The Secret Life of My Secretary (2019)

N/A

IMO this is a past time drama. A show where you only watch to lose time. The story is a bit predictable and I in the first episodes I had predicted a possible ending.

“You weren’t accustomed to being treated nicely, so when he gave you the bare minimum you fell in love with him”.

They romanticized the boss’s biggest red flag.

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This popped up on my suggested somewhere, so I decided to give it a try and watch it.

I actually really enjoyed it, a really like lighthearted romance of like a secretary and like a boss. The actor Jin Ki-joo who played the character Jung Gal-hee, I really liked this character - I think she played the secretary so well, with her outfits and her red top! And just being like such a strong women who provided a lot for her family, and worked soo hard! I actually think she was such a pretty actor when she dressed up as well!

I think Veronica Park, was my favourite character too, I thought she was soo funny- just how they she portrayed the like rich CEO women, who just was so unique in different ways - and her Veronica Park phrase! A line to remember when I think of this drama

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The secret life of my secretary is pure romance. The story centers around a director and his secretary and their relationship how they find love and figure out his Prosopagnosia(face blindness) I really liked the performance. It was lighthearted amusing and intriguing to watch. I loved the surrounding characters around them, they added laughter and flare to the story. I love Jin ji joo and Kim young kwang I have seen both their works before and they are talented. They did well in this and their chemistry is so worth watching. If you’re looking for a lighthearted romance this is the drama for you. You can’t regret it . Watch it!

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FUTRE EDIT: I recently re-watched this drama and now feel compelled to come back to my old review and make amendments, as I made some criticisms that I simply don't agree with anymore.

Original Review (now with amendments):
I'm gonna give you one suggestion before you start this drama. Disregard everything about Do Min Ik being a face genius. It's superfluous information that has no bearing on the overall story, and you'll enjoy the drama better if you just ignore it.
EDIT: I completely renounce this suggestion. While there are still some issues with this part of the plot, I don't think him being a face genius at the start is as big of a problem to the story as I once did. I address said issues a little further down in my original review. :FINISH EDIT

As for the rest of this drama, it has an old-school style filled with small, but important, twists on a classic formula. A male lead who's not really a jerk, just starts off a little thoughtless then quickly becomes the cutest puppy you've ever seen (and I mean Quikly). A female lead who's a candy but not, who stands up for herself repeatedly and doesn't let anyone push her around and is very proactive in her own life. The use of disability(ies) in a way that is thoughtful and kind, even if not very accurate (looking at you, face blindness), and that isn't used as a plot device only to be reversed later (ie. not giving characters disabilities only to take them back at the end in order to achieve a 'happy ending').
EDIT: I STAND BY EVERYTHING IN THIS PARAGRAPH. :FINISH EDIT

There's an office plot outside of the romance, but that's gonna be really hit or miss for a lot of people, and probably more of a miss for most. It's not a typical office plot, in my opinion, and I really appreciate where the writers were trying to go with it, but it does have some glaring flaws that keep it from being as compelling as it could have been.
EDIT: I really liked the office plot the second time around. It doesn't go the direction you expect it to (I suspect because one of the actresses playing one of the secretaries central to this plot had to leave the drama due to a family scandal and this required changing the storyline unexpectedly), but I actually like where it ended up going. It's not super high stakes or exciting or intriguing, but it's very realistic and conveys a very strong message. :FINISH EDIT

The two main problems with this drama though are going to be this:

1) Making Do Min Ik a 'face genius' worked against them when they took away his ability to recognize faces, as he should have had no real trouble recognizing the people around him via their voices, mannerisms, way of dress, etc. (as is implied he was very good at when he was a 'face genius'). Yet he can't recognize any of these things about people, and there's no reason given as to why, which makes you strongly question just how much of a 'face genius' he was before. This is why I said to completely disregard this part of the plot as it's unnecessary and you'll enjoy the story more without it.
EDIT: I mostly stand by this. It doesn't make sense that he was so incredibly good at reading people and then when he lost his ability to see faces, he lost everything else as well. At the very least, he should have been able to recognize people's voices. I can recognize my parents' coughs and sighs and sneezes when they're on different aisles of the grocery story. Surely, he could have recognized people's voices. :FINISH EDIT

2) People are tired of dramas where the main conflict is dragged out longer than necessary, and this drama definitely makes you feel like the main conflict is being dragged on longer than necessary and can make you really dislike the female lead even though you clearly aren't meant to. (I never disliked her as the lie itself never upset me to the level it did everyone else, but I definitely felt the frustration many felt over her not ending it sooner than she did.) But once you get past this part of the story, and the writers finally give you an explanation for some things, you do understand why they chose to go this route, and it makes a lot of sense.
EDIT: Again, I mostly stand by this, but I also felt a stronger empathy and understanding for Gal Hee this time around. Truthfully, some of the blame should be on Veronica as well, as her way of punishing Gal Hee for deceiving Do Min Ik...was to make her deceive him some more. She should have been held at least partially responsible for that. And even though the lie goes on overlong, I also think it was consistently well-utilized. There aren't any scenes where I felt like 'This is unnecessary. This harms the drama/the story.' The conflict I experienced was that I understood and appreciated the decisions the writers were making with the lie while also knowing and anticipating and being already heartbroken that Do Min Ik was going to be gutted when he found out. And he was. :FINISH EDIT

What I would have liked to see in this drama:

1) Gal Hee's mom should have been a central character from the beginning. The drama starts off with mom playing a more central role in the early episodes as a sort of voice of wisdom to Gal Hee, but then she sort of disappears for awhile for no explainable reason. She starts popping up again in the second half to have little, private conversations with Gal Hee about things, and it adds So much to the story as you get to see into Gal Hee's mindset and why she does the things she does. The first half would have greatly benefitted from more of this, and I think people's anger at Gal Hee's character would have been cooled by it.
EDIT: I don't know what I was on about. Mom was actually very well-utilized throughout the story, and I don't know why I remembered her only showing up toward the beginning and the second half. I'm also not sure if the story would work as well if mom showed up more often. I liked her a lot, but it probably worked better for her to pop in periodically rather than every, or every other, episode. :FINISH EDIT

2) I don't mind that Do Min Ik couldn't tell that Gal Hee and 'Veronica' were the same person. The explanation we get later on as to why works for me. There just needed to be more insight early on into what was going through Do Min Ik's mind to help us understand why he never recognizes how similar Gal Hee and 'Veronica' are to one another and why he has so much trouble choosing between them. It would have gone a long way to easing the frustration a lot of viewers felt over his not being able to figure it out.
EDIT: I agree. :FINISH EDIT

And that's ultimately where the split is going to be in this drama. Either you're going to be frustrated with Gal Hee for not ending the lie sooner or you're going to be frustrated with Do Min Ik for not recognizing they're same person. But at least for my part, I don't feel like either of these things should deter anyone from watching this drama. I fully admit that my rating for this drama is based purely on my enjoyment of it and not it's flaws. Despite the flaws and some frustration in the middle bit, I thoroughly enjoyed this drama. It's fluffy and lighthearted and not meant to be taken too seriously. The writers know exactly what kind of story they're trying to write, and they don't try to be anything they're not. At the same time, they managed to take an old, tired formula and make it new and refreshing and full of little twists here and there and filled with characters you can't help but fall in love with. (You will love Do Min Ik. You just will.) It also has possibly one of the greatest final scenes in all of dramadom. Literally. That. Was. The. Moment. To. End. The. Drama. On. That last scene….was perfection.
EDIT: My rating for this drama is because this drama is wonderful, and the flaws are not nearly as large as I once thought, and the emotional heart of this story is compelling and strong, and the leads are incredibly sweet together, and I stand by this statement, Dang It. :FINISH EDIT

I highly recommend this. It's too cute not to.
EDIT: HECK YEAH, I DO! :FINISH EDIT

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This is the proof that a simple, overdone story can still be amazing

Has this drama satisfied all my needs: Yes.
Has this drama over-satisfied my needs: YES.
Has this drama given you diabetes: Yes.
Damn. I loved it way too much! I was not sold at ALL when I first saw this coming out, last year, but damn I was bored as heck and needed a cute unproblematic romcom, in this quarantine situation and YES did it satisfy me! I was seriously taken aback at how much I just liked and loved everything! The main leads! The main leads TOGETHER! And hot damn, their KISSES! Kim Young Kwang as Do Min Ik YESSSS! Jeong Ga Heel is such a cute pie I loved her to bits. I know that this drama is not one of those that go down in history or rise up in ratings, but it is certainly underrated in a sense. I tend to easily get tired of a drama and drop it after a few ep, but I literally binged watched this in two days. Maybe it's because I dig romcoms, but the thing is this drama didn't excel in comedy, the romance was superb between the mains! (so much better than many other hotshot dramas out there upsi) But it was so lighthearted it felt so nice. Maybe I am getting old, but I sick of those overly used melodramas and tragedies. They don't do anything positive for me and my life.
Shoutout to the fact that there was no second lead! And NO LOVE TRIANGLE I MEAN!! One of a handful!
And shoutout to the fact that the main "antiprotagonist" wasn't bad at all. It was justified and very understandable. I am overlooking the "plot holes" since people tend to nickpick a lot and honestly compared to soooo many other popular dramas, these plot holes were minimal. And lastly shoutout to the fact that they made Do Mi Ik keep his illness. One half of me wanted to see a cliché healing wonder, but another half just wanted him to live with it for the rest of his life, which is way more realistic. And yes it happened (even though I don't know if those moments were he suddenly sees faces again for a longer period of time actually works). Imo it makes their relationship a bit more meaningful and those moments too. When he argued about how his illness has positive effects too I was lowkey impressed.


Satisfied the heck out of me. An underrated gem! Not life changing, but lighthearted, superb chemistry, bromance and womance! and damn satisfying, you don't ever want to eat sweets again. The main couple might just kill you with cuteness. Enjoyed every bit!
P.S.: Kim Young Kwang will make you fall in love with him, be prepared. And also Jin Ki Joo, she's so adorable.

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I liked this drama way more than I expected and that is definitely thanks to the characters. Phenomenal cast, all of the four main leads were entertaining, had great chemistry and you just rooted for them.

However, the story is not only simple, but sometimes quite silly and inconsistent. Also, and that might only be because of my personality, the element of the double life and constant lying was very hard to watch for me. I totally procrastinated the episodes where this situation culminated. The only thing that got me trough that were the sweet scenes between the main leads.

On the other end, I don't regret my time with this drama. It had so much good stuff in it - the relationship between the siblings, Do Min Ik finding out his worth with a disability, the constant bickering and genuine fun of Gal Hee and Min Ik on the screen and also a female character that was very into one male character.

Music was nice, I also think that this drama has a few of those scenes like little gems that I am going to go back to.

Overall, if you are in a mood for something simple and easy with amazing characters, this a good choice.

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Adorable

This was the typical rom-com — very adorable and never really high stakes because you knew things were going to be okay.

Ultimately, I really enjoyed it, and it helped that the secretary and boss didn't fall too much into the cliche cold jerk/weak but warm stereotypes. JGH stood up for herself when necessary, and DMI was nicer than a lot of other bosses. The chemistry was really good.

I do, however, have a natural dislike for characters that keep these kinds of secrets — the kind that involves and hurts someone else and is purely for selfish reasons — and while I think the drama did a good job of balancing how JGH wanted to be someone else and yet felt trapped in her lie, I still think it might've been dragged on for a little too long.

I also wish the rules around DMI's face blindness were worked out a little better; how it was resolved at the end honestly felt deus ex machina, though I was still kind of relieved we got a nice resolution.

The secretary subplot was honestly really interesting, but I really wish it had been given more screentime and had been fed to us earlier. It's also rare that our two main characters are so uninvolved in the subplot and rather just victims of it (which was interesting to see actually). But I also felt like it wrapped up a little unsatisfyingly, though that could've been because I just didn't spend enough time with those characters to care deeply for them.

I liked JGH's siblings as well — even though they were parent-less, there wasn't ann overdose of angst and I loved how they still teased each other and supported each other.

Ultimately, this was a really fun watch, and I gotta say Veronica Park was HILARIOUS and cast perfectly. Favorite character.

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This is basically a poor man's version of "A Business Proposal." Though the premise is more or less the same, one thing I did not like here was how Gal Hui took advantage of her boss' illness to dupe him into believing she was somebody else. Overlooking this fact, the rest of the drama is cute and funny, and sometimes heartbreaking. I can't believe I enjoyed this drama more than I should, despite it's many loopholes. To name a few:

1) The Fall. I am surprised that Do Min Ik did not split his head open while he fell from a good height (on his head!). The chances of surviving this fall is slim to none without major injuries. I get it that he dislodged the pin that made facial recognition possible, but that is all. No bandage wrapping around his head, no broken bones, how is it possible??

2) The Box Cutter. How lame it is that the person who tried to hurt Do Min Ik and others uses the same weapon multiple times??? There was blood on it, dude! How can you use the same damn thing?? Might as well put a sticker on it, "Property of this Idiot."

3) The USB File. I guess everybody has the same USB that could be mistaken easily, that it is a wonder how confidential documents are kept. You can have cat videos and accounts of extortion in the same damn device and people can just take it or leave it or throw it as they please

4) Dubious Company policies. It must be some poor HR screening policy that allows people who were once fired, to be employed again. Do they not keep some records? Won't there be more questions why you are coming back to work?

5) The Police. Clearly they have nothing else to do but to solve this one case of non-murder. They are so easily swayed by statements made by their suspects that it will be surprising if they caught anybody. Hint: they did not. The idiot in #2 turned himself in.

And the best of all:

6) The Cast. I mean the cast on fake Veronica's arm. I mean Do Min Ik may not be able to see faces, but a glaringly obvious green cast with a heart he drew on Gal Hui's cast. In what world would she be able to explain that away??? Even if her cover was not blown earlier in the night, she would be caught green-handed.

There are too many coincidences in this drama to make me believe in logical thinking, but if I switch my brain off, and overlook these inconsistencies, the drama teaches you to open your heart to possibilities and be more human.

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One moment of patience may ward off a great disaster

How the plot came to be, seems a bit tepid for my taste. I was looking for that climax to build up anytime soon but somehow never seems to exist and entice for the past 12 episodes. If not for Kim Young Kwang, who plays Do Min Ik, this would still be on my "plan to watch" list. I saw him on "I Live Alone" recent episode so I become curious. Plus, I saw that the other female role, the original Veronica Park was played by Kim Jae Kyung. She was Sung Hoon's female partner in the drama Noble, My Love.

Fortunately, I didn't give up on this drama as there were some interesting moments. So better watch out for those. For one, I didn’t realize that hand washing couldn't get any sexier than episode 23. Thank you for Episode 8 too where it suddenly became funny.

On the downside, I didn't like that the story focused more on their love story. I didn't get to experience the intriguing life of a media director, as was Young Kwang's role is in this drama. For a media director of a mobile company, apart from the stockholder’s meeting and preparation, I don’t seem to see actual work from him. I guess the writer placed much emphasis on his disease, prosopagnosia, and the complications that go with it in daily life. I would have loved to see a man in action. As the saying goes, no matter what profession a man is, a working man tends to be sexier.

At the very beginning, I began to be skeptical about the whole red cardigan thing. So I would just assume that she washes it every day and placed in the dryer right?

Although a lot of their conversation lacks humor and wit thus redeeming to be a bit boring and dragging, there were a couple of statements that catch my attention. Don’t neglect what you have hanging up on something you have lost. — wow! its as if something just hit me with a hammer. Another one would be: "Loving someone shouldn't mean having to give up on something or someone. Be it a dream or a person."

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This was a lot of fun to watch. Yes the story makes no sense and it's cheesy to the point that it's embarrassing to watch at times, but I was properly entertained. I wanted to watch a romcom that doesn't frustrate me with it's triangle shenanigans and this one really delivered.
However even if I ignore the overused prosopagnosia plot, the entire secret secretary organisation feels super stupid. Luckily they quickly shifted the focus away from them (unlike in Strongest Deliveryman.), so I wasn't annoyed too much. If you like sweetness & borderline embarrassing humor you will certainly like this show. Over the course of the 16(32?) episodes nothing too frustrating or unexpected happened, not even the chaebol family issues were pronounced. The pacing could have been a bit better, he found out her secret identity like 2 episodes too late, not that it's that big of a problem, since I think we've gotten enough fluff before the closing credits anyway.

This was airing at the same time with Abyss, this one is like 32278347823432423 times better.

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I think this drama was great, even though the story is kind of new in kdrama , the characters acting and chemistry make it well for me. I first watched it because of I’m huge fan of Kim young kwang and I was not disappointed .

The main characters have great chemistry and there is no really Hateness between the other leads and main ones .
This drama kept me going even though, it was really slow moving forward which I hate but things kept me interested like whose the villain and such more.
I think this might not be those super doper popular kdrama but it’s worth to give it a try in all of honesty ?

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