Stunning first half. Second half falls victim to lazy scriptwriting.

I have to separate the first and second half.

The first half is a solid 8/10 for me. It's everything I'd ever want from a youth drama, and I absolutely loved every second of it. The characters' love story feels so unique to them. The script also sprinkles in just the right amount of tropes and pulls them off in just the right way to leave any romcom lover feeling satisfied without feeling overdone. The male lead is both cool and handsome while relatable and dorky over his first love. The female lead pulls off the sunshine personality and has great determination as a fan. I especially liked how consistent the story was about her steadfast, optimistic personality which she learned from the hardships she overcame as an adult. The drama never felt heavy, but I could still feel that there was love for the characters and their story. Also, small spoiler (but it happens within the first two episodes), but this is the only time that I have been completely sold on a love at first sight premise. It makes total sense to be a teenager, meeting such a kind, bright personality. It's like that friend crush, that person you wanted to get to know all four years of high school but never worked up the nerve to. Sun Jae's perspective is always so beautiful, and part of why the love at first sight works is because we can see how his feelings for Sol grow into something more meaningful as he gets to know her.

The second half is a 3/10 and falls victim to atrociously lazy scriptwriting. There are entire episodes dedicated to comedic relief and one-off scenarios. At that point, the relationship between the leads fails to develop which was such a waste, considering how beautifully their story was developed during the first half. I couldn't help but feel the shallowness in the story after episode 9. The story fails to have any goals or real development after that point. The writing sloppily tries to close the story with cheap plot twists, and none of the scenes really feel like they fit together or have a particular purpose. In essence, the second half of the show is entirely filler and completely fails the beauty of the first half.

I am still so happy to have experienced the first half but am utterly disappointed in the second half.

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Mixed feelings

I gave this a higher review because gosh the romance was so believable, the tension palpable, and I loved the level of yearning. The premise is so amazing and had me excited. However, pretty much everything else about this series falls a bit flat for me.

There are multiple, overall pointless, conflicts in the plotline. For example, the incidence with the tiger within the first couple of episodes. This was wasted space that could have been better spent on the relationship or we could have focused on Yi San's reign. The conflicts should have helped develop the characters more or made us more invested in them.

This brings me into my next point. For a while, I couldn't tell if the writers were bad at scriptwriting by making the grandfather have unbelievable mood swings or if the grandfather was meant to be realistically temperamental. The writers later got better at writing the grandfather character and made it apparent he was meant to be temperamental, but at the beginning of the series, it was very, very poorly executed.

My biggest gripe is that Deok Im lost pretty much all of her personality and any speaking time after the Yi San becomes king (even before she is meant to lose herself to the palace). Whenever they had romantic scenes together, I would be immersed but be pulled out because it almost seems like Yi San is just talking at a thing. Deok Im rarely speaks again or has her personality shine through in other scenes. As a result, when she's supposed to lose herself to the palace after becoming a concubine, it doesn't feel as poignant because it feels like we lost the character already a while ago.

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Very compelling romance

For the most part, very strong writing and script. This might be a controversial opinion but I think the justification for the strong bond between the male lead and female lead in Love Between Fairy and Devil is much stronger than Ten Miles of Peach Blossoms (my all-time favorite xianxia drama). Even though the chemistry and acting were top notch in tmopb, I could never fully justify why the leads were so attached to each other. I loved the romance in lbfd because I was completely convinced on why the leads were so devoted to each other, and the foundation for their romance was so well-integrated throughout the plot (hats off to the writers).

The male and female lead are equally powerful in every respect and both grow incredibly throughout the drama. Their love is of complete devotion and selflessness without either character ever losing the essence or complexity of who they are; this alone has me so impressed with this drama. It's so difficult to pull off script-wise as dramas will often fall into the pit of the male or (more often) female lead completely losing their character for self-sacrificial love. Additionally, all of the key scenes in this drama are so epically captured. Some of the best special effects I've seen in Cdrama-land. Dylan Wang in particular really impressed me with his acting and depiction of Dongfang Qingcang. I love Orchid's tagline of "I love all beings. I also love one person." Oh my god. Gets to the heart of their romance, and their greater duty to the realm.

My biggest gripe is the drama's pacing and script fall a little flat for me in episodes 32-35. The ending (mostly) redeems itself, but I would have loved to see just a little bit more. My other (not so serious) complaint is the script writers definitely riffed off some of the key lines from Our Times (very famous Taiwanese movie). As someone who understands Mandarin, I couldn't stop laughing cause they copied it almost word-for-word. Anyhow, overall very solid watch.

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Not worth it

The most confusing part of this drama is the high quality production and great acting that’s paired with a terrible script.

I thought the premise of the drama was very unique, and I was super excited after seeing what a bada** the female lead is. However, the sequence of events doesn’t make a ton of sense. The ending is very lazy and rushed which just doesn’t cut it for what this drama was trying to pull off. The acting and production quality though was so good which made the terrible writing all the more confusing and disappointing because after finishing the drama, I keep on pining for what it could have been.

With the romance, I thought the dynamic at the beginning where she thought Gon was crazy made sense. There was lots to fun banter. But then they all of a sudden fall completely head over heels for each other with basically no reason. I couldn’t get over that the whole show. The neck kiss made no sense to me given the conversation they were having which killed any chemistry I might have detected between them. The lack of chemistry also made it lackluster when Gon saves our main female, telling the guards that she’s the future queen.

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Sweet romance. Constant butterflies.

The lead actor and actress have great chemistry. I overall really like the pacing of the drama. It was such a sweet romance, constantly giving me butterflies, and a very satisfying watch.

Nothing too heart-wrenching happens, but the conflicts make sense for elite level sports. The lead characters communicate well with each other for the most part so it doesn't feel like the conflicts are being dragged on for no reason. The male lead is very charming; he approaches the little things in life with an easy-going, silly attitude. However, it's apparent that he is serious and dependable at the same time. The female lead I think could have done better at balancing being the mature, older partner with being vulnerable or carefree with the ML. Sometimes I felt her dynamic towards him erred too much towards being a parental/guardian figure. Also, I felt the ending was kind of rushed. The drama could have benefitted from a couple more episodes, but that's common in Asia-dramaland. TLDR love, love, love this drama

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Young love captured beautifully. Would have benefitted from more editing to the script.

The part of the drama that really stole my heart was the past storyline. The young ML and FL acted so naturally, and it never felt cheesy. ML actor captured the essence of his deeply kind, free-spirited, loyal character so perfectly. I cannot overemphasize how wonderful his acting was. Usually, I hate it whenever a character’s main trait is their love, but in this case, it makes sense to me. ML is such a loving character it made sense to me his life’s purpose would just to live happily with his family and the love of his life. Likewise, the FL complemented him so well. She’s a more traditional student, over prepared but has a silly streak that makes their relationship make so much sense. My heart was racing during all their scenes, and I keep on rewatching them.

The adult actors did a splendid job, but unfortunately, their storyline I felt was a little messy. I felt every scene and plot point from their youth had a purpose. However, as adults, I felt the plot points dragged on, and I didn’t feel that all of the conflicts were necessary. This stole time that I think could have gone towards their time together, or spending some more time developing the romance from their youth, which I felt we did not get to see the full depth of. I liked that through their life choices, I could feel how their was a missing part of their lives without each other. It emphasized how complete they were together during their youth, even though they were still growing. They are both romantic about life and dreamers at their core so their relationship really brought out the best in the both of them. However, I'm not a huge fan of how everything bad under the sun happened to the female lead until she met our male lead again.

In summary, the actors and the story of their youth really captured my heart. Such a sweet, heart-fluttering watch.

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Super cute watch. Went in with tempered expectations.

I went in with tempered expectations, knowing that this series was only 8 episodes. I think the writers went into a reasonable amount of depth for the length of the series, and the pacing was surprisingly smooth for such a short series. For example, the ends of episodes 5 and 6 I think were executed so well, especially considering time constraints.

I could feel the depth of the main couple's feelings, and they truly complement each other so well! This J-drama is like a shoujo come to life. However, this J-drama separates itself from other youth dramas I've watched because the acting doesn't feel overdone. The acting feels like real people (not live-action anime characters) which is part of why the actors' feelings come across so authentically, and I was so invested in their stories. Overall, it was such a sweet watch that captures the intensity and sweetness of teenage romance. It definitely satisfied my craving for a cute, authentic high school romance story. For anyone who grew up reading manga but kind of matured out of the genre, I think you'll really enjoy this one!

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Heartfelt, fun story.

Overall, I really enjoyed watching this show and binged it in only a few days. I really liked how they incorporated many different poignant, controversial, and/or taboo topics such as miscarriage, sexual assault, comfort women, grieving loss, etc. There were multiple episodes where I was balling my eyes out because the messages were so relatable. Even with the many emotions, I still walked out of the drama feeling like it was a fun watch. Overall, the cast I think had great chemistry too. The side characters, especially Park Joong-Gil, seemed three-dimensional when they could have easily fallen flat between the many character relationships and stories. I didn't like how the main character became a side character more towards the end. I also wish they revealed Koo Ryeon and Park Joong-Gil's story. I think the "all at once" dumping of all the secrets somewhat made the impact of the ending for Park Joong-Gil less impactful. Overall, a solid watch.

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I bawled like a baby

I absolutely love the relationships in this show. The friendship that transcends time is absolutely beautiful. The flashbacks to the past life always had me guessing, and were absolutely beautiful. The plot about the modern life does drag considerably towards the middle; I almost stopped watching. However, the last few episodes were completely worth it. This is definitely one of the top "made me cry" k-dramas I have ever watched just for the past life story alone.

Admittedly, I tried rewatching it. The rewatch value is really low because it's the mystery and past life scenes that really push you through some of the dragging portions. However, the guessing game that makes this drama so suspenseful is lost in a rewatch. The past life scenes alone though I could rewatch to no end.

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Why did they have to ruin such a good series?

First of all, I absolutely love the first ten or eleven episodes. They can be hilarious but also very emotionally heavy. The premise was so unique, and I was fully expecting the series to join the ranks with some of my all-time favorite dramas like "While You were Sleeping." I would highly recommend that you even just watch those first 10 or 11 episodes alone because they were THAT amazing. I cried on so many occasions because the emotions the characters felt for each other and the exploration of interpersonal relationships was just so amazing. The entire cast has amazing chemistry. The characters were so well established, and I really enjoyed their personalities. Maybe read the synopsis for the last episode to see what happens to all of the characters, but by no means would I recommend watching the last third of the series.

At around episode 12, the series completely crashes and burns because of lazy writing. Rather than being a cohesive plot, the episodes just feel like loosely pieced together scenes meant to tie up various subplots that were established during the first half of the series. I can understand when the final episode of a kdrama does this, but I've never seen a series that was so strong throughout the first half degrade so suddenly. It's like episode 11 was still amazing and then episodes 12 onwards felt like they were written by completely different writers. There were a few gem scenes. However, I couldn't fully enjoy them because the pacing and surrounding plot was just hot garbage. Those scenes just made me feel even more sad like they were meant to be part of the amazing series that the first half established. Within the last 3 episodes, there's multiple occasions (one in particular in the cafe that irks me... iykyk) where a character literally answers questions about mysteries and character motivations throughout the series like a Q&A section. The pinnacle of lazy writing by reverting to telling not showing.

I usually love dramas that have a great ensemble cast with very heartwarming relationships (like the Reply series). However, the poor writing made it so difficult to find any joy in the final developments of some of my favorite relationships in the series.

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Must see for refreshing plot and humor but drags in the middle

Such a refreshing plotline. The comedy had me dying laughing. The chemistry between the leads is amazing as well. I'd say the beginning third and last third really make the show. I almost stopped watching in the middle because the show was getting bogged down by the politics. The humor that made the show so charming went away for a bit, and we didn't get enough time with out leads which is where the show loses major points from me. However, it picks back up around episode 13, and I was absolutely hooked again until the end. Definitely a must-see drama in my opinion because the humor is impeccable and the plot is so refreshing. I don't recommend for a one-sitting binge though because of the dragging.

I loved that the "female" lead kept their eccentricities until the end. The actress did an absolutely phenomenal job depicting a man's consciousness inhabiting a woman's body. The mannerisms were so on point and was such good observational humor about men's mannerisms. Jang Bong Hwan in the Queen's body was my favorite character in the show hands down.

I wish that they perhaps consolidated some of the villainous characters so there would be less villains but more flushed out into 3D beings. I think it would have given our main characters more screen time, would have prevented the drama from dragging in the middle, and made the court drama more engaging. The villains are quite two dimensional and don't have a backstory to enforce their motives. Their motives are also very generalized to "money and power." For me, that's the most cliche part of the show is the villains. Even when Concubine Eui and Byeong-In become bad guys for a period of time, their characters lose all dimension to fit their villain roles.

As for the ending, I'm not sure I could have reasonably expected anything different. I knew going into this drama that by the end they would try to make it as heteronormative as possible, given how the LGBTQ+ community is viewed in South Korea. Also, most Kdramas don't usually have stellar endings so I'm giving it a lot of leeway. I hope in a time where the LGBTQ+ community is more accepted that they will remake this drama so we can get all the love scenes and the ending that Jang Bong Hwan and Cheoljong deserve. The only great thing about the ending is when the Queen visits Byeong-In's grave and tells him "you found me again even when I was hiding"... Oh my god that hit me right in the feels and was the perfect scene that encompassed their relationship.

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So much potential lost

The first five episodes of this series are absolutely phenomenal. I love the in-depth development of our totally bada** female lead's backstory. I would recommend only watching those first episodes.

However, once you catch up to "today's" world, I recommend just dropping the series and just inferring what happens from there in the most generic way possible. I found the female lead totally lost most of the things I loved about her as the series went on, and those characteristics I loved would only come back as convenient plot devices before washing away again. She gets too caught up in revenge. Too much focus on administrative drama.

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