Kate

How to ruin a good movie in 20 minutes.
How NOT to do superhero movies.
How to kill the joy of being alive for the viewers.

...
I was thinking for a few minutes about how to title this review. It was not easy, because technically I enjoyed more minutes in this movie than not. Sadly, the bad ones were... bad. I feel like the writers didn't know if they should keep the plot local and in a small area, or go wild. They tried both and it didn't work out.

I love me some good redemption stories. The fallen human being is trying to better himself, but here it felt a bit flat with an extremely (and I mean EXTREMELY) anticlimactic ending. I'm sorry dear writers, but you can't go "realism" on some parts, but disregard it on others and call it a day (and no, I'm not talking about his superpowers here).

There were many elements in the plot and some characters that were pretty useless and/or under explored. For example:
What was the point of Director Hong? She brought nothing to the movie. They could have simply kept it vague, who the big bad guy/girl is and don't waste time on scenes with her. Use that precious time to explore the father/daughter relationship more.

Why would you allow the media to be involved if the only purpose of it was to inform the main character about what is going on? Not following it by showing the public's reaction made it unrealistic. You want to tell me that a video of a man fighting police with his superpowers would not go viral? That other countries would not get involved? And it could be so easily fixed; make the bad guys "kill the press" by restricting anyone's access to the area where the confrontation took place.

With superhero movies you can either go big or give depth. If you go big - go silly about it, unrealistic, don't take yourself too seriously. Don't give a realistic ending - give a good ending. If you want to give the movie depth - keep it local with a smaller cast. Focus on the relationships between characters, not big fights and special effects. Tone down comedy a bit, make it more organic and natural. This movie tried to combine both of the approaches and it simply backfired.

At the end of the day, the comedy bits were the best. The ending was poorly written and made me annoyed. While I enjoyed watching for the most part, that last 20 minutes made me feel like all I have seen so far has no meaning and it was a waste of time.

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I was quite amazed how well all 3 main relationships worked and how I was almost never angry or annoyed by some ridiculous, easily explained drama.

Phana will come down in history as the best boyfriend. Find me another guy in BLs who asks for permission before he kisses, says they will wait until their partner is ready and then lets them decide when they will take the relationship further (if you know what I mean ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°), wants to talk and communicate with their partner about any situation that may cause misunderstandings, easily forgives mistakes, but first explain how they did hurt him, is not obsessed and possessive by not letting his partner hang out with other boys, understands that friends are as important to their partner as he is. The amount of times I screamed: YES MA MAN YOU DO IT RIGHT!

Not to mention Ben's acting, damn he good. He truly did look like he was deeply in love with his boi. I've got butterflies in my stomach just watching him look at Wayo.

Then we have the imperfect character of Wayo which makes the drama that much better. With how insecure he is, he creates the necessary tension and conflict that make the watching experience more entertaining. I wasn't sold on Earth acting tho. It wasn’t always natural and at times, his facial expressions felt exaggerated and over the top.

Ming and Kit... Another interesting dynamic - shy boy and a playboy. We saw it many times, but here it was a perfection. Ming was not portrayed as an asshole who cheats on his partners and parties all the time. He stays honest to his feelings and tries his best to not hurt others in the process of figuring stuff out. Kit needed someone persistent enough not to give up on him, because it took him some time to open up. I loved how they both learned how to accept each other.

Forth and Beam, my babies. They are the most different from all the previous couples. Their relationship literally sparks in one evening and then they have to figure out how to deal with what happened. Yet again, the key was communication. They were both honest about how they felt, even though they were not on the same page at first. But it helped them navigate and decide what kind of approach would be the best (or rather, it helped Forth decide how to go after Beam).

Can we talk about Park tho, because damn boi got me shook. He was literally just lurking in the shadows, showing up every few episodes causing just slight mayhem up until it all went to hell in the last episode. He was so hard to figure out and gave such an amazing creepy vibe.

Honorable mentions to: Cake for being the best girl ever. She was so amazingly relatable with her funny remarks (how she tried to hint to Ming's ex that he liked boys now, or how she reacted to guys being cute together and trying to cover it up in a natural way). Pretty gang too, such supportive friends! Willing to protect their boi Wayo from all the creeps around.

While some may say this drama was quite cringe, I'd say: that's what I love about it. Some lines were so ridiculous I started to anticipate more of them. It was simply fun and entertaining to watch. In my eyes, all BLs are more or less cringy and that's their charm.

Overall, I finished the whole show in one day/night. Was impressed how reasonable the majority of the characters were. The jokes were over the top, but somehow fitted perfectly into the type of storytelling presented.

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When I was younger, I found supernatural stories extremely scary. Now, as I grew older, home intrusion is far more terrifying for me; it's realistic.

The movie drops us into the plot from both the introduction scene and the first scene with our female lead. We have no time to adjust to the creepiness of it. The anxious feeling increases with every scene shot in that small apartment, making the viewer feel paranoid and claustrophobic.

Kyung Min is not exactly the smartest character ever. She makes many mistakes and jumps to conclusions too fast, but wouldn't that make her more relatable and realistic? That said, the lack of either fight or flight response in some scenes was quite frustrating to watch.

My biggest complain character wise: how lazy and dumb the detective was. The conclusions he came up with made no sense taking into consideration circumstances.

Plot wise, there were few moments that surprised me, small twists I did not see coming. I kept questioning and guessing who the mysterious man is, and always failed with my predictions, every character fitted the creep quite well.

Overall, it was quite an enjoyable movie. The pacing was good, though some work related scenes were not necessary since they did not bring anything new either character or plot wise. Adding some more sequences of the man "intruding" would be better, since these were the most atmospheric and well shot.

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By the end of the drama I hated the characters I loved at first, and loved the ones I hated with passion. And I definitely loved the drama enough to be excited for the second season.

The strongest points of this show are definitely the characters, filming sequences and the lack of CGI and the payoff we get in the last episode. I was amazed with how smart this drama was filmed. Instead of using mediocre special effects, they focused on conveying the special powers and how they work/manifest with creative angles, camera movements and lighting. They worked their magic and it truly enriched the viewing experience . This drama shows that sometimes “less is more” as long as you are smart and creative in your work.

I also appreciated the sci-fi vibe this drama had, from the design of specific scenes, grounding the special powers in the scientific biological changes and even the background music. It all made a coherent picture surrounded by a fitting atmosphere.

The pacing and the structure of the episode made it easy to get to know, relate and understand the characters themselves, but also slowly realize the bigger picture gradually presented. A good portion of the episodes was dedicated to exploring the stories of each specific member of The Gifted program, which made me think of a procedural crime show: one case (character) per episode with an overlying bigger plotline being entwined between them. This format definitely worked for the plot, sub-plots and characters' background, making it easy for me to immerse myself in the story.

The last episode was amazing. It had more plot twists than all the dramas I have ever watched combined. It made me cry from frustration and I did feel exhausted by the end of it, but it was all worth it.

Overall, it was an awesomely done drama with interesting characters and logical storyline. I did not have high expectations when I started watching it, but even if I did, I feel like this would exceed them anyway.

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Found footage horror genre is not an easy one to execute well. There are many mistakes that can be made, and this movie avoided almost all of them.

The premise of the plot is quite simple: a group of young adults goes to a haunted location to film some spooky stuff and things go wrong. To sell such a story and make it believable you need few elements.

REASON
Why these people and that specific location? Here we have Ha Joon being the "captain" of the ghost hunting team bringing a group of selected people into one of the top 7 scariest places. It's not hard to believe that a group of haunted houses and ghost enthusiasts would sign up to go to such a location, especially since money was also involved. This setting makes it easier for us to believe this story could happen. There are plenty of youtubers doing just that.

CAST
The chemistry between the characters was amazing. While some people might say that the beginning part was boring and a bit too long, I'd like to say it was necessary. We got to know what are the dynamics between different characters, their motivation and style of acting and communicating. All the characters were relatable and easy to like which made the stakes much higher. I wanted them to survive.

That said, making a horror movie believable in the style of Blair Witch Project and using actors' names for the characters works only if the actors are not well known. Here it did not make much sense. I see no reasons why the fictional characters did not get original names since it's not like the writing, nor a production team really wanted to play on that "believability" aspect like it happened with BWP.

ENDING
Why no one searched for the kids? Why no one was concerned with what was going on? Why did none of the viewers call the police as they were watching? All of those questions have been answered in a simple yet quite clever way in one of the last scenes in the tent. Since they used a "live broadcast" as a way to showcase the found footage trope, I was afraid it would be hard to give it a reasonable ending, yet the writer and director made it work.

Overall, it was a nice horror movie. There were quite a few moments that made me scared. It wasn't heavy on cheap jump-scares, but instead they created a nice atmosphere and did a good job of playing with the different lights and shadows to make a viewer question if they saw something or not. While some scenes at the ending were unnecessary for me, and cheapened the movie a bit, I still believe it was a watch worth my time.

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It's 2007 giving 1997 vibes.

If this script was created in 2025 I'd guess it was ChatGPT generated - it's the most copy paste typical Japanese ghost horror you can imagine, with typical AI generated mistakes.

Ghost in the background, ghost in the photo, ghost in the corner of the screen. Killing black hair, creepy kid, unresolved grudge and mediocre investigation from the female lead. That's the whole movie. You had your mandatory plot twists at the end, one that was obvious from the start. You have that "open ending" vibe that is supposed to make the movie more "eerie" since no closure always gives the feeling of discomfort, but somehow it just made me roll my eyes.

The acting was fine? With a plot like that I don't think the actors even had a space to flex their skills.

Overall, just rewatch Ring or Ju-on.

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Having a social life and friends can save your life.

And with that I am convinced leads from this movie had none. I cannot believe they’ve been gone for days without anyone having any contact with them. Not one person who was concerned? All it would take was one person, it’s not like they were on some secret mission. People knew where they were seen the last time. They would be found on day 3 if just one person cared.

Putting the mindless set up aside, it was both decent and bad at the same time. I actually really like the idea of a person being trapped in a place with no contact and no way out. If just the execution was better. It would make the movie more tense and less frustrating.

The performances were fine. The production was fine. The pacing was fine. Nothing really stood out, be it positively nor negatively. The beast was not beasting a lot, mostly chilling in the corner. I don’t think the “no animal was hurt during filming” note at the beginning was necessary, since it was clearly visible when the dog was fake and when it was real.

Overall, I’m not mad about how bad it was, I was more bored. When I think about the plot of this movie, it is scary. But when I actually watched it, I felt nothing, but mild frustration.

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Minimalistic atmosphere building the tension.

Nothing happens, but somehow the tension is high. Everything is vague, but you kind of understand what is going on. Rather than scary, it’s more eerie - driven by the atmosphere, not the plot. There is a lot of talking, still camera shots, pauses in dialogues. And with all that you will either enjoy it, or find it painfully boring.

I want to start with the fact the synopsis is a bit misleading. It makes it seem like the plot truly starts when they head to the woods, but that’s not the case - this ain’t Blair Witch Project. The majority of this movie seems like the exposition of the past, the lore for the mountain, the incident involving the child.

I would not fight anyone who would say they fell asleep watching this movie - I totally get it. Nothing happens for a good 80% of the runtime. They do not try to fill the gaps with fancy editing. Many dialogue heavy scenes are still cameras, the whole conversations shown from one angle with no cuts. And I think this is why it worked for me. At times it felt like you were there with the characters in the room. It gave the whole story quite a found footage vibe even though this is not exactly a found footage horror movie.

The performances were good. I don’t think the movie had enough depth to require groundbreaking acting, but for what was supposed to be presented, I have no complaints.

Overall, this will be either hit or miss. You will either buy the atmosphere they tried to create or not. Personally, I like these vague, nothing really is happening, but also everything feels wrong and creepy horror movies. For others it might be a snoozefest.

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Why did it feel so cheap?

From writing, directing, filming to acting and editing - everything felt cheap and mediocre. Which is somehow surprising, since the cast is actually rather good, filled with well known supporting actors.

The plot was extremely basic and predictable. I'm confident halfway through the majority of the viewers will understand the mystery behind the house. The structure of the plot was also extremely messy. The opening scene logically makes sense, but the way it was "blended" to the story just felt off.

Not one character was well developed and that includes So Hui. Detective Nam should not even exist, since he did not bring anything to the table. In Gyeom's introduction was good, but the way his connection was explained was not. Hye Ran was there to fill the screen.

Overall, I was rather bored. I did chuckle a few times, but for completely wrong reasons.

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For a movie that was supposed to give these characters more depth and present their perspective of the events that were part of what happened in The Untamed, I'd say they leaned too far into simplicity in writing. Little to nothing happens, and the whole movie consists for what feels like less than 10 scenes.

The CGI, still a bit awkward at some places, was still a huge improvement from the drama. What's more, I actually did like the last fighting scene. I would remove the "transformer spirits" from the equation though. There was not that much acting to be done, even though the movie was over an hour long, it felt more like 30 minutes - with that I don't think any performance had a chance to shine.

The best aspects of the Fatal Journey was the last shot of Nie Huai Sang that could be described as "ah yes, this is his origin story". Knowing what's coming next, that shot was truly impactful.

Overall, it's clearly movie that targets TU fans only. It's rather meaningless for anyone who does not have prior knowledge of the overall story.

Ps. Adding black eyes for 2 scenes is not enough to call movie a horror.

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Trying to balance horror and drama is not always a good choice.

In this case, the drama was far more engaging than the scares. The story about a female lead learning from the beginning how to view the world would probably work better as a slice of life - at least with the scenes presented in this movie. Loved to see how she still needs to assist herself with other senses, because she doesn't know how to fully depend on her eyesight.

Even the drama related to the cause of the nightmare reality she needs to face was great. Diving deeper and in more detail in these stories would be amazing.

And the horror? Mediocre at best. They did not deliver the scares, nor the true suspense.

Acting itself was good. My favorite performance must be Yut Lai So as Ying Ying. Adorable actress and heartbreaking tale.

For the production, you can feel it's 2002 movie based on the special effects. What’s more? They thought they were clever with the braille credits, but nope, it was dumb

Overall, neither the story nor the horror was that well written and presented. While I was not bored, I was not that interested either.

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My brain is dead, but at least I had fun?

I get people loving it because it was entertaining, but damn this was extremely poorly written. Too many plot points were simply ridiculous and beyond unrealistic and too many things were just vaguely explained. Some scene progressions were questionable at best, distasteful at worst. One of the best examples - the way they switched from showing physical abuse to a silly rap battle made me so uncomfortable. Or when the witness starts with “she almost made me blind”, but they end the statement on “she asked me to buy her sanitary pads” as if that was the worst thing he had to deal with - is this a joke? Social satire? What is going on?

I think the biggest flaw of the drama was Cha Woo In. She was stagnant throughout the whole show, and her character development happens before the story starts. She is presented as a basically flawless person - smart, strong, righteous, caring, determined. Anything she had to learn she already did, anything she had to improve she already did.

On the other hand, we’ve got some great development for the other characters, including many supporting ones. Stories that focused on admitting to your wrong doings, facing the consequences and learning from them. Lessons that show kindness can change a person, even if we think they can never improve. Surprisingly a lot of depth considering the over the top scenario.

The highlight of the drama? Everything Noh Tae Nam related. I would love to see a drama focused on him as the main character. This could be some great character study.

Production value was the standard high quality we get from tvN - nothing stood out either on the positive or negative side. The soundtrack was great, especially the opening song - Ha Hyun Woo has simply magical vocals.

Overall, it was fun, but painful for my brain.

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How can a slice of life feel so empty?

Things happened but everything was meaningless, because nothing was established. There were so many things that did not work out.

They tried to tell us the main characters are struggling. With what? What was the focus of the story? Honestly, I don't know. Was it striving to achieve your dream no matter what? Was it changing your dream after finding out who you truly are? Was there something going on between the leads or not? Did any of the characters have any depth, personality, personal story? Everyone was so one dimensional, defined by one personality trait or personal story, it was hard to care for any of them…

It’s hard for me to comment about the acting, since the characters were rather shallow. There were few highlights from Shin Seung Ho and Irene did fine - the character had just nothing to offer, so she had nothing to show.

What’s good? The movie is rather pretty.

Overall, it’s not like there was something wrong with this movie… but there was not anything right about it either.

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The purest form of crime drama.

Burning Ice is not exactly a show that will get you hooked on from episode 1, but by the end, you will be invested and dying to know how it will all conclude.

While from the synopsis it might seem like a typical action thriller with an innocent good guy trying to prove he is not the culprit the police are looking for, it could not be further from the truth. Close to none of the characters are just good/moral or bad/evil. Most of them exist somewhere in the middle of that spectrum, and depending on the circumstances and potential consequences of their actions, they might sway further into either of the extremes.

It’s more of a character driven drama, than an action driven crime thriller. The investigation and the crimes are the frame in which the characters operate, but the core of the show are their interactions and desperate attempts to either uncover or hide the truth.

While I enjoyed most of the cast performances, I feel like some were a little bit diluted and not expressive enough. Zhu Hui Ru was a character that seemed the least consistent in writing, which made me care about her the least (that said, Deng Jia Jia’s performance closer to the end of the show was truly stellar and the character was the most enjoyable at the end of the journey).

Yan Liang, Wen Luo, Li Feng Tian - all with personal motivations and grudges that pushed them to take action. It was fascinating to watch how different people might act and how far they are willing to go when faced with tragedy and injustice.

The only thing I have to say about Guo Yu is the fact, he was perfect to hate - great portrayal from Dai Xu.

Visually speaking, the drama has this cold and dim atmosphere that perfectly fitted the grim reality these characters were dealing with. Any other setting and the show would not be as effective in creating the suspense.

Overall, a great story with complex characters and interesting dynamics between them.

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20th Century Girl was going strong as a light, fluff and full on cliche teen romance with cute characters, fun interaction and a bit of 90’ nostalgia, until the writers decided to be “ambitious” and give it a random, unfitting and poorly executed ending to make the movie “more memorable”. And I’m here questioning why? I get it, as a writer you don’t want to start your career with a cute, but not memorable rom-com, but what we’ve got here is not the way to go.

What went well? Most of the characters are likable, even if they lacked depth. Bora was your typical energetic and bubbly girl, Woon Ho was a perfect first love material with his warm demeanor, and Hyun Jin was the most fun and entertaining of the group. Sadly, the writer did Kim Yeon Doo dirty presenting her in rather unflattering light - clueless about the situation she was in, not getting a hint about the relations people around her have, defined by her circumstances and the illness - little to no info about her as a person.

Surprisingly, I adored all the piling misunderstandings. All of them presented in a light and heartwarming way, showing the mistakes most of us made when we were teens facing our first love.

What’s more - 20th Century Girl is simply beautiful. The use of light and shadows gave me goosebumps more than once. I am a sucker for good dim aesthetics.

So what went wrong? For a movie that is 2 hours long, we truly did not know much about the characters. Halfway through the movie I started to question, how there is still an hour to go and why are we not exploring any of the circumstances the characters are in?

The acting was also not mind blowing. Maybe I expected too much from this cast, but with a plot so simple and full of well known cliches, the performances are what carry it. Here, while everyone did a great job, none of the portrayals of the characters was truly unforgettable. My biggest issues were the more emotional scenes - they did not resonate at all. Maybe because Kim Yoo Jung tried to tap deep into the overly emotional teen, but her crying was more annoying and less moving than I would like.

By now, everyone knows the ending is just disappointing. I honestly don’t have an issue with the idea the writer had for it, but the execution was simply bad - no set up, no explanation, no message to tie it all together, no nothing.

Overall, it’s a decent movie, bringing back many memories of my teen romances and for that I am grateful. It’s not exactly memorable, nor innovative, nor a simple feel good watch. Tries to stand out in the sea of teen rom-coms with the ending, but fails to truly deliver a cohesive narrative that leads to this conclusion.

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