Dramas I Should’ve Dropped And Why I Didn’t

The dramas featured in this article:

Note

• When the story started to go downhill from the middle on and villains became laughing stock with no logical motives for their actions, I should’ve known this wouldn't live up to the high expectations I had based on its beginning.
• I saw a major spoiler for the end in a review and was certainly not happy about the preview to the ending (spoiler review got deleted by now).

• Especially the female lead captivated me with her acting, very cute with a bright smile yet natural but the male lead and support cast did a good job as well.
• The story itself was sweet and the chemistry of the leads really good.

• The drama is cute and fluffy without giving you a sugar shock.
• Cat lovers will like the anecdotes and the scenes with the real cat.
• Leads have a very lovely chemistry that steadily builds up in the story.

• If you’re 10 episodes into a drama of 58 episodes total and don’t know why you’re even watching this because it doesn’t entertain you a bit, then you should probably give up on the drama and go for something else (that was my mental note back when I was watching it).
• Jealous/scheming side characters that got so much screen time that I felt the urge to skip their parts every single time because I knew they were just up to something evil again which gave the drama a repetitive feeling.
• Main leads could only capture me in their second arc, for me, the second pairing was more interesting and their chemistry was shining brighter.

• MDL Watch Challenge (yep that’s one reason) because I wanted the time and willpower I put into that drama to gain some positive result, also I really tried til the end to like this drama.
• Two side characters I loved dearly and looked forward to seeing.
• The cinematography and costumes were beautiful.

• Well-known and popular cast members.
• Gorgeous costumes.
• The chance of being one of those who’ll love the drama, the majority of watchers liked it.
• The undeniable higher budget the production profited from compared to the shorter C-Dramas in this comparison.

• Lacking chemistry between leads and a romance that just happens because the script says so (the poster looks way too promising).
• The exaggerated comedy that rather made me cringe.
• Overacted, annoying characters that barely make a contribution to the story other than yelling, sobbing, whining, etc.
• Lame and predictable story, aka you already know what will happen way before it happens.

• Ji Chang Wook and some of his previous dramas that set my expectations to a higher standard.
• So I could use it for the MDL Watch Challenge (again).
• Only a couple episodes left so it seemed pointless to drop it so shortly before reaching the end.

• If you’re only watching for Ji Chang Wook you might be able to ignore/forgive the negative things.
• If you're interested in a lighthearted/entirely non-serious approach to Science Fiction.

• The love triangle trope is omnipresent and here it lacks common sense and realism.
• Really annoying second female lead, I wonder what the scriptwriter was thinking.
• Endless back and forth of the main leads' relationship, we break up, we make up, we break up... 
• The CGI cat is... well, let's say she obviously had too much mackerels and the poor thing got washed with way too hot water as the nose and paws shrunk in the process.

• Somewhat liked the main leads despite their "hot 'n' cold" play - pun intended.
• My love for cats and hope it might at least reach the level of I'm a Pet at Dali Temple.

• Another drama for cat lovers (though this one is animated).
• If you want a short comedy drama to watch that you don't have to take seriously.

• Boring and repetitive story that could not captivate me.
• Didn’t feel chemistry of main leads.
• Really unoriginal scriptwriting aka poison is literally the answer to everything.

• Promising story idea.
• In the good moments it gave me I'm a Pet at Dali Temple vibes but that being said, I watched it right after I'm a Pet at Dali Temple so this might be a biased feeling.
• Length of drama as it's a short drama.

• Short C-Dramas often share similarities so if you're into them you might like this one.
  
• It has a second season now which might be better.

• Plot holes because the scriptwriter lost herself in the fancy story and failed in making the universe she created logical and tying up loose ends.
• Invasive and irrelevant product placement that distracted from the story and made me feel like I was  watching a shopping channel with all those lines that praised the products.
• Badly written and poorly developed characters except for one who managed to stand out.

• Woo Do Hwan was a ray of light and provided the humor + actress Kim Yong Ji caught my eye.
• The cinematography was beautiful.
• I wanted to know how it would wrap up.

• The concept and original story idea is interesting, it's just badly executed.
• Cast is good and delivers a nice performance (they made the best out of what the script gave them).
• If you like Woo Do Hwan you will love his characters, I promise.

• Toxic/self-centered behaviour of main lead Teh really upset me.
• Incomprehensible actions of characters that I could not relate to no matter how hard I tried.
• The emotional scenes of Teh could not move me (which is usually not a hard thing to do for dramas/movies), here I couldn't help but cringe.
• I already knew it was very likely I would hate the drama's ending.

• Amount of episodes and total runtime was low enough that I could watch them in a row anyway.
• The overall positive feedback and praise made me believe there must be something special to it.

• To see for yourself if you'll be one of those who love it.
• Shows a different approach to the topic of one falling in love with someone else of the same gender.

Lessons learned

• Stay away from comment sections of dramas before/while watching and read reviews with caution, there will always be one person who randomly blurts out which character dies in the end, that the gardener was the murderer, etc.  
  
• It's okay to drop a drama at any point and the reason why is up to you. After all it can happen that you're disliking something or someone so much right from the beginning that you don't want to continue.
• Do not force yourself to watch something you sincerely dislike from the bottom of your heart because you don't want to disappoint a friend who recommended it to you. They will respect your opinion, if they don't... well, drastically speaking, you might want to look for a new friend instead. ;)
• Listen to your inner voice. If it can tell you what will happen in the drama before it actually happens in the drama, you already know what you need to know. This is so badly written that it doesn't need a crystal ball to foresee the rest of it.
• Watching a drama full of tropes you dislike is like entering a mine field because it's likely at least one will trigger you, so if you decide to go for it, be prepared.
• Speed watching or skipping are your best friends to overcome obstacles in dramas, they make it so much easier to deal with boring, long sequences or triggering tropes.
• Just because you're a fan of an actor/actress doesn't mean you have to watch all their works, skipping some of their works is not making you less of a "true" fan regardless what others say.

Do you have a drama you look back at and think you should have dropped it?

What keeps you from dropping a drama?

Why would you drop a drama?

♥ You have reached the end of this article. Thank you for reading. ♥

^{Disclaimer/Sources: The banner and the collage are made by me. Posters are from MDL. Screenshots (in order of appearance): 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21. Thanks to the editors for their work and to you dear users who read til this point. See you in my next article(s).}