This review may contain spoilers
As a fan of the original Korean drama Suspicious Partner, I had high hopes for the Japanese remake Ayashii Partner. Unfortunately, it turned out to be a frustrating and joyless experience from start...
The biggest problem is the complete lack of emotion or engagement. It’s as if every spark, nuance, and emotional depth from the Korean version was deliberately filtered out. What was once a rich, layered romance and legal thriller became a hollow shell — a lifeless re-enactment rather than a meaningful adaptation.
In condensing a 20-hour drama into just 10 episodes of around 24 minutes each, the show lost all the character development, emotional buildup, and narrative tension that made the original so compelling. The fast pacing doesn’t feel efficient — it feels rushed, careless, and empty. Scenes jump from one plot point to another without giving the audience a chance to breathe or connect.
The acting, too, is painfully dull. Both the male and female leads deliver performances that feel more like a rehearsal than an actual production. There’s no chemistry, no conviction — it’s as if they were reluctantly dragged into the drama and paid in leftover lunch boxes. If they’re not interested in their characters, how can the audience be?
It’s baffling why this adaptation was made at all. Rather than bringing a fresh perspective or cultural reinterpretation, it feels more like a checkbox project — something done for the sake of having a Japanese version, not because there was any genuine creative vision behind it.
To sum up: Ayashii Partner is an emotionally vacant, rushed adaptation that fails to capture even a fraction of what made the original beloved. If boredom were a category at the Nobel Prize, this drama might just win.
The biggest problem is the complete lack of emotion or engagement. It’s as if every spark, nuance, and emotional depth from the Korean version was deliberately filtered out. What was once a rich, layered romance and legal thriller became a hollow shell — a lifeless re-enactment rather than a meaningful adaptation.
In condensing a 20-hour drama into just 10 episodes of around 24 minutes each, the show lost all the character development, emotional buildup, and narrative tension that made the original so compelling. The fast pacing doesn’t feel efficient — it feels rushed, careless, and empty. Scenes jump from one plot point to another without giving the audience a chance to breathe or connect.
The acting, too, is painfully dull. Both the male and female leads deliver performances that feel more like a rehearsal than an actual production. There’s no chemistry, no conviction — it’s as if they were reluctantly dragged into the drama and paid in leftover lunch boxes. If they’re not interested in their characters, how can the audience be?
It’s baffling why this adaptation was made at all. Rather than bringing a fresh perspective or cultural reinterpretation, it feels more like a checkbox project — something done for the sake of having a Japanese version, not because there was any genuine creative vision behind it.
To sum up: Ayashii Partner is an emotionally vacant, rushed adaptation that fails to capture even a fraction of what made the original beloved. If boredom were a category at the Nobel Prize, this drama might just win.
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