kchelsea

I come back to this page from time to time and I still think this drama is criminally underrated. This was one of my favorite webtoons back in high school. I do still like the webtoon better, but the story was faithful to the original webtoon, and I thought it was well executed and the cast carried the emotions across well.

I do see how the musical aspect might not be everyone's cup of tea, and I'm a bit on the fence about it myself. The original webtoon used a lot of unique artistic choices to help convey the characters' inner feelings which wouldn't have translated to a live action drama well, so I feel like the choice to make this a musical may have partly been to replace that aspect.

This is a different Park Jin Young. They thread you're referencing is talking about J.Y. Park, founder of JYP Entertainment.

Don’t get me wrong, I thought it was well done and can understand the hype. I was just trying to think of why it didn’t quite hit the mark for me personally, but it may be individual experiences. I’m Asian and in my 30s and appreciate the realism in the characters and relationships in this show, and I think that it can resonate with a lot of others in my peer group.

This drama was good but not great for me, so I was shocked to come here and see how many people are calling it a masterpiece. But maybe it's because I couldn't really relate or resonate personally with it. I can see how this can be relatable for a lot of people, and I presume that's the appeal for many.

It's not a Kdrama though. It's an American show and thus stylistically more aligns with American dramas. I agree that it's just a difference in taste though; neither style is inherently better. I don't see the average Kdrama watcher gravitating towards this one though.

The kisskh rating for this drama is criminally low. I'm glad I gave this one a try despite the odd premise and the low ratings. It was surprisingly realistic and relatable. Aside from the "authorized affair" part, I think a lot of the problems it tackles can be relatable for a lot of those who are in longer-term relationships, and I loved how introspective this drama was and how it handled things with nuance instead of portraying things as black or white.

Thank you! :)

Yeah, that's what I figured. I just wished that was the direction that the story went since that was what was suggested in the premise (even though it was implied later that it wasn't suicide to begin with) and felt like it could've been 8 episodes without the serial killer plot in the second half of the series.

Am I the only one who wished the story stayed about Sun Jae and Sol healing each other emotionally and Sol saving him from suicide? I realized later on that it's probably implied that he was taken out by the serial killer in the original timeline too, but the whole thing about him being fated to be taken out by a serial killer and her trying to prevent his murder just had nowhere near the same emotional impact as the storyline about her saving him from his emotional scars.

This might've been the most gorgeously shot drama I've seen. Gorgeous soundtrack as well. The characters were endearing, and the actors were excellent. Too bad the plot was full of cliches and old tropes. Still enjoyed it nonetheless because everything besides the plot hit all the right marks for me.

I was thinking they could use the child Buyeon actor up until they revealed the plot twist and then use the OG Seolran for the final scenes.

Lol I thought that after all of those plot conveniences that they would have at least one tragedy fully materialize in the final episode. None of the challenges they faced this season (like Yul facing death or the dilemma they had to open the prison door to save Naksu) had any emotional impact on me because I knew they were going to have some convenient solution to fix it. I was actually tearing up at the scenes with Park Jin and Maidservant Kim dying because I thought they were legitimately going to die with the way they were dramatically setting everything up and with it being the last episode. It felt like it kind of lessened the weight of the whole firebird conflict (that they've been spending the entire season setting up) when every single person came out unscathed.

I understanding not being able to get JSM back for a few scenes, but I kind of wish they got the actress who played the original Seolran if possible. Would've made more sense than having child Buyeon there.

Might be an unpopular opinion, but I wished they didn't make Park Jin, Maidservant Kim, and Lady Jin survive. It kind of ruined in the impact of the scenes where they were dying to prevent chaos. There were too many instances this season where they set something up with having high stakes, a huge dilemma, or something tragic just to go "JK we have this convenient, magical solution to this" two seconds later. Everything was just wrapped up way too neatly, too easily, and too Disney-like. I did want at least Uk and Yeong to have a happy ending, but the way they got there just felt too convenient.

I did love some of the action and CGI sequences here though. That firebird fight was epic (albeit short), and Danggu's arrow fight scene was badass AF. Also, those opening scenes in Danhyanggok were sooo beautiful. To an extent, I'm satisfied with the ending and am glad they didn't go with a super tragic ending with Uk and/or Yeong dying like I expected.

Most characters outside of Uk and Naksu got watered down in S2 and relegated to background roles. Besides Danggu and Choyeon, I feel that way for Yul, Park Jin, etc.

I thought that they thought that the soul shifting was not accomplished properly because they couldn't find anyone else in the area with a corresponding blue mark? But as viewers we know that's because the blue mark ended up in Mudeok's eyes instead of her chest. The blue mark on Naksu's chest indicated that the original soul left the body but doesn't give any indication if a new soul entered it or not. Uk and Yul at least knew that she successfully soul shifted (followed by everyone else at the end of S1), so for all they knew the original "Mudeok" died in Naksu's body. Ahhh maybe I'm just hurting my brain too much over trivialities.

I've always had an itching question and hardly ever saw people talking about it during S1. Now that Buyeon is getting grilled for using Naksu, this question is itching at me again. Throughout the series, it's been portrayed as immoral and heinous to use AOS to escape death and sacrificing another person to die in your place. But isn't that what Naksu basically attempted to do in S1 Ep1? Obviously by now, we know better and Buyeon/Mudeok didn't actually die in her place since there are two souls in one body. But most of the other characters don't know this, and even the audience didn't know this for much of S1. Did no one (Uk, Yul, etc.) even fathom what happened to the other person who was probably innocent (to their knowledge at the time)? Did Naksu not have any moral qualms with it as she developed into a more virtuous person throughout the series? For all they knew, a random, innocent person's soul died in Naksu's body. Doesn't that make Naksu at least kind of messed up? Maybe I've been thinking too hard about this.

It's an open ending, but it's not sad. More of like a hopeful ending.

As someone who loved the webtoon so much after reading it 10 years ago, I was ready to be underwhelmed by a live action adaptation, but I was pleasantly surprised. I think the webtoon and the drama each have their own charms in different ways. The cast was excellent and really breathed life into each of the three main characters. There are certain things I liked about the webtoon more than the live action, but one thing I found myself more invested in with the live action was the characters, which I really attribute to the actors. I especially don't remember loving Il Deung's character so much in the webtoon, but he was my favorite character here.

Lol yeah, that's what got me. My parents have papers from 60+ years ago. But considering how much moisture and insects and what-not it's been exposed to, and considering how even the clothes had disintegrated by then, that was just bizarre to me.