Lovely Runner

Overall boring and frustrating

The plot seemed very interesting to me.

But I didn't like the execution, Im Sol seems super desperate to me, a lot of things have happened to her in life but she is still very immature, literally their lives are at stake and she is not able to take things seriously.

It is super frustrating to see that the other male protagonist was only a decoration throughout the entire series.

It was not well explained how time travel works, and it is good that it is not explained in depth, but how is it possible that the two of them and the grandmother have memories but the other characters do not? If the murderer also had memories of him it could have been much more interesting.

Apart from the fact that the killer looks super out of nowhere. They don't tell you anything about his motives or his story.

The story of the brother and the best friend is not funny, it is super frustrating, no one behaves that way and if they do it would be super cringey

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If I got to be that guy so be it. SADLY RUNNER is more like it

Lovely runner started off as a show that seems to show promise. I love the fact that they have two great cast and probably an exceptional storyline. However, it's get too draggy and boring real quick. The show tries to show multiple ways that indicates how the story plays out. It doesn't help if the FL keeps messing up and tries to keep it a secret. Messing up does unlock a lot of potential plot twist or surprising moments. With poor execution and pretty predictable, it wasn't gonna work. I say this show had everything and just could deliver. At least make the bad guy better since he wasn't even feared at all.

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Let me just say...

I'll be honest, I think the reason people love this show is because of Byeon Woo-Seok's portrayal of Sun-jae. The fact that he's very attractive, tall, and is generally likeable makes this show nice to watch, lol. The love story itself is interesting, but there's a few things I think the show did a poor job at.
1. I WISH that we got a richer back story on all the characters
2. I wish more things tied the ML and FL together besides the FL's ability to go back in time. Maybe if they had known each other since childhood rather than high school? Idk. I just feel like the relationship itself sort of lacked depth.
3. It would have been nice if the themes of class or poverty or something substantial were highlighted. Casting such attractive characters is great but I wish the producers/writers also put more thought into adding more complexity to this plot.
4. The person who was trying to hurt Im Sol -- wish we had background on him? Like if the reason he wanted to hurt was for revenge idk I just feel like it was a weird plot twist that made no sense to me. I wanted MORE! 😭

I like the relationship between the leads, I think the love story itself is nice, Sun-jae is a good bf, etc etc. But I just wanted more. There's 1000s of romantic storylines, but very few are able to have substance and unfortunately, as adorable the couple is, thats kind of the extent of what makes this show memorable. Their on-screen chemistry made me want to continue watching and it got me hooked on the show for a bit, but that's about it sadly.
Great songs though, 10/10.

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Typical kdrama with a typical story

I don’t know which lovely runner everyone else is watching because the one I am watching is just a mid and typical kdrama story. I don’t understand what was soo good about the show !!
First episode showed a lot of potential which went down the drain just after a few episodes because there was nothing much to look forward to..
Time travel become a game( try try again) and sun jae died soo many times it wasn’t even serious anymore 😭 made me laugh the third time he died and that scene was in slow motion like wtf. Totally killed the serious vibe.
The female lead got on my last nerves, she was soo annoying ( forced attempt to be cute). Not to mention her dumb explanations, she was in her 30s and time traveled to her 18 year old self but acted like 15 year old. Soo much could’ve been done with the time travel plot but we got soo little. And the character development was nil.

Kdramas at this point have become soo repetitive with the same plots and storylines. Its hard to keep watching after few episodes. And the story gets too predictable just as with lovely runner.

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Overrated for sure

I didn't know until now that the writer of True Beauty also wrote this drama. It suddenly made sense why there were so many similarities, even down to the sequence of certain events. The love triangle, the "bad boy" second male lead, the male lead constantly saving the female lead it all felt very familiar. My point is the overall vibe is very similar

The comedy was another major letdown. Some scenes were so cheap that I genuinely couldn't understand how they were supposed to be funny. The scene where the male lead doesn't hold the bathroom door, leaving a guy exposed in front of everyone, or the female lead's friend pooping her pants... seriously? Instead of making me laugh, they just made me cringe. I don't understand why supporting characters have to be humiliated for comedy.

The female lead was probably my biggest issue with the drama. She spent most of the series confused, making frustratingly dumb decisions that created problems out of nowhere. There were several moments where I stopped rooting for her altogether and just wanted the male lead to run away. She also behaved less like a fan and more like she was already his girlfriend from the very beginning. What fan acts like that?

The male lead started off as the drama's strongest character. He was attractive, driven, and had goals beyond romance. Unfortunately, as the story progressed, it felt like his entire personality became "being in love with the female lead." Once that happened, he lost much of what made him interesting.

The drama completely lost me after Episode 9. The constant time travel became repetitive, and watching the male lead die over and over again stopped being emotional—it was just exhausting. Instead of raising the stakes, the story kept repeating itself until it became predictable and boring.

The soundtrack was genuinely excellent, and the chemistry between the leads had plenty of sweet moments. Those were the main reasons I kept watching. But even the romance eventually crossed the line from cute to overly cheesy.

In the end, nothing about the story surprised me. Every twist felt predictable, and despite all the praise this drama receives, I never understood the hype.

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tropey writing makes one dimensional characters

there was immense hype around this drama when this was airing. i finally got to watch this, and unfortunately i do not see what the hype is about. I feel like this drama is like those trope books which restrict the characters to one dimensional attribute and do not allow them to grow from their initial role. I cannot even begin to think/elaborate how frustrating the time-travel was - just too many plotholes, like i get that it's fiction, but even fictional stories are bound by their own rules of magic and world-building. For instance, Sol gets 3 opportunities to go back in time to save Sun-jae, then somehow there is a fourth try too with Sun-jae's watch after he was stabbed/drowns. I liked the way Twinkling Watermelon handled the timetravel shift . Sol's character had limited expressions - shocked, tearful, scared and annoyed - her role as a 16 year old girl and 34 year old woman were exactly the same lol, one would think a 34 year old woman would know better to use her brain and not cry at the smallest inconvenience. The only feel-good aspect to their romance is them saving each other's lives at multiple instances and the angst to override/change their fate by maintaining Sol-imposed distance. I wanted to know why were ML/SML head over heels over Sol despite her rejecting them at various instances and being mean/rude to them. So many elements of this drama was uneplored like why was that killer behind Im-Sol, time-travel rules. Sol had so many resources - SEEING GLIMPSES OF THE FUTURE - being one of them, yet she failed to use them in her favour. Sun-jae's own journey with his music/acting was left unexplored. I do not think the acting was bad but imo the actors didnt have a lot of room for expression and which is why i felt they were cringe and immature. Nevertheless, just because this drama live up to the hype doesnt mean i didnt enjoy it. The ending of ep 4 will forever be iconic. I will be enjoying sappy edits of Sol-Sunjae,

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if you don't want some draggy confusing drama plot with cliché leads, don't watch

the ost and acting for this drama is actually a banger. all of these actors really doing great with their characters. but im so sad the plot didn't doing great

i think there's just too much unnecessary plot. there's a lot of plot hole where watchers didn't get much proper explanation of the story. like when im sol jumping from one to another timeline, there must be some explanation where im sol got every memories from each timeline. when im sol time traveling for the last time, why suddenly im sol traveling using sunjae's watch instead of the one in her hand, and why she can traveling in traveling time mode(?) when she's not even ended her time travel era first before traveling again??? and it seems like there's no end to her last traveling era? is she living in the past?? and by calculation im sol's soul's age must be around 47 years old by the time she met sunjae again?? isn't it weird?? idk there's just too much weird things and didn't make sense even if you called this fantasy genre.

and there's scenes where it repeated heavily, draggy, and the female lead character getting more annoying as the time goes by (no hate to kim hyeyoon. ik she's just doing amazing acting, im criticizing the writer).

maybe if the writer cut some unnecessary plot and make this drama into 10 or 12 episodes only, the drama would be less draggy and less depressing.

overall i just want to take back all the time I've spent watching this drama... im here just for byeon wooseok 😒😒

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Very cheesy drama with plotholes

Started off as one of my fav drama but after ep 12 the story felt dragging and many points were missing from the drama like the story of the taxi driver , the grandmother, how the watch helped Sol to travel back in the past and why did she get another chance to save Sun jae and I felt that there wasn't any personality of Sun Jae other than being a loser for Sol..I wish that it was a drama where Sun Jae actually committed suicide without the taxi driver plot and in the end Sol had to become disable as it is an inevitable fate like they did in Twinkling watermelon and Sol and Sunjae would help each other to overcome their depression...I thought that the drama will be like this but then I was like no it's again that same serial killer plot...my fav character is Tae Sung ...he had the most significant role in the drama because without him Sunjae and Sol wouldn't have a happy ending

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Jekyll & Hyde show that is doing my head in

To say that I'm torn about this show is an understatement. I have seldom seen a series that managed to succeed in one key area and yet screw up another. Please allow me to explain.

This series is built on two drama staples. Swoon worthy romance and the time traveling do-overs.

It nails the first with aplomb. Our leads' chemistry is undeniable and when it works, it is meltingly good. Time and again, when I start to suffer, the writer-nim would bring on the amore and we are floating on a pink cloud. . . until we crash back to earth due to the ham-fisted way the show handles the timey-wimey stuff.

The problem is not that the show tripped up on some high temporal concept but rather simple plot management. To wit, the show used weaponised time travel like a blunt instrument. Internal logic and intersecting plots be damned.

It worked ok the first go around but after each do-over, the narrative got more convoluted. It basically tied itself in knots. Did events change? Did time correct itself? Does someone know or cares?! I'm sure the writer doesn't. Forget about time traveling taboos, it was a road kill right from the start.

Another contributor to this mess is the serial killer/kidnapper subplot. How I wish k-dramas would stop using this trope, but I digress. As before, his first couple of appearances was impactful and fits within the context of the central premise. However, one of the fundamental purposes of a do-over is to change the timeline so that history does not repeat itself. In this case, the plot around the killer is more like a rubber band. It is a millstone.

It doesn't help when the antagonist is a "faceless" bogeyman. I get that he is obsessed with the FL, but the rationale is lost in the mist of plot disarray. He has a name but no backstory, no motivation for any of his actions. They shouldn't have met, or he should be in jail as each timeline changes. Then what happened to him in the 15 years since he may or may not have kidnapped the FL? Did he killed more girls or just looked for the FL all those years. What are the police doing? Watching reruns of Dr. Who?!

The antagonist finally got his just deserts in the last EP but how I wish it happened 6 eps earlier. The last EP is total fan service on steroids! It speed-run through a stack of dating tropes and it is total guilty pleasure. It compensates for some of the mid show confusions.

There is a decent amount of skinship throughout the run and they felt right. Not the most passionate I have seen but swoon-y nevertheless.

In terms of acting, it is the same split personality. I love the leads to bits, but the support cast is all over the place. The grandma is sweet. The mum is bearable. The ML's dad is a buffoon who goes for the cheap laughs. The FL's bestie and her brother are so cringy. Their roles get more and more exaggerated as the show progresses. Are they 13 or 30? I groan during some of their scenes.

The kidnapper deserves his own paragraph. He is so one dimensional. Basically, a cardboard cutout. He shows up, does the Death Stare with bonus grimace and retires to a dark corner to await his next money shot. So little effort yet so pivotal a role.

In the end, if they do a director's cut of our leads’ romantic journey, it would be 10/10. I would be a happy couch potato watching it on repeat. The rest gets a 6/10. In view of balance, the show gets an 8/10.

I can totally understand the hype and attention surrounding the show but I also get why some would defer as well. I need therapy.

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i don't like this one

most of the actors are overacting all the time, too many filler, too many "coincidental" scenes between main characters (falling into each other,...). Additionally, there are many details that are given only once and are not repeated or developed or explained (the first time the male lead dies of depression - why is he depressed?, the scene where the female lead discovers that
her mom hides her illness - has their relationship changed?, the female lead can escape the fate of being crippled but find it difficult to save the male lead?). In particular, what annoys me the most is the pair of supporting characters (the female lead's brother and best friend). They're too loud and don't really contribute to the main story line

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Had high expectation but felt short!

Lovely Runner has been on my plan to watch list forever and I finally completed it. Unfortunately, I am disappointed after watching it, especially given the high rating and awards the show has won. I struggled with the first 10 episodes, from episodes 11 to 15 it got better and then there was the last episode ( not sure if we even needed it…)
What’s good:
1) ML’s acting. I thought he did a decent job as a ML. Only saw 1 movie of him prior to this show so no real expectation.
2) Chemistry between the three actors, BWS, SGH and LSH. Whenever there was a scene between them it brought a smile to my face or a LOL.
3) Decent OST
What’s not great:
1) The plot - too repetitive, boring and confusing. I did want to drop the show because of it but I preserved until the end because I don’t like dropping dramas lol.
2) Chemistry between ML and FL. I know this is possibly an unpopular opinion but for me it was just average. I really don’t feel the electrifying chemistry between them, which made it difficult to watch because the show is about great first love who timed travel many times over to save each other. I felt there was better chemistry between the FL and SML (SGH).

Overall, I would not rewatch this show. If you like the actors/actress then give it a go. It is an ok show to watch but definitely no more than that, in my opinion.

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