(The review below is my own personal point of view, if you disagree please do not be offended
this is one drama I would have loved to say I liked, and while I enjoyed some parts of it and found it overall entertaining, I still dreaded a lot of other things about it.
I went into this drama because I am a bit of a Jung Kyung Ho fan myself, and also because I felt like watching a light romcom after my long hiatus from Kdrama watching.
well, I am not necessarily disappointed and definitely can't say it was a waste of time, but this drama failed to thrill me, or make me enthusiastic watching it.
# First and foremost, the story
It is a very common old-school romance comedy with a touch of angst, and by old-school I mean....well I'll get to the point; cilched.
It had the childhood friends which were separated and reunited as adults, and the one-sided love from the hero reigniting towards the pure and kind-hearted heroin.
We also have the love triangle, and as angsty as it can get with the two males being best friends.
The only new twist about the story might be in the fact that all of the sides of the love triangle (well, most of the characters in the drama!) are divorced (thereby the title of the drama), and the hero has a kid which he brought up himself. Oh, and also maybe that the heroine is an ex-idol.
So overall, there's nothing super special or unexpected going about in the story, you're kind of watching waiting for the next expected step to happen while enjoying some fun interactions between the leads. Also towards the end the drama felt so dragging with not much going on for any of the characters. It made me always eager to find out how they will fill up or the remaining episodes, and why don't they just cut the thing shorter.
# The characterization
This drama has a huge amount of characters, main characters, side characters and in-between them a bunch of filler characters. We have the main 4 ex-idols/old-time BFFs (hereinafter "the quartet"), we also have our main lead and his best friend (and also the third angle in the love triangle, hereinafter referred to as"3rd angle" ) and his ex-wife.
The main male lead was by far my favorite character, maybe thanks to Jung Kyung Ho (heheheh) or simply because he was very well-written realistic character which Jung Kyung Ho helped to bring it to live as a relatable and lovable single-father. The main female character is also nicely written and brought to life by the hands of the ever cute baby-faced beauty Jang Na Ra. She's a woman who has been through many tough challenges in her life making her a strong and independent person. The two's chemistry and the zing you felt in the way they talked and looked to each other was so lovable and irresistible, you can not help but cheer for them.
The story being the kind of simple one that it is, it was only normal that the writers felt obliged to create a story-line for each character or a couple of them. In doing that they had to stretch all these story-lines in order for each to develop parallel to the main story. The problem is not in the large variety of characters and their consequent story-lines, but rather in the fact that out of all the characters only one or two felt believable and their stories ones that you could relate to and care about, with the rest of the characters being either odd-balls that downright drove you mad, mediocre with uninteresting stories, filling the drama with scenes that were meh making you feel the urge to fast foreword.
As for the other 4 side characters; the 3 ex-idols and the 3rd angle, only one of them made me care about her and that was Da Joeng and the rest of them were just there to add either a spice of comedy or angst but were never quite convincing . Regarding the quartet, I have to add that I couldn't help feeling that not only was Dong Mi and Ae Ran's characters lacking and mediocre and there scenes sometimes boring, but I also felt that the actresses were ill-chosen, both not really fitting their respective characters...one didn't give that ajumma or lacking-on-the-looks-side feel that she was supposed to give, and the other was the other way around, never feeling that hot or sexy like she was supposed to be, but rather looking older than everyone else around her.
As for the remaining character of the quartet, Dajoeng, as I previously mentioned her story was the only one I found interesting, with an idea I believe has not been introduced many times before in Kdramas. I have to sadly admit that at a certain point when the main lead's story was relatively settled with not many developments, I was more curious to find out how her story will progress even more than their's ( I also believe I read in several other reviews people saying they were watching eager to know how her story ends), it might be a good thing,but I also believe we have to admit it should be considered as a flaw in the writing.
I don't want to go into details not to make this any longer, but I hated a certain character so badly I could barely hold myself from throwing something at my PC screen, and that is the 3rd angle aka. Dr. Goo Hae Jun. I couldn't quite understand what the writers were trying to tell through his strange admiration towards the main female lead, but if they were trying to sell it as love or even attraction they failed, at least for me. To me it only felt as a strange obsession and a wish to relive his sad past differently on other people's cost. He always gave that bad-loser aura, a guy which doesn't know when to stop and simply give up....AND I HATE THAT KIND OF CHARACTERS. There were many moments in which I sincerely wished he would act in a certain way and salvage his horrible character putting an end to all the meaningless angst he was causing, but no NEVER...he always disappointed me right until the end...there was no salvation to this guy.
# Directing
The editing between the scenes was sometimes odd. I know there are many side stories going on, but you don't have to show me someone receiving an urgent call telling them to rush over because something bad has happened, and the next thng a totally unncessary and boring scene of two people chatting over a cup of coffee, that could wait believe me.
# Music
Overall a fine OST, liked some vocal tracks that started playing towards the end when the angst arch was at its peak.
I'm gonna try to sum things up:
If you're looking for a fun & light rom-com + you're either a Jung Kyung Ho or a Jang Na Ra fan, you can go ahead and give this drama a try, it's a fun watch.
But if you're looking for a rom-com with a bit of a new touch, that would make you thrilled and on the edge of your seat waiting for the next episode, then I would advise you to look elsewhere.
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