allie

I am not sure entirely what I expected when I went into this show, but I didn't expect to love it as much as I do. I think I felt worried about the topic of age regression and trauma as it can be very difficult to explore, but I think that Santa did such a great job in his role, and I think Solar and Sun's stories were handled with care. This show was an exploration of love, contention, trauma, mental health, life, self acceptance, and learning to adapt to those around you. There were so many beautiful lessons here and take aways that would stick with anyone.

I think if you are going into this expecting a 100% serious depiction of mental health issues, you would probably feel a little disappointed by this show because I think it can be easy to nitpick. While I do think they did a great job at handling the characters mental and emotional struggles, this show is overall meant to be more of an upbeat watch and it's definitely reflected in the characterization. I did feel like up until episode 8, Solar's trauma was a little bit downplayed? But I think the intention with that was them trying to show Pobmek's struggle with teaching and learning to accept and handle both Sun and himself vs the entire show being about Solar's recovery. I honestly loved that both sides of the couple were explored, and you could feel them learn more about each other and the people around them the entire time. I really enjoyed the decision to not focus on Solar entirely because I think it gave the plot a lot more dimension for something that could have easily fallen very flat, very quick. Watching Pobmek go from trying absolutely anything and everything to get rid of Sun to the last episode where he was making Sun's breakfast, completely forgetting that Sun was finally resting and wouldn't be coming back, was such a sweet full circle moment.

And getting to know Pobmek as a character was so important and really helped to understand why his development felt so fulfilling to see. Him being able to forgive his mom after what she put him through, and work through those issues to not only be a better version of himself, but also be better for Solar showed how strong he was! Seeing him slowly crack until he could put down his walls to let his friends support him broke my heart. I loved that this didn't feel romanticized at all, and you could see how difficult the entire situation was for Pobmek. Seeing someone you love suffer and wanting to do anything to help them is already tough, but also being able to admit that the situation is paining you is so difficult to admit without feeling guilty. I think I just loved how open everyone in this show was, and no one was ever made to feel bad about their emotions at any point. Even if Pobmek made a lot of mistakes, he was able to overcome them and you can see how hard he worked to change his ways. When Solar broke down because he was trying to hide his distress, I felt so pained for him. He knew he was putting his partner through a lot, so he didn't want to make it worse for him, and unfortunately it led to him breaking down. There were so many points of contention for both characters, but knowing that no matter what they would be there for each other, always made me feel relieved. Sometimes I cannot stand when characters break up or give up on each other over the smallest things, so knowing that that would never be a worry for Solar and Pobmek made watching this show that much better for me.

I really enjoyed how the kids were directly apart of the conflicts, and not just there because it was a show about teachers. Seeing the kids accept Sun and Solar, and how much effort they put into helping him was so heartwarming. You could really feel how eyeopening this situation was for everyone involved, and the openness of the children and their ability to see things from Sun's perspective that Pobmek could not understand, helped to give him courage and insight that I think he would've missed out on otherwise.

And when we finally got to see Solar figure out his past and what actually happened, I really felt for him. I can only imagine how much pain he was dealing with, both with his own and Sun's pain. I was worried when he went to meet his dad at first, but I felt so relieved to know that his dad didn't blame him for anything, and even though he can't be forgiven for running away, every single character in this show made choices that you could understand. I'm not sure if it was intentional, but I felt like the writers wanted to show as many perspectives as they could in so many different people, and there was never actually a true villain here because at the end of the day, everyone is human and makes decisions they regret. Whether it was Solar's parents, Pobmek's mom, Pang, the students, the students' parents, etc. Everyone had a reason to act how they did, but what they did after to change or handle it, was more important part in the end.

I honestly fell in love with this show, everything from the characters to the styling was just so good!!! I can understand anyone who watches this and doesn't love it, but I'm really so happy I decided to watch this show because I ended up with a new favorite. It's not perfect, but it was such a heartwarming story of growth and love, and I felt like I could really understand all the characters deeply.

I can't wait to see Santa and Perth's next project, they have such wonderful chemistry and I love seeing them together!