lupisohu
This review may contain spoilers
A good story with a bad focus
This has a good story but a lot of time is wasted on irrelevant events or irrelevant characters leading to less time for actually interesting characters(mainly ML and FL) and character development moments. That's the gist of my whole review, but if you want to know more read on.
Story: The premise is good but the execution is bad. That is to say, the baseline story of a rich spoiled princess turning over a new leaf due to interactions with a crude, blunt and down to earth man and then turning over a new leaf, is actually quite a good premise. This premise offers a lot of room for character development, lot of opportunities for actors to tap into their acting prowess and lot of areas for writer or director to include some heavy emotional scenes. But, sadly, what we get is severely lacking and nothing close to the possibility.
9/10 for premise but the story we got was nowhere near, so 7/10 for story.
Direction: I found it lacking in a lot of areas. Too much time is wasted on side characters and the events that should have taken more of episode time are rushed instead. Pacing is not the issues, proper management of screentime is the issue. Music is good but badly placed. Just playing a song in background doesn't create the ambiance. To create a specific atmosphere you have to play the right part of the song at the right time with a right pace, a lot of other KDramas are a good example of that. The drama seems to also struggle on whether is a melodrama or not. Its the duty of direction to realize the potential of a story, but sadly that's not the case here.
Direction gets a 3/10.
Production: Not lacking but nothing extraordinary too. I found costumes lacking at some place.FL's wardrobe was good but ML's wardrobe could have been better, it definitely was in Secret Garden. Cinematography is decent, they could have used more locations though. In this type of story, tbh, production's relevancy is very less.
7/10 for production.
Acting: I started this because of YSH but, tbh, his acting was erratic in this one, sometimes off by miles and sometimes quite on point. YEH on the other hand acted quite good and carried this. I loved her portrayal of a rich spoiled heiress. Her transformation into a confident and caring person was also quite good. That's not saying that YEH's acting was perfect, I still spotted minor mishaps here and there, but most of them were not noteworthy. My biggest problem though was chemistry between ML and FL. As other reviewers have pointed out too, chemistry between ML and FL felt lacking, and that's not a skinship problem but the actual chemistry was lacking. I don't know if that's due to bad direction or acting.
6.5/10 for acting.
Characterization and Character Development: This is the area where this series should have excelled and it does but not without some problems. The story presents a great chance for character development spread throughout the 16 episodes, but, sadly, character development only happens in a select few episodes where if you have completely missed the other episode, you would have missed nothing. Characterization also falters at points where a character's decision or slowness will annoy you a bit. I would say direction failed the story massively in this area. Still, due to good base storyline and decent acting this area is still satisfying to watch.
8/10 for Characterization and Character Development
Music: As I said before too, OST is decently good but badly placed. Also there's not much variation in OST.
6/10 for Music.
I started watching this for the story and ML (YSH). I continued watching this for FL (YEH) and character development.
Overall its a decent watch, sad part is, it could have been much much better.
Final rating, 6.5/10
Story: The premise is good but the execution is bad. That is to say, the baseline story of a rich spoiled princess turning over a new leaf due to interactions with a crude, blunt and down to earth man and then turning over a new leaf, is actually quite a good premise. This premise offers a lot of room for character development, lot of opportunities for actors to tap into their acting prowess and lot of areas for writer or director to include some heavy emotional scenes. But, sadly, what we get is severely lacking and nothing close to the possibility.
9/10 for premise but the story we got was nowhere near, so 7/10 for story.
Direction: I found it lacking in a lot of areas. Too much time is wasted on side characters and the events that should have taken more of episode time are rushed instead. Pacing is not the issues, proper management of screentime is the issue. Music is good but badly placed. Just playing a song in background doesn't create the ambiance. To create a specific atmosphere you have to play the right part of the song at the right time with a right pace, a lot of other KDramas are a good example of that. The drama seems to also struggle on whether is a melodrama or not. Its the duty of direction to realize the potential of a story, but sadly that's not the case here.
Direction gets a 3/10.
Production: Not lacking but nothing extraordinary too. I found costumes lacking at some place.FL's wardrobe was good but ML's wardrobe could have been better, it definitely was in Secret Garden. Cinematography is decent, they could have used more locations though. In this type of story, tbh, production's relevancy is very less.
7/10 for production.
Acting: I started this because of YSH but, tbh, his acting was erratic in this one, sometimes off by miles and sometimes quite on point. YEH on the other hand acted quite good and carried this. I loved her portrayal of a rich spoiled heiress. Her transformation into a confident and caring person was also quite good. That's not saying that YEH's acting was perfect, I still spotted minor mishaps here and there, but most of them were not noteworthy. My biggest problem though was chemistry between ML and FL. As other reviewers have pointed out too, chemistry between ML and FL felt lacking, and that's not a skinship problem but the actual chemistry was lacking. I don't know if that's due to bad direction or acting.
6.5/10 for acting.
Characterization and Character Development: This is the area where this series should have excelled and it does but not without some problems. The story presents a great chance for character development spread throughout the 16 episodes, but, sadly, character development only happens in a select few episodes where if you have completely missed the other episode, you would have missed nothing. Characterization also falters at points where a character's decision or slowness will annoy you a bit. I would say direction failed the story massively in this area. Still, due to good base storyline and decent acting this area is still satisfying to watch.
8/10 for Characterization and Character Development
Music: As I said before too, OST is decently good but badly placed. Also there's not much variation in OST.
6/10 for Music.
I started watching this for the story and ML (YSH). I continued watching this for FL (YEH) and character development.
Overall its a decent watch, sad part is, it could have been much much better.
Final rating, 6.5/10
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