Reviews

Woah, I can't believe that I have finished this drama in... 3 days! I didn't even wanted to watch when I found out about it, because the poster is so ugly in my opinion (yeah, I'm superficial), it has 21 episodes and I don't really have the patience, and the story sounded silly for me.
But I decided to give it a try and I regret nothing!
As I said, the story sounded kind of silly. A perfect-looking alien landed on Earth 400 years ago, and then he falls in love when he has only 3 months to stay on Earth. But as I watched it, I really enjoyed it. I really liked the references to the past. Some were very sad, some were just hilarious. I really liked how the story went, how the comedy was so nicely combined with the melodrama, and with the supporting story (if I can call it that way).
The acting was great, and the actors did an amazing job! I actually lived with them the happy, and even the sad moments! I really liked all the characters. Kim Soo Hyun was amazing in the role of Min Joon (or should I call him Da Mon? lol)! Also, Jeon Ji Hyun was great, even if in the beginning I didn't really like her, she did an amazing job! And Song Yi was a really great character, I have often identified myself with her. Park Hae Jin also was good, and I liked his character a lot. As much as I like Yoo In Na, I think that she didn't sell her character quite well, she just seemed sweet and innocent all the time, even when her character was technically showing her teeth.
The music was great, I really enjoyed the OST!
As a rewatch value, I gave it a 9, because I may want to watch it again in the future, I really liked this drama.
Overall, I give this drama a 9.5. If you want to watch a drama where you can laugh, and cry at the same time, where you want something serious, but not too many complicated things, misunderstandings and bullshit between the leads, you should definitely watch it!

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I usually watch melodramas when I want to watch something more mature and serious or when I feel like I need something that might be more solid and when I heard about this drama coming out on dramabeans I was all for it. The synopsis had all the elements of a good melo and despite people being uncomfortable by the considerable age difference of the leads I just didn't mind (or care) and wanted to see if it was good or not, and BOY it was good past being good.

Story:
Something simple where a mother is dying and needs someone to watch over her daughter and enters into a contractual marriage, but we enter into Hye Soo's life when she really doesn't have that except in her friend Joo Yeon. Cue in Ji Hoon who plays the time adage of a rich chaebol playboy with more enough money in his pockets and enough girls in his bed that he doesn't have time to be serious or particularly nice to anyone around him. Despite the expectancy of knowing that the main lead character will change the main male character as understanding that he isn't all bad, Ji Hoon represented a character i haven't seen in a drama in a really long time. A character knowing he is flawed, knowing and believing he is the worst human being and not seeing himself as being redeemable. He didn't believe he was any good, he didn't get the love nor care and wasn't seen as being redeemable by his family or in his own eyes so for a woman that he barely knew, a stranger such as Hye Soo to point it out that he was a good person and with such firmness .....it just got to me that he wasn't such a simple character and there were layers in this jerkish playboy and they were nice layers and just needed tender loving care and someone to actually stick around but not wanting to take advantage or use it against him.

Acting/Cast
Ever since the first drama I seen Uee in(which was You're Beautiful....she made me truly hate her character as a second lead female that just dripped two-faced and a bitch all at once), I had a feeling this girl could act but it was just the lack of a really great drama to pull it out of the ballpark to show everyone that she could. I knew she could meet the challenge and wasn't surprise that her and Lee Seo Jin had chemistry. But WAS surprise by how HOT that chemistry was!!!!

The two of them complimented one another, whether they spoke or not you got what you needed from their eyes, they portrayed their characters longing, their passion, their fear, worry, confusion and it all with just their eyes....they fitted completely together like pieces in a puzzle

The child actress Shin Rin-Ah or the little Eun Sung who seemed more like a brat in the beginning (in all honesty I wouldn't dare run off when my parents told me to stay put or ignore when my parents told me not to do something) but in all honesty she is just a child and is naturally going to be defiant. But this little girl was just so freaking adorable, sassy, and fiesty. Eun Sung was smart, knew when people were lying, considerate, and importantly her interaction with her mother, Hye Soo was just at times adorable, cute, and heartbreaking. That a mother would go above and beyond her ownself to secure her child's future and at the same time Eun Sung went above and beyond in loving and protecting her mother in the only way she knew how as a child. Also her interactions with Ji Hoon was just freaking adorable of being able to finally have a father of her own and no matter what happened to her mother she would still have someone that she will love and be by her side.

The Supporting Character such as the chef Hyun Geol, the manager, and even Hye Soo's best friend were so wonderful, funny, and were able to add comedic relief during times when shit was getting serious and you wanted to cry (which happens ALOT in this drama so have some Kleenex nearby).

Music:
I love me some music, but I HATE it when dramas use it as a filler in trying to bring out an emotion that actors or actresses cannot effectively convey. This drama didn't use music for that AT ALL. Instead the music was simple when it came to soft humming (don't know the singer's name) to small little instrumentals it only helped amplify the emotions whether it was pain, passion, or the confliction of the characters feelings that they couldn't put into words but we knew as viewers that they felt, the songs just amplified them ten times more. Instead of the music carrying the drama, this drama and music worked hand in hand in making scenes even sadder, or more upbeat, and etc...

Overall:
After successfully waiting weeks for this drama to finish airing this has to be one of my top five best dramas that i have ever watched. Aside from the romance, this drama showed that its never too late to seek forgiveness for our sins towards the people we've wronged. Whether its family or friends, we have a second chance to make things better which was evidenced by Hi Joon's mother and his uncle and Hye Soo mother in law. This drama also displayed that realizing what is truly important in life, realizing that family is everything and chasing after idealistic and materialistic items will only leave you at alone at your dining table at the end of the day; valuing life, taking up for our errors and trying to be a better person, and just simply appreciating everyday and not take it for granted. To love ourselves and one another but importantly don't take life for granted. This drama breached on so many things we sometimes forget in the repeated cycle in our lives and it takes a drama like this to remind us that we shoud appreciate the people that we have around us. If it was possible I would rate this drama more than a 10, but since I can't I give it a 10/10!!!

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Where to even start! This drama has caused me to write my first review on MDL and for good reason! I've seen manymanymanyMANY dramas in Dramaland (mainly Korean because I'm Korean, haha) ever since I was in Elementary school (not joking about that, haha, anybody remember Huh Joon?). I've seen a wide variety of cliches, typicals and over-used concepts, plots and themes. As I continued watching dramas, my taste for dramas matured over time and dramas that I thought were 10/10 back then are now rated like 5/10 now, haha. For example, one these most cliched and over dramatic dramas, "Prince's First Love". Marriage Contract is no exception here and uses one of THE most over-used melodrama plots ever.....sudden death, aka the Cancer Virus! (Calling it a 'virus' because that storyplot spreads easily!)


Now cancer, in itself is no joking matter, so please don't misinterpret my sarcastic scoff as a laugh to the real thing in the real world! But, in Dramaland, it's a pretty infectious concept. Especially in the melodrama department.


STORY: For the most part, it's pretty well-written and handled the cancer story pretty well too! I appreciated how the cancer was not the most PROMINENT thing that carried this story. Yes, it played a major role in Hye Soo's decision to enter into such a contract. But other than that, you don't see the illness take up too much physical screen time away, until much later towards the end where the illness starts to take its' toll on her body. Here, the illness is shown to take on a low-profile while our main characters carry the story. The soft moments really make this drama stand out, where the story highlights the little things in life that make it exciting and entertaining. In my opinion, it really emphasized how people's lives, as they live it, can be all the drama you really need in a story to make things interesting. This drama played out in a very down-to-earth way and really showed the audience the raw of the emotions, frustrations and conflicts. The only thing I disliked was the father. I was really hoping that they would flesh out his character a little bit, to explain maybe why he is the way he is, but alas, they did nothing, really, with the father. But I understand that not every story is going to be perfect, and stories do need a villain, so I guess I can let that go considering the bigger picture.


And as far as the age-gap between the two main characters, I honestly didn't even notice it until I read someone's comment on it. That really tells me that their chemistry was so flawless that I didn't even notice the age gap when watching this drama! Pleasantly surprised when I realized that they do have quite an age gap, but really made me fall in love with this drama even afterwards!


CHARACTERS/ACTORS: Here, we see flaws in the main characters with a rich/not-so-rich chaebol who is dismissive but has a heart of gold. The quiet and somewhat timid looking girl, who is just trying to get by in life. These two character profiles could've been taken on a wild ride of over-exaggeration and just too much, but our actors (and I'm sure writer) really took off with them and made them both lovable and realistically so. I really enjoyed in the fact that these characters were written with more than one dimension! Ji Hoon, our rich and bratty chaebol, showed many sides of himself that are different. When he's with his mother, or with his father, or with his friend. I've seen Lee Seo Jin only once before in 'The Lovers', and I gotta say, pretty impressed with how he took this character to new heights. He showed a variety of complexity with Han Ji Hoon, especially when he's with his father. I think any characters most complex sides show the most when they are interacting with their parents. In MC, we see Ji Hoon show pretty conflicting emotions when he's with either with his mother or his father, and the way he acts with either of them are completely different. When he's with his mother, he shows his more childish and needy side for the love he was denied from her and yet expresses his aggravation towards her, for that denied love. When he's with his father, he's all business, very professional and very logical and direct, yet still shows an air of bitterness in his interaction with him. Loved how Ji Hoon grew up a little as he became more involved with Hye Soo. Hye Soo and Ji Hoon's mother mirror a lot with another seeing as how they both loved a man that left them, both try to do what they think is best for their child, and both, in the end, are also sick. We can see how Ji Hoon acts out a lot in the beginning towards Hye Soo, perhaps because he sees so much of his mother in her. But we see that love mature as does Ji Hoon's attitude towards his mother as well as


Uee, is a actress I've kept an eye on for a little while now since I watched her drama Ho Goo's Love. It wasn't the best written drama ever, but was mildly entertaining. I skipped High Society because I could just tell, it was not going to be good. But, seeing her act in Ho Goo's Love, I saw real potential. Any actor is going to start off rough as they gain more experience in grasping their characters and showing a complexity of expression and body language, so I don't blame some people saying that her acting was bad in the past. I'm sure any one of us would start off pretty bad ourselves in the beginning of an acting career. But in MC, her hard work has really paid off! I've seen such growth in her acting since Ho Goo's and that ugly crying scene is still leaving me with heart-wrenching feels! I feel that crying scenes shouldn't be pretty if they are coming from somewhere genuine, and if it is pretty, than the director/actor/actress is more concerned with how they look rather than performance. Uee really grasped her character well, and delivered an amazing performance as a single mother, struggling to raise her child in this harsh world. Uee performed Hye Soo with a silent strength of will. Most strong female characters I've seen in dramas, yell pretty loudly to project their strength, and that's not always a bad thing, but I've seen a lot of them do that, haha! Hye Soo is a refreshing take on a "strong female lead" whose strength is measured in her restraint and not her struggles. I really appreciate that Uee conveyed Hye Soo as a very level-headed and calm character despite facing so much struggle.Great job Uee!


A big round of applause to the child actress! It's pretty mind-blowing how old this girl is, and yet able to deliver a realistically believable performance in MC. There were no hints of line-reading, sounding like a robot, or flat-toned acting here. Which still blows my mind! You can tell that Shin Rin-Ah and Uee really bonded while acting and it shows through in their performance together, you really wouldn't believe that they aren't mother and daughter in real life.


This part of the review is sooooooooo long because the drama did so incredibly well because of our actors/actress performance here. Gotta give a shout out to the mother, Lee Hwi Hyang. I've seen her is several dramas, and started calling her the "Dragon Lady" when I first saw her in "Stairway to Heaven" because she often played the not-so-nice step-mother or mother-in-law, and also, she has a fierce look about her too. But really liked that she didn't play one in this drama though. We saw how she can be a very warm, kind and caring mother with an affectionate expression. Kudos to the whole cast as well!


MUSIC: Not really one to pick on the music of a drama, but I enjoyed the selections that they chose to compliments the ups-and-downs of the moments. Other than that no complaints. Like I said, not the kind of person who will pick on the music too much, unless it really doesn't suit the drama, or it did a really good job of complimenting it. Such as Kill Me, Heal Me, which I thought was an edgy decision to make it the dramatic theme song. Haha!


OTHER POINTS: Something I really wanted to point out, that I don't think a lot of people noticed is that the director made a very subtle, yet prominent decision to dress Hye Soo in very frumpy looking clothes and nothing too pretty either. If you noticed the way Hye Soo dresses, outside of work, she dresses in very comfortable and loose clothes because she's a mother. Mothers are usually too busy taking care of their child or paying the bills to be concerned with the way they look, and I think this makes the feelings Ji Hoon has towards Hye Soo all that more genuine and real, because he fell in love with her heart and her inner beauty, not for her outfits or pretty face (although, I'm pretty sure that didn't hurt either, haha!).


All in all, I thoroughly enjoyed watching this drama! It's rare these days for me to find a drama that I look forward to watching every week and get pretty sad when it ends, but also pretty happy that I saw it. I took away one point because of the lack of a need of Na-Yoon as a character and really how unrealistic the father turned out to be in the drama as a whole and how they never delved deeper into his character either, but other than those two factors, I thoroughly enjoyed watching this and would put this as a re-watch drama and do RECOMMEND this drama to anyone considering watching it!

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It was a simple story of a man suddenly having to play the role of a father for a baby. I was able to finish this because I liked the concept of taking care of a baby and learning to be selfless. If you like that type of dramas you might, just maybe, make it through.

However, it didn't feel as if characters were well developed. We meet so many people but at the same time its like we don't really know them and I could not get attached to the characters. Also his story with his first love, the relationship just suddenly seems to spring, when they had so much potential like involving her five year old and creating sweet moments.

This might have been a lot better as a movie than dragging it on by trying to focus on the other characters. The story was about the baby, uncle and first love so in my opinion it should have stayed focused about them.

I also found it annoying that they made it seem like this new dad was better at what he was doing than all the moms that had useless meetings and his first love raising her kid in a childish manner. I guess they wanted to make the dad look better but doing it by making the other people look bad wasn't the best way because it made characters less endearing.

I don't see any reason to re-watch the drama, but it wasn't terrible, so if its on tv i might just let it play in the background.

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Mizushima Hiro and Oguri Shun are absolutely wonderful in this drama! I love how their characters act together; they are absolutely hilarious partners! I would love to see them act together again. After re-watching this drama, I noticed a lot more familiar actors/actresses and I fell in love with this series all over again. It does get a little cliche-love-story toward the end, but it isn't too bad and it doesn't make it so you can guess the outcome. This drama is filled with twists and turns; the work in this series is very unpredictable. I would recommend this to someone in a drama slump or just starting Japanese/foreign dramas. It is fast paced, but that doesn't mean it skips over anything or it's hard to understand. The acting in this light-hearted, almost slice-of-life, detective series is fantastic! The characters (actors) all have a wonderful rapport with each other and they bounce off each other's skills and personalities well.

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So just like the title says, it is a drama that will make you cry. There are a lot of reasons why.

First of all is it a story based on a real life story, so I keep feeling like it could happen to me or someone I know. Also does it show how the family feels and her friends.

The acting is also great, when they acted it looked so real, like it really happened. The music also fitted perfect at the moments.

I don't know why but I really felt sorry for Ako (the sister of Aya), maybe because she was acting so good or because I could see trough her eyes that she was having a hard time.

I really recommend this drama cause it is just so good.

(sorry if there are grammer mistakes.)

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This 2016 drama of the love story between a doctor and a soldier was wildly successful and for good reason. Bucking K-drama tradition in order to meet approval with Chinese censors, this drama was completely pre-recorded in 258 days. This resulted in a more cohesive final product, rather than slipshod episodes being developed on a whim.

So much about this drama is a refreshing change to Korean drama. For one thing, part of the story takes place in a fictional country, played by Greece. I haven't been so excited about a location change since Jan Di and Jun Pyo went to New Caledonia in "Boys Over Flowers".

Another refreshing element is the juxtaposition of the careers of a soldier and a doctor. Additionally, they become romantically involved, despite that some aspects of their occupations will never mesh. Song Joong Ki and Song Hye Kyo were excellent in the leading roles and were fondly referred to as "Song Song Couple" by fans of the show.

A third great aspect of "Descendants Of The Sun" ("DoTS') is that supporting characters get their own story lines and don't exist just to make the OTP look good. Jin Gu as Sgt. Seo and Kim Ji Won as Dr. Yoon have their own relationship trajectory. Shinee's Onew as Lee Chi Hoon and Kim Min Suk as Pvt. Kim Ki Bum and others have their own storylines that tie into those of the TTP (Two True Pairs).

Fourth, the female leads are shown as competent in their professions. In so many dramas, the female(s) are seen as incompetent in their jobs, only to be rescued in the end by their heroic men.
Drs. Yoon and Kang were presented throughout the dramas as professionals ably performing their jobs, despite difficult decisions that had to be made.

A few more details that just were icing on the cake....an Anglo that could actually act, David McGinnis as Agus, a good guy gone bad; and Dr. Kang's BFF was a wheelchair user.

The soundtrack was great and many of the songs became popular among fans.

Unlike many dramas that start and end well but sag in the middle, this drama kept the plot going through all 16 episodes. It was very enjoyable to watch and I'd put it on the desert island short list, those I'd watch if I had a limited supply to take to a desert island. Because who knows...someone might actually film a drama there!

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I remember I started watching this drama (the first time) because of Mizushima Hiro, after I had seen him in the movie "Drop" I was attracted to his unique acting skills and personality; much like Satoshi Ohno, it seems as if Mizushima Hiro disappears in to the character he is playing. Although, as soon as I started watching, I became completely distracted by Kimura Takuya. The way he played Tsukumo Ryusuke was amazing! All the quirks, mannerisms, attitudes, behaviors, and personalities he brought to the character himself was fantastic to watch. I absolutely loved the way he laughed out loud, talked about brain science, and how he interacted with the other characters/actors. It was also great to see all the guest actors for each episode! Gackt, Sato Takeru, Kamenashi Kazuya, Sugimoto Tetta, Abe Ryohei, Kimura Tae.... And so much more!! I wish a lot more dramas did this. I also wish Mr. Brain had lots more episodes, a second season, a movie, a special episode... it was way too great of a drama to just end at 8 episodes. Also, since I'm writing this review after I re-watched this drama, I now know who a few of the actors are (Kagawa Teruyuki, Shiho, Shitara Osamu, Ichikawa Ebizo) so it was great to watch them! I would definitely recommend this to someone who is just starting out with foreign/Japanese dramas; or someone who likes to laugh or who likes detective dramas!

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Descendants of the Sun is defiantly a must watch of the the season just because it honestly is that great. Right of the bat on episode 1 it had tons of action that will for sure catch your attention. This was the 1st military themed drama that i have ever watched & now i just cant seem to get enough of it. The story was amazing because it didn't really have any non interesting parts that some dramas have & the story was very interesting through out & had me wanting episode after episode but sadly i had to wait for episodes to be released lol. The acting was very well done. The music was top notch it has got to be one of the best soundtracks that I've ever heard out of all of the dramas that I've seen. The relationship between the actors was great with bits of humor that just really added to making this even more perfect. I would highly recommend this to anyone who is either a drama addict or someone who is just getting into kdramas; whether you are into action, romance, medical themed, or just eye candy that can act very well this drama has it all.

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