Reviews

Surprise hidden gem with a polarizing male lead

Being a working mom of 3 whose free time is sparse, I watch dramas purely for entertainment value. Does a drama need to be high budget or have well-known actors to appeal to me? Of course not. This drama was not even on my radar as I was trying (and failing) to watch The Last Immortal. I rarely ever complete a historical/fantasy C-drama as I almost always lose interest and anything with more than 24 episodes is too long for me. In fact, I cannot remember the last wuxia/xianxia that I've ever watched from beginning to end without a whole lot of fast-forwarding. The last historical drama I watched in its entirety was The Imperial Coroner. Under the Power and Maiden Holmes are also favorites of mine so I guess I lean towards mystery dramas with romance. After reading some comments, I decided to give it a try as I did not like either versions of Sword and Fairy that were out and looking for something new to watch. And I am so glad I did! This review will be long, sorry.

Story: Nothing new here as it seems there are a lot of dramas about the female lead transmigrating into a book. I was hooked after the amazing opening scene. It was enthralling and straight to the point and had me rooting for the 'villain', Ji Chu. His cold stare, arrogant strut towards the throne and smirk immediately made him my favorite character. In fact, his character was so great that the actor's sometimes rather wooden acting almost didn't matter. The actor, Ding Ze Ren, was pretty great when he sparred with our Fl but he needs improvement during sad scenes but I'll cut him some slack because he's fairly green. He has a lot of potential, though. Anyway, back to the story. The mysteries were nicely woven into the main plot and all the characters, including small side ones, had an important part to play. The reveal of the real big bad was a surprise. In fact, I was kept guessing a lot throughout the drama, especially Secretary Du being a bad guy. I really did not expect that!

Acting/Cast: Song Yiren nailed her character. She was smart, cute, silly but not overly to the point of obnoxious. I wish they hadn't dubbed her voice because I like her real voice. She and Ding Ze Ren had good onscreen chemistry which is always a deal-breaker for me. If the leads don't have chemistry, I tend to get bored and drop a show. Thank goodness, they did. In fact, their bickering in the beginning had me laughing a lot. Of course, once the ML fell first and made it clear his pursuit of the FL, I was left swooning and squealing. The bathtub scene, the 'child-bearing pill' scene, the real first kiss scene, the 'forced kiss', and of course, the unexpectedly short, sweet and hot bed scene. That's how you show so little but make it suggestive, people! They had so many more scenes in between, too. Like, from the very beginning, the FL touched Ji Chu a lot. And he's a germaphobe yet he let her touch him all the time...so many cute moments. I can go on and on but please, do yourself a favor and watch it yourself.

Pros: I have to give some kudos to the beautiful sets and costumes. Never have I seen such memorable outfits, especially for the ML. The colors and hair styling really suited him. He and the FL also had a lot of complementing couple's outfits which was nice. The music was also great...the ending ost is on repeat for me.

Cons: I wish they had cut the whole arch with the little emperor and his sister and given us one whole episode of the leads being in the modern world. I knew that would be the ending but was hoping for longer than a 1 minute of them just meeting each other.

Overall, while this drama is not perfect, it's perfect for me because it held my attention, made me laugh, smile, and cry. In the end, it had everything I love and it'll be hard for me to move past Ji Chu and Hua Qing Ge's love story.

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Smart main leads

This is a nice drama to watch if you like fantasy genre, action and having strong and smart leads who are on top of things and are always together supporting each other. I like how fl are cold at first but changes after meeting ml and becomes more friendly as she make friends. The sfl is not annoying and has her own love line even though at first she has feeling for ml. It's a watchable drama but can be draggy when drama doesn't focus on the main leads and their friends. Xukai was great as dongbo xueying, his perseverance and strength of conviction is admirable in the face of hardship and his drive to rescue his mother. This has some very good kiss scenes between the leads, xukai and gulli nazha are good kissers.

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A subtle, feminist show

Had a drop in quality towards the end, but the last episode redeemed it. The message was consistently strong (but cleverly subtle in its delivery): this is a show about female emancipation and self-determination. This message elevates it from fluff fantasy to meaningful storytelling.

The lead actors deliver 10/10 in terms of acting, but the villains fall flat, with uninspired motivations. The true “villain” in the show is patriarchy and social conventions derived from patriarchal norms so that partially explains it, but suspension of disbelief is required from the viewer to put up with their brainless, illogical actions.

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Really good is u like a good cute drama

I loved this drama a lot it’s cute has a nice storyline and the actors as expected of Esther and Ding Yuxi are absolutely amazing they could not hv done a better job. The eps itself were just the right amount and perf to binge.
Only complaints would generally be with a few things in the plot this is spoiling so if u hvnt seen yet just letting u k
I hated the fact ml best friend liked fl eventually as well that really irritated me as not only did it put strain on their relationship the fl obvs seeing ml friend as an idol of hers didn’t see much about going to get coffee or stuff with him if it came to work stuff which sort of developed to normal life which I didn’t quite like as it made ml feel jealous and annoyed I think if they just didn’t put the best friend liking her and everything if would hv took out a lot of the aggravation I had during the drama. Another would be the annoyance that the ml did not tell fl that he is her online best friend it was so annoying and could hv been admitted much earlier which would hv cause much more cuteness and closeness between them.
I wish there were more cute scenes of them but not too much to like a sickening point since it did lack a bit of it however I truly loved this drama and would rewatch some eps defo hope u guyz enjoy ❤️

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Important messages throughout

The cast did an excellent job of portraying their characters
Yu Sen's story is by far the best as it is simple yet elegant and loved how it was a chance encounter with Yueh. The scene at the funeral was just well done as it showed passion but also hurt. Is it just me or was the grandma watching them?
Would've loved a bit more screen time for his story.
The youngest was relatable but remember if you are getting inappropriate messages or trolling go to the police. I feel she discovers who she really is as you can't love others without loving yourself.
She sometimes bottled problems up which is never good.
A married couple the husband needed more communication on his side. The wife was interesting especially when she went on the retreat to understand her body but glad they learned what they really wanted through the tests.

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Crazy, but Fun

Like the title of this review, Only Friends was crazy, but fun. There's a LOT of drama, but that's the whole point of the show. If you're looking for a gentle, sweet, kiss-on-the-cheek drama, check out 2gether or something like that. This show is NOT for the people wanting the innocent first love story. This show is meant for the people that want the drama that comes with boys that are capital M - messy!

Story:
I gave the storyline an 9.0 instead of a 10.0 because there were so many misunderstandings. Don't get me wrong, I love me a good misunderstanding, but it felt like there was a point where the only drama for every couple was the a misunderstanding arc. Use it once or twice, but don't keep reusing it in the same fashion for every couple. Communication is key!
I will say, the ending was pretty good and the way that the characters reacted to things was fairly understandable/reasonable for their characterization. This is to say that the reactions may not have been reasonable in a modern IRL setting for an everyday person, but for the characters and their stories, the reactions and motives were fairly on point.

Acting:
First/Khaotung were amazing as always. Their chemistry is OUTSTANDING. I loved them in The Eclipse and I loved them here. They were messy messy, but they were real in a way that I appreciate. Sand stayed firm in his boundaries and Ray learned how to see himself through Sand's eyes leading him to loving himself more than he had in the past.

Give it a go if you're looking for a far more mature series (and you're not afraid of a little mess.)

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Okay, but Not Incredible

There have been worse, there have been better. I feel like that sums up the story.

Overall, the story isn't bad. The cinematography is nice and JoongDunk do have nice chemistry with each other. Other than that, nothing to write home about. It wasn't overtly unique, but it was a decent watch.

I didn't regret watching it, but I think I would like to see how these MLs do with a more mature script. Maybe it's because the college/high school arc is getting old, but I'd love to see Thai dramas in general move forward out of the school era.

Overall: Decent watch, but not life-altering.

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This is the best gift you can give to yourself

I loved this story so deeply, it melted my heart completely. I loved every single caracter. For once there is a story that talk about profund love not in a romantic way, just lost people that need someone who belives in them and been there where in needs. Just kindness, compassion and trusting, first for ourselves, against the hardness of life. This is a gift for everybody, reminding us that everyone needs a second chance, that nothing is set on a stone and that is possible to love and be loved in very significant way, even if the one who give it to us is not related neither by blood nor from long time friendship or age.

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New standard!

Totally exceeded my expectations! K-bl starting to lose its spark last year, everything just goes downhill after the eighth sense and our dating sim released, because those two became the standard, the bar is so HIGH, making other series is nothing compared to them. BUT! Love for love's sake is just so good, it surpassed the bar! Or even better, they raising the bar!

The only minus from this series is its duration. It's too short for delivering such a complex storyline. The series itself is already good but there's still some confusing part like the explanation of why myung ha got transferred to game world, sang won's feeling development towards myung ha, and also who's that person that myung ha called 'sunbae'. It feels like everything just floating around without proper explanation.

If only they make it longer.. 10 episodes would be perfect! At least they got another ±50 minutes to explain it more thoroughly.

But overall, it's good. it's MORE than good actually. So so so good. 2024 k-bls after LFLS are gonna STRUGGLE bc the bar once again has been lifted higher than last time!

For the acting, i don't have anything to complain! Total superb. Also hands down to the casting staff, they choose the perfect myung ha and yeo woon!

Lee Taevin potrayed Myung Ha so perfectly! The emotions reach me thru the screen! I can feel how frustrated and sad myung ha is! His eyes just speaks! Very good acting!

Cha Joowan.. i— i am so satisfied with him as Yeo Woon. His acting is so good! He's just soooo precious like he can deliver how vulnerable yeo woon can be when he's around myung ha. And not to mention how puppy he is T_T

My favorite scene is totally when he begs.

Oh, also, i LOVE the little kisses T_T on the lips, on the cheek, I love all! It's so cute +_+ and for the REAL kiss, it's an easy top 5 best kiss of entire K-BL kiss. I don't actually want to mention this but, the way yeo woon smile in between their kiss is justtt givee a bit more flavor to the kissing scene itself and I've been crazy about it for these past few days!! They ate, totally ate.

That's it for me!

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Romantic, sweet, angsty, just pure perfection wrapped up in a series

What I found the most interesting is that there are essentially 2 main couples. I had originally thought the past cpl would just be simple flashbacks, but the series actually shows the development of their whole relationship, and it was so endearing yet incredibly sad at the same time. I was crying buckets all the time for them.

The main couple is just adorable, who doesn't love an ML who's loyal and graceful only to his bf, and MC who's just the cutest with the most adorable smile in the world!! I love the similarities between the past and current couple, the mirrors and links were executed perfectly. ML was the one being chased in the past life, but this time he was the one chasing MC, MC can be shy at times but also brave as a lion when he wants to. The cause-and-effects were done perfectly, especially the last episode really made me cry my heart out.

The overwhelming feeling whenever they remember their past lives, was really vivid, and I applaud the actors for their amazing performances. And sibling love really does transcend even time, the grandma scenes made me super emotional!! And I especially like how the parents aren't the typical antagonists (both the current and past life ones), we see how the past parents had actually loved their children, they didn't want this tragedy to happen.

Truly one of the most spectacular written BL series, there's the perfect amount of romance, that doesn't need to be shown through explicit scenes.

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Dont bother it's a waste of time!

Uuh, this was bad. On surfice it's had a cutesy vibe but it's seriously lacking and undeveloped. There were very few things I liked. The story could have had potential, but in the end, it was just disappointing and a bit cliché.The one thing I liked was when the rich main intrest  said love should be on equal footing that the other guy can't live for his dream that he need to find his own and that the other guy loving him so much made him so uncomfortable. I didn't think they would acknowledge it, but I am glad they did.

The curly guy made me uncomfortable too; his entire personality was liking this guy, and they gave him this tragic backstory (as a sympathy card? like the guy would pity him or something? To be clear I have noting against sad backstories or childhoods as long as it one more think that will make us understand this character more not when it's his only personality trait or when it done to not make him "boring" or whatever or even worser to excuse the actions of the present ugh)
They made him so pitiful and sad but even worse is that he took so many liberties by pushing his feelings on the rich guy (I don't remember their names). The show portrayed it as cute and cheeky, but it really wasn't why you would want somebody you don't like to constantly try to kiss you and touch you (hold your hand or caress your back while you are bathing, etc.); it would make me super uncomfortable.Also, the story had some major plot holes, like how he was able to earn money for living alone and going to high school and college by just delivering milk? He gets smacked around so much by the mob on the face and doesn't come to school all swollen and bruised up. Coome on
I won't even talk about the rich main lead his personality is non existant all we know is that he is rich, rude as fuck, and that he is some bugs hot runner that has a problem with pacing lol.
The romance was just awkward, and let's not mention the rich guy was angry this dude left how does he deal with it? He fucking hits him like, what the absolute fuck? That is not how you deal with problems or your emotions.  Who thought that was an okay action, especially in 2020? I can't even

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Destined is a great historical romantic “comedy”. It is a drama with stellar actors that did a great job bringing their characters to life. There are usual twisted palace antic, great action scenes, striking cinematography, remarkable friendships, and a strong, beautiful and steadfast slow burned romance for the leading couple. Although their great romantic scenes are at episodes 27 and 28 only, the leading couple oozed phenomenal chemistry every time they were together, even when they were bickering, just looking at each other, or planning their next strategic move. This drama might seem not well done for individuals that were looking for a great factual based historical drama with no plot holes, but for those looking for a drama on a leading couple who are perfect match in mind and spirit with great values and deep love for family, friends, and their countryman, this drama offers all of that in a very satisfying way and entertaining way, Enjoy it!

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An average drama with a seriously annoying male lead

I do love a drama about gods and demons and so on. At first glance this appeared to tick the boxes, but then it fell into the predictable cliches TVB employs.

I usually find Brian Tse pretty bland to watch, almost like wallpaper paste or window dressing that is just a white veil. Nothing offensive but nothing outstanding, he is just there. However, this is a perfect match for his role as an immortal because the expected mannerisms of Lu Dong Bin just somehow compliments his acting method tremendously well. I found myself quite enjoying him in this role and I never thought I would say that. Predictably, the moment he was introduced with all his magical powers, TVB had to take them away so that the drama could last 20 episodes instead of being sorted in a single one, but the way he loses his powers was by his beard getting set on fire. That made no sense, why would his magical powers be tied to his beard? That’s like working out and getting all these muscles but one day losing your physique because somebody shaved your pubic hair.

Erica Chan is okay. So far - 7 episodes in - I do not have any lasting impression of her. The actress can be pretty good as she was one of the standout female characters of that TCM drama, but here she is just… there. I don’t hate her character but I feel like she lack the main female lead charisma needed to carry the show.

And then we have the most annoying character in the show played by Danny Hung. Man, he is a swindler here but he spends most of it constantly acting like a brash childish idiot screaming at Brian Tse the entire time. Brian has amazing patience as he accepts being shouted at but I just found myself hating Danny the more I watched the drama. It is not really Danny’s acting since he was great in the TCM drama, it was just that his role was so poorly written. He has two modes so far: throwing himself into a jealous outburst whenever anybody even comes close to Erica, or acting all high and noble as everybody thinks his is an immortal. His character was also written so stupidly, because he backstory was that he really believed in Lu Dong Bin as a child, but one day people came over to his house demanding his grandfather paid his debt due to his grandfather’s gambling habit. He prayed to Lu Dong Bin for help but Lu never came, and so he doesn’t believe in the gods and uses it to swindle people. Like his grandfather brought it on himself, how could he blame it on the gods? He should have blamed his grandfather for gambling with no abandon.

In any case, let’s see how this progresses. I never thought Brian Tse would be this dramas’ saving grace but there you go.

Update: yet another filler drama from TVB that just disappoints. We get the demon as I was hoping for but unfortunately it was introduced too late to really matter. So a “hidden treasure map” is introduced mid-way into the drama, leading to Danny discovering the map to it and finding a magical hairpin. Yes, of all things, it is a magical hairpin stuck inside a rock face. Danny removes it and discovers he can do magical feats with it, but at the cost of his health every time he uses it. It turns out that Brian’s godly Lu Dong Bin fought a demonic Pangolin that had 1000 years of magical training so was highly formidable so was unable to beat it. To help him, Erica - who was then a fairy - stole the Queen Mother of the West’s hairpin in order to give it to Brian and aid him in his fight against the Pangolin. The Queen Mother discovers this and was very upset about this not because she stole the hairpin, but because Erica fell in love with Brian (oh no) so she is punished to suffer 10 cycles of life to let go of her love. Meanwhile, Brian managed to defeat the Pangolin with the hairpin because of all the moisturiser that rubbed off on it from the Queen Mother’s head, but not enough to kill it completely but only seal him within the mountain as long as the L’Oreal hairpin stayed in there.

Danny was an annoying anus all the way until the end. He does something really heroic at the end despite learning it would likely kill him and he ends up in heaven facing the King of Heaven, but he spends the entire time disrespecting someone this important, but the King Of Heaven is really easygoing. The King of Heaven later offers Danny the chance to study and train to become a god, but Danny declines it (wtf?) The final episodes forces Danny and Erica together and I feel that it was undeserved because for 19 episodes Erica was pining after Brian, who as a god could not reciprocate her feelings. Then, out of the blue, Erica suddenly cares about Danny and then boom, they get together. No. It was totally unearned.

Again, Brian is the only redeeming feature of this drama. I liked his acting here but it is not enough for me to rewatch this in the future. Just Danny’s character in this was enough for me to never touch this again.

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Sweet, light and surprisingly healthy drama

This was a nice surprise. It's a pretty light hearted drama, even though it does touch on the topic of mental illness. It's actually the first time I've seen this topic portrayed in such a healthy, positive light in a cdrama and it was heartwarming to see.

Highlights:
- healthy, natural relationship between main couple. It's more innocent like, but it's very cute and their interactions didn't feel forced.
- the display of healthy male friendship
- the suuuuuper rare healthy family dynamics, specially from the FL's side
- the lack of super duper evil villain or unnecessary over the top angst

Could have been better:
- it does lack a bit of punch for my persornal taste, buuuut I don't think it was the original intention of the drama anyways

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Came for the plot, stayed for everything

I just want to start off by saying that comedy thrillers are always very hit and miss for me as it's quite hard to put the comedy element into a serial killer series well however this drama genuinely had very good execution.

Story:
Did they drag out the mystery plot a bit? Yes. However did I carry on watching it anyway? Yes. The characters are very likeable, their relationships are dynamic, well paced and interesting and the thriller element kept me hooked all the way through. I did genuinely laugh while watching this drama and the cinematography is gorgeous. The storylines and backgrounds for all the characters are important and realistic enough to be relatable. The idea of a girl developing superpowers and working with a detective to solve a serial killing case sounds a bit mad but they did a good job. They worked the supernatural element in very well and this also helped the cinematography as well. The romance is also really sweet and nice however 2nd lead was my endgame.

Acting:
I want to praise the acting in this series a lot. The comedic community was portrayed very well and every actor fitted their role very well. The main leads were particularly good as they showed nice adaptability with the sad and intense scenes whilst containing their contagious cheerful personas. The male lead did his portrayal of an outsider city detective well and had a good balance of likeability but also slight annoyance when he went against our favourite side characters. The actors also all did a good job of being possible culprits which meant you could never fully trust who you thought it was. I truly love the atmosphere of this drama.

Rewatch?
Overall I would say it's 100% worth watching but I don't think I'll revisit anytime soon. In the future I may want to be able to see the cute less dramatic features of this drama again but I think parts of the plot are quite generic or forgettable. It's nice and watchable but not something I'll spend too much time thinking about.

I also want to side note that the intro and outro music is very good and I really liked it so I'm now going to go find out who sings it and what the song is haha. I know I've praised the cinematography already but it truly is amazing. Solid 8/10 for this drama as it kept me hooked all the way through :)

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