Beatrice

La Meh

It's not a good sign when the best acting and storyline comes just from the parent characters when the majority of it is about the main characters. Neither of the main couples where very interesting despite the supernatural conceit of a mystical rain powered connection.

I find the psychic hearing/loss portrayed interesting in that there is more choice in it than the characters realize. It's appears to be a strong connection of some kind between two people that doesn't require mutual love and can be broken unilaterally as well. The maturity of the parents was amazing, from their break up to supporting the mom's new path in life.

From the focus on showing how psychic rain hearing doesn't mean a magic unbreakable love bond and can be platonic soul mates, it's so nonsensical to push the main characters Tai and Patts back together. Their only connections are the psychic rain hearing, that they are both man children, and the doctor being the biggest one between the two. It would have been better if they just broke up permanently and Tai learns to be a stronger person on his own than to get back with a emotionally volatile and physically violent guy who has a ton of issues of his own to work through.

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Time Duel

The drama got a strong handle on seriousness and when to add humorous moments most of the time. There were moments where it didn't work, but it wasn't too bad considering it was on the rare side. I love the dual language aspect of the bilingual actors who are able to speak both Cantonese and Mandarin do get to speak both. Though all the characters understand each other, for those who don't speak either languages, they are not automatically mutually intelligible in real life. They need to be learned. There is some English at some point too, but that's not exciting. I know that the production filmed in different cities with big Cantonese speaking populations, and the news within the story is entirely in Cantonese, but maybe I missed it, but I never quite got where the show was supposed to be taking place with so many people also speaking primarily and only in Mandarin as well. I appreciate the male lead giving a few Cantonese phrases a go. I spotted a Life is Strange poster Ding Qi's house. That coupled with the over writing gives me the sense that the writer(s) have an appreciation or familiarity of various time travel stories and tried their best to make fresh new take. I really like that there is an explanation for the time loop ability and there is side effects as well. It's fun seeing how Ding Qi figures out the best ideal way to save the day and him going against fellow loopers.

The weakest part of the story is when Ding Qi and An Lan are forced to go through romantic trope scenes which doesn't work when we know nothing about them together, especially when there's no romantic chemistry to coast on. The saddest part is that it's not that the writing is unable to do a believable romance because Yuan Chi and Wan Qing's love story was strong and believable to be what drives Yuan Zhi. Ding Qi and An Lan working together later down the line actually strengthens their believability more when she also gets to be a full fledged three dimensional person. She's the coolest when she gets to be her scientist self, instantly getting down to science business when Ding Qi tells her about his time loop ability. The guy who plays Yuan Zhi is really good at playing up the charisma that tech bros think they have. He totally was sporting an Steve Jobs inspired outfit too. Ding Qi's death scene was way too overdone with too much focus on all of his individual team members freaking out. It's supposed to be sad, but it became silly. An Lan's cure out of nowhere seemed weirdly tacked on with no transition as well. The last second new loop was not a bad way to end, but I think I would have respected it if Ding Qi just died too with An Lan continuing her work after saving her mom. Maybe have her become a new looper with an improved formula instead.

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A hollow void next door

This is supposed to be romantic, but it really unintentionally looks more like a psychological horror show and maybe it would have been better if it was. Like the main character writer has snapped from the pressure of being unable to write and imagined a pushy musician housemate that matches up to his pretentious tastes and would give him some excitement at home and at his convenience store job. Not that the main character ever interacts with anyone else, but the musician guy definitely doesn't. He might as well be imaginary or a ghost. He never has any behavior that indicates he's a real, three dimensional person. There is no chemistry though I can see the writing trying to establish their connection and I appreciate the actors committing to the kiss scenes, but it looks awkward and doesn't need to go on for so long. The director needs to accept that and cut the scenes shorter.

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Should have been a movie

The premise of a group of super powered immortal beings living through the ages amongst human beings inevitably brings to mind Ma Dong Seok's much underrated film The Eternals, which was an ambitious story that would have been better served as a series to delve deeper into the characters, whereas Twelve's plot and characterizations is so paper thin even amongst the 49 minute run time which is much shorter than the usual 70 minute or more episodes of Korea dramas and with 8 episodes that's shorter than the usual 12 or 15 episodes, it should have just been a movie.

The angel family doesn't get to do much bonding or fleshing out of who they are to each other or to endear them to the audience. They don't even all assemble into until the third episode. The show instead only has Tae San spend much of his time with Geumsoon. I don't mind that storyline, but it needed to be in conjunction with the family. They instead just feel like the comic relief lackies the entire time. The casting of the angels is also an issue along with the writing for them, there is no feeling from them as a group developed to endear them to the audience whatsoever.

Seo In Guk is criminally underused. He's usually the lead in acting projects and his acting is proven, so it's really weird to see him in a secondary support role that's usually reserved for newer up and comers to get experience. I keep waiting to see there be a reason to cast someone of his caliber, but it never comes. I wonder if this role is a favor for someone or something. There is a mute character and it feels weird that they just cast a Taiwanese actor who may not speak Korean instead of maybe an Korean actor who has mutism. There is a lot of fight scenes, but they lack any tension since there is no connection to the characters and it just drags the story along which is already slow.

The core storyline doesn't get going until the very end of episode 5 where it's revealed that Ogwi and Mir forcefully separated lovers and a fight scene that looked cool and actually had stakes and consequences for Marok and the whole crew. This should have been the first or at least second episode. When it's finally revealed, there is only as much shown of the romance than the random club owner guy and his girlfriend who at least have a funny exchange where he's saying he went to school for 15 years and she asks if that means he was studying for a phd.

The special effects are hit or miss throughout. I do like how the wings are done. The last episode is shamelessly all product placement while adding even more characters while we never really got to know the ones we started with. The number one weakness of this show is it doesn't care to let the audience know the characters nor their interpersonal relations to each other, resulting in zero feeling for anything going on in the story. There is no reason for this to be an 8 episode story. If they do a season 2, there needs to be some major overhauling in the writing quality.

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Despairsm

There is a constant change up in the status quo throughout the series that keep up the pace of the episodes. The portrayal of the endless pit of poverty is brutal, where everyone is subjected to the fires of desperation in this morally complex and ethically ambiguous exploration and study of characters. The supernatural entity in the form of an halmoni selling magical golden spoons to people desperate enough to see her, (though Joo Hee seems to be the exception to carry out an errand for her) is no guardian angel, but rather an agent of chaos offering opportunities to sew discord and mayhem to any type of person, regardless of their intentions. All the customers receive and cast the fates that they forge for themselves and their victims. It is pretty convenient of her to forget to give out all the rules at once, so everyone only knows more if they revisit her or someone who knows informs them.

Seung Cheon gave up his family in order to satisfy his ambitions with the excuse to help them in the way that money only can but though he loves them, he loves being elevated from being poor more. Tayeong who is the unwitting victim of the non-consenting life swap chose to stay as Seung Cheon to be with the "best parents in the world" but a lot of his choice is also colored by him not retaining direct memories of his life as Tayeong which are supplanted to those of Seung Cheon's and can't even parlay the skills he retains into a way out of poverty until the far future where it's also because of the years of monetary help set up by Seung Cheon for their parents to have a business and residence with cheap rent.

I like how the show kept it ambiguous as to whether Tayeong killed Joo Hee's father or not because he held on to Seung Cheon's hands until the latter slipped into the river, but he did leave him for dead before changing his mind mid being driven away by his driver Moon Gi. Tayeong could have had a moment of weakness or even a mere accident that he had forgotten. I never thought he was the school shooter though, which turns out to be his step uncle Jun Tae who is Yo Han's biological son. It's strange that Yo Han/ new Hyeon Do didn't do the math and figure out that one at all though he knew that Jun Tae is his second wife Sun Hye's son and not brother. Her never acknowledging Jun Tae as his mother even when he already knows the truth was pretty cruel though he's a murderous sociopath.

There is a loud omission to how Joo Hee survived with just a few bills in her pocket. She is an idealistic, naive heiress who worked at a convenience store for fun and believed that money is not important until all she had to inherit was her murdered father's debts and 500,000 in leftover slush funds that her selfish brothers gave her that was quickly stolen from her and she kept looking for in the 10 years time skip when she already has her own apartment and is employed full time as a journalist. What did she do for money and housing as a high school senior and college student? Did Seung Cheon secretly help her from afar as well? She also doesn't really challenge Seung Cheon on ethics of his choices which seemed like she was a character that was set up to do. Even though she gives some lip service to Yu Jin, insisting Seung Cheon will go back to his own life.

In the end, Seung Cheon cannot escape the cycle of greed that the golden spoon enables, barely escaping death when the gardener switches lives with him and dies in his stead. He no longer has his own memories and becomes a different person until Joo Hee found him. She continues to love him for the person he was when they first met, ignoring the greedy, selfish person he became that throws friends under the bus, rationalizing everything along the way. Seung Cheon's mother and sister should have been able to know the truth as well and make their own decisions as to how they feel about his and Tayeong's choices. He deserves a thrashing by his sister for sure. His father who always felt guilty for not being able to monetarily support his family and apologetic for being Seung Cheon's father still felt rightful anger at Seung Cheon for abandoning his identity to be a rich kid with different parents though in the end accepted his decision that Tayeong chooses to be his son and his birth son doesn't.

It's fun that both of the To My Star leads had supporting roles in this show as the bully Jang Goon and the driver Moon Ki. They both make it to the end with Jang Goon as Yu Jin's husband and Moon Ki as Seung Ah's husband who watches along with the rest of the family of Tayeong's rise as an successful webtoon author writing about The Golden Spoon, which seems awfully dangerous to give an how to guide for a very real supernatural object that the granny entity continues to sling to anyone willing to ditch their parents and steal someone else's life.

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Doppelganger madness

I have indeed seen the original drama, but it's been enough years that I can also watch this drama with fresh eyes and for it's own merit and flaws. The story feels like it takes way too long to get going to the interesting parts with multiple episodes of emotional scenes for a characters and a couple we don't know yet. It's a relief when finally Jun Hee wakes up in 1998 and it's interesting that she has some of the host body's memories, enough that she is confused about who she really is. Like most magical reality premises, the magical item/ability origins is not explained, but the drama kept consistent with doppelgangers of a specific 7 year age difference regardless of being related or not interacting with the walkman and song on the tape.

Si Heon's hair is a bit distracting, but it looks like Ahn Hyo Seop's hair may be contractually obligated to be styled like that since 2020 after looking through stills of the dramas he's been in since that time period. Jun Hee and Min Ju feel like completely different people, which is kudos to the actor. She changes up the chemistry with Si Heon according to the character she's playing, which is great to see. I do think it's a bit weird that Jun Hee acts different when she is in Min Ju's body versus when she's herself both in college and in 2023. She's way more playful teenager, but her mind is still her adult self. It's a minor thing though that can be easily looked past for the story being told.

The biggest heart wrenching tragedy is original Yeon Jun's untimely death when he and his almost boyfriend Tae Ha finally recognized the feelings they have for each other, but didn't look at the road ending with a complete and total kill your gays moment. They deserved a second chance, I wish the show made some effort to change their ending rather than just using them for a shock twist. A gay man's body being used to change the fate for a straight couple instead is extra cruel. He wasn't even out to his family, nobody even knew how out of character he's being. Real Yeon Jun deserves better.

The way that it was unavoidable that Jun Hee would accidentally divulge all the important information to the absolute worst person to tell since it's a family friend from college was well set up, as was Jun Hee saying all the wrong things to a suicidal high school student that no one paid proper attention too, not even Jun Hee even though she was literally in her shoes for a long time. It's good the show spent time to explore Min Ju's perspective as well, how crushing it is to hear from everyone tell her to her face that they didn't like the real her, how her desperation would drive her to lie to Si Heon and welcome her demise at the hands of a serial killer. It's good that Jun Hee is able to use her free will to break the time travel cycle which saves Si Heon. Whether Chan Hee would kill again isn't shown, but there is enough in the story to indicate that maybe his elder brother would be enough of an influence for him to suppress that side of him without his future self going back to encourage it.

I'm really glad that the drama concludes with Si Heon meeting Jun Hee again in 2011, when she's also a full grown adult rather than a minor. It was totally stingy of them to not set aside time to show a bit more of their new world together though.

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Liar Love

Meri was done super wrong by her cheating no good ex-husband and pushed to desperation, but her forcing an innocent man to commit fraud with her when he did nothing but be nice to her despite her drunkenly assaulting him is awful too. Though there was a some quid pro quo for him with his company needing her design company otherwise they lose out on the mass amount of money already spent on the designs, it still benefits her more. He seemed to enjoy going along with it, it would have been more interesting to see how far he would go along with her schemes and see him fall for her without him figuring out who she was from seeing the family photo so soon. It would have ameliorated the oh so convenient childhood connection trope at least if he would fall for her as she is as an adult. It was too convenient for him to instantly overlook all her weird behavior in an instant and agree to take fake wedding photos with her and go deeper and deeper into the lie. These particular actors can handle more nuance thrown at them to portray and the relationship of the characters would be stronger and the story overall would have been more memorable for it. Otherwise, Meri and WooJoo are a cute adult couple to watch. It's nice that they are in love, and sweet but not childish. It's refreshing that WooJoo's grandma is not remotely interested in being messy controlling in laws like Meri's former ones and just trusts WooJoo knows how to pick his person.

I liked how the show always hinted that WooJoo's cousin Eung Soo isn't that bad of a person, just not ambitious. He's the one who noticed the design rights expiration that led to Meri's company getting contacted to work with them again. He's the only one that remembers WooJoo's birthday, what he likes to eat, and that he had a favorite little toy when he was little. In the end he helped to take down his truly villainous father who he already knew was cheating on his mother.

Sang Hyeon's storyline is very interesting as a pleasant subversion of a usual villain goon. He totally looks like one, but slowly his suppressed soul starts to light up more and more with his interactions with Dr. Yun and she in turns gets over her one sided obsession with WooJoo. She also deserves a mutual loving relationship with someone who is attentive to her as she is devoted to them.

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Run away from this drama

The story is promising until it becomes unbearable, beginning with some interesting facets, highlighting issues of the wheelchair bound people, parasocial fan culture, mental health struggles, time travel and the rules of this particular version. Once Sol and Seon Jae meet, there is no chemistry though the engaging mystery of the lead figuring out her situation and how it works kept the pace going, but soon there is clearly not enough plot to to sustain 9 episodes, let alone 16 episodes of hour+ runtime because it just relies on tropes to pad out the runtime with all of the interesting set up just abruptly ending, unexplored and unaddressed. What the drama became was like the writer is actually desperate to write a comedy and is also really bad at it. There are so many shouty scenes of endless misunderstood moments, withholding information and intentions, stupid testosterone contests, side characters bickering that go on forever.

The acting of the leads aren't good enough to elevate anything either. The second lead Tae Sung is comparatively better than the rest and the character is the only one that has growth and change throughout the story which helps to make his quirky scenes that don't involve the inane one upmanship with Seon Jae, actually funny. Sol has always acted immature even as a 34 year old adult and her entire focus just revolves around Seon Jae when she goes back in time. She doesn't get to have an substantial moments to develop her bond with other people like her family who were also facing some serious problems like her mom's health, her grandma's eventual mental decline, or even her friend and future sister in law. Everyone is just a comedy bit. Even Tae Sung with his father when he rushes to the hospital after his dad was nearly killed by the escaped serial killer, the show just leaves it at a comedy bit. Seon Jae is actually even more immature as a 34 year old in all iterations of his life and also doesn't have a single serious moment with his father. The leads have no dimension in addition to no chemistry, so their relationship has no weight. Truck sama wiping out the serial killer is the ultimate lazy conclusion. They should have had Sol behind the wheel at least. The show hates depth and characterization. The sky high mdl rating as of this writing confounds me, there are dramas that are way better that don't have anywhere as near high ratings.

I do not recommend this drama. If you want a well done time travel back to high school plot to save a guy, watch Love for Love's Sake.

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The sum of Karma

The costume design for the show is really good, particularly for it's various period settings, they look the best that I've seen in any Thai drama so far. The lighting and color grading provides a gorgeous look. Sadly they are wasted by the other two immensely important aspects of the overall cinematography and atmosphere, the photography and editing which doesn't know how to create horror, atmospheric, or emotional tension with the static shot framing and stagnant edit pacing. Paran being sucked into the earth looked cool, Jet getting possessed and pulling over the bridge, as well as Khem getting possessed was good. Basically the white contact lenses and ghoul make up really give a fantastic lofi but strongest effect. Those are a rare few times the horror finally clicks, but the track record make them accidents rather than intentional.

There is no punctuation to what should be key emotional moments. Other shows do it too much, but here they just don't do anything. The green actors are directed well enough. The show's sluggish pace works best in miring in the emotion like when Khem presents a meal for his spectral mom. I do appreciate the balance of seriousness and humor in the tone of the series though it completely the feeling of tension that should exist in this type of story and I do see the attempt though they can't quite reach it. I also see the attempt to convey the emotion within the nc scenes and not just be fanservice. Some of them definitely could have been or needed to be edited to be a lot shorter .

Paran is already stunning as a young modern day shaman, but he was even more gleaming and every bit the ethereal visuals of a deity in his past life. He tries to keep a boundary between their past lives current selves, but it can't help but overlap for Paran who already memories and feelings of the past before anyone else. Every life is a different person, you make the choices that you can in the specific situation that you are in, yet the karma is cumulative be it good or bad. Paran receives kindness from a fellow deity that lives on from his past life, giving him his past life's godly weapon. Paran's past life Wat's brother who caused past life lady Khem's death with his obsession towards her also came back to help empower Paran in the final fight. Khem's past life despite being a child was one of the people that horrifically wronged Ramphueng that set off centuries of woe though in his current life and as an adult he would not have made that same decision. It's sweet that Thong and Ake is reborn into kids that were adopted by Paran and Khem and Paran will bear eating the spiciest food to not disappoint them despite being so strict with them and also Jet when they were his spirit and human disciples restrictively. He is the softest dad and Khem is probably the main disciplinarian dad.

The first episode starts with an interesting idea that sadly went nowhere with Khem using his curse as a gift to do good. His ability to see ghost saved a child living across from him from an abusive situation as well as the ghost's soul. That would have been cool if Khem got to do more of that as he solved the mystery of his curse. Khem is strongest as a character and in his element outside of his romance plot when he's with his schoolmates. He speaks up and out for himself for and to others. He's really good at art, which also doesn't come into play at any point except for getting a job teaching it at the end. Art degree coming through with an additional income for the family of four. It's lovely that Paran and Khem talk about registering their marriage and going on to have a happy family. The Thai legalization of gay marriage is still so recent and such an amazing human rights win.

The second couple are less supernaturally confused being they were already drawn to each other before any memories of their past lives come into play. They are just regular 20 year olds who have never dated before confused. They are also a good contrast with Khem who is more femme in demeanor because that's just the way Khem is and not because his past life was a femme woman because so were Jet and Charn. Charn's vision seems to be getting worse since his past life though, which is some kind of weird karrma. What did he do to wrong the vision gods? The scene where the fieldtrip club members was fawning over Charn when his glasses fell off was silly. He looks better with his glasses on. The show tried to keep the product placement as organically blended into the scenes as they can while still highlighting it. Charn dropping The Face Shop bag in slow motion is one of the best dramatic use of the product placement I've seen so far.

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Bland and lacks both flavor and filling

Even the writers felt Lukchup and Ramin don't have the energy to sustain the full 14 episodes as they focused way too much on the over the top bully and her psychological and physical torment on Lukchup, evoking the dated drama trope where the lead is a helpless doormat until the end. While it's nice his family, friends, and boyfriend rally to help him, he never steps up to help them help him in any significant way. They should have developed Sky and Paitong as the secondary story, they're a fiery, mature contrast to Lukchup and Ramin's slowburn relationship instead of suddenly throwing them in the final episode. The acting was so-so, the music was okay, and watching this drama once is more than enough.

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Romantic Warrior Couple

I love this pairing, Chu Yu loves fearlessly and Wei Yun loves fiercely, both embodying the English title of the show Fight for Love. All Chu Yu wanted in a romantic partner is someone who will fight through life's obstacles beside her and she them, and she got it in spades finally after her first try didn't work out. Both characters both can get serious and have their playful sides. They are a delight every time they are on screen together. They are on equal footing with her also being a comrade in arms and an extremely capable General having fought and learned alongside her general father since she was a child. She's also smart and fun. He's also all those things, it's fantastic. It's always great to see romantic partners that are not only take care of each other equally, but equal in power dynamics for either hetero or queer romances. One of the things I appreciate is that Chu Yu is older than Wei Yun and looks every bit the gorgeous grown woman warrior that she is, while Wei Yun is younger and has a baby face though Ryan the actor is 30 and Wei Yun is just 3 years younger than Chu Yu. Both the characters are able to be cute and funny without being annoyingly cutesy and also have gravitas when the situation requires it. I love that once she decides to date him, they aren't stingy with the displays of affection. The kisses are actually romantic, particularly when she kisses him and he kisses back even more passionately, opening his eyes mid way just to look at her, and they continue kissing. The show is however stingy without giving them one last kiss scene as they overlook the peaceful scenery of their homeland that they fought and won together.

All the women characters get to get their agency in various ways and it's wonderful. Chu Yu's ex boyfriend Chu Sheng really fumbled again and again. She's truly the coolest girlfriend in the world, not caring about conventions, protected and helped him achieve his goals, only for him to ditch her for his own plans, but still wants her to be with him. His ex-wife also genuinely loved him and he couldn't even be nice to her, though her dad did threaten his life in order to marry her, but Chu Sheng also got a political boost that he wanted out of it. Good for her to divorce him. At least Chu Sheng becomes a helpful political ally for Chu Yu later. It's poetic justice for Chu Yu that her signature romantic gestures in order to secretly scheme with the Wei family's eldest brother happened on the same day as Chu Sheng's marriage that led to her catching the attention of Wei family's youngest son. Technically Wei Jun also fell for her, because who wouldn't swoon at a gorgeous lady declaring their love for them in such an artistically spectacular way even if he later found out it was to plan with him about solving a problem that affected both their families. That probably made him fall harder. He died on the battlefield, but at least he got to be grieved and his family taken care of by Chu Yu as his widow in the time that his family needed the most.

Chu Yu saved Wei Yun from being scapegoated to death and even empowered his military standing as the head of Wei family. It was great seeing him fall deeper for her as she takes action to save him and take care of his family even while he's so suspicious of her before finally finding his brother's letter. It's even better when he completely loves her and his eyes are always so soft and vulnerable around her. While he serves his 3 years of border patrol duty, she becomes an official general of Beifang when the crown prince takes over as King and doesn't have the same constrictive views of his father before him keeping Chu Yu down in order to boost Wei Yun, and also opens up the opportunities for women to become Officials as well. It's beautiful that she does a proposal dance at the city gates as Wei Yun returns, the same dance that captured his heart and she full on proposes to him, "I'm here to marry you, will you marry me?" And he accepts saying "I will." with teary eyes. His dream has come true for her to proposal dance to him. I also love how it's recounted verbally to Chu Sheng by his helper, that the General of Beifang is dancing upon the gate tower for Duke Wei, so the road to the palace is blocked. The guys got to hang out a lot and there were two instances where one of the guys went into full drag. ShiLan pretending to be his sister makes sense, but Liu Qiba going full drag for the fake wedding didn't make any sense other than he just wanted to for fun, which good for him. It would have been nice if there were more scenes when all of Chu and Song women were together. That one scene of them commiserating on the roof showed that they had great friendship chemistry together as well.

The other standout woman and her twisted romantic pairing is of course the Eldest Princess who should have been King, ChangMing. She loves her country deeply and survived an abusive political marriage in order to secure the throne for her brother. She has a harem and even keeps some porn in her library that was hilariously found by Chu Yu's sister Chu JIn who tagged along to investigate what happened to ChangMing who gets kidnapped by her favorite harem guy HanMei who turns out to be both a mole, but also the royal lineage of the enemy country who becomes king Zhao Yue and wants her to be his queen. She tries to kill both him and herself, but failing that, she decides to do what she does best and destroy the enemy from within. Despite him being her favorite, she never slept with him, but she seduces him as a step to sow discord in his alliance marriage with a lord's daughter. She becomes pregnant to her own surprise. Symbolically, it might have been because the pregnancy was a product of true love, as she really did love HanMei and he loved her. Sadly, the pregnancy did come at the worst time for her and she can only tell the little soul to find her in the next life as she takes abortion medicine in order to frame the other consort and HanMei makes an enemy of that consort's family. She implies the same thing when she gives poisoned kiss to HanMei who asked her if she ever loved him at the edge of a cliff, telling him that they shouldn't be born as royals in the next life. She also dies of the same poison, but willingly hurls herself off a cliff after pushing him off despite Chu Yu offering her an antidote, declaring she will clear the other half of the blame for HanMei. I hope the family of three finds happiness in another story. Truly a fantastic role for Joe Chen, it would be great to see her in a modern drama romance with Liang Xue Feng.

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Romance and Responsibility

Three years out from the first airing of this drama in 2021, the sitting president in 2024 announced martial law and was swiftly countered by immediate fierce protests of citizens who assisted elected officials who did everything they could including climbing over the fences and barricaded themselves against the military to get their votes in to lift the martial. It was a bipartisan unanimous vote. The martial law from 1980 is still very much fresh in the historical memory of the country and remains remembered through holidays and dramatized depictions like this drama. The atrocities portrayed is a mere fraction of what occurred but is still sickening and sad. The stories are led by Myung Hee, a nurse of three years, and Hee Tae who is a top student in the final year of medical school. It took me a while to get to this drama because of the actor's strong performances as siblings in another show, but they show off their acting prowess depicting a different chemistry as different characters here.

Myung Hee has the tenacity to work towards her dreams, but she's always beaten back by the hostile political atmosphere of the country. She's has the dichotomy where she's extremely capable at her job and can take care of herself around guys being a creep, but she lets herself be taken advantaged of by her co-workers to do the tasks they don't want and to give in to her friend rather than follow her own feelings due the event of her getting all the blame for political posters and getting kicked out of high school and her father who is later revealed to have been branded a communist after being forced to confess as one under torture by Hee Tae's villain father, telling her to accept it. She also has the dumbest little brother. He's 12 but has zero awareness or thinking skills beyond his own wants and needs. He doesn't care that she has her own dreams and wants to put her already many years deferred dream of going to school in Germany, partially because she sent back a lot of her hard earned money for his living expenses to watch his race. He doesn't care that there's no out running soldiers with guns, except for a family member to sacrifice their life by blocking the bullets with their body. He knows that's how his father died, but still goes off by himself causing his family to go after him. Myung Hee deserved better. I do enjoy how her older sibling kindness fared better with Hee Tae's half brother Jung Tae who saved her life by foiling the assassin from murdering her. She also gave perspective to Hee Tae regarding his brother that led to the brother's finally connection with some true familial love in that abusive household.

It was moving when a tied up and beaten Hee Tae accepts that his step mom isn't able to help him and pleads for her to get away with Jung Tae instead, which leads to her bravely setting him free and facing down her abusive husband for divorce. The actor who plays him is really good, he brings a realistic, chilling gravitas that is more found in Korean films than television show and the scenes where he acts against Lee Do Hyun as his son are excellent. It was so sad when Hee Tae revealed that the only reason he joined his father's step family was to not be alone. Myung Hee was going to be his family, but she was murdered. She did reconcile his relationship with his brother who he looked to have kept in touch with his whole life. I really enjoyed the scenes where they both worked together as medical professionals to help patients as more and more victims of the atrocities poured into the hospital. It unfortunately meant that they missed their window to get out of the city again and again until it was too late. Hee Tae really has a head and body of steel, he received head trauma by taking a blow to the head for her, then probably more head and body trauma from a hit and run, then more injuries being tied up and banging himself against the furniture and the floor to get help, and he just shows back up at the hospital up and running just fine.

The drama also showed the conscripted soldiers point of view, where they were forced towards violence regardless of their personal views and could only do so much to counter it. This reflects real life where the conscripted soldiers in the real life 2024 martial law event also seemed a bit confused as to what they were supposed to do. Hee Tae and all the other main players got to live out their life to modern day while Myung Hee's body was finally unearthed decades later. She deserved to live and find happiness the most. There's also the plot of the rich best friend who let Myung Hee go down alone during high school, totally compromising her ideals to force Hee Tae to marry her for her family's financial stability fulling using Myung Hee who she knows loves him and vice versa to convince him, and a cop dies for her, a cohort of hers is in love with her, and her family learns what it means to really contribute to helping the city by using all of their stores after her brother gets kidnapped and tortured just like the regular plebs. The wealthy and the privileged get to survive just fine in the story while Myung Hee and her dad who both suffered a lot in both poverty and politically and were the bread winners of their family of five die horribly. It's weird messaging.

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The leads got shortchanged

Shin Min Ah absolutely shines as Son Hae Yeong who in the hands of another actor would probably be a very misunderstood character. I love her range from being organically cute without any over acting like in the scene she's munching away on the kimbap with her chair pushed back out view in the car and does her little moo to breaking my heart when she confronts the pain that her parents caused her. Genuine foster parents are very important, but I agree with the advice for people considering fostering that if their biological children can't handle it well then fostering is not a good fit for their household. Hae Yeong was just a child who still needed to be cared for and they put their own needs to be saints above their daughter. It also hurt her every time someone who became family would leave her. All she wanted was a stable homelife and to be loved in return, she doesn't even hate the foster kids. She fiercely loves the sisters that came back and stayed. Sadly the show also put the happiness of all the side characters above Hae Yeong.

I loath all the side pairings which also has the worst characters Gyu Hyun and U Jae, both of whom are scumbags who abused Hae Yeong in a professional setting with Gyu Hyun the creep who both spammed Ja Yeon with hate comments as well as making his secretary do it then demoting Hae Yeong out of spite because she's married to his father's extramarital child and U Jae who dumped her to marry up, creepily stalked her after he's married, and stole her work and keeps failing upward. It's so much worse that the show chickens out and makes it that Gyu Hyun did not write the worst hate comment, they don't even let his character growth count for anything. He also never rectified what he did to Hae Yeong. He should have given her all the money she wanted for her start-up as compensation. The lip service to the polyamory storyline ends in the most heteronormative way with Hee Sung marrying the one guy and having the child instead of getting an abortion and being the independent person she wanted to be.

I did enjoy Hae Yeong and Ji Uk's romance. He knew who she was, but truly got to know here as they gradually built up their rapport through their interactions at the mini-mart and supporting her schemes. I also like how their first meeting made sense because it's her house that he was staying at and was trying to walk by to avoid her while she was contemplating smoking for the first time and he just so happened to have a lighter which foreshadowed their future as co-schemers turned lovers. He actually looked better with his longer hair, it frames his face very nicely. Ji Uk's story was also swallowed up by the annoying side characters. I would rather see his friendship and brotherly/fatherly relationship develop with that guy that was formerly the Bok family secretary and settle his angst with his birthmother. Hae Yeong and Ji Uk deserved their fantasy ending being happy in love, snuggling with their cat Baby and her with a successful business venture instead of ending on a kiss after reuniting post a long separation.

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No sugarcoating, just pure grey

It's great to see a drama that understands the focus of what makes a fascinating drama is the characters and it's a real shame that there is no proper subtitles yet as of this writing for this twisty thriller that's a meditation on the desperation to do whatever it takes to survive and to claw a sense of relief from poverty/abuse/neglect/illness/etc that is being faced. It's kudos to the writing and performances that the main characters can illicit both sympathy and disgust for their selfish yet understandable actions through the lens of their individual needs.

I felt so bad for Ho Su who felt cared for by the person who wanted to kill him and betrayed him when she saved him, that little bit of kindness, even knowing it was self serving to save her sister, was such an ocean to him that he entrusted his most precious information, his mother's location to him and she tragically caused her death. He himself has caused so many deaths with his drug cookies, but his folly of humanity, of wanting love, connection, and trust was pitiable.

It was also so sad that Soo Young's wish is is what she's living by proxy with the facade she as Eun So, the senior year she never had, school, friends, dating, looking forward to university without the baggage of her broken family and needing to raise her sister while being barely older herself. Her photobooth scene with Jin Woo and neither of them knowing what to do was so funny. As Eun So, she showed that she is resourceful in using the connections of various cookie customers to get information and creatively get out of situations. It shows what potential she could have had.

There are no saints in this story, but everyone is a protagonist of their own. There is a high death count and the show is not afraid to make the characters to explore what lines they will cross to get their objectives and the fallout of the decisions. It's kind of funny Ho Su and Sung Pil kept coming back from assumed death. The end seems to set up for a possible continuation. I hope that this drama will get proper subtitles either from a kind translator or from a streaming service that will pick up the distribution for it.

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Queen of endless villain meetings

The drama boasts an exorbitant runtime that's around 90 minutes per each of it's 16 episodes but it's filled with constant meetings of the villains planning, enacting, or going over what they did for their schemes instead of strengthening the relationships of the characters, the most important one being the main pair Hae In and Hyun Woo. Their chemistry really fluctuated as to when the writing really understood them as characters with history, which the scenes when they are at odds at each other capitalized the most well on, giving them pathos informed by their shared traumas, whereas it's the weakest in the romantic sections where the writing and direction portrays them like teenagers dating for the first time rather than estranged spouses whose years of resentment (that lead to Hyun Woo to the point of celebrating the news of Hae In's terminal illness) stemmed from shared overwhelming grief over a miscarriage and miscommunication. There are moments where their current romance reflects on moments in their dating past that gives their current relationship a bit more depth, but otherwise there is this astronomical void that is never reconciled so Hae In and Hyun Woo falling in love again, all the sweet scenes, and emotional declarations feels hollow. It doesn't matter if they kept meeting each other throughout their childhood into their adulthood and elderly Hyun Woo is the one visiting her grave in Germany after she has passed from old age in the future if the biggest obstacles that utterly destroyed their love for each other is never addressed properly.

The most affecting relationship of the show is Soo Cheol and Da Hye. Soo Cheol is a comically petulant man child who can't do anything right, but he understands that he's been sheltered and stunted by his parents and wants to step up to be a good husband and father and he absolutely is. His pure unconditional love and acceptance for his wife and child even after he's discovered that Da Hye had scammed him and he's not the biological father of his child and every moment that he will do whatever it takes to protect them are the most powerful emotional parts of the show. The key moments are Soo Cheol waiting endlessly until Da Hye logs in to the game not to confront her, but to send her their son's shot records, not allowing his parents to speak down to his wife, learning to ride a bicycle so he can teach his son, learning to take hits and to box to protect his wife, calling her over the lost and found speaker, him choosing to recontextualize her confessions of picking on him when they were little in the sweetest way, and waiting for her release from prison. It's so sweet the both of them share a genuine enjoyment of gaming together. We get to see Da Hye have very good knife skills, chopping up copious amounts of vegetables swiftly. It would have been nice if we could have seen Da Hye and Soo Cheol work together for a business for themselves or something instead of the endless villain meeting scenes.

Kim Soo Hyun did a good job portraying Hyun Woo from his sweet vulnerable side to his cold combative side. Kim Ji Won's Hae In was most effective as the past version where she manages to be balance being cocky and romantic in a charming way. None of Hae In's supposedly comedic moments hit as funny in the current day portions. Hyun Woo's friendship with Yang Gi and the lawyer crew as well as Secretary Na being the closest thing to a best friend that Hae In has were also enjoyable. It would have been nice seeing Hae In explore her friendship with Secretary Na some more. It was trippy to see Sebastian Roche show up as one of the German doctors and seeing the German nurse station where they gossip about the situation, filmed in that specific kdrama style. Hae In's rare brain tumor being magically healed with no resulting issues other activating an amnesia plotline is also another wasted opportunity in the writing. There's a lot of potential in this drama, it's a shame that they couldn't edit the show down and focus in the writing stage to the more important parts to keep a good momentum and give more substance to the story of the main leads recovering from their broken relationship.

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