No Gain, No Love (2024)

the leads became the second leads?

Overall the drama is good, light and funny. Its a good show to watch when you feel like having a good laugh with some romance. The comedy scenes are really quite funny, even during serious moments you will be shocked by the sudden change in vibes.

That being said, halfway through the drama the second leads gained a large amount of attention and their story was cute indeed (haters to lovers). So towards the end actually the second leads started getting more screentime and cute moments...hahaha which eventually extended to their own spinoff drama

The starting episodes of the drama were really good but the last few episodes felt very dry for the leads. Glad the drama was 12 episodes because there wasnt any big plot they were trying to solve or anything.

Overall it was a cute a fun drama!

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The leads got shortchanged

Shin Min Ah absolutely shines as Son Hae Yeong who in the hands of another actor would probably be a very misunderstood character. I love her range from being organically cute without any over acting like in the scene she's munching away on the kimbap with her chair pushed back out view in the car and does her little moo to breaking my heart when she confronts the pain that her parents caused her. Genuine foster parents are very important, but I agree with the advice for people considering fostering that if their biological children can't handle it well then fostering is not a good fit for their household. Hae Yeong was just a child who still needed to be cared for and they put their own needs to be saints above their daughter. It also hurt her every time someone who became family would leave her. All she wanted was a stable homelife and to be loved in return, she doesn't even hate the foster kids. She fiercely loves the sisters that came back and stayed. Sadly the show also put the happiness of all the side characters above Hae Yeong.

I loath all the side pairings which also has the worst characters Gyu Hyun and U Jae, both of whom are scumbags who abused Hae Yeong in a professional setting with Gyu Hyun the creep who both spammed Ja Yeon with hate comments as well as making his secretary do it then demoting Hae Yeong out of spite because she's married to his father's extramarital child and U Jae who dumped her to marry up, creepily stalked her after he's married, and stole her work and keeps failing upward. It's so much worse that the show chickens out and makes it that Gyu Hyun did not write the worst hate comment, they don't even let his character growth count for anything. He also never rectified what he did to Hae Yeong. He should have given her all the money she wanted for her start-up as compensation. The lip service to the polyamory storyline ends in the most heteronormative way with Hee Sung marrying the one guy and having the child instead of getting an abortion and being the independent person she wanted to be.

I did enjoy Hae Yeong and Ji Uk's romance. He knew who she was, but truly got to know here as they gradually built up their rapport through their interactions at the mini-mart and supporting her schemes. I also like how their first meeting made sense because it's her house that he was staying at and was trying to walk by to avoid her while she was contemplating smoking for the first time and he just so happened to have a lighter which foreshadowed their future as co-schemers turned lovers. He actually looked better with his longer hair, it frames his face very nicely. Ji Uk's story was also swallowed up by the annoying side characters. I would rather see his friendship and brotherly/fatherly relationship develop with that guy that was formerly the Bok family secretary and settle his angst with his birthmother. Hae Yeong and Ji Uk deserved their fantasy ending being happy in love, snuggling with their cat Baby and her with a successful business venture instead of ending on a kiss after reuniting post a long separation.

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a true romcom that's really romcomy

a drama where i think our writernim have found the right balance between seriousness and absolute ridiculousnes , drama and comedy .. my respect, writernim.
this show was so good , one of my favorites second couples ever to be honest was looking forward to their scene as much as i was the leads if not more , it was so good , i love their story .. i like the leads as well so much , lovely kisses as well and the couples are just too cute
the drama was so good that i stayed up all night til 4 am binging all episodes , the final could've been a bit better but it doesn't take away from how good this was
it was such a one true romcom .. not much else and i like that about it , nothing too cliche in my opinion i love it .. it made me laugh so hard and made me happy ..... there were of course a few serious things but they don't take up that much space and everything is like really well balanced whish is how i wish most romcoms are tbh
the feelings and fun count in my rating so yeah subjective all the way with this one , when i enjoy a drama i no longer rate it objectively and i don't care about it's flaws ... bok gyu truly hilarious he and the writer are my fave characters tbh they have my heart and don't forget to watch the spin off , after this as you won't have enough of them

i really really adore this one i have to give it a 9

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Fun, enjoyable and easy to watch!

I really enjoyed this drama from its start to its ending. It’s really fresh and heartwarming. The perfect series that boosts your mood after a tiring day!
It also has a satisfying ending, even though I hoped that secretary Yeo would feel more sorry about his really hurtful comments and that he wouldn’t brush it off with a smile… or maybe that’s just how his character is.
I really really liked Hee-sung and Yoon PD and how their relationship evolved and got more clear.
I also believe that the overall plot was explained well and it unfolded smoothly. Shout out to the writers for this amazing drama!!

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don't waste your time on watching this garbage

mid show mid cast mid storyline with mid chemistry 😅

even side characters have more chemistry than main one force comedy which doesn't make u laugh like 2nd couple chemistry more they were good other this show is jist waste of time and energy maybe spend that time onother shows

no character development main lead kiss scene looks like two wood panel sticked to each other with 0 emotions and intensity, i kind of don't like their acting too if i m not they were in diff. drama too don't remember the name but comparing to that this totally failed to expectations

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Bright start but a poor development of the characters

The start was fantastic! We have a strong story, a female lead (FL) that seems intelligent and ambitious, and a handsome male lead (ML) that is strong, sweet and has his own convictions. We also have good side characters. At the beginning, their stories seem to take almost equal attention as the main story, which makes sense as the series advances.
However, the development of the characters is so bad, specially the FL, who becomes very annoying (Min-a is a good actress, is the character who becomes insufferable).
Just when you think the FL is finally evolving and becoming less selfish, she strikes again with another tantrum. The perfect example is episode 10, when the ML really needs to hear from her that she loves him. Well, she didn’t not say it and in top of that, when she realises that Ji-wook was one of the kids her mother took care of, instead of asking for his reasons to hide the truth, she only explodes and says she is disgusted by him. The ML losses all his convictions and he becomes a total FL pleaser, he is immensely patient and always demonstrating his love for the FL, and she keeps being her annoying self.
the FL’s sister/friend and the Chairman’s son had a much better character development… it looks more and more as they were the main characters and not the originals.

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Simply in love with this series!

the real romantic comedy! From chapters 1 to 10, everything was incredible, the plot was fun, light, funny, I started watching because of the trailer and I loved the main characters. The main couple's irritation at the beginning was very funny, the protagonist boy flirting with the protagonist girl was simply wonderful, I simply loved their romance, but then in the last two episodes the screenwriter commits disrespect towards the main couple and the viewer, by including many more scenes of the secondary couple and giving crumbs of 3 seconds in the last episode of the main couple, I was very angry, so much so that at first I was looking forward to the spin-off of the secondary couple but after this disrespect in the last two episodes of no gain no love, I lost the desire to watch the spin-off!

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I have finally decided to drop this drama...

Many may be confused why I waited every week for the episodes and then just gave up on episode 10, so I want to clearly want to explain my thought on this narrative.

This story felt like a slice of life comedy since no matter what dramatic situation the character was in there was a bit of a comical twist as well as a deep topic with a dark turn.

Example:
One of the fl sister is in a polyamorous relationship, the fl found out and thought one of the sister's partners was cheating and beat him up with rage (filmed in a comical way from the exaggerated attacks comical) then finds out she is pregnant.
Another of her sister wrote spicy novels and a the CEO finds out his mum read it so spammed it with hate from shock. While serving his community service from the hate comments their romance arc started but then it touched on the sisters trauma with the harshness of the comments leading to her abusive dad.
In conclusion the side plot bought in dark situations from everyday life but added some comical element to not make the side story not too dark.

Or some stories are just comical e.g the fl planning a wedding just to get her cheating ex boyfriend's wedding money back

But all of these drastically contrasted the main plot e.g. the potential chaebol that became an orphan who is now looking for revenge is just deeply contrasts all the other topics written in the show and makes it seem so dramatic because it really stuck out for me. Which was not funny, just serious and very stereotypical. I think this just really put me off because they primarily shifted the focus to that plot which annoyed me.

In summary this is MY OPINION about this drama, I honestly found the main plot , the whole chaebol thingy just so boring because it is a very saturated market and has been around since for ever so I got bored and decided to drop it...

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