I came into this with high expectations, as I love and adore both lead actors. I thought no matter the story, these two can make anything work. Sadly, no. No actor in the world could have rescued this mess of sloppy, contrived, and inconsistent writing.
I have watched my fair share of K dramas, from the excellent to the mediocre but have never been more disappointed or angry than with this one.
Whatever was deemed inappropriate content is nothing I would even raise an eyebrow over (the "kiss" in the pilot is chaste and without context, the protagonist's best friend draws an erotic webtoon for a living **yawn), however having a Korean character be borderline blackface and his portrayal as a "Rastafarian" be the butt of all jokes is cultural appropriation at best and racism at worst. How is this a "joke" in 2020? he could have been made a funny sidekick without all of that, he could have been the awkward virgin who longs for love but is getting paid to write erotica and make that hilarious. Ugh so disappointing.
Aside from that, the plot is a mess. Instead of having a meaningful past connection between the main couple established, we are thrown one scene of background, remembered by the female protagonist who has been stalking the male protagonist for a decade (oh yes, how romantic *sarcasm). When the male protagonist finally remembers it at the very end, we are not given any insight of how he came to this revelation or why it would matter (no soulmate vibe here, peeps). We have to watch him suffer in an annoying relationship with someone who doesn't value him for 10 out of the 16 episodes (I kid you not and no, this is not the female protagonist but a side character). We aren't given any meaningful development of his feelings for the female protagonist, no believable switch from his brotherly/ supportive boss attitude to actually having romantic feelings at all.
And to add insult to injury, we are not even given a romantic kiss between the leads at the very very end?
What was the point of the martial arts plot? To teach us that violence is NOT the way to solve conflicts? Except it turns out, in this show it absolutely is shown to be the solution every single time? If the martial arts school her dad ran was supposed to be the red line that threads all the main characters together, it miserable failed at that, too.
And I know music isn't THAT important but if I hear "crazy, crazy" one more time, I'll scream.
Don't get me wrong, there are a handful of emotional and well acted and executed scenes in this drama, mostly centered around family and feelings of belonging but they are few and far between.
What an underwhelming, uninspired waste of two amazingly talented and beautiful actors.
I have watched my fair share of K dramas, from the excellent to the mediocre but have never been more disappointed or angry than with this one.
Whatever was deemed inappropriate content is nothing I would even raise an eyebrow over (the "kiss" in the pilot is chaste and without context, the protagonist's best friend draws an erotic webtoon for a living **yawn), however having a Korean character be borderline blackface and his portrayal as a "Rastafarian" be the butt of all jokes is cultural appropriation at best and racism at worst. How is this a "joke" in 2020? he could have been made a funny sidekick without all of that, he could have been the awkward virgin who longs for love but is getting paid to write erotica and make that hilarious. Ugh so disappointing.
Aside from that, the plot is a mess. Instead of having a meaningful past connection between the main couple established, we are thrown one scene of background, remembered by the female protagonist who has been stalking the male protagonist for a decade (oh yes, how romantic *sarcasm). When the male protagonist finally remembers it at the very end, we are not given any insight of how he came to this revelation or why it would matter (no soulmate vibe here, peeps). We have to watch him suffer in an annoying relationship with someone who doesn't value him for 10 out of the 16 episodes (I kid you not and no, this is not the female protagonist but a side character). We aren't given any meaningful development of his feelings for the female protagonist, no believable switch from his brotherly/ supportive boss attitude to actually having romantic feelings at all.
And to add insult to injury, we are not even given a romantic kiss between the leads at the very very end?
What was the point of the martial arts plot? To teach us that violence is NOT the way to solve conflicts? Except it turns out, in this show it absolutely is shown to be the solution every single time? If the martial arts school her dad ran was supposed to be the red line that threads all the main characters together, it miserable failed at that, too.
And I know music isn't THAT important but if I hear "crazy, crazy" one more time, I'll scream.
Don't get me wrong, there are a handful of emotional and well acted and executed scenes in this drama, mostly centered around family and feelings of belonging but they are few and far between.
What an underwhelming, uninspired waste of two amazingly talented and beautiful actors.