scenophile

The first thing I noticed about this show is that it's filmed beautifully. The cinematography and lighting are really gorgeous, and the music really adds a nostalgic tone to everything.

I was really seated for this one at the start. This drama is very reminiscent of bittersweet Asian first love romance films, where we often see innocent couples grow up and become jaded from everything life throws at them. It's fine as a movie plot, but dragged out over 26 episodes...it really does get quite miserable, unfortunately, and I can only take so much before I think "yeah, these two should not be together" and we should all just move on.

I also think we spent so much time inching through every single repetitive conflict, but ended up time-jumping through the biggest changes, and that we should've paced it out a bit more so we got to see more growth in our characters before the end. The same goes for the second ship, who are intriguing in theory but ended up giving me whiplash. The third couple I just didn't care for at all, and I think their appearances in the present timeline actually took me out of my immersion.

Ultimately, I feel very mixed on this one. I didn't hate it; it's beautifully filmed and the characters are flawed and raw in a way that cdramas don't often depict. But I don't think I'll be recommending this to anybody, and I don't think I'll ever touch this drama with a ten-foot pole, because like I said...it was kind of miserable.