6
Another Heart Transplant Love Story
The usual daily drama format. It took exactly 3 episodes to glue everyone together inside a company setting. More or less, the drama had about three major problems. The drama hit a dead end and became in an irrecoverable state at episode 102 which is why a sudden switch was flipped to alter the drama's direction. Another possible reason for the shift, everyone was contractually obliged for about 100 episodes but the drama suddenly got an extension for 30+ episodes and some members of the cast had a busy calendar so they weren't available for the extension. The other problem was the constant escape technique the writer plagued this drama with. Do Hyung's father played a big role creating conflict and tension with the leads, however, his weak health was always present to cut any dialogue/scene short, delaying the conflict, and neglecting his purpose as a character. Being hot-tempered parent/in-law is a common archetype in daily shows but combining that with his health problems made things quite irritating. The third problem was the intense and harsh humiliation and degradation the FL and her family suffered from throughout the drama. At a certain point the drama attempted to fix the situation in preparation for the ending, while they might have been fine on the surface but the damage couldn't be washed away. At bare minimum, they needed to address it directly and make it worthwhile. Anyway, the drama remains pretty average.Was this review helpful to you?
Season 4 in second place
God's Quiz in general was more mystery/thriller/investigation than medical. The main lead, who's a medical examiner, was doing more field detective work and following suspects than the real detectives. I didn't like how they setup the main lead character, he's genius because of a drug experiment in his childhood and this led to all kinds of made up scenarios stemming from his condition across different seasons. Every season, they twisted it in a different way which took away from having a consistent character. It's the eternal problem of any unplanned sequel seasons in a series. Which imposes an impossible task for any multi-seasons writers.Production: Seasons 1 to 4 were molded under the same OCN early days template, which all shared the same level of underwhelming production value. Soundtracks during season 1 & 2 were super generic stock background noise, only with season 3 they started to include music. Although season 3 was filmed better but had a much worse audio production in general. Season 4 was a noticeable improvement in production but it still wasn't quite there yet. This is all in comparison to regular shows that were released around early 2010s. On the other hand, season 5 brought with it a proper production and other improvements.
Characters: The dynamic and chemistry of the entire group during season 1 was abysmal, overacting from everyone, forced unnatural interactions and none of them clicked. Season 2 somewhat got better in that regard, you can notice that they got more relaxed but still not quite there yet. The ending scene of season 2 while the ML is kissing, his lips were shivering like crazy. It must have been super awkward to the point that they couldn't afford to have another take. Season 3 took a step backward with its changed cast. Detective Bae Tae Shik brought an awful dynamic to the table. Him and main lead didn't click together and created a bad on screen combination. It's probably why the writer didn't write him in for later seasons. The same can be said about other characters associated with Bae Tae Shik. The relationship and attempted romance between ML and Kyung Hee during season 1 & 2 was plain awful to watch. Only in season 4 it got reasonably better and season 5 fixed this issue completely by dropping the childish romantic tension and having them behave like adults. I liked seeing Kim Jae Won as a flashy villain in season 5, it was fun watching a different type of role from him.
Story: The structure of every season consisted of having a few cases then dedicate the last 3 episodes to the final case which had a personal connection with the characters. These last cases in every season were quite problematic for a variety of reasons, only season 5 had a better implementation despite its weak climax. More highlight across the seasons, the last episode of season 3 was the worst out of the entire series. The cloning plot in season 4 was super trashy and tacky, despite having an obvious playing room to take it into very interesting directions. The ending of season 4 featured another super weird and awkward kiss. The entire thing about AI in season 5 was really janky and a big stretch for the viewers to accept. In general, the cases were a mixed bag in every season, some were decent and interesting while others were boring, flawed or being stretched thin. However, season 3 featured mostly bad cases in addition to the handful of other problems which made season 3 to be the worst one in general.
The series as a whole was alright with a lot of ups and downs. It had a good concept with a varied degrees of execution. Although season 5 is the best one but it wouldn't have been that good as a stand alone drama without the accumulation of these characters journey. The ending of season 5 with both leads walking outside was very nicely done. On an unrelated note, it was impossible to not notice the ML's height.
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Season 2 in third place
God's Quiz in general was more mystery/thriller/investigation than medical. The main lead, who's a medical examiner, was doing more field detective work and following suspects than the real detectives. I didn't like how they setup the main lead character, he's genius because of a drug experiment in his childhood and this led to all kinds of made up scenarios stemming from his condition across different seasons. Every season, they twisted it in a different way which took away from having a consistent character. It's the eternal problem of any unplanned sequel seasons in a series. Which imposes an impossible task for any multi-seasons writers.Production: Seasons 1 to 4 were molded under the same OCN early days template, which all shared the same level of underwhelming production value. Soundtracks during season 1 & 2 were super generic stock background noise, only with season 3 they started to include music. Although season 3 was filmed better but had a much worse audio production in general. Season 4 was a noticeable improvement in production but it still wasn't quite there yet. This is all in comparison to regular shows that were released around early 2010s. On the other hand, season 5 brought with it a proper production and other improvements.
Characters: The dynamic and chemistry of the entire group during season 1 was abysmal, overacting from everyone, forced unnatural interactions and none of them clicked. Season 2 somewhat got better in that regard, you can notice that they got more relaxed but still not quite there yet. The ending scene of season 2 while the ML is kissing, his lips were shivering like crazy. It must have been super awkward to the point that they couldn't afford to have another take. Season 3 took a step backward with its changed cast. Detective Bae Tae Shik brought an awful dynamic to the table. Him and main lead didn't click together and created a bad on screen combination. It's probably why the writer didn't write him in for later seasons. The same can be said about other characters associated with Bae Tae Shik. The relationship and attempted romance between ML and Kyung Hee during season 1 & 2 was plain awful to watch. Only in season 4 it got reasonably better and season 5 fixed this issue completely by dropping the childish romantic tension and having them behave like adults. I liked seeing Kim Jae Won as a flashy villain in season 5, it was fun watching a different type of role from him.
Story: The structure of every season consisted of having a few cases then dedicate the last 3 episodes to the final case which had a personal connection with the characters. These last cases in every season were quite problematic for a variety of reasons, only season 5 had a better implementation despite its weak climax. More highlight across the seasons, the last episode of season 3 was the worst out of the entire series. The cloning plot in season 4 was super trashy and tacky, despite having an obvious playing room to take it into very interesting directions. The ending of season 4 featured another super weird and awkward kiss. The entire thing about AI in season 5 was really janky and a big stretch for the viewers to accept. In general, the cases were a mixed bag in every season, some were decent and interesting while others were boring, flawed or being stretched thin. However, season 3 featured mostly bad cases in addition to the handful of other problems which made season 3 to be the worst one in general.
The series as a whole was alright with a lot of ups and downs. It had a good concept with a varied degrees of execution. Although season 5 is the best one but it wouldn't have been that good as a stand alone drama without the accumulation of these characters journey. The ending of season 5 with both leads walking outside was very nicely done. On an unrelated note, it was impossible to not notice the ML's height.
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Season 1 & 3 in last place
God's Quiz in general was more mystery/thriller/investigation than medical. The main lead, who's a medical examiner, was doing more field detective work and following suspects than the real detectives. I didn't like how they setup the main lead character, he's genius because of a drug experiment in his childhood and this led to all kinds of made up scenarios stemming from his condition across different seasons. Every season, they twisted it in a different way which took away from having a consistent character. It's the eternal problem of any unplanned sequel seasons in a series. Which imposes an impossible task for any multi-seasons writers.Production: Seasons 1 to 4 were molded under the same OCN early days template, which all shared the same level of underwhelming production value. Soundtracks during season 1 & 2 were super generic stock background noise, only with season 3 they started to include music. Although season 3 was filmed better but had a much worse audio production in general. Season 4 was a noticeable improvement in production but it still wasn't quite there yet. This is all in comparison to regular shows that were released around early 2010s. On the other hand, season 5 brought with it a proper production and other improvements.
Characters: The dynamic and chemistry of the entire group during season 1 was abysmal, overacting from everyone, forced unnatural interactions and none of them clicked. Season 2 somewhat got better in that regard, you can notice that they got more relaxed but still not quite there yet. The ending scene of season 2 while the ML is kissing, his lips were shivering like crazy. It must have been super awkward to the point that they couldn't afford to have another take. Season 3 took a step backward with its changed cast. Detective Bae Tae Shik brought an awful dynamic to the table. Him and main lead didn't click together and created a bad on screen combination. It's probably why the writer didn't write him in for later seasons. The same can be said about other characters associated with Bae Tae Shik. The relationship and attempted romance between ML and Kyung Hee during season 1 & 2 was plain awful to watch. Only in season 4 it got reasonably better and season 5 fixed this issue completely by dropping the childish romantic tension and having them behave like adults. I liked seeing Kim Jae Won as a flashy villain in season 5, it was fun watching a different type of role from him.
Story: The structure of every season consisted of having a few cases then dedicate the last 3 episodes to the final case which had a personal connection with the characters. These last cases in every season were quite problematic for a variety of reasons, only season 5 had a better implementation despite its weak climax. More highlight across the seasons, the last episode of season 3 was the worst out of the entire series. The cloning plot in season 4 was super trashy and tacky, despite having an obvious playing room to take it into very interesting directions. The ending of season 4 featured another super weird and awkward kiss. The entire thing about AI in season 5 was really janky and a big stretch for the viewers to accept. In general, the cases were a mixed bag in every season, some were decent and interesting while others were boring, flawed or being stretched thin. However, season 3 featured mostly bad cases in addition to the handful of other problems which made season 3 to be the worst one in general.
The series as a whole was alright with a lot of ups and downs. It had a good concept with a varied degrees of execution. Although season 5 is the best one but it wouldn't have been that good as a stand alone drama without the accumulation of these characters journey. The ending of season 5 with both leads walking outside was very nicely done. On an unrelated note, it was impossible to not notice the ML's height.
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Scam High
Season 1: The drama started off mostly alright for the first 3 episodes or so, but once they confined everything into the school settings, problems started to seep from every corner. Imagine all of the school related tired tropes and cliches amplified by cringe to create the cheesiest abomination. Jason as a character, actor, story and writing was easily the worst aspect of this drama. Which created one of the worst memorable dynamics with his love interest. From the outset, the plot followed a predictable trajectory but things got a lot worse around the last 1/3 of its run. During which the story became static, the characters fell apart and the drama started to shove empty scenes of side characters. They reduced Sam Dong screen time significantly as well. They also isolated Pil Sook and Jason despite being main characters and had little to no interactions with others later on. All of this led to a below average last episode and a lukewarm ending. Despite its flaws and problems, somehow it worked, to a certain degree.In comparison, season 2 was an obvious downgrade in all regards, it's just plain worse. The empty scenes I mentioned earlier turned into amateurish random musical performances here. I noticed they were mostly using Korean songs in this season, compared to season 1 which had more western/global songs. In season 2, no one had any chemistry with anyone, all pairings were as incompatible and dry as they could get. It also had the same ending as season 1. I think the cast also had more idols than actors? Anyway, changing the directors and writers made its sequel DOA.
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Scam High
The drama started off mostly alright for the first 3 episodes or so, but once they confined everything into the school settings, problems started to seep from every corner. Imagine all of the school related tired tropes and cliches amplified by cringe to create the cheesiest abomination. Jason as a character, actor, story and writing was easily the worst aspect of this drama. Which created one of the worst memorable dynamics with his love interest. From the outset, the plot followed a predictable trajectory but things got a lot worse around the last 1/3 of its run. During which the story became static, the characters fell apart and the drama started to shove empty scenes of side characters. They reduced Sam Dong screen time significantly as well. They also isolated Pil Sook and Jason despite being main characters and had little to no interactions with others later on. All of this led to a below average last episode and a lukewarm ending. Despite its flaws and problems, somehow it worked, to a certain degree.In comparison, season 2 was an obvious downgrade in all regards, it's just plain worse. The empty scenes I mentioned earlier turned into amateurish random musical performances here. I noticed they were mostly using Korean songs in this season, compared to season 1 which had more western/global songs. In season 2, no one had any chemistry with anyone, all pairings were as incompatible and dry as they could get. It also had the same ending as season 1. I think the cast also had more idols than actors? Anyway, changing the directors and writers made its sequel DOA.
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Babyless Woman
While the drama had its moments of charm and humor, it struggled to deliver a truly expansive storyline that kept you engaged. The drama relied on the key characters interactions to drive its story, however, the long wait between these scenes was off putting despite barely having any additional side plotlines. Speaking of which, there were a few small side plotlines but none of them were remotely good or had any considerable weight. The third guy (Choi Kang Eu Tteum) always felt out of place and the attempt to give him something later on for his character was pathetic. The theme is good and some ideas were entertaining but the characters needed a deeper exploration. The OST was below average and the track "Only You" in particular was plain awful. The drama was alright but it felt incomplete in many aspects.Was this review helpful to you?
Soul Searching
You need to keep in mind that this is a sitcom before going into it. Don't expect its story and themes to be grounded into reality. For a sitcom, it doesn't stand out when compared to other sitcoms from 2000s. It took a while before the humor started to click, the first few episodes were a bit try hard. Even after it got better later on, some scenes and jokes were a hit or miss. While the characters were okay but it needed a better variation in the characters. The brief main story was delayed for too long, they shoved most of it into the last 3 episodes. It would have been much better to lay it out throughout the drama and build the jokes around it. Anyway, the OST was quite good and it had no right to be this good for a drama like this.Was this review helpful to you?
A New Dawn
Due to the striking and unmatched popularity and brilliance of the original series, this spinoff was birthed, challenging its creators on a hasty race to attempt to top and dethrone its predecessor. An impossible challenge in hindsight, but through sheer perseverance, talent and hard-work, they managed to create this unrivaled anomaly, breaking all kinds of traditional convictions in its way and setting the bar on an unprecedented level, a new standard to be inspired by. This drama is a worthy celebration of true human ingenuity and artistry. It makes me wonder what humans will achieve next?Was this review helpful to you?
Single and Too Sick to Mingle
The story was unbelievably dry and dull. It was a bad setup from the get go. His son was diagnosed with a tumor in the brain and got a surgery, then a few episodes later the father got diagnosed with a tumor in the brain too. I don't understand what kind of writing is this. What were they trying to achieve with that. It didn't fit the narrative doing it this way. Probably because they had nothing prepared for the climax. The characters just didn't work together but the drama kept forcing them to interact. Which resulted in its own set of problems. The drama was a big mess with different problems, sure it had its moments with the ML's son but that wasn't remotely enough.Was this review helpful to you?
The Usual
I still haven't found a real answer to why most daily dramas convert their setting into a cyclical run inside a corporation despite their initial premise. Possible theory, it's easier to write while rehashing from its predecessors and to re-use the same materials and assets while building a set. Out of all the possible ridiculous tropes to ensue insanity, the psychiatric hospital trope is the only one I will never tolerate. It's the cheapest and lowliest insult to the medium and to any viewer. Therefore, this drama gets the stamp of shame for incorporating that once and attempting to do it another time later. The final resolution for these characters ended up being disappointing, they forced it to remain relatively soft and tame. Which took away from all of the angst and revenge. Park Ha Na picked up this project after her previous one Apgujeong Midnight Sun (2014) which was pretty good even for her first main role, in comparison, this drama was a significant downgrade.Was this review helpful to you?
The Real Sassy Girl
The silliness and the chaotic descension of old rom-coms remains unmatched. The improbable setup of their story was stretched too thin but it worked with their abrasive behavior. I found the highschool arc to be tolerable despite having the infamous "theater" episode trope just like most school themed media. The leads were a bit old to be passed as highschoolers but at least they switched the setting shortly after. The main conflict lasted for too long and the drama tried to take more serious tone during it which wasn't fitting for the story or the characters. This also forced the ending to be really short and quick. The main soundtrack with vocals was quite good. On the other hand, there's a certain type of soundtrack that always accompany Uhm Tae Woong across different dramas and I can't figure out how or why?Was this review helpful to you?
Saint Chapo
The plot unfolded with a good mix of suspense and intrigue, throwing in enough attractive elements to grip you in, however, it's not exactly breaking new ground thematically, it did a decent job for laying down a serviceable short story despite its rough start. I appreciate having the entire plot based outside of Korea, it was nice breaking out of some tired cliches in the Korean drug world. Although the drama didn't mess up the ending but they went for the generic and safe route. The drama had a decent selection of cast but Hwang Jung Min stole the spotlight as usual. Always makes me wish to see him taking more drama roles.Was this review helpful to you?
Love of Eve
The drama was visually appealing with sleek fashion yet shallow, drawing viewers in with its polished aesthetics and grand production, but failing to deliver on beyond its initial entertaining value. Speaking of production, whoever handled the post production processing and edit did a poor job with Seo Yea Ji scenes. They over softened her skin too much to an artificial level of smoothness. Despite knowing what's coming, the plot was initially as enjoyable as having a fast food meal after a late night. The entire plot was structured around heavily dramatized drawn out scenarios. This is the type of plot that other shows usually make a parody of it when mocking makjangs. The constant bombardment of flashy visuals and exaggerated emotions overshadowed everything. I admit I enjoyed that aspect of it but only for the first 5-6 episodes before it lost its appeal. Waiting for the revenge to finalize is what kept me going, however, I can't say I'm satisfied with the resolution of the revenge. I was hoping for something different and maybe a bit harsher. Moreover, If I'm not mistaken, we didn't know what happened to any of the children at the end. On another note, the drama came out around the same time as Seo Yea Ji was going through a controversy. I'm not well versed on the subject, but I couldn't help myself to draw some parallels with her character in the drama.Was this review helpful to you?
Green Mothers
At first sight, you might think this drama was about the mothers and children in this community, but the mystery tag was there for a reason. This drama was kind of a mess; it tried to pack in a lot of themes and tropes you often find in female centered plots but failed to do any of them right and brushed off each one shortly after. The plot was equally disorganized and messy; it started with the ghosts from the past, the community of mothers and the tension with Jin Ha, then shifted to the female lead's prodigy kid, then turned into a murder mystery "whodunit," then moved on to some side stories, and then returned to the murder mystery with crimes and drugs. What even was that? I'm not sure what is the correlation between female centered plots and displaying all men in a negative light; this drama was no exception. If their intent was to give a highlight with social commentary, then it's obviously not a good way to do it.Was this review helpful to you?
