Pleasantly Amazing
Before watching HDL, I thought it wasn't going to be my "cup of tea". However, I was wrong, I was very wrong. HDL was amazing, fantastic, superb, wonderful in all the right bits and places. The first one or two episodes were a little slow, however, this is nothing new to me, as many Korean dramas seem that way, that's natural! But by the fifth or sixth episode, oh my gosh, I was so hooked! I loved every single character, the chemistry between the cast was phenomenal, and the storyline somehow had just the right amount of everything.I'm not usually much of a fantasy-enthusiast but HDL may have drastically changed my opinion on the genre altogether and has made me become more aware of how great a fantasy drama can truly be.
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Very underwhelmed by the story but FL is the only one that saves the show.
I love Man-wol but I think there is just too much talking about the past without showing us what happened in the past. There’s a lot of talking and less doing. The ghost of the day and the killer seems like a distraction/filler from the main story. There is like 2 episodes between midway and ending which was good but other than that, everything was slow.A little predictable which is expected from Korean dramas. There is so much budget in the production but I can tell that there is a lot of CGI. It is really hard for me to immerse myself into that world since everything seems so fake.
There isn’t enough chemistry between the leads. The male lead seems too stiff and one dimensional. I would have enjoyed it a lot more if they have chosen another male lead.
I feel so much more for the second lead that waited for 1000 years by her side, loving her. He risked his life, his pride just to save her. And even waiting 1000 years, he is willing to be happy for her falling in love with someone that is not him.
OST is amazing!! It just captures the right emotions at the right moment. Directing is amazing as well.
I'm just a bit underwhelmed with the ending and the whole show. Everything was slow but the only saving grace is Man Wol.
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The OST is simply amazing, almost as good as The Goblin. Two of the songs which I really liked are Yang Da Il's Only you and Heize's "Can You See My Heart(내 맘을 볼수 있나요)" . Many of the songs gave the drama very dreamy feel, further reminding the viewers that this is just a drama and can never happen in real life, hence, there is no need to keep our logic and rational, just go with the flow of the drama.
I love the main actress, Lee Ji-eun (as Jang Man-wol). She is so pretty in this drama! Of course Yeo Jin-goo ( Koo Chan-sung) is quite cute too, but I think Ji-eun kind of steals the spot light here. Her character is much more difficult to play as it spreads over several hundred years. In the fighting / combating scenes, she was quite good.
The plot is quite interesting , many strange things, not conventional and quite entertaining.
Would recommend to watch .
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Personally I don't like the one ghost/case/patient per episode type of dramas but I really liked this one.
The main story is very interesting and the main roles' stories are very creative and fun to watch.. But they didn't focus on that as much as they focused on the ghost of the episode story so that was a little disappointing.
The ghost stories were good too don't get me wrong but the main stories had more potential to have made this drama a perfect one.
Other than that, everything else was really great.
The acting was amazing. I've never watched the male or the female leads before (I've heard of them though) so I'm not biased at all.. Both of them did a great job. Actually all of the cast did (In the present and the past). The acting in this drama was one of the best I've ever seen.. Everyone was made for their part.
A must mention: IU "ate" her role. I can't think of other words to describe it. The first time I saw her I thought aww she's too cute to play this part but as I continued the drama I became convinced that no one was going to be able to do it better than her.
The music was pretty good too.. 2 songs are definitely going into my playlist because I can't get enough of them. And the background music was funny and new I liked it a lot.
If you don't mind the one story per episode type of dramas this is perfect for you.
And even if you're like me I think you'd find it pretty decent to watch too so give it a try.
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Let's start with the first category: the story. This is the only category in which I gave 9.5. I loved the story. Rich in twists, very well written and it kept me with my mouth wide open for the shock/surprise the 95% of the drama...the remaining 5% I was crying so it was open so that I could breathe. There were only a few things that I would have added in some cases, but...that's fine!
Next: acting/cast. Here we come! Can we talk about how awesome IU has been for the whole drama? She's Amazing! I loved to see how badass she can be. I mean, among her dramas I only watched Moon Lovers, and there she was as perfect, for sure, but the character was different: sweet, innocent and naive (sometimes even too naive!). So I was really surprised: she caught me completely off guard. Queen!
Also, Yeo Jin Goo! What can I say? I love him, I've loved him in other dramas and I loved him even more here. Great acting, great chemistry, they were sooooo beautiful! He made me laugh and cry and laugh again within five minutes.
I also loved all the other cast: they were superb. Great acting! Amazing.
Music: beautiful, BEAUTIFUL OST. I won't name them all, but: Heize, Punch, IU, Gummy, etc… great names, great voices, great songs, great singing. Check it out. Can't stop listening to the songs on YT.
Rewatch: same as above, I didn't feel many differences, even if I already knew the plot. It allowed me to notice even more details that I had missed before.
Overall, this is a fantastic drama! You should definetely give it a try, because it deserves it.
Bye and...thanks for reading!
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Heartwarming with a bittersweet aftertaste
I am in love with what this drama makes you feel! It gives you this bittersweet taste of not knowing for certain what should be bitter and what should be sweet. A lot of scenes were shown to supposedly be pleasant yet the emotions it translates leaves you clutching at your heart; confused as to what you should actually be feeling.There are certain plot holes but they could be easily overlooked because of how flexible the plot is: anything can happen when it's fantasy. The main couple also exudes with chemistry and I am loving how pure and selfless their romance is with the whole "I love you enough to let you go" trope. I also love their cute and wholesome bickering, adds so much fluffiness to my heavy heart. Their love is very subtle yet leaves a very deep impression to the viewers.
Each character also has their individual subplots which adds more flavor to the overall story - especially loved the whole parallelism of the female lead's past and present (and how they tackled reincarnation). I will always remember how effective this storyline is in evoking conflicting and contradicting emotions, which takes this drama a notch above other dramas with similar premises.
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Hotel Del Luna
- Acting is pleasant.- Some comedic value.
- I like how they gave each worker at the hotel some backstory.
- The music is memorable. (Or I just watched it too many times and it's stuck in my head.)
- Very unique concept.
- The ending is exciting.. but there won't be a season 2 *allegedly*.
- I get why there isn't a season 2. The season 1 already explained the bulk of everything and there's not much else to say and film that isn't repetitive from season 1.
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The main couple could have been stronger; I didn't feel that much chemistry between them. And the last few episodes felt a bit dragged out for me and were hard to finish. Those are the only negative points for me.
Aside from that, I loved everything. It's a show that teaches a lot about the pain of letting people go from your life and the grief that remains in those who are left behind. The bride episode was a real standout for me; I confess I even cried a little.
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This review may contain spoilers
Beautiful Drama but too scary at times
I know I am being a scaredy cat here but I am usually not a big fan of horror at all. Obviously this is not a typical horror drama but it does have some lowkey scary scenes that were enough for me to close my eyes (and miss the kiss scene in Room 13 😂)Apart from some scary moments I mostly liked the story and plot of this drama as well as all the diverse side characters.
First of all I liked the concept of this drama. The first few episodes were hilarious and the reason why I continued watching. I was intrigued to find out more about the different stories of different ghosts. Man-Weol’s past story was ofc interesting too but I also really liked the plot of the present time a lot.
The only flaw I have about the story is that it was not exciting enough for me to binge it, or to die out of curiosity. Thats why it took me longer to finish it as I was watching other dramas on the side too (I usually dont do that if the drama is overly exciting).
For the characters I am torn. There were some very remarkable characters in this story which was made even greater by the acting skills of the actors.
1. Obviously IU as Jang Man-Weol. Her character had many ups and downs, depth, layers and very importantly light and darkness all combined in one. judging from her past she definitely suffered a lot. There was some comic relief in there too (her excessivr drinking and shopping, etc)
2. Mago! I haven’t seen anyone talk about Mago!!! First of all Kudos to the actress for portraying like 6 different types of Magos with a similar essence to their characters but with slight differences. In general the things that the Mago did and say were very thought-provoking like sending Koo Chan-Sung to the past and making him decide whether he will stay there or go back.
3. Choi Seo-Hee aka the roomkeeper at Hotel del Luna turned out to be more interesting than I had initially thought. When we slowly started learning more about her past and grudges I felt more connected to her and I think het story might have been the first thing that made me cry in this series. I was happy to see how she was able to overcome her grudges and her goodbye with Man-Weol was the most heart-breaking. They were like the mother and daughter for each other that they never had.
4. Last but not least I loved Cheung Myeung played by Lee Do Hyun (The Glory). I kinda knew / hoped his actions were a misunderstanding. At the end when Man-Weol finds out I was hoping she would fall back in love with him and they would leave to the afterlife together. Yes I was ready to abandon Koo Chan-Sung 😂😂😂 I was rooting for Man-Wol to get together with Cheung Myeung. Sadly that didn’t happen…
Some things I didn’t like:
1. Some scary scenes or scenes that seemef more like fillers
2. Overly dragging love scenes where the FL and ML were just standing there, looking at each other romantically with some romantic song playing in the back. Some of these scenes were like 3 minutes long 🤯🤯🤯 It was just too boring for me at times…
3. The Main Lead, Koo Chan Sung was not interesting enough. He was adorable and a nice guy and I guess the kind of guy most women want. But apart from his mother story there was nothing else to him.
4. The bartender Kim Sun-Bi’s story was so sudden and random I was disappointed that we didn’t hear about it until to the last episode literally… His past seemed very sad, unfair and interesting so I wish they had given more time and effort to his background as they did for the othet two hotel staff. His story felt too rushed tbh.
All in all it’s a nice watch, with a great plot and interesting concept as well as enchanting OST. I wouldn’t watch it again but I recommend watching it if you wanna see more if IU.
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One of the more unique rom coms
First of all I dropped it the first time I tried watching it. But when I picked it up again and finished watching it recently I was glad I gave it another shot. It was a beautiful drama. As someone who loves beautiful visuals, this drama was a literal eye-candy (except for the horror parts, which were a bit icky). It was also one of the very few dramas which satisfied me in the music part too. The OSTs were amazing. As an audio-visual treat this drama was 10 out of 10. That being said the drama had a good story with some volume to it which was evenly paced and kept me interested to know what happens next. It had it's fair share of loving and touching moments, silly and serious moments, which kept the drama from becoming stale after it hit a certain point (unlike most other dramas which loses their momentum at the half-way point). As a horror drama it's not scary at all, so if you are here for the horror then you will be disappointed.One of the major reasons I dropped it the first time was the ML. The acting of the male lead felt too stiff and awkward the first few episodes. It was a major disappointment for me at that time and so I dropped it. Now after watching the whole drama I can say, in the later episodes the acting seemed a bit more natural and it was good.
But I was pleasantly surprised with the Ma Go (support) character as the actress did a very amazing job in my opinion. The female lead seemed perfect for her character too. She made the cold character seem very lovable throughout the whole drama.
It's already been a while since it's release, and if you are still wondering whether to watch it or not then don't be like me. Just watch it. It's worth the watch.
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~Pulls all emotional strings balancing the stories of the leads as well as the ghost guests. The journey through life and death as well as morality often makes a mark
~All the leads and side characters nailed their performances. IU plays one of the most iconic characters ever seen in kdramaland as well as the gazillion wardrobe goals she gives the viewers. ~Personally, I liked the chemistry between the FL and SML better than with the ML.
~Shoutout to the gorgeous cinematography and OST of the show.
~I also loved how the ending played out perfectly in line with the drama’s concept.
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If Only The Writers and Director Spent alittle more time working on the plot
At the end of this drama I find my initial thoughts on the ghost related plot to be messy right on point! The consistency of combining afterlife with reincarnation was nowhere to be found.. maybe because it's a flawed concept to being with, so them trying to be extra imaginative with it made fall in shambles.An example would be when making the dead able to roam around the living in some cases ( there was no rule!) They sometimes can affect the living while others can't (depending on the plot needs) and so on.. even Fantasies need rules set in the world to make sense to the viewers.
Even the couple's drama suffered from this inconsistency that something which was strongly emphasized was never used or mentioned in the finale!
Aside from that, the drama of our hotel family and the reaper - love his character- was really good that i cried a river in the finale. Everyone had an impact which isn't always the case when we have a main couple to focus on, though our ML had weak presence compared to the other 2 second leads which iscrazy considering they aren't even in the same timeline!!!
The setting wasn't that special for me, while the MUSIC was everything! Halfway through the drama I started humming along with teary eyes everytime one of the osts starts playing.
If only the writing wasn't this sloppy, it's a tragedy considering the cast being superb actors!
To top it all the drama was 50% repetitive slowmo scenes..
I was planning to rate it an 8 but after summing up my review a solid 7.5 is all my mind could spare.
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