The game of light, colours, and nature was just brilliant, with a nostalgic note, beautiful sceneries from Norway, and melodic pieces of classical music and piano to paint the perfect picture of an idyllic and tranquil picture. The pace of the drama was equally perfect for the cinematography, as it was calm, with nice notes of drama here and there.
The performances were excellent from all the actors and actresses in the cast as well.
However, the story was messy and confusing. The script offered little to non information about the cryptic gadget that used a person's voice and character to communicate with the loved ones once that person has passed away. The characters were equally mysterious as well, with some background stories coming through from the flashbacks that the drama offered, but, overall, it was difficult to understand them, know them, and, thus, sympathize with them. The message that, I guess, the drama wanted to pass on, that there is some comfort after a loved one dies, was beautiful. However, the romance was boring, as the characters seemed wrapped up in their past and didn't really invest in the relationship.
So, overall, five out of ten.
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1Remarkable drama
I can honestly say this is one of the most powerful, well written poignant dramas i have ever watched on Asian or british websites. I binge watched the complete series and it was the quickest 4 hours of my life.the young actors were just jaw-droppingly good, the music was perfection and for the first time ever watching an Asian drama i am going to read the webtoon this drama was based upon.I cannot praise this piece of work highly enough, the storyline fast fast paced, my attention didn’t waver for a single moment, i am just awestruck at the quality of the acting, the writing, the music, i just hope everyone “gets it” the way i did.
You have a rare treat in store my fellow viewers
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Somewhat boring love story between two really good looking people
I must be in the minority here because I didn't find this a very good drama. Yes it is watchable because the sets, the people, the clothes are all very beautiful, but the story itself is so boring. Nothing really happens in the plot that makes you want to stay up to watch the next episode. The acting is ok. Nothing too impressive but not bad either. Both leads suit their roles well and they do look really good together. Such a beautiful pairing but I personally didn't feel the chemistry was that strong with them. Dilraba seems to have better chemistry with Gao Wei Guang and Zhang Bin Bin. The aerospace and gaming plots didn't really catch my interest either.If you're looking for a fluffy love story with two very good looking leads, or are into gaming then this might be for you!
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Three genres are featured prominently in this drama: action, drama, romance. None were explored to their full potential. Plus, where the cliches of one genre were challenged, they ran amok in others.
The action scenes were well choreographed and exciting to watch, but were often pulled up short and were too far in between to have full effect. Just when my adrenaline started to flow and I'm about ready to forgive less involving aspects of the show, they were over.
Which brings me to the weakest, but most prominent, link ... the drama. I spent a good portion of this show, from ca ep 6 to at least the 3rd quarter of ep 14, being bored. These episodes were mostly dedicated to the back story of the parents, for which I never developed an interest. I never became invested in any of these characters enough to care about their story. I cared about the characters in the present and wanted more of the focus on their individual & common journeys, independent of what happened to their parents in the past. There's a reason why they urge you to keep flashbacks as a driver of story to a bare minimum in screenwriting 101. Flashbacks are intrusive and passive, and should only be used as a function of character (for eg, recalling a memory), not story. An entire story hinged on flashback yanks us out of the present action and keeps the plot from moving forward, which is exactly what happened in Healer (and many other K-dramas. Why some Korean writers can't seem to grasp this very basic rule of screenwriting, I don't know.).
What's more, characters were inexplicably killed off or shipped off when they no longer suited the writer's purpose. This was glaringly obvious. There was no cohesion in how one plot line flowed into the other. Just '(s)he is getting in the way of where I want to take this story so bang! you're dead!' When the sex scandal case concluded, I was like 'Wait, what just happened? That's it?!!' And have you ever noticed how women in K-dramas are *never* killed off? No matter who they are or what situation they find themselves in. Oh, the men are fair game, but the women always manage to escape with their lives. ::eyeroll:: ... because this is such a cliche of the genre.
Finally the romance, it was nice. I agree with other viewers who commended the absence of the usual unpalatable cliches as well as the relatively good characterisations. I really applaud this evolution the romance genre seems to be having in recent K-dramas. They're finally starting to acknowledge their characters as sexual beings, rather than strip them bare of human desire. My only complaint? People will make bold statements ... about kissing, holding one another, making love and what have you, but words aren't followed up enough with actions. It's all just big talk. There's still that air of fakeness and lack of emotional depth in romantic relations. That lack of natural, comfortable, spontaneous intimacy (one drama which came close to what I'm looking for is It's Okay, That's Love). Oh there were some fine moments, by all means, but they often felt ... stilted. Staged. Contrived. Awkward. And even if this were only a minor complaint (it's not, not for me), the romance itself took off too late, almost in the last quarter of the drama, and stayed around for exactly two episodes and change, before focus was returned to less involving narrative arcs. Romance has always been a 'back-up' genre for me. When all else fails, it tends to keep me going, until hopefully things pick up again in other departments. That didn't happen here. Basically, every aspect of the drama that could've and should've kept my interest, short-circuited. There's no doubt the romance was cute, there's no doubt the characters had chemistry, but it wasn't executed to satisfaction.
A more worthy drama to me is Nine, in which the same combination of genres were better executed. I can't remember being bored watching Nine. I was on full alert, wondering what would happen next, how will the characters react? The plot wasn't without its holes, but the pacing maintained its momentum almost from beginning to end. The romance was evenly spread, so that when it wasn't being featured I didn't miss it, but just when you started to crave it, it appeared. I was able to enjoy Nine in spite of its faults whilst Healer became untenable because of them.
In closing, I would be remiss not to mention the 'villains' (with the exception of Secretary Oh). I've never seen a more pathetic lot. All these imbeciles knew to do was snare. Imagine a whole barrage of goons not able to break down a door being blocked by one man ... and other absurdities. In terms of moronic villains, Healer could be Cruel City's cousin, the drama in which a pair of slight 100 lbs women in 6 inch heels, who couldn't fight, outran & outfought seasoned criminals. To say these bumbling idiots were cartoonish would be an understatement. And as per usual dramas give the South Korean police a very bad name. If I were a police officer watching this show I would be offended. Neither one nor the other presented any real threat or challenge to the good guys, which only served to discredit whatever battles they won against the Farmer and his farmhands. It's really hard to suspend belief when they make it sooo easy for the good guys to win.
By the time Healer drew to a close I didn't even care that the ending was rushed, because the show had already gone downhill for me long before that.
There were things I DID like: the score and the soundtrack. The characters and the acting. Yoo Ji Tæ can do no wrong for me, an incredibly charismatic actor. I didn't think Park Min Young was that bad. Ji Chang Wook is one to watch. And I liked the mild-mannered, unassuming, but creepy Secretary Oh. That little smirk of his, with his hand raised to his mouth. It was a nice flair. I appreciate these little quirks and habits that make a character stand out. And it was rather effective too. I wouldn't want to be trapped alone in a room with that guy. So kudos to the actor.
While I liked these things, if sloppy storytelling keeps pulling me out of the narrative and have me asking too many questions, instead of sucking me in with the action and the drama and the romance, then something is wrong. Healer, in some ways, is quite different from the average K-drama, but in other ways it's all pretty much the same.
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On a more positive note, the performances were good and the bookish refrences nicely done. The side characters' stories were interesting as well. So, 6 out of 10, because I loved the first part, but the second one was boring.
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so much male ass so little everything else
i didn't know we were allowed to make entirely new shows and release them like its the season 2 of a well-established show. where the FUCK was song kang. they think that they could just show his ass for a little bit and i wouldn't realize that the MAIN CHARACTER was GONE for like a long ass time?? i do need to talk about how the writers were so fucking horny for song kang tho like. that lab monster fight was real fetish content. why is this strong milky smooth FULLY NAKED BARE ASS MAN being slow motion drenched in blood full-on carrie style. like sloppy dirty blood bathed glittering red breasts of a man. they didn't need to have him naked there like its soooo extremely harder to choreograph a fight scene when you can't show a character's swinging bare dick but NO. they needed to give us song kang’s bare ass. and i gotta respect that but sadly we didn't get much else beyond ass. i like the intense homoerotic tension between him and that spiky monster goo guy if they let them fuck i would be more ok with the rest of the season. but yeahhhhhh...... the rest of the season.... what the fuck was that.... like they were trying to replicate the large cast of characters trapped in a tight space trying to survive with their complex inner mechanisms but of course it's not gonna work if ur trying to introduce like 30 characters to me halfway through season two like i don't give a FAWK. where is song kang. the only characters remaining from season one is fuckass eunyu with that fuckass bob and then the little kid that got annoying way too fast and the lady that births a kid made out of mud in a frozen lake, disappears for a couple of episodes and comes back all oiled up with a pixie cut. and her baby is not even made out of mud anymore like damn. like their arc actually pissed me off so fucking much. like look at the set up here my god we could have seen this extremely weird and fucked up mother-daughter relationship develop as ms pixie learns to deal with the weird ass situation that she's in. like damn. this is a kid that literally ripped its way out of me and its a monster and its weird and dangerous but its also just a kid and its my kid and i have to take care of it and as she grows she understands her own place in all of this between monster and human or whatever the fuck but they thought that the best way to tell this extremely complex and delicate story would be to skip out on it for two episodes and then give us a few flashbacks. because it was SOOOOO important to instead show us eunyu just wandering around a bunch. god i wish they knew how to write female characters. why is every woman in this show stoic cold blooded bad ass and fucking BORING. eunyu could have a compelling arc about finding her brother but they make it so dry idk theyre sooooo worried about making her stoic cold blooded and bad ass like what happened to HAVING A PERSONALITY. IM BEGGING YOU FOR WOMEN WITH PERSONALITIES. from the new characters i dont give a fawk about anyone. why did that guy kill his mom that shit was fucking weird. and ofc he had to explode so we could see yet another man bathed in blood from head to toe. he wasnt naked this time but i know a kink when i see one. priest guy is hot ofc hes a priest and he's cool and he smokes and he has a lot of sexual tension with another one of the guys BUT WE ALREADY HAD THAT CHARACTER IN SEASON ONE!!! AND HE DIED!!! YOU CANT JUST GIVE ME SOMETHING TWICE AND EXPECT ME TO LIKE THE CHEAP ASS SUBSTITUTE. i want all the generic army guys to explode. (not the pretty face micro bangs one, he's safe) like do ANY of them have a personality. would it KILL you to idk. make one of them like a little weird or something. like maybe one of them could have a lisp.. or... a really big mole in the middle of his forehead. i guess there was the one with the scar on his cheek but hes still BORING. idk man anything to make them stand out from the other million army guys like none of them had personalities distinct from each other and they all wear the same clothes and u just gave me like 30 other characters to keep track of like who do you think i am. was i supposed to be writing this shit down. idk man shit was just boring. WHY WERE WE NOT FOLLOWING YIKYUNG AND HYUNSU'S PLOTLINE THE WHOLE TIME...... I FUCKING HATE SHIT THAT GETS EXPLAINED RETROACTIVELY LIKE THIS FOR NO FUCKING REASON. why would the best way to tell this story be through a flashback with narration over it. bitches never heard of show not tell. song kang grew his hair out and u want me to care about anything else.. he raised the mud baby for a bit and i dont get to see that at all? the set up to that whole thing was soso good they did it so dirty and then concluded it in the weirdest way possible. like not even a hint of resolution character growth or anything. i do think its compelling for yukyung to want to kill her kid! there’s so many interesting themes surrounding this crooked lens of motherhood but it was almost like they couldnt really commit either way… she wouldnt fully make an effort to truly accept what her daughter is but also she wasn’t really trying to actually kill her.. she just…. walked into a boat on fire… and then got fucked up at the end i did not understand the purpose of her monster transformation like is this supposed to have any relevance to the plot or to the character orrr.. did we just want a monster transformation here… and same with the mud baby like they do soo much tell not show in this stupid season like ok she hates people….. WHY. like i can see oh ok they tried to kill her a bunch and her mom kind of hates her but i cant FEEL it. and the moment where she like goes evil and tells hyunsu she actually wants to kill people and make them suffer its supposed to be this very like. intense and sad moment of this literal kid being so confused and grief stricken by her place in society that she cant do anything else but retaliate but like ive never really known this character before. i cant feel this shift from her. there’s nothing she’s turning into if that’s all she ever was and so that moment is just super flat like i dont really know this kid! idk man.... this was just messy.... like im mostly confused what was the plot here we just had a bunch of stuff happening with no particular purpose or goal. absolutely no single great story arc at all. what did we achieve.i love that fuckass little monster tho that little shit was so cute. it would just go oooouuugggg... grrrr nnyeeeeooowww brrr ggrreeeaoouggghh... like yeah baby lets hear it. let him speak!! i could have more thoughts but idk…. ending was weird… like i actually dont get it…. i am however soooo glad eunhyuk is back AND we got to see his ass like who decided that this show needed this much male ass and why are you right… anyways…. i just want to see lots of eunhyuk hope he’s a little evil twisted next season idk give me something fun to look at.Was this review helpful to you?
FL ruins EVERYTHING
I watched up until Ep2 then dropped the show , the FL completely ruined the experience for me , the way she gets in between their friendship which was the highlight of the show.like come on she was no needed , like I physically can't stand her charater at all
so after the friendship was ruined by her I dropped the show and could no longer continue watching...
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It was worth to watch.
I think this drama is worth to watch. I instantly got super into this drama since the trailer came out. Definitely a hands up especially to the characters. I just hope that the release of episodes are early and consecutive...Bai Lu suits the female lead really well. Her voice is natural as well as Dylan's. Her natural beauty and elegance are on point based on the description from the novel. I understand that since the story is also modern, the flow is kinda slow and careful.
I think this drama is worth to watch. I instantly got super into this drama since the trailer came out. Definitely a hands up especially to the characters. I just hope that the release of episodes are early and consecutive...
Bai Lu suits the female lead really well. Her voice is natural as well as Dylan's. Her natural beauty and elegance are on point based on the description from the novel. I understand that since the story is also modern, the flow is kinda slow and careful.
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Not extraordinary but it's interesting.
I really enjoyed this one. It was a wholesome movie with both emotional and hilarious scenes together and it was a good blend of it. It's definitely different cause it first Korean production related to space. As its name suggests it's the story of space sweepers who do the cleaning of space debris in the year 2092. We all have wide imagination of how our future will be and actually they did a good job cause it seems like future.As I said the story isn't extraordinary but it's entertaining. It does have many plot holes and answered questions in the last but we cannot expect to show it all in the duration of 2 hours. The actors did a good job in acting I guess the cast was good for their roles. I would really like to appreciate Park Ye Rin she's such a cute girl and did a great job portraying Dorothy.
The best part is its graphics and cinematography it's the real strength of this. The beautiful scenery and realistic graphics are really great.
Overall I really enjoyed it, don't expect too much from it but still, it's worth watching so give it one chance if you really love sci-fi and space you won't regret it watching.
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This review may contain spoilers
Aparently all is well that ends well since happy music played at the end of this very dark tale.
I'm prepared to not be liked here. From the overall decently high rating on MDL (Currently 8.5) and the sheer volume of "I loved this," or "Best Couple of the Year," remarks on the Dali and the Cocky Prince comments board, saying anything negative is likely going to put me in hot water and get me scolded. Unfortunately, if I have any integrity and aim at all to be honest, I must confess that DATCP is one disappointing outing that is MANY things but NOT anything near what I would call light and fluffy.Yet, these two adjectives, light and fluffy, are probably the MOST used to describe this series by commenters. I've recently been watching a bit heavier, or more serious, content and wanted a break for something fun and easy. I had read positive feedback about DATCP while it was airing and held off so I could binge it once it was done. Thus, here I am writing this review long after the final episode wrapped and I wish I had a better more carefree experience. My hopes were not fulfilled.
The first episode was very enjoyable. I came for cute, funny, and light and it gave me cute, funny, and light. The characters are sketched fast yet sturdily. We open on Jin Moo Hak (Played effectively by Kim Min Jae) as a young wealthy business minded money loving son to a growing empire. Unlike most heirs he isn't out spending his families money but is the driving force behind the family's empiric rise. His greeting is fast paced, funny, and delightful. In the process he angers his father as he jets off to Holland for a business meeting and thus when he lands finds himself financially cut off in a foreign land.
Enter our female lead Kim Da Li (Played effervescently by Park Gyu Young) a wealthy heiress studying art abroad in Holland. She is, in most respects, the opposite of our male. Wealthy but not caring about money. Book smart but lacking most practical understanding. Elegant, kind and refined, Dali lives in the world of the elite while never becoming one of them. When the museum curator she studies under asks her to pick up an art critic for a high-end schmooze fest from the airport, a comedy of errors ensues. With the same last name our male lead thinks she is the poor errand girl sent to fetch him, and Dali not knowing what the art critic looks like is shocked by the arrogant playful attractive man that approaches her.
By the end, the chemistry between these two is a massive blaze. The show is funny, cool, fresh, sexy, and yes fun, and you think, or I thought, yes this is going to be a great ride!
But then tragedy befalls our female lead when her father dies back in Korea, and she must instantly go back from where she came. Our male lead Moo Hak feels rejected and is convinced by his staff that she played him to get his wealth, and the hunt begins to find her.
This is where the fun stops. While the second episode is filled with moments of "Look UP!" she is right there, oh my God I can't wait for them to get back together mishaps....when it finally does happen....it is gross and devastating.
Our male lead to this point has been fun and funny. Arrogant, money grubbing, short sighted, and uneducated yes, but he has still been rather friendly, cute, and kind in his own right. He is fun to watch, and fun to hate. Our female lead has been smart, driven, kind, helpful, and caring.
But episode 3 turns the tables and ruins this set-up. In a single scene that hollowed me, our male lead degrades, berates, demoralizes, and threatens our female lead and turns himself into a monster. She is days out of her father's death, in the midst of mourning, being hunted by family and creditors, the world she has lived crashing upon her and is one step from bankruptcy and losing everything she has ever had. Our male lead knows ALL of this, but to make sure no one thinks he is soft, to show that all he cares about is money, and to prove that he doesn't have any feelings he stands up and screams a diatribe down to our female lead calling her his debtor and that he will sell everything she owns to get the money her father borrowed from him.
The series is not interested in righting this wrong at any point. It is just a plot step to the end. Our female lead accepts being treated as such and never even remotely requires an apology. The next time our leads see each other cute love music plays the entire scene, she trips and falls into his arms, they stare lovingly into each others eyes, and the oh look at how cute they are music swells.
For the next few episodes our male lead will continue down this path tormenting and degrading the female lead. By the middle of the series Dali has become a prop. She makes not a single decisions on her own. She is fully controlled by all the men around her. She is saved left and right just for being the girl everyone wants, and her character comes off stupid and insipid. She sells her entire life to keep a gallery afloat and before the end of the series is physically attacked multiple times.
Our male lead grows and becomes better and by the series end is basically back to how we met him in Holland. But never does he ask Dali's forgiveness and never does he admit his actions were wrong. Near the end, when he is subjected by our "bad guy" to the same demoralizing scene he subjects Dali to in episode 3, our male lead is allowed to get angry, require an apology, and ignore and fight with Dali over it, even though it wasn't her that degraded him. In what is easily the greatest double standard I've seen in programming this year.
He gets so mad that he calls our female lead a whore. Tells her "To have sex to get his 2 million back. If she did she could probably get 20 million ." In what is the lowest point in the series.
It is immediately followed by a kiss by the way. He calls her a whore and then kisses her, and we are supposed to ship it.
Everything outside of our main leads is a wasteland. Besides a woman at Dali's workplace and her childhood best friend/like brother...every other character in the show is a villain. All of them plotting the downfall of the leads. The story lines include family betrayal, government corruption, blackmail, secret killing, drug smuggling, bankruptcy, public slander, disownment, orphan shaming, suicide, forced prostitution, and just if there weren't enough bad guys (the count gets up to 9 I believe) or degrading and depressing plot lines out pops a long lost uncle that reveals a secret adoption and thus we get to degrade and shame adopted children publicly and then try to take everything away from them because they aren't blood.
In short, there was nothing LIGHT or FLUFFY to be found. There is a lot of disgusting, depressing, and abhorrent story lines and characters and there is little value in any of it outside of empty shallow entertainment. The large gulf of cultural divide between the west and Korea is glaringly obvious here.
If you want to watch this with blinders on that is fine. No one can stop you. Yes, there are comedic bits. Yes, there are moments where our leads are adorable and fun to watch and be with. Yes, there are things to like here.
But taking those things and adding them all up will probably net you a total run time of 3-4 episodes. The other 12 episodes are filled with the male lead being a nasty piece of trash, our female lead being a helpless victim, and all the junk awful story lines I just ran through above with massive amounts of time spent with these other horrible characters.
For a brief stent the show seems to be aware of how awful it is, one character having a conversation with the other, "Why would you act like that and do that? Pulling her hair? What is this a soap opera?" and the answer is yes. It is a trashy soap opera that does little more than fill your time.
6.0/C/ 3-Stars Average in every way. You got a 50/50 shot of liking it simply depending on your taste.
At least we had Holland and that first episode of a much much better show.
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The FL falls for someone who doesn't deserve her. Then she humiliates herself over and over again by confessing her love endlessly. And then when the supposedly ML decides to accept her as a girlfriend, she jumps right into his arms. Sad, very sad and demeaning to women. Loving unconditionally is romantic. What is not, is obsessing over someone who doesn't give a damn. We frown upon rivals who don't give up, even when their affections are unrequited. Then why do the writer expect us to cheer for a heroine that does that and doesn't really value herself as a human. Yes she is disqualified from beginning to end for her stupidity and shallowness.
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1This review may contain spoilers
IM GONNA BE VERY HONEST
General Setting: Happy Ending, low romance, high on politicsIf you are looking for good execution, directing or romance then this is not for you. To be honest, the clips of the leads I saw on twitter made me excited to watch this. However, when I saw the actual scenes it was so disappointing. The first half of the drama is good although the pacing is messy and there are many mini plots which they try to end quickly. But still its interesting and you feel like watching more. Around eps 20 onwards it started going downhill with poor build-up and really bad introduction of plots. One main example is the story of song han. Just by watching the drama I could tell how much they had to cut out because really the progression was bad for his arc. One minute he is following songmo like a loyal brother 2 eps later suddenly he wants to kill songmo and has all the ambitions he never had. This is just one example.
The entire drama started with a time slip. This time slip was mentioned like maybe 2 times(?) in the entire drama. But i can understand cause the minute she stopped Songmo from his rebelling plans she couldn't really predict what happens anymore. BUT at least she should have like explained it to Songmo (she tried for like 5mins on their wedding night). So the entire "time travel" plot was dropped.
Romance....I didnt feel the chemistry at all....the chemistry the two had in ep 1 practically carried the whole show cause once they got married it felt like i was watching a 50year old married couple instead of a newly married couple. Honestly i blame this on the execution cause their kiss scenes were shot so bad all the random camera angles and cut scenes...their tension was much stronger when they weren't together lol .
I'm honestly not sure why people are rating this so high and claiming it to be the drama of the year...its really not..its a very normal drama i feel. First half good second half bad. The villains are mediocre only appear at the end, the battle was so underwhelming (they tried to make it emotional but...). Jiyong the character i thought will be her advisor and guardian for the time travel plot was a character with no role and just acted all mighty.
Overall, had expectations for the drama but was let down. Acting was subpar as well so probably will not rewatch this...
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CEW´s character was the only worth watching part of this season
I started watching this cause of KNG is Jin´s fav actor so I wanted to see his acting and I was not impressed.I can´t think of really nothing that was memorable about this more than Johan.
The first two eps were very slow and nothing much happend there (I thought it was a kind of intruduction and 2 ep s is a lot to introduce a character but I was still trusting them) somehow they managed to keep me watching, and since it was 6ps drama I think that was a help too.
What I liked:
-As an introduction to a bigger plot it was kind of ok, still I think they could´ve put more into its short eps.
-Incredibly the character I liked the most was CEW´s. Why is that incredible for me? cause I´m not the biggest fan of his acting, BUT I must say I found myself crying along side with him in the last ep.
What I did not like:
-The absence of actual development on the main plot. We were told she has great powers that should be awaken and we spent 6 eps and her powers are still sleeping. When ep 4 ended I thought to myself "We are gonna see her on action next week" but it did not happend.
-I feel like the characters were so close and it didn´t feel believable for me. I mean you meet someone and that person is cool, and kind and all that, but you don´t trust someone that fast, You don´t become THAT close THAT fast.
-They killed some characters for not apparent reason, I mean Johan´s brother may have some repercution on the character development for s2, but the other guy. What was the reason? if that´s not going to be important for s2 there was not point on killing him. Came here again to say, they didn´t even adressed his death properly, like they showed us the funeral but that was it.
-And that leads us to another problem. During the whole season they made every murder and problem as if it didn´t happend, like the guy on the police station at the airport. Like no one ever asked what happen to those people or where they are, it was like they never existed to others.
-And talking about development, the only one with it was Johan. Van and Miho were there but what were they doing the whole season all along? Is like they were but they weren´t there.
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Overall I think this should be called "Priest Johan and his friends" I would Actually love if CEW where the only ML on this cause his story was the only thing actually being told here. If they had given more screen time to him it would´ve be perfect.
If eps 1-4 were squiched into 2 and then the las 2 it would be better, and I don´t think it was a good choice to split this cause there is not so much plot for it. I haven´t seen part 2 and I did not read the manhwa, but I´m probably not so wrong if I say it would be good as just 8 eps drama as a whole, maybe.
Just to say I´m not a fan of CEW nor I am fan of his acting, but it is what it is, he was the only worth thing on this season.
I´ll watch s2 because I want to know how they´re gonna wrap it up and if they´re gonna do better, but this trending of part 1 and part 2 is doing kdramas dirty ig.
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Started off well, but lost it's way. Overrated drama, just because of famous leads
Many people will disagree, but I feel this is just so overrated, Okay, so what if the cast is renowned and they act well. There is hardly any script inn here. I mean nothing really happens. Initial few episodes, which revealed how 2 teens of very opposing nature keep bickering, and eventually fall in love, through those videos and flashbacks, were cool, and had a good thing going. The moment t hey got back together, which was no surprise, the show turned super cheesy and then there was nothing left in story at all, but still it dragged on like forever. The subplot with NJ was kinda cute but unnecessary. The side-plot with the other Woong was boring and unnecessary as well. More so was his subplot with his mother, and the love interest from his assistant. All these plot points were complete fillers for a stale drama. The subplot with the protagonist being adopted, and about his art being criticized was also unnecessary and did not contribute to the plot in any way. The female lead was shown as such a strong character in the beginning, but towards the end was insufferably cheesy and a waste of character. At the end, the leads get separated as they focus on their respective careers but immediately get back together because they just so "missed each other".. the whole thing felt forced, as if they wanted to put in some dramatic moments before they ended the drama. I was utterly bored in last few episodes. Sorry to anyone who finds this drama likeable and disagrees with my review, but I hope this will help someone save their few hours of life by skipping this drama.Was this review helpful to you?
Worth the watch
Idol I is a quiet, emotionally grounded drama that succeeds by choosing restraint over spectacle.At its core, the story is less about idol glamour and more about vindication, trust, and identity. It strips fame down to its most fragile parts; solation, public judgment, and the way power distorts truth. Ra-ik’s journey is painful but human: a man forced to confront betrayal, loss, and the slow rebuilding of self-worth when the world decides he’s disposable.
Se-na is the drama’s emotional anchor. As both a fangirl and a lawyer, she could’ve easily fallen into cliché, but instead she’s written with integrity. Her belief in Ra-ik is never blind or performative; it’s principled. She chooses him not out of fantasy, but out of conviction, and that choice shapes the drama’s moral backbone.
The romance unfolds gently, built on quiet moments, shared silence, and emotional safety rather than grand declarations. When affection finally surfaces in a confession, a kiss and a compliment, it feels earned. Their relationship works because it grows alongside healing, not in spite of trauma.
What truly elevates Idol I is its refusal to simplify its characters. Even figures like Woo-seong are treated with nuance, while the reveal of Hye-joo as the killer delivers a chilling reminder that not all harm comes from misunderstanding and that some comes from entitlement without remorse.
Overall, Idol I is a slow-burn drama that rewards patience. It’s thoughtful, sincere, and emotionally resonant , a story about choosing truth, standing firm against power, and finding comfort in being truly seen.
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