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Entertaining and intelligent law drama
Very nice law drama overall, I enjoyed it a lot. I like that the plot was well written and stayed tight, and coherent throughout the entire series with no dumbassery, fillers, or circus in the court room. The killer's identity reveal also comes naturally, without contrived attempts to prolong it being kept hidden (like in headache inducing Blind, for example). If you watched a certain Hollywood movie with a similar plot, or simply figured it out early from a rather limited range of presented characters then good for you, take a cookie.The highlight of the drama is not "whodunit" mystery in itself, but the story behind it and FL's character development, which progresses considerably after she starts to get involved with ML and seemingly unrelated cases he one way or the other drops on her. I thoroughly enjoyed their characters interactions, they had great chemistry.
I'd say my only complaint would be that the initially calm and intelligent main villain made a big mistake down the line by trying to cover up another character's crimes (which would have been revealed anyway). And while trying to consequently cover up that mistake he started to get increasingly paranoid and made even more mistakes, which in the end led him to a rather dumb cliche end. It was totally avoidable, with minimal damage to himself, if only he stayed put and didn't do anything unnecessary. But other than that it was quite an enjoyable watch.
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A kaleidoskope of failed relationships
This drama is a kaleidoscope of failed relationships and call me a cynic but I'm not seeing a bright future for most of this drama's couples:-Yu Jung and her lazy ass husband finally talked it out and have delved into role playing games to spice things up, but watch them get bored in a couple of years again. The husband will be the first because he is just lazy by nature and takes his wife for granted. And the wife needs constant affirmation of their love.
-FL's spoiled brat of a sister just didn't give me the vibe that she truly loves the guy, she just goes with the flow in life. A NEET and a minimal wage worker, they are a staple divorce statistics example, so often stories such as these happen. Since they don't even know each other well or what they want to do with their life I think in a couple of years she's gonna start blaming the guy for ruining her life and gonna end up a divorcee with two kids, continuing living off of her relatives. If I were FL I would have given her an earful and kicked her out of the "bird's nest" long ago to get a taste of real life. Or at the very least made her pay rent. I really dislike lazy loafers like these, have seen them in real life and they just never learn to live on their own due to continued coddling.
-U-Ri and CEO...just why and how the ef? I don't even think CEO really fell in love with U-Ri, no chemistry whatsoever. He just didn't want to end up alone in his age and used her puppy love to his benefit. Too bad his ex wife didn't want to get back together with him, would have been a better fit. I don't know what else to say besides it being cringe.
-That bitchy bride friend of FL's is gonna get divorced in a couple of years as well. Pressured an unready guy into marriage, yeah, that's gonna end well.
-The chicken sh*it of an ex his current gf - not gonna happen. At this rate the guy is going to end up forever alone, he really needs to dial himself down by a lot.
-ML's ex and her husband - not really seeing it either. She clearly didn't know what she wanted and gonna question and beat herself up until her husband will get sick of it.
-ML and FL...they will probably be ok? ML kinda half-assed his confession, but FL considerately gave him slack. ML really struggled to convey his feelings until the very last, but judging by his behaviour in the end he seemed to have overcome it, he became all lovey dovey with her. They were quite cute in the end. And FL is not going to ditch ML, because where else will she find a guy who likes her no matter all the embarassing stuff she constantly gets herself into. Personally, I think the lead couple was the most natural in development and healthiest of all of this drama's relationships. Their bonding through similar ordeal allowed them to really get to know and understand each other, which I can't say for many of the other couples of this drama.
Overall, a 7/10 from me. I really loved YIN's performance, she really carried the show and managed to pull off various aspects of her character, ranging from really embarassing ones to very mature ones, with effortless grace. I can imagine it must have been difficult though, because her character had to stay likeable while being very flawed.
And some of the show's dialogues were real gems, full of witty banter and meaningful one liners.
But still:
-1 point for cringey U-Ri and CEO couple.
-1 point for trainwreck of a shotgun couple.
-1 point for too much screen time and tears wasted on Mr. Trash.
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Nothing new here
Another one of those very far removed from reality saeguks where bored court has nothing better to do but to plot against each other inside the palace. It's better filmed than some other of its kind and actors are ok for the most part, but there's nothing new here.In this one we have a jealous, spiteful grandma, the queen dowager, as the main villain from the get go. She makes no mystery of it. She's playing the kingmaker behind the scenes for her grandsons, like she did for her son, the king, and is not beyond stooping very low against those whom she doesn't like. She hates the current queen, who is FL, for being of nobler birth than her and for not being obedient to her.
Then of course we have the evil minister, who's in cohoots with the grandma.
And last, but not least, a staple of many saeguks - a weak and powerless king, who not only has to obey the ministers lest he be deposed, but he can't even kick out his own scheming mother into fckn retirement to some back palace. His only prowess of note is spawning tons of children with his ever growing harem of concubines.
The concubines can be summed up to basically one character - your typical crazy Asian mother who wants to whip her child into becoming an overachiever and m̶a̶k̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶i̶t̶ ̶i̶n̶t̶o̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶m̶o̶s̶t̶ ̶p̶r̶e̶s̶t̶i̶g̶i̶o̶u̶s̶ ̶u̶n̶i̶v̶e̶r̶s̶i̶t̶y̶ ̶to ̶b̶e̶c̶o̶m̶e̶ ̶a̶ ̶m̶a̶n̶a̶g̶e̶r̶...to become a king.
And since the king is so prolific in the field of child making there are many male contenders to the throne, which is the crux of this whole drama - everybody wants to take FL's and her sons place. So through her tenacity and guile she has to protect them against all the schemers (which is basically everybody in the court here) lest they all get deposed and killed like what happened to the previous queen and her sons. That's about it. There's lots of intense drama over borderline makjang bs, so if you're worried about your blood pressure I wouldn't recommend watching this drama.
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Good, but the old TV series were better
Yea, that muted ending and furniture of a protagonist didn't do it for me. Never once was he shown to be actually needed by Toranaga and he wasn't even funny to be his pet clown, because they communicated too seldom here. And many important scenes about the protagonist were cut to make time for a parade of side characters.And too many times it seemed that Toranaga was just plain lucky and adapting, not megaminding everything ten steps ahead. Yea, he was a ruthless liar who surrounded himself by people he could easily manipulate, but he wasn't omniscient to predict all random things. Like, what happened to his son, or his brother betraying him, or what happened to Mariko.
And speaking of Mariko, she was more of a protagonist in this show than ML or Toranaga combined. MVP, but disappointingly way too suicidal.
My favorite character in this drama is not her though, but Yabushige - the most human and entertaining one to watch. He was squirming on the frying pan for the whole series trying to get the most profit, but failed expectedly :).
Anyway, it's still a good drama. Production quality, especially the costumes were great. Too bad they didn't show the epic battle of Sekigahara, but it wasn't in the book, so ok. I'd give it an 8. But old TV series in terms of the plot and characters were still better, imho.
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I'm blown away
Very creative, well filmed drama with a well thought out plot. It looked at first like a very creepy supernatural thriller about ghosts, totally didn't expect the twist in the middle. The latter part was absolutely heartbreaking.The only thing I don't think was worth inserting was Moving characters and its season 2 teaser (?) at the very end of the drama, it should have been self contained. But I guess since the director and screenwriter are the same, and it's the same fictional universe, they decided to have a bit of fun here.
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Best comedy of 2022!
This short format, fast paced kdrama is not only packed to the brim with sizzling comedy, but also somehow managed to pull off one of the most charming and well done romances I've seen this year, even though it's just one of the subplots going on in it.The funny lighthearted plot, pacing, acting - everything's excellent.
All the cast did a stellar job and I thoroughly enjoyed watching their hilarious characters navigating through various situations at their chaotic workplace and after it.
It's a very bingable show, a surprisingly great comfort drama and rewatch value is very high. A solid 9, highly recommend!
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