bokminthe

Yes, that's the reason I mentioned in my review "Maybe they didn't want to portray her as a gyaru to keep up with the times, but they could have done something else to show the contrasts of her character since there is nothing in the way she acts or speaks here that tells me how she is either."

Started this yesterday and so far I'm not very impressed. I'll see how it goes since I very rarely drop anything, but so far all I'm seeing it's a repetition of the classic "great concept-poor execution" that tends to happen in many of these series that only add a couple of fantastical aspects. There are already plotholes everywhere when it comes to the main character, and depending on how the details are presented (or if they will be presented) it could become quite frustrating. We'll see.

I read only the part about keeping a diary of a guy in class is based on true experience, but not the overall plot.

"whatever you're trying to explain your viewpoint by" what means that you didn't understand what I wrote and decided to go with whatever you assumed. Ageism would be if I had a go at the actress because of her age and I said she can't act or be an actress at her age, and that's not what I said is it?
I didn't see that level of chemistry as you say, and there are plenty of good actresses that fit better with the age they could have taken that I'm sure could also have chemistry with ML. But as I said, it could also have been solved if they had changed the script and had put the actress closer to her own age. The age gap was not a problem to me, breaking the immersion by treating your audience as stupid thinking they won't notice or won't care is risky and obviously not everyone will be onboard, and I'm one of those persons. They basically wanted that actress because she's very famous and gives them an audience and whatnot, what is fair, what isn't is that they took the lazy route of not changing the script to adapt to that situation.
It's also ageist when they decide to take someone older to play a younger role because an actress is more well known than taking someone younger and less known. Ageism affects younger people too, and if we're talking about career wise, these days younger generations are more affected by age discrimination.
To you it was a minor detail, it's fair, to others it wasn't.

As I mentioned at the end of my review, it's watchable if nothing else to do. The reason it gets a four it's because despite all its flaws and the fact I wouldn't rewatch it, it had some good moments, the main plot followed a linear structure (sub-plots were most of the problem story wise) and characters were generally consistent (except for a couple of exceptions). There were things that were problematic in the topics and execution but I've seen worse. That's the reason for the 4. Still, at least to me, a 4 is a fail since I cut it at 5 being an ok basic pass. A show can be generally bad and still have some ok moments.
There are some shows I've given them a one, when they're not watchable, toxic, portray problematic situations or characters and it's handled in a bad way (like enabling those problematic behaviours), or their plots are completely messed up by terrible writing.

I agree with you, she's too old for this role, even more since for some reason they decided to make her more of an ajumma.
The flashbacks are supposed to be 2010, even if CCY was 21 and her, let's say 26, that means they're supposed to be around 34 and 39 respectively. It doesn't matter how I look at it, she doesn't look late 30s nor early 40s to me and breaks the immersion. I think if she dressed a bit more like the age she's supposed to be maaaaybe she would fit it a bit better but it still would be jarring to me anyway. I mean, it's mentioned how she looks "young" to have a kid that age, yet all the other actresses playing mothers are around the same age than Jeon Do Yeon... like what? except for Hwang Bo Ra's character that looks young to have a kid that age... because she's 39 in real life... yet she's supposed to be older I'm assuming, no one mentions to her she looks young to have a kid that age though... ¯\(°_o)/¯

It would have been easily solved by making the script match her age more. I don't care about their age difference if it was portrayed closer to the ages the actors are.

That will 100% happen.

Yes, as I mentioned she clearly has some issues, communication is certainly one of them, and her mother is a big one as well. He might have told her how he felt and that's fine, not saying she didn't overeact either (probably because of the mother issue again). But leaving this to the side, he clearly didn't like her lifestyle, yes, he beared with it but didn't like it and was waiting for her to change (recipe for disaster in a relationship in my opinion). He lied to people about her career, and he kept hiding the fact he was getting new things for her because he didn't like her getting second hand stuff or repairing things. We have seen him flinching continuously whenever she chose to reuse/recycle/repair instead of buying new. He could have been completely open about the fact he got the nightstand for her instead of lying about its origin as well.
It's not uncommon to find a couple where they might be together, and one bears with things they don't like of the other person hoping they will eventually change, or they'll change when they move in together (and rarely happens). We don't have anough information about him to know if he was thinking this, but he clearly didn't like her in those specific things. If he had accepted her, as you say, he wouldn't have lied to others about her jobs, for a start. Would I think my bf accepts of me if he's lying about what I work in? No. Would I think he accepts of me if I found out he's buying new stuff from me when he knows I don't want it? No. Now, she didn't know this as far as we know, she might have, in which case while she didn't choose the right action, we also don't know how often it might have happened, also in which case again, maybe harsh but when someone is not getting the hint even when you're stating with words you don't want something, then... well, they have to assume the consequences of their actions.
All this doesn't change the fact that I do believe they had bad communication and all, and I don't dislike him at all, I simply think they have different lifestyles that are clearly not compatible, but my original comment came mainly because I saw a lot of people criticising only her.

While I might not agree personally with the quote of "there is no such thing as a special relationship", I can accept her thought if that's what she wants to believe, but as you also point out this is most likely related to her mother and the detachment she has suffered from her family. We know her mother is in the UK but we don't know anything about the rest of her family. It's just a shame there was not more exploration of the side characters.
But also that phrase at that moment felt fake anyway and in a way out of character. We have seen her being super attached to EO so it felt weird she said that and I can only assume it was put there on purpose as a foreshadowing of her mother issue.
And yes, I'm totally saying this as someone that didn't like the writing in this series overall.

To be honest EO was not kind to KG either in many occasions, she was quite rude. I feel they have a friendship dynamics where KG is the receiver of the anger/frustrations because he has the most calm personality that we have seen.
And yes, totally agree RY handled the ex-boyfriend situation terribly, as well as EO's ex, very immature way.

As far as I remember I don't think she was going off to another job any time. She got fired of one job, and the same day got another one. Other than that I do not remember her getting any other job. We also don't know the schedules of these jobs, for all we know it could be one of 4 hours 5 days a week, the other two jobs only of a couple of hours twice a week. That compared to the average that is around 52h a week in Korea would give her certainly a lot more time. But again, we haven't seen enough to tell. I don't remember GJ disagreeing with her having more free time so I'm taking it as she indeed might have, we have seen her plenty of times with her friends when GJ was still working.
Not sure how it matters that she suggested selling the alcohol, not that the others opposed the idea (except a bit from GJ), and they certainly drank it. As for the nightstand, she got the one upcycled from the bin before GJ got her the new one, she wanted to keep it not only because it was free but because GJ had painted it, so it had now a sentimental value as well. Who is at fault here in terms of communication? GJ didn't tell her he bought it, he said he got it for free, gave it to her as a gift, she decided to sell it. We don't know if she knew or not, if she trusts him why would she question it? It wouldn't be far-fetched that he got it for free given his job and knowing she was looking for one. But again, if she indeed knew and was pissed how often he would do this, I wouldn't think she did bad either. As I said, if he doesn't get the hint after openly saying out loud she ddidn't want one new, he needs to accept the consequences of his actions. His anxiety took hold of him and it was more important to buy that new nightstand than the fact she said she didn't want one brand new.
Certainly if it was me I would have tried to sell it for a lot more, but she seemed to want the fast cash. I can't have an opinion on this because it's up to each one to decide for how much to sell something. She got it for free and whatever she makes on it it's still a profit, if she's ok with it so be it.

Well, as I said, I think that these type of break ups when it has been a longer relationship might be something stupid that finally makes it happen, doesn't mean there hasn't been problems from long ago, that's also the reason why I think that a lot of people could already see this coming and also why to me it seemed pretty realistic.
Precisely not long ago my brother's girlfriend left him for a similar reasoning after around 4 years of relationship. When lifestyles are very different there is always a limit of time when both persons try to make it work, but eventually it can easily become insurmountable like in this case.
Yeah sure, lifestyle is not the only issue here clearly, lack of communication is always worse and usually the underlying problem but let's be honest, a lot of times if there was a communication there these kind of couples wouldn't even exist. If he had been open to her about his disliking of no career and lifestyle choices and she had been the same about about what he likes, the fact that she doesn't want to marry and the issues with her mother, this relationship wouldn't have existed. And still, these kind of relationships do exist in high numbers in real life.

Yeah, thinking about what you say it's true about that. She clearly snapped because she thought about what her mom did. We can't know if he would have acted any different if he had known though.
I do agree also there is nothing wrong in him asking her about her priorities, problem is that she had already told him in another episode when he was pushy about her studying again that she was happy where she was and didn't want to change, and he kept buying her stuff because he didn't like her lifestyle. She was clear about being happy as she was, and he knew she didn't like buying new things. So while I agree that she knew his priorities, I don't think he knew nothing. I guess we come back at the lack of communication, what is clear, but also I feel that her jobs and being frugal was very clear to him but as we saw in this last episode he's concerned about the image he projects to the world.
Basically I think their lifestyles are incompatible, they want different things and they should find people that fits better into how they want to live life.
I think their relationship was more realistic and also more interesting than the main one and it's a shame we didn't get the insight it deserved.

Exactly, totally agree!

I feel like today all I'm doing is defending this poor lady, but I feel like many people here have too many attachments to the typical lifestyle and the typical views on how life is supposed to be lived.
I don't think we have seen enough of her to tell for sure she's scared of commitment. She has been in a long term relationship with GJ for example. There is no indication she keeps changing part time jobs (unless they fire her). She has had friends from childhood... So basically her lack of commitment simply because of marriage and because she refuses to get a corporate job?
Maybe she likes to do part time jobs because she gets to do a bit of everything, she gets more true free time to do whatever else she enjoys in life or because she doesn't like how a long term job could affect her life, if it's a company that expects a certain level of commitment like if it was second family, something very common in some east-asian countries (and there are movements of young people that refuse this kind of lifestyle and live on part-time jobs, there are documentaries about this you can watch if you're interested).
Maybe she doesn't want to marry him because simply she doesn't believe in the institution of marriage, or because she hasn't even thought about it for now so her answer in the present is no.
We have seen her being very frugal, minimalist... she might simply have a different lifestyle. We haven't seen enough of her to know anything for sure I think.
Also, marriage doesn't mean "more stable relationship" necessarily, and not for everyone either.
Why should she fight with him? As she said, he denied her life by not being accepting of how she wants to live it. Why would you try and fight or argue more with someone that is against you as a whole. He didn't like she was working part time jobs, he didn't like she didn't buy new things, he didn't like that her immediate decisions were to stay happy as she was.
Also I don't know you, but I haven't known of any long term couple fighting with each other when they broke up, generally because you can already see it coming or because the feeling started to be mutual, so to me their break up seemed pretty realistic. Also, it doesn't even mean they might not be back together at some point because "let's break up" is an easy very common phrase to use when you're pissed having an argument with your bf/gf (although personally I don't think they should get back together).
I don't think she doesn't face herself, she clearly has some issues. But the reason, precisely, why she wanted to break up is because she's strong minded, she knows what she wants and could clearly see their relationship hit a wall.
I don't agree either with EO trying hard to understand herself, but if you see her as the one trying I guess I can understand why you would see RY as the opposite of that.

When she said that she was referring to her lifestyle, wasn't she? he was denying her life because it wasn't like he wanted it to be. She then told him about the mother as an add-on (totally agree there in lack of communication, she should have told him this earlier on, she clearly bottles up bad things), but this mom thing didn't make any difference to everything she had already said, and he was clearly not accepting of her. We have seen this over the episodes when he already tried for her to study again, bought her things she didn't want and so on.
I didn't think she was accusing him of not knowing about the mother, unless there was something there missing in the translation that I didn't see.

Clearly they have different views on life, and that's fine. They're not compatible in that sense. GJ is more typical, and RY is more out there. I think the practical/impactical is very subjective. She's happy, she's doing what she wants, if he doesn't like it then fine. Obviously they have a lack of communication, that for sure.
But yeah, I mean, if she chooses to she can be doing part time jobs for the rest of her life if it's what she wants, or maybe in a year she gets the inspiration and starts her own company, or changes and decides to get full time job. The point in the end is that it's up to her, if it's a deal breaker for him then they're clearly better not together, but he can't expect her to be doing what he wants or keeping up with his expectations. He cares for the image he projects to the world and she doesn't.
I think she understands herself pretty well, reason why she got angry and stated what she didn't care about and what she wanted, but as said, lack of communication is another thing. However, she had already said to GJ she was ok working and living as she did previously when he suggested her to study in a previous episode, he kept pushing new furniture and items to her when he knew she didn't want it, and we know he has been doing the same for a very long time going by what KG said to him in one of the episodes.
I think they're both fine and represent different things. I'm not sure they can have a fulfilling relationship together, I think they need to find people that is more akin to their respective lifestyles.
I wish they had spent more time in their relationship considering that ending. It makes me feel like there was more planned for them but because of time constraints (as in, spending all their time in the main couple's unnecessary wallowing), many things didn't make it to the screen, reason why her speech in the end might also come off a bit unrelated/sudden dump of information.

I wish in real life mental issues were also as easy to overcome as this drama presents. The big change of ML and FL in the last two episodes is so unrealistic I thought I was watching a different drama.
Simply bad writing to me. They had enough time, instead decided to wallow in the misery for most of the drama and the "change" got lost inbetween two episodes... (although EO said she hasn't done any progress yet...).
Realistically, what we haven't seen is that after the ending a week later EO ran away with her suitcase, took a bus to somewhere, she only came back a year later, didn't want to speak to JW because felt ashamed XD
I was appalled as well with that stereotypical idea in the end that the guy saved the day... but no surprises I guess.

I'm sorry to say that there are films that manage to explain a lot more things in two hours than this series has done in 7.5h so far. There was stories to tell, but they managed to waste so many episodes and minutes in repeating the same flashbacks of them in the beach and JW being obsessive and wallowing on his misery and EO being awful and uncommunicative for no reason, 20 minutes we get the idea of their situation (now, that is digestible) and then they could have gone directly to progress and growth and learn more about the insight of the characters. They cut all that wallowing short and then they have about 6 hours left to tell a good story, how they changed and what happens to them from now on (as well as more focus on the other characters).
I'm afraid I still think this series suffered from bad writing, and the time is no excuse. There are plenty of 1h dramas that suffer from the same problem and drag the story to then speed things up in the end because "ups, we ran out of time now" and left things without explanation or answer. Time is not the problem, it's the writing and the execution of the series.

How the main characters acted in this episode is out of character and I can't blame the time or episodes being short given how the show has been presented in general.
I don't like this show for multiple reasons in terms of story/writing, this last episode was just the icing on the cake with that out of character overnight change (and we'll see if it lasts).
And it's funny because this has been the first episode I've actually enjoyed since the first ones, but in my opinion it has been done badly, both in writing and especially timing and it doesn't make any better anything that has happened in previous episodes nor it redeems the main characters in any way :/

Wow, what happened with the writing in this last episode? It's like the main two characters got one of the brain cells that were missing and they seem a lot more mature than they have been the entirety of the series and it happened overnight and I'm supposed to believe it.
I wish this had been like episode 4 or 5. I've had to watch so many filler episodes for this to happen and they have been both so bad until now I don't feel anything for these two characters anymore, so their apologies and their new discovered maturity is unrealistic and unbelievable. Such a shame. If this had been episode 4 or 5 it would have been such a better series for me.
I liked the moment between KG and SY, it was good, although they have shown so little of these two when they were together that at the same time it felt disconnected in a certain way.

Pretty much exactly that... hahaha

I get it why they did it that way, posts would have been impersonal in a professional account, but it just highlights even more how lame and unrealistic the whole idea of that scene was.

I didn't see those details so I went to check and I think it says 0 followers and 0 following? She didn't seem to have any comments or likes in any of the posts either... and also her instagram account name is 03_lovely? with a zero as well instead of an O?
Shouldn't she have a very open professional instagram account for her own company as O3? Isn't she in marketing? haha

So true.
I found the instagram thing very lame to be honest... Easy writing.