monstersnroses

Since you brought up how disappointing the last part of the show was, I'm just gonna vent my issues with it for a min also:

It was so risky and irresponsible for him to break up with her the way he did. Knowing how she felt about him, and how critical he was to her life, for him to not just break up with her but ghost her like that could have caused her to unalive herself.

That's how it is in romeo and juliet, which is why it was such a tragedy. He made a major decision about the relationship without telling her (faking his own death) and she believed it because she wasn't in on the decision, thought he was dead, and -being in such an unstable state- unalived herself due to extreme grief.

when someone feels powerful emotions like that, they should be dealt with honestly and not toyed with. Grief is the most painful emotion of all. He put her through that without telling her why.

Then to get back at him, she puts him through his own kind of grief. This is how true love gets poisoned, by being tainted with resentment and pain, being toyed with.

All this is so uncool, and the fact that "everybody was in on it" against her, is so uncool. He actually made his/their family and friends choose a loyalty, and they all decided to be loyal to him and not her. Is she ever supposed to feel okay about that later? What an insane amount of forgiveness she would have to have for him for the rest of her life not to bring that up in a domestic dispute later and hold a grudge. He has muddied up and besmirched the love they had when it was pure.

And another totally hot take, it's like well now she has seen the world and has gotten a career lined up.... well she's fated to breed with that man. What good will a career be for her once they get together? The second she gets pregnant she's gonna leave whatever job she had so she can be a conscientious mother to a child. If he hadn'tve done all that crap keeping her away, they would have gotten started earlier, she'd be younger by the time her kids were out of the house and would have some of her middle age for herself. She saw the world, so what. She was MISERABLE the entire time.

No one ever asked HER opinion. If mumu had been asked "would you rather see the world alone, or would you rather never leave your zip code but be with your man the whole time" what do you think she would have picked? So she was robbed of any agency over the relationship or her life, once again.

Honestly all that happened is he chose her future without her input, and the continual sadness and loneliness and stress just caused her body to flood with cortisol every day, causing inflammation and probably taking years of her lifespan. Good job, you bastard.

And everybody's clothes and hair took a nosedive too, what's up with that? This was a bait-and-switch.

End of rant.

I'm old enough that I no longer say how old I am, and also for me I'm completely in love w this drama.

Yes. Water because to metabolize alcohol, the body uses a lot of water (alcohol is dehydrating, think about what it does on your skin...). Food because it acts as a buffer on the stomach lining so the alcohol doesn't absorb as quickly. This is why bars often have wasabi peas, peanuts, boiled eggs, rice crackers or chips out on the bar for people, and why in many american states it's a law that food must be served in a bar until a certain time of night.

...and then their "strong independent FL" is like way way too strong, it's very all-or-nothing with the c-drama FL's. A rare few FL's are moderate.... My Fated Boy, Falling Into You, Kunning Palace, Fake It Till You Make It, Blossom....

also, sometimes the performance of the actors can be encouraged or worsened by the director and the vibe on-set. If she has a cry scene, they could try pre-filming coaching, changing the lighting, minimizing the number of people on-set, giving her more time to get those scenes in the can by modifying the filming schedule.

I just watched Learning to Love, which has incredibly epic perfomances by the whole cast, but especially the ML (Raul Maito), and they all said the director took LOTS of time to work with them and help them access the emotions they'd need for the scenes they shot. The ML is basically a novice actor, and he completely credits his performance to the director's patience with him and dedication.

I'm not saying it's on the director that she's not the best cryer out there, but you never know what it is that actually held her back, or if she just doesn't have it in her to access those emotions onscreen, or what.

I agree. People look to reviews and comments sections to find out if they are going to like a drama or not, so of course you want to hear from everybody so you have the best chances of actually picking a drama that you'd vibe with by hearing both sides, from people who liked it AND didn't like it.

TY! This world would be a really crappy place if we all liked the same things! Why is someone else's opinion being different such a threat that it could drive someone to personal attacks, i've never understood. I hope we can show that L&S fans are not mean or petty to people. 🌈💖

The predominant global opinion is that this is not internationally recognized as "normal" for flirting behavior. On this topic, internationally, there is a majority consenus "standard", and SOME asian subcultures could use a critique or two from outside perspectives or have you never heard what happens to Hmong girls. Asian enertainment opens themselves up to this kind of conversation by aiming to make money by opening themselves up to international audiences.

Some of the things they do alienate their international audiences and turn them off. Knowing that gives them a choice between giving the international audience the bird, and losing some of their potential viewers and therefore revenue, or tone it down for the sake of appealing to a wider global audience.

You think there's only one culture in the world that thinks of themselves as the standard and deviating from it leads to critique, you've obvs never met the muslim/indian mad max gangs that prowl the pages of MDL looking for moral and religious fights.

😂😂😂 Oh yes, my watchlist def has some unpopular opinions in it. Lots of them. BUT! My 10 is not for Esther Yu! It is because I am constantly in search of A) spice B) kilig C) Toxic/red-flag/monster/badboy/taboo/forbidden angst/demon/morally gray/antihero/twisted/dark MLs.

You have no idea how hard it is to find a good show (with an HE) that fulfills all 3 criteria at once. So to me this one is up there with kunning palace and cranky blood drinking drug addicted forced kiss snow dementia Xie Wei. Also the cars part is really really good imo.

I have looked over your watchlist, and given your tastes (not going strictly by what I liked, but more by what I think you might like):

Slow burn, modern:
Amidst A Snowstorm Of Love
Life Is Sweet
Fake It Til You Make It
Falling Into You

Light and fun:

okay this is where it gets tricky because c-light and fun is different than k-light and fun. So you could branch off into several different types of "Light and Fun"

Makjang light and fun
Love On the Edge of Divorce
Playing House
My Lethal Man

Spicy light and fun
My Fated Boy

Comedic light and fun
The Princess Royal

Epic wuxia light and fun
When Destiny Brings the Demon

Action light and fun
Romance of Tiger and Rose

And just honorable mention to probably the most batshit crazy insane good-bad train wreck spicefest that ever graced the screen:

I Love My President Although He Is A Psycho

oh im sorry i didn't know black baby girl was a big thing.
I didn't know muslim girls tee-hee-hee'd under their burquas
I didn't know latinas were into baby dresses and doe eyes
I didn't know indigenous american girls pretend they can't fix the AC on the rez

SMDH omg...

if you want, you can tell me what kinds of things you want in your next drama, and i can give you some reccs if you want to put you in the right general vicinity of what you're after.

Ive watched so much c-drama at this point that the other day when i went into my local cantonese bakery, where everyone speaks cantonese, I sat down and instantly realized the family in the booth behind me was speaking mandarin, and I got so weirded out because I almost understood some of what they were saying.

That's a lotta c-dramas lol.

Tis the viking way. Norse life is bitter, and so follows the beverage. A good refreshment slaps you in the face with the harshness of this world, and braces you against the reality that looms ahead like a giant lifeless fjord full of coldness. Uff da.

I love this drama like in a very top 10 way, and I think Esther's acting is strong here, but even I have to admit that her crying needs just a little bit more work, it is her weakest link imo. Sometimes I believe it, and sometimes it hits that 'okay that's enough' nerve in my brain like when little kids fake cry to get toys and candy.

japanese, chinese and korean cultures all have a significant subsection of girls who behave like that. They're opened up now to international viewership, but still writing to asian audiences. And it can get awkward. Like how in c-dramas, its perfectly acceptable to wrap your hands around a womans throat in anger. Just try doing that to an american girl and see how far it gets you lollll. You'd get your ass kicked faster than you can say hǎo bù hǎo.

my family is norwegian, so i was sat down and ordered to drink coffee at age 12 as if liking it was not a choice but a genetic and cultural imperative.

right?!😂

in chinese culture men often consider it an accomplishment to have wives and daughters that act sweet, naive, spoiled, and innocent, because it says to others that you're such a good protector/provider that your women know nothing whatsoever of the cold cruel world. So then in turn, these girls are seen as a sort of status symbol to potential husbands because it means that A) she will reflect that image of alpha male onto you just by being with you and B) she has a father who gives a shit about her, and doesn't come from a broken home so it will be a good family to marry into.

Also it's pretty clear to me at this stage in the drama, that the big brother/little sister thing is a kink they both share, so she's playing it up to turn him on, and he's playing it up to turn her on.

I also thought for a long time about what FL's could have done a good job with this role... I came up with:

He Rui Xian, but idk if she could pass for 18-19 yo
Xu Zhen Zhen, if she were better at kiss scenes than what I've seen from her
Li Xing Yao

i used to watch k-dramas almost exclusively, and i switched a few years ago because of the drought of good content in k-drama land. I have stayed in c-dramaland ever since. Every now and then i check and see if anything good has come out on the k-side.

dynamite kiss is totally lit also, too bad eps only drop twice a week. But to me, that's the best thing to come out of k-romance in quite a long time. So stoked to see JKY with a super hot role, he deserves it imo.