spungle

I must not have the big brain energy for this... (at least according to the people who have given this a good review).

I finally watch the film with the most polarising opinions and I'm just left confused...? Like, I have no idea what I'm supposed to have taken away from this film. What's the purpose? What's the message? There wasn't enough context given, despite being 2 freaking hours. And I haven't really seen anyone discuss what they've taken away from this. All the positive comments and reviews just mostly talk about how it's "coming of age" (which I don't see how) and it's cinematography. And the cinematography wasn't that great at times. I don't understand why they couldn't have just let the camera focus on the scene a few more seconds before changing the angle. Then again, I'm still not sure why opinions on this are so divided. I've seen a lot worse.

It just feels like 3 selfish men decided to treat a middle school girl poorly..

And Mizuki's hair? Couldn't he have just been blonde?

Good point. This would have been cool if the villain was a bit of a nobody. Or at least someone who had risen up from out of nowhere. And now that I think about it, I don't really know what the motive is for the villain

I thought the exact same thing during this episode. I already didn't like the FL, but honestly, the drama would be been better without her. Her incompetence as a police pofficer, her lack of judgement, her connection to the case itself, her physical abuse towards the ML, and the weird ghost reputation she had at the start (that's no where to be found now) is just too much.

Is this what they think a strong female lead is? It's really getting on my nerves. If she had a strong sense of conviction, she would have been better. Also, rather than giving her some weird ghost ability where she can run fast or whatever (which she clearly doesn't use after ep 1 or 2), I would have liked if she was really perceptive and observant, and had gained her reputation that way. Her character seems like a combination of bad writing and bad acting

And I'll be really mad if she actually force a romance. How is her constant abuse supposed to make him like her. In ep 9 when he's sad, I kind of wished he had pushed her away when she tried to comfort him...

Han Joon and rest of the Cafe members are what is saving this drama for me. I'm not particularly interested in the crime itself. And I don't really like any of the police or prosecutors either

I think the problem is that he was type casted for a long time. Because of his visuals, he kind of got boxed into a corner where he played MLs that were overly attractive but with a shit personality. But if you look at his work from 2018 onwards, you'll see that changes. And I do think his more recent more is able to show his acting a lot better

I didn't even realise Ryusei was in this at first. They hardly show his face properly. But I do want a drama with them together in the future

I love that. For some reason, I thought it was a historic drama...

fun fact: it's is legal to marry your cousin in some countries. But in some, it's is only possible for 2nd cousins. (fyi, I have not watched this film)

A disappointing book-to-film adaptation

Unfortunately, I don't think I can recommend this film to anyone. For the people who have also read the book, you'll be disappointed in the execution. And for the people who haven't, you'll be confused with most of the scenes.

It's a film following Toru, a reserved university student who finds himself liking two girls - Naoko, who is dealing with mental health issues; and Midori, a fellow student who is a bit of an enigma. Whilst in the book Toru is very introspective and is able to analyse the relationship dynamics he has with the other characters, film Toru is mostly just a bit contemplative. Clearly, it is very character driven.

Despite that, it seems as if some characters have been toned down a lot. So we end up with a bunch of characters that more or less feel the same in terms of tone, mannerisms, personality, etc. This makes quite a few of the interactions slightly bland at times. Toru, Natsumi, and Midori were probably the most true to the original source material, and were best cast in my opinion.

The problem with this film is that it is very disjointed. From the perspective of someone who has read the book, it feels as of I'm in a literature class and have been given a handful of extracts of the book and I've been made to try and decipher what is happening. It lacks I'm both cohesion, and coherence.

The problem with the lack of structure means that a lot of scenes don't make sense. Since some scenes are cut out to not be too long, we're left with shortened scenes which don't add anything to the plot. For example, a scene between Toru and Midori's father is cut. Instead, we're introduced to him, only for him to stop being mentioned after 3 or so minutes. This leads to a lack of development for many characters, including Naoko's friend, Reika, making their presence seem pointless. The lack of explanation for many scenes invoking certain characters just leads to confusion. And for the scenes included from the book, the dialogue is a carbon copy from the book, not adding anything new, once again, leading to many gaps which are not explained.

And despite leaving a lot out from the book, it is a painfully long film. Since not much happens in the book, the film wasn't able to capture enough of the characters' situations and feelings well enough in order for the film to be the least bit engaging. And mentioned before, some of the characters felt the same.

Although the music fit, it easily could have put me to sleep, especially during the scenes where the characters are having a quiet and slow conversation.

Another thing to note is that it's a particularly quiet film to the point that I can hear the wind and trees more than the characters' voices. However, there are few moments where suddenly, characters are shouting, which caught me off guard since I had turned up the volume quite a bit in order to hear them.

If this was remade today, I do think that it would be a lot better. The only problem is that the author has very sexist views which bleed into his work (including this one), so it would be interesting to see how those aspects (i.e. the male gaze) are improved upon or changed without taking from the overall meaning or plot. Also, as a heads up, Toru has sex with nearly every woman within a 5 mile radius of him, or at least thinks about it. The only exception is Natsumi, who in my opinion, is someone Toru respects and sees almost as a sister in my opinion (at least in the book).

most of what I've seen him in falls in to the 2nd category. Even if he isn't, he's always playing eccentric characters that give off a weirdly nervous energy

Probably one of the best AI romances from Korea

yeah, I would've preferred Saito Takumi. He's a superior actor. Yamashita Tomohisa makes me uncomfortable. But I love the other actors enough to continue. Plus, I've waited for so long for S2

Just watched the first episode and noticed a few things. The police officer seems regular. I either just imagined a scene that focused on her randomly, or it happened in another episode

But in flashback scene, they showed 3 characters faces who look suspicious and I'm still not quite sure why they showed them (one of them is the taxi driver, and the other is of the woman living in the place the girls were kept hostage. But there was another man they showed who almost approached Gye Hoon. He could have been the character they introduced in ep 13 but I'm not sure.

Now that you mention it, didn't she appear in one of the very first scenes? Or am I making that up? I'm pretty sure I thought she was the sister at one point because of her appearance in ep 1. I need to watch it now to confirm though

Sometimes I don't even know if they're broken up or together. It would have made more sense if they had only one big break up after more was revealed. I do like them as a couple. But if you take into consideration their individual trauma, I'm not sure I want them to be endgame

Yeah, me too. I started watching when 6 episodes had already been released. But after 11/12, I would procrastinate watching the episodes. It's hard because I really do like the story and the characters. It's just the pacing that's disappointing. I don't watch too many kdramas these days, but when I do, they're mostly on-going and for me, I've seen a pacing issue in almost all of the 16 episode ones

I've said it before, but I find it quite disgusting that so many characters blamed Gye Hoon for what happened to his sister, even in the present time. Especially since so many of the adults know more than what they let on and probably could have helped find the suspect if they had spoken up. Some of them just chose not to say anything, but I do get that some were trying to protect their own family. But to put the blame on a child just because the adults and especially the police are incompetent is slightly getting on my nerves

I hope everyone who is even slightly involved gets punished. Also, regarding the main couple being endgame.... I don't know if I want it anymore. Poor Gye Hoon just needs a fresh start in my opinion. Away from all this neighbourhood filled with liars.

I wonder if this would be a more interesting drama if we had 4 main characters - including Won Tak and Jin Geun. It would take a slightly different turn but I think it would have kept it more interesting and not have dragged... just a thought. And there needs to be more interactions between Won Tak and Gye Hoon

I think it's relatively common with 16 episode shows to start dragging after ep 11. But I also think when we watch it influences that (i.e. whether we watched it as ir aired of after it finished)

That's a perfect description. At least with Kakafukaka I actually managed to finish it (it was somehow my first JDrama...). I still have brought myself to finish this drama. I writher in pain when I watch this... I get so uncomfortable. But I definitely agree with them being a fun hte watch

I didn't even realise he was an instructor. That really flew over my head. Maybe because they only showed one flashback scene of him doing it. I assume that he's just avoiding fighting back

Yeah, 18 is a lot. Maybe it's just because I watch so many JDramas that are mostly around 10 episodes, but I've noticed that after ep 11, KDramas tend to drag a bit. Not all the time, but I think it's obvious are trying to fit the 16 episode tradition. But 18 episodes? It's not that complicated of a plot, compared to longer dramas such as Mouse. Or even Vincenzo