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Will You Be a Dog or a Pig?
An intense, gut wrenching look at what trauma does to a person and how some wounds are just too severe to ever heal. All the childhood flashback scenes are harrowing, every scene is thick with dread and suffering and the violence has such an unsettling visceral power. As dark as this gets the brutality never feels forced or like gratuitous misery porn, we get a good sense of the how and why the bullies are allowed to run rampant. I also appreciated this show's nuanced take on justice and revenge. Kim Dong Wook and Kim Sung Gyu both gave excellent performances playing compelling characters, though I was frustrated by Dong Wook's lack of screen time. He absolutely killed it (pun intended?) in every single scene so I wanted more time with him. I think the show should have spent more time following him and less time following the cops investigating him.Was this review helpful to you?
Not enough meat on the bone
This was an enjoyable watch for a while. It had a warmth and heart to it I responded positively to and I was curious to see how the story and the characters were going to develop. However, I eventually became bored with it. The story is thin and cliched and the characters are two dimensional at best. The actors playing the boys in the band had an appealing natural chemistry with each other but that wasn't enough to compensate for how uninteresting they ultimately turned out to be as individuals and how rote their personal journeys were. This probably would have been a perfectly pleasant movie or miniseries but it was too shallow to sustain itself as a 16 episode drama.Was this review helpful to you?
Twisty as a pretzel factory
At its best this show is pure adrenaline. The first half maintained such a breakneck pace that kept me glued to the screen. Since the show burned through so much plot so quickly parts of the second half dragged for me though because everyone gained or lost power or changed allegiances so much that the impact of some of the twists was lessened. The love line between the leads was forced as well. I did love the complicated, passionate, toxic relationship between the second leads. It has a satisfying conclusion which is important for a show like this. I also never stopped getting a kick out of the bombastic score/power walk/hallway standoff scenes.Was this review helpful to you?
Ok Thriller, Fun Soap Opera
At its best, this was diet Penthouse. If you like watching rich people behaving badly this show certainly delivers. Bong Tae Kyu and Shin Sung Rok were so good at being so bad. While I enjoyed the big soapy personalities in this one, the plot was a mixed bag for me. The core story is good, and I'm glad they didn't shy away from making the villains depraved and the revenge harsh, but I also felt like this show spent a lot of time spinning its wheels. The runtime felt padded. The casting change was a positive development, I preferred the second lead actress.Was this review helpful to you?
Great spin on a time travel story
This one is a real mind bender. Plot-wise this show was consistently excellent. The story was creative, well paced, and expertly balanced its substantive existential concerns with the borderline soapy family drama. I liked how the writers handled the logistics of time travel. Even with the limited screen time afforded to it I was able to buy into into the romance. I read the ending as ambiguous enough to support multiple possible interpretations, which suits the vibe of the show well. The one downside was the acting was a bit patchy at times. Lee Jin Wook was generally good in this but there were also times when he was too stiff and expressionless. Jung Dong Hwan's performance as the villain was fine initially but got so bad in the later episodes of the show it was hard to watch. His constant slack jawed/bug eyed mugging was embarrassing. I can enjoy hammy overwrought acting under the right circumstances but his clownish performance just annoyed me and was out of sync with the rest of the show.Was this review helpful to you?
Excellent show
A delight. The build up to the romance is subtle and slow burn, it's not the kind of show that got my heart fluttering right away, but here slow and steady wins the race because the leads are such lovable characters and watching their chemistry build was fun. Their dynamic is so wholesome, sweet, and funny. No dumb tropes to deal with either. No noble idiocy break ups, no sudden trips abroad, no contrived miscommunications, just lots of cuteness and mutual growth and supportiveness.Thankfully the plot is accessible even if you don't know know anything about Korean politics. The practical and emotional stakes of the various issues that come before the district council are clear, and the show does a good job depicting the small victories and petty corruption of life in local politics with a lot of heart. The only thing I wish the show had dove deeper on was the relationship between the ML and his father.
The heavy use of fish eyes lenses and extreme wide angle shots were bold creative choices that paid off well. The director did a good job of visually emphasizing to the audience the offbeat nature Goo Se Ra's personality and the distorted perspective made comedic scenes funnier and office scenes more intense. I also love the super vivid color palette and how many close ups we get of the main actors' faces, allowing them to really shine as performers. Watching this makes me lament Nana hasn't done more rom coms because she's obviously extremely well suited to the genre. She's such a force of nature here.
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So much squandered potential
I wish this had just been a straight up House style diagnostic procedural where the doctors solve a case per episode and that's it. The patient stories and the debates about euthanasia and end of life care were good, the rest of the show was lacking. I hated the relationship between the two leads. Even apart from their DOA romance, I found the leads to be shallow and underwritten characters. This was especially true for the FL. So much staring into space as crappy ballads drone on in the background. The antagonists are potentially interesting but the show doesn't know how to utilize them effectively and they were ultimately just frustratingly inconsistent and two dimensional. The last few episodes are particularly frustrating, sloppily plotted and emotionally unsatisfying.Was this review helpful to you?
Watch this
Great show, Jang Hyuk delivers again. I loved his performance and I was so invested in the struggles and triumphs of his incredibly compelling character. His power and range as a performer is just mesmerizing. This works really well as an intense sports story, a beautiful and heart wrenching family drama, and a gruesome medical thriller. Really liked the characterizations of the second ML and the villains. Once I started watching this I couldn't stop. The only thing that didn't fully work for me was the characterization of the wife in the second half of the drama. She became placid and bland and faded into the background too much as the story progressed. I would have also enjoyed more scenes between husband and wife fleshing out their dynamic more.Was this review helpful to you?
This review may contain spoilers
Awesome show, adorable cast, with minor quibbles at the end
What a great show. I was sucked in immediately: this is exciting, funny yet also heartfelt from the outset. The characters pop off the screen and get you engaged right away. The greatest strength of this show is the complexity of its characters and relationships. As far fetched as the premise and plot can get, and the show doesn't even bother getting into the nitty gritty details of how the science would work, there is a core of psychological authenticity to how the characters interact.Nam Shin III is the most adorable marshmallow of a character ever, and I loved how the FL was won over by him and was able to open her heart after the adversity she had dealt with earlier in life. Watching them grow together and fall in love was so sweet, I swooned hard. The typical evil chaebol shenanigans were well executed. Supporting characters were also rich and layered.
I thought this could be a 10/10 but it slightly fumbled the bag in the last 10 minutes of the last episode (Human Shin has a random two minute redemption arc? Nope, don't buy it. Evil Henchman is totally chill in prison after his 30 years of evil schemes amount to nothing, nope, that's not how that would go. Why wasn't the FL informed that the ML was being repaired, everyone just let her mourn for a year wtf?). Minor quibbles though, this show was awesome.
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Eh Fingers!
This was in that awkward zone of not being bad enough to drop but not being good enough to really satisfy. It peaked in its first four flashback episodes, which were excellent. They did a great job setting up the twisted family dynamics and a potentially interesting plot with high emotional stakes. However, once they were adults the ML and FL were such insipid characters. Their romance was painfully bland as well. Between this and Mask I've learned Ju Ji Hoon can't act in makjang to save his life.The plot would have been fine at 16 episodes, 20 episodes max, but was too thin to fill 30 episodes. There were cool twists and reveals, but it also got slow and repetitive. The great villains are what kept me going. Chae Shi Ra was excellent as the evil mom, she was so charismatic and totally commanded the screen, and Ji Chang Wook was similarly strong as the jealous, vengeful stepbrother. Since the "nice" characters were mostly a bunch of drips I was always rooting for their evil schemes to succeed. I'm not mad I watched it but I also don't think it was worth the 30+ hour time commitment. Thankfully, Kim Soon-Ok would later explore similar themes in a similar setting with much greater success in the Penthouse.
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Moving and sensitive - worth the time
I was moved by this sensitive drama and how it tackled the difficulties of aging, grieving, and economic hardship. The sweet moments amidst the tragedy stirred my heart as well. The performances were uniformly powerful and nuanced. This show also provides an example of a big shocking twist done right: it's foreshadowed well and its reveal makes what came before richer. The drama's slow pace did test my patience in the middle but I'm glad I stuck with it and powered through my temporary boredom because taken as a whole this story really worked for me.Was this review helpful to you?
I was surprised by how much I enjoyed this.
Slow, pensive, understated shows usually aren't my jam but this one hooked me right away. I was riveted by the first half especially. The show did a great job building the fraught but tender relationship between the leads while gently teasing the mystery of Annie's life and death. I also liked how the writer showed us the leads' self actualization and growth alongside the gradual development of their romance. I appreciated the perceptive treatment of the difficulty of obtaining work/life balance for working moms. The second half of the show was still good but sometimes erred on the side of being too muted and elliptical. In particular I think there needed to be more meaty, dialogue heavy scenes as the marriages definitively broke down and fewer flashbacks, montages, and scenes of the leads staring wistfully into space as ballads drone on in the background.Was this review helpful to you?
Perfection!
This so warm and sweet and beautifully written. The lead couple is incredible! I cannot handle how cute they are, it's one of those situations where I literally squirm in my seat because I need a physical outlet for how much I swoon when I watch them together. They're former childhood best friends (2 of a 4 person childhood friend group) who reconnect in adulthood they understand and care for each other in such a lovely way. Watching them work their way towards each other was so heartwarming. They have the cozy familiarity of long term besties but when they pine for each other it's electric and when they're together the kisses are certainly not platonic! I've seen my share of childhood flashback scenes by now and this show handled them especially well.The friendships, family relationships, and secondary romances were also excellent. I just loved spending time with these characters and watching them eat and talk and work and play together. They also did a great job with the second ML, making him a well rounded and sympathetic character and not just a plot obstacle. I can't emphasize enough what a delightful watch this was and how much I was moved by its tender good-heartedness. The Kim So Yeon cameo at the end was the perfect cherry on top of the sundae, it's so cute she and Lee Sang Woo guest spot on each other's shows.
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This review may contain spoilers
Good trash
A solid trash panda watch. I appreciated the brisk pace, the flashy action, and all the debauched rich person family drama. Give me some infidelity, some shame babies, some embezzlement, some murder and other assorted mayhem and I'm a happy camper. The show's tone was enjoyably campy. It is too bad both the leads were dull characters and their barely there "romance" was dry as hell because everything going on around them was really fun.Was this review helpful to you?
Incredible show
Incredible show that really brought the feels. It deftly handled comedy, romance, and heavy family drama. The characters are so rich and well developed, even when their behavior is infuriating, you always understand why they behave the way they do. The two leads have insane chemistry and I was so emotionally invested in seeing them overcome their traumas and get their happy ending. This show looked like a million bucks too: everything from the lighting to shot composition (the split screens and montages were so well done!) to the set design to the occasional use of whimsical animation created this dreamy, swoony aesthetic that made the drama feel so warm even during its saddest moments.Was this review helpful to you?
