Provides some great social commentary
I really enjoyed this drama. The chemistry between the leads was very believable and the romantic thread was well paced. Perhaps it is a cultural thing but I wasn't thrilled with the seemingly standard trope they followed of allowing parental filial-piety to interfere with their lives for unreasonable reasons – especially considering their supposed ages and history but it did set up for an excellent ending scene for the pair.The story provides a great commentary on the fickleness/evil of social media comments – especially the blatant hypocrisy by the commenters who actually did bully someone that was merely alleged to have bullied an employee.
I do wish they'd done a little more on the romances for the other sisters (perhaps dropping the rather weak love triangle trope of the main romance thread). Both of those story-lines were interesting in their own right and I would have really liked to see them fleshed out. That is one criticism I have for many Kdramas, they seem to require having a secondary (and sometimes tertiary) romance thread that they then do little with.
Although I dislike the love triangle trope, I really did like the conversations between the two suitors and especially Yong Pil's attitude – ...'don't feel bad, you cannot control your feelings...' and to give his competition the advice to confess his feelings. Actual love for another means wanting what is best for them even if that means they chose someone else. The main thing I hate about the LT trope is it usually involves jealousy and this drama did not stoop to that.
Finally, the little girl actress (Kim Do Eun) was adorable.
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Simply a comfort watch
I really enjoyed this series. It doesn't introduce anything new to the genre but it also doesn't go overboard with the standard romantic tropes...they are certainly there but moderated over what has become all to common in romantic dramas.I really enjoyed the acting by Seo In-guk and Park Ji-hyun. I felt they played their characters excellently. Park Ji-hyun did a great job playing someone that had given 7 years of her life to a one sided relationship that had not seen proper closure. While it was sometimes frustrating to watch her struggle to move on from her ex and with her jealousy over Si-woo's ex, the way she portrayed those emotions was just right – making her character understandable rather than irritating.
Seo In-guk's portrayal of Si-woo was equally good. Rather than the standard purely stoic ML, his subtle grins and caring glances added a lot of depth to his character. While Si-woo is an excellent example of a green flag courtship, I did think he was a bit too accommodating to some of Ji-yoon's insecurities. The seesaw metaphor that comes up in one of Ji-yun's discussions is an excellent example for a healthy relationship.
The workplace drama is your standard bad boss / conniving executive trope but fortunately the series doesn't spend an inordinate amount of time on it. It was frustrating for there not to have been any repercussions for the sabotage they committed as there was ample proof of their guilt and it was something that could have affected the entire company.
As with almost all romantic drama's I wish they'd spent more time with the secondary romance. Kang Mi-na and Won Gyu-bin did a great job with their characters and I'd have liked to see them fleshed out more (too bad the secondary romance is seen as obligatory to have yet rarely given the time it deserves)
The last episode was a bit weird. While the ending itself was satisfying, what they did with Si-woo's character was strange and somewhat out of left field.
So while the series did have some issues, I did enjoy it throughout. The minor irritations were far outweighed by the vicarious pleasure of watching Si-woo and Ji-yoon budding relationship.
NOTE: as others have mentioned, the English dubbing is horrible. While I always watch Asian dramas in their native language with English subtitles, for some reason, Prime video was set for the thumbnail trailer to blast out the version with the English dubbing...it was almost enough to make me not want to watch it.
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Fun series with an ensemble cast
I found this to be a fun romantic comedy about a family of a mother and 5 daughters (plus 1 adoptive daughter) working to find husbands for all of the young women. The series spends 5 or so episodes centered on each of the daughters in turn and does a great job of giving them a different plot-line in finding their 'perfect match'.I found the first few episodes enjoyable but a bit hard to follow. Part of the issue is that there are a lot of main characters to introduce and considering half of them are the Li family and thus couldn't be rolled out over time, the first few episodes throw a lot at you. But then it settles into a good pace of finding a husband for each of the unmarried daughters.
The series does a great job of keeping the stories interesting as the match making for each daughter is different and presents its own set of challenges for the rotating set of protagonists to solve. It also does a good job of keeping the entire family relevant throughout the series. Even after a particular daughter finds her match, she continually returns into the story to assist the next in line in solving the challenges that arise.
Overall, a fun series that excels at mixing light comedy, suspense and action into an enjoyable watch.
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This review may contain spoilers
Great Art piece, terrible entertainment
Art is meant to invoke a deep emotional or intellectual response from the viewer while entertainment is meant to provide enjoyment and escapism. That distinction made it difficult for me to rate this series as I initially started watching it as entertainment. Under that guise, I was finding the series rather slow and somewhat boring. But once I started viewing it from an Art perspective, I found myself become more engaged with it and eager to see where it was going.As Art, I would rate it a 9. It definitely hit me emotionally and is staying with me after I finished watching. But as entertainment, I rate it a 5 as I found long stretches to be rather boring and most of the emotions that it evokes are negative – primarily sadness and frustration and the miss/lacking communication trope (which I hate) is way overused. Overall, I would likely have given it an 8 as it did succeed as an Art piece for me but I settled on a 6 as I felt episodes 8-9 had provided an excellent opportunity to provide a satisfactory ending from both an art and an entertainment perspective and they instead chose to go with a pure Art ending that left me only feeling frustrated..
The Good:
The cinematography/editing is excellent. The way they used lighting, scene settings and superimposition were great in supporting the emotions for particular moments in the drama.
The sound track also did a great job conveying the emotions for the underlying scene.
The acting is a bit mixed for me. For a majority of the series, Park Jin-young and Kim Min-ju are emotionless or sad...even when Tae-seo and Eun-a are together. Considering the art aspect of the series, I assume this was how they were directed to act. But in the pivotal scenes, they did an excellent job conveying the emotions of the scene. And how they portrayed their initial dating was perfect. They really brought out the awkwardness of a teen first love relationship. (Side note: I am constantly amazed at how Korean actors in their 30's can convincingly portray high school students – Park Jin-young did an excellent job)
The 'misunderstanding' scene in ep 8 is brilliant. Sequence of small, innocuous decisions adding up to a catastrophic consequence.
The series was full of nuance that is easy to miss and greatly adds to the art of the series. From how the name for Eun-a's contact info in Tae-seo's phone changed as the story progresses to how the seasons are used to set the tone to the field of flowers relating to the current status of their relationship. They also make great use of symmetry such as the bike path split that appears in the beginning and again at the end.
To put a positive spin on the long narrative stasis / interiority scenes, they are mostly easy to FF thru as they usually do not include a voice over (although a few do).
The Bad:
It overdoes the narrative stasis and interiority scenes. While making FF easy, it became a bit of a drag even from an Art perspective.
It overuses the miscommunication trope. All of their issues would have been solved by a couple of 2 minute conversations...instead, when there was an issue, it was “Let's break up” → “OK”. This is fine from an Art perspective but is very frustrating from an entertainment perspective.
The ending is terrible. The series had done a great job in ep 8/9 in setting up a plausible ending with A-sol. She was a much better fit for Tae-seo from an intellectual and personal values perspective but instead they end it with Eun-a leaving to live her life abroad and Tae-seo essentially saying 'I will go build the life we talked about and if you ever want to join me, I will be waiting”. Thus, other than finally having a bit of clear communication between them, neither really show any personal growth – he remains the duty-bound, self-sacrificing giver and she remains the emotionally avoidant taker. Perhaps appropriate as an Art piece but I feel going with an A-sol ending would not have hurt that aspect and would have provided closure from an entertainment perspective
Summary
If you enjoy emotional Art dramas, you may really enjoy this series. But if you want a drama that has fast pacing, shows character growth and provides a satisfying ending, you may want to skip this one.
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Well written, fun drama
I really enjoyed this series. It has a great mix of campy comedy, light comedy, romance and action.The story is cohesive and well written, with only a few minor plot holes that are easy to overlook. The pacing is great and I thought they did a good job with the flashbacks for providing timely context of what was going on and what was yet to come.
Jung Hae-in maintains the excellent work he's shown that he is capable of in his previous lead roles while Ha Young easily demonstrates why she deserves to be cast as a female lead.
Jung Hae-in (Tae-ha) and Ha Young (Eun-sae) have excellent, believable chemistry. I found the scenes after Eun-sae accepts that he is her 'longtime boyfriend' and wants him to come back to the main bedroom very amusing – Jung Hae-in does an excellent job portraying someone that nervously won't take advantage of someone he truly likes over the deception he has set up. I felt their chemistry was almost on par with that of Jung Hae-in & Son Ye-jin in Something in the Rain (which tops my list for chemistry).
Ha Young and the SES Ladies do a great job with the campy comedy...sometimes taking it a little too far for my taste but those moments are brief and overall, their scenes are a lot of fun.
I really liked how the story handled the development of 'trust' between Tae-ha, Eun-sae and the Doctor. It felt believable given the information Eun-sae and the Doctor had as the story progressed. And giving Eun-sae 2 names was a great way to get around her just doing a web search to find out who she really was.
The writing does a good job taking 1-off comments/events and wrapping them back into the dialog later.
Most of the fight scenes were very good....Tae-ha avoids most of the baseball bat swings (believable) rather than absorbing them (not believable). And Jung Hae-in did a great job with the choreography. I could believe he was a top boxer. I loved how he changed his expression when he transformed from 'boyfriend' to thug.
I really liked the development of the twist toward the end. I felt they provided very good foreshadowing in the earlier episodes and I did not feel manipulated in the slightest. And the brief montage showing the foreshadowing was a nice touch for those (like me) that had missed it.
And the ending was excellent. They actually allowed enough time to really wrap up the story and provide the characters with a great ending....refreshing after so many dramas doing the wrap up in 5 minutes.
While I thoroughly enjoyed the series, it wasn't without some issues. For instance, one element that strained believability was Eun-sae’s lifestyle. Her salary as a prosecutor wouldn’t realistically support a luxury apartment, sports car, and designer wardrobe, and the show never explains how she affords them....she was an orphan so no family money and her Prosecutor salary would be ~80-90K USD....not enough for those types of expenditures.
I'm not a big fan of the endless waves of disposable thugs for the fights nor with the omniscient villain that dynamically sets up an elaborate trap during the unexpected car chase scenes. Nor with the extremely quick recover from stab wounds.
They do have one major continuity mess up. His Mom tells his 'Grandma' that she is 23 years old yet the dates on her tombstone show she was only 22 when she died. Not integral to the story but it is sloppy.
Despite a few inconsistencies, Our Sticky Love delivers a charming blend of romance, comedy, and action with standout performances and a satisfying ending. It’s a drama that’s easy to recommend
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