So I'm watching this on Viki which has the 60 episodes version. I'll obviously mark this drama as completed on here once I've finished it on Viki, but I hate that marking it complete on here implies that I watched the 63 ep version when I didn't. It's obviously not important at all, just a personal irritation, but it irks me nonetheless, lol.
I lived in South Korea for a year in 2012 'teaching' English at an Elementary school. I didn't have to experience…
I definitely could have told them no, I wasn't going to play with them, but the majority of the staff played together every week as a mandatory thing, and I felt pressured into playing as well, so I did. And it wasn't the volleyball itself that was the problem, it was the way they treated playing. They were intensely serious (they did competitions with the other Elementary schools in the area). I was actually not bad at all. I kind of impressed them in the beginning. But then it turned into pressure for me to be really good, which made me really anxious, which made me mess up a lot, and then they would have me practice with someone to try and make me better. It was a whole cycle, lol. If it had been a more relaxed atmosphere, it might not have been so bad, but they took their volleyball too seriously for me to be able to have fun.
I look back at it now and realize I should have just screwed up my courage in the beginning and said I wouldn't play, but oh well. Cest la vie, lol.
I lived in South Korea for a year in 2012 'teaching' English at an Elementary school. I didn't have to experience the kind of workload Koreans experience 1) because Elementary schools have shorter work hours for staff, and 2) I was a foreigner there on a Government program, so they can't work me harder or I could report them and get them in trouble. (And the school knows that foreigners will advocate for themselves, so they are a little less willing to do it then they would be with a Korean.) But I saw enough of what work-life balance is like in Korea to be very grateful for the job I had. The worst things I experienced as a foreign English teacher was having to play volleyball with all the staff every Wed (I HATED IT), having to clean a single classroom with everyone else on staff for two hours even though the room was clean after 30 minutes (this happened twice, different rooms each time), and getting the Korean cold TWICE within my first month of being there and only getting ONE day off. I felt terrible and couldn't teach, but I still had to be there, runny nose and all. These were frustrating but nowhere near what the Koreans I knew had to live with.
I agree with sumikon's comment that there are some things about it that could be better. I personally struggled…
I think there are valid exceptions for rating after the first few eps, but it has to be something more than just 'I thought it was boring.' Gee, thanks. That really helped me...Not.
I agree with sumikon's comment that there are some things about it that could be better. I personally struggled to connect with ep 1. The pacing off was to me, some of the character interactions felt weird, and it didn't make me laugh at all. Ep 2 is definitely better. I liked the characters way better, the plot felt more natural, and I laughed multiple times. Both eps feel like they should have been packaged together as 1 episode though, not 2.
Unrelated to this drama, but it makes me want to pull my hair out when people rate a drama that hasn't even finished airing, lol. I rate dramas I've dropped all the time, but when a drama hasn't even aired more than 2 eps, rating it is nonsense.
Sadly, this is not surprising to me. I lived in Korea for about a year back in 2012, and the hierarchical system there makes these sorts of situations depressingly common.
On the flipside, however, seeing more of these situations being addressed publicly makes me feel a little bit hopeful that there might actually be some level of change in the future. This would never have been discussed openly in Korea in the past, as it would have been seen as losing face. The fact that more Korean actors, singers, etc. are more openly discussing it says to me that that attitude is dwindling.
So while it might feel distressing to all of us outside of Korea, I personally hope we start seeing more people in the industry pointing out these practices. After all, in order to fix a problem, you have to admit it's there first.
The dating show was a one episode "pilot" and my impression was that if it had great ratings, they would have…
Ah, ok. That would make some sense. It still feels a bit like a bait and switch if they don't go on to have the show revolve around a dating show, but I can at least understand the logic of that.
Second episode was much better than the first. I actually laughed out loud multiple times, which I didn't episode 1. But did I understand the preview for ep 3 right and the dating program is literally only going to be one episode? If so, that both makes no sense, and I also feel like I was kind of tricked into this story. If you advertise that the characters are going to be on a dating show, then the drama should be about a dating show.
Just finished episode one, and I'm unsure what I think. There was something about the episode that felt off to me. I don't know if it was the pacing or what. I think the story itself was fine, but there was just something that didn't quite click. I also don't know how she recognized it was him, when he looks totally different from when he was a kid, lol.
I can't believe I haven't watched this drama sooner! It's been on my to-watch list for ages, and I know it's really popular, but for some reason, I've just never been in the mood. I'm on ep 11 now (after marathoning most of last night, lol), and I love everything about this drama! It does all of the tropes of its era right without spinning its wheels in drama or prolonged misunderstandings (minus the main misunderstanding, which is the whole conceit of the drama, lol). I'm just impressed and in love with the story and regret not watching it sooner!
I was never a follower of his career as he never really did dramas that I was interested in watching, but it makes me very sad that he's been using drugs, and I'm praying for him that whatever it is that drove him to drug use, he can find a healthier way of dealing with it. Drugs destroy your life, and I don't want that for anyone.
I'm three episodes from the end of this drama, and I just want to sing it's praises. I'm hesitant to say it's better than the original Kdrama as it's been awhile since I watched the original (I plan on doing a rewatch so I can do a comparison and analysis), but I'm confident in saying that this version is more strongly written and plotted. I adored the original with all my heart, but I would be lying if I said it didn't have flaws. Plotholes, plotlines that don't go anywhere, some story elements that come out of nowhere. This version addresses all of those issues while managing to stay pretty closely faithful to the original story. It fills in the plotholes, follows through on the dropped plotlines, and gives those random story elements purpose. I think I'll probably find I prefer the performances in the original version more once I do a rewatch, but I have to commend this version for the way it handled the flaws in the original without losing what made the original so good.
1 
I look back at it now and realize I should have just screwed up my courage in the beginning and said I wouldn't play, but oh well. Cest la vie, lol.
Unrelated to this drama, but it makes me want to pull my hair out when people rate a drama that hasn't even finished airing, lol. I rate dramas I've dropped all the time, but when a drama hasn't even aired more than 2 eps, rating it is nonsense.
On the flipside, however, seeing more of these situations being addressed publicly makes me feel a little bit hopeful that there might actually be some level of change in the future. This would never have been discussed openly in Korea in the past, as it would have been seen as losing face. The fact that more Korean actors, singers, etc. are more openly discussing it says to me that that attitude is dwindling.
So while it might feel distressing to all of us outside of Korea, I personally hope we start seeing more people in the industry pointing out these practices. After all, in order to fix a problem, you have to admit it's there first.