Ripe for the Picking

Trying to tell too many stories, but a VERY lovely main romance & First experience

Subjective Gut Rating: 8.25

Stumbled upon “Ripe for the Picking” on Netflix as it silently shows up without much fanfare. As I read the synopsis, I was expecting another over-the-top rom-com about a 30-year-old virgin and a socially awkward guy. But I was pleasantly surprised that this is lovely and heartfelt love story between two vastly different individuals.

This is a very short drama, only 9 episodes and less than 30 minutes each. I would say my biggest complaint would be too many side stories. As much as I enjoy learning each co-worker’s individual journey to love and finding themselves, they are too short and take away screen time from the leads. The leads’ love story has become an afterthought in the first few episodes, while the drama spends its precious limited time on:

A working mom trying to find work/life balance, and her own identity.
A career woman whose sole focus on work jeopardizes her personal relationships
A girl with low-esteem struggling to find love in all the wrong places and being shallow as hell.
A asexual co-worker whose story was mentioned in passing without much depth

These are all interesting stories individually, but with such limited time, they just seem to be stories that hit all the checkboxes. They are not given the proper time and effort in developing them into meaningful ones.

Having said all that, the main romance is lovely. The leads are both awkward but sweet individuals. Their encounters and subsequent development are lovely to see. Oh, and there are quite a few frustrating moments with communication, but I’ve learned to forgive them because they tug my heartstrings.

Female lead is pretty and quite successful at work, yet she hasn’t had a boyfriend since high school (hard to believe!). She’s embarrassed to be a virgin at 32 and is on a mission to sleep with someone. That drive and desire propelled her to take the initiative in approaching our socially awkward ML. I have to applaud FL’s shy forwardness because she is the one making all the moves and trying to clear all misunderstanding/miscommunication. My heart breaks for her when she was ‘rejected’ and was so confused about what happened.

But what I love best about this drama is how it gives us a sweet, awkward but very realistic portrayal of a first sexual experience. I’m glad so much care and thought are put into writing their intimate time together. It was beautiful to witness (and quite embarrassing as I feel like a voyeur). When they do open up to each other, no matter how weird and awkwardly frustrating it is, it feels honest and intimate. And special brownie points to great kisses that feel romantic, tender and a lot of desire.

This drama might not be for all, especially if you usually get upset with a lack of communication. We have some of those frustrating moments, but they get cleared up pretty fast. I had a lovely time watching this and shed some tears of (seemingly) heartbreaks for the leads.



Completed: 4/21/2024 - Review #431

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Awkwardly Ever After!

The series beautifully portrays a shy woman in her 30s who is a virgin, alongside our ML who struggles with regrets of a lost dream and has serious self-esteem issues. They both have their own demons to face!
What's great to watch is how they motivate each other to be a better version of themselves (both directly and indirectly). The emotional connection between them provided the much necessary comfort they both needed to get out of their shell !

Despite some lack of communication, they don't drag it out unnecessarily. The story is genuinely sweet and their chemistry shines through.

There are side stories too tackling themes like loneliness and work-life balance but I felt too many sub plots were present considering the run time! Though they gave a happy ending to each!

The English translation of the title is terrible and the synopsis is way too vague and doesn't do justice to the depth of the story.
I would definitely recommend this drama for the characters and their awkward heartfelt journey!

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So good that it should have had a longer running time!!!

I absolutely loved the story and the way it way presented. The series is basically about different insecurities of different people and how each one of us built assumptions based on it. The best part of direction here was that the viewer gets to listen the thoughts of not only the main character but others as well, which immediately shows how our insecurities are building our judgements about other and how they can be so wrong.
I read many reviews which said that there shouldn't have been so many side stories, but I strongly disagree !! The issue actually is that due to shorter running time, the side stories didn't felt too deep, But I think most of them did the job (except the story of the manga writer mom, which I felt could have ended better), and we see the result of this in the first scene of episode 9 where all the 4 women are sitting and talking about relationships and giving thier opinion on divorce. Because we knew the back story of all the other characters, we could understand exactly why they had the opinion that they had and that scene felt really well done.
The other aspect that I really admired were the few but slow sensual scenes, I haven't seen such well done intimate scenes in a really long time. It's a very good example which shows that you don't need nudity to make a really intimate scene.
Improvement needed-
There were some scenes where I thought direction could have been better, and ofc I already mentioned that with slightly longer running time there could have been more depth in the series but still these all aren't dealbreak.
I would whole heartedly recommend it to someone who wants to see a non-clice drama with a hint of romance which focuses about the less spoken things in society
P.S- Special kudos for having a asexual side character

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A fresh down to earth story among so many hyper romantic dramas

If you are looking for an exciting romance full of energy then this one might not be for you. Though i would encourage you to try an episode or two.

Its a story about quite adult issues of people between around 30 years old doing regular jobs. The female lead is a virgin at 32, which is established right away and she craves to have sex, not in a lustful way but more being embarassed about never having it. Her friends/colleagues have their own relationship issues, but she is romanticising all their relationships a bit. Overall focus is on her, but we get a little window into the others lives. Ending is quite nice and relatively sweet without glamour, just like the show . Its a chill watch and with 9 episodes less than 30 minutes each its an easy recommend for a weekend or midweek afternoon.
As both character leads are very awkward and inexperienced there is many awkward moments and misunderstandings, but they get resolved through actual communication, wow what a concept for a romance dram, but seriously its so nice to see a misunderstanding not causing some convoluted plotline for 3 episodes.

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Love in many forms

The synopsis above does no justice to this sweet little series! In three hours it tidily shows a beautiful relationship blooming between Kosaka Maiko and Kagiya Senri with four other stories around Kosaka's life informing how we see their story.

I was really charmed by each of the 'side' stories and how they tied into Kosaka finding her way into a positive and lovely relationship with Kagiya. Kosaka learned a little bit from each of her co-workers' relationships through off-hand remarks, which is such a charming way to show how we all affect each other.

To me, each person's experience shared the lesson that we should find love and happiness in a way that suits our lives, rather than what we have been told to expect or want by others.

Even more interesting to me was the repeated theme that we need reminders now and then about why we love our partners, and that it is important to reflect that back to them. This feels very real as I enter the twelfth year of a relationship and is something I have rarely seen addressed so beautifully.

I absolutely adored this little snippet of sweetness and will definitely rewatch when I'm in the mood for something emotional with an adorable happy ending.

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Esse drama aborda um pouco de cada personagem ao longo dos seus 9 episódios, mas a trama principal é da Kosaka, 32 anos, que é virgem e conhece o Kagiya, 29 anos, virgem e que está perdido na vida, seu plot é revelado mais no final então não darei spoilers por enquanto.

Sinceramente os atores que fizeram esse casal principal não me convenceu, a caracterização do ator Sato Taiki não parece ser de um homem de 29 anos, o cabelo o deixou extremamente jovem, a máscara logo suspensa nos primeiros episódios ficou sem sentido e suas roupas eram muito jovens, o que não seria um problema algum se a caracterização da atriz Kusumi Koharu a deixasse completamente mais envelhecida, sendo que a diferença de idade era apenas de 3 anos entre eles, tudo bem que sua personagem trabalhava em uma grande empresa, mas no dia a dia, a deixava parecendo uma mulher de 50 anos. Não digo nem 40 porque estou próxima dessa idade e jamais me vestiria assim kkkkkk

Apesar disso, as histórias abordadas, mesmo que rapidamente foram bem interessantes. Um assexuado, uma "feia", uma mãe, uma workaholic. Acho que apenas a da workaholic que teve realmente um desfecho. O assexuado disse apenas que tinha esperança. A feia, que não tinha nada de feia, era extremamente superficial porque procurava aparência invés de cuidado e amor. A mãe, não senti que houve mudança, ela apenas aceitou o fato de que sua vida era aquela, mas poderia ter mostrado um marido que preste e a ajude a conquistar seus sonhos ou pelo menos a sair com os amigos às vezes.

Mas fiquei triste pela história do Kagiya, imagina dedicar a vida desde os 7 anos para algo e ver sua última esperança de sucesso aos 26, quando na realidade é quando a vida adulta está apenas engatinhando? Foram 19 anos de dedicação, então eu super o entendi por ter passado 3 anos no limbo sem desejos, apenas sobrevivendo porque era preciso. Mas gostei da maneira que ele finalmente quis fazer algo, mas poderia ser por ele, e não apenas para ser digno de alguém, mas já é um bom começo né?

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