monstersnroses
This review may contain spoilers
Great beginning slowly marches toward a predictable and unsatisfying ending.
Starts off with great chemistry and plenty of swashbuckling and sexy scenes peppered here and there. All leads are very good in their roles.
However this director/ screenplay has a hard time balancing the plot with the sense of romance and excitement. As the plot progresses and becomes more involved, the leads gradually lose their spark, and you kind of start to wonder why theyre going through all the trouble.
FL, while pretty and charming, is -imo- not quite right for the part. She is supposed to be a proud, dignified, and vengeful person. But the way this actress portrays it comes off too harsh and awkward and I found several of her "strong proud woman" scenes to be nauseating and tedious. However, she's not THAT bad. She was decent.
Now, the SML / SFL couple is where you will really emotionally invest. Right away you'd notice that they violate the c-drama rules for a happy ending, so logic would tell you from the start that theyre doomed and won't live. And indeed they don't. But it wont stop you from emotionally investing. Therefore by the time they died, I no longer cared about what happened to the main couple. The second couple is funnier, sweeter, more exciting, and WAYYYY sexier.
The plot was involved, but not very gripping. The villain is unpleasant and gets too much screentime. Main couple gets very little screentime together through the middle/end of the story.
It doesn't feel like a happy ending, although technically you could get away with calling it one.
The whole thing lacks a firm artistic vision, and often seems like just a hodgepodge of scenes tromping blindly ahead through the prescribed plotlines, to the point that finishing some episodes felt like a chore. The director on some level knows this, and attempts to use the ost to pump up the emotional amperage of what is basically a somewhat flat story. Which just makes the ost sound aggressive and intrusive.
In this case, it was the 4 lead actors who had to hold this crappy story up, and they do a very good job of it, but they cant rescue the drama from its phoned-in direction, muddled script, and letdown ending.
However this director/ screenplay has a hard time balancing the plot with the sense of romance and excitement. As the plot progresses and becomes more involved, the leads gradually lose their spark, and you kind of start to wonder why theyre going through all the trouble.
FL, while pretty and charming, is -imo- not quite right for the part. She is supposed to be a proud, dignified, and vengeful person. But the way this actress portrays it comes off too harsh and awkward and I found several of her "strong proud woman" scenes to be nauseating and tedious. However, she's not THAT bad. She was decent.
Now, the SML / SFL couple is where you will really emotionally invest. Right away you'd notice that they violate the c-drama rules for a happy ending, so logic would tell you from the start that theyre doomed and won't live. And indeed they don't. But it wont stop you from emotionally investing. Therefore by the time they died, I no longer cared about what happened to the main couple. The second couple is funnier, sweeter, more exciting, and WAYYYY sexier.
The plot was involved, but not very gripping. The villain is unpleasant and gets too much screentime. Main couple gets very little screentime together through the middle/end of the story.
It doesn't feel like a happy ending, although technically you could get away with calling it one.
The whole thing lacks a firm artistic vision, and often seems like just a hodgepodge of scenes tromping blindly ahead through the prescribed plotlines, to the point that finishing some episodes felt like a chore. The director on some level knows this, and attempts to use the ost to pump up the emotional amperage of what is basically a somewhat flat story. Which just makes the ost sound aggressive and intrusive.
In this case, it was the 4 lead actors who had to hold this crappy story up, and they do a very good job of it, but they cant rescue the drama from its phoned-in direction, muddled script, and letdown ending.
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