Brogana Sunfrog

Ocean's 11 vibe. Leads lack chemistry. recycled fight scenes

I would give it an 8.5/10 for being entertaining, but it lost points for the awkward non romance interactions , having parts I wanted to skip through & for how I feel at the end . This is a bit of a Ocean's 11 vibe. There's alot to like in this series, yet:
1) villain got way too much screen time with close ups of him being gleefully laughing.Alot
2) bodily functions comedy & references-not funny
3) Leads didn't seem certain that they weren't flirting but as they had zero chemistry, it's fine, but somehow it felt like there should be something there, which seemed to be teased but just was awkward
4) under used 2nd male lead
5) useless female added to team late in the game was like an extra wheel on a boat (like why is it even there !?)
6) about 30 min too much fight scenes that felt recycled
7) end felt like there should be a season 2
8) male lead had a double life but his goofy persona should have been an act to throw people off, but ended up being who he really was- he was only cool when he wore the suit-kinda funny, but at the same time disappointing.
9) end was lackluster though "happy".

also Odd : a point blank public service announcement admonishing Korean artifact thieves to return the loot.
10) I would have preferred more light hearted, slight romance with less violence and more artifact stealing

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Tedious & flawed melodrama focuses on friendship

There were so many other dramas I wanted to watch more, but this was free on Netflix so I thought to watch it before it left. It is mostly drama/melodrama. Heavy on friendship. I found the main male leads to be a bit dim when it came to relation ships. The romances were dissatisfying to me as the females were mean, aggressive, physically abusive, pushy & selfish. Everything had to be on thier terms. Their love interests were loooong suffering. There were 2 mothers in this, that were terrible people but were forgiven in the end. I really didn't like the way in which they resolved this. I particularly hate it when main leads swear their undying devotion & to go through anything together only to end up having one or both of them leave, then of course get back together. was just glad to be done with this.

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Rehashing plot line & lead is sulky not tsundere

This did not need to be 10 episodes. Some issues were dealt with more than once it made the characters look stupid. They could have better used the time to fill out & resolve the hollow story of the thug who kept trying to take over their restaurant but it seems that the back story as well as the resolution to that got edited out or the writers just forgot ! Kento Yamazaki's character was anti romantic. Yah, I know this IS fiction, but no one in their right mind would want to spend 6 months much less a whole life with his cold ,sulky character. I'm not sure why his character was so rude & seemed broken when he grew up loved & ignorant of his sad history. I'm also not sure why any female would fall for a guy who is going to hit you more than hug you, rarely say something nice & when he does it's more an insult .That's really messed up. It made for an unsatisfying romance. It was unclear to me why the family register issue could be used as leverage. All they had to do to protect themselves was reveal the truth to each other. Shohei Miura's character ended up being a wishy washy waffle of a guy who seemed like a catch in the beginning but couldn't keep his focus on one girl & doesn't seem to be able to care for any girl more than a little while. I mean he goes so quickly from :"agh ! you broke my heart !" to "ah I'm fine" it gives you whiplash !

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lead characters delightful, but the secret destroys that so things don't end well

I was really disappointed that while both main characters were delightful, the ending was not. It may be a culture difference.. My world view is that, hope is central to life and lying is selfish & wrong. Hence the reason why this is a bomb.
In a nutshell: girl has secret that will destroy the boy, and it pretty much does.
to explain I have to use spoilers
Guy does not want to fall in love & tried hard not to admit he has. He even tries to not encourage the girl. His father left he & his mother when he was a toddler & his mother had a nervous breakdown & now he has to take care of her.(They show him washing his naked mother!! EU!!! just wrong!!) He lives on a tiny island where people visit or come to train in the military, but no one stays as there is no real economy or much to do (that's modern). He does NOT want to be left again. Along comes a real nice girl, who takes a fancy to him & pursues his affections, knowing that he does not want to set himself up to get hurt (left). She convinces him to enter into a relationship with her by telling him that she is not unfaithful & will never be. Problem: she has lupus & is dying. She does not tell him ! That's selfish !! She is not supposed to go out in the sun as it makes her sicker, but she wants to be with him so much that she spends days out in the sun with him (she could have told him). SO eventually she gets worse, flies off without saying goodbye in person & then dies. Except her twin sister returns to the island pretending to be her dead sister, until he figures it out. She is no substitute for her sister to him, so he becomes a broken hearted faithful visitor to his dead girlfriend's grave. happy ending ? NO !

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Disappointment. More violent/scary stuff than romance+Villain has excess screen time

It's 30 min format just feels a bit weird & it would have been better to have cut it down to 35 episodes . There is more violence & scary stuff than romance. The end reveal ,(about the bad guy ),is brilliant & unexpected BUT this just doesn't feel like a very balanced series.
Ji Chang Wook is incredible with his many nuances. Choi Tae Joon shines, while Nam Ji Hyun does well but her character is written poorly. Kwon Na Ra is irritating & Kim Ye Won's character should have been written out by the 10th episode at the very least. Dong Ha's character is the stuff of nightmares & is in WAY too many episodes, which is my main problem with this series. Negatives out weigh the positives for me. Breaking up & making up trope should be done away with ! Neutralizing the bad guy & then bringing him back again & again & again is just tedious & traumatizing ! Side characters that don't take No for an answer should be done away with as well. I wanted to like this & Ji Chang Wook is So good in this, but there just isn't much that's satisfying beyond his acting. There is a happy ending for the leads & the 2nd leads but the satisfaction is ruined by adding 2 more un necessary episodes AFTER the happy ending which is just lazy writing. I loved Healer but with this series, I had to take breaks every few episodes because it got so dark & violent . How many people have to get stabbed!!??? Pretty disappointed in this

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Light & Fluffy over doses on the "sweet" but fun reality escapism

Pleasant Mindless, very low on drama is a lovely reality distraction . It's fun to watch male lead act cold . Female lead was a bit too childish & over the top cutesy. The parental drama is cringy. The end is happy & there is implied 2 year time skip that you never actually see as they skip right to inexplicably being together happy ending
that doesn't really fill in a whole lot of plot holes .
The time skip & career pursuit at the end felt forced.
I could not find a version online that had consistent sound so be prepared for soundless parts in each episode & also when the characters text it's not subtitled.

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intense ethnic barriers & commonalities is not for the faint hearted

D.O. is incredible & the whole movies is Brilliantly done; great dancing, well acted, But no happy ending. The fault is not in the movie, but in that it was not a movie for me. I am the wrong audience for this very serious story . The trauma that the characters faced will haunt me & perhaps it is meant to be that way, but I am unable to be pragmatic about such things. I would have passed on this important but searing raw portrayal of ethnic barriers & commonalities. I can only imagine how meaningful this is to Koreans, for whom this is recent past for . While I loved the dancing & grew fond of the characters, the intensity of the drama was too much for me....if I had known I would not have watched it because once seen, such things can not be forgotten.(will give me nightmares)

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Similar to the American series: Leverage

This is 16 episodes, not 32
I was unsure if I would like this because it has no romance but Jang Keun-Suk smirks & side glances with a twinkle in his eye as he romances the camera, so fans will still get thier fill of his charms without having to share him with an onscreen love. this is very much like the series Leverage, (there are times when the soundtrack sounds similar to that of the American Leverage theme song!) This is much more enjoyable than the Korean leverage series (which was very forgettable.) Their are some intense scenes of violence & car accidents that people ridiculously recover from. The series does an impressive job of switching the two look alikes; keeping us guessing which is which at key points.

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rollicking bromance is violent & creepy but still engaging

intense, interesting & much more fun than I anticipated. Mostly a rollicking bromance with alot of friends fighting friends without the intent to kill. I gave it a lower rating because there was alot violence and scary/creepy evil. I was glad to see alot more of Rang & for him to have a romance WITH a happy ending. Female mountain god was a bit brainlessly fixated and shallow, but then again pretty much every woman in this was just a pawn, scenery or both. this is all about the guys having fun
tussling each other & kicking bad guy butts. main characters all end up alive . Very strong Korean ethnocentricity theme, which given the era it's set in & thier history with Japan-totally appropriate & warranted fitting the story. Very engaging, well acted drama-just too violent & creepy at times for me to make it something I'd put on my shelf to rewatch. Kudos, by the way for making it only 12 episodes. 16 would have been draggy .

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Not light hearted. Has a good bit of melodrama

(has same actress as my girlfriend is a 9 tailed fox, which is why I watched it)
Though Shin Min-a steals every scene she is in. This is not a light hearted film, but a drama where Shin Min-a does a good bit of agonizing , waiting & crying. Having said
that, it's Still, very enjoyable. It's hard to grasp why Seun-beom Ryu is so insecure about his looks (scar is not disfiguring) & so the premise is kind of ridiculous. I was not impressed with his selfishness in his self sacrificing. Has a happy ending

Spoiler

but incongruously, he has both his eyebrow and his scar back at the end

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story of deceit, manipulation & revenge

This would have been better if they had made it longer than 1 hour 28 minutes because they don't take enough time to show WHY the guy is such a "catch" (OK he's rich & supports stray dogs, but still; he's a womanizer fixated on a model, though neither one of them is faithful to each other). Nor do they really develop the romance .Listed as a :Comedy /Romance, it is really neither but rather a story of deceit, manipulation & revenge. The story begins & proceeds with a seemingly generic Cinderella story until it gets to a point where you see that Cinderella is not who you & the other characters think she is. Then it becomes heartbreaking. The story twist may be difficult for some viewers to accept because family & loyalty to family at the cost of one's own interests & happiness is what drives the main character.There IS a happy ending but the end kiss scene is a mess as the guy initially misses her mouth but then proceeds to devour her, ( not in a sizzling first kiss way but rather in an unromantic " will suck you into my vortex & inhale your soul way") . Still, the movie is not a bad waste of time, it just could have been better.

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