K-Drama 
6
5
1
1
1
3
True love is a verb…not an emotion
After a gentle, nostalgic first season, Love Is Better the Second Time Around returns with something I enjoy even more…the difficult part after the happy ending. These two have become my Yong and Sang lovers. I am completely invested in them, not because their love is perfect, but because it feels lived in…messy, tender, and painfully real.
Miyata’s insecurities truly show in these first two episodes. How many relationships have been damaged because one person quietly believes they are less than they truly are? He is not only threatened by Takashi’s past lovers. He is still carrying the empty feeling Takashi left behind when they were teenagers. Miyata remembers the pain of being left…but perhaps not enough of the acts that showed Takashi’s love.
That is why this season works so well for me. It is not just lovey dovey moments after the reunion. It asks what happens when old wounds, past lovers, and the fear of not being enough enter a relationship. Love is not only an emotion…love is a verb.
Takashi waited for Miyata for so long. That is an act of love. He continues to choose him, reassure him, and remain present even when Miyata’s fears make it difficult. When we are insecure, we tend to remember only how someone made us feel…not the sacrifices they made, or the good they brought into our lives. We become so consumed by our own hurt that we forget the other person has also loved, waited, and endured.
Miyata deserves compassion for the frightened younger version of himself…but loving yourself also means healing, instead of making the person who loves you pay for an old wound. What has Miyata sacrificed for this relationship so far…other than drowning in his own insecurities?
By the end, Miyata finally seems reassured because the immediate threats to his love are gone. But what happens next? Life does not stop testing us just because we have found the person we love. It always throws tangerines.
Will Miyata’s love become as steady and secure as Takashi’s…or will the next fear send him back into the same old spiral? That is the real challenge of Season 2…and why I love this series even more.
Miyata’s insecurities truly show in these first two episodes. How many relationships have been damaged because one person quietly believes they are less than they truly are? He is not only threatened by Takashi’s past lovers. He is still carrying the empty feeling Takashi left behind when they were teenagers. Miyata remembers the pain of being left…but perhaps not enough of the acts that showed Takashi’s love.
That is why this season works so well for me. It is not just lovey dovey moments after the reunion. It asks what happens when old wounds, past lovers, and the fear of not being enough enter a relationship. Love is not only an emotion…love is a verb.
Takashi waited for Miyata for so long. That is an act of love. He continues to choose him, reassure him, and remain present even when Miyata’s fears make it difficult. When we are insecure, we tend to remember only how someone made us feel…not the sacrifices they made, or the good they brought into our lives. We become so consumed by our own hurt that we forget the other person has also loved, waited, and endured.
Miyata deserves compassion for the frightened younger version of himself…but loving yourself also means healing, instead of making the person who loves you pay for an old wound. What has Miyata sacrificed for this relationship so far…other than drowning in his own insecurities?
By the end, Miyata finally seems reassured because the immediate threats to his love are gone. But what happens next? Life does not stop testing us just because we have found the person we love. It always throws tangerines.
Will Miyata’s love become as steady and secure as Takashi’s…or will the next fear send him back into the same old spiral? That is the real challenge of Season 2…and why I love this series even more.
Was this review helpful to you?
