SmallDrop_InA_BigOcean

Yeah, I am hoping for a good plot myself. Will watch it soon. ^-^

🤞

I will check it anyways regardless of ratings! Just waiting for it to finish airing.

Why does all the dramas that I set my eyes on have low ratings now a days? 🙄 It can't be that bad, premise is very clear and solid. 😓

It sounds interesting, ngl.

Haha I agree. You summed it up perfectly about what this drama is like.
Personally, I wasn't looking for a romance but I was interested because of the word "kidnapped" and thought it would be an easy, light hearted rom-com drama. I assumed this would have a similar story like 100 Days My Prince. First episode made it clear what kind of drama it is and so I waited patiently to see where it goes. And, I am hooked. It's well written story, it's just that it's not rom-com and one requires to be serious and prepared to tolerate scheming, irritating, anger-inducing villians. XD

I am at 10/20 episode and I like it tbh. The story feels slow because development is slow but I like how every character has something to do with the story and create conflicts and grow through it. The plot is cooked slowly and is well done. I am not annoyed with characters at all outside of the story. They all appear to be rightly done according to their setup.

However, it is not comedy at all. It's more about politics, power struggle and drama within the palace among royals and ministers with only a little bit of romance on side. Tags are heavily misleading. The drama is also not for those who like everything instantly resolved and fast-paced and prefers black and white portrayal (aka no deep conspiracy and dramatic sub-plots) for side characters and antagonists. So people should be cautious when starting this one.

A very good advice, tbh. I have learned to wait till the drama finish airing to get the idea of overall rating. The opinions sways a lot and for this drama, opinions are changing at the speed of light. So I grew curious what's going on. XD

Oh, okay. Glad to hear. ^-^

A very good advice, tbh. I have learned to wait till the drama finish airing to get the idea of overall ratings. The opinions sways a lot and for this drama, opinions are changing at the speed of light. So I geew curious what's going on. XD

4 days ago, people complained about this. Now all I see are psoitive comments. T-T
I am so confused if I should watch this one or not.

Eyeing this one for a long time now. Finally it's over. Is the writing in middle of drama drags or is messy? Why is it 7.9? 🤔
Please someone let me know (without spoilers) whether they will tie down all the major plot points and give a satisfying ending. 😅

I wanted more romance scene. Bogeol and Mokha needed as many scenes as possible after they seperated so tragically in the past. T-T
But I am fine with that haha. I get writers wanted to keep the pacing a bit tight and fast.
I absolutely like dramas like this, especially when main characters have motivations, goals and character development and the story have good conflicts and decently written antagonists to keep the plot going. It's even amazing when side characters have time to shine and they enrich the lives of main characters with their presence. Add in some slice of life, romance, family and comedy and I will cry ugly tears and giggle like a teen girl over cute scenes lmao.

Yes, better than never. See ya around! 🤗

I see. I actually have decided to not watch season 2 tbh. It's kinda too triggering and I don't think I will be able to enjoy the overall message it is going for despite the serial killer plot twist drama showed at the end of ep.4.

Yup, I know their government invest a lot in their soft power. But saying government solely wants this to be their stance for suicide was too harsh on my part. Who knows what goes in the background?

Yeah, from what I have seen, SK and my country has similar views regarding suicide and mental health. "Sin" and "coward" are other popular terms. I won't say everyone has same perception and I was no way generalizing anyone. It's just that show itself with it's stance towards suicide irritated me for real and reminded me too much of reality I am surrounded with 3 days ago. I let it go for first 2 episodes thinking writers are probably playing around with the idea of hell and God of Death like any other fantasy kdrama but it comes off too strong and serious that people legit are saying they'll recommend it to suicidal people. T-T

Soul isn't anti-suicide/ suicide prevention movie or anything but it's messaging and the events characters go through somewhat felt more relatable amd comforting. It is just my perspective, that's it. It filled me with little bit of hope and reason to live back then when I watched this movie. You should watch it someday, the movie's really good.

I absolutely loved it. Felt like I have been back to 2019-2021, when kdramas felt endearing, warm and coherent with their universal themes mixing well with their plot and characters (without getting too sad and depressing.). I enjoyed every second of it and personally rank even higher than 8.
Ngl, I was stupid to be this indecisive about the story being boring just because of some negative, one sentence comments in here. Thanks a lot. Your reviews are amazing! I will try some more in the future.

Okay I am no longer on board with this drama. And this is coming from an asian.

I wonder if you've watched season 2. I just finished watching this show and thought the same thing. The show leans towards religious sentiments and "supposed sin" way more than actually addressing actual problems and our selfish collective attitude towards suicidal people. The fact that this is government sonspored makes it even more disappointing since this proves government and their society do not understand why their suicide rate is only getting higher. "Life is hard. Someone's else life is harder. You got to work for society. How dare you fell weak? Others would be so hurt because of you." is a very dangerous message for real. It makes me feel very annoyed and angry as I for one, very well know this would not make even a dent on an actual suicidal person. Soul movie does a way better job at it, even though that was meant for children and teens.

I don't agree with all of your points, especially anti-suicide message but you rightly pointed out the shallow and hypocritical characterization of death in the drama just for shock value. In fact, it only goes to prove how the anti-suicide messaging fails in case your fate was suppose to be shitty from the start and no amount of "others have it worse" and "your loved ones will be hurt" will work. Why it fails? Because happiness comes from within and you work for it for yourself, not from someone else.

Great! I am glad I am able to share some thoughts with you and even you think they make sense. I was really going crazy (and kinda jealous) given how others seemed to love the drama but I couldn't. Wanted to see their perspective but I cannot find anything interesting. I even thought I am being harsh on episodes way too much. But, I could I not be when I have watched "A Time Called You" pulling off similar setup of characters in a similar time travel mechanics but in a much much better way.

Anyways, I checked out some of the reviews you wrote on your page. Out of them, I noticed Castaway Diva review. I was interested in it for quite sometime but my indecisiveness self won't let me watch it because I hate bad climax and bad endings. Your review convinced me to watch it. It painted a simple picture in my head (gave me some ideas) and made the basic synopsis look a bit more interesting. I will give it a try soon. Thankyou for that review as well.

Hopping to watch another drama from my watchlist. See ya around.

Perfectly encapsulated what I thought every 10 seconds while watching drama from ep 5 onwards. This is clearly made for teenage audience or for the audience to turn off their brain and feel the emotions (like an escape from reality). You're not wrong when you questioned your own standards. I would say your standards aren't high at all. Asking for a meaningful story and plot isn't high standards. Do not beat yourself up for negatively reviewing it. Your perspective matters too.

(Feel free to skip to last paragraph if you're not interested in reading my rant/thoughts.)

Few things I would like to add (which are different than the review) since this review impressed me. It's my personal opinion. When I first saw the synopsis and watched first episode, my heart was extremely heavy like Twinkling Watermelon's first 2 episodes. The way it looked, I falsely expected the drama to have slice of life elements where FL tries to save her idol and in the process learns how glamour and glitz isn't a definition of happiness. That her idol aka ML was truly sad and lonely due to loss of love (that was her), loss of friends, constant pressure and haters wishing death upon him. I expected her to save him, learn more about him on personal level, him learning about her on personal level and both of them overcome their fears or learn something :- FL learning to give herself more importance and work towards her goal despitethe fear of loosing her legs and ML learning to not suffer silently and share it to his friends and father and not be
too nice to everyone. In short, I feel like, even the main characters had no definite goals, fears or misbeliefs. I genuinely thought if ML had some sort of trauma to keep everything to himself and try this hard. E.g. Maybe he wanted to make his father proud and thought he wanted father to rely on him after seeing death of his mother and witnessing his father grieving and working hard to raise him or something (remember he didn't tell his father about his shoulder injury surgery unless his father learns about it after visiting school? Or how he hesitated to not tell his father about not pursuing swimming?). But no. Nothing. Oh my goodness, the way writers dropped the ball. Argh.

Side characters including 2nd ML were completely wasted. Their only purpose was to be an eye candy, to be a source of small conflict (like fire in house or sick grandma) and to bring comedy to the table. There were endless possibilities with them! Like the member of ML band who was shown to be angry at ML in 1st ep. and seemed too self-centered to me. I was excited to see rivalry and bonding and thought he was somehow contributing to ML lonliness as their friendship soured during 12 years of their career (which was a big red-herring and it's serial killer on loose, the way I rolled my eyes and didn't care). I genuinely thought 2nd ML would somehow turn out to be killer, have dark side, end up getting hurt or something lol.

While I was watching it, I easily recalled / kept comparing it with "A Time Called You", "Blue Birthday" and a little bit of "Heavenly Idol" as all three have similar sub-plots, same character themes and was even more disappointed in this particular drama. Two of them handle similar theme of time travel mechanics and emotions of the characters who loose their friend/boyfriend in a similar manner but way, way better. (Yes, they have flaws that I am aware of but it had a story and a plot at the very least.) As for third, it was a completely different drama setup and theme wise but also had FL whose characterisation was same as FL of this drama but way better and handled more seriously. I will always prefer the FL in Heavenly Idol to represent what it means to be a true idol fan over this FL tbh. The FL literally became Y/N after episode 3. The ratings and synopsis duped me into watching this and I am ashamed to have been fooled as an idol stan myself.

I can rant even more about it. But, it's already too big of a rant in your comment section.

So, this review which addresses every single problem makes me feel not so alone in the crowd lmao. Every sentence is 100% right, necessary and well placed, whether it's about acting, characterization, story progression, antagonist, themes attempted to be discovered and the lack of resolution.
Thankyou for this review!