The Drama Notes

That is a truly bizarre defense of her acting skills. Do you regret casting her? Oh no, we needed a famous person so the short role is remembered, and seeing how fans are worked up about her bad acting skills, I was right to cast her! See, the role will be remembered! 🙈

By episode 2 or 3. She doesn't really hate him, she's just mad at him. And in this redo they agree to become true allies, which quickly starts to veer into unintended flirting. It's cute. Don't worry, it's obvious they like each other and always have.

I have always loved her, but I didn't expect this level of performance. Song Kang surprised me too. I'm so impressed with the whole cast and crew but especially the writer, Choi Ah-il! She of Mr Queen fame. 💜

Kim Yoo-jung is EATING UP every scene she's in! I love this drama so much, right now!

Thank you for sharing your feelings on it. I probably would have given ATCY a 7 or 7.5 if I had never seen SOOD, because although unsatisfactory, there are no glaring issues with the story. However, knowing the material they had, and seeing the choices they made just made me slow-breathe through the whole run. And I did watch the whole thing so I couldn't be accused of writing it off. I love JYB so much, and it was especially hard watching her bring to life a character who was written into the ground by the adaptation. She definitely delivered the only impactful scenes here.

The original versions of the music are splendid. My low rating is entirely because the remix didn't have the same impact, and certainly not to the degree that SOOD's thematic scores did. It was a production choice that didn't work for me, no hate for the OG tracks.

Oh absolutely. She can't be faulted for saving herself. This is what I love about this drama. It's never predictable, and there are multiple smart people in the story, not just the leads.

Er there is no modern time waking up. Xuening and Xie Wei will have their ending in the current story and the drama will end with the writer finishing her draft on her computer. The drama had originally planned a slightly longer run but because of the new cdrama restrictions to 40 eps, they cut down some of it. I know it feels like there's very little time, but i think they'll manage to make it a very action packed and satisfying final arc.

I appreciate this comment very much. 😄

Not quite the same. In the novel the 2nd lead had traveled back in time too, just like the FL. But because of restriction on certain subject matters in cdrama - like time travel - the story has been changed a little. The 2nd ML in the drama is not a time traveler. This is because the drama can justify the FL going back in time as the writer of the novel deciding to write a story with more uplifting morals, but they can't justify a secondary character also traveling back in time for that reason. It doesn't matter if this is water tight logic. This is how cdramas get around absurd censorship.

yep

Xie Wei omitted a line about being loyal to the king/court, so ZZ suspects that he might have rebellion in his heart.

Yeah I'm not sure if Woo-hak is Ki-ho's (Bo-gul is definitely Kiho) half or full sibling. But as far as Ki-ho's dad seems to know, he has the one son. I suspect Ki-ho and Woo-hak's mom decided to change her children's ages as a way to hide them better.

I think you're confusing dad characters, maybe? This was the ex-policeman dad who abused Ki-ho. I think we can assume that it's only Ki-ho he's obsessed with. We don't know if Woo-hak is also his son.

Thanks for this, Cool. This was very enlightening.

I've been waiting for her to get a lead role since More Than Friends. But this is beyond my expectations!

No, I read the webtoon recently and Seoha isn't sickly or weak. He practices martial arts and the creator (when describing him and his bestie/secretary, Ha Doyun) explains that Seo-ha is a few pound heavier because of his muscles.
He's gentle though, and I think that's the side of Ahn Bo-hyun they're trying to tap through a leaner physique. If you've watched Yumi's Cells Season 1, we saw that version of him there.

That's probably encouraging? At least they have experience writing less urban family structures. I'm mainly worried about the K-drama version polishing off the awkward edges of the story.

I can't find the writer Kim Si-young on MDL's database. Really want to know what they have written before.

Again My Life was the best non romantic kdrama of 2022 for me. 😄 But I'm trying this one just for KHN. You're right about it being a thriller with a sombre tone, which is very much a throwback to excellent thrillers of the previous decades in Korean film and dramas. But now going by the production and cinematography this looks more like a movie made for the festival circuit than drama for niche thriller lovers.