Reviews

Surprisingly sweet and stress-free watch.

I don't usually decide to watch modern Chinese dramas because the ones I've seen before have disappointed me, but Hidden Love was completely different—and honestly, it made me feel lonely AF *help* but amazing recommendation from my friend.

I went into this with almost zero expectations. School-themed dramas usually tend to be overly childish, exaggerated and often infantilize the female lead. There were no unnecessarily stressful characters or forced drama, which made the whole viewing experience truly enjoyable from start to finish. Why not a perfect 10/10? Simply because the male lead was TOO perfect and honestly, that just annoyed me, haha! Nobody in real life can compete with that standard.

Overall, it’s a deeply comforting, beautiful story with a very satisfying happy ending. Highly recommended if you want a feel-good romance that actually respects your peace of mind!

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Worse and worse by the episode..

I don't even know where to begin. I've never written a review before but I just had to in the middle of an episode because this is just absolutely ridiculous. I went into this blind and enjoyed the first 10 episodes or so, after that it already started to feel a bit boring to me, but i kept going since I was interested in knowing how our main couple would end up. These last few episodes I've constantly been laughing at how ridiculous this drama is. Oh and not to mention I find both the FL and ML so insufferable in this show so I guess they did a good job on acting.

I wish I stopped watching before this absolute horrendous ''love story'' happened. I'ts just nothing but grabbing our FL by the throat, pushing her up against walls and forcefully kissing her. AND TELL ME WHY THE ML IS JUST CONSTANTLY MAD? I'm genuenly curious about whos watching this and thinking: ''These are the sweet moments we've all been waiting for!!'' because what about this relationship is even remotely okay to literally anyone. Toxic slop with no communication.

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Pick me relaoded

How is this drama popular!? the depiction of the tennage girl as an airhead who was boy crazy was annoying but still tolerable but when the adult Xiao Xi continued to show the same traits, i got very upset. Both the male and female characters made no positive improvements. The male lead remained entitled and often belitled her while she seemed grateful to be the ''chosen one''. Change the background music and forward this story to them being together for 10 yrs with this same dynamic and it will become clearly apparent, how dangerous such a relationship can be. Anyway, this was one of those dramas that needed me to switch of my brain to enjoy it but i guess i took it too seriously.

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Can the step-sibling era end soon?

Started off strong but in between it dragged a lot. Their younger arc was good, but when they grew up and sometimes called eo “siblings”, it made me uncomfortable to watch. I loved officers zhao’s wife smmmmm- she is so pretty!!! Sad that she got less screen time:(( Her death was heartbreaking. Moving on to fl’s mother, what she was doing all her life, for survival while neglecting her child. At the same time fl not wanting to see her mother, i kind of understand both of them. Fl mom was not wrong trying to settle and survive, Fl is also not wrong for wanting to be acknowledged. :)

Overall it was a good watch with predictable story line. 6/10!

I loved MJ character, ZJY portrayed her emotions well. SWL was hot asf.

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A Cast of Thousands and Nearly as Many Plotlines

Three friends were separated by circumstances as children. Baili Dong Jun was haunted by his friend's unjust death and in true adolescent rebellion rejected his father's guidance and sought his own way of life, even though he was coddled and much beloved. Ye Ding Zhi, whose military father won too many battles and gained too many accolades and had to be contained by the Emperor by false accusations of treason, had escaped his family's massacre and grew up on the run. Yi Wen Jun was the pawn of her sect: to gain favor and power, she was offered to the Emperor's son in marriage even though she'd been promised to Ye Ding Zhi when they were children.

The Good:
• Hou Ming Hao suited the role of the dashing Liquor Diety. His exuberance, friendship, and loyalty never diminished.
• He Yu was excellent in the role of a man pushed beyond his limits.
• The camaraderie of the wuxia world was enjoyable.

The Bad:
• With so many characters (MDL says the cast had 212 members), I had a hard time figuring out who was whom and if I'd seen them before or if they were new.
• I know I'm supposed to admire Prince Langya, but he was an enabler of horrible things all coated with the false respectability of doing it for the greater good. I will allow that he held the same standard for himself, so he wasn't a hypocrite. But he was wrong. Enabling evil, even with the best of intentions, only strengthens evil and brings ruin upon the innocent.
• After Baili Dong Jun got the girl of his dreams, she was relegated to the role of arm candy in the drama. I wanted her to match him in terms of strategy and determination instead of sitting passively in a pretty white dress.

I couldn't decide on whether to put Yi Wen Jun in the good or bad category. I despised her even while sympathizing her predicament. Without her, there wouldn't have been much of a story, but it would have been a happier one. She was a self-centered coward, but she was a powerless pawn.

I added a half star for the character of free-wheeling, loyal Baili Dong Jun as portrayed by Hou Ming Hao. (Because he reminds me of my departed cat. Hey, it's my rating—I can be capricious.)

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Will turn you into a man-hater

The tragic portrayal of the reality of living as a consort in the emperor's harem. No matter your beauty or skill, a man in the ultimate seat of power is not one to be trusted.

It was refreshing to see a drama that chooses to paint the supposed ML, the emperor in a negative light. It was not a story of romance, but survival. His favor was not a reward but poison.

This is truly a story of female friendships. Ruyi's love towards her fellow sister-wives were definitely more tear-jerking than that bitchass king. I cannot put into words how much I hate that man. That childish, egotistic man. I wished Ruyi never showed up to the wife selection to be saved from that very long and painful journey in front of her. She did not deserve the ending that she got.

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Comedic Trash: TayNew Deserve better

I watched this for TayNew, but it just wasn’t enough
The beginning was so strong and promising, but it fell off around ep 4, then it just became almost unbearable to watch and uninteresting.

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The Story: the plot follows a flight attendant, Kanit (New) and a rescuer / EMT/ Paramedic Toto (Tay). They repeated bump into each other and at first find each other annoying. Then one day, by chance, they both fly to the same place and their luggage gets swapped, and Toto ends up in trouble for starting a fight and ruining Kanit’s expensive belongings. Kanit agrees to pay for the damages and Toto can work it off. Toto becomes a “sort-of servant” and does tasks for Kanit to work off the debt. Toto discovers that Kanit’s pilot boyfriend of 4 years, Lion is cheating on Kanit with another flight attendant Veha. Toto works to prove that Lion is cheating and exposes him, but develops feelings along the way. Kanit, heartbroken has to relearn what love means to him and if he wants to risk it again for Toto. The two eventually confess to each other and become a couple, only to face issues with money and family, testing their love and willingness to fight for and be with each other. Overall, the main couple started off interesting, but quickly became lackluster and no longer interesting, following the same rich/poor dividing mindset between the characters and need to live up to parental expectations. In my opinion (coming from an Asian person), parent’s opinion are given more weight than they deserve to. There cat and mouse / dog and cat game also became boring, don’t really know what the direction of their relationship was meant to be.

Now onto the side couple. Honestly, they were completely uncessary to this series. This is in no way hate to the actors. There visuals and chemistry are good together, but the characters they played weren’t necessary. I hated how this couple started. The story follows Toto’s friend and coworker Akki and Veha, same side piece as before. Akki hates cheaters because his ex girlfriend cheats on him, but he ends up with a side piece / cheater. Although Veha himself isn’t the cheater, he is cheater adjacent. They somehow develop feelings for each other after learning they went to high school or college together (forgot which one). Once Lion was exposed, Veha all of a sudden felt sorry and sad huh??? Like you were with a taken person hoping that they would break up, but now that it’s exposed now you no longer want Lion and are sad at the situation. Akki helps Veha get past Lion and they get together.
Honestly their story was confusing and not needed at all. Their ending was even more confusing??? Don’t know why they made Akki go to military and split them up, but whatever.

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The good: the only decent thing about this series was TayNew’s chemistry. Despite the weak and ridiculous plot, their chemistry shown through and was always a pleasure to see them together. Their acting was as good as can be given the script / plot.

The bad: As I mentioned before. basically (unfortunely), the storyline of the side couple. I didn’t like it and it wasn’t necessary. (already talked about this)

Toto’s job location made no sense to me. This might be because I live in the US and accustomed to our first responder system. But what exactly is Toto’s job? Is he a first responder? Is he a rescuer? Ambulance driver? Paramedic? Whatever it is, why does it always seem like him and his team is always lying around doing nothing, no incoming emgency responses, and the only ones they respond to in the show are the ones where basically they start happening by coincidence in front of them. Like if Toto is a first responder or something adjacent he should be just as busy or if not busier than Kanit, but he always seems to have time on his hands to pursue Kanit and work his hand full of odd side jobs.
***this could be entirely my misunderstanding of his job and what he does***

Next, while I understand that Kanit is a flight attendant and Toto is whatever he is, why do they have to include ‘emergency scenes’ (not really tho) to bring them together. Like I don’t understand why they had to deliver a woman’s child in the backseat of a car, why Kanit dealt with a fainting or whatever situation in the sky or whatever that incident was at the end during their I wanna say wedding (honestly don’t know because I sort of blanked out during the last ep). For me, if they wanted to include those scenes, I was hoping they would do a better job and made it seem realistic, but alas it’s GMMTV, so you know, we got whatever. No urgency, no idea what they are really doing, and not really the appropriate response. :(
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As you can see from the good v. bad paragraphs, my overall rating is a 5.5/10. ………don’t really know what could have have this show better, but it just wasn’t good.

Honestly I wouldn’t recommend this series or rewatch this series ever. I feel so bad for TayNew, but they definitely deserved a better series given their chemistry and acting skills.

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Good thing the acting is good.

I don't know what it is about this series, but every 20 minutes felt like an hour. I watched this at 1.5 & 2X speed, and it still felt like it took forever to get through. I had to do this in season 1 as well, and it had a lot more funny moments.

Also, can I just say that I love that they made Me and Thee a series inside the series? So what we watched was them acting out everything that already happened. I also liked that they inserted the series title and did a callback to We Are at the end.

The acting was really good. I liked the cameos at the end, but it got a bit much; it went from funny to being WAY too dragged out and not funny anymore, then back to funny when we got to PerthSanta. I have to give Junior credit for bringing the crazy. And have Pond & Phuwin's kisses gotten a bit better, or am I imagining things? William's English is so cute. William also did a scary good job making his eyes look "dead" when he was killing the guy who shot Mok. That was the first time I believed anyone in this crazy family is actually part of the mafia.

Now the things I didn't like are actually very few.

1. The fighting looked so fake that it hurt to watch.

2. The side couples. Why was a new one introduced? This show can barely handle the two we had in the first series. I still don't even know if Tawan & Aran are together, which pisses me off. Rome & Mok get a bit more screen time, but it still wasn't enough to make me care about them & at least we get to see a ring on Rome's finger to confirm that they are official. I get that Thee and Peach are the main couple and they are the most important, but this series had more than enough time to give the side characters more development.

3. Throughout both series, I didn't grow attached to any of the characters. Maybe it being a comedy makes it more difficult to really get you emotionally invested; IDK, I just know that I hate coming out of a series and not being sad to say goodbye to any of the characters.

As a sequel, this was good, but it's not one that I will rewatch. The series as a whole I wouldn't rewatch.

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This show confused me.

When I first spun the lucky wheel and landed on Twenty-Five Twenty-One, I was excited. Finally, a romance. After Son: The Guest and Navillera, I was ready for butterflies.

Instead, the show confused me.

Not because it was badly written, but because I couldn’t put a label on the main relationship.

For the longest time, I kept asking: What are they?

They weren’t friends. They weren’t lovers. They weren’t siblings. They weren’t mentor and student. They were somehow all of those things at different moments. Every time I thought I understood them, the show proved me wrong.

The funny thing is… by the end, I realized that was the point.

At first, I understood Baek Yi-jin much more than Na Hee-do. He made sense to me. he was consistent. He loved her long before he admitted it, and when he finally confessed, he didn’t pressure her into returning his feelings. He simply wanted her to know.

Hee-do, on the other hand, was chaos. and that’s an understatement haha.

She cried when he disappeared. She fell asleep listening to his old recordings. She thought about him more than her own boyfriend. She got jealous… the list goes on.

And then she still said she didn’t love him like that when he confessed.

I spent several episodes questioning whether she even knew what she felt. Looking back, I think she didn’t. maybe. She wasn’t lying. She simply hadn’t caught up with her own heart yet.

One of my favorite realizations while watching was that this drama isn’t interested in telling us exactly when friendship becomes love. It treats love like a rainbow. There isn’t a clear line where one color ends and another begins.

Their relationship wasn’t confusing because it was badly written. It was confusing because that’s exactly how real feelings can be.

Then came the kiss. (the first one)

After all my confusion, I finally got butterflies. Only for Yi-jin to immediately panic afterward. I remember wanting to scream at my screen.

“YOU confessed first! Why are you acting like this now?!”

But that became one of the show’s greatest strengths.

Neither of them handled love perfectly.

Yi-jin’s instinct whenever things became difficult was to pull away because he believed distance would protect the person he loved.

Hee-do’s instinct was the opposite.

The hardest part of the drama wasn’t watching them fall in love. It was watching them slowly stop being able to reach each other.

it kind of broke me. Because love hadn’t disappeared. It simply wasn’t enough to bridge the distance anymore.

I understood Yi-jin’s job. I even defended him for a long time. I saw how much becoming a reporter changed him. He couldn’t even grieve properly because news didn’t stop happening around him. His work demanded everything from him.

But I also understood Hee-do.

She grew up with a mother who always chose work first. She promised herself she would never build a relationship that made her feel that lonely again.

That’s why their breakup worked for me. They never stopped loving each other. They just couldn’t keep asking each other to live with a kind of loneliness that neither of them deserved.

The moment Yi-jin applied for New York without telling her beforehand was the point where I stopped defending him.

it wasn’t wrong to take that apportunity but he should’ve communicated first. he asked her to understand him without trying to do the same. it was hard for both of them. I know.

One thing I appreciated about the show is that it never turned either of them into the villain. They were simply two people growing into adults whose lives demanded different things from them.

That hurts more than if someone had cheated or fallen out of love. in my opinion.

Outside the romance, this drama shines just as brightly.

Hee-do and Yu-rim’s relationship is just as beautiful. I cried so much during Yu-rim’s storyline. (If I went into details I’d write an essay lol)

Hee-do’s relationship with her mother frustrated me, but it was also painfully realistic. By the end, I understood both of them.

The secondary couple made me kick my feet like a schoolgirl whenever they appeared. They were the perfect balance to the emotional heaviness of the main story. it also shows a diffrent side of a first love.

By the end, I realized: This story was never just about Yi-jin and Hee-do.

It’s about friendship.

It’s about chasing impossible dreams.

It’s about hard work.

It’s about the people who shape us.

It’s about parents and children misunderstanding each other.

It’s about growing up.

And most of all…

It’s about first love. Not the kind that necessarily lasts forever. The kind that changes who you are forever.

The title itself says everything.

Twenty-Five Twenty-One isn’t the age they stayed. It’s the age they were happiest together.

Some chapters of our lives aren’t meant to be the whole book. They’re meant to become the reason we are who we are.

I started this drama expecting a romance. I finished it with something much bigger than that.

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Story if a Girl a Genius girl Lin Zhixia full of life lesson not cringe ,you'll cry and laugh

What i like about this drama.Well it nit your typical romance drama trope .Its well written, well directed ,I Salute for the creative team behind .Prepare yourself to get hooked on the storyline its very addictive tive you csnt stop watching .Lin Zhixia character and Jiang Yubai os focus on mutual respect ,Uplifting partnership.It discard toxic relationships so this will not give you stress as an audience.Tian xiwei as Lin Zhixia give life to Lin Zhixia she can be innocent, sad ,genius and freaking hilarious 😂. Overall is gives you warm , youll also cry amd laugh out loudfor real almost all episodes the comedy is freaking amazing.Not cringe all all

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Good effort, but falls short in many places.

The premise of the drama is good, it starts off well and intriguing, but the problems start showing on pretty early. It is a K-bl, so I did not expect it to be long at all, but even the run time that it has is not utilized well, sometimes things happen without motivation. For a crime drama there is barely any set up at times to many things, things just somehow fall into place at the right time, there is no background or introduction to substantial evidence, things just suddenly click and boom crime solved.

Even on the relationship side it is lacking, they start off as sex partners but then suddenly start liking each other, and Taeson goes from hating Chaeha to suddenly liking him, we are not shown any reason as to why he would start liking him. Taeson says he does not hate Chaeha anymore because he is already miserable enough, but that is still not reason enough to start liking someone. And Chaeha liking Taeson also makes no sense because Taeson had been an absolute ass to him since the beginning.

The characters also feel hollow at times, Chaeha is always the damsel in distress and Taeson is the prince charming who almost always saves him. Chaeha is also stupidly resilient abuse and does not know how to stand for himself at times. Taeson is also super problematic, and forcefully kisses Chaeha the very first time, something that everyone seems to just glance over. The dialogue also feels incredibly shallow at times, not just between the leads but overall with all characters.

The ending also made absolutely no sense, the last scene felt like it was out of a romcom rather than a crime heavy genre, it also went completely off the aesthetics the drama followed in all the other scenes.

Complains aside, there were a few things I did appreciate. Like the effort to atleast dive into the crime genre (something that is not easy to execute, and often requires lots of efforts to be well done) with the small budget and run time that K-bls ususally have, so it was a good first try and I hope to see more K-bls in similar genres. Secondly the opening was also pretty well made. The setting and cinematography were also pretty well done, I like the darkness in the atmosphere throughout the drama, the gloomy weather, dark interiors, gave the heaviness of a crime show.

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Korean BL steps up its game and redefines the thriller genre with The Prosecutor’s Proposal, a series that boldly breaks away from industry clichés. Moving past the usual school or office tropes, it takes a risk with a dark, mature, high-tension murder mystery that grips you from the very first minute.

Key Highlights

A Tragic, Intricate Plot: The narrative centers on a brutal murder from 15 years ago, reconnecting two men marked by history, the victim's son and the accused killer's son. Reunited years later as a prosecutor and an investigator, they are forced to uncover a web of corruption while confronting their own past demons.

Electrifying Performances & Chemistry: Park Si-woo (Chae Ha) and Yoon Do-gun (Tae Seon) deliver masterclass performances. Years of lingering pain and social stigma ground their resentment, making the friction between them raw and palpable. Their chemistry jumps off the screen; emotional tension builds at a slow burn through every shared glance and confrontation without ever overshadowing the core police investigation.

Flawless Production Value: The cinematography stands out with its sleek aesthetics and dynamic pacing that keeps the suspense sharp throughout.

A Mature Balance: It expertly strikes the sweet spot between a complex crime investigation and mature, organic moments of intimacy.

The Prosecutor’s Proposal doesn't just raise the bar for Korean BL productions, it stands as an absolute must-watch for fans of suspense stories packed with high-stakes emotional and romantic drama.

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