Repetitive main story and underdeveloped side stories

No Spoilers Until Warning

Overall I thought that most of the stories were interesting and did a good job of showcasing common problems in marriages. However, the stories left something to be desired in terms of the endings. Most of the stories aren't resolved until literally the last ten minutes of the show and even then it's just brief conversations that hint at what happened. For some of the stories it's just a bit annoying and feels like it wasn't fleshed out, but a couple stories don't really get resolved. I get that it's a short drama, but it would have been nice if they cut back on drawing out the main story and instead left a few minutes for resolution of some of the more ambiguous endings.

MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD!!!

Now I'll go ahead and break down the summaries and my thoughts by story.

The Fishbowl Wife:
This is the main story of the show, starting in episode one and continuing throughout the show. The husband is basically pure garbage; he cheats repeatedly, he hits her, he's extremely controlling, and she is living in fear. The explanation of his actions at the end took very little responsibility saying he did everything because he truly loved her and was afraid she'd leave him, so he kept testing her to be certain that no matter what he did, she would never leave. It also really annoyed me that the mistress said that the salon closing was because of the wife leaving and that the wife ends up helping to rebuild that salon instead of only building her own.
Her relationship with the goldfish store owner was also a bit repetitive. They just kept deciding to be together and then something would come up and they would be tested and separate and then eventually come together. First it was her husband and them feeling like she couldn't just leave that life forever so there's tension and then she decides to stay. Then his father says that she could ruin the company reputation and she leaves "for his sake" (even though the only person she was really helping was the father). She feels like she will only bring him trouble and he feels he has no right to date her because she kinda lost her career because of him so she runs away until he eventually comes for her exactly at the moment when her husband is trying to rape her. And then she comes back with him and stays while she's trying to get a divorce only to leave right after her divorce goes through so she can help her ex rebuild the salon. Then it's implied that they meet each other again at the fireworks two years later. I didn't get why they had to have the "break up for years and finally meet again" cliche but I guess they wanted her to figure herself out before they were together instead of growing together.

The Outsourcing Wife:
This was one of my least favorite because of the lack of conclusion. Basically, her husband doesn't want to have a kid yet (and maybe doesn't want to have sex with her at all, but unclear), but she does and feels like him not having sex with her to make a baby means he's no longer turned on by her. Again, it is not clear if she is right about this because he only rejects her advances twice. The first time she says she wants a baby and he says that they aren't ready financially and the second time he is already trying to sleep in bed and she gets on top of him and he says he's not in the mood and that they should just go to sleep. She gets bored and meets up with her ex who then forces her against a pillar and kisses her and then she pushes him away. He says that if she was irritated by him forcing himself onto her, then that means she is still turned on by him (like what?). After her husband rejects her for the second time and then a feng shui consultant touches her crotch and tells her that once soulmates touch their bodies don't want to be apart, she decides to sleep with her ex. She says it's a one time thing and she just wanted to make sure that someone was still turned on by her, but then he tells her he wanted to buy her a goldfish and that he loves her and they walk off together holding hands. And that's the end of their story until two years later she tells her friend she is pregnant but doesn't know who the father is (implying that her husband still wanted to and did sleep with her but that she's also still sleeping with her ex). So not really any resolution there. She was cheating with her ex and she still is.

The Lunchbox Wife:
This couple wanted to have a baby, but the husband isn't turned on by his wife anymore. But he does get aroused when she is with another man, so he gets a guy from the office to hold her hand and try to kiss her even though she is clearly uncomfortable with the situation. The office guy seems to really be into her and asks if she's okay with everything and then he says her name lovingly and then the husband cuts in and drags her off to the bedroom and tells office guy to leave. The feng shui lady says that the wife is a people pleaser who is restrained by her husband and that she should try to be more free. The next time, the wife seems to be aroused by how much office guy likes her cooking and they both get into it a bit until they're about to kiss and the husband drags her off again and the office guy hears them having sex. The next day office guy calls in sick, so the wife takes a bento to his apartment. He tells her that he won't come over anymore because he and the husband had hurt her feelings and she says it's for the best because she gets turned on by him enjoying her food. They look at each other for a second and then she runs over and they have sex. And again no resolution in this episode. In the two years later clip in the last few minutes of the drama, they show office guy eating a nice bento and the husband eating convenience store jelly bread implying that she left him for the office guy.

The Chaperone Wife:
The husband in this couple is shown a few times in other episodes trying desperately to secure a business deal with the garbage husband from the main story so he can make more money. His wife always stays inside and doesn't have any friends and drinks alone. Through flashbacks they show that she got him into running when they first got together. Then he got them the expensive condo for the nice view even though she didn't seem to care much about it. Then he tells her to quit her job and be a stay-at-home wife and he keeps cutting her off and the leaves for a meeting when she tries to say she doesn't want to. Then one day they're running and she's not feeling well and he tells her to go back home and he'll just finish the run without her which shows that she feels he is literally and figuratively leaving her behind. After that he is always working late and trying to make enough money to afford the nice condo when all she wanted was to spend time with him. She is miserable all alone and doesn't make friends with the other tower wives because they're mostly all elitist and live very lavish lives that she can't relate to. The husband tells her that she should come on a run with him because it would be good for her to get out. She wants to go but says no because he's telling her to come like it was something they would be doing for her sake and not something they would enjoy together. She storms out and is comforted by garbage husband who says that it's hard when you can't connect to your partner. Feng shui lady listens to her say that everything has gone wrong since they came to the condo and tells her that to change her feng shui she needs to run, no matter where. So she runs to garbage husband at which point I was ready to slam my fist into my table. As he's kissing her body, she has a slightly uncomfortable look and then her phone rings. Her husband got advice from another married runner that he should run with her at her pace and support her to see what he was missing. So he tells her that he's sorry and he's literally running back to Tokyo for her and then his phone dies. So then she runs towards him and then when she sees him, she apologizes to him for everything and not communicating (which annoyed me a bit because after all that he just says I'm sorry too and they hug). Two years later it shows them running together and when she stops to tie her shoe, he waits and then they keep running together.

The Headache Wife:
This story went on for two episodes because the writers thought they were being clever and that they'd have a huge plot twist in the second part that completely changes everything, but I guessed in the first five minutes of seeing them together that they were married and she couldn't remember him because she blocked him out after he cheated and she kicked him out. Every episode she was in before this she would be in a conversation and infidelity would come up and she would get a headache. Half of her personality was just yelling that infidelity was wrong and holding her fingers to her temple. I was just waiting for an episode and a half for them to reveal their real relationship. But I guess for anyone who couldn't figure that out it would just be an okay two episodes watching her be tortured by her views on infidelity but feeling extremely drawn to this random man she happened to meet at the river. So she starts sleeping with him at his new apartment and her son realizes this and tries to force her to remember by saying he knows her secret. Instead, she has a massive headache and is too weak to move for a night, so she decides to end it with him. But then she sees a picture of the three of them together with goldfish which leads her to the goldfish shop where her husband also happens to be. He apologizes for cheating and lying when they met again but he really wanted to be with her. They seem to reconnect and two years later they are living together again at his new apartment and not in the condo tower.

The Renovation Wife:
This one is another without closure. In this episode we see the reappearance of one of garbage husband's mistresses. Turns out she was married to a guy who never listens to her and always favors his MIL (mother-in-law). She copes with his inattentiveness by cheating. They're building a house together for them, their two kids, and the MIL and whatever the MIL says goes. The wife connects with a construction worker after MIL says that the bruise on his forehead is off-putting because the wife actually has a similar bruise that she's been covering for years with makeup. Then the husband walks in on her removing the makeup before bed and ask if she could start keeping it on whenever MIL is around when they all live together. She is upset but says okay as long as they can add another bathroom for her to remove and apply makeup and the husband says that it makes sense and agrees. She is happy that she'll have that one room where she can be herself, but when the MIL sees it on the plans she asks if she has any problem sharing a bathroom with her and she says she doesn't. The mama's boy obviously says nothing in her defense, so the MIL removes the bathroom from the plans so they don't waste money. She leaves saying she needs to get groceries and the worker follows her out. They have sex and then she comes back and tells her husband she's fine without the bathroom. That's all for the episode and then two years later she's still married to him and also still cheating.

Final Thoughts:
In my opinion, cheating is one of the worst things you can do in a relationship. I think that if your relationship is broken enough that you cheat, then you should just end the relationship. However, I understand that it isn't that simple for a lot of married women, especially in Asia. I'm not saying that I support the actions of all of these women, but I think that this drama did well in showing that there can be some gray areas where cheating seems like the only escape from marital problems. Again, I don't support infidelity, but in a few of these cases I can see why it came to that. Overall though, the drama didn't flesh out all of the stories and the main story seemed to be written by figuring out how many ways they could be split them apart and then bring them back together. It may have only been a few times, but in an eight episode drama with only forty minute episodes, it seemed like that's all they were doing.

Read More

Standard enemies to lovers movie, but with some open conversation about sex

This movie is like a standard version of the trope mentioned above but there were some sweet scenes and cute moments. It's not super creative in terms of plot aside from the doctors using their medical expertise to insult each other. There's some signature Kdrama elements like parental pressure to get married, a distant parental figure, and a past trauma that needs to be overcome. It does touch on some sexual topics not usually explored like some reasons men may feel unconfident in their ability to perform and women feeling the need to be "tighter" to prevent men from cheating. Because of this, it seems like they knew they'd lose the more conservative viewers, so they decided to go completely in the opposite direction added in some softcore scenes that don't really serve any purpose in the movie other than to show off Ha Joo Hee's body. I was hesitant to mention that in the only review on this movie in case people only watch it for that reason, but it did come out a while ago and a lot of people probably already know. And I think that if people end up watch the whole movie even if just for that reason, they may end up becoming more educated and aware of some of the stigmas related to sex.

Read More

Another average webdrama with mediocre characters

No Spoilers Until Warning

The drama is centered around a girl and her high school friends, including that one classic transfer student that somehow knows all about her.

MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD!!!

Her friend group obviously has one guy that likes her, an exhausted idol trainee who's not around much because she's always training, a constantly arguing couple, and then the new girl who she opened up to when they attended the same summer academy and knows all about her forbidden feelings and past bullying.

The ending fell flat for me because all the new girl did was tell an old friend to cut out someone who she was told was 100% flirting with her boyfriend. And then she felt guilty about it because she knew how much the main girl suffered so she wanted to tell her when she was ready. But then the main girl sees something and assumes she knows the whole story (which seems to be a trend in the drama). And then when she finds out the truth of what happened, she graciously ends a bullying situation that she inadvertently started anyway but also blames the victim for not defending herself as if everyone hadn't already decided what they wanted to believe. And after the new girl apologizes she still doesn't talk to her for the rest of the year, but she benevolently allows their mutual friends to keep hanging out with her.

Until episode 10 I thought this would be a 7 because it was an okay webdrama, but then the main girl's overreaction and outburst in front of everyone made the new girl an outcast and the friends were all telling her she did nothing wrong because everything she said was true (even though it lacked context). It bugged me that all the friends were okay cutting out the new girl who had no other friends without asking for her side. And even after the misunderstanding was resolved they didn't hang out with her again until the main girl told them they could. It was clear that she partly blamed the new girl for the bullying she went through even though she knew nothing about it.

Read More

Poor time management didn't allow for much of a plot to form

No Spoilers Until Warning

Before I go into the actual review, let me just say that I really hate the flashes of important quotes at the beginning of each episode. They're already super short episodes and if you listen to those quotes you know exactly what'll happen in each one. If you do want to actually watch the show, I recommend skipping the first 9 seconds of each episode. Honestly though, if you don't want to spend 36 minutes on this, then you should only watch the first 9 seconds and you'll be able to figure out pretty much the whole story. Honestly, I feel like a 5 is generous but I don't want to be too hard on a show that only had so much time to work with.

Now aside from that poor editorial decision, I feel like PlayList Global is pretty hit or miss for me. On one hand you have great shows like W.H.Y., XX, and Ending Again but on the other hand you have web dramas like this. This one was only 36 minutes in total, but it didn't make good use of its time. You can definitely make a sweet or emotional short with 36 minutes and then break it up into parts, but this show told the story from multiple perspectives and points in time causing some overlap in story.

MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD!!!

Complete Plot Breakdown:
The whole first episode seemed like a comedic filler flashback that just conveyed attraction without any plot development. Then there's one relevant present-day scene at the end that you don't realize is relevant until the end of episode 3.
The second episode is a typical high school couple backstory. One likes the other at first sight and doesn't hide it, then the other starts to like them back, then a misunderstanding splits them apart, then it gets resolved, and then they get together.
The third episode starts with a relationship montage to bring us back to the present and then a hostile conversation between the girlfriend and childhood friend establishing a love triangle. Then it ends with a scene that has a clue from the first episode that tells you exactly what's going to happen in the last episode.
The last episode is a predictable argument because of a distant boyfriend, followed by the girlfriend feeling bad and catching him in a lie on her way to apologize. The episode ends exactly as I expected with not much resolution.

The show used the first two episodes to convince you it would go one way and then the third episode convincing you it could go another way with an ending scene confirming how it ends. The last episode could've sped through the argument and shown the climax to allow time for some resolution, but instead it took it's time and the only scene after the climax was a quick flashback to a high school conversation about where they thought they'd be in 10 years.

I didn't realize how dumb the plot was until I thought about it for a bit. A guy has a female friend for several years who likes him, but he doesn't see the same way. Then he sees a girl singing and it's love at first sight. He tries finding her with no luck until she transfers to his school, and he's convinced it's destiny. Then his jealous friend relentlessly bullies the new girl and tries keep them apart, but eventually they get together. The guy stays friends with the bully and dates the new girl for 10 years. Then he starts to like the bully friend and dumps his girlfriend of 10 years. And that's the whole plot.

If you actually read this far and aren't completely turned off yet, then I actually recommend watching it. I did go over the entire plot but if you care more about the journey than the destination, then you should take a half hour and just watch it for the experience.

Read More

Great story idea, flawed execution

No Spoilers Until Warning

You may be confused that I gave the story and acting 8's but the drama itself only a 6. This is because the story that I had full context for by the end was great, but the way it was shown seemed a bit messy.

Let me start by saying that I loved the first 45 minutes of this special. The plot was great throughout the special, but towards the end it definitely seemed like things were rushed. The flow of the story telling isn't always chronological which is usually fine, but in this case there are definitely some spots where the ordering of the story showed you some things without full context and then give more context later. And then in the last 5 minutes, they give more context for scenes throughout the whole special in the form of a reminiscing montage. I personally thought that if that montage scenes had been spread out throughout the special or at least shown earlier it would've given a lot more context for why people acted or felt a certain way.

MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD!!!

There are also some parts that just don't seem super fleshed out. In the first few minutes, they have a montage of the two main characters being friends throughout their childhood talking through their windows. At one point the guy is drying his hair in the window either shirtless or naked and then she sees him, screams, throws a stuffed toy at him, and then slams her window shut. And then they both seem annoyed at each other and don't speak again for years... until the first scene where her bike breaks and she flies a bit and then lands in his arms. It seemed a bit lazy to not clearly explain why they hadn't talked for years. But then they pick up right where they left off as super close friends. And then later on there's a single side plot that has basically no resolution and then they loosely tie it into the main plot. They show a flash of a quote from the side plot when the girl walks away in the climax, but they don't give you context for why the quote is relevant until a bit later so it's a bit confusing when you see it.

Speaking of the climax, it was my main issue with the special. I have no issue with what happened because it seemed very realistic. However, it seemed very rushed and also not fleshed out. Starting from the climax until the ending scene, every clip is cut up into short bursts of dialogue without super clear transitions. They don't have a continuous coherent conversation, but rather it shows pieces of a conversation as they go to school one day. And showing shots of leaves, trees, and grass also isn't a super precise way to convey how much time has passed so towards the end you kinda just have to infer from what the characters say.

All in all, I really appreciate the storyline and the overall plot, but the way it was presented kinda took a lot away from my appreciation of it as a whole. I feel like it could have been a completely different experience with a few different editing choices, a few extra scenes for more explanation and resolution, a more continuous climax, and just a tiny subtitle before the last few scenes saying exactly how much time had passed. With those changes I could see it being an 8 or 9 but given the director and writer's choices, I personally see it as a 6.

Read More

Not much of a plot and no compelling romance

The older brother was kinda just a typical sad and pathetic guy who could never really communicate his feelings. The younger brother was a cocky playboy who never connected emotionally with women. Of the two, the older brother was a more likeable character, but the movie decided to explore the younger brother more and he's exactly what you expect: flirty and horny.

At the beginning I thought that the older brother was the main character. Then 35 minutes in, they go back and tell the story from the younger brother's point of view and then they meet back when the brothers finish a conversation from the older brother's story. They continue telling the story from the younger brother's point of view with a few scenes of the older brother mixed in. It seemed like the writer had a story in mind that involved both brothers but for some reason didn't want the older brother to be the main character. So instead of telling the story chronologically, they started with all the buildup of the older brother's story and got it out of the way and then cut to the younger brother and told his story start to finish with a few climax and resolution scenes mixed in for the older brother.

I initially thought that if the story had been told chronologically then it would have been better, but either way the focus would be on the younger brother who isn't a very interesting character. I think that the older brother's story is around a 6 and the younger brother's is about a 4 and when you combine them together the way this movie did, you get a low 5. The ending was okay; it wasn't great, but it wasn't that bad.

Read More