Nostalgia and heart all wrapped up in one.
"Love Story in the 1970s" has completely pulled me out of a viewing slump. I haven't enjoyed a show this much in ages. The story follows a factory worker with college aspirations who, after an unexpected event, crosses paths with a man from her past. They enter a fake marriage, and the story unfolds from there. This show is genuinely healing, beautiful, and deeply emotional. I found myself captivated from beginning to end.The nostalgia of the 1970s is beautifully woven into the fabric of the story, from the cinematography to the aesthetics and the characters themselves. The realism of the setting and the characters' struggles adds another layer of depth. The female lead is a compelling blend of calm determination, hard work, and underlying vulnerability. Paired with the male lead's gentle demeanor, intelligence, and wit, they create a love story that's both inspiring and heartwarming. Their interactions had me alternating between giddiness and tears.
The chemistry between Chen Feiyu and Sun Qian is undeniable; at times, it felt like I was watching real life, not a performance. The acting from both leads was nothing short of perfect—genuine and natural, with no exaggeration. Even the secondary couple's storyline was engaging, and I never felt the urge to skip their scenes. Overall, "Love Story in the 1970s" is a must-watch. I highly recommend giving it a try.
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It’s Funny
I loved this one, the storyline, the acting and the setting. it was all so fabulous.I did not care for the FIL at all as either a minister or the father. He did his job well, in making you hate him. The romance was fun and the comedy - I couldn’t stop giggling, all the way through. Set in the Joseon era, the writer did well to keep it historically correct with the widows and the way females were treared and yet was so good at bringing in the humour at apptporiate moments. Yes tgere was an age gap, Noona romance, however I have to say both Leads carried it well and there was definitely chemistry. overall, well done!!!
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This review may contain spoilers
Is the FL's character supposed to be that annoying?
I hoped this would be another interesting show. I like the plot of a werewolf and a princess together but the FL's character puts me off. I'm already on ep 22 but I can't finish this. I'm so fed up with the FL's stupid schemes.----
I'm so fed up with the FL's stupid schemes.
I'm so fed up with the FL's stupid schemes.
I'm so fed up with the FL's stupid schemes.
I'm so fed up with the FL's stupid schemes.
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Ongoing review
I will be updating this review periodically so I don't forget what to say.Review up through episode 13:
- Love the costumes, not a fan of the makeup. The makeup makes people look kind of...gaunt. But, it's crime solving so perhaps that's what they intended?
- Pacing is a bit off. The first case was fine, the second case felt long and kinda went around in circles. So far, the third case is okay.
- The relationship between the two leads is rather stiff. Sure, this is still early and the tag says slight romance. Still, it's stiff and rather awkward. I've seen other dramas with Bai Lu and WXY. They can do romance. I don't know why in this drama (so far) the relationship is like this.
- I like how the cases have to do with the plight of women. To be female in dynastic China was difficult. This drama addresses many facets of the plight of women.
Review at episode 25:
- Cases still focus on the sad plight of women in ancient times.
- We learn more of the leads' backstory.
- The leads emote more. That's a relief.
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“Boyfriend on Demand Falls Short of Its Potential”
Boyfriend on Demand ultimately struggles to deliver on its promising premise, leaning too heavily on familiar romantic tropes without offering enough depth or originality to keep the story engaging. The pacing often feels uneven, with several episodes drifting through repetitive misunderstandings rather than developing meaningful character growth. While the concept had the potential to explore modern relationships in a clever way, the execution frequently feels flat and predictable. The performances also vary in strength, and in particular, Kim Jisoo sometimes appears limited in emotional range. Although she brings a natural charm to certain lighter scenes, some of the more dramatic moments lack the nuance and intensity needed to fully convey the character’s inner conflicts, which can make key emotional beats feel less impactful than they should.Very disappointed to be honest!!! :( :( :(
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A Vibrant and Faithful Tribute to the Original Legend
I honestly didn't expect to be this blown away! As a long-time fan of the anime who hasn't read the manga yet, I finally dived into this live-action adaptation. I had my doubts — I was afraid they’d turn it into a melodramatic "soap" or drown it in unnecessary philosophical monologues. Fortunately, none of that happened. The drama is a remarkably faithful adaptation, staying true to the source material except for a few minor details.Admittedly, the over-the-top (OTT), almost cartoonish expressions of the actors felt a bit jarring at first. It takes a few episodes to get used to the FL's wild energy, but once you do, it feels perfectly natural for this specific world.
At its core, this is a beautiful coming-of-age story about finding one’s place in life. The journey of Gong Xi (Kyoko Mogami) from a girl blinded by betrayal to an actress learning to see the world through the lens of love is incredibly moving. I loved the "found family" aspect — the manager, the agency president, and the cafe boss. They provided the warmth and support she lacked while her world revolved around her selfish childhood friend, Bu Po Shang (Fuwa Sho).
While the romance is minimal here, it’s clear that love isn’t the main focus of this specific arc. This is an underdog story about a "ugly duckling" transforming into a swan through sheer determination. For the heavy romance, I’ll definitely be heading to the manga!
The casting is absolutely spot-on:
Ivy Chen (Gong Xi): She masterfully captured everything from bone-chilling hatred to shy, blossoming love. Even with the exaggerated expressions, she stayed true to the original character's spirit.
Choi Siwon (Dun He Lian / Ren Tsuruga): Total crush material! His portrayal of a guarded yet deeply caring star was perfect. He didn’t need many words; his screen presence and expressive gaze said it all.
Lee Donghae (Bu Po Shang / Sho Fuwa): A fantastic antagonist. I think I hated his character even more here than in the anime—he captured that arrogance and egoism perfectly.
The Supporting Cast: They truly stole the show. The President and the Manager felt even more vivid and "human" than their anime counterparts. My only minor gripe is that the FL's female friend felt a bit overshadowed by the extravagant male characters.
As a co-production between Taiwan and South Korea, featuring members of the iconic K-pop group Super Junior, this project had high stakes. Even though the Korean actors were dubbed into Mandarin, the voice dubbing was incredibly seamless and never felt distracting.
Verdict:
A worthy adaptation with a great heart. Despite minor flaws, I’m ready to overlook them because of how much I love this story. I’ll definitely be rewatching my favorite moments!
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do not recommend
i have to say I really liked the first 9 episode the plot should continue and romance should be slow, but no they just randomly suddenly confess ,so I was like so many eps still left they already confess and kiss what are they gonna show? the story becomes just ridiculous 😂 are you serious? i actually decided to quit at 14 something because the focus is neither romance or comedy but just work work work ? continuously? so I got bored and end it and came to see reviews no wonder everyone thinks the same I skip at 14 so idk the end I checked now the story is absolute nonsense 😂😂😂 are you wasting our time showing story like that? ,if the first 9 eps continue till mid and slowly the romance starts it could've been better, completely ruined a good plotWas this review helpful to you?
It's been a long time since I finally watched a modern drama again
It's been a long time since I finally watched a modern drama again, as I'm usually consumed with historical and xianxia dramas. The drama clicked with me immediately when I tried watching episode 1. All of FL's struggles were similar yet different from mine, making her struggles feel like they hit me too.I even wished there was a place like that where I could role-play as someone else for real, just for a little while.
With each episode that followed, I realized that my behavior, from always isolating myself to reading novels, comics, and watching all sorts of dramas, series, films, and anime with unrealistic genres, actually showed my desire to escape reality.
I really enjoyed this drama. The cinematography was excellent, the various angles were meticulous, the pacing was smooth and fast, and the plot was engaging, blending reality and games in a way that felt truly refreshing. I even finished this drama in two days without realizing it.
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None of you who wrote a bad review are used to thai culture and lakorns
Many criticise the ML for not standing up against his mother. In Thailand its culturally wrong to disrespect the parents especially your mother. In thai culture and buddhism you have to thank your mom your whole life, when shes sick, when shes sad etc. And it was obvious how ML was fed up with her shenanigans but hes just a bit too kind. I lowkey like that because i want drama characters to have flaws. Also i heard people criticise the FL's over the top acting. Thats literally the point of traditional lakorns like this. The target audience is not teenagers, its for thai aunties. So you need to consider that this is not meant for you, so its natural you don't like it. Also if you don't know thai culture too, you are never "too much" to be cringe is to be free. Thai people are very cringe because culturally we were always told to be our unfiltered selves. Plus its a bit more dramatic because its a freaking drama. This is why most traditional lakorns usually cast 30+ year olds because its supposed to feed the dream of 40+ thai aunties with the secret mindset like "This could've been me 10 years ago" But it was very enjoyable for me because im from the thai countryside and grew up watching these shows with my mom. Im glad they got rid of some of the older lakorn style like "Rich guy come save poor girl like me, i will even lick your shoes!" Or the slap-kiss aka tsundere style.Also makes sense they casted mid twenty year olds because that age was the peak for farm work (hence ML's abs lol) and it may attract some young people. All im saying is, see this drama from a different perspective. Thailand is still growing for het (hetero) lakhons. BL and GL are usually targeted toward international teen audiences, they lose some of the thai "cringe" personality to fit international audiences. We are not on the same level as Korea in the 2020's. I would say we are like Korea in 2014. Still needs to grow. This is one of the great examples of the growth we made, and what is still needed. I think having more traditional lakorns like this and having more international style lakorns like F4 Thailand is what makes our drama industry great.
I also think bad characters like ML's mom or Krongtong are needed for the drama effect. It makes you feel more passionate about the drama. The writers WANT TO piss you off. I think ML and FL chemistry is great, many complained about the kiss scenes, they don't have to lick each others faces, calm tf down.
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perfect
ive never written a review for any of the hundreds of shows I’ve seenive never cried for so many reasons. sadness obviously, but Joy, because i was proud, because i was scared, because I was nervous or relieved, because this show was perfect.
there are some shows I wanted to be longer because of the feeling it gave me, or because I loved the cast/love story. but I wanted to continue to see these characters grow. so complex and beautifully written characters- every single one had depth.
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quantity > quality
Maybe I've watched too many other shows recently that have particular outstanding qualities not found here.Maybe when I go into a drama with big expectations, I always get disappointed.
Or maybe when it's Gu Man, I see various Gu Man things that I'm not the biggest fan of (China #1: either China goes to Mars or develops leading hightech breakthroughs or whatever, patriotic Chinese researchers are leading the field in other countries but return to China to advance their homeland, the Chinese government has oh-so-many initiatives that are oh-so-perfect, and some snide remarks that white people food is inedible and inferior unless it's a sponsor in the show), or how she covers at least three industries... but that brings me to my actual complaint.
For me, Shine On Me has too much quantity over quality.
Recently I've felt a bit underwhelmed by how few songs My Page In The 90s makes do with (3-4). Meanwhile, Shine On Me has 17 songs (seventeen!!!). Of those, I like about... one and a half. Even the Liu Yu Ning song is in the bottom third of Liu Yu Ning songs. It's played exactly once, and then thrown in once more at the very end when the producers realize they paid for a lot of songs so they might as well use them all again. Chen Xue Ran this is not.
Character-wise, the quantity onslaught starts with her college roommates in the first episode. For some reason, she doesn't have the standard assignment of four girls in one room, but we instead get six. Then for an extra flimsy reason, they're 'paired' with a room of another six guys. At work, a female lead in a drama is guaranteed one best friend by law, but this one has at least three of them.
We have a mostly useless SML. After he served his purpose, he still gets a decent *quantity* of appearances. But not only that, he also gets a whole boatload of own side characters. They all have names, they all get scenes. But it's so low-effort that two girls with no differentiating features are called 'Min' and 'Mia'.
Even the (fortunately largely ineffective) villains come in groups. Typically they're delivered as a set of three. I find it a bit problematic how the show propagates the idea that the children of selfish and mean people are themselves bound to be bad human beings, but this is going too far off topic.
Other than the FL's cousin Jiang Rui, who stood out in some way in nearly all of his scenes, none of the side characters in SOM were consistently good / entertaining. A bunch had their moments, like particular small mini arcs or scenes in which they stood out, but ... I just came from rewatching another show after two years where all (!) the side characters had stayed somewhat memorable and felt much more like real people than random characters. It doesn't help that Gu Man or the other screenwriter sometimes override some random character's personality and literally just put words into their mouth to replace having a narrator.
I'm still not sure if I find Shine On Me a bit meh because my other recent shows just had *cuter* cute scenes of the leads being cute together, or all the other stuff in-between just wore me down.
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1,000,000,000 /10
this drama is amazing I love this couple so much I love the plot of fourever you I love the plot and their characters in that show if they were those characters again and they had like 100 30 or 1,000 Episodes I will watch every single one of them that is how much I love this drama and this couple if I have the option to erase all my memory and rewatch it I would 1000 for the rest of my life Black I genuinely really love this drama and I’ll probably continue to always re-watch her for the rest of my lifeWas this review helpful to you?
amazing
if I had the chance to raise my memory and rewatch this all over again I would 1000 times this drama is just so sweet and so amazing the storyline is amazing the acting was so good can’t wait for two absolutely in love with the story i’m not gonna lie my favorite couple was jJOHAN and NORTH if they had their own serious where I had like 100 30 or even 1,000 episodes I would watch every single one of them I would continue to rewatch the struggle for the rest of my life that is how much I love itWas this review helpful to you?
This review may contain spoilers
A fun light romantic "comedy"
I really enjoyed this. I know a lot of reviewers said it was awful and degrading to women; I don't agree. I loved the ML accepting the FL's "mishaps" and I think they evolved well throughout the show. I love the FL and haven't seen the ML before but I loved him. They had great chemistry.I did not like the boss and receptionist ending up together - he was clearly far more mature and older than her and she was very naive. I thought it was a very unnecessary "couple".
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Compelling Start ...and then the plot lost itself.
I am gonna be honest..is it great? No! ...But is it non-watchable...Also no!You could definitely watch this to get your BL fix when nothing else seems interesting...The lighting and cinematography were really good.
Fair warning, though, you will feel like screaming at both the leads...sometimes the miscommunication is dragged..like one instance of Toh overhearing an incriminating sentence uttered by Jimmy would have been enough (after which the next sentence is undoing the first impression, but of course Toh is long gone by then, and did not hear the second half)...we did not need multiple such 'coincidences'.
Anyways...among the things I liked, at the top is definitely Plaifah and Ter's relationship. Though it started a bit racy and red-flaggish, it actually evolved to be the healthiest one by the end. They were sexy but also sweet; they communicated well, and both seemed to respect each other for their roles in the relationship. I stan!
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