Started great than fell into every single K Drama tropes

Very Short review here.

It's started fun and fresh. Very cute and funny with an interesting setup of following ex-cons and the challenges they encountered in trying to build a life in Korean society... all that with a fun and fresh romance...
Too bad this drama decided after a couple of episodes to veer away from what made this romance feel fresh and new and focus on basically what all k romances have done for the past 20+ years: the childhood connection, the ridiculous love triangle, the useless family drama (mafia style) in order to get a useless noble hero trope + separation trope and a couple of needless side stories to give some depth to some extra characters ( and I said extra not secondary).

Throw in a couple of side couples I never manage to care about - especially the baby couple... their love story just felt so forced it made me roll my eyes big time - in order to fill the minutes for the empty plot and you get My Sweet Mobster. Not a bad show, not a great show, a somewhat meh-good show that you'll probably forget in 2 months tops and is going to join the long list of shows you watch to pass the time and doesn't make you invested.

Not a show I would recommend... I struggled to finish it. The only reason I did was because I watched it as it aired... but it's definitely a show I would have dropped earlier if all episodes had been available as I would have checked where this series was going after I felt it was started to drag... which is something I started to feel about episode 8.
I'd say, the first 10 episodes are a delight... but after that the drama takes a very quick and steep deep dive into tropey territory and ultimately lost me.

As in most Romance K dramas, this show would have been great if it had only been 10 to 12 episodes at most. Ultimately its length ruined it. I was personally very tired by the end of it... But I do think you should watch it to make up your mind. Most characters are adorable and for some viewers, lots of the flaws can be overlooked, just because you love the characters that much.

It's usually my case... but not this time.
Dear My Sweet Mobster. Our relation was somewhat ok while it lasted... I don't hate you... but I won't remember you.

Lire davantage

Beautiful but draggy and frustrating

Hmmm... One of the rare case where I'm going to lower my initial ratings after a rewatch. I rated it 8.5 initially but I've decided to lower my ratings to 7.5. Not because I've changed my mind since I initially watched this 3 years ago... but rather because everything I felt back then, is still the same today. It's just that 3 years ago, I just couldn't bring myself to rate this show according to what I truly felt given the production value, how gorgeous this series is and how much people liked it. High production BLs is still a rarity in Thailand so whenever you come across one, we tend to forget to rate the show for its overall story and not for how good it looks. Not saying it shouldn't play a part in the overall ratings but it shouldn't overshadow the main criterion which is the story.

So what issue do I have with this show? Well, since I'm too lazy to write a long review and lots of people have extensively written about how magnificent this drama is yadayadayada, I'll go straight to the elephant in the room:

Struggle n°1: I feel the director loves their cinematography too much. Yes it's gorgeous, yes it's important to let the viewers be "in the moment" but every time I feel like each scene could have managed the same effect with less extra seconds. Each scene is always slightly too long to the point of feeling draggy and because it piles up and piles up repeatedly, it just makes watching the whole thing a struggle.

Struggle n°2: These teenagers are SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO frustrating. Teh in particular. I'm not gonna go back on his case but I found these characters realistic but frustrating to watch. My God were they frustrating to the max. Is it because my teenage years are a far away memory now but there were many instances were I was just utterly fed up with the both of them. Both Teh and O-Ew were being ridiculous.... But Teh was on another level. No matter how beautiful the show was, at the end of the day, Teh made every scene a struggle. I'm not really sure why I got frustrated to that degree because I regularly watch shows featuring teenagers and no matter how unreasonable, I'm usually not as frustrated... But my guess is that Teh just has a very shitty personally. He's not a bad person, but the few flaws he has are HUGE. Most of his problems are struggles of his own making but the worst of it is how hurtful he turns out to be and repeatedly at that.

With almost 20 years of Asian dramas under my belt, I can count on the fingers of ONE hand, the number of times I wish the main pair didn't end up together. This one takes one finger and I hope I'm mistaken... But I think the follow-up series "I Promised You the Moon" which I've yet to watch, is probably going to take another... of the same hand.

I'm glad to see that I'm not the only one who felt that way though. When it first aired, it was difficult to find anybody who shared the same sentiment but time did its job, you see lots of people who are sharing their frustration.
People who loved it LOVED it though... So you should definitely check it out yourself.

I'm currently rewatching though... But with 2 episodes left on my rewatch, I'm now 100% sure my opinion is not gonna change. I felt the same back then and still feel the same today.

Lire davantage

Not terrible just mediocre

So...
8 episodes to the end and the most accurate reviews go to people rating it 7 or below.

I was pretty invested when I started this show but ultimately the show fell flat.
It's a BL with a plot which is rare. But as a story, romance-wise, plot-wise, wuxia-wise, execution-wise, production-wise etc. it lacks on all fronts. Though I have to mention that given China's censorship, I wasn't expecting anything from the BL aspect no matter how much people lauded the BL aspect of this show. I'm glad I did because, the few flirtatious lines felt more like two friends teasing each other than anything else which is 100% ok btw, I don't see the problem. My problem is people advertising this show as one the greatest BL of all time when there's just two friends teasing each other.
On that front, I'm sure I'm part of the minority since everybody's saying the flirting is pretty explicit... which is true... But I don't know maybe its because I'm French. I personally consider such teasing pretty average. It's more a matter of interpretation than anything else. If you take them seriously it's flirting. If you don't, it's just teasing each other by pretending your relation is really really close... which I've seen many of my perfectly heterosexual male friends do. There's this mention of "soulmate"... But very early on, it's established that it doesn't necessarily mean in a romantic way so here.

Also I don't remember when the switch happened but at some point, there are so many characters and subplots and the supposed main leads take such a backseat that we spend more time with the villains plotting whatever convoluted plot has been written (which is very complicated... for something actually pretty simple) that I started to wonder if this show was really supposed to be about Ke Xing and Zi Shu since they are hardly featured in there. As mentioned by other reviewers, it feels like they're both literally watching the story from the sidelines instead of actively participating in it.

Anyway... I'm finishing Ep 28 as I'm typing these lines... but I've been struggling with this show for more 13 episodes now.

I'm still going to finish it since I'm too close to the end to give it up... But my advice for people who want to watch this show is...
Lower your expectations A LOT to avoid dissapointment. If you have a blast, good for you, but if you don't, just know that you're not an exception at all.

I'm usually not the type of person that screams "overrated" since lots of shows which are very loved on MDL are shows that I personally hated so I understand my taste doesn't necessarily always align with others ( though most of the time it does)...
This being said, here I'm forced to say overrated.

It's not terrible... But it's very very bland and again too much plotting, too much talking, not enough time with the leads, too many side characters. I haven't seen an immense amount of wuxia so far... But I'm getting really getting familiar with the genre, and out of all of them, this one is at the bottom of the bottom of the bottom of the barrel in terms of fighting scenes.
I don't particularly mind the low production value, but when low production value is combined with a mediocre story, it just ruins the experience even more. It just doesn't work as a story period. But as a BL from China... I guess you could say you'll have a hard time finding something that's better ( and no I haven't seen the Untamed yet... or rather I dropped it at episode 19 but I'm planning to give it another go... for the story not for the BL aspect as I've read the first 3 volumes of the novel).

At the time I'm writing these lines... I'm heading towards a rating of 6.5 at most... But I'm leaning more towards 6 or 5.5. It started ok but it quickly went downhill. Even if I did my outmost to be generous, this show would never get more than an 8 (and that would be being generous with generosity itself) , calling it a "masterpiece" is just ridiculous.

Also... Something I've noticed with a lot of Chinese shows I've seen so far. They drag things out A LOT and then the end is just rushed leaving you with a very unsatisfactory ending. Why not use time more efficiently instead of feeding the audience with boredom and useless scenes that do not contribute to the plot, featuring characters we don't care about? This unfortunately has also been done in Word of Honor.

Again, not terrible... just mediocre.

EDIT: Final Ratings 4.5. I Just can't give it even an average ratings. Don't even get me started on the bonus episode. All the final scenes that were supposed to be epic just didn't resonate because of the poor production value and very very average and bland filming. There was no cinematic flair and it was toped by some terrible acting.. Only sheer will helped me finish this as I just can' t use the fast-forward button for the life of me.

This drama has drained me so I'm going to stay away from Chinese productions for at least 2 months... and be sure to carefully really carefully choose my next Chinese drama because I just don't want to go through the same ordeal twice in a row.

Lire davantage

WTF was that?

I have a new synonym for "Complete Waste of Time" ==> Funouhan aka Impossibility Defense or as I'd rather call it "Impossible Crime" which is the literal translation of the title and makes much more sense. It's been years I haven't watched something so terrible or random or... I don't even know what to say... Just that I'm flabbergasted that I've sat through this whole ordeal with the hope that this would lead somewhere...

Anywhere.

I'm PISSED because I usually only manage to have a bit less than 2 hours to watch anything per day (basically when I'm eating) and today's treat has been wasted on this dumpster fire.

Watched it on Viki where the Ratings is incredibly low for the platform (8.4) but I naively thought that since most viewers on Viki are women... they tend to lean more towards romance and crime/thrillers usually have less audience which might explain the ratings.

Haha. My Bad. I should have checked the comment section.

I think the best comment I read for this movie is from:

@KuroSteve "I guess most of the actors were young and needed the money ... –_–"

Will I ever bother to watch the prequel ( not available on Viki for now): NO
Will I ever bother to read the manga: NOPE

Terrible as a stand-alone and even worse as something supposed to make you interested in the original manga.

To you, poor naive soul who has gotten lost on MDL and want to find a good Japanese thriller... This is NOT the one. Do yourself a service and find something else.

If you're still curious, well, at least I've done my duty. You've been warned.

If I could rate this show below 0, that would be a minus 10.

PS: Yeah I know the suggested rating is higher... but no way in hell am I giving this more than 1.

Lire davantage

Terribly Formulaic.

So I wasn't planning on writing any review for this show... but since the only review currently available is in French, I thought I'll make the effort for those of you who don't speak the language. If you speak French, I direct you to read Kenseiden's review which is way better written than what you're about to read. For the record, I'm also French... so don't expect my prose to be as compelling as his in English.

So this is a live action adapted from a 22 volumes manga. Now. I'm personally not familiar with the manga itself. Never heard of it before so given the title I was expecting some form of puzzle game à la Liar Game ( of which I've read the manga and watched the 2014 K drama adaptation but not the Japanese one). This review is hence solely and purely based on the live adaptation itself.

The first episode started great. It looked good and it felt expensive... I thought I was in for a high budget wild ride.

...
My... Was I mistaken.
This feels very cheap... All the budget must have gone to produce the first episode, the last 3 minutes of the show and the demons/devils CGIs.

Very quickly this shounen adaptation fell into a very repetitive formula which very flat and boring directing didn't help and led me quickly to a state of ultimate boredom. 1 episode = 1 game + 1 new friend or friendly foe. This is a genre that I usually enjoy. Japanese are usually pretty good at turning something pretty boring on the outside, into something exciting... particularly when it comes to mind puzzles. Unfortunately not this time.

If you manage to get past the 4/5 first episodes ( so HALF the drama), things pick up a bit and though the formula is still the same, there's enough new plots thrown into the mix to keep things mildly more interesting. But not that much.

The series must have stayed pretty faithful to its source material because unfortunately we also get the usual shounen manga style acting that don't always match well with live actions. I'm still not really sure it worked well here but I'd say it's 50/50. By the time I reached the end, I was no longer as annoyed with the over the top anime like acting of the actors as I was when I started the show.

More importantly, good adaptations require sometimes that you let go of some of the shounen clichés such as: revelation no jutsu, talk no jutsu, family trauma no jutsu, the power of friendship no jutsu, the final useless talk no jutsu, the blahblahblahblah no jutsu ( to fill the minute and create some tension in the cheap background that looks like my garage, if I had a garage), the let's be friends forever even if we've met only once and you're an asshole no jutsu, the friendship/rivalry no jutsu, the useless butler no jutsu, the I'm better than you back-and-forth-useless-dialogues no jutsu, I'm turning evil so I change my clothes and haircut no jutsu, the power of friendship is the only thing you need to save the world no jutsu, the savior syndrome no jutsu, the sacrifice no jutsu AH I forgot the I-tell-you-my-life-sob-story no jutsu because I need you to understand where I'm coming from because it would be too long in a manga to draw and too expensive in a live action to film... no jutsu.

Of course this ACMA game... has err.... Games. And as usual in the genre, comprises of lots of strategies that are easier to follow in written format than on TV. I tried to, but as per usual at some point the strategies got so convoluted ( and the characters remember everything because... err Shounen no jutsu, inhumane memory no jutsu and shut up it's a manga no jutsu), I switched my brain off and kept on reading my subtitles mindlessly... no jutsu.

And yeah you might be irritated to read my review no jutsu... But seriously this live action oozes "shounen" from every single pores of its body if it had any. And I get it. It's a live action... But a good live action is an adaptation. What works in a manga/anime doesn't necessarily work with live actors. You ADAPT. And I struggle to see where they adapted anything except for the budget and removing a lot of the original story.

Most of the plot twists were expected though I didn't see the "BIG" plot twist in episode 9 coming. Arguably most people would have seen it miles away but it was just too big a cliché for me to predict. Should have kept my guard up. No amount of plot twists could save this live action though.

In conclusion:

Was it a bad show? Err... I honestly don't know. I don't see it as bad because it is a shounen. Shounen are made to be exciting... But if you're already very familiar with the genre... this one doesn't feel fresh, it's an old recipe that's been done and done again except that it is without directing flair so even its most exciting parts felt either boring, bland or both. Some of the clichés will make you roll your eyes. The final episode ends as it started: with a lot of predictable plot twists which you probably have seen coming miles away and hence just felt like lazy writing.
Reaching the final ten minutes, I started to wonder if this wasn't a shounen parody.
It felt like a manga that was literally riding on a popular trend at the time it was written without any effort to bring something original to the mix and a live action just as lazy, which didn't bother to adapt it well to fit its format.

Would I recommend it? NO

Did I have fun watching it?

Err It depends... I was bored for the first 4/5 episodes but once I understood that this would be filled to the brim with clichés, I started to enjoy making fun of the show... Do you know? It's the feeling you get when you're watching what we call in French a "nanar" : a show that's so bad, it's good.

So my final rating will be a 7. Don't trust the individual notes I gave because I just made it so that it reached 7. The best rating that was suggested from the ones I had originally entered was a 6... But honestly the show got so fun in its ridiculousness that I think it deserves a good 7 for the laugh.

Lire davantage

Not enough story to fill 16 episodes

Really enjoyable up to episode 9. After that it's just useless fillers with additional useless storylines to fill the minutes... which couldn't even last until episode 14. Yes. I'm not kiding. Even the filler plots were so weak and useless that it lasted only until the middle of episode 13 and after that... It's fillers after fillers. It's sweet and will give you cavities if you're craving sugar... But personally, I like sweetness that goes somewhere, not snippets of unrelated scenes stuck together. Also, I wasn't invested in any of these relationships by the end of the drama given how draggy it went... so that unfortunately made me also fall out of love with it.
When I started this show... I was sure to give it a strong 9 which when down to 8.5 which went down to 7 which went down to 5.

It doesn't help that I was watching this during the same period that Lovely Runner aired which stroke the perfect balance between lots of sweetness and humor tinged with a bit of sadness and thriller plots. The comparison was just unavoidable. This drama attempted the same for 7 episodes but failed poorly at everything.... and it felt poorly notably because it was not presented to us from the beginning. We were offered a love/hate relationship with two characters who secretly loved each other and that was IT. At each new plot they added (the secret mother, anti-fan number 1, number 2 and number 3), I was left with a feeling of "What was exactly the point of these storylines in the story?". It was poorly executed, pointless and so on and so forth. It didn't feel like they were organically weaved to the main story but rather that they were added just to feel the 7 remaining episodes i.e almost HALF of the series.

It terms of production... It's a K-drama... They do things well BUT there was no cinematic flair at all. I've seen enough Rom Com to know there's way better directing you can do on a rom com. This felt extremely generic and very lazy.

[And I didn't comment about the whole "Africa" debacle... But I COMPLETELY get why people were pissed since I also was. I didn't take it into account for my ratings. I've just decided to erase it from my memory since I think they had good intentions... but it seriously backfired]

Should have stopped at 10 episodes... 12, if I'm being generous. But 16? Gimme a break!

Lire davantage

Disappointment of the year with awful kisses on top

[This was actually a pretty long rant, but I had to remove 2/3 of it because MDL limits reviews to 10 000 characters]

Started well, then turned into a crying fest, then went back to what it should have done from the beginning but in such an unearned, nonsensical and jarring way, that this supposed 'rom com' turned into a parody of its genre : Terribly formulaic, no satisfying closure to any of the conflicts raised and a final cop-out twist in episode 13 that definitely cemented this drama into the mediocre and forgettable category.

Final ratings 4.

My love for both leads saved me from giving less. The show was weak but the performances were strong but alas my frustration level got so HIGH and the over-the-top “fake sweetness” of the last episodes prevented me from giving this a passing grade. In fact given how annoyed I got… had it been other actors, I’d probably would have given less.

When a show is not consistent with itself, that’s were I draw the line.

But let’s start with the good... err 10 000 characters limit so let's forget it, there's plenty of other reviews for that.

Now..

On to the long rant (sigh...)

This show doesn’t know what it wants to do. Is it Melo, Slice of Life, Rom’ Com? Choose what you want to do and stick to it. You want realistic problems with realistic solutions ? Sure. Then follow through with all characters.
Every single problem these characters faced apart from Seok Ryu’s were magically resolved overnight.

Absentee parents ? No problem, let’s all hug, and over 30 years of neglect are swept under the rug. Estranged couple with NO COMMUNICATION whatsoever notably because of the assumption that one is cheating the other ? No problem ! The dude with whom she is supposed to have cheated is gay. So all of these years of not talking disappear overnight after some dramatic night in the forest !
Also the husband who has been shown to always be busy because of his work at the hospital, has now all the time in the world to get drunk literally everyday with Seok Ryu’s dad. Makes no sense, but since these two were the only ones that truly made me genuinely smile/laugh by the end of this drama, I’ll give them a pass.

Children are not stupid, if they see your careers are more important than they are in your eyes, they learn the hard way to become indifferent very early in life. Seung Hyo caring about your divorce?At 34? Seriously? As if! If he even cared about the both of you at that point that would be short of a miracle.

Ah… but it’s a rom com’, why so serious? Why? I don’t know, ask the show. They went into a full cancer nightmare, work harassment, blaming shit, crying fest and so on and so forth for more than 6 episodes, so I feel entitled to get the same amount of care for issues foreshadowed since episode 1. Is that too much to ask?

Wife gas-lighting her husband literally every day ? Let’s put some drama in so that she makes a grand declaration because even if she gaslights him, she’s got his back so everything is forgotten. She doesn’t need to change because « her heart is in the right place ». And I’m not even talking about her hitting literally everything that moves.

Little Brother is spoiled and want easy money. Got scammed one more time, made his parents loose some money AGAIN, but poor dude is crying because he’s just a victim of circumstances. Big sis is doing a small talk and we’re all back on good terms ?
NOPE. Doesn’t work show.

Journalist’s got a daughter so you can see how Mo Eum and him can’t be a couple because of South Korean’s society… BUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUT NOPE. Plot twist, his daughter is actually his niece so there’s no longer any real obstacle because this show HAS NO BALLS !!!

But we do need to have the mother opposed to it for I don’t know why, because there’s 3 episodes left, and by God do we need to fill the minutes… with these overly long-ass episodes.

As for the romance…. My God, let’s just forget how it started. I don’t even know were to start, and this review is already too long…

The good : Seung Hyo and his ex. That was actually a pretty satisfying and realistic part of the drama. Not overly dramatic just pretty natural and nice. Gotta give praise where it’s due.

The VERY bad: Seok Ryu, her ex and her present


The ex comes to visit South Korea and win Seok Ryu back. At that point, Seung Hyo is not yet going out with Seok Ryu. Yet, he feels entitled to act jealous, is extremely rude to her ex who HE DOESN’T KNOW, acts like he’s got dibs on her when she hasn’t even agreed to be with him.

WHAT.A.TURN.OFF

But it’s Jung Hae In, he’s the male lead so we’re supposed to give him a pass. So Ok. I’ll give a pass to this MAJOR RED FLAG.

Any man acting in such an overbearing way when you’re not even going out together yet is to be fled from immediately. You can be sure it’s gonna be worse once you get together. In fact, you can smell the wife’s beater from miles away.

He’s not like this because he likes you. He’s like this because you’re his thing, and you need to stay in line.

But it’s a K drama so don’t worry, once he gets the girl, he’s gonna turn all nice. And you bet he is going to get her because at some point after having declared his love, he tells her  « I don’t do friendship with you no more » meaning if the dude can’t be her boyfriend… he’s decided he’s going to put an end to their 30+ years of friendship.

Another Minus for the Emotional Blackmail.
Also, INCONSISTENCIES anyone ?

Wasn’t the reason why you didn’t want to say your feelings in the first place was because you were afraid of losing your FRIENDSHIP ??? Why are you so willing to flush it down the toilet now ? Are you 13 ? I don’t mind the childish banter but at some point a 34 years old do need to show the maturity of a 34 years-old WHEN IT COUNTS.

Ultimately Seok Ryu gives up Mister Green Flag for Mister Red Flag because of… K Drama. She cries at the airport and I wonder why.
Either you still have some feelings and you cry because you’re realizing what a gigantic mistake you’re making or you don’t.

It wouldn’t have been nice for the fiance to say : " I realize you never loved me as much as I did. I supported you through your darkest time, put my career on hold for a year, you threw me away for one dispute, I crossed a whole continent to win you back, only to realize your heart never truly belonged to me. It’s a good thing we broke up. I deserve better".

But it’s a K drama so, we can’t make the FL look like she acted terrible towards a man who’s only crime was to love her so he apologizes for "not helping her the right way" and "realizing she needed other people by her side". And I’m not saying he didn’t make mistakes, but it takes two to tango, and he was the only one who tried to dance.

The truth is, you never loved him enough, you didn’t want to live in the US, you hated your job, you missed a certain someone that wasn’t your fiance. You had plenty of reasons to go back to South Korea, but show decided to put the blame on the break-up YOU initiated instead of on all the elephants in the room.

As far as feelings go, I was never sold on her being with any of them.
It’s difficult to sell a couple when one party was, until recently, engaged with another man who supported her through her cancer ordeal, who she had a five-year intimate relationship with, and who cried crocodile tears when said man left. Obviously you need all these EXTRA SWEETER THAN SWEET scenes to make you believe this relationship is more solid than the one the FL left behind ( THE CRINGE is through the roof)

It was too melo before so by episode 11 it’s in sweet overdrive – to the point of turning the show utterly ridiculous, boring and cringe. As soon as our lead are together they sleep together. As soon as they sleep together, we’re speeding to the marriage proposal??? Girl got engaged after ¾ years of dating with Saint Ex, but not even half a year has passed since she broke off her marriage that she already has another dude’s bracelet around her wrist. .

It would have been good if all that sugar had been peppered throughout the whole show instead of drenching viewers in it for the last episodes... Also since they need to make us feel some empathy for the other characters we get all the conflicts I talked about above, resolved in speedy, unsatisfactory and ridiculous fashion. Even when there was supposed to be legitimate issues, the show treated it as a 'non problem' and I would have given an example if there was no 10 000 characters limit.
This writer needs some fake dramatic plot device such as: husband being scammed by V-tubers, Little bro being scammed by fake protein company, Mother who thinks she’s got Alzheimer and gets lost in forest, Seok Ryu breaking his arm and so on and so forth... in order to get some great empty declaration of love or other BS, so that the conflict is resolved.

The drama concludes with a very neat (and predictable) but dissatisfying little bow. I slugged my way to the end, only managing to finish because I cut each episodes in 4 to 5 parts alternating with more engaging shows or surfing online.


Last but not least… WHY do I have to commit to 3 HOURS EACH WEEK for a ROM COM’ ?!
A FUDGING ROM COM DOESN’T NEED 3 HOURS A WEEK!!!
ARE YOUR DRAMAS ANY BETTER ‘CUZ THEY’RE LONGER?

NOPE. THEY.ARE. NOT!!! WHY TVN WHY?

So please, for the love of all Drama gods Past , Present and Future, STOP THIS INSANITY!

Lire davantage

Another great one from Be On Cloud but this is NOT A ROMANCE.

WARNING : NO SPOILERS But some mild comments which will be separated by lines from the rest of the review.

There was no way they could have given this series a satisfactory ending if not for that one. Although it's bittersweet and a couple of threads could have been better tied up.
One thing I'd like to warn about however is, if you're looking for romance.... this is not the right show. Not that there's not any but it's honestly not the heart of the drama... though they did give some fan service here and there esp. in the final episode in spite of the lack of NC scenes (in the final episode).

____________________________________________

Great was never great but by the time we reached the end of this journey, he had learned to be better. I'm mostly sad for Tonkla, but he crossed a line he should never had. At least Korn redeemed himself though not by choice but because he was driven to it.

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The show was made confusing on purpose and it's one of those that it's better not to know anything about before you start, but at the same time, that confusion is probably what the character we mostly follow felt.

"Why Don't You Stay" was my favorite song in Kinnporsche so it was pretty nice to hear it sung in another voice in the final episode.
Overall a great watch. I personally don't mind NC scenes as long as there's no violence involved ( BDSM or whatever is a BIG NO), some are relatively graphic so it might have hurt some people's sensitivities but personally I watched it for the story so whether there were NC scenes or not didn't make a difference... though I do think some of the earlier scenes with Tonkla felt too gratuitious.

Honestly, I still feel a bit overwhelmed, so I don't know how to write anything coherent apart from that I loved that show from its very first minute and that it kept me on the edge of my seat throughout its 8 weeks long run.
I have nothing but praise for the actors and for the whole crew who worked on this little gem which are SO SO SO RARE in Thai BLs.

Bible delivered but I was confident he'd pull it off, but Jes, Fuaiz, and Bas were nice discoveries. I'll keep on following their next projects whether they act together again or not.

Lire davantage

This is was terrible but Billy LOOKS HOT ???

Did I expect this to be good? NO

BUT!!!!

Just kidding. It sucked. Well. The main series' plot was already all over the place and completely nonsensical but since they attempted something new and my shallow self is always going to rate up anything Billy stars in, I managed to close my eyes and rate the Sign 8. Not this one though. I'm not THAT forgiving.

I have no memory of any special drama being good, so no dissapointment.
I needed my Billy dose and I got some crumbs mixed with a hodgepodge of nonsense. It's time for Billy to get back to filming some real dramas ( BUT NOT a sequel to THE SIGN), because I love him, but I'm sorry I have absolutely NO INTEREST in adds, behind the scenes, and fake couple interviews. I want actors to do their job which is TO ACT ( yeah I know he sings as well but don't care either)

Also, it was very obvious they were setting up the girl captain and the VERY HOT boss of IDF (don't remember his name but I've seen his abs on another drama and he's top tier in the abs department.... WHAT? Don't look at me like that!) to be hot for each other so why didn't we even get a little love-hate kiss from the both of them at the end? Talk about a let down.

Well this wasn't a complete waste of time...
I got to see some bare chested good looking dudes so... not everything is lost.

What? Did anybody finish this for the story?

At least I'm being honest.

PS: Oh yeah... I'm going to be that person. The child actress is... not good. I've seen her in Love Sea. Drama was terrible but her acting was better. She does witty well but any dramatic scenes... not so much. No hate, she's just young... Not expecting stellar performances from child actors... except in South Korea because child actors there... are just on another level. Must be the way they're taught acting I don't know. Anyway. People raving about her acting... Just nope. Arguably, everybody was overacting in this so there's also that.

Though great production value as usual from Idol Factory.

Lire davantage

Wants to tell a grand story and butchers it in 5 episodes.

Amazing Action scenes.

But that's it.

I only knew the manga by name but not its story... But this show tries to tell too much in 5 episodes... and among these 5 episodes, 2 episodes are for the grand final... meaning we have basically 3 episodes to introduce all the main characters, get the brunk of the main story, get attached to the characters... somehow... and be hyped for the fights... While it's visually a great live action and I feel the actors were acting manga-like... - I've read in some comments that some viewers felt the acting was bad... but I beg to differ. They're faithful to what you would get in most shounen anime. It's just that it can't work because you have to get "in the moment" and it's impossible because again they PACKED TOO MUCH in 5 episodes!

Anyway It just made me feel... nothing. Also don't get me started on the blue haired girl who literally spends her time crying when she could have helped them fight. Seriously girl? You can heal people WHAT ARE YOU DOING? But this is a shounen... and girls in shounens are only here to cry and be saved. Completely useless.

Final rating 7. It's short and bingeable... But this series is from a 19 volumes manga whose author was so tired of his editor stressing him out to add more volumes given the series success that he decided to butcher its end.
It deserved at the very least 12 episodes to develop what it tried to tell properly. It deserved better. We deserved better. But so be it.

Won't recommend this live action to anyone but if you are like me and sometimes you don't want to watch something too engaging because you just finished something very heavy, this one might do the trick in-between more engaging dramas.

Lire davantage

STRONG pacing issues, engaging storylines resolved off-screen and a very rushed ending.

So finally finished this... Can't believe it took me this long... But I struggled with the first 4 episodes... then was entertained up to episode 10... and then for some unknown reason slugged through the last 6 episodes.
I really wish I liked this as much as everybody else but for some reason this show wasn't "it" for me. I can't say it's a bad show... But reading other negative reviews... I finally was able to put my finger on what made me struggle with this show：

1. The pacing
2. The pacing
3. The pacing

Basically, this show was really good at creating interesting and engaging storylines but then didn't give enough time to them. It spent too much time on the less engaging ones. It didn't deliver on the romantic front for both couple... It was better on the friendship and youthful aspect, but it didn't deliver at all on the most interesting storylines created such at the relationship between Cheong Ah and her father nor between Se Kyung and her daughter or Se Kyung and her father or Se Kyung and her adoptive parents。 I'd rather they didn't introduce these conflicts if they had no intention of giving them a proper amount of time to be resolved in a satisfactory way... when there was a resolution for that matter because some questions are just... not answered. Yes I'm frustrated.

The end was rushed so that's another minus.

Now, most people really enjoyed the show and were able to get over it in spite of its flaws... And I get it, some of my favorites have plotholes and flaws I just disregarded because ultimately these shows delivered on what I cared most... But this show didn't. It introduced lots of storylines and only delivered on those I cared the least while giving some off-screen resolution if any to the ones I cared the most.

This made each episode feel really really overly long to me.

I know I'm part of the minority so don't let my opinion deter you from watching it. I still gave it a 7 which in my book means that it was enjoyable in some way.

Lire davantage

The One and Only: A political drama as the name doesn't implie.

So on episode 15...
Rave reviews and it was highly recommended by somebody on my friends list. I tried hard but this show is not making it for me. I don't dislike it but it's too heavy on politics and too light on the romance so far... For a 24 episodes show...We only get crumbs of torturous romance here and there... I understand that's the point of it but I can't with that pace...
So far I'm hesitating between a ratings of 7.5 and 8 at most... But we'll see if the remaining episodes make me change my mind.

I wish I liked it as much as everybody else but unfortunately no... Too late to drop this though, I've passed the middle mark. Well at least the show is gorgeous. I'll give it that...
But it is S-L-O-W.

EDIT: Hmm... On to episode 18. I've decided I'm going to binge the remaining episodes because I already left this drama without watching a single episode for over 15 days and given where this is going if I don't finish this NOW, it's probably gonna stay on my Watching List until January... Too much backstabbing, too much politics, not enough romance forbidden or not. That's not what I signed up for. So I'll be probably be among the minority that didn't like this drama.

Is it a bad drama? No
Am I enjoying myself? No
Probable ratings by the end: 7. Genuinely good show that I just didn't like for a variety of reasons .

I think it's important to enjoy yourself, so if the enjoyment is out of the window well better drop it... except It was so highly recommended to me that I hang on until now (ep 18) so now I feel that if I drop it, all these hours would go to waste. This being said, I'll watch "Forever and Ever" at some point. I think I'll enjoy it way more than this one. From the few bits I saw on youtube, that one is heavy on the romance as its title implies contrary to this drama which title suggests a focus on a grand love story but actually focuses a LOT MORE on politics.

I'd personally name it:

"Marriage in ancient times sucked especially if you were a woman except maybe the empress who was lucky enough to be a window and could screw all the very young, fit, six packed soldiers she fancied, but don't worry since everyone is backstabbing everyone karma's gonna get her at some point. Also, assholes survive, good people die or live their lives unhappy, so f*** escapism in your romance drama: A political journey."

Lire davantage