Brogana Sunfrog

take out all the scenes without Jang Keun-suk then you can say: "ah that was worth it"

I am coming [years] late to viewing this. If you are a Jang Keun-suk fan then you may be able to forgive many things but though I did love him in" He is Beautiful" & thought; "how bad could a movie actually be if it has Jang Keun-suk in it"?! I mean I got through" Bel Ami " and was a bit non plussed but it was still enjoyable [if not what I was hoping for]. With "Marry me Mary" , I had high hopes. If you take out all the scenes without Jang Keun-suk, then maybe you could still say; "ah that was worth it" But honestly, this was just a sad disappointment. Even for the date it was made in, it is an impossible premise , But this suffers from the same heavy second lead syndrome that "Boys over Flowers" did [-where you really like the guy who you know will not win, and he will just be left hanging in love limbo.] in this drama, however, It makes no sense as this 2md male lead actually had an interest in the 2nd female lead in the beginning so really they should end up together. "Should" being the key word. They are trying to redefine "happy" ending in light of a modern mindset by pushing hard the message that you can love someone but not want to get married for now or maybe never. OK, but ironically, they didn't actually sell that as a happy ending ! As clingy as he has been, we aren't convinced that Jang Keun-suk 's character actually is capable of such a commitment anyway [, especially given his past record of non commitment]. Female lead spent a great deal of time simply staring sadly instead of talking. So misunderstanding were the fuel of the last few episodes. Sadly, there is not enough fun, fluff, romance or happiness to keep me interested or invested.

*****
If you're going to watch it, you might want to stop after the kiss and the camping trip, because the last 4 episodes don't add anything to the drama

Read More

Bloated drama has too much detail & too many twists & turns

This suffers from a bloated amount of episodes and it stops being interesting after episode 12. Be forewarned there is a good deal of creepy Crime going on but
all the beloved characters will survive, (& yes the leads get thier happy ending) but getting to the last episode will frustrate you & tempt you to fast forward as it get's bogged down with too many twists, turns & details .
what's wrong:
1) The lead's playful relationship gets awkward with a badly written romance . Their first kiss is meh & right after it they (off screen) sleep together. The whole setup- first date and the male lead's sense of entitlement, expectations with no satisfying build up are real turn offs.
2) Non native English speakers playing Americans really tarnish this drama , getting words, grammar & pronunciations really wrong. Bizarrely, most the Americans (located in the American scenes) speak Chinese/Mandarin ! The male lead spent many years in America, graduated from an American College, is a professor AND yet in conversations HE speaks Chinese & The Americans speak English back to him !!??
3) Main male characters keep getting shot and surviving. Maybe just not shoot them so much so often ?

Read More

2nd viewing update; Leads have good chemistry. Rushed ending

free on youtube
At about 67 minutes long, this is almost the perfect length for this story ,though it could have used one more episode episode because the last episode leaves you feeling like you missed something as it rushes the lead's relationship to resolution. Still, this is a bit size K-drama with spunk & romance. . Both leads are appealing with good chemistry.
nice ,clean romance. I've watched this 2 times. Some things detracted keeping this from a higher rating.
1) it seemed low budget as they did a really bad job of making the male lead look "fat" or even chubby in the scenes before his transformation. I mean cotton stuffed in cheeks & over sized clothes did not make him repulsive or even unattractive, just like he had come from the dentist & borrowed his dad's clothes ! (totally still dateable :P )
2 times of viewing this is plenty , though it's pretty forgettable, so never say never.

Read More

Leads have no chemistry with anything other than the food

This was my first Mukbang drama. The food takes up 85%+ of each episode. I initially gave this a 9/10 rating, but some years later, after re watching it, I gave it a 6/10.
3 more years after that I give it about a 5/10
with all viewings: The romance never worked for me. The leads did not have romantic chemistry.
The office bickering was tedious. Usually there is one annoying side character, but here there are 3 here & that is 3 too many. The second female lead was cute to the point of ad nauseum . The male lead is VERY charismatic & mesmerizing to watch (especially when he eats). The female lead was attractive, but her character was shrewish & unpleasant. There was no real premise for any romance, nor did you want them to be romantic.

Read More

Serious topics +Seeking revenge turns you into the same kind of person you hate

I only watched this because I got it free & was curious because V of BTS did one of the songs on the OST. The plot/premise did not sound interesting & it turns out that I should have just passed on this as there was a whole lot not to like.
I don't know what they were thinking here, having the male lead act so woodenly then his hair cut; AHG !!! every other character changed hair style as they aged , but the male lead kept his unattractive hair style to the end !

Before I was even half way through I stopped caring because everyone was unlikeable ! The main characters ended up being disappointingly unsatisfying un hero like. As for the premise of revenge. Did they intend to show that it turns you into the exact thing that you hate & are fighting against as you waste your life pursuing it when you could move on ? A big negative that jarringly broke the flow of the story was a 4 year time skip [episode 14] . As for Romance: well ,you've got a pentangle ( 5 people) & you don't care about the outcome because they are all behaving badly. Both female leads were unlikeable. Kisses & happy (main couple) ending occurred at the very end, though by the end I wasn't invested in them. Revenge, racism, transgenderism -lots of serious stuff crammed in & it just felt like too much. There is also a good bit of product placement. Park Seo Joon played his character with a CONSTANT blank stare , perpetually petting his own head in confusion [were they implying that he was autistic or had brain trauma?]. At times you could see him channeling his real life friend Kim Taehyung (& doing it spot on) but mostly he showed a very limited variety of expressions . All 6 main characters had thier humanity just burnt away in the acid bath of obsession, hate & revenge . By the end of the drama the male lead straight up says that he literally will do ANY THING (meaning violence) he has to do to save the female lead & puts his friend at risk of prison by telling him to to whatever it takes as well. {it's like everyone is turning to the "dark side" !]
The father nemesis: Yoo Jae Myung' frozen angry face got WAY to much screen time . They presented him as sick & elderly so he should have been wheel chair bound. Female lead Kim Da Mi 's character had some disassociative social disorder. The only person she could summon empathy for was the main male lead & even then she spent a great deal of time vacantly staring up at him while bobbling her head {what was with that !?} . Kim Dong Hee,'s sweet character followed in the footsteps of his mentor & father as he became a heartless, ruthless businessman.(shame on the writers for not making his return to the family business a way to actually support his friend in the end!) Finally, Kwon Na Ra's character was lack luster. There is NO reason why she & the male lead should ever have been a couple- a fact which is brought up more than a few time in the series, Whatever it is that they have, it's not romantic. They are both so selfish that you don't fall for what's supposed to pass for love bread crumbs. The most laughable part is when
**spoiler**

at the end she meets Park Bo Gum in a last minute cameo (to soothe viewers !?) and she instantly goes: yeah, NOW I'm in love ! yup, that's how you do it, bring in someone for the failed at love female lead that is just as handsome as the male lead for her. Funny, though, Park Bo gum looks like a pretty innocent lamb being served to a wolf !

Read More

Unsatisfying , doesn't hold a candle to season 1. Focus on sick people's stories & surgeries

This season suffered from writer's bloat. It also has some of the most awkward inexplicable romance attractions that build up & then end blandly that I've ever seen in a drama. I was baffled by how much time was spent showing surgeries in progress yet we miss important key parts of the lead's relationships progression. (One lead's crush is given 5 chances in which to convince him to go out with her & we see 1!!!!) I loved the balance of drama to relationship stories in Season 1 so I was disappointed with the mind numbingly long surgeries, explanations of surgeries & tangent stories of random cast members .
In the last 2 episodes it seemed like they were scrambling to create tension by killing off a whole lot of patients, while at the same time quickly get all the lead's relationships tidied up. It was weird & unsatisfying . Also, I swear they reused the same bloody pictures during surgery ! Yes everyone get's a happy ending , just fast forward to them.

Read More

Hot & Cold female lead. The village people are intrusive with too much screen time

The two leads are great & thier dimples work over time, but I never warmed up to the small town residents They are annoying, intrusive & make excuses for each other's bad behavior. They also get way too much unnecessary screen time . Shin Min-a's character ran cold & hot & it was hard to like her at times. There were other times when she would start channeling her " My Girl Friend is Gumiho" & "Oh my Venus" characters, squealing like a teenager .Considering her age, It was a bit off & odd.
I think that this is my least fav role for her-at least the way she is written. Her character is alternately too pushy & too mushy at times. The last few episodes were boring; being taken up with tidying up all the town people's stories- I just didn't care for that at all.

Read More

Look A spleen & gushing blood ! If you're seen one surgery, you've seen them all: Yawn

This is a good drama but I have no idea how I talked myself into watching it as it's WAY outside my drama genre enjoyment zone. I really get bored with lengthy surgery scenes. Granted, some surgery scenes were interesting because of the character's interaction during the surgery, but much of the surgery shown was tedious. Surgeons always seem to end up with blood on their faces . There lot's of bloody gloved hands & organs shown which was just boring. [honestly, we know it's all fake so it's not even gross] .The ending was satisfactory & the main couple's relationship is resolved with warm fuzzies .Sadly, some plot points were not resolved & the "Appendix" extra episode that was at the end ( I watched from DVD) was unnecessary. It also had to do with a controversial topic which made it unappealing.

**Spoilers**
female lead never is told that the boyfriend that died was cheating on her. this was really frustrating. It's implied that the Casino Chairman will provide for the country hospital so that it won't have to shut down (because as it stands it will be shut down as soon as the chairman leaves the hospital)and you never see the chairman pass away from his lung cancer.

Read More

Almost hits that sweet spot, but ending suffers from bad writing & editing

Warning: this drama was SO close to perfect.10* {especially for the acting!}, but it drops 2 points & gets a big angry "Boooo" for the way the writers ruined the ending.

On the bright side :
3 incredibly handsome men in One Drama!
Random fact: Female lead's sobbing was very unique
The rather sad premise/plot topic had me wondering how in the world it could end well, but, there are happy endings for most of the characters. ( though it felt a bit forced to have literally everyone's story tied up in a bow) And I really didn't need or care about what happens after the happy ending. That sort of stuff kinda deflates the happy ending .

There IS alot to love about this drama, but the last few episodes put a damper on by serving up inane content that seemed like just filler. .Plus, the female lead became all wiffely waffelly about being together with the male lead-after she just said :"don't leave me for one instance" -Huh !!?? she suddenly becomes wooden & stand offish. Made no sense.

Needs re editing!!

Read More

Mild, fluffy drama with NO second lead syndrome

Mild, fluffy drama with NO second lead syndrome .
The mean characters are cruel but not scary & are redeemed by the end (which I take issue with ). One thing that really disappointed me though was how harshly mean a father was to his daughter. Second lead female was tediously moody, needy & weepy through out the whole drama. Main couple were sucked into the lying & "breaking up with you " (for your won good)trope which was annoying.
I found the female lead's character to be exhaustingly noble & painfully nice.
The OST is not great & there is slot of song repetition [needed more song variety]. I will rewatch it again because romantic dramas that are light on the drama are rare

Read More

A glut of villains , violence & comedy imbalance. Cringeworthy irritating comedy.

Started out interesting but then got bogged down by the sheer number of people the Female lead was in conflict with. It's one thing to have you wondering who the evil behind the evil is, and it's quite another to have more than three "grade A" villain's! Super creepy/violent scenes trade off "comic" relief, which is more irritating than relieving [IE: gang members who turn into super fans of the demon-just cringy]. The romance between the lead's assistants got way to much screen time and again, and was also cringy. Episodes were either super violent or stupid sidekick filler. I was really puzzled why this drama didn't just pull me in & keep me in because it checked off all the right boxes of what I am interested in. Still, when they revealed the whole back story of the main couple-I was nonplussed as it was not compelling.
the last 3 episodes dragged, and the end, though happy. was anticlimactic-like the writers & actors were all just tired & ready to be done. Yes tidy endings for all characters, but kinda TMI & bland at that.


In the end it was a few things that made this a huge disappointment:
***Spoilers***
It just didn't work for me that in her past life the female lead worked in a tea house-which translated to prostitute (?)! was planning on committing suicide & then faked being Catholic in order to hope to change societies norms concerning rank. I just didn't see the nobility in that, nor the grand love, and certainly not any grand sacrifice. Which is what they were trying to sell us.
Also, a major blunder on the writer's part was having the female lead's parents die because of a deal with Demon (& ha ! he didn't even remember ? but then said he did but didn't mention it because it would complicate things ? All of the was unconvincing, but even more unconvincing was female lead's forgiveness of that due to her seeing that he "saved" her in her past life (uh, NO he didn't, he just accidently interrupted your suicide attempts) Another plot point in which we have to suspend disbelief is that the female lead's surrogate mother was trying to take down the female lead's parents & had a significant part in their deaths. OH the time skips. must every drama have them ? And having Demon just appear, with him being like :hey yeah I'm back why are you surprised ? not excited, not showing any emotion, so weird & unromantic. Then thier lives just go on with him STILL being a demon-you know the thing that appalled her when she actually saw him in action after he supposedly became a nice guy!? yeah, so he's immortal, goes around looking for bad people to punish and wow-that's actually pretty awful if you want a future with him (you hate his job & you're not immortal). I felt like they just kept him bipolar-I love cake- I take lives-I love my woman-I send souls to hell. If they were trying to get us to see him as some Batman/Robinhood righteous dude, they failed. This is no Tale of the Nine tailed, nor is it Healer.

Read More

watched this online at: ondemandkorea for free & enjoyed it. I liked Exit 2019 & Hospital playlist as well as Oh my Ghost (& other dramas Jo Jung Suk was in) so was looking forward to this, but I didn't feel like the story did enough for his character. The whole movie just didn't have enough "meat on it's bones". I found his sister & mother to be unfunny unsympathetic leaches. It was hard to really grasp why his character garnered such a strong reaction that he lost his job. For non Koreans, it will be hard to discern where & what the main character is actually doing at the end of the movie. They set up the male lead but then left him hanging ,as if things were changed, or edited out. Jo Jung Suk is better than this movie, why isn't he given better (written) parts ?

Read More