hum

Thank you so much. I think I'll try with it again after reading your opinion.

I never thought it was a BL drama. You should stop imagining things about things you don't know.

I haven't reached the end, so I don't know either :p

Or maybe just a friend. His conversation is too broad and too vague to assume anything more than he's meeting someone later.

Firstly, please don't get me wrong. I also like this movie, but on reading your review that says this is the best Chinese movie you've watched, I'd like to recommend you a couple more in case you're interested. I think you might consider A Little Red Flower a very good one, too. And maybe also Better Days. In those two films, they actually have the same ML and his acting is superb. For me, this movie comes on third after those two on my Chinese movie list :)

https://www.bilibili.com/video/BV1FW4y1i7LR?share_source=copy_web

Guys.... in case you haven't seen this part. It's the deleted kissing scene from ep20.

https://youtu.be/vDYH8hW_XGo

Whoa, thanks so much for taking your energy in this conversaiton with me. I'm so sorry I didn't finish my original rant properly. The points you mention were accumulated notes of mine during watching episode per episode. They were cleared out towards the end of the series. I was exhausted watching this series (and taking in the harsh information of the real event that inspired the crime in the series -- I was curious and researched more after done watching) and didn't come back to edit my review. It's irresponsibility on my side.

I don't remember all the details as of now. Maybe I'll watch it again later.

But all in all, the real problem of this series is that it intended to deceive the viewers. They intended to distort some details during the previous episodes and changed it in the latter episodes. I agreed that they were not reckless. Before I finished watching, I thought they were as they might forget the ealier details, but after watching the last episode, when they bore out all the answers, it's clear that what they did before was intentional. And the reason they did so because they were not wise enough to let the viewers think along and find the culprit together with them, so they hid some crucial details that the viewers would never know the answer without these pieces of information. They not only hid, but even distorted some details - in the same scene but in the earlier episode and latter one, the scenes were displayed differently. This is, to me, considered cheating. (--Also another reason I couldn't finish my review decently. I thought I should dig back into the old episodes to be able to make a reference if I wanted to talk about what I'm talking here and it added to my exhaustion just to think about going back to all those hard-to-swallow content.)

The 'love' you are talking about (-A) and the perception of love that you think the writer forces upon the audience (-B) somewhat lead to the analysis of Youngro and Sooho's intrinsic feelings and the validity in it, though.

(A-) It started when we refer to the meaning of 'love' differently. What I talked about was the romantic feelings occurring b/w them, which I see are valid in the story context. But you clarified later that what you talked about was actually true love, which we agree that it's not quite believable to happen yet - which is also the reason I didn't view it as true love in the first place.

(B-) The case is that the way you try to force the feelings between them to be "true love" is actually your interpretation. The writer didn't say it's true love. That's for the viewers to interpret as you can see that we interpret it differently.

Here, if you interpreted the feelings as true love, you might try to portray it for others to see along. However, since you don't see it as true love, then it shouldn't be a point to have a grudge on the writer as she didn't say it's true love, either 😃 From my point of view so far, it seems like you misunderstand the writer and upset with her for the point that you don't realize you misunderstand.
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PS. It's ok we don't have to push forward the convo on emotional manipulation. I'm already satisfied to be able to do some justice to the character(s) in the series 😂 I think if someone want to talk about emotional manipulation between Youngro and Sooho, they shouldn't leave out Youngro as she's more obvious on this (--not that I think what they do is that severe to be stamped by the word.)
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PS.2 In my circle of friends, there's a common dark humor that says we must not get into a relationship with someone whose gf/bf has passed in the middle of their former relationship because when they part ways with regret, it'd be hard to forget and their ex would likely always remain in their mind and we are not gonna be in a fair game to compete with someone who's not existentially here anymore.

The same goes for Youngro. She would never find out what can possibly happen between Sooho and herself if he stayed. She would never know if the feelings that happened were to become true love or just a crush. Their backgrounds are so different, I think so that it's not gonna be easy adapting to each other. But everything ends before the answer comes. Youngro is left hanging in the air with the hypothesis about what-if. It'd be especially hard for her to forget.

Anyway, in many other k-series/dramas, it usually stops right when the leads find out they have feelings for each other and start to date. We don't usually see if they get married or break up later. And the time duration the leads develop their feelings is also about the time duration of the broadcasting period, which is too short for true love. Many of those couples don't have what you expect to be true love (yet) even when they say the word 'love' out loud (people do it in real life, too. We use the word 'love' with our partner all the time, but many times we just think we do.) So, I think we don't have to force ourselves with the assumption that the feelings between the main leads must be true love on all occasions 😉

Respect your opinion. Thank you so much for reading my excessively long comment :)

Yosh, please let me participate in your conversation a bit ;)

I think you overanalyze about Sooho having Stockholm Syndrome. He wasn't held hostage or abused. He was adopted. His feeling for his stepfather is more of gratitude than any kind of blind love from mental distortion.

I'd like to recommend you to watch this series till the end. It'll help you understand the whole picture surrounding the topics you're interested in and would surely help you form a clearer psychological analysis of each character :)

Thank you for your invested reply! Hope you had enough energy to go on with your next activities after that 😂

Good to clarify first about the views between us on the meaning of love here. When you wanted to talk about true love, I was translating the word only on the conventional level of romantic feelings as it's the meaning people usually conveniently use the word for.

In the initial stage of a romantic relationship, the feeling is usually not true love. As you try to convey your thought - how can we truly love if we don't know the true self of our partner - I have the same view on that. And if that's so, our topic would be able to end here.

Anyway, as I already viewed it from the perspective of romantic feelings and dragged you into this side 😂 let's discuss a little more since your defensive points already have a touch on it.
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1.
First of all, I feel like telling you as well that I'm not the kind that believes in love at first sight. I never had that kind of love. I don't take in the concept of first impression, either. I always take time to learn about people I meet before having any kind of feelings toward them. However, when I'm in a relationship, there's always that initial stage when both of us are excited to know more about each other and think of/miss each other all the time. It's called the honeymoon period (*you can google 'stages of love' for more on this). That kind of feeling eventually dies down even when the relationship is healthily sustained.
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2.
I still don't see that there's any emotional manipulation between Youngro and Sooho. When I said this previously, I've already put all the threatening (by verbal and gesture) and pointing-gun situations from ep1 to the last ep into consideration. There're some significant reasons why it's hard for Sooho to do that to Youngro, which are:
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2.1
- Sooho has exposed his gentle and likable self to Youngro since before. So, while the hard and stern image he tries to impose on other hostages works, it works because they don't know how soft he can be. From most of the hostages' points of view, Sooho has only one side, which is the brainwashed, cruel NK spy whose morality and rationality are questionable.

- For Youngro's roommates and Bunok, they're more in the confusion from the conflict between what they perceive about Sooho from before and later. But as they haven't interacted with Sooho in the way or as much as Youngro has, they incline to view the situation as they being deceived by a spy and what they know about Sooho from before is likely to be deceit and lies.

- If there'd be anyone here to claim that she's emotionally manipulated, Bunok is in the closest position to be able to say that as she's the one who invested her feelings and set up her expectation on him. But still, she'd claim it from her selfish point of view. Sooho didn't mean to make Bunok have any feeling for him. If there's really someone emotionally manipulating some other people here, it's Bunok emotionally manipulating herself.
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2.2
- Youngro's half-conviction (the other half is most likely confusion 😂) that Sooho wouldn't give up on her life easily has built from the time she almost fell from the building and he risked his whole life to bring her up. A strong trust between them has already formed, so it would take some time for Youngro if she had to make a new belief (*more on this, check 'grief cycle').

- Later when she begins to struggle more with her warring feelings (--again, how well you weave the words here~ please write more reviews!) and has to adjust/assess her whole understanding anew from all the contradictory knowledge that floods in, Sooho happens to can't help himself to still be caring for Youngro. He's the one who notices her wound on the hand and comes out of his way (as the captor) to make an excuse to bring her out and personally takes care of her injury. What I think while watching this scene is that Sooho is doomed. He completely falls into his own trap. What he does here would make it harder for him to control Youngro later. Now, right when Youngro is still conflicted and tries to figure out what kind of a person he really is, he personally hands in the positive kind of answer to her.

- From this point on, she starts to know she has influence over him more or less (it'd be reaffirmed time and again later on from the subsequent situations like when he pushes her down to protect her from a hail of bullets by the window - this protective act of him for Youngro is also awared of by other hostages as they would mention about this later in a cynical way).

- And right after that, she boldly goes against him by standing up for her dorm friends when he uses the gun to threaten them. She does the exact thing that forces him to point his gun on her, or else his different treatment (pointing gun to everyone except Youngro) would expose him to the others that there's something special about Youngro to him.

- It's expectable that being pointed by his gun would be the case if she's going to openly oppose him at that moment. I myself see it's coming very clearly while watching that scene, so I think this must also bear in Youngro's mind as it's not difficult to foresee. This outcome can be expected by other hostages as well when Youngro gets up to yell like that. But, what other hostages don't know while Youngro does is the knowledge that Sooho wouldn't actually shoot her.

- From here, it would be more proper to say that Youngro is the one who emotionally manipulates Sooho than the other way around. She uses his feelings for her that guarantee her ultimate safety to go against him without restraint. And don't forget when she fakely back-hugs him to get his walkie-talkie 😂

Hope to be able to read your next review! By the way, what major are you? Is it related to literature or media studies? Your view is very thorough here. Can't praise you enough.

Wow, your thought is so well-organized and your masterly language isn't under-utilized at all (yes, I tease you 😄) Thanks for sharing your thought here! I'm kind of able to imagine how much energy you have to spend to conceive this piece.

I don't totally agree with you though, but I think it's a good thing (don't worry!) Differences can make it more fun when people discuss and reconstruct ideas. If you have time, let's chat a bit, but no obligation to dive into it with me at all. I know this can consume energy more than we think :P

I'm agreeable to most points you present. Only one point I want to pick up to discuss is the validity of the feelings between Youngro and Sooho:

1. Vague superficial attraction can be intense and still real. If you ever had a naive love (no matter at what age), you would know the situation of irrationally falling head over heels does exist, esp. in the short time span as it is in the series. Youngro and Sooho are only in the initial stage of their relationship that both are so taken up with each other. They say it takes averagely 5 months together for a couple to reveal their true self to the other. So, when Youngro gives in to the kiss (--wow, love how you describe the kiss here), I don't feel that it's too quickly or unrealistic. Moreover, you might underestimate the power of atmosphere. If people are rational all the time as you expect, humankind might be able to spare 75% of their regrettable one-night stands 😂

2. Deceit and lies between people in love can always be justified if there's solid reasoning, esp. if those deceit and lies are not about their feelings for each other. The most important thing between lovers when they discover an unbelievable truth is whether or not the feelings they think they receive from the other party are true and truthful. If yes, in the short term, every other things is most likely forgivable. (In the long run, when they have chance to sit down and their minds have time to arrange their thoughts, things can change, but this process takes a lot more time than you might imagine.)

3. I don't feel that Youngro is emotionally manipulated. I see that Youngro even knows she has command over Sohoo's feelings for her as she never scares him. Her bold action and feelings that burst out toward him are mostly due to anger, not fear, from clashing interests and opinions. She might be utterly confused and perplexed at first with the unthinkable turn of the situation, but it looks like she knows well that Sohoo never intends to harm her. Each time he threatens or points a gun at her, he does it within the permissible limit when the situation forces it and/or it'd be for Youngro's good as the outcome, and this fact seems to bear in Youngro's mind as well no matter how much she resents him.

4. Extreme situation is actually a very good accelerating factor for love. By going through extreme experience(s) together, it can build a special bond between people that wouldn't happen as fast or as deep if they just go through the ordinary process of getting to know each other. So, even though your doubt about Youngro and Sooho's accelerated love esp. in regards to the depth of their bond after knowing each other for a short period isn't baseless if it were to a normal situation, in this kind of circumstance it isn't suspective either, in my opinion.

What a neurotic laugh 😂 I'll just leave it w/o any more comments to let the passersby decide who's the real psycho bitch here.

You tell others to trust themselves and make a decision without involving external factors but, at the same time, you give permission for yourself to act in the way you don't approve others to do? Why mention opinions on online platforms if your only right way is to formulate opinions on your own? 🤔

Your self-contradiction just reaffirmed what I said about you having an illogical mind. Your double standard just proved your bias. You making a baseless argument even without looking at the original data is called fallacy and it's ridiculing you.

Good luck with your life. I can only see you go nowhere. Don't know how to help you and no point in having a conversation with you 😞

PS. You say nobody reading what I wrote. Umm... Don't you realize that what you say is irrational as it's contrary to fact?

JadeStar360, it's actually you who are shameless. You are incapable to talk back to people with reasons, so you're down to insult and deride them. This kind of your action is pathetic. All the people who read your comments can easily see how you have an illogical mind with low EQ that can't cope or accept other people's ways of thinking+gathering information that lead to their decisions.

The way you rely on your primitive emotions to condemn others just shows how uneducated you are. You don't know the way to master your own surging emotions to express them with courtesy. When you choose to come down this path of disrespecting and ridiculing others, don't you expect a gentle response from anyone.

No one deserves this kind of action you're doing. Your action is unacceptable in the real, offline society as well. If you are still determined to be this kind of disgusting person, you'll only be able to be arrogant on the internet while being a pathetic loser in real life.

Glad you get it. I did put my heart into criticizing this series, so the review surely comes out reflecting how worst the series is, lol.

Thank you for sharing your thought : ) It's also fun hearing people with similar tastes criticizing the same points that we see through. It's like meeting people who talk the same language in a foreign land -- can't deny that on this site there're too many immature+irrational users who like to act as some crazy sasaeng, lol.

P.S. Sorry for replying to you late. I missed your response. Just saw yours with the new one that just came.

Haha, yeah I went to see your watchlist a bit. Our tastes for high-score dramas are more common than not. (Some of my higher-score still fall into your lower-score group, though :P) So I'm pretty sure this one isn't going to be your cup of tea, either. Thanks for letting me know your opinion. Now I have another watchlist as the reference for my next programs. The Memorist on your list looks very interesting to me :)