Moon Lovers: Scarlet Heart Ryeo

this drama was unfair to everyone

For the first time in my history of watching drama I do not regret the tragic ending of this drama or whatever ending u might call it .
kdrama writers would literally do anything so that the FL would love and only end up with the ML even if it means turning a completely good person into a villain to achieve that, this can be seen in the case of the 8th prince, wook and hae Soo , in case people would say I'm bias, I'll let u know that except from IU, I do not know any other person in this drama,
The drama just messed up, Soo loved wook up until episode 10 out of a total of 20 episodes and all of a sudden due to some poorly executed reason she fell out of love and then loved the 4th prince, how do they expect us as the viewers to take that, why can't writers be creative and different for once.
if you are a person that watches drama, u would have known write from the 1st episode that it's the mysterious and cold person that the FL would fall for at the end, but the writers decided to go in circles before that
let's not forget how she has relationship with each of the princes,poor 14th prince why did she have to marry him in the 1st place,that's rubbish,also there seems to be some left out stories that could have prevented the unnecessary sidelines to prolong the drama.for me there was no true justification for most of the 4th prince action like threatening Soo to kill the person she initially loved or his hysterical act after becoming king and etc
I would also say that this drama was unfair to every character and also the unnecessary killing and plothole,who didn't die here apart from the main characters?
I would have actually preferred the FL to end up with the 8th prince even with his uncompleted love story
To sum it up I really can't ever think of watching this drama again not because of the ending but because of the storyline

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One of the greatest love stories of all time!!!!

This is sooooooooooooo good!!!!! Top 3 favourite dramas ever!! Be prepared to cry and not be able to think about anything but this show for weeks after finishing it. So good. Phenomenal acting, phenomenal storyline, amazing everything.

I’ve re-watched this show three times now and I still get so affected by it. One episode I’m laughing and smiling so hard my face hurts and the next I am ugly crying in the foetal position on my bedroom floor. And I’m not gonna lie after I finished the series I couldn’t watch anything else for over a week it just lingers in my head.

There has only been one other drama that I feel is on the scale of this drama and that is The Story of Yanxi Palace. So if you enjoyed this show at all I think that you would probably really like The Story of Yanxi Palace.

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A Promise of Greatness That Fades into Tragedy Overload

I had always heard a lot about this drama, and for a long time I postponed watching it, especially knowing it was extremely sad and dramatic. When I finally gave it a chance, I realized that although the beginning had a lot of potential, the way the story was handled really disappointed me.

Up until the death of the 3rd prince, the plot still made sense to me — although I already found his death a bit forced. He was someone who fought so hard for the throne, and then he dies from some unexplained illness, just like his older brother, the crown prince? That felt repetitive and like a wasted narrative arc. From that point on, it seemed like the writers were using any excuse to kill off characters and increase the suffering. There didn’t seem to be a clear purpose anymore — just a string of tragedies with little emotional buildup in between.

The death of Prince Eun, for example, made me cry a lot — it was genuinely heartbreaking. But after that, even with more “emotional” scenes, I couldn’t feel much. It was as if the drama had lost its balance and was relying only on pain to hold the audience’s attention.

As for the main character, played by IU, I thought she was fine, but nothing outstanding. I was expecting much more depth — especially since she was a time traveler. From the very beginning, we see she wakes up in the body of a woman who already existed, with her own life and personality, so different that other characters even comment on how much she had changed. And after that... nothing. No memories of the previous life, no internal conflict, no emotional weight. That identity was completely forgotten, as if it never mattered. That frustrated me a lot, because it was such a great opportunity to explore moral and identity dilemmas.

The same goes for the time travel aspect. The fact that she came from the future was completely underused. The drama never really explored the consequences of that, nor what she could have done with that knowledge. She basically reacts to everything like anyone else would. And when that plot point comes back — in the last episode — it feels rushed, thrown in just to wrap things up. It lacked coherence and follow-through.

In the end, I found the drama slow and dragging in many moments. I felt like it lost its focus as it progressed and relied too heavily on tragedy instead of properly developing what it promised in the beginning. Maybe if I had watched it when I was younger or as my first drama ever, it would have hit me harder. But now, I’d give it a 7/10. Visually, it’s beautiful, it has touching scenes and a great soundtrack, but it fails to deliver what it sets up — especially when it comes to writing, pacing, and developing its own concepts.

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A review in 2021 - This is worth the watch, but ...

The bad:
My review may have some biases, as I am reviewing this drama in 2021. If I watched this drama in 2016, I probably would have given it a 9.5 instead of an 9 but I cannot do that now, and here's the reason why, ignorance is bliss! What I mean by this is nowadays, I loathe toxic male leads, you know, the ones who tell you they are going to kill you one second, and then the next tell you that you belong to them. As much as I wanted to romanticized the female and male lead in this drama, I couldn't because the male lead character screamed toxic, although his acting was on point! BTW, in real life I do believe monarchies were very toxic people, so it's not unreasonable for the characters to exhibit such traits. The male lead was looking to the female lead to give him the maternal love that he never received from his mother, or older brother. Thus, he sought that in the female lead, but it was never truly love as much as it was his self-appeasing nature. He grew up trying to appease his family but all in all he still wasn't wanted. I did have compassion for the male lead, as he went through extreme trauma growing up, and it's human nature to make mistakes and try to learn how to behave better, as we grow and learn. Nevertheless, I am over the misogynist male lead characters (e.g. kissing women without their permission, not understanding that no actually means no, putting their hands behind the female characters back and pushing her up for a kiss, etc..). Although, there's a level of toxicity with the princes and princess, I am so glad that I did not get the damsel in distress vibe from the female lead character. Oh yeah, I think the music was somewhat too dramatic for certain scenes. Like in one scene around episode 6, the song "I love you," is played when the male lead is threatening the female lead. It's a bit weird.

The good:
*The scriptwriter did a great job explaining why the male lead end up killing his brothers. Usually when we hear of stories like this, we automatically assume that the killer was a psychopath murderer. Instead of investigating the real culprit working behind the scenes. The female lead did have visions about the future, but those visions didn't tell the full story but rather what would happen.
*The acting was on point. While watching this drama, I thought the female lead was the same female lead from Records of Youth. I never watched a movie in which IU acted, until this one. Neither am I familiar with her music, so my opinion is not bias. I think she did a fantastic job acting as a woman who was wanted by all the princes, except for 2. That's not an easy task to be able to act that out so well, that it doesn't turn the audience off. I believe each actor played their roles well, although this series probably could have had 23 episodes instead of 20 in order to allow for the romance between the female lead and male lead to seem more realistic. I believe their romance between episodes 7-13 was a bit rushed. However, the screenwriter did a fantastic job, with what she had. Btw, Eun's death was so tragic (episode 16), him and his wife are so cute in that episode. Good acting, I am in tears!

Overall, this drama was good but watching this in 2021, and not being ignorant of how media plays a role in sociocultural, and the viewpoints of society is the reason why I cannot give it a 9.5. BTW, I know it's a creative licensed historical drama, thus, there has to be some toxic traits, and that is the reason why I did not give it an 8.

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The story itself when compared to the Chinese version of scarlet heart, is very lacking. But then again the Chinese version is also much longer than the Korean version. The story itself was acceptably good, but since I have watched the Scarlet Heart (CN version) I found it hard to accept the story. It is very mediocre compared the CN one, the CN one had many scenes where everything broke my heart, this one is more "cutesy" and it is too easy to do some of the things like raiding the castle. While the development of the characters could be extreme and somewhat inaccurate, this is still quite a good drama to watch. The music is amazing and has a perfect mix of modern and ancient. I would rewatch this, simply because it is less heart wrenching than the other version.

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one word for those of you who HAVEN'T watched it: PAIN.

when i tell you this drama is NOT for the faint of heart I MEAN IT. This drama will LITERALLY WRENCH YOUR HEART INTO PIECES, gently sew it back together just a little, ONLY TO WRENCH IT INTO PIECES AGAIN! you have been warned, watch at your own discretion if you are up for it. The OST's are gorgeous tho so i definitely recommend checking them out.

now to my friends who HAVE watched the drama: ..why?
i'm sorry i'm still crying i can't take it, this was just (⁠╥⁠﹏⁠╥⁠) (*bawling*)
i mean the character development was so unreal (as is to be expected froma political drama i suppose). like they would evolve, devolve, evolve again devolve again and the cycle went on and on, to no end.

i could never do that again. im sorry. never again. the emotions would probably kill me if i did that agin. in the beginning their brotherhood and closeness to each other and then the way they killed each other and died in the end, i could never look at it the same way ever again.

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Do not underestimate the angst.

I knew that Moon Lovers was one of the saddest dramas out there, and because i wasn’t able to avoid spoilers, I was also aware of certain events, despite all of it, it still took me by surprise and was intensely painful to watch. What I loved the most about this drama was how they’ve stuck to history and brought about the important events by making them revolve around/influenced by a character who may or may not have existed.

The first half of Moon Lovers is quite playful, it builds the set up, it lets you get attached to these characters who you know are going to suffer. Its from the latter part of eight episode that things really start to get intense. There are time skips as the episodes progress, some are well done and some could have been better paced out. The character development and the acting of the older Princes is too notch. IU’s acting was a bit botchy in the beginning but as the episodes start to get sadder, she seems to have levelled up. It’s in episode 11 that she really shines! And of course, it’s the episode with the umbrella scene which one can watch uncountable times!

The last few episodes promise you constant sadness and angst. What hurts you more is that their happy moments feel momentary and don’t give you any hope. “I came to sit by water. However the clouds had come.” Are the lines told by Wang So to Hae Soo, and it seems to perfectly represent them. They yearn to be together but things don’t quite allow them to be so. Even in their happier moments, there’s a sense of uncertainty.

The drama ends making you wish for a future, not quite promising or leaving you with hope. I can see why fans of this drama are still hung up over it — I’m a part of them now.

From love, greed, politics, bloodshed, well wrapped plot, great character development, layered antagonists, this drama is packed to serve.

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This was a drama I had heard about - or, rather, read about a lot - in the past, though at that point I really did not pay much attention to it so when I decided to watch Moon Lovers over a year later since it first came out it was on a whim (and completely blind, since I hadn't spoiled myself). I binge-watched this, by the way, in the span of 2 days and it did kill me, yes.

Cast/Acting
Beforehand I was a bit wary of this drama due to it's cast. Now, I don't judge actors and whatever kind of background they may have, but idols (or singers, for that matter) who decide to act are often either really lacking or turn out to be surprisingly talented. In this case I was extremely positively surprised by IU's acting skills!  I have never listened to her music or seen any other film/series in which she stars in, so if I hadn't known before that she was a singer I would definitely have mistaken her as a pure actress! Besides her I also genuinely loved the entire cast in this drama! The acting was superb on everyone's part and all of the characters they portrayed were just so so great and insteresting. I honestly felt like I was part of the world, which really doesn't happen that often.

Story
Story-wise this drama was a whole rollercoaster of feelings. In the beginning I thought, oh alright it's picking up the pace here we go, and then, yes, this is good! and then came the point were I believed we would get the ultimate happy end .. and suddenly the entire drama pulled a 90° turn. It made me happy, sad, giggle around due to all of the sweet scenes and cry like a baby throughout the entire 80% of the series.  Personally I'd say if someone likes romance and tragedy than this is quite a nice watch, even though there are some reeeeeeeealllly tiny moments of comedy too, though those were really nice rays of sunshine in between all of the more sad and heavy scenes.

OST
Now, the most important thing of this drama for me was it's OST. I have to admit that I often don't even pay attention to the music playing in the background of certain scenes mostly because it's just ... lacking something. But here everytime the soundtrack came on, especially - that- song (you know which if you have watched the drama) my heart stopped, because I knew  1) I'd probably start to cry again and the scene that would come on would be really impactful. While as a whole I loved the drama I still think that this soundtrack has made a juwel into a diamond. I don't normally by OST's of any kind of media, may it be film, series or similar but for Moon Lover I will make an exception because I need this music in my life.

In the end I finished this drama within two days and while I started it not expecting much it turned into the most memorable 48hours of laughcrying  I had ever the joy of torturing myself with. The story, the characters and the world as a whole grew on me so much within this short time span and I'll probably be stuck thinking about this series for a while before I can start watching another drama again. I'll definitely rewatch this, and that probably more than only just one time.

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There is something about Scarlet Heart Ryeo that I was just hooked at the first episode. I binge watched it till the final episode, only stopping once to sleep. I was really expecting this to be a cheesy drama filled with bad love songs and cringe-worthy dialogue- boy was I wrong!

The story was 10/10. The plot kept me compelled to watch to the very end. The story was executed so beautifully that I hadn't realized I spent 20 hours watching this. The writers let the characters feel like real people, the backstories made sense to the plot, and decisions the characters made were understandable. This drama was just so well done that I won't be able to forget the plot or details anytime soon.

The Actors were absolutely excellent. Lee Joon Ki's performance was probably the high point of all of this. He mad me feel bad for the 4th prince, fall for him, hate his guts, laugh, and sob like a baby. I won't spoil anything, but this man is the at crying. He makes it so realistic that just makes your heart ache. He is so romantic in this it made my heart flutter too! I just couldn't help but smile.
IU, I wish her character was a bit stronger, she was amazing as an actress, but I felt that her character was slightly lacking in competence.
But the love story is just SO GOOD! You could feel the love radiating off both of them. It was just so heartwarming ad gorgeous that I instantly loved them together.

The sound track was SO unbelievably good. The original background songs like Wing of Goryeo were just beautiful and conveyed the mood of the show wonderfully. That song is just beautiful and the vocals were captivating. And the songs like "Can You Hear My Heart" just had be smiling every time it was on. The music is just amazing and helps convey the story and the emotion so well!

I have already re-watched this once (with my roommate, who doesn't usually like Korean dramas but had us up bingeing it till 1am in the morning because she just adored it). It is just a must watch. I pray that they make a second season to this masterpiece because we NEED one desperately.

The only bad thing I have to say about it is that it left me crying so hard I started choking on my tears both times I watched it. I ran out of tissues... But I so recommend this to anyone even if you don't normally enjoy historical dramas.

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