True Beauty

Steaming hot pile of cliche!

Bad acting, bad direction, bad story line - sorry non-existent story line; if all that is not enough, there is bad romance to boot.

I hated what they did to Park Yoo Na'a character. Poor Kang Soo Jin . They left her character suspended in middle of mental breakdown. Surrounded by selfish classmates and brainless bimbos, Soo Jin looks like a moon fairy captured by a curse and left trapped in a place she doesn't belong.

There is no proper conclusion to any relationship except the main one. The show survives on very standard school comedy and disparaging remarks made by family members against each other. Excitement lasts till episode 4-5. It is all repetitive from there.

The sob story about dead friend had no use whatsoever except for creating a nonsensical hostility among characters. Sister-Teacher romance was pure cringe and not at all funny. I would not advise anybody to watch it. Pretty pointless and you don't even feel satisfied at the end.

It's a stupid drama with no justification to its title "True Beauty". Maybe they should've read Keats:

A thing of beauty is a joy forever
Its loveliness increases, it will never
Pass into nothingness;

Or George MacDonald:

“For essential beauty is infinite, and, as the soul of Nature needs an endless succession of varied forms to embody her loveliness, countless faces of beauty springing forth, not any two the same, at every one of her heart-throbs, so the individual form needs an infinite change of its environments, to enable it to uncover all the phases of its loveliness.”
― Phantastes

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I was super invested but was it worth it?

Is this concept new or fresh? Is the storyline free of cliches? Well it’s a no to both those questions. However they do it right- balancing humour and romance with a tinge of melodrama carried by a talented actress in the leading front.

The main romance is not my personal favourite part as I do not feel the chemistry and also suffer from SLS but many may enjoy it, and if they do there’s a fair share of love dose of the two so you’ll be satisfied. The best chemistry on this entire show is still between the 2 boys in all honesty.

One of the best things in this show apart from Han Seojun (honestly Hwang In Yeop NAILED IT) is JG’s family dynamics and her badass sister and her love story. Their ending was also the most satisfying for me.

The story is very predictable and honestly it is very clear from the get go who the girl will end up with as JG’s heart never wavers. Still the writers do a very good job of instilling hope to all those in favour of the second lead by dragging the love triangle right till the last episode. We as viewers know we are being bated but to watch the true beauty that is Han Seojun was enough for me.

Everything was going fine till episode 13- our main girl JG even musters up the courage to accept her appearance and face her bullies which is the most important part. Suho and her are happily dating too. Ofcourse in the very next episode due to his father’s illness our main boy Suho has to leave. Owing to the great ‘struggles‘ of their long distance relationship, Noble Idiocy takes form in the name of Lee Su-Ho as he decides to break up with JG- this entire drama would make sense if there were repercussions of their distance and break up in the relationship when he returned. All it takes is a day after he returns for them to get together and act like they did in high school when the dated for a brief period. Don’t get me wrong- I knew they would end up together, but is this the best way to bring last minute drama into the show? Completely unnecessary and didn’t add anything to the drama. They even make Seojun cry in pain during the finale as he gets rejected- They do make up for it by making him debut as an idol as he sing 2 songs while looking flawless and being beautiful as he is.

However, I simply can’t deny how invested I was in the show. If you like high school dramas, typical tropes, love triangles and slapstick humour you will definitely enjoy this show. I was totally in the mood for something that satisfies the criteria above and thus I enjoyed it for the most part. If you’re looking for something more serious, deep or different this is not your pick.

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What is true beauty?

Not bad, light hearted. With pleasant to look at "eye candies" AND with decent acting.
What bothers me is the obsession, this and few portraying pimples , eye glasses = ugly; to be beautiful = make up, surgery as solution, when there is other way to it like skin care , contact lens, wisdom, character,.... The world is not this small and narrow. No one deserves bully because of their look.
I am not even sure if I like her character , when she is not even dare to admit SH her boyfriend, her reaction in the hospital after found out SJ was there by the side, still the look more important than boyfriend?. I am those who will be more attracted to Soo Jin's character before she turned bad as a love rival.
Finally, my favorite episode perhaps is episode 13 when she finally stands up for herself.

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A nice way to spend your evening

I really liked this drama. It was cute and all.
It was one of the few times where I had a somewhat second lead syndrome. Loved Seo Jun but never really hoped he would end up with Ju Kyung and I think it's for the better that they didn't have a relationship during the time jump because she was not over Suho and that would make him a rebound and he didn't deserve that. He is precious.
Honestly I was team Suho from the start, maybe somebody who read the webtoon would feel like they destroyed the story but as someone who didn't let me tell you I was not disapointed with the outcome.
The music was amazing, the more upbeat songs got me kinda dancing in my seat and the more slow and heartbreaking songs got me sentimental.

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Drop this

I’m dropping....the girl is still annoying......what’s with that character .....I thought it was a good entertaining series , what a waste of time...........what’s with the way she still talks ....c’mon is the director retarded....I’m sure she can act a little mature in the end now.....it’s a caricature , yes, but it doesn’t have to be so retarded......the screeching childlike talking, I’m sure this actress doesn’t talk like that ......I’m upset with the way this series progressed....blame on the director ....the story can be really cute but this main lead girl is annoying seriously I have to stop watching....it’s a shame ....🥴🥴🥴🥴🥶🥶🥶🥶🥶🥶🥶🥶

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the worst adaptation in the history of webtoon adaptations

i'm not even sure this can be called an adaptation.... taking character names, their basic traits doesnt make it adaptation.
i`ve been reading true beauty since 2018 although i dont even like it anymore drama made me drop webtoon completely. basically drama and webtoon have nothing in common names and few aspects aside. story is non existent, character personalities are pretty much changed from original and i knew it will be usual highschool drama cliche from the moment it was shown that suho and jukyeong knew each other as kids. actors did pretty good job, but ones who rewrote whole story didnt do nothing better from original.

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Nothing ever happens except for male eye candy

Story: This drama should have been 6 episodes long and I'm generous. A pretty girl hides her acne under a heavy make up and spends 14 episodes out of 16 in fear that someone will see her bare face, although the most beautiful boy in the world (played by the most beautiful actor in the world) loves her for who she is. That's literally the story and it's stretched beyond any reason by having the characters repeat the same beats (she's scared, he cares, rinse repeat) over and over and doing some heavy padding with side stories involving her comic relief parents, her younger brother's crush on another acne girl, her unni's romance with the teacher, scheming BFF, her boyfriend's music past, his rivalry with his former BFF-turned-romantic rival. Everything ends just as you predicted after watching episode 1. You only had to wait for 16 to see it play out exactly like you knew it would.

Acting: Solid all around though FL (Moon Ga-young)'s OTT comical reaction to everything (including not-so-comical things) starts to grate early on and never evolves from that repetitive shtick. It is also annoying that ML and SML care for FL much more than she does for either of them which makes it hard to root for her to end up with either. Her slapstick reaction to everything makes her seem fickle and not as emotionally invested as her male counterparts who, while play their roles with some levity, are not comedians. And they are really easy on eyes. Cha Eun-woo is probably the most beautiful man in the world and while his acting started off stiff, he warmed up into the role and we saw both character progression and an acting one. But true standout is Hwan In-yeop whose his charm, charisma nd impeccable comic timing left a long lasting impression. Supporting cast is good I guess but I had no patience for exaggerated comedy of FL's parents and romance between FL's unni and teacher so I skipped those parts.

Music: sugary sounds, nothing memorable except the same song that played in Crash Landing On You (I'm missing you, waiting for you yadda yadda) so I remembered it from there.

Rewatch Value: No thanks. Way too long for so little content. Barely anything happens and that's all massively predictable. The ending does not stick the landing.

Overall: Poor Man's My ID Is Gangnam Beauty, a show that knew how to pace itself and deliver a satisfying ending. True Beauty wrote itself into a corner when the leads became a couple and then spent the next 8 episodes or so building SML as a worthy suitor who just might be the endgame for FL...except that would be unpredictable and out of character for this rote show. No wonder ending soured many fans.

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Average to its core, True Beauty aims more for Kpop fandom than following its own early magic.

In the beginning....

Is becoming a true curse of my Kdrama journey. The first translated words of the Bible, are famous for their ubiquitous and straight forward approach to storytelling, yet over and over again are becoming a warning, that many times what starts strong has nowhere left to go.

It rings true yet again with True Beauty. At its start there is a certain magic to this take on the age old "ugly duckling" story. The female lead (Moon Ga Young) is cute and winning with a decent set of comic chops. Liking her is shockingly easy. When the male lead shows up (Cha Eun Woo) he is very dreamy and grade A South Korean boy beef, even though his character is locked behind the now oh so boring trope of cold stand-off aloof guy. He comes in as a hero, saving our FL from attempted suicide. (Korea is 4th in the world for suicide and their Kdramas have now made it a blase everyday plot occurrence, its chilling to watch as a westerner. This is a show directed towards a younger crowd and yet here it is. They must laugh at how upset the west was over 13 Reason Why) But once the actual saving is done, he retreats into being a standoffish jerk.

Why girls love this type of character, and why Asian dramas are obsessed with using this trope, is beyond me. I genuinely don't understand why anyone would want these guys except for their superficial beauty. The pretty asshole, is what gets you a pretty shitty real world life. Yet here, Che Eun Woo's Su Ho is quickly given enough backstory and home-drama to warrant his angst and keep him from being maligned into dirt-bag territory. In truth, his warmth is very much on display from the get go.

When the second male lead (Hwang In Yeop) shows up in episode 2, the rivalry between the two is fun to watch. They actually bring out charisma in each other, and both are at their best when the show is focusing on their frenemy bromance. But, of course this isn't why we are watching and thus the meaty scenes are far and few between.

Our FL's family has a larger role in the story and is a mixed bag. The older sister and father of the bunch are fun and delightful characters to watch and spend time with. The older sister arguably one of the best characters in the drama with her reverse gendered role love story a true treat. However the mother, and younger brother are as toxic as they come. The mother, arguably the worst villain of the show. If you want a step by step guide on how NOT to be a mother, watch this drama. The younger brother is just a ridiculous human being and not realistic, but has a somewhat redeemable story arc.

As for the rest of the cast, they are mostly the student population that surrounds our FL and her two rivaling MLs. Most of these characters are throw away, with a few exceptions. The most important, and one who ends up with some heavy lifting storytelling, is Park Yoo Na's Kang Soo Jin. You will love and hate her, I promise. Though almost all of the cast has a tragic home-life, hers is arguably the worst.

For the first few episodes to halfway through the series you will find yourself having a great time as you meet these characters and discover the world of the story. Again, there is an electricity, a spark, some type of magic that will keep you hitting play.

But then, the newness wears off, the story turns on its autopilot, and the mundane sets in. It is just another ugly duckling tale. Our main heroine quickly changes her face, but not her personality, and thus she just keeps repeating the same mistakes over and over again. The same situations arise over and over again. And like all ugly duckling tales, she just can't believe the male lead likes HER! HER of all people!!!

And one begins to yawn while watching.

By the end, the whole subplot KPOP suicide (yep someone does actually make the fateful jump with a 2nd suicide plot-line) story takes center stage. The romance (which stalls for multiple episodes straight) takes a back seat as the ML family drama and bromance come to a boil. The love triangle, (Though I am tired of this term as it is inaccurate. A true love triangle would mean one of the boys falls for the other boy who falls for the girl who falls for the original boy. Three points interlocked in a triangle wanting what they can't have. This is just a love line or plane with three points. The girl at the center with a boy on each side. But whatever, everyone keeps calling them triangles) is really a non-starter. The second male lead is never given a chance at any point at ever being a true option for our FL. She never once looks at him with any resemblance of wanting. It kinda just dissolves. And just when everything seems to be resolved, you find you still have 4 episodes left, and BAM!!! Enter outside plot devices to reek havoc.

This, is where everything just falls apart. The second warning side and curse of my K Drama journey. THE TIME JUMP!

Listing all the dramas that take this approach would be fruitless. Most being only one season with the creators diluting and stretching the story as much as they can to fill the episode count needed. The stories in play want to, or need to, move beyond the constructs of their premise. To solve this, and not need a whole new season worth of content, the powers that be just throw in a time jump. Is it needed? Of course not. Does it add anything to the story? Nope. It is just tacked on additional episodes because they hadn't meet their slotted quota, and also establish a false sense of closure to the story. Everything ends up in the same place after the jump as it was before. You as a viewer just find yourself repeating the same plot points in a shorter time-span to get back to where you already were.

By the time the show is done, there is a feeling of relief. You can now find something better to watch. It wasn't bad, it had some life lessons, there was drama, and by God are there some hunky leads, but whatever magic lured you in the beginning had fully dissipated. Ultimately you found yourself finishing it just because you'd already come this far! Oh well, we will try again with the next show!

6.5 C+, 3 1/4th star just above average outing. Not mad I watched it, but would never really recommend others to sit through it either.

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Wasn’t bad, could’ve been better

Short and sweet review :’)

Honestly, I didn’t expect much, and in general I wasn’t impressed by the love triangle, but I really want to say Cha Eun-woo’s acting has improved soooo much since My ID and I’m really proud of him, people who say he can’t act, just watch his his crying scenes then argue to me he’s a “stiff board” lmao, also want to give credit to Hwang In-yeop, hadn’t seen his acting until this show and the man has got some serious acting potential for future dramas, I look forward to seeing future roles he chooses. I know the drama was based off the webtoon of the same name and obviously in 16 episodes they couldn’t fit everything but for the most part I’m impressed how well the writers paced this drama, like I was expecting some half-ass cutscene or just filler episodes that had no purpose for the plot at least halfway into the series, but it didn’t happen, so I’m happy about that, however the one thing that went remotely terrible for the plot was the classic (and every kdrama fan totally loves this ... sarcasm 101)

“1 year later” trope ...
- ughhhhhh x 1,000

And the worst thing the writers did wasn’t even the time jump, it was making Suho forget he literally ignored Jugyeong for a year, didn’t text her at all, magically comes back, follows her around, and he expects her to fall in love with him again? B— in reality I would’ve moved on by then, possibly gotten together with a fish, or Seojun since Jugyeong and the writers didn’t give two sh— about his feelings ... The writers did give both him and Suho great development of their friendship, which by the end of the series I was hoping they’d rekindle, and I’m glad they eventually did, but for this drama imo there wasn’t anything that wowed me or anything special about the show besides the acting performances, got to throw Moon Ga-young some credit, she did what she had to doooo. The plot was cliché. The OST was fine but not spectacular, pacing was great, the writing could’ve been better, I friggin love though ... LOVE how in the end Soo jin redeemed herself, love the writers did that because she was fullmetal to Jugyeong up until the last 3 episodes lol, honestly thought they were gong to forget about her, but nope, also love how we could see her character growth, from excepting she’s finally away from her abusive father and is living her life the way she wants, thank you writers for this.

In the future I hope Cha Eun-woo takes roles away from rom-coms or romance, honestly I think he’d be great in some crime thrillers or horror kdramas, just anything away from the “serious, tsundere” character he’s played in almost every drama he’s been in lol, sad but true. I look forward to Moon Ga-young & Hwang In-yeop’s future projects. If you like the “cliché love triangle” trope in kdramas, this is your drama, if not you might consider sitting this one out lol, especially if your team Seojun X’((( overall wasn’t a bad drama, just needed better writing for the last two episodes imo and a better story. Watch the drama and see for yourself! Peace!

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I LOVED everything about this drama, all the characters and character development

Watched this whilst it was ongoing, thought I'd write the review now despite it being almost year since I started the drama. It was a very memorable drama.

I haven't read the webtoon and I never will (I've read parts of it online). But, from what I heard, the webtoon isn't very good mostly because it lacks character development, something this drama did not have an issue with. Do not come into this drama expecting it to be like the webtoon.

I loved all the characters in this drama and I was actually able to understand them all (excluding Soo Jin). This drama deals with a lot of big issues such as suicide, bullying, depression, loss of a parent (2 actually) and abusive parents. It's also about following your dream. It's not just about romance, the drama doesn't start with romance (though it does have a lot of chemistry), it grows into romance in a not slow (but not fast) pace after delving into the friendship of all the characters. Despite the serious issues this drama deals, it is still a hilarious romcom and doesn't gloss over the trauma all of the characters had to deal with.

I found Ju Gyeong relatable in many ways. She was bullied at her school for the way she looked, despite what a great person she was. She was betrayed by her friends and she hated herself because of how people judged her solely based on her looks. Her parents didn't understand her or even attempt to (until the end), and out of all her siblings, she was the least academically smart (and least good looking) and was often overlooked by her family. She made herself "beautiful" using makeup as her shield to protect herself from people bullying her at her new school. She had a lot of trust issues and didn't think that people will ever like her if they knew how she really looked. I loved that the drama delved into this a lot and had her finally accept herself and be okay with people knowing what she looked like without makeup, it stopped being her lifeline.

I loved Su Ho and Seo Jun. Despite having a little bit of a second lead syndrome, I loved that Ju Gyeong ended up with Su Ho though. Su Ho and Seo Jun both lost there best friend which caused there friendship to break up. They were the best of friends, they were so good together both when they hated each other and when they loved each other (a lot of people ship them). They both lost a parent, but whilst Seo Jun was really close to his mother, Su Ho hated his father and wasn't close to anyone. He was the most lonely character in this drama which is why it was perfect that he and Ju Gyeong ended up together, whilst also maintaining an amazing friendship with Seo Jun,

I LOVED the second lead couple. They were the perfect role reversal couple. I loved their screen time and I loved that they didn't take all the screen time (like the second lead couple in Reply 1988), despite the drama showing their relationship from the very start to their marriage at the very end.

I liked Soo Jin at the start, a lot. But there was always something dodgy about her and you could see it. She later became the character I hated most and I didn't think she would be redeemable at all. I wasn't expecting to ever like her again, but at the end I started to love her and you could really see her character development through her expressions alone. Park Soo Na did an amazing job portraying Soo Jin, you could really see the darkness behind her eyes when she was facing a lot of abuse from her family and when she was no longer "good" and became Ju Gyeong's bully. The one thing I couldn't understand about her is how she could so easily betray such a loyal and sweet friend. Which is why I prefer Soo Ah and Ju Gyeong's relationship, the only friendship where Ju Gyeong wasn't betrayed.

I loved the acting in this drama. Despite Cha Eun Woo being criticised for not showing any emotions in this drama, it was his role to play the "cold' character and he did show a lot of emotions as did all the other main leads. All the main leads had at least one really emotional breakdown and I loved how Moon Ga Young portrayed her character, the most emotionally revealing and yet reserved, main character.

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