A warm hug of a drama to provide comfort this winter
Initially I wasn't planning to write a review but GOD this is so good.Ep 6 had me crying, screaming, throwing up so let's get into it.
Storyline:
It sets such a different tone to the drama as a whole. The whole idea of ex-lovers uniting after 10 years to reshoot a documentary is so fresh but it had me questioning how it would realistically be possible to convince them to do it. The drama explains it perfectly and additionally makes it entertaining. There are a lot of tropes (it's a romcom what else would you expect) but it's used so perfectly, that it doesn't make you cringe or make it seem 'ordinary'. The main characters are beautifully written, making you sympathize with them for their circumstances and decisions. Yeonsoo is your cold, logical female protagonist who makes small gestures to her loved ones, completely opposite when you compare her with Ung who is laid-back, impulsive and sensitive (in the best way possible). It's so so enjoyable to watch them banter. Kim sungcheol's Jiung is a wonderful character who's personality falls in the middle of both Yeonsoo's and Ung's with his story. There are additional side characters who you love and hate. I HAVE to mention Ung's parents who are literal angels. Something about how welcoming and warmhearted they are makes me tear up.
Cinematography:
It's so aesthetic. The sites where the scenes occur are all beautiful. The yellow filtering adds a beautiful nostalgic, film-like texture to it. The art work is brilliant and the transitions are pretty as well.
Soundtrack:
It's so beautiful and melodic. It just suits the drama perfectly. I love how V's track is the one that always plays during Ung's art scenes. My personal favorite has to be 10cm's 'Drawer'. That track is PERFECT. The little heartbeats before the instrumental starts? BEAUTIFUL.
Dialogue:
Ok I had to make this a separate section from storyline because of how painfully beautiful it is. Episode 6's ending broke me. That one line 'It's us of all people.' You hear that sound? Yeah that's my heart breaking. The contrast in how their dialogue matures, the words that are used in arguments all of it seems so natural. It's probably my favourite element of the drama after its storyline itself.
Acting:
The performances are as expected really good. Yeonsoo's character is something that Kim Dami embodies to the T. (not a spoiler) Than scene in the bathroom was so beautifully portrayed, it refuses to leave my mind. Choi Wooshik is perfect for Ung's character. He gives the character a certain flavor that makes him seem so charming, but I can't quite exactly place what it is. It was so enchanting to see how in the one episode where there's a little flashback montage of Ung's childhood, and I don't know if it was the child actor mirroring Wooshik's mannerisms as Ung or the other way around, but the resemblance is uncanny.
Rewatch value:
I'm resisting the urge to go rewatch it right now and just wait for future episodes. That should say enough.
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"Summertime is always the best of what might be."
Reviews are one of two things for me. A waterfall of thoughts that can break a dam. Often leading to unorganized, but somehow still (hopefully) coherent thought. Sometimes though, my brain runs too fast and all the words escape me. I find myself wanting to bask in the feeling and immediately dive back into the content, in search of more with hopes of retaining the feeling even if just a bit more before it fades away. This show...well evoked the later. It was soo frustratingly good, so annoyingly mature, while still brilliantly capturing all the notes of youth that I love. Just like the name, it is a summer I will remember for a long time, just like the characters. And so as I sit here, nearly 3 years after my first watch...the feelings may not be as raw, as fresh, but they are still felt.This is a drama that provides comfort. Our beloved summer was what beaches and fairs felt like for the child me. It was a breath of fresh air that swept my heart towards warmth as well as washed away thoughts of worry. It was also a reminder, that before summer is spring and after all the summer, comes the leaves of fall.
The story at its core is growth as a person and we as viewers get to see how this growth molds and opens the hearts of our leads...as they grow into another relationship. It was really interesting to see how they were able to showcase the internal conflicts and sometimes self sabotaging nature of our characters.
Our brilliant but tired Yeon soo, is strong and prideful, always with a goal and sense of direction. Little her was fighting against the circumstances of money. We see how this molds into the present as her sense of responsibility pushes her to made decisions for her future. A future that does not seem to be able to fit love into it's sphere. As an adult, she is able to breathe more, but still plagued of worry.
Our resident artist trying to live carefree and lacking in drive or discipline, much to Yeon soo's distain was all to shield himself from the fear of failure. No expectations, no disappointment. Once we see his grown up self, we see another layer of the onion. One where his past limited his confidence to be loved but allowed him to love and care for others. But his new worry that the success, the things he has, isn't his. As the onion is peeled, we see that it isn't just Yeon soo that has struggles, that this timeskip was also something he needed to discover things and accept others.
Our poor producer...if you fake it till you make it....and you make it, does it matter if it was fake?
All of our characters grew out of some worries, and into others with time. All because of this very beautiful summer. A summer that gave Yeon soo a glimpse of a life she wanted but too burdened to accept. One that gave Choi ung warmth and love that felt full. Also giving Ji Ung a goal and point of focus. It was a time where they felt a lot of things, had great impact and like summer...also had to end. As the cold winds of fall swept them back into reality.
Some say the pace is slow, and I agree to a certain extent but I think I enjoyed that pace. We can run with Choi ung and Yeon soo when they found courage to pick up their feet. We were also able to feel the hesitancy and weight of their worries by the pace. So much of the love shown in the drama was about actions, willingness and not about what was received or circumstance. It was a story of people. Rushing the pace would just have been rushing them through their growth. I think seeing the moments of growth, and their struggle to get there, made it all more rewarding and impactful.
The show hits like a quiet existential crisis tucked into a passing thought. HAHA
The ost was brilliant. All tracks capturing an important feeling, thought, timepoint. It complemented the mood and themes so much.
The actors!!! Oh god. They were so good. Eyes felt so raw, pleading so heartbreaking and desperate. The webtoon characters brought to life. It was honestly just a masterclass. There was something about being able to feel the hesitancy and distance in the body language, the vocal delivery...they just had such soulful eyes.
Well rewatch....HAHA try more than 10 times. I recommend. I am not sure if this will give everyoen a crisis. In the beginning, it was just plain old comfort and cozy like summer for me. As time grew, I loved it more. Like school, its returning to a class of students and friends you knew so well...and seeing a different version of them walk through the door. Summer is comfort and a time for fun, but also a time for growth as we ready ourselves for change.
Not sure if this counts as a review anymore but....welp, life moves on.
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Heartwarming
Watching this in the summer really hit different than if you would've watched it in any other season, it just really brings the full vibes of the show out. The dynamic between the main two is of course one of my favorites, the bickering and the pettiness between both of them is wonderfully shown and I loved it. It also had those very noticeable hints of them still caring for each other whenever they meet again, which with how they left things off there were a lot of feelings still there since they didn't actually wanna break up. A lot of people call this boring and although I agree that at some parts it was boring the actors chemistry and storyline made up for it, from the time that the two characters were teenagers to late adulthood they kept the same bickering attitude while still showing that they love one another. Another thing that I like about this show is the other possible love interests, because they weren't crazy they were just normal. They accepted their defeat whenever they realized that they didn't have a chance with them, I neeed to see more of that.Was this review helpful to you?
This review may contain spoilers
This could have been a cult classic - but alas!
This drama made me laugh, jump for joy, applaud the entire team, cheer them loudly, slap their backs, clasp my hands......what other expressions of happiness can I use?Alas though - these feelings of exhilaration lasted only to episode 10 or 12.
After that it started rolling downhill so fast that only crashing against an iceberg could halt it and leave it broken and cracked.
Why why why do most leads in k dramas need to originate in orphanages?
Why did a cancer suffering mother come back to torture her child after destroying his childhood?
Are happy families so hard to find in this region?
Where are all the parents? Why do they all die? Is it so hard to be creative with living parents?
How come there is such finely developed romance but it never culminates in loving families?
What's the ratio of kids in orphanages? I read in the news that the country had banned foreigners from adopting their children.
This drama is so finely tuned with humor and slice of life details that I expected it to walk away with an unseen ending in the drama world.
Alas - the writer, director, screen play writer all seem to have lost their MOJO. The last few episodes are shabby, sorry and appalling in their positioning in this drama.
You had a fantastic product which could have reached the finish line with undisputed victory, yet you decided to go down the repetitive trodden path that was shabby and pathetic.
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a summer i once left behind, now lives within me
i’m not the type to fall for pure romance. my taste in k-dramas leans toward the extraordinary – fantasy worlds with time travel and supernatural beings, mysteries wrapped in crime and thriller, or intense medical dramas that keep my brain ticking. romantic comedies, on the other hand, have always sat at the bottom of my list. i usually find them too predictable, too repetitive – two people falling in love, misunderstanding each other, fighting, making up, and ending up together anyway. i tend to drop them halfway, wondering what the point was.and yet, somehow, our beloved summer slipped past that wall.
i dropped it a long time ago after just three episodes. not because i hated it, not because of any flaw i can remember – i just did. and honestly, i don’t even understand why. maybe i wasn’t in the right mood, or maybe it didn’t click at the time. but recently, it started flooding my fyp, and curiosity got the best of me. before pressing play again, i read reviews – and the most common complaint was that it was boring. still, i gave it another shot.
and i’m so glad i did.
from the first episode to the last, it never failed to make me laugh. it made me smile in that soft, quiet way that doesn’t need big punchlines or loud moments. the main characters, the side characters – everyone added something warm, something sincere. this drama isn’t loud. it doesn’t try too hard. it just exists gently, like a memory you didn’t realize you needed. it’s light. peaceful. healing. it feels like taking a deep breath after holding it in for too long.
maybe that’s why some people find it boring – there’s no chaos, no dramatic twists, no villains. just life. raw, real, and quietly beautiful.
and let’s talk about the cinematography – absolutely breathtaking. every frame is filled with intention and softness. from the golden light filtering through trees, to the nostalgic haze of their past, to the dreamy stillness of ung’s house. even the opening sequence feels like a painting in motion. it’s the kind of visual storytelling that lingers in your chest.
i never expected a romantic comedy to break through my usual preferences, let alone stay with me like this. our beloved summer didn’t just meet my expectations – it gently surpassed them. it reminded me that sometimes, stories don’t need to shout to be heard. sometimes, they just need to feel honest.
oh, how i wish i could watch it again for the first time. till we meet again, ung and yeon-su. till next summer.
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Pretty but boring
This drama has beautiful cinematography and osts. The story in the beginning is fun and engaging. The cast is really really good. The main leads in particular are really able to deliver all their feelings. This is the best thing of this drama. You can feel all the three of them from the first scene. After a while though, I lost my curiosity as to how the story would end. It became boring. Each episode has noteworthy moments, but overall it was really challenging for me to make it all the way through the last episode.Was this review helpful to you?
This review may contain spoilers
The first 7 episode are excellent!
The first 7 episodes are excellent, but then everything becomes repetitive. Unfortunately,toxic push and pull relationships are normal in real life, but unlike in real life, viewers don't want the relationship between the leads in this drama to be push and pull for most of the drama. I'm halfway through and I'm considering lowering my rating from a 9.5 to a 9. Outside of the on going push and pull relationship between the male and female lead characters, everything else is pretty great. I usually don't like male lead characters like the male lead in this drama, but the actor did so well, that I am enjoying his character.
I hope the storyline for episodes 9-16 will change a tad bit, we need a little variation.
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Did not Meet Expectation
I had very big expectation for this Drama. I am very disappointed. I watched this show, all 7 episodes just for Kim Da Mi. If she was not in the show, I would have dropped it after the 1st show. I personally do not like shows with ton of flash backs. This show is littered with flash backs, which is irritating and annoying. I am not saying you should not have flash back in a show, there is a limit.Flash Back when they were 7-8 years old,
Flash Back when they were in High School
Flash Back when they were in University
Flash Back from few days ago
Flash Back from a day ago
Flash Back from few minutes ago
You get the point. Every Episode has it. Absolutely annoying.
This story so far has no suspense no pull so they are manufacturing it by slicing and dicing the scenes and jumbling them so the audience cannot figure out what's going on. I believe they have achieved it and ruined the show. The story is simple, sometimes keeping it simple is much better than the alternative.
The more I think of it, it is becoming more and more frustrating. What a Shame!
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Too overhyped
At the beginning I had high expectations when I wanted to start this drama but everything changed when I watched this drama. The story starts with ML who hasn't been able to forget FL and FL who isn't good at expressing her feelings for ML (ML too). The story only goes round and round between ML and FL because there is no good communication between the two of them. The story is too monotonous and not very interesting in my opinion because there are many low rated dramas that have better and more exciting stories than this. I only watched this drama until episode 6 because I couldn't continue until the end because I felt bored. Overall I give this drama a 4.Was this review helpful to you?
Overdramatic and unconvincing
This drama has a refreshing synopsis and is aesthetically pleasing, but the execution is incredibly cringey as a woman past her mid-twenties. This drama builds up on the mystery of why both of the characters are so angsty and no longer together. Why they still think about each other, and loved each other. You see how depressed and miserable they are, see flashbacks that gives the viewers a peek at what happened before, but the ultimate reason for it is just so stupid, and unconvincing. The drama tries very hard to be edgy with how they present the character's personalities, which is where the cringe comes in for me. It tries to sell itself as a show that presents a realistic and raw relationship, but nothing about it seems that deep at all, and anyone who has actually been in a relationship could not take their relationship seriously. The FL was rude and dismissive, and the writers just expected the audience to root for her to be with the ML just cause she has family problems? K-dramas thinking that family/mental issues is a good enough excuse for repeatedly treating someone bad needs to come to an end.For this drama, I just dropped it after they get back together, because it was just so lame and i really did not see a reason to continue watching. Note i had to force myself to even watch that far, because most of the time the drama was so boring and uninteresting, and I don't see how anyone could actually watch it while thinking "wow this is so interesting." I could not care less if the ML and FL even got back together in the first place. Also, the most cringey part of this drama is the weird idol plot line. For a drama that aesthetically is trying to position itself as a realistic slice of life drama, it just felt so out of place to have a random character with bleach blond hair that's an idol...
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I knew from the first episode this show probably was not for me. I kept watching because 'secret longing' is a favorite character trope of mine, and if this show had a defining theme it's 'secret longing.'
But, even all the yearning and pained glances, couldn't keep me watching this. The conflicts are highly typical from the school portion: 'failure to communicate' 'absentee parents' and 'being looked down for being poor' and the adult portion: 'failure to communicate' 'insecurities and jealousies regarding failure/success.'
There's a lot of nostalgia for their school years that feels unearned. Indeed the flashbacks pick moments from all five years of their relationship and yet don't show any relationship development. No stray touches or being able to communicate in an easier way; there's no sense that the relationship was ever lived in.
A five year 'everyday relationship' is more than studying and a few school pranks and awkward and stilted interactions. But that's all we got in five hours, five hours is double the length of a movie!
Perhaps for some, the warm familiarity and predictability paired with better budget and cinematography is enough. For me, it felt too much like drifting without a compass.
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This review may contain spoilers
The Good:⌲ The documentary concept
⌲ The sequencing of the major plot points (first half is more melo, the second half more romcom)
⌲ The docu flashback scenes are the best.
⌲ The romance, mostly (It's way more magical in Hogu's Love)
⌲ The chemistry between the two leads
⌲ The brilliant acting (If ML did variety, he could dethrone YJS in a few weeks & the FL is also incredible)
⌲ FL's cute chubby face
⌲ The bickering
⌲ The weak love triangles
⌲ The last 5 minutes of the drama (Had they spent 1-2 episodes on that 3rd documentary, I would have given the drama a 10/10 rating for sure, flaws be damned.)
⌲ The mild melancholia
⌲ The visuals
⌲ Despite all the stupid foreshadowing the leads stay together after they start dating again.
⌲ The rewatch value should be excellent with some FW buttoning.
⌲ The low key good OST
The Neutral:
⌲ NJ (I'm suspecting the actress was portraying Sulli & that made me quite sad)
⌲ Let's be friends! (Horrible plot device, but the ensuing romcom moments were good)
⌲ There were some well acted, but underutilized supporting characters.
The Bad:
⌲ The writing is not coherent, this is especially obvious if binge watching. (yay live filming)
⌲ The reasons for the initial breakup (I would have accepted "pride", but they just had to put a noble reason spin on it)
⌲ The second ML's character feels misplaced & pointless. (Could have FW buttoned all his scenes for more enjoyment)
⌲ The last 3-4 episodes were sullied by the entire "French Architect School" plot. (Woong of all people is such a genius that he has become an architect/engineer in 2-3 years and then he went back to Korea to continue drawing for galleries and whatnot)
⌲ The story drags in the middle. (The writer pulled the breaks on romantic progress in jarring ways, because 16 episodes..)
⌲ The final episode is weak, sans the last 5 minutes. (It's not ruining anything, it's just whelming)
⌲ The audio quality is trash, don't bother with those planar headphones! (were all microphones bought at the 1$ store, then again even some of the songs sound horrifyingly low-fi, while some others are excellent)
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I strongly recommend watching https://youtu.be/yxGomiIUN8s AFTER you are done with the drama. (it's only 2 minutes long)
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