Sort By: Author's Order
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![A Good Day to Be a Dog]()
1. A Good Day to Be a Dog
Korean Drama - 2023, 14 episodes
- A very cute drama that at one episode a week started to coax me back into dramaland. Nothing new per se, but sweet and fun and a spark of something interesting in its execution
- Unfortunately that spark sputters out quicker than I hoped. It drags in some random unneccessary high stakes (incomprehensible revenge plot, magic amnesia, past lives, etc) but it felt like repitious angst and filler trying on tropes like hats. The distilled worst parts of everything you've already seen in another drama. Boring, next.
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![Doctor Slump]()
2. Doctor Slump
Korean Drama - 2024, 16 episodes
- Rivals-to-burntout-idiots-to-lovers, a flawed but trying family, a relatively fresh and accurate take on mental health and recovery
- Some weirdly less well-thought out aspects; medical accuracy of characters drinking while on antidepressants aside, the repeated binge drinking in a show themed around mental health is a Choice
- Hits a slump (sorry) in the back half and the plot labors mightily to stretch itself for the amount of air time left to cover. I could rate the first half of this drama wildly higher than the second
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![A Shop for Killers]()
3. A Shop for Killers
Korean Drama - 2024, 8 episodes
- A stylish action thriller with twists and turns, and Kim Hye Joon is really one of my favorite newer actresses
- The early episodes are well balanced between the present action and flashbacks to how exactly Jian's keeping up despite not being a blooded mercenary herself. The later episodes lose themselves in the flashbacks too much imo
- I do appreciate how well some of the twists and turns were foreshadowed. I just wish momentum hadn't dwindled
- Min-hye is alive and I will not be taking questions at this time.
- She made herself an absolute boogeyman among mercenaries in just 10 years. Ma'am <3
- Enough loose ends that I suspect the writers are to hope for a second season but overall still self-contained and satisfying as single series
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![The Judge from Hell]()
4. The Judge from Hell
Korean Drama - 2024, 14 episodes
- Entertaining but ultimately forgettable. Park Shin Hye was obviously having fun (good-for-her.png), but that's about all I can say
- There's a lot to chew on in the set up (OG Kang Bitna who haunts the narrative, Justicia's story; how does a greek god of Justice end up in Catholic Hell as a demon?; all of the legal and ethical theory, etc.) but it never does because we're more interested in the male lead's man pain
- The zeitgeist of people's feelings towards the law is on display here but it never really deals with the tension between people's reliance on the law for justice and their frustration with the injustice baked into the system. Not that I really expect a drama to have The Answer but it always annoys me when they just swan by it.
- There's something about punitive vs restorative justice in here too that it skirts around but never actually addresses. Is it the villain we hate or their actions? If it's retribution, does that make torture okay?
- Who cares, the leads are hot and sad lol
