Kim Soohyun and Kim Jiwon are the real definition of powerhouses of acting

Didn't really believe in "less is more" until the last two episodes of this drama because what the hell? I'm thinking the writers had some sort of animosity towards Baek Hyunwoo because why was bro hit by a high speed car and then shot in the back all in the span of a couple hours?
All that aside, I can understand why this drama blew up, because god were Kim Soohyun and Kim Jiwon absolutely AMAZING in it. I was genuinely blown away by their performances. I knew Kim Jiwon had it in her after watching her as Choi Aera in Fight For My Way, but she still surprised me. I just wish the stylists did more with her beautiful hair instead of giving us the straight blowout every time but oh well.
I think award shows should now introduce a best hug category because man those hugs that Hyunwoo and Haein shared were truly sensational. I will always think about the ones they shared on the steps of Berlin Cathedral and the church before Haien's surgery.
Besides that, I was planning to give this show full stars before the last half, when the villians started to seem very cartoonish with no real depth to their evil motives, and Hyunwoo and Haein never had a real conversation about why they fell apart in the first place, and they just started dating again when it would have been more enjoyable to see them fall for each other again. I understand that the thriller aspect of this show was just a subgenre, but if you're going to include it in your story, you should do it well. Seeing as this was directed by the director of Vincenzo, I had high hopes for it all, and while it was doing pretty good in the beginning, it fell through soon after because of how unrealistic it was getting.
I also enjoyed the representation of family in this drama. The character development that the Hong family went though was very nice to witness, but Hyunwoo's family was just so exceptional.

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I lost sleep thinking about how bad this drama turned out to be

I feel tricked. I was SO hyped for this drama. I love me some friends to lovers action, and the fact that we were getting Jung So Min and Jung Hae In as the faces for it this time? I was SOLD. Besides them, the cast was packed, and it was perfect. There was so much potential, and the first couple of episodes seemed to be fulfilling it, until they weren't.

The fault lies in this being marketed as a romcom. It was NOT a romcom. I could count on my fingers the number of comedic scenes we got, but only if they are memorable enough, which they are not. You would think, well, even if the comedic aspect of it flopped, we still have the romance, right? We don't. The romance was worse than the comedy. So forced, so uninspiring, so bland. By the time we actually got to the romance after all those intense storylines -- that we did not ask for -- were done and dealt with, I did not care. If I did, I would have loved every second of the abundant amount of fluff we got in the remaining six episodes; instead, I wanted to just fast forward through the whole thing.

The biggest reason why was the lack of good development. The writer was so honed in on making the sad storylines impactful, she spent little to no time on gradually building up the romance. I genuinely felt like the leads were picked up and dropped into a relationship, and I was expected to immediately be invested in them. That is NOT how it works. You're supposed to make me root for the characters to get together. Give me some angst, some tension, those little cute moments when the leads know they like each other but haven't confessed yet, like those furtive yet admiring glances cast at the other when he/she isn't looking, accidental occurrences of physical touch that leaves them flustered, etc. You have so much source material to work with, and what do you give us? Nothing.

The second leads' romantic storyline seemed much promising in comparison, but they ruined that too. Mo Eum's strange obsession with being Yeon Du's mom was so weird. When she confessed to Dan Ho, the first words out of her mouth were, "I wish I could be Yeon Du's mom." Then, when they did start dating, and it's time to break the news to said girl, what are Mo Eum's first words? "Can you give me the chance to become your mom?" I bet you a hundred bucks that if the roles were reversed, and it was a man insisting on being the female love interest's daughter's father, it would raise several eyebrows. By the end of this drama, I was convinced she was dating Dan Ho to be with that little girl, because they shared none of the physical intimacy that would indicate they were in an actual relationship. It was drier than the Atacama Desert.

I could spare a couple more paragraphs for how unfulfilling the romance was, but I'll end it with what I once never thought I would say: Seok Ryu and Seung Hyo should have stayed friends. They were way more bearable together when they were at each other's throats all the time.

A couple other things I dislike were Mi Suk, which most of the viewers agree with; Hye Suk and her husband's reconciliation and subsequent honeymoon phase (was that vow renewal ceremony necessary?); characters making up with each other only after the other was on the brink of death, which is such lazy writing; storylines unfolding in a non-linear manner, which kept the confusion and questions going for several episodes, to the point of it being infuriating as hell; the friends never bothering to figure out WHY Seok Ryu left America and broke her engagement in the beginning and whether she was okay, just for the sake of dragging out the story even more; Seung Hyo's ex being such a blatant plot device instead of a subtle one.

Some things I liked, I guess, to balance it out:

- Seung Hyo and Seok Ryu's first kiss. It was beautiful and sweet. I almost cried during it.
- Seok Ryu pointing out the double standards between her and her brother, which I really related to as an older sister. Every time Seok Ryu confronted her mom about how unfair she was to her hit hard.
- The Lavender sisters. I genuinely enjoyed all of their scenes. Their chemistry was amazing.
- Scenes where most of the cast was together, like Geum sik's last night at his restaurant, or Seok Ryu's belated welcome home party that Seung Hyo planned and them going home together and joking around afterwards, etc. The actors and their chemistry with each other was the saving grace for this drama, because the story was hellbent on being bad.
- Seung Hyo and Seok Ryu's banter in the earlier episodes. I enjoyed every second of it. At least the friends aspect of the friends to lovers trope was done well.
- Seok Ryu and Seung Hyo as kids. The child actors were PHENOMENAL, especially the girl who played Seok Ryu. They were so adorable.
- In the earlier episodes, Seung Hyo showing up whenever Seok Ryu called even though he said he wouldn't come, or following her around while pretending it was the greatest inconvenience ever.
- Whoever styled Jung So Min for this show deserves a raise. Her outfits were ALWAYS so good, and the one thing that I really admired was Seok Ryu sporting different hairstyles at times instead of the same straight blowout, which imo takes away from the realism of the drama.

There are a lot of other minor and major details that I absolutely loved. It's just sad that the story being so inadequate in quality dimmed its luster. All in all, I don't think I'll rewatch the drama; maybe I'll just revisit Seung Hyo and Seok Ryu's scenes from the first couple of episodes to feel some of that excitement that was so palpable when the drama first started airing.

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