6
Okay but lacks a lot....
Well, the drama is a little bit different but ends up following the same footsteps of its melodrama predecessors, mainly after the 1st half. The drama is definitely one of the tamer ones, the writer just doesn't let things get too far even when things have all the right to be fully escalated. This is why the envelop of forgiveness was aggressively pushed beyond its limits. This is also why the drama had a very very long 12 episodes epilogue just to stress on that one single point. This is also why you may see the influx of positive comments. This is also why feelings in general became disingenuous at the end.
Both main leads had a weak performance and even a weaker written character especially the female lead. The actress is just too stiff, the only scenes she showed some expressions was the ones with the baby while the remainder mostly poker face. Her poorly written character suffered greatly due to its saint-like personality. You know how these kind of personalities go in dramas. Anyway, the 1st half was promising but it didn't live up to my expectations.
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Good...
Pretty good drama, great diverse cast, full of stories and the writing is decent. The drama does a lot right and it will appeal to a lot of people. I think Joo Yeong will be a fan favorite. However, there are few annoyances that bugged me. As good as it may seemed but it got seriously exhausting after a while watching the male lead endlessly taking all the shit, sacrificing to no avail and being the victim. He might as well just be a saint.The drama also rely lazily on that one dimensional antagonist that I'm wondering why the writer didn't put any effort into him? They are clearly able to so judging how they made the other characters. It's also a little problematic how long the antagonist linger around with no real development to the story, I think it would be better if he was only given attention for a certain period.
Another thing bugged me is how both main couples/both brothers' relationship came to an abrupt pause around the last ~30 episodes for an unjustified logical reason just so that the drama could have 1 more conflict before the ending. Which brings me to my next note, the drama needed a little more tension than the massive influx of happy moments, the only factor that was creating tension was the lawyer which himself was lacking a lot as I explained above. Overall, still a good show 7.5/10
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Barely serviceable....
Personally, it was a little rough to get through because I really don't like "Zo In Sung" as an actor. Tedious, annoying and predictable love triangle. The moment the "accident" happened, I knew the drama was a goner and I was 100% right. Ngl a bit annoyed that it went on for 20 episodes just to get this conclusion, didn't like the finale pairing either. The female lead classifies amongst the unlikable female leads in Kdrama world. Anyway, Go Hyun Jung & Ji Jin Hee deserve to be in better projects.Was this review helpful to you?
Amazing...
I absolutely love this director, it's been 10 years since his last project, I really hope he comes back to direct a modern drama. Yang Dong Geun and this director are the perfect match. I'mma say the obvious, they don't make them like this anymore. This is the earliest performance I've seen from Gong Hyo Jin so far and it's amazing, vibrant and full of life. The OST was straight up a certified banger! It's had been 1 eternity since I rated a drama 8.5 and it's well deserved.Was this review helpful to you?
Bad...
This is the worst long-running drama I've seen from SBS usually they are serviceable, no wonder they canceled the time slot. It's really unfortunate that Choi Jung Yoon came back from 7 years hiatus for this awful project. This is one of the most brainsmooth stories in kdrama I've seen, absolutely mind numbing. This is the writer's first drama and it's showing big time. Amateur writing, cheap production, bad stylists and horrendous cast performance. There are kids shows better written than this, it's hard to believe a human wrote this. A production value from 20 years ago, awful lighting and sound design. These stylists need to be fired, look at the characters' faces, a thick mask of whatever make up they have is about to fall off. Finally the cast, which consists of 85% of unknowns who can't act and are always awkward. For the same reason, the few side stories we had were uninteresting and lacked and characterization. I think what contributed to the death of this drama the most is the lack of familiar faces, the size of the cast and the side stories.Misleading poster, the redhead was only there for the first 25 episodes then turned to brunette/dark.
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Kinda watchable...
Don't watch it for the romance, this is 90% politics/business/drama and 10% romance. Most of the couples don't get together until around the ending. Speaking of the ending, last 15 episodes was a one big event that got stretched for way too goddamn long. The ending itself was really lame, this weak-ass ending isn't fitting for a 64 eps drama. Many characters didn't get a follow up or update at the end, like Soo Hyuk's mother and her love interest.The drama also lacked consistency, its pace is all over the place especially the writing quality, as if there are more than one writer going against each other. Episodes 30 to 50 felt like a dry batch. The excessive time skips were another weak part of the drama and a prime example for how not to do a time-skip. Every time there was a skip the drama created a jarring big disconnect with its content and flow. The action/fighting scenes look too staged and artificial. The dramatic thunder clap sound effect radiates extreme cringe energy.
It's weird for Jung Hye's father to feel this entitled for a daughter he didn't raise for 30+ years. He was introduced around the end and his sole purpose was to create some tension with the baddies, another reason why this drama should have been only 50 eps. Speaking of female leads, imagine if the writers gave both female leads more than 1 singular brain cell! That would make the drama a bit more tolerable.
Cha Soo Hyuk (Lee Pil Mo) is the worst part about this drama, this pathetic leech of sub-human with severe inferiority complex and victim complex. He deserves a worse ending, how he ended up wasn't enough.
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Great love story.
What's love? This is a mature story about people falling out of love, searching for love and are afraid of love. Great character writing and smooth exchange of dialogue. The subtle comedy was done wonderfully. The drama had a unique sense of direction at times where it expands beyond the conventional realm of drama, it even steps into film territory briefly with film-like shot compositions and witty dialogue. This is the type of drama where whether the couple came back together or not is irrelevant, their love story is what made it worth it. The drama isn't perfect by any means, but it succeed in delivering a well made package. Although I wish if they merged Mi Yeon and Yoo Kyung into one character/story instead of giving each a section in the drama.Lee Ha Na, this is her first acting role in drama or film and she absolutely nailed her performance. She even outshone Son Ye Jin every now and then. I find her, as an actress, is better fit in casual roles like this one over action ones like in "Voice". It would be nice if Voice would just end with season 5 and Lee Ha Na would move to bigger and better projects.
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Passable, I guess?
The opening scene is a teaser from episode 17, I hate when a drama pull this kind of stuff. It's okay to tease a couple of episodes in advance but not a teaser from the ending. Speaking of the ending, the last two episodes were bad, they were leaning to heavily on old melodrama themes/cliches that doesn't work in the context of this drama. Most of the cast did a half-assed job, their performance came out as awkward and immature, especially from those who work in the campaign. The candidate's son Jang Sung Min was the worst character/actor in the dram, replace him with a stranger might be better.Regarding the story and its events, there was no real big escalations that you might expect in a political focused drama, it was mostly the known generic jabs in a political context. They forced "In Yeong" and "Min Ki" plot line but then proceeded to brush it off aside without much regard. Their screen time appearance was very limited after that. The drama was passable at best.
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I had some expectations...
If you're looking for a historical drama about the foundation Goguryeo then this drama is NOT it. This drama was mostly about the in palace melodrama and conflict. Furthermore, it's important to know that this drama included a handful of fantasy elements sprinkled around all over it, so don't expect it to be grounded to reality. Han Hye Jin who played the female lead as Soh Seo No was a poor cast choice. Soh Seo No needed a more rigid and stubborn looking actress to better fit the character.A weak incapable king, a greedy prince and an underdog illegitimate prince going aimlessly in circles. Wars, fights and action were surprisingly and disappointingly scarce for a never-ending 81 episodes historical drama about the founders of Goguryeo. Which is why we had little to no planning or strategy for these wars. That one big war at the end against another nation that we waited ages for, was condensed down to just 1 singular episode of utter disappointment. In fact, the entire last episode was extremely rushed and we were given a joke of a wrap up. They had all the time in the world and they couldn't make a decent send off. The last episode was absolutely stripped off genuine emotions. It robs you the wrong way after you had gone through 81 episodes. Speaking of which, they were trying too hard to reach the 81 mark with prolonged uncut full-scenes repeated flashbacks! You would lose your mind watching it serializing.
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Lazy writing
The insane amount of plot conveniences ruined the drama and killed even the slightest potential it might had which made the writing seems abysmal. Not only it was stupid with every step along the way but it also removed the tension with any serious scene. Moreover, we were over fed the same repeated information like babies. Even if we were to disregard all of that, the pacing was terrible with a big empty gap of nothingness in the middle parts. None of the side cast were interesting enough to make the middle parts worthwhile. Aside from the first episode, there wasn't much appeal left.Was this review helpful to you?
Pain is temporary
A poor fantasy that failed to establish a reasonable foundation from the very beginning, it even did a worse job with its brittle world building. The low budget visual effects weren't helping its case either. The cast may seems to be fine on the surface but the characters were as one dimensional as they could come. Its second biggest selling point after fantasy is the romance, of which was the least appealing aspect of the drama. By the end, I couldn't care the slightest about either of the leads and their fate. A cheap Chinese knock off fantasy with gods and dragons would have been better than this.Was this review helpful to you?
Driest music-themed drama ever...
Do I Like Brahms? No. While the scarce music bits sprinkled throughout the drama were great, yet, this is one of the worst music themed drama. The relationships, despite being the main focus here, proved to be detrimental, leading to a catastrophic downfall of the entire drama. The amount of brain worms these characters were ingesting was unprecedented. This is a 16 episodes drama that was purely driven by the characters self-sabotaging themselves constantly in the most pitiful and mind-boggling manner imaginable. Even trashy soap operas can be more fun. Going back to the music, I couldn't feel the cast's passion while performing, under-delivering on the music part again. You better off close your eyes and imagine. Even then, I believe there was a total of 5 very short performances for a drama themed around music!! Honestly, you're better off to go watch some classical music on YouTube. This is the writer's first full feature drama and I'm not looking forward to see more of her works at all.Was this review helpful to you?
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Interesting concept but fails to deliver
That was kinda boring. We are barely given information about the mystery, it's mostly a slice of life with loads of repeated scenes. The actually story is no bigger than a 2-3 hours movie. Almost nothing happens in the first 5 episodes, the story starts at episode 6 with tiny bits of small teasers every now and then. Most of the "previous life" story is condensed in episode 15 and half 16. At least it was nice visually.On another note, I prefer to see Yoo Ah In in movies rather than long format dramas. He was also the main and the only highlight of this drama.
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