Daddyjoo

Penthouse but not nearly as good

Um Ki Joon is once again excellent as Matthew the main villain, but I preferred his character in Penthouse. Hwang Jung Eum was unfortunately miscast for her role here, she was unconvincing as a villain. Jin Mo and Myoung Ji seemed to be more comedic but the actors are clearly meant for more dramatic roles. Ju Ran and Cheol Woo had much more obvious comedic potential, but were relatively underutilised this season. Here is my pitch for what should have been done:
Jin Mo as the brooding cop with a drug addiction
Myoung Ji as the gynaecologist dating the grandpa
Ju Ran as the gangster CEO of Cherry Entertainment
Cheol Woo as the art teacher

The main plot (between Matthew and Do Hyuk) is completely irrelevant to what went on with Dami, making the connection between the characters tenuous at best.

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Went way downhill after an excellent season 1

The plot was way more contrived and nonsensical in this season. Major spoiler: Dantae had no good reason to murder Rona, he's way too smart to do that for no reason lol. Rona should not have somehow survived the murder attempt. Suryeon as Aegyo was fine but I preferred her dynamic with Dantae in season 1, way more fun. Logan was way more boring after dropping the Gu Ho Dong act, and I hated his forced relationship with Suryeon. It's really awkward even if you ignore their shared relative (poor dead Seola). Kyujin and Sangah continue to be hilarious, although Sangah's (secret) resentment of Kyujin is inconsistent: does she hate how entitled and lazy he is or does she want to mother him willingly? It makes no sense. Seojin and Yoon Hee's tense and homoerotic relationship continues to be enjoyable though. However, the love triangle between them and Yoon Cheol is unbelievable -- Seojin suddenly claims to have loved him all along even though that doesn't make sense. He also lacks chemistry with both of them.

Seok Kyung is slaying a lot more in this season but the kids' drama is still predictable and not that fun. I was also very confused by Suryeon's passionate speech in defense of Yoon Hee at the end of the season: she murdered her daughter and instead of turning herself in, tried to have Suryeon herself murdered -- and she somehow insists that Yoon Hee is a good person and Seola would have forgiven her?? It's quite clear that a child murderer is more evil than Sangah, for example, who only reluctantly goes along with others' evil schemes rather than doing anything that bad herself.

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Best Kdrama I've seen

Um Ki Joon and Kim So Yeon are the MVPs of this show. Their characters are amazing to watch and I'm seated. Kyujin and Sangah are hilarious, I love them so much. I also really enjoyed sassy Yoon Cheol and Logan as Gu Ho Dong but not so much as himself lol. I really liked the twist about who was the real murderer but the motive is so crazy it's camp. The tension between Yoon Hee and Seojin was incredible. Suryeon and Dantae had excellent chemistry and I enjoyed their respective schemes. Seojin and Dantae unfortunately did not have any chemistry though so watching their affair scenes was weird lol.
The kids' drama was somewhat contrived but it was fine I guess, I just couldn't stand the forced romance between Rona and Seok Hun.

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Mid at best

Although I found Choi Ja Hye's character very good (and I liked both actresses, but Park Jin Hee was more evil-like, not that I mind lmao), I cannot say the same about some of the others. The performance of the actor playing In Ho was really bad, someone tell this fellow that opening his eyes all wide and confused-like is not acting lol. He was also utterly charmless in this drama which is a damn shame since the others are pretty good or at least decent. I was not convinced by Tae Seok as the main villain, he was too unserious imo. There was a serious tonal issue when it comes to Hak Beom. The writers should have chosen between evil rapist or comic relief, it's really weird if it's both. I was uncomfortable. Joon Hee was such an NPC which really sucks because the actor was good in Penthouse as sassy Dr Ha. I was also not convinced that Na Ra was some genius lawyer because she seemed to be very confused and shocked by very obvious happenings. The plot also made no damn sense.

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