Sinasina

Disclaimer: I have not watched the so called season1, because I have been warned about the terrible plot twist beforehand. (which makes it a 2/10 drama from the get go)
---
This is basically a rather generic cdrama romcom. There is almost not a single new thing here, maybe with the exception of checking marriage license authenticity with amnesia. The chemistry is average, the comedy is average, the acting is average and the plot is average too (which means it's bad objectively speaking). There is also a rather typical semi-weak love triangle, though it ends very peacefully.

What makes this drama stand out a tiny bit from mediocrity is that it's a bit shorter than normal (12ep kdrama length) and so the plot is progressing rather quickly & there are no big annoyances anywhere. It's basically 70% fluff n sugar, which is something I always appreciate, even though the romances could not have been any shallower. While the villains are really poorly written and all, the fact that they barely have any screen time & fail to cause any big upheavals is pretty great.

One thing that somewhat annoyed me is that the drama has several very forceful kisses, but it's played off as successful seduction or something along those lines..
Oh I almost forgot, some of the product placements are just direct ad breaks basically, they start talking about certain brands directly & unnaturally. (Adolph Shampoo & whatever sanitary pads)

Read More

Not as amazing as the original, but it's still one of the better localized adaptations I've seen.

I Hear Your Voice is one of my all time top 10 Asian dramas. Up until a few days ago I did not know this adaptation existed, so I quickly lined this up to watch during my daily workout sessions. Overall I'm glad I did. It may not be as good as the original, but I would say it's about as good as watching that for the 3rd time would be like, still plenty great.

Cdramas are inherently less intense than kdramas, but since this came out back in 2019 it's still far more intense than what we are used to today. So the general mood of the original kdrama is quite nicely transferred over. The writer made some changes, from the second case onward the cases are different, but with one big exception* most of the iconic scenes, moments and even the annoying love triangle (the only bad thing about the original) is there. The casting is good, but of course not nearly as good as in the original, but they picked fitting actors.
There is one thing the adaptation did much better than the original, which is FL is not trying to push away ML nearly as much and she completely accepts ML as her future partner. I'm not a big fan of open endings, this felt nice.

*My favorite part of the original drama was when ML pretended to have a memory loss & that is essentially completely missing from the adaptation. Sure ML does get a memory loss, but the pretending part only lasts for 5 minutes & has no romcom relevance.

Read More

A-

This is a very decent Chinese romance drama. Overall it's quite similar to You Are My Glory, but it has more comedy & the setting is different. (entertainment industry vs. corporate environment in this one) Janice Wu is always 10/10 in romcoms & this paring's been quite fantastic. Also I like "faceslaps" in Chinese fiction & this drama has plenty of that.
One big positive in this drama is that the high school flashbacks are quite well done. There are not overly many of them & have proper child actors, which is always nice to see.

So why is it only an 8?

Well, for starters the final 4-5 episodes were quite difficult to get through. The crises were not too serious or anything, but the whole "company's in dire straits" thing was really unfun to watch & then a rocket had been launched & we got fed an incredible amount of Chinese propaganda stuff before the ending credits.

There is also the matter of ML's younger brother. To me it feels like the writer thought the leads are ready to get married, so let's fix the ML's "big problem" before then, I'm quite disappointed with this, the kid was comedy gold, would have much rather watched him bicker with FL, over whatever corporate shenanigans that went down.

Also I really disliked most of the songs. Mainland Chinese rock that gets to be on TV almost always sounds really weird to me, but this drama has been perhaps the worst offender so far.

Oh I almost forgot, the drama is full of insane product placements.

Read More

It's on the cusp of greatness, but the writing has ruined it.

To me it feels like this drama had most of the ingredients to become something really special. Namely, we've had amazing actors and an absolutely amazing production team. With a better writer this could have almost been a Goblin. To me everything outside of the plot is working really really well. The lead couple I think had great chemistry & the actors did a phenomenal job creating some really touching scenes, to some extent letting the audience feel that emotional roller coaster in a good way.

But of course the plot has almost ruined everything. In the comment section I remember reading someone criticizing that most romantic progress in the drama is conveyed by side characters trying to convince the leads that they have something going on. I can kind of agree with that take, the romantic plot just meanders aimlessly, even in the final episode. I cannot believe that anyone would think this show has wrapped up nicely! Is this even a happy ending, is it even an ending, what the heck has happened?
The biggest problem of course is that this is a time travel show and the plot is completely random. Deus ex machina is considered by most people a writing tool that should be used very sparingly if at all, in this drama though it is everywhere. In general it's quite difficult to write a time travel plot that makes sense, oftentimes the audience is expected to turn off their brains, but this is perhaps the least consistent time travel story I have ever witnessed.
Of course the pacing is totally off as well. So much time is wasted on meaningless stuff like that delivery guy's story, but when it comes to important stuff everything is so condensed. For example the title has saved 10000 times in it, then why is that important plot point so rushed , why are the events that led to this standing on such a shallow footing?

The show has a love triangle, it's not a very offensive one, but at the same time the second ML keeps popping up, he confessed in the final episode as well.. I very strongly dislike love triangles, this is close to the limit of what I can still endure.

(This is supposedly an adaptation, but it barely resembles the kdrama & only does so very early on..)

The OST is quite good, the song "慢慢走吧 Man Man Zou Ba - 王梓赫 Ray " is really really great. (you can easily copy paste the Chinese name and find it on Youtube)

Read More

Twins separated under oddly mysterious circumstances is a very popular trope in Chinese pulp novels, as such I was kind of looking forward to watching this, despite knowing full well in advance how bad some of the plot is going to be. As far as this genre goes the setting could have been far worse, it's pretty bad of course, but due to a lack of explanations the parts that are told the audience are honestly not nearly as outlandish that I've seen, or rather I've read before. With that said most of the drama is very enjoyable, the fluffy romance is quite up there, the leads look great together and have good chemistry. While the children are not very skilled child actors compared to what's normal in a cdrama of this budget, they are of course very cute & adorable making the drama even better.

So why is this only a 7?
The big one is that the ML has made some questionable choices that made me dislike the character a little. Also the episodes (4-5) preceding the finale are quite bad, but stuff like this ALWAYS happens in this genre, so I suppose I should've known what's coming.

Can triangle haters watch this?
I think yes, because the ex is only present for a couple of episodes and she is rebuffed with resolve, for me at least this much is bearable.

Read More

It's basically a 170 minute long movie.

There is nothing revolutionary about the plot or the narrative, but for a Chinese movie, it's more than just highly unusual. The subject matter & the narrative are both something I would maybe expect from an artsy Korean movie, but never coming from mainland China. This is really a production that is very much like a western indie movie prepared for the festival season..

Anyway, I liked the black comedy & I hugely liked the ending. It's also worth noting how the rather melodramatic events that happen, or get revealed in the drama are presented in a way that makes it very tolerable even for people that hate angsty content. The romance is good & at times borderline magical..

So why is this not 10/10? Well, episode 7's plot with the sister in law is strongly out of place. Black comedy or not, that alone taints the show quite a bit.

Read More

It's a magical show with significant flaws.

Rating this show is extremely difficult. On one hand it's been such a long time since I've seen a kdrama that I enjoyed so much. It kind of recaptures the feeling of some of the greatest kdramas I watched, when I started the Asian drama watching hobby. (Lover from the Star, Secret Garden etc..) However the -2005 era-ish - love triangle is annoying on multiple levels, even though it's not the most frustrating one I have ever seen, it leaves a sour taste in my mouth. Also the writing is not only inconsistent, but also multiple annoying cliches are used, such as falling onto lips, weird relationship contracts, agree to go on 3 dates with the ex, getting filmed by bystanders at an opportune moment etc..

Onto the good things, I think the cast is great, the leads have increasingly great chemistry as we go along & while the special abilities are a bit underutilized, they add a nice flair to the drama. There is a lot of charm going on across the board, it really often feels like I'm watching art, not a technician's work. The office life part of the drama is above average, there are some kdrama specials of course, but it's usually far worse than this.

As for the ending, I detracted an entire point from my rating due to the last two episodes. Up to episode 10, this is a flawed, but very entertaining fluffy romcom, however that's followed by 90 minutes of flashbacks & the big crisis of the drama, this part held very little interest for me & while I was waiting for the inevitable happy ending the last 20 minutes happened. If this was in episode 7 I would have loved it, but before a 10 seconds happy ending? Heck no, what were they thinking? I guess this is what happens, when the production team thinks they don't really need an established writer, since it's a webtoon adaptation. They were mostly right, except the webtoon is ongoing & season 1 ended with a cliffhanger & the writer did not spend enough time to think up a reasonable way to give us closure. Though with adjusted pacing it could have worked, who knows it might be 90% the editing's fault, after all the audience has no idea what ended up getting cut..
Then I again I'm not sure if I blame them, this is a long ongoing trend in kdramas, the production team doesn't care much about the last episode, because it does not influence the drama's success, people already watched the product placements, it's not like you need the audience to come back for another episode, right?

edit: I should give more credit to the writer, yes she has botched the ending somewhat, but the drama's plot is better than the webtoon's in my opinion. (usually the reverse is true, see Secretary Kim, Business Proposal)

Read More

I should probably stop watching these 3 hour long kdrama movies. It seems like they all (at least the ones I've seen) have the same 2 minute long happy ending. One of the main reasons I still watch kdramas is that they often have long & satisfying endings. This despite being only 3 hours long felt a bit draggy & yet we've still gotten the usual 2 minute ending!

If I ignore the ending thing, this drama is alright to watch, at least if there is nothing else in your backlog. The OTP interactions were quite cute, though highly unrealistic for a friends to lovers romance.
In this genre the chemistry between the leads is key, but I feel that could've been better. The plot is alright, though there is no innovation here, none whatsoever.

There is a love triangle, but luckily there was no time to develop that, so it fizzled out without becoming offensive.

Also the OST is quite nice, however it's strangely underutilized. It's like they went ahead and commissioned some great tunes, but the mixing/editing in the drama is not taking full use of them. Just listen to the OST separately on YT & you'll know what I mean..

The picture is very nice, the cinematographer did a great job.

Speaking of 3 hour long kdrama movies. You Drive Me Crazy (https://kisskh.at/28300-you-drive-me-crazy) is a very similar story with an extremely similar plot sequencing, but it's like 10 times more exciting.

Read More

It's not great.

Up until recently this has been the most recommended drama that I have yet to watch. People just kept recommending it to me over and over again. I kept procrastinating, because I dislike love triangles and oh boy the triangle sure is annoying in this one. The biggest problem is the second ML being a forking stink button, his toxic personality is not something that I could have ever tolerated in a romantic comedy. Another significant issue is all the character rewrites that we've gotten, character micro adjustments are unfortunately pretty normal in kdramas, but here it's pretty extreme & not only that, but multiple characters had personalities that were just all over the place.

The OTP romance is not that great. ML's robotic acting & weird fake smiles sure did not help with the immersion. Also the leads did not really grow as a couple & their relationship was super weird in a bad way.
Even the comedy is just whelming. Even if I ignore the triangle thing, what's left is still mediocre.
Some of the patients had touching stories, but compared to Hospital Playlist this is not worth mentioning. The poems felt like an afterthought, they were not bad or anything, but some of them felt quite forced.

The best thing about the drama is without a doubt Lee Yoobi. This is the first time I've seen her in a main role, but she was absolutely radiant. No one could possibly accuse her of not having the glow of THE main character. I've seen her playing the crazy sasaeng-ish archetype multiple times, I never thought she would be so great in this one.

Read More

Forgettable!

The Good:
⌲ The triangle is weak.
⌲ The fantastic (but underutilized) side characters
⌲ The fantastic (but underutilized) side couples
⌲ FL's mom

The Neutral:
⌲ As much as I like Seo Hyun Jin, her acting felt quite technician like in this one. (still not bad)
⌲ The healing aspect of the drama (I love healing dramas, but this is not working very well here)
⌲ Yoon Park is a great actor, too bad he always gets the worst scripts. (this was a low point even for him)
⌲ There is a lot of fluff, but it's hard to get into it.
⌲ Is there really an ending?

The Bad:
⌲ 30-40% of the drama is a largely disconnected crime/thriller flick and it's NOT WORTH WATCHING. (FW button time)
⌲ As short lived as the noble breakup was, it's just super stupid.
⌲ The OTP relationship is extraordinarily weird in a shallow way.
⌲ Kim Dong Wook's acting (he was far better in Find Me in Your Memory)
⌲ Metaphoric heart pain causing real heart pain being an actual plot point. (I'm nitpicking, but come on!)
⌲ ML's backstory was needlessly explained & it's really stupid. (failed MD has become a psychiatric doctor, did he go back to University & spend 3-5 years on that? drama logic)

Read More

Entertaining & not as cliche as expected

Just to get it out of the way, yes the writing is pretty bad, but most of the time it's not annoying.
Yes, it's weird that the amnesia thing happens twice, but I was not annoyed by that very much at all. The problem is not the second amnesia itself, but rather how ML acts for a while after it happened. A rational person would not turn so hostile to a woman that claims to be his girlfriend. Do verify before burning all the bridges, right? In the second half of the drama there is a lot of on and off dating/ will they, won't they stuff, however it was quite entertaining most of the time, except shortly after the aforementioned second amnesia and episode 20 was just a horrible horrible episode, with a recycled plot used in an intelligence insulting way. Yeah sure there is also quite a bit of noble reason bullshit as well, but overall I think it's acceptable.
The love triangles are weak and almost entertaining & end in a timely manner. The writer did a great job in this regard, triangle haters can safely watch this.

I'm not a fan of "Eden" Zhao, but this is by far his best performance that i've seen. (okay, he was good in Le Coup de Foudre as well) As for FL I've seen her in The Untamed and she was far better here, especially in the second half of the drama, she had some very amusing facial expressions and had great chemistry with Zhao.

The story may be bad, but the comedy is really on point throughout the drama. The side couples are not that special or anything, but there is nothing much to hate about them really. The fluff is good, at least whenever we are in the "on" phase.

People in the comment section complained about the cause of the amnesia being really stupid. I think it was not bad at all, it's nicely explained & it's not COMPLETELY unreasonable by cdrama logic standards. It's far better than let's say being allergic to one's own tears.

The OST is bad, but most of the time it's just unnoticeable. There is some weird Christmas music there, but not too much, it's not the most offensive OST that I've heard.

Yes the early episodes are very Secretary Kim-like, but is that really a bad thing? I think not. The second half of the drama is substantially different.

TLDR: This is a VERY entertaining romCOM, with some minor & not so minor frustrations.

Read More

It's okay!

The Good
⌲ There is a lot of quality fluff in the second half.
⌲ The good OST
⌲ The pretty picture
⌲ The ending is fairly good, though it's not anything I have not seen before. (the special episode is included in this)
⌲ FL's parents were quite wholesome.

The Average
⌲ The chemistry between the leads
⌲ The side couples were not all that interesting.
⌲ The comedy is not the strongest.
⌲ The triangle/square is not very offensive, but it could've been even better.
⌲ The early episodes were quite mediocre.
⌲ ML's parents
⌲ The badminton training sessions (the competition was better)

The Bad
⌲ The third worst separation plot I have ever seen
⌲ There are three and a half absolutely trash episodes.
⌲ The plot involving ML's hereditary mental disorder is wrong on so many levels.
⌲ ML's robotic acting in the early episodes
⌲ Pathologist doctor has done a c-section to help a cat giving birth.
⌲ The wasted potential that is the Detective Club.

Read More

If Hyperion was a low-budget kdrama romcom filmed in France (alternatively, Red Herring Country)

As far as travel fling stories go, this one is pretty good. Not only is the OTP couple fun, but also all the main characters, everyone participating in the package tour were very interesting (at least interesting after a while) & well acted. Also I found the realistic portrayal of sex for a 2017 kdrama quite unexpected. The only love triangle in the drama is more of a Red Herring than anything else, so yes love triangle haters can safely watch this.++

It would have taken minuscule effort to fix the script & create something remarkable. Unfortunately for a pre-produced drama the story sure doesn't seem to be particularly well written, or consistent. Just a minor change in the timeline would have removed the completely unnecessary ugliness from the OTP relationship. If I look at this realistically, it sure looks more than a bit horrible. At the early episodes ML is still in a relationship with the supposed love of his life that may have betrayed him, but he DOESN'T YET know that, they are basically in a quarrel. If I wanted to be mean I could say, that the whole plot is kind of like "We were on a break & then I fell in love with the copy-place girl, BUT IT'S FINE, because LATER I've learned that Rachel is Hitler." it's okay to completely fall for your rebound, but not like this, I don't think.

France sure is beautiful & luckily The Package works fine as a travel show as well. Though the cinematography is a bit strange. It's like the crew had no time to properly set up the scenes & think about how to effectively use some of the prettiest landscapes in the world. The end result is still gorgeous, but the photography is just whelming.

There were some very - ehm - creative product placements. As dumb as the "my friend needs these, he's lonely" sounds for a Peepee enlarger product placement, it's still better then the usual "everyone being sick all the time feeding each other cold medicines mouth to mouth" & whatnot.

#rant on
I'm sick and tired of the whistleblower cliche. I mean sure okay, whistle-blowing about embezzlement & then getting burned, because Korea is a corrupt sh***ole is not fun to watch, but that's at least somewhat in the realm of reality, right? However using African citizens as guinea pigs and then tens of random white collar workers covering it up like this is just too much. You need to be a special kind of psychopath to cover up potential mass murder this way.
Also have you guys noticed the trend how in kdramas completely unreasonable love can succeed, but whistleblowers never do. It's almost as if BigChaebol is paying for these educational lessons, as unlikely and stupid this conspiracy theory appears to be.
It's just too difficult to justify why this plot is in the drama, there is no real benefit, it could've been easily replaced with something more realistic. (like she cheated, she was forgiven & then has not shown up at the airport, because reasons)
#rant off

The ending is not nearly as bad as I have thought it would be. Of course there is the totally dumb, illogical separation, but the presentation is somewhat beautiful, it's not a complete blowout like in most kdramas. Overall I would rate the final episode at 6/10, which is certainly far above average, there are countless far better kdramas with hugely worse endings.

This is the first time in my kdrama watching carrier that I liked Yoon Park in a role. He is typically the teary-eyed second lead that ruins the drama for me. I never though he is not a good actor, but he really drew the short straw as far as typecasting goes, I wish he had more roles like this!

7.5/10 is a bit high for this drama, but considering how unique it is, it's probably justifiable. Every kdrama addict should watch this, eventually.

Read More

If you have NOTHING else to watch, you can use this to fuel your sugar addiction!

I enjoyed watching the OTP romance in this one. It was really cute, fluffy and the leads looked great together and had a reasonable amount of chemistry. Though it was certainly not without problems, such as there was a 2 episode long ridiculous breakup & reconciliation plot. Also the leads were so in love that the FL literally jumped in front of ML to protect him with her body, but apparently not in love enough to forgo the pillow barrier thing, when they shared a bed in a hotel room. So yes, there are all kinds of cliches, but all the wholesomeness & fluff made me forgive them. Also this is a safe drama to watch for love triangle haters such as myself.

Based on the main romance alone this would be a weak 8-ish drama, but there were side couples as well. The two other couples were quite alright to watch too in the last 10-15 episodes, but before they've gotten together, the men not yet in those relationships have done some REALLY silly borderline cartoon-ish things. Yuda's character was unwatchable in the earlier episodes, "luckily" he has received several character rewrites & by the time he has started dating the second FL he has become tolerable, but nonetheless jarring character adjustments are never okay. I would've rather had him killed & introduced another guy for Cheng Yi.

As for the non romance related plot. It was pretty weak. It's not nearly as annoying as in Love is Sweet, but it's an endless loop of minor annoyances & the Daoist interpretation of Go. Naturally there is a cartoon villain character as well. Honestly this plot is wasted on the excellent ensemble of actors.
There were 41 episodes, unfortunately out of those 5 are straight up trash. I'm talking about episodes 31-32 due to the stupid breakup thing & 38 to 40 due to the tragedy & the ML losing his mind. The short 10 minute long ending is basically ML regaining his mind. I would have much preferred the basic "proposal -> register marriage -> have kid" formula. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

The visuals are good, but the photography is not out of the ordinary as far as 2021 cdramas go. As for the OST, it was fairly mediocre, I did not particularly like any of the songs, nor is the instrumental background music used to a great effect.

I'm not a hardcore feminist or anything, but Ding Lan's lack of ambitions as a Go player and her monologues about sentimental women such as herself being worse than men at Go was not a great listen. (I cannot be 100% certain about Go ofc, but in regular good old western Chess women are not inferior to men, at least when the conditions are the same, unfortunately that's almost never the case)

6/10. (if you want something similar but better, just go for the Go Go Squids instead)

Read More

How do I even begin reviewing 20th Century Boy and Girl, how should I rate this? On one hand the drama has fairly little emotional impact, there is no angst whatsoever, but the romances are also not exactly overflowing with emotional charge either. There is not much plot, but it meanders in strange directions. It's fantastic that the love triangle is so tame & easily resolved, but at the same time Anthony's character is just a waste of screen time, he is not annoying, just boring. Also the whole setting has infinite untapped makjang potential, certainly it's awesome that the writer did not go in that direction, but when I realized that the two male leads are stepbrothers, I could not help, but roll my eyes. Also the way the ML kept telling the second ML that he is only only friends with FL repeatedly certainly caused me some minor frustrations.

Despite the above I had a great time watching the drama. The sismances are up there with the very best & Han Ye Seul's calming energy is something rarely seen. Also the leads had great chemistry & looked adorable together. Most things in the drama are unusually wholesome and it's super nice how quickly and easily the scandals are dealt with.

I cannot help, but feel that there were too many (interesting) characters to completely develop them in 32 half-episodes and the team has even wasted 2 full episodes worth of time on Anthony.
Still gotta give them credit where credit is due. How often does one watch a relaxed romcom like this without it becoming draggy? The episodes certainly went by really fast, I reached the finale in a flash.

Read More