Anita

Interesting true story with a very obvious agenda

So I wanted to like this more than I did. The story itself is really interesting. It's based on a real town in China called Longgang, where farmers built a whole modern city on tidal flats without any money from the state. That's a crazy thing to build, and I enjoyed learning about it.

The supporting actors are the best part. I really like the performces of Zhu Yuanyuan, Chen Minghao and Geng Le. Zhu Yuanyuan's scenes made me emotional, especially knowing it was her last work and she filmed it while she was sick. The two leads felt a bit stiff to me, and honestly the side characters stole every scene.

The tone didn't work for me either. The real story was hard and serious, but the drama makes it funny and light. Some jokes felt silly, it treats history like a comedy sketch. Also some of the romance stuff was bad. There's a guy sneaking into his crush's house and a girl following a man around, and the show treats it like it's cute. It's not.

And I have to say it, this is propaganda. It's not subtle at all. The government supported it, CCTV helped make it, and it aired on CCTV 8. The heroes are Party officials who fix everything, and nobody really questions anything. I read somewhere even Huang Xiaoming wrote a piece in People's Daily about how the role taught him what "serving the people" means. So watch it for the story and the actors, but don't take it as the full truth.

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Loved It, Mostly

This show has a crazy premise .A rich girl paraglides, a tornado throws her into North Korea, and a soldier hides her?? But by episode two I had stopped doing anything else and my tea went cold. I don't think it's a perfect drama, but I loved it way more than I thought I would.

The thing about it is you laugh and then two minutes later you're crying and you don't even know how it happened. Se-ri was so annoying at the start, honestly, loud and spoiled and thinking money fixes everything. But she gets softer, and he gets braver, and it didn't feel rushed. Hyun Bin barely talks in some scenes and still I understood everything he felt. Son Ye-jin is just so good at being funny and sad at the same time. When they look at each other it feels real, not like two actors doing a job.

But the village ladies!! I could watch a whole show about them. And his four soldiers too, they made me smile in every episode. Even little things were so fun, like Se-ri finding out her own company's makeup is wanted in the North Korean market, or Captain Ri cluelessly shopping for her skincare. I read that people from North Korea praised how the everyday life looked, even the accents and words, and I thought that was nice to know. It's still a fantasy, of course. Nobody is as perfect as Captain Ri, lol.

Now Seung-jun. I'm still not over him. I didn't like him at first, then I started to feel sorry for him, then he was shot saving Seo Dan and I just sat there, not ok. Why did they have to do that? He deserved better and so did she. And the villain was a bit too much like a cartoon for me, always sneering, but fine.

I will say the middle got slow. Same thing again and again, she almost gets caught, she escapes, then it starts over. I got a bit bored and I looked at my phone more than I want to admit. Also how did nobody find her for so long? Anyway, I didn't mind that much, because then something sweet would happen and I'd forget.

I loved how pretty everything was. Switzerland looks like a postcard, and the piano scene by the lake is the one I keep thinking about. The songs are lovely too, I played "Give You My Heart" a lot after I finished.

The ending wasn't the one I wanted. I wanted the big happy wedding, but they can only see each other two weeks every year in Switzerland, and it's sad. But it felt true to the story, and I think a perfect ending would have felt fake.

So yes, I'd watch it again, maybe skipping some middle bits. I'd tell anyone to watch it, especially if you want to laugh and cry and be a bit sad when it ends.

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