This review may contain spoilers
Insanely promising start, but devolves into stereotypical romcom
tl;dr: starts off extremely promising, but partially abandons deep themes that would make the show unique in favor of a typical romcom kdrama. Still explores said earlier themes and will make you super emotional, but plot holes are evident and there is so much wasted potential. However, the show does characterization so well that it's still worth a watch, but you might get distracted at the wasted potential of the show.Twinkling Watermelon is an amazing show. I must admit: I cried like a baby in the first and last few episodes. I'll start off with my praise for it before moving onto criticisms.
1) Cinematography was amazing
The cintematography was so so smooth, and in the first few episodes, I was so immersed in the story that I forgot I've never touched guitar in my life, I'm not a CoDA, and I'm not Eun Gyeol. Seriously. Even in the less magnificent mid-end portion (more on this later), it would have been at worst considered a 8-8.5 overall ranking on MDL.
2) THE CHARACTERIZATIONS!!!!!!
Yi Chan and Cheong Ah stole this show. Both characters are relatively 2D, yet something about them just makes me so attached and I was rooting for them throughout the entire show. The main cast (barring Seol In Ah, but just because I'm biased and disliked the character she portrayed for reasons I will state later) is so immensely talented at bringing out their characters. It's something about the micro expressions and flawless execution of each scene that could make me believe that each character is real (also thanks to the cinematography).
3) THE EMOTIONS!
I cried like a baby so many times throughout this show (mainly at the beginning and the end). Every time they explored the relationship of Eun Gyeol and his parents, I would start to tear up. Again, the cinematography and characterizations of his family members was just so amazing that I genuinely felt like I was a part of their family.
While my criticisms may be a lot longer than my praise, it's just because the show (like I stated 10 times earlier...) just had so much wasted potential and left me so much to think about.
1) Music and the implications it has on Eun Gyeol
I'm not going to lie, I digged the guitar concept: it was so sick seeing Eun Gyeol work at something he was passionate about. Nice to see a series where the main protagonist actually has passions, and that passion is well explored. However, it pissed me off when he was praised as a guitar prodigy but the only thing he kept on playing was Pachabel Canon in D. Nitpicky much? Yes, but the main qualm I have about the music in Twinkling Watermelon is: they don't focus on it enough. The first few episodes leads viewers to believe that the show will be heavily centered around music creation with Eun Gyeol's prodigious talents and Yi Chan's strong willpower in creating a band. The focus on music in the first few episodes (especially the parts where Eun Gyeol is able to practice late at night as a child due to his family being deaf, which is interesting because it seems like an advantage but is in reality an example of what I'm about to say) also presents a painful dilemma: the people that Eun Gyeol loves the most, his family, will never be able to hear Eun Gyeol's passion in life. This pain is nearly untouched, and there was so much wasted potential in leaving music unexplored.
2) Time travel brain failure
God, I hate how they portrayed time travel in this kdrama. I was so distracted from the superb characterization and exploration of relationships between the characters by the dubious plot. In the beginning I was absolutely 100% in for the plot, when I assumed that Eun Gyeol would take on the role of Dong Jin, avoid the name Eun Gyeol at all costs, and desperately try to correct the tragic events that happened to his mother and father but in the end, fail to change anything because that's how time travel should work logically. Unfortunately I developed a brain aneurysm watching what the writers decided to do with the PERFECT CONCEPT while taking on a generic time-travel plot that makes no sense if you think about it critically (just search up time paradox). Also, I'd just like to say. Even if you ignore the time paradox, Eun Gyeol's parents in the last two episodes are NOT the parents he's grown to love. He is not the son they've raised for 18 years (or however old he is). In fact, he shouldn't even be there. Cheong Ah and Yi Chan met a lot earlier "in this timeline" (if you choose to turn off your critical thinking skills and accept the paradox). They didn't meet the same way. They were separated. Eun Gyeol's conception date should be extremely different. He shouldn't even be alive.
3) What even was that middle section????
If you watched the kdrama, you know what I mean. The middle section (more like mid-end) was only such a crime because they throw away amazing characterizations, portrayal of raw human emotions (like my favorite show: warts and all (iykyk)) Reply 1988 vibes in favor of your typical high school kdrama amok with frustrating misunderstandings, loves-me-loves-me-not dilemmas, and the pacing of a snail. It would be less of a crime against humanity if they didn't build up the focus on raw human relationships in the earlier episodes, the complexities between relationships that need to be said but aren't even remotely explored in the romcom kdrama genre (except for Reply 1988 and the like). Wasted potential much?
4) Eun Yu
I did not care for Eun Yu's character at all... first of all, her motivations for impersonating her mother made 0 sense. Se Kyeong is abroad... yes, Eun Yu and Se Kyeong are identical, but remind me again how her mother, who is abroad, and is still betrothed to Eun Yu's father, will be impacted by any way by Eun Yu trying to find and seduce Se Kyeong's "first love" in Korea? Suppose you ignore the time paradox. This is what will happen if Eun Yu succeeds: 1) Eun Yu finds and seduces Se Kyeong's "first love" 2) ??? Nothing happens to Se Kyeong? Because she is a social elite, and will not return to Korea until Se Kyeong's biological dad returns, meaning micro events in Korea will not have any impact on her life? 3) Eun Yu is still born!! Also, I understand how romance between Eun Gyeol and another character would popularize this show, but come on: it was so unnecessary. Eun Yu's character as a whole was unnecessary. I felt absolutely 0 chemistry between Eun Gyeol and Eun Yu, and so the romance felt so forced, unlike Yi Chan and Cheong Ah. Eun Yu's inclusion as a character also perpetuated this romcom shift, which I disliked a lot because it drew attention from the unique themes (I'll elaborate in 5 + 6) and to a more typical romcom.
5) The ending + themes part 1
Like many other people have said, the ending is super rushed. Why not cut off the BS romcom arc in the mid-end to spend much more time on building up the ending? Ignoring the time paradox rant, Eun Gyeol does not live his life at all. Everything is handed to him on a silver platter. He does not work to become the biggest boy band in Korea. He never even communicates with his parents and tries to resolve the unsaid pressures and tensions on him being a CoDA... none of the juicy plot from the beginning is resolved, and it feels like the kdrama switched directors midway.
6) More abandoned themes :(
Kind of touched on in 5- Eun Gyeol's conflict with his family in the beginning was because of the responsibility and pressure he felt as his family's connection to the outer world. He kept his issues to himself, he didn't communicate his true desires to his family. It was his own passion versus his love and responsibility he felt towards his family (particularly, his father). But Eun Gyeol doesn't realize: his father is his FATHER, someone he should rely own. Eun Gyeol is not responsible for his father's happiness, despite what the world wants him to think. But, you know what? Eun Gyeol travels back into time and fixes both his. mother's and father's lives (with the exception of his father's hearing loss). So Eun Gyeol is, indeed, responsible for his parents' happiness.
An Ideal World:
I swear to god, it feels like the first half of the show is written by a completely different person than the second half of the show. An ideal world, where the Reply 1988 vibes continue throughout the whole show (can you guess what my favorite kdrama of all time is???), goes like this: Dong Jin and Joo Ma have never been acquainted (even in the future), Dong Jin never sees the forum post Joo Ma and Yi Chan put up but Eun Gyeol does, Eun Gyeol sees the forum post and impersonates Dong Jin throughout the process while never revealing his own name. Yi Chan and Cheong Ah are originally high school sweethearts. Eun Yu DOESN'T EXIST. Eun Gyeol learns of his parents' tragic pasts, and how they are strong people even without him, while connecting Cheong Ah and Yi Chan and providing emotional support. Eun Gyeol tries his best to change anything, but nothing changes. He learns that he is not responsible for his parents' happiness: he is not an angel, he is just their child. Eun Gyeol returns to the future, where he communicates with his parents and chases his passion. They struggle, but in the end, it is organic, painful, the human reality: warts and all.
Was this review helpful to you?
