Disclaimer: this is a review, and as such it contains spoilers of the whole series. Please proceed to read at your own risk if you still plan on watching this show or if you haven’t finished it yet. You have been warned.

Romantics Anonymous
(匿名の恋人たち/ Tokumei no koibitotachi / Anonymous Lovers)
MyDramaList rating: 7.5/10

Hiya, and welcome to my last review of 2025! Instead of spinning my Wheel of Fortune as usual, I decided to wrap up this year with a new show that I was curious about. I haven’t gotten to watch many Japanese dramas this year and it seemed to be a romantic and atmospheric end-of-the-year show, which I happened to be in the mood for. I’ll say right of the bat that this drama managed to surprise me in unexpected ways. It was very typical at times, but then I would suddenly find myself tearing up at random moments. I also thought they did a really good job at merging the different themes and touching on various important topics, so I’m excited to share my views on it. I’ll keep the intro at that. Allons-y!

Romantics Anonymous is a Japanese Netflix drama with eight episodes of about 50 minutes long. It’s a remake of the Belgian-French movie Les Émotifs Anonymes from 2010. The story centers around Lee Ha Na (played by Han Hyo Joo), a talented chocolatier with a severe case of scopophobia (the fear of being watched or stared at in public). The only person she’s ever been able to look in the eye was her mother, and after she passed Ha Na has been living in blissful solitude, doing the one thing that brings her the most happiness: making chocolate. After a traumatic experience at a chocolatier contest, Ha Na was approached by Kuroiwa Kenji (played by Okuda Eiji) who insisted she come work for him at this chocolaterie, Le Sauveur. Despite the fact that Ha Na’s scopophobia applied to him as well, Chef Kenji managed to comfort her and give her a sense of purpose and belonging. Ha Na started working for him as an ‘Anonymous Chocolatier’; she makes the chocolate at home, delivers it to Le Sauveur early in the morning and always keeps her identity hidden from the rest of the staff.
When Chef Kenji tragically passes away due to a heart attack, Ha Na’s position as Anonymous Chocolatier (AC from now on) is jeopardized when a large conglomerate called Futago Confectionary takes over the chocolaterie and intends to sever her contract since they ‘can’t work with someone they don’t know’. The president’s position is given to Fujiwara Sosuke (played by Oguri Shun), the son of Futago’s CEO. Just like Ha Na, Sosuke also suffers from a mental illness, in his case an extreme form of germophobia: he can’t touch anyone without becoming physically unwell, and even the tiniest speck of dirt on his clothing causes an irrepressible urge to cleanse himself.
Due to a misunderstanding, Ha Na is hired to physically work at Le Sauveur before she can reveal her true identity to the staff. During their first meeting, Ha Na and Sosuke find out that, for some reason, they’re immune to each other’s phobias – Ha Na has no trouble looking Sosuke in the eye and Sosuke can touch Ha Na without feeling queasy – and they decide to help each other ‘practice’ to get better. Despite the fact that Sosuke’s father originally sent him there to steal Le Sauveur’s recipes before tearing the place down, Sosuke gradually warms up to his new team and all the other parties involved in the business, and he and Ha Na find a unique sense of comfort in each other.

I just want to mention in advance that I specifically did NOT watch the original movie because I didn’t want this to become another comparative review like The Beauty Inside. I only watched the trailer and I might watch the movie on another occasion for fun, but not with the purpose of using it as a reference for this review. The only difference I gathered from the trailer was that the main leads seemed to suffer from severe social anxiety, which means that the choices for Ha Na and Sosuke’s phobias were added specifically for this remake, and that’s all I need to know.
I honestly had no idea what this drama was going to be about before I started. I just figured it would be a movie about romance and chocolate, something like the movie Chocolat (2000), and I was down for that. When Sosuke’s germophobia came in I was slightly reminded of I’m Not a Robot, but I ended up being very surprised with the development of this story. Its build-up brought me back to Juuhan Shuttai! in the sense that it goes through specific arcs of bringing on board and improving relationships with various distributors and business partners, who then end up coming to Le Sauveur’s aide in the end. I read very mixed comments on MDL that were critical on various parts of the story, like the ending being ‘too abrupt’ and stuff, but I honestly wasn’t bothered by those things at all. I thought the writers used the limited number of episodes they had very efficiently to build up the story and its main characters, and still managed to leave room for the chocolate theme and the side arcs that all contributed to saving the chocolaterie.

I thought it was very cool and unique that they used Le Sauveur’s signature Rainbow Palette to navigate through the story. The Rainbow Palette is a series of seven chocolates, all with different colors and flavors, that forms the main attraction of the chocolaterie. Every episode was named after one of these seven chocolates, and emphasized its production by exploring the collaboration with the distributor of its main ingredient, stretching from types of cacao to liqueur extracts. It was really cool to see how they ended up improving every single chocolate piece throughout the story, and that the chocolates also were adapted accordingly in the opening sequence, which kept changing based on the piece that was featured in each episode. I really loved the consistency of that theme, also because it connected so well to the conclusion of the story. Apart from that, the Rainbow Palette was also just plain gorgeous to look at.

To start with Lee Ha Na, I thought it was very interesting that they made the female lead Korean, despite her being fluent in Japanese. I felt like, next to her scopophobia, her different nationality contributed even more to her sense of not fitting in and always being the odd one out. You could definitely say that she was the special ingredient that Le Sauveur needed to survive, which in turn tied neatly into the ‘savior’ reference that was mentioned in the final episode.
As to be expected from someone with scopophobia, Ha Na prefers to stay in the background and doesn’t like drawing attention to herself – she even wears a kendo mask during her online consultation sessions, which has earned her the nickname ‘Ms Darth Vader’. Although she manages to keep working at Le Sauveur in person, she never has the urge to take credit for her own contribution as the AC – she just enjoys being able to work with people who are as passionate about chocolate as she is. I thought that was a really admirable trait of her. Even when she tried to reveal her true identity, it was always in favor of helping out the chocolaterie and never with the intention to take credit for herself. This hit me the most when she pretended to be in touch with the AC to pass on the recipe for the Pure Kenji chocolate to the rest of the team. Despite my initial annoyance at the fact that she still lied instead of confessing the truth, I found myself respecting her humility in trying to help out the team without taking personal credit for it.
I also thought her gradual development in getting better was very natural. I can only think of one scene where I found this slightly inconsistent: when the Le Sauveur team goes for after-work drinks at Bar Brush and Ha Na is kind of peer-pressured into singing a song. I found it a bit weird that she managed to actually stand there and sing the song with people looking at her for at least five minutes before still freezing up when she became aware of everyone’s gazes. Then again, it makes sense because she had just learned that her being able to look at Sosuke might indicate that she was getting better, and she probably got a little over-confident/excited for a moment. Apart from this scene, I thought her development was really natural and I didn’t even mind that her phobia didn’t completely go away in the end. I feel like her development had more to do with accepting herself the way she was than with actually conquering her illness. I liked that it ended with Ha Na and Sosuke running away from their wedding ceremony together, fully embracing their own and each other’s imperfections rather than overcoming them to become ‘normal’. The ending felt like a sort of hommage to The Odd Ones Out, which I appreciated.
I’d say the only few annoyances I had with Ha Na were in the scenes where she kept avoiding certain situations, like how she kept ‘missing the chance’ to tell her blind date who she was or tell the Le Sauveur team that she was the AC. In the end, neither of these revelations caused a very big stir, so no unnecessary drama came out of that. I guess the trope of characters not telling the truth under the excuse of ‘missing their chance’ when they literally have every opportunity to do so is just a pet peeve of mine (looking at you, Gisou Furin).
All in all, I thought Ha Na was a really original and refreshing main character. There’s one line that she says at the end of the first episode, when she’s asked why she’s applying to work at Le Sauveur, that I wrote down because I loved it so much: “私には心しかないんです” (“watashi ni ha kokoro shika naindesu“), translated into English as: “My heart is all I’ve got”. It’s such a simple line and at the same time so profound because it sincerely describes her passion. She’s able to convey her heart for chocolate so strongly from the start that Sosuke hires her without even feeling the need to check her credentials or actual experience.
I think Japanese dramas are typically very good at exploring a character’s passion by letting them navigate a certain field and build connections that help them overcome their own issues and insecurities as well as others’. Juuhan Shuttai! did a great job at that, and so did this show. It was really satisfying to see Ha Na gradually find her place within the Le Sauveur team and inspire others to open up about their ‘flaws’ as well. In the end, she was able to participate in that contest and stand in front of an audience again thanks to the support of her team, and that was really heartwarming to see.

Moving on to Sosuke, I really liked his character development as well. I loved that he grew out of the detachment caused by his germophobia and even started showing more silly and funny sides of himself. The scene where he dramatically offered Ha Na his umbrella and walked away, only to ask if he could get it back because he couldn’t stand getting rained on really cracked me up, lol. It was so funny to see him desperately try to withstand a situation, like getting a drop of something on his suit, and then just going: “Nope, can’t do it, bathroom.”😂
As funny as those scenes were, I was absolutely gutted when the origin for his germophobia was revealed, that made me feel SO bad for him. Sosuke (as a kid played by Takagi Haru) used to have an older brother, Shunsuke, who got terminally ill. One time, Sosuke went into his brother’s quarantine room to share some candies with him, as a sweet kind of ‘medicine’. Not long after that, his brother passed away, and from what I gathered, Sosuke felt like he had somehow infected his brother by coming into his room or giving him the candies. In any case, that’s when his germophobia started. It broke my heart when he told Ha Na: “It’s not that I find other people dirty, it just feels like I am.” He couldn’t even stand the touch of his own father anymore, which I think also contributed greatly to the distance that grew between them. It was really touching to see him finally being able to grab his father’s hand in the hospital in the final episode, because that felt like a reward for how hard he’d been trying to get better.
The way that Sosuke was drawn to Ha Na was very sweet and natural, as well. I initially thought he’d be the type of cold-hearted boss that wouldn’t be swayed by heartfelt stories in a business context, but the fact that he immediately acknowledged Ha Na’s heart for chocolate and kept picking up on her expertise without even questioning how she got it was very telling. I also liked that he didn’t avoid his feelings for her, he basically confessed to her multiple times before it got ‘official’. In that sense, I felt like he was very honest with himself and didn’t try to be someone he wasn’t, even in situations where he had to conceal his germophobia.
Speaking of the chemistry between Ha Na and Sosuke, there were actually a couple of moments that really made my heart race. We all know the trope of two people ‘practicing’ together to confess their love to someone else and falling for each other in the process, but there was something strangely intimate about their practice sessions from the start, before they even realized their true feelings for each other. I was actually taken aback when Sosuke immediately went in for that bear hug during their first ‘practice’, like, I thought they would start by shaking each other’s hand, lol. The addition of those scenes in which he remembered hugging his brother as a kid and Ha Na remembered playing with her mother suddenly made it so intense. I was expecting it to become a typically awkward ‘practice’ scene but it became such an emotionally loaded scene all of a sudden, it actually gave me goosebumps.
The other scene that made my heart jump was when Sosuke officially confessed to Ha Na after saving her in Koita. The way he went from SHAKING her hand to HOLDING it, intertwining his fingers with hers and all that, was SO FREAKING SMOOTH. Seriously, that made me go 🫣🫣🫣, haha. Who knew holding hands could be so intimate??? And then there was the way he just matter-of-factly kept saying “sarang“… Honestly, this man.🤭I’m all for deep slowburns, so the gradual development of the chemistry between these two was definitely my cup of tea.

As I’m on the topic of Sosuke, I’d like to elaborate a bit on his family. From what we learn about his father, Fujiwara Shuntaro (played by Sato Koichi), he used to favor Shunsuke over Sosuke, and even got his eldest son specific chocolates from Le Sauveur that he wasn’t allowed to share with his younger brother. There’s not a lot of verbal or visual proof of the relationship that Sosuke had with his father while growing up, but the two have definitely driven apart. I personally didn’t even realize that the Futago CEO was Sosuke’s actual dad until it was mentioned somewhere halfway through the story, because their dynamic seemed so professional. I initially even felt like Shuntaro may have only viewed Sosuke as an inevitable heir after losing his eldest, because he kept finding ways to make him feel incapable. However, my feeling towards him changed once Takashi’s plot came into play.
Fujiwara Takashi (played by Narita Ryo) is first introduced as Sosuke’s assistant when he takes over Le Sauveur, but then is later revealed to actually be Sosuke’s cousin, the son of Shuntaro’s brother who already passed away, making him another potential heir. While he consistenly remains on Futago’s side and keeps reminding Sosuke not to lose sight of their original objective, it’s revealed that he’s actually been planning a coup in the meantime, helped by different committee board members from Futago. I honestly didn’t really know how to feel about Takashi because, even though he did get a bit of a villain arc, he also immediately bounced back after failing to get Le Sauveur’s shares and then suddenly all was good between him and Sosuke again. It felt like a very sudden and quick redemption after all the work he allegedly put into that take-over, so that was a bit unexpected. Then again, I appreciated that the story didn’t linger too much on misunderstandings. I was just glad to hear him say that he immediately felt awful when he realized how much he’d risked to go against Shuntaro, the man that raised him as his own son after his own father passed away, and Sosuke, who’d been like a brother to him.

Another character that kind of pulled a uno reverse on me was Kawamura Motomi (played by Ito Ayumi), the chief chocolatier at Le Sauveur. Honestly, from the moment she was introduced, I expected her to become kind of a hostile factor towards Ha Na. She seemed visually upset whenever Chef Kenji favored the AC’s chocolate over hers, and this slight disdain towards the mystery figure kept coming back, even as she was warming up to Ha Na as a team member. I was totally anticipating a dramatic turn of events when they’d find out Ha Na was the AC and Motomi would get hostile towards her, so you can imagine my surprise when this didn’t happen! I’m actually glad it didn’t. It would’ve been very typical and I felt like this show was more about learning to understand each other than holding grudges. I came to like Motomi’s character a lot. Come to think of it, I don’t think her name was ever mentioned until the final episode because everyone just called her ‘Chief’. I liked that she was able to set her own frustrations aside for the improvement of the team, and how she always (albeit reluctantly) agreed to get the AC’s help, because she knew that the team needed it if they wanted to keep growing and improving. Despite her own qualms, she always kept respecting Chef Kenji’s wishes, which made her a very loyal ally.

Now that we’ve gone through all the chocolate business-related main characters, I’d like to talk a bit about the second leads, whom I’ve purposely not mentioned yet because I wanted to give them their own intro.
First of all, there’s Takada Hiro (played by Akanishi Jin) – I see that MDL credits him as ‘Hiroshi’, but as far as I know he’s only called ‘Hiro’ in the series, so I’ll stick with that. Hiro is an old school friend of Sosuke’s who runs the jazz bar that the Le Sauveur team often visits after work, Bar Brush, which is right across from Ha Na’s house. Ha Na has had a major crush on Hiro ever since he once saved her from getting hit by a car when she absent-mindedly crossed a road near her place, and she’s even taken up private kendo lessons with him since it allows her to spend time with him without having him look at her face. Chef Kenji, who used to frequent Hiro’s bar to get inspiration for which liquor went well with which chocolate, knew about Ha Na’s feelings for him and arranged for the two of them to go on a blind date together right before he passed away, but Ha Na chickened out. At first, Ha Na displays her crush on Hiro in quite a typical way: in contrast to her bickering with Sosuke, she always smiles and happily agrees to whatever Hiro says, and Sosuke eventually offers to help her ‘practice’ so she can confess her love to him.
However, the truth is that Hiro has no interest in Ha Na at all, and he also wasn’t the person who saved her life that one time. That was Sosuke, who just happened to be bringing Hiro his kendo gear that had his name on it. The other reason Hiro has no interest in Ha Na is that his heart is already taken by someone else.

Irene, ultimately revealed to be named Namikawa Airi (played by Nakamura Yuri) is a psychiatrist who happens to be treating both Sosuke and Ha Na for their phobias. I liked how she became kind of a mediator between them, listening to their respective stories about ‘that one person’ that their phobia didn’t apply to, and how she ended up connecting the dots that they were talking about each other. One part of her counselling includes a talking group aptly called ‘Anonymous Circle’, where people can write a fictional name on their name tags and talk about their problems. She even manages to drag Sosuke into a couple of these sessions, despite his reluctance to participate.
I honestly really liked these sessions, since they felt like relevant intermissions. They weren’t just meant for comic relief, they actually resulted in messages that echoed throughout the story. I really enjoyed the revelation that the woman Sosuke gave chocolates to after one session turned out to be Chef Kenji’s wife, and his act of kindness made her buy the final needed shares to Le Sauveur, that was such a good plot twist. Another scene I found unnecessarily funny was the one with the kleptomaniac lady who just produced belongings from all the other participants from her pockets, saying: “I just found it on the floor over there!”😂 Even if this scene didn’t particularly mean anything, it just cracked me up, lol.
Anyways, back to Irene. It’s suggested very early on that she and Hiro have some kind of history together. It’s not specified what kind exactly, but I figured they slept together one time and she bailed on him while he got attached. All in all, it seemed like Irene had some serious commitment issues, and acting like a couple in itself made her physically uncomfortable, no matter how much she was drawn to Hiro.
I thought the episode that elaborated on her trauma with her mother was very powerful. Seriously, imagine growing up with a mother that literally tries to unalive herself whenever a relationship doesn’t work out and then just leaves you on your own when you’re only a teenager – no wonder her image of relationships was messed up. I appreciated that they used Irene’s backstory to build on her reason for becoming a psychiatrist, as well, it rounded her out very nicely. All in all, I found it impactful to see so many types of mental illness being represented in this series, especially since I feel like these topics are often not talked about in Japanese society. I really respected Irene for standing up for her own boundaries. I don’t think I would’ve even minded if she stuck with her decision, because it was such an original perspective, but I also thought it was cool that she actually decided to go to therapy herself so she could ultimately still take a chance on Hiro.
While there wasn’t as much build-up between the two of them as there was for the main leads, I thought their relationship was quite endearing. It was nice to see Hiro, who initially seemed like such a chara-otoko, express such genuine interest and commitment towards Irene. I mean, he didn’t even try to get over her, he just waited for the next time they’d ‘coincidentally’ bump into each other again and always tried to make the most of every moment he got to spend with her.

I think that’s probably it for the main character analysis, because it’s such a short show with such a compact cast (very convenient for writing reviews). I’d now like to give some examples of side stories that particularly touched me and/or jumped out to me. As I mentioned in my intro, this show had a knack for making me emotional when I least expected it. It literally went from the leads dramatically falling on top of each other in slow-motion to a completely random emotional backstory that, despite (or because of?) the short build-up – just hit me in the feels.
While every episode had a significantly touching moment related to the improvement of a Rainbow Palette piece, one that jumped out to me was the episode about the Bonbon Sakura. If I remember correctly, Sosuke took Ha Na with him to talk to the manufacturer of a liqueur that was specifically used for this chocolate, in order to renew their contract. The proprietess of this company was rumored to be extremely strict and picky about which clients to work with and rejected everyone who didn’t pass a specific test. When they arrive at the proprietess’ house, they are greeted by her daughter, Hosen Kiyomi (Yamaguchi Sayaka), who reveals that her mother passed away several years earlier and she’s taken over. Again, there was little to no build-up to this side story, they were literally just going to talk to his allegedly hard-to-please woman. So when Kiyomi suddenly started talking about how miserable she felt in her mother’s shadow, it really caught me off guard. I actually started crying with her when Ha Na said she liked the taste of her liqueur better than the original. I honestly have no idea what came over me, it just hit me so unexpectedly. I was really impressed by the way the writers created such simple yet powerful stories without even needing to build each of them up throughout the series, that was really cool.
I also really liked the episode about the Spécial Orangette, where they literally summoned an ex-employee from Le Sauveur, Saegusa Ritsuko (Kaji Meiko) to recreate the original flavor of this piece because a customer desperately wanted to let her hospitalized sister taste the chocolate they used to enjoy together back in the day. The way they literally called upon someone who’d worked at the chocolaterie thirty years ago to cater to the personal wish of one single customer was crazy. I really loved Mrs Saegusa’s character as well, how she just jumped out of her wheelchair as soon as she got the call to make chocolate again.
Another scene that I didn’t expect would make me cry was when they went to visit ‘Mama’ in the countryside. At the beginning of the series, ‘Mama’, or Yamaoka Sumiko (Ise Shima) was one of the veteran employees at Le Sauveur, but she quit after Sosuke took over the chocolaterie. It’s later revealed that Sosuke knew about her deteriorating eye condition and let her go after taking care of all of her medical needs. At some point, the team visits her in the countryside and even though Mama had only appeared in the first episode before, I literally went “OMG IT’S MAMAAAA 🥹🥹🥹” as soon as I saw her. For some reason, her talking about enjoying the small things in life while knowing that some day soon she wouldn’t be able to see any of it anymore hit me right in the chest. That was such an unexpected emotional encounter, but I really liked that they brought her back to give the team some new insights.
Although I didn’t care too much for the whole trip to Koita (which I believe is a fictional name, by the way), the story from the old lady about how Chef Kenji managed to make chocolate with the usable parts of their rotten cacao beans was also really beautiful. It was such a random trip to a foreign country, featuring foreign actors and everything, but they still managed to drive the point home that chocolate could bring happiness to every single person.
Because of these random yet touching and heartfelt moments, I wasn’t even bothered by the occasional cheesy scenes. Yes, it was typical when Sosuke told Ha Na to picture him as Hiro when they were ‘practicing’ and she visualized Hiro doing the slow-wink (that actually made my toes curl🙈). Yes, it was typical when Ha Na’s head rolled onto Sosuke’s shoulder on the train, or when she pretended to be asleep after busting him from trying to touch her face. Yes, it was typical when Hiro drunk-kissed Ha Na after mistaking her for Irene, or that Ha Na got attacked by a bunch of suspicious guys after coming all the way to some island to find some specific type of cacao bean (that actually gave me Hana Yori Dango in New York vibes). There were a lot of moments that made me go: “Oh God🙈”, but at the same time it didn’t matter, because everything still contributed to the bigger message of how chocolate was able to save people and bring them happiness. I really appreciated how they kept everything so close to the core of the story, even the most silly or random moments.

By the way, as if I wasn’t surprised enough by the appearance of foreign actors, I lowkey tweaked out when that girl suddenly started speaking Dutch during the chocolatier contest in the final episode, lol, I was like, WAIT WHAT?!😂 It’s so weird to suddenly hear your own European language spoken in an Asian drama series.
The last thing I wanted to mention was my reaction to that final cameo appearance of Sakaguchi Kentaro and Song Joong Ki at Irene’s Anonymous Circle group. When Sakaguchi Kentaro came on screen I was like, right, I’ve seen enough shows that wrap up their story by suddenly introducing some celebrity cameo as a new character and then leave it there. But then Song Joong Ki appeared as well and that actually made me yell: “WHAT THE FUCK” out loud.😂 Like, that was so specific and random at the same time. It almost made me feel like it was a reference to something the two of them appeared in together, why would they put these two people opposite each other with such a knowing look in their eye without it meaning anything? In any case, I thought that was just the cherry on top of all the random things this drama had to offer, lol. I loved that.

I just wish to comment on a couple more details from the series that jumped out to me. I already mentioned before that I appreciated the consistency in the recurring chocolate theme and how they kept changing up the opening sequences accordingly, but there were more recurring things that I liked.
In the first episode, Irene introduces a technique against panic attacks that includes crossing your arms over your chest and patting yourself on both shoulders, saying: “It’s fine, I’m fine”. While it was dismissed as kind of a silly exercise at first, I just couldn’t help but love seeing Ha Na do this exact thing again before she had to go on stage for the contest in the final episode. I really liked that they kept this technique in, even just as a simple way to stay calm. I might actually try it myself if the need arises!
I also liked the multiple references to the word ‘anonymous’ in this series. The word used in the original title is tokumei, which is also used in the name ‘Anonymous Chocolatier’ (tokumei no shokoratie). On top of that, Irene’s talking group is called ‘Anonymous Circle’, in English. Although here the reference to ‘anonymous’ is purely used to indicate the fact that people don’t have to share their real names to tell their story, I liked that the word kept popping up in different parts of the story, that was pretty clever.
Finally, I just want to say something about the ‘savior’ reference mentioned in the final episode, because I felt like this tied a lot of things together. Besides the fact that chocolate was constantly defined as something that brought happiness to people, I loved it when they included that final flashback of Chef Kenji telling Ha Na that ‘Le Sauveur’ meant ‘the Savior’. Looking at the entire story and its characters, even the ones that weren’t specifically involved in the chocolatier business, you could say that everyone got saved in one way or another. Saved as in coming to terms with themselves, whether that meant getting treatment or accepting things the way they were. Sometimes this happened in small and unexpected ways, like when Takuya suddenly spoke up to defend Ha Na for lying about being the AC because he’d also lied about not being able to speak, due to a nasty experience at a previous workplace. In my opinion, this series was very much about learning how to understand each other and acknowledge each other’s efforts, and in that regard I appreciated it even more that they didn’t include any extremely dramatic developments or misunderstandings that took ages to be solved. All in all, I think Chef Kenji’s words summed it up very neatly: “If I can offer even a little salvation to someone going through a hard life in the form of sweetness, I couldn’t wish for anything more.” I think it’s safe to say that Le Sauveur, and chocolate in general, became a savior to both Ha Na and Sosuke, and eventually led them to meet each other, the one person their phobias didn’t apply to.
Speaking of this destiny element, I do wonder what could’ve caused the exemption from these two people in particular. One thing I thought of for Ha Na was that she was only able to look at people that she truly felt sarang for, like her mother. Could Ha Na’s love for the person who saved her life (her literal savior) have taken root in her heart to the extent that her brain just accepted that person as worthy of her gaze? It didn’t work on Hiro because he wasn’t actually the person who saved her. Even though she was fixating on him, her heart already chose Sosuke, as he was the one who’d actually saved her. I don’t know, maybe I shouldn’t put too much thought into it, but I did wonder how this could’ve worked, also on Sosuke’s side. I guess we could just go along with Irene’s deduction and accept that they are soulmates who were always meant to be together.

Having said that, I think I’ve reached the end of my analysis, and therefore I would like to go over some cast comments!

It was so cool to see Han Hyo Joo in a Japanese drama! I haven’t even seen her in that much Korean stuff (only the drama W – Two Worlds and the movies The Beauty Inside and 20th Century Girl), but I knew enough to acknowledge the transformation she went through to portray Lee Ha Na. I was very impressed with her performance, it’s like she became a completely different person from what I’d seen her in so far. It was nice to hear her speak Japanese for a change, interwoven with the occasional Korean of course, and the energy she brought to her character was very endearing. I also liked her chemistry with Oguri Shun, that was a pairing I definitely didn’t see coming but it worked pretty well! I’m really glad I got to see her in this role. I feel like she does more movies than dramas, but I keep getting impressed by her acting performances, so I hope she’ll do more dramas in the near future as well.

What an incredible blast from the past it was to see Oguri Shun again! This guy was all of my past J-Drama crushes, from Gokusen to Hana Kimi and Hana Yori Dango. Besides that I’ve seen him in Stand Up!, Tokyo DOGS, Rich Man Poor Woman and Nobunaga Concerto, all golden oldies from way before I started writing reviews, lol. Gosh, this man ages like fine wine. I loved seeing him portray Sosuke, especially when he started laughing more. He can literally go from distant and stern to playful and silly, and I love that. It’s great that he’s still appearing in things and I’ll always be happy to see him pop up somewhere, even now that he’s past forty. This series proved to me again what a great actor he is, even just in terms of facial expressions and the way he takes in his surroundings. His chemistry with Han Hyo Joo was great and I loved seeing him act out the different layers of Sosuke’s personality. It was really great seeing him in this.
By the way, was it just me or did Takagi Haru – who played young Sosuke – actually look like a young Oguri Shun?? From his eyes to his smile, I thought he was a spot-on casting choice for a younger version of him, lol. He did a really good job, too!

Akanishi Jin was another blast from the past for me – I remember him from Gokusen 2 and was actually excited to see if I still remembered his face but I didn’t, really. Maybe it’s the glasses and the facial hair, because his profile pic on MDL looks a lot more identifiable to me. 😂 I’m not going to lie: one reason I wanted to check out this series was because I’d seen a Hiro fan edit on TikTok and wanted to see for myself if he was really that handsome. I’m just a girl, you know.💁🏻‍♀️By the way, I see that he’s been out of the drama world for a VERY long time, he did something in 2007 and then some Chinese historical drama in 2024, so thirteen years of no activity there. That’s quite some time. I wonder if he’ll be picking up more dramas after the success of this one. In any case, I think he did a good job. I think it’s safe to say that he got the least in terms of backstory and development and I have to admit he felt a little bit flat to me at times, but he was still a nice supporting character that always jumped in to help. It would’ve been cool to get some more information on how he and Sosuke became friends and what exactly happened between him and Irene, but that would’ve just been juicy extra intel because the story in itself stood well enough. I wonder what he’ll be up to next!

No wonder Nakamura Yuri looked familiar to me, I’ve seen her in a bunch of things (although I might not remember her from everything). She appeared in the movie Like Father, Like Son (from my favorite director Koreeda Hirokazu) and in the dramas Tokyo DOGS, Tokujo Kabachi!, Higashino Keigo Mysteries, Tantei no Tantei and Perfect World. I liked getting a bit of backstory on Irene. I initially expected she’d be kind of a ‘pick me’ girl towards Hiro, but it turned out she was the opposite, a ‘don’t pick me’ girl.😅 I thought it was nice that they gave her character an unexpected perspective and I liked that she was such an independent strong woman who stood her own ground and didn’t need a man to be happy in life. Even as a side character, she was her own person with her own life who dealt with her own life choices, and I respected that a lot. There’s one more drama with her on my list, so I’m curious what else she can bring to the table in terms of acting. What she showed in this series was pretty promising!

I know I’ve only mentioned his character in passing throughout my review, but I still want to acknowledge Okuda Eiji’s performance as Chef Kenji. I can’t say I’ve ever seen him in anything before, but he definitely made an impression through this show and I really appreciated that they kept referring back to him, not only in the dialogue but also through actual flashbacks. It was cool to see that everyone kept remembering him, from the Le Sauveur staff to the people in Koita. He was such a pillar character in this series and he meant so much to Ha Na. I really enjoyed his vigor in portraying Chef Kenji – the way they introduced him was impactful enough to make me genuinely sad when he passed away halfway through the first episode, and that says something.

Even though she has such an easy name, I never seem to remember Ito Ayumi. I just knew she appeared in Watashi wo Hanasanaide. Besides that I’ve also seen her before in Shinigami-kun, Hirugao and Kira Natsuko, and the movie The Story of Yonosuke is still on my watch list. As I mentioned in my review, I initially thought Motomi would be a rival character to Ha Na, especially after she’d find out she was the AC. I just felt like there was something about her that could turn malicious at some point, but I’m really glad they wrote her character to be better than that. She was a well-respected and fun-loving team leader who was able to set her personal feelings aside for the greater good and that was really admirable. It was cool seeing her in this, she always adds something memorable to her roles, even if I can’t remember her name.😅

I’ve seen Narita Ryo before in Gakkou no Kaidan and NigeHaji, and there’s a couple more shows with him on my watch list. It was interesting seeing him in the antagonistic role of Fujiwara Takashi. I don’t know if they meant to reveal later on that he was Sosuke’s cousin or that I just missed it at first, but it was definitely a twist that the assistant was the one pushing his boss not to lose sight of the objective while conjuring his own evil plans in the background (actually, that pretty much sums up Crash Course in Romance, lol). I feel like they could’ve fleshed out his character a bit more instead of springing the sudden ‘I’m actually Sosuke’s cousin and I’m here to take over the company muhaha’ twist on us, but it did help that he turned out to be a good person at heart who realized he couldn’t bring himself to stab the people that raised him in the back. A little bit more rounding out would’ve been nice, but I thought his role was solid enough as it was, and his performance was good, as well.

I’m going to leave my cast comment section at that. As I said, the convenient thing about shorter series is that there’s (hopefully) less complicated storylines and extensive casts involved, which make it easier and less time-consuming to write a review. I’m definitely glad I watched this show, and I can very much recommend it, especially with a cup of tea and a piece of chocolate at hand.
I really enjoy Japanese shows like this, that manage to capture a relevant story and important topics while still retaining the silly and goofy Japanese humor and typical tropes. I appreciated how they made chocolate into a metaphorical savior while also touching on matters like making mental illness visible and finding solace in the small things. The side arcs all contributed to the main storyline and it was very wholesome to see everything come together in the end, with all the people they worked with throughout the story showing up to help Le Sauveur when Sosuke and his dad were at risk of losing their shares to Takashi. Without even being aware of it, Sosuke and Ha Na managed to inspire so many people and make bonds and friendships for life. I really liked how this drama was built up, the quality of the filming and the acting was great, and even the few confusing or cringy parts couldn’t ruin it for me. Everything just contributed to a solid story with a solid message, and I enjoyed watching it a lot. And the very appetizing depictions of various kinds of chocolates helped, as well, of course. I wish I could try them all.

As I said, this is going to be my last review for 2025. I’m not going to try and squeeze one more in just for the sake of another review before the year is done. I’ll be spending the rest of my December relaxing in-between work and I’m probably going to have my head full with whatever the finale of Stranger Things S5 is going to bring, so that means my next review will be in 2026! I’m already looking forward to what new shows I’ll be watching next year, and I’ll be sure to keep these reviews going, whenever I can.
For now, I wish whoever has read this far (thank you) a very happy Christmas and start of the new year. I’ll be back when I’ll be back.

Bye-bee! x

Disclaimer: this is a review, and as such it contains spoilers of the whole series. Please proceed to read at your own risk if you still plan on watching this show or if you haven’t finished it yet. You have been warned.

Soft Memory
(別碰我心底的小柔軟 / Bie Peng Wo Xin Di De Xiao Rou Ruan / Don’t Touch The Soft Spot of My Heart)
MyDramaList rating: 5.5/10

I guess my Spin-the-Wheel app has developed a ‘soft spot’ for Chinese romcoms, all of a sudden. Again, I don’t remember precisely when or why I put this show on my list, but I must’ve seen a snippet somewhere and thought it looked interesting. I usually like Chinese dramas that follow a group of friends throughout high school, college and adult life (like Love til the End of Summer, A Love So Beautiful, With You and A Little Thing Called First Love), so I thought this would be something similar, especially since the summary on MDL described the characters ‘navigating the ups and downs of youth and discovering what really matters in love and life’. However, as much as I’d hoped for another wholesome coming-of-age Chinese drama, I have to say from the start that this show didn’t grab me whatsoever. I’m still going to write a proper review about it, since every drama is an exhaustive investment of time and money, but just be warned that this will be a relatively negative review.

Soft Memory is a Hunan TV/Tencent Video/Youku C-Drama that consists of 20 episodes of about 35 minutes each (including the, again very lengthy and full of spoilers, opening and ending credits). I started watching it on KissKH, but then the episodes suddenly stopped loading and I switched to the full playlist on the Tencent Video YouTube channel.
The story basically focusses on three friends that get involved in an unusual love triangle. The first character we’re introduced to is Sun Xiao Rou (played by Xin Rui Qi), a very typical high school girl with her head in the clouds. One of my favorite songs by the Dutch duo ‘Yentl en de Boer’ has a line that goes (translated): “A girl is born to give love, to drift through clouds in pink, with a prince” and I thought that described Xiao Rou to a T. She literally says in her introduction: “I believe that every girl in puberty should be full of yearning for the love in fairytales, and I am no exception”. She was depicted as an ultimate girly girl that only loved cute and romantic things, and got completely immersed in crushes and daydreams.
At the start of the story, the target of her infatuation is a tall, handsome boy she calls ‘Pleasant Goat’ (which has something to do with the name of the bus stop she always spots him at). One day, Pleasant Goat suddenly transfers to Xiao Rou’s class, which makes her indulge in her destiny-filled daydream of him even more, as much as her two best friends Zhao Bin (Liu Luo Xi) and Xu Jing Wan (Jin Yo Mi) tease her for it. Pleasant Goat’s real name turns out to be Ou Yang Yu Sheng (played by Yi Heng). Although he initially seems very cool and indifferent, this image crumbles abruptly once it’s revealed that he has an unrequited crush on an older woman. Seeing him cry over being rejected immediately breaks the spell for Xiao Rou, and the two start getting along as normal friends. Luckily for Xiao Rou, she doesn’t have to be crush-less for very long, as (seemingly the next day) yet another transfer student appears. This mysterious new student is Chu Lu (played by Ni Yan). Assumed to be a guy, Chu Lu soon becomes the school’s new heart throb with their androgynous looks, mesmerizing singing voice, beaming smile and tendency to be kind to everyone. Even Yu Sheng finds himself strangely attracted to Chu Lu, and this causes him and Xiao Rou to suddenly become something resembling love rivals. As it happens, Chu Lu is actually a girl, who for some reason pretends to be a boy as she searches for her mother Zhong Li Fang (played by Zheng Shuang) and hides from her ex-boyfriend Gao Yuan (played by Cai Yi Da).
As the teenage drama reaches its climax and Chu Lu intends to reveal her true identity to Xiao Rou to get rid of her crush on her once and for all, a terrible earthquake causes the friends to get divided, both emotionally and physically. Chu Lu disappears to Beijing with Gao Yuan and is only reunited with Xiao Rou and Yu Sheng a year later, after reassuming her female identity. As both couples come to terms with what happened and how they feel about life and love, their shared experiences ultimately make them realize the true value of life, including their true feelings and dreams.

I just want to say from the get-go that I was very thrown off by the implementation of the earthquake. What started off as a light and silly story about a love triangle based on a mistaken identity suddenly turned unexpectedly dramatic and serious, and I personally don’t know how to feel about it. What’s more, according to a comment I read on MDL, the earthquake depicted in this show was actually based on the real Beichuan Earthquake that hit the Sichuan Province in 2008, which killed almost 100.000 people and destroyed 80% of the buildings in the area, including schools and hospitals (credit: mengosteen). The fact that this was used as a plot tool in a low-budget romcom feels a bit awkward to me.
Honestly, without the knowledge that it was based on a real event, it felt just like the plane crash in Grey’s Anatomy to me: mostly meant for shock value and to support some drastic decision of a main character that they apparently wouldn’t have realized without losing one of their closest friends. While it’s not a bad thing to include real-life events in dramas – sometimes it can really contribute to the time- and world-building of a story, like the financial crisis in Twenty-Five Twenty-One – in this particular story, the addition of such a dramatic event felt really out of place. I mean, they didn’t even establish what year this story took place in, so it could’ve easily been passed off as a fictional earthquake. Maybe it was meant to signify the mercilessness of real life in contrast to the romantic fairytale these teenagers were living, but it just felt like such a sudden and unnecessary twist, especially with killing off an important side character. I honestly don’t know how I feel about this as a plot tool, all the more now that I know it was meant to represent an actual earthquake that killed hundreds and thousands of people.

In terms of story and build-up, this series leaves a lot to be desired, as well. I saw a lot of comments on MDL and YouTube that expressed confusion as to who the main character was supposed to be. Going off the first introductions, you’d say that Xiao Rou would be the undeniable protagonist, also because Yu Sheng and Chu Lu are initially brought in as her crushes, aka side characters in her story. However, after the earthquake, the narrative suddenly shifts to Chu Lu, and Xiao Rou and Yu Sheng become more like supporting characters in her story. Maybe the writers had the intention to make Xiao Rou the main character in the first half, and Chu Lu the main character in the second half? Generally speaking, I would say that Xiao Rou, Yu Sheng and Chu Lu are all main characters, but I agree that the way the focus kept shifting between them was pretty confusing.
As if this continuous shift in focus wasn’t confusing enough, the ever-changing feelings between these three also caused a lot of bewilderment on my part. Maybe it’s because they were all eighteen and their youthful hormones were all over the place, but I’ve honestly never seen a show where the main characters’ feelings for each other changed so often and so quickly. In hindsight, it’s actually funny to see that everyone ended up with their initial crush, even though there didn’t seem to be any kind of build-up to that throughout the series.
Besides these elements, I also felt like there wasn’t a lot of depth to the story itself, apart from Chu Lu’s storyline. The rest of the story and the characters are only formed through present events, and don’t really build on the characters’ pasts and backstories. While this is fine in itself – not everything has to be destined or predetermined – I can’t deny that this made it hard for me to really relate to anything or anyone. It felt like I was already made to sympathize with the characters before I fully grasped them, and I kept struggling to get invested in what was going on. As a matter of fact, I spent the entire series not really caring about what was happening, simply because I couldn’t get into it. Even the more dramatic events felt exaggerated and typical to me, which is really bad considering the fact that the earthquake was based on a real catastrophe.
I guess my main issue with this show is that it tried to focus on too many things at once before even establishing one clear main storyline, and this caused the whole thing to become kind of messy and all over the place. I don’t want to dismiss the underlying and relevant themes of dealing with loss, the importance of friendship and achieving one’s goals without having to hide, but I feel like the way this show dealt with these themes was quite shallow. It even became a bit boring to watch people have the same conversation about joining or not joining a band over and over again. I actually started putting this series on in the background at some point – despite the fact that I don’t understand Chinese – and picked up my phone while watching it. As someone who likes to give my undivided attention to what I’m watching, this was definitely a bad sign.

Before I start on my character analysis, I just want to mention that I wasn’t able to find a single source website that credited the entire cast of this show. I always want to give credit where due, especially when it comes to the actors, but none of the sources I found even listed important side characters like Mi Na. Being my persistent self, I resorted to deciphering the actors’ names from the credits myself, using this website. Through this method, I’ll do my best to credit as many of the actors as possible.

I will start with Xiao Rou, since she’s the first character we meet. As I mentioned, she’s initially depicted as a very stereotypical, hopelessly romantic female protagonist who loves to giggle and daydream. I’m not even gonna lie when I say that she annoyed the heck out of me during the first half of the series, when they’re still in high school. Not just because she was such an airhead, but because it seemed like she only cared about herself. As well as she got along with her friends, it never seemed like she got genuinely concerned about them, whereas as soon as something happened to her or her crush, the whole world turned upside down. She was really living her life as if she was the protagonist and everything revolved around her. There were times when I found her behavior a bit unsettling, too, for example when she kept following Yu Sheng through the school to snap pictures of him. There was something about her appearance that just put me off, for some reason; it seemed like they gave the actress lenses to make her eyes look bigger and I kept getting freaked out by how large her irises were. The look she’d get in her eyes in combination with her wide, goofy smile lowkey made me shudder at times.
The way she kept pursuing Chu Lu even after the latter kept trying to convince her not to, also got a bit awkward at some point. While I’m also blaming Chu Lu for beating around the bush, Xiao Rou was definitely not the sharpest tool in the shed, and she needed things spelled out to her. Honestly, I wouldn’t have been surprised if seeing Chu Lu in a dress on stage would’ve just made her go: “Oh, so he likes cross-dressing? That’s fine!” instead of finally realizing that Chu Lu was a girl.

On a side note, I found it very typical how unequivocal this show was with regards to same-sex relationships. It was never expressed in direct, literal words, but it was very clear that romantic feelings between two men or women were treated as something unthinkable and out of the question. Not very progressive for a show from 2019, but I guess the story took place in 2008 and it was still more of a taboo back then? In hindsight, I’m actually starting to think that the premise of the unusual love triangle might have been the reason I put this show on my list, positively anticipating the idea of a more progressive Chinese drama – I guess that was wishful thinking, after all.

Moving on, as much as we followed Xiao Rou’s thoughts and feelings throughout the first half, I couldn’t really gauge what went through her mind once she found about Chu Lu’s true identity. I mean, her face definitely fell when she saw Chu Lu in a dress on stage, but it wasn’t clear if she understood what was going on, and then the earthquake also disrupted her processing of what she’d just seen. Fact remains that she immediately cried for Chu Lu and set out to find her, but she never voiced whether her feelings had changed or not. I was lowkey hoping/expecting her to just stick to her romantic feelings for Chu Lu even after finding out she was a girl, that would’ve been a cool twist. But I guess she just switched to a “okay well then I guess I was just attracted to her as a friend” mindset, seemingly in a hearbeat.
As much as she aggravated me in the first half, I was positively surprised by her character development in the second half. She clearly matured a lot and responded much more rationally to certain situations than before. Although I initially didn’t understand why she didn’t go inside the café after seeing Yu Sheng and Chu Lu there, it made sense when she explained that she suddenly felt like a third wheel, and this was validated even more by the fact that Yu Sheng built up a personal connection with Chu Lu while keeping Xiao Rou in the dark the entire time. I also appreciated how genuinely mad and disappointed she got at Yu Sheng for lying to her about Chu Lu’s disappearance – honestly, this was a big turn-off for me, as well. On the other hand, she forgave Chu Lu really quickly and then just went back to treating her like before, only as a best friend instead of a crush. The friendship between Xiao Rou and Chu Lu became really wholesome in the second act, which I liked. Even when they both realized their feelings for Yu Sheng, they never became prickly with each other; I think Chu Lu always knew the two of them would end up together, and Xiao Rou was actually willing to bottle up her own disappointment in order to support her two best friends’ relationship. Even though I got annoyed at her a lot in the beginning, I actually ended up feeling for Xiao Rou in certain moments, because it was unfair that she was kept out of the loop when she was the only person that never once wavered in her love and care for Chu Lu, be it as a crush or a friend.

By the way, I really liked Xiao Rou’s parents (played by Kong Lin and Zhao Liang). They made a really fun and interesting pair, and I’m sad they just disappeared in the second half. I believe Xiao Rou has one phone call with her mom at some point, but that’s it. Come to think of it, they weren’t even featured at the wedding in the final episode, which was curious since there was a full audience of random people present. I really wondered where Xiao Rou got her personality from, because her parents seemed to be wired very differently, lol. I loved how they kept bickering and how her dad kept trying to come up with ways to appease Xiao Rou. I thought they seemed like really cool parents.

As much as Xiao Rou initially annoyed me, I can’t deny that nothing beat Yu Sheng. This guy consistently made me go 🤨🤨🤨 as he went back and forth between his feelings for Xiao Rou and Chu Lu. It’s actually funny to realize how much the way he was initially introduced differed from how he turned out. The only background information we get about him is that his mom (Chen Jin) was very strict and only wanted him to focus on his studies, which initially made him hesitant about joining the school band and play the guitar. In the end, he was able to keep the guitar as a hobby and focus on his medical studies, so I guess that was fine.
Anyways, I simply could not with the way this guy ‘navigated’ his feelings. He was absolutely clueless, but instead of taking the time for himself to figure stuff out before rushing into things, he just went along with something before realizing it wasn’t actually what he wanted, often unnecessarily hurting people’s feelings in the process. My biggest issue with him was the way he seemed to ‘gatekeep’ Chu Lu from Xiao Rou. Ever since he found out that Chu Lu was a girl, it honestly felt like he was enjoying the fact that he had a way of getting closer with her that Xiao Rou didn’t have. Instead of sharing the information so they could all be on the same page, he just kept it all to himself. I just didn’t understand why he would lie to Xiao Rou about Chu Lu’s disappearance, like why couldn’t he have at least told her that Chu Lu was alive and safe, but moved away or something? What’s worse, he even used it as an opportunity to build a personal relationship with Chu Lu himself, and this really ruined whatever was going on between him and Xiao Rou for me. It literally felt like he wanted to keep Chu Lu to himself, and he didn’t have any qualms about keeping it a secret from Xiao Rou, even though he knew how hard it was for her to not know what happened to Chu Lu.
After meeting Chu Lu again in Beijing, he just started amiably meeting up with her to catch up behind Xiao Rou’s back. That moment when Xiao Rou found out through Gao Yuan that Yu Sheng had known about Chu Lu’s whereabouts all along and it switched to Yu Sheng and Chu Lu just cracking jokes about how Xiao Rou would react when she saw Chu Lu again was absolutely tasteless. It made me feel like Yu Sheng really had no qualms whatsoever about lying to Xiao Rou, and he didn’t even realize how much he’d hurt her feelings in doing so. That’s not how you treat a friend, much less someone you’re (apparently) harboring hidden feelings for.
Another thing that bothered me about Yu Sheng was how he dealt with his romantic feelings in general. He initially got attracted to Chu Lu when he still thought she was a boy, and then got really relieved when he found out she was a girl. But after reconnecting with her as a girl in Beijing, he suddenly felt his romantic feelings for her fade away, just like how he suddenly didn’t feel anything for Xiao Rou anymore in the beginning. He even tells Xiao Rou that he doesn’t feel romantically attracted to Chu Lu anymore. Meanwhile, he and Chu Lu have the greatest moments together: he joins her while busking, they run while holding hands, they make each other laugh and take care of each other. Honestly, from the way he treated her, it seemed like he was completely into Chu Lu. He even came running to her house to take care of her when she was sick. What’s more, when Chu Lu confesses her love to him, they’re suddenly ‘dating’ the next day, and that actually got me wondering if I’d misheard him telling Xiao Rou he didn’t have feelings for Chu Lu anymore. He certainly didn’t act like it. And then, he suddenly realizes his affectionate feelings for Xiao Rou again while he’s ‘dating’ Chu Lu and the two even end up standing in the first row of Chu Lu’s stage performance while HOLDING HANDS, like nothing is weird about that. At least he had the decency to tell people that Chu Lu had dumped him in the end instead of the other way around. I have no idea what he thought he was doing.

In terms of the ‘romantic’ development between Xiao Rou and Yu Sheng, I think we can all agree that it was one of the most confusing and ultimately disappointing aspects of the story. They were basically introduced as the main couple – and then they weren’t – and then they were again. I’m not even going to lie when I say that this was probably one of the worst romantic build-ups in the history of C-Dramas I have ever seen. Not even in terms of toxicity or anything, but in the actual lack of its existence. I didn’t sense ANY kind of romantic tension between them after Xiao Rou stopped crushing on him, which was halfway through THE FIRST EPISODE. She never gave him any kind of attention after that and seemed fine just being friends. Even when Yu Sheng suggested he had feelings for her at first, she actively rejected the option. I didn’t even sense anything when she suddenly tried to make her feelings to him clear by doing ‘I love you’ poses while he was taking pictures of her, because it completely lost its meaning when he didn’t get it and she just ended up pouting “You silly boy” 👉🏻👈🏻.
Because of this, it just felt really weird when they suddenly started pushing the two together again towards the end, and by that I mean in the very last episode. Yu Sheng receives an orientation about medical assistance in the military and suddenly thinks of Xiao Rou when he has to write the name of the person he’d want to claim his remains (very romantic, indeed). They topped this realization up with a whole flashback of moments they shared, which weren’t even romantic moments in the first place – one of them was literally the scene of him dragging Xiao Rou along on a walk at night to rant about his conflicting feelings for Chu Lu.
His final love confession was also the driest and least romantic one I’ve ever seen or heard. If it wasn’t bad enough to suddenly, out of the blue be like: “I just realized I want you to be the one to claim my remains if I should die during medical military service”, this guy literally flew from Beijing to Chengdu to drag Xiao Rou to their old school’s rooftop and then read his confession OFF HIS PHONE, without even facing her directly. Also, while I get that the choice of using only anatomical metaphors was meant as a joke, it just took away even more from the intended romance. Seriously, if you’re gonna say stuff like: “you’re the cure to my stomach ulcers” and “if you’re the small intestine, I’m the large one”, at least put some passion into it. Don’t go all: “You’re the blood that flows through my veins” and “My heart can’t beat without you” when you literally haven’t shared a single romantic moment in the entire series. He literally read it to her like he was sharing a freaking weather report – there was no feeling in that confession whatsoever.
I honestly have no idea what the writers were thinking while establishing this couple. I’ve never seen a drama before where the main leads literally only got together after realizing their feelings in the FINAL episode, without ANY kind of build-up or slowburn. They may have tried to make up for the absence of romantic scenes by suggesting some tension between them in the dialogue, for example by making Yu Sheng say that Xiao Rou would always text him every single thing she did, but we never actually see her keep in touch with him like that, so those kind of lines remained completely empty and unsupported. Also, why did they make a whole point of Xiao Rou throwing away that framed picture of her and Yu Sheng after accepting that he and Chu Lu became a couple, when they later showed that she had a whole freaking collage of pictures of them as her PC desktop? There was literally nothing that suggested that they were thinking about each other that much, and then suddenly they did and they got married. So yeah, that was very weird. Needless to say, I didn’t feel anything for this couple, or any couple in the series for that matter.

Moving on to Chu Lu, even though she was introduced as a side character or potential love interest for either Xiao Rou or Yu Sheng, she ended up getting the most backstory and development out of everyone.
Chu Lu was abandoned by her mother Zhong Li Fang (played by Zheng Shuang) when she was still very young. I believe she’d been looking for her for eight years (?) so that would mean she’d been ten years old when her mom left. In any case, once she came of age she left her father’s place to officially track her mother down and see if she could live with her. From what I gathered, Li Fang was kicked out by her in-laws for giving birth to a girl, or because they thought her work as a bar singer wasn’t respectable enough. Chu Lu’s father definitely didn’t stand up for her, because she left with the intention to never get involved with the Chu family again, which sadly included her little Lu Lu, who was given her father’s surname.
Apparently, Chu Lu only decided to dress up as a boy before transferring to Xiao Rou and Yu Sheng’s school, because there’s a whole flashback of her meeting Gao Yuan and joining his band before that, when she still has long hair.
Chu Lu met Gao Yuan after spotting him busking on the street one night and he piqued her interest (and vice versa). Acknowledging their respective love for music, they started busking together and Gao Yuan was taken with Chu Lu’s special voice. The two even started dating for a while, but things soured between them after they were given the option to sign the band to a label and Gao Yuan was willing to give up Chu Lu to continue his own music dream (they could only assign one vocalist, so it was either him or her). Feeling betrayed, Chu Lu left and I believe her disguise as a boy was partially to hide from Gao Yuan. It could also be that she felt some guilt about being born as a girl, since that got her mom kicked out, and the fact that Gao Yuan once told her that her singing voice would’ve been more special if she’d been a boy (what a compliment). I guess it was a mix of different reasons, although it’s never explained exactly as far as I remember. In any case, Chu Lu went undercover and joined a new school. The reason why she’s able to transfer to a new school so easily is that her aunt from her mother’s side, Zhong Zhuan Yuan (played by Liu Lin), is a teacher there. Mrs. Zhong just happens to be Xiao Rou and Yu Sheng’s homeroom teacher, and as such manages to get Chu Lu into her own class.
From this point on, Chu Lu just wants to be away from her past, make new friends and enjoy an uncomplicated school life. As she’s not used to being surrounded by close friends, the fact that Xiao Rou immediately reaches out to her initially overwhelms her a little bit, but it doesn’t take long for her to start seeing Xiao Rou as a very dear and important friend. Once she realizes that Xiao Rou harbors more than just friendly feelings for her, Chu Lu starts to get conflicted about how to tell her the truth, as she really doesn’t want to destroy their friendship.

If I may believe the comments I read on MDL and YouTube, besides the question of why Chu Lu was pretending to be a boy – which was eventually explained (sort of) – a lot of people, including me, were really confused as to why Chu Lu didn’t just tell her friends at school that she was a girl. Honestly, I wasn’t even sure she was pretending to be a boy at first, I just thought she was an androgynous-looking girl who didn’t entertain people’s assumptions about her. But then there started to be more instances where people addressed her as a boy and she didn’t correct them, and that’s when I went: ‘Huh, but why?’ Like, I get that she wanted to start anew in some way, but why would she openly lie to her new friends about it? It’s not as if they had anything to do with her family or Gao Yuan. Especially when things got awkward and she realized some girls started to crush on her, I think it would’ve been more respectful of Chu Lu to just break it to them before she involuntarily started breaking hearts. Although, as I said, Xiao Rou was definitely very dense and didn’t pick up on anything unless it was spelled out to her, I also thought Chu Lu’s ways of telling her were very roundabout and indirect. I mean, why would you say: “we can only ever be friends in a girl to girl way” when you could just say: “we can’t date because i’m a girl”.
Another thing I didn’t really like about Chu Lu was that she could never think of ways to solve her own problems. After failing at persuading Xiao Rou to give up on her crush on her, Chu Lu even asked Yu Sheng – who already found out at that point – to do it for her. Later on, something similar happens when she doesn’t know how to face Xiao Rou after the earthquake. As much as I understood Chu Lu’s awkwardness in maintaining close friendships due to her past, I couldn’t help but think that she should at least take the responsibility of finding the right words to explain things and apologize by herself. As cool and chill as she’d seemed in the beginning upon transferring, she became more and more indecisive throughout the series and that was a bit frustrating sometimes. Again, I don’t want to dismiss the fact that she was trying to figure out life and really needed the advice and help of others, but I felt like it took her a VERY long time to figure out what she wanted, and it took a LOT of nudges in the right direction for her to finally come to terms with the life she wanted to live.

If the relationship between Xiao Rou and Yu Sheng wasn’t already confusing enough, I honestly still have no idea what was going on between Chu Lu and Gao Yuan. It seemed like Chu Lu was completely done with him, but then she still ran to the hospital as soon as she heard he got hurt, telling Xiao Rou that ‘she still cared about him’. When she started ‘dating’ Yu Sheng, I actually got the feeling that she was trying to suppress her feelings for Gao Yuan by doing so, but then when she realized Yu Sheng liked someone else she couldn’t keep pretending, either. I never truly understood Chu Lu’s real feelings, or if she actually liked Yu Sheng romantically. I can only guess that she ended up going to Japan after hearing something happened to Gao Yuan during his surgery because she realized she still loved him, but we never find out what happened to him – Chu Lu just turns up at Xiao Rou and Yu Sheng’s wedding in the last episode with that same old mysterious smile on her face, and that’s it.
I’m not even gonna lie when I say that I paid very little attention to what happened between Chu Lu and Gao Yuan after they came to Beijing together. From what I gathered, after the earthquake Chu Lu suddenly decided to join Gao Yuan’s band after all, but then switched companies because she didn’t just want to sing his songs. Then the company she joined went bankrupt and Gao Yuan tried to get her to come back to his band and company, which she kept refusing. I think that’s what was going on, but it was honestly the least interesting part of the story for me. It actually brought me back to the repetitive office scenes from Road to Rebirth, which I know a lot of people started skipping altogether. In the end, Chu Lu manages to achieve her goal of becoming a solo artist, partially because Gao Yuan falls away due to the after effects of the injury he sustained during the earthquake – he becomes deaf. Then it turns out he knew this injury was gonna bite him in the ass one day and he actively started writing all his songs for Chu Lu because he wanted her to succeed more than he cared about what would happen to him (d’aww).

I honestly never really knew how to feel about Gao Yuan. He seemed like a decent enough guy, also from his interactions with Xiao Rou when they met without knowing their respective connections to Chu Lu. It always seemed like he meant to make up with Chu Lu, and that he cared about her and her music dreams as much as she did, but somehow it kept coming across the wrong way or something. I guess it could be seen as a noble move that he knew the severity of his injury and convinced Chu Lu to come to Beijing with him because he wanted to make more music with her before it was too late and his injury would catch up with him. Still, that doesn’t change the fact that he acted incredibly rashly during the earthquake. This man actively ignored the emergency workers and drove his car right into an area that was literally dropping rocks. Even in a desperate attempt to get to his loved one, this was just reckless and stupid. Also, the fact that he kept screaming for Chu Lu to be rescued without even checking first who the other trapped person was and then getting all shocked after finding out it was Mi Na was very typical. Honestly, I don’t think it would’ve mattered to him whether it had been Mi Na or someone he didn’t know, he would’ve still chosen to rescue Chu Lu. I also hated that he literally lamented Mi Na by saying: “she was the best bassist I knew” as if that was the only noteworthy thing about her, especially after we just learned that Mi Na had had a secret crush on him all along. It was as if the majority of the characters in this show only cared about themselves and one other person they were in love with, and the rest didn’t really matter that much, despite being able to at least shed a couple of tears about losing a friend.
In the second act, I actually got really annoyed by him because he kept asking Xiao Rou to drink with him and listen to him rant about Chu Lu. I didn’t really get the weird friendship that started between them, in the first place. The drinking also seemingly came out of nowhere, and he was extremely neglectful about his dizzy spells and headaches for someone who knew he had an injury, so that didn’t really make sense to me. All in all, I didn’t really care about his character, and I don’t really know how to feel about him, also because we don’t find out if he survived the surgery in the end.
Also, as Chu Lu’s ex who seemingly loved her so much that he was willing to give up his own music career so she could go solo, there wasn’t a single shred of romantic tension between them in their scenes. We never actually got to see them be close or intimate as a couple. Just like with Xiao Rou and Yu Sheng, their history together was just summarized in words. The lack of visual proof that these two used to be in love only made it harder for me to truly believe they were ever together.

I’d like to move on to the characters that left a more favorable impression on me. I’ve already mentioned her name a couple of times, but now I’ll actually say something about Mi Na. Mi Na (played by Tong Hua – as I said before, I deciphered the actress’ name from the credits because she’s not credited on any website: SHAME!) used to be in the same band as Chu Lu and Gao Yuan, as a bassist. After Chu Lu joins the band at her new school, she suddenly turns up as the new bassist player there, initially causing Chu Lu to run away from her because Mi Na knows who she really is. Now that I think about it, I don’t actually know how Mi Na ended up at this school, because she definitely wasn’t a student. Maybe she just tracked Chu Lu down there? Anyways, after Mi Na joins the band she actually becomes like an older sister figure to Chu Lu. In the earthquake, the two become trapped together and it’s a typical Descendants of the Sun situation where they can only save one person because the whole structure they’re lying under is connected.
I absolutely hated that they killed Mi Na off like that. At that point, she was honestly the coolest character out of everyone. I loved how chipper and confident she was, and how she teased Chu Lu about pretending to be a boy. Of course, her loss fuelled Chu Lu’s determination in continuing to make music, as it’s also what Mi Na would’ve wanted, but I still really hate that this needed to happen for her to come to that decision. Mi Na was the best of them. I can’t believe they actually killed off the one character I would call ‘my favorite’ after just letting her exist for a handful of episodes. SHAME.

Next up are Xiao Rou’s two best friends Zhao Bin and Xu Jing Wan, who ironically also disappear in the second arc, only to make one final comeback in the very last episode. I liked these two and I would’ve liked to see a bit more of them.
Zhao Bin, or Bin Bin, was a typical tomboy girl with short hair that got her automatically categorized as ‘one of the guys’ and ‘not attractive as a girl’ (these freaking beauty standard stereotypes, bro). Anyways, she was also Xiao Rou’s deskmate and got the most banter with her. She was the typical funny friend, whereas Jing Wan was much calmer. I actually would’ve liked to see more of Jing Wan, because she seemed really cool in her own way.
Looking at their friendship with Xiao Rou, I can’t deny that it felt as if these two were just assigned the roles of ‘token best friend characters’, but I never actually felt that much closeness between them. Maybe that’s because Xiao Rou seemed so occupied with herself, as I mentioned before. It would’ve been cool to see how they met and became friends, at the very least. While it was nice that they made a final reappearance. I remember wondering where they went at some point, but they just ended up as another item on the list of things that suddenly made a comeback in the very last episode, along with the main characters’ feelings for each other, lol.
In any case, I liked these two and they deserved more screentime. I actually found it weird that they just completely disappeared after the earthquake and it wasn’t even mentioned how they separated. If it weren’t for the opening credits scene of the three of them walking together in their ‘adult’ clothes, I might not have even have expected them to come back at all.

When the storyline about Chu Lu’s mother was introduced, I was actually quite intrigued because it was the first time we saw Chu Lu as herself, not pretending to be a boy, and it was interesting to get some substantial information about her past. I thought the scenes where Chu Lu followed and watched her mom and secretly left her gifts were kind of sweet, it showed how much she wanted to close the gap between them. It was also nice to see her mom as a singer, as this would be the first indicator of where Chu Lu’s natural love and talent for singing came from. Despite the life that her mother was living, Chu Lu still preferred staying with her and I think that also said a lot about her dad – he was only willing to take Li Fang back if she’d return with Chu Lu, and when that didn’t work out she was left to her own devices all over again.
The only time I didn’t like Li Fang was when she took Chu Lu in after the earthquake and started getting involved in her life and music career to the point that even Chu Lu got tired of it. For the rest, I actually sympathized with her situation. It’s crazy that women can be just outed like this in some societies, I really felt bad for her. I’m glad that she and Chu Lu at least mended their bond.

The last character I want to mention is Zhong Zhuang Yuan, Chu Lu’s aunt and the friends’ homeroom teacher. I actually really liked this woman. I loved how she seemed to be a very typical Spartan teacher, but then turned out to be so loved by her students. That one time when she came into the classroom wearing a nice dress and everyone was like “woohoo Teach!” was really nice. I also loved the part at the end when she joined Xiao Rou, Zhao Bin and Jing Wan in the old classroom and reenacted her iconic chalk-throwing, lol. It was really nice of her to take care of Chu Lu, even if it was just by allowing her in her class to keep an eye on her. I liked that they created an extra link between her and Chu Lu and Li Fang, it gave her character a bit more depth. I think that she might have actually been my favorite character after Mi Na, if I can really talk about favorites in a series I didn’t feel any kind of connection to.

I think that’ll have to do for my character analysis, so now I’d like to go over some specific scenes and things that stuck out to me for being either weird and sloppy or nice and wholesome.
To start with the more negative elements – I always dislike saying this because again, every drama takes a significant amount of time and money to create and produce – it was clear that this was quite the low-budget drama. I’m not just talking about the quality of the filming, acting and dubbing, but there were a lot of sloppy details in the continuancy and general execution of the story as well.
First of all, and this is very typical for low-budget series that feature a singer or any other kind of music element in it: there was a very limited number of songs they used for Chu Lu to sing. To be fair, I quite liked the songs and her singing voice was nice to listen to. But she only ever sang that one same song, which was also part of the soundtrack, and you could actually hear the autotune seeping through at some points. At least they managed to edit it over Chu Lu’s mouth movements so it actually seemed like she was singing it for once; I’ve seen too many sloppy edits where a person starts singing and the soundtrack overlapping it is an entirely different song that doesn’t fit the character’s lipsynching at all. But yeah, I definitely cringed at the obvious autotune and the fact that they gave Chu Lu so little to choose from. They’d always play something else at band practice, but when she was by herself it was always the same song.
Secondly, and this also contributes to my later and more extensive criticism regarding the acting in this show: every person cried in the exact same way. Whenever someone got emotional, they always got the same shot showing one tear calmly making its way down their cheek. I never saw a single emotional scene where the actor produced tears as they were acting, which contributed all the more to the shallow feel of the whole thing. Even in the scenes where people where sobbing I just remember distressed faces and exaggerated wailing by the voice actors to distract from the absence of actual tears.
Something that also jumped out to me was that, in several occasions, people were able to overhear conversations that took place on the other side of the street, or somewhere else that would realistically be too far away to catch. I believe this went mostly for Yu Sheng, by the way. At some point he is waiting in traffic and sees Chu Lu having a conversation with her father in the distance, but they kept switching between their discussion and Yu Sheng’s reacting face as if he could literally follow what they were talking about. The same went for when he found out that Chu Lu was a girl – Chu Lu and Mi Na were having dinner outside and he was standing a couple of meters away but still apparently heard every single thing. I don’t know, it was kind of unrealistic.
Another general thing that confused me was the overall timeline of the story. There’s only two time jumps in the series, one after the earthquake (one year) and one in the final episode (three months). Which means that it ends roughly two years after we first meet the characters in high school. After the first earthquake, Xiao Rou starts working/interning and Yu Sheng is in medical school, so that adds up, as either working or going to college are both logical steps to take after graduating high school. However, after the final time jump of three months, when Xiao Rou is reunited with Zhao Bin and Jing Wan, they visit their old school and talk about how the halls used to look much bigger and stuff, and that just made me go: ‘You literally went here until two years ago, tho?’ Like, those comments would’ve made more sense if they’d revisited the school after more than five years, at least. It sometimes felt like much more time had passed since the earthquake, also because Chu Lu’s hair had significantly grown (this was obviously a wig, by the way).
Speaking of Chu Lu’s hair, what the heck was up with her switching hairstyles for her solo debut? We literally see her right before she goes on stage, and someone is brushing her hair in her dressing room – the same hair/wig she’s had for the entire second half. But then she appears on stage with a completely different coupe, shorter, dyed and with all sorts of highlights and extensions in it. And then afterwards it’s back to normal again. That’s not how hair works! What the heck was that inconsistency?

One other scene that I found weird was when Xiao Rou brought a present to her reunion with Chu Lu but then couldn’t bring herself to enter the café and instead left the present outside the window Chu Lu was sitting at with Yu Sheng. First of all, very brave to just leave that box outside where literally anyone can grab it. Second, seeing its position, Xiao Rou must’ve walked up very close to the window to put it there, presumably right within Chu Lu and Yu Sheng’s peripheral. But no, they didn’t notice a thing. After that, there was the whole weird episode with Chu Lu and Gao Yuan sharing their stories of what happened after the earthquake with Yu Sheng and Xiao Rou, respectively. While Gao Yuan and Xiao Rou were sitting on some terrace roof, having a beer, Chu Lu and Yu Sheng seemed to still be sitting in that same café, even though it had already gone dark and there was no one else there, and the present was STILL sitting outside the window. It took them their entire conversation before one of them suddenly noticed it, like seriously? That was so weird.

Something else that made no sense at all was the news coverage of the earthquake and, more specifically, Chu Lu and Mi Na’s dire situation. They literally used the double shot of them lying underneath the rubble and the close-ups shots used in their dialogues as the actual news footage. You’re telling me that there was a cameraman on top of them or something? The whole point was that they were underneath a structure that couldn’t be moved, and somehow they featured their entire intimate final conversation on the news, so that Chu Lu’s mother could literally see her daughter lying there from up close on TV. Honestly, make it make sense.

And then I haven’t even started on the scenes where extras were seemingly too aware of themselves, didn’t know where to look or just kept standing somewhere randomly even though their part was already done. I distinctly remember this one woman at a studio that Gao Yuan’s band performed at who gave them directions while she was walking by. After that little interaction, the band members continued their own dialogue, but this woman just kept standing there in the background. Like, at least walk off screen, ma’am, that was your only line, you can go now!

Overall, I was less than impressed with the acting in this series. Admittedly, the dubbing occasionally made it worse than it was, but it was never great to begin with. Especially Yu Sheng’s actor really bothered me. He literally delivered all of his lines in the exact same way, without any deep feeling behind it. The only scene where he went the extra mile was when he was searching for his friends in the direct aftermath of the earthquake, which asked for some dramatic acting. Other than that, even the way he would look up to see if someone was there seemed like the actor just remembered that he had to look up. The love confession to Xiao Rou was the absolute cherry on top, I cannot believe how little emotion went into that.
I also felt like Xiao Rou’s actress just got the instruction to pull as many girly and childish pouty faces as possible. There was one scene in particular that really threw me off, the one where she read an emotional letter from Gao Yuan from his tablet, since he couldn’t talk anymore because of his deafness. She just stared at that tablet, not even moving her eyes to suggest she was reading it line by line, and occasionally either looked up to stare wistfully into the distance or pitifully at Gao Yuan while the narration just kept going. I was like, seriously, this is simply not how you read a letter. Of course you can stop halfway and look at the other person to express your shock at what you’re reading, but it seemed like she wasn’t even reacting to or looking at anything specific. Details like this, that were just added for dramatic value, made everything seem even more shallow and ungenuine.

To end on a positive note, there were also a couple of moments that I found touching, like Chu Lu’s reaction to Xiao Rou’s ‘Welcome Home’ balloon sign when she officially moved in with her. Ever since the beginning of the story, Chu Lu had always lived by herself and she kept changing places to stay, so the final decision to move in with Xiao Rou, her best and most loyal friend through it all, was really meaningful. Chu Lu was someone who always expressed her emotions through her expressions more than her words, and I think that came out really clearly in this scene – I was surprised she didn’t actually choke up. I thought that was a really nice and meaningful moment.
The moment that got me personally choked up is when Chu Lu pictured Mi Na standing next to her during her first solo performance in the final episode. That transition was actually really good, and it just made go 😭😭😭 seeing Mi Na standing there, bass in hand, nodding and smiling at Chu Lu as if to say: “Don’t worry about me, you did it and you deserve all of it, girl.” That actually wrapped up Chu Lu’s whole “I kept going for Mi Na” argument really nicely, I loved that.
Lastly, and I already briefly mentioned it, but I really liked the part in the final episode where Xiao Rou, Zhao Bin and Jing Wan went back to their old classroom and had a rendezvous with their homeroom teacher, Mrs. Zhong. It was really funny how Zhao Bin imitated Mrs. Zhong before she came in herself and they had that little reenactment. There hadn’t been any kind of closure of their school time because the story time-jumped immediately after the earthquake, so this at least felt like a final farewell to those innocent and worryfree days.

I have some final practical comments before concluding this review, starting with the poster. I believe there are several different posters, I’ve seen one on DramaWiki that features just Xiao Rou and Yu Sheng in their school uniforms, but this one I used is actually kind of peculiar. It shows Sky Band, the band that Chu Lu and Yu Sheng join in high school, together with Mi Na on bass and Liu Ge (Shi Zi Xun) on drums. Xiao Rou isn’t a part of this band, so it’s kind of weird to see this particular group of people together. Also, it shows Chu Lu with long hair, which technically doesn’t make sense because she only has this hairstyle in the flashback of when she first met Gao Yuan. The entire purpose of her character is that she starts out looking androgynous enough to be mistaken for a boy, and that’s also the look she has when she joins Sky Band. So why depict her with this specific look, when she only looks like this in one flashback? I also feel weird about Mi Na and Liu Ge being depicted instead of Gao Yuan, for example. Mi Na was only there for half of the show (RIP) and Liu Ge also disappeared after the earthquake and only came back for Chu Lu’s debut stage in the final episode. As much as I liked them, Gao Yuan was a much bigger character and I would think it more logical to put him on the poster. Anyways, the awkward photoshop and posing is enough to make me dislike this picture, lol. They could’ve done so much better. It’s honestly kind of weird that they made such a happy-looking poster that even features the one character that dies in such a carefree way.

As I usually do with Chinese dramas, I want to take a closer look at the original title versus the English one. What I like about the Chinese title is that it contains a wordpun on Xiao Rou’s name, 小柔, which in this sentence translates to ‘soft spot’. Despite this, I don’t really know what this refers to or whose soft spot it talks about. Going along with the final sentiments of the story, I guess this could count for Yu Sheng, realizing that Xiao Rou was always the ‘soft spot’ in his heart? As for the English title, I think ‘Soft Memory’ is as vague and generic a title you could think of. It would be appropriate if it was actually a typical coming-of-age drama that described the precious memories of youth, but I don’t actually remember a single ‘soft memory’ at all, thanks to that freaking earthquake. In my opinion, they could’ve definitely come up with a better title that at least reflected the overall tone of the entire story, including the serious parts, instead of trying to be a wholesome depiction of a special friendship. I guess the friendship between Xiao Rou, Yu Sheng and Chu Lu ended up being special for them, but I was too concerned with all the problematic aspects that I couldn’t even fully embrace what they had as a viewer. It’s kind of a pity. In hindsight, I would’ve even expected something referring to Chu Lu more than Xiao Rou, since her story was depicted in the most detail.

I’ve been writing this review while I was sick and already took longer than planned to finish this, so I’m going to skip on a cast comment section for this one. I didn’t know any of the actors and I generally didn’t really like the acting, so there’s not much for me to say. The only people whose acting I liked were Tong Hua (Mi Na), Liu Luo Xi (Zhao Bin), Liu Lin (Mrs. Zhong) and occasionally Zheng Shuang (Zhong Li Fang), so I hope I get to see more of them in the near future.

To sum up my final thoughts, although this series definitely didn’t offer much in terms of story and romantic development, it was bearable enough as a quaint little romcom. I wouldn’t say it frustrated me as much as it confused me, and that does make a difference. It was a pity that they abandoned that interesting premise of an unusual love triangle so quickly and suddenly threw in that earthquake to turn everything upside down. I think it could’ve been much better if there had been a clear storyline and main protagonist to follow instead of continuously going back and forth on both accounts. Apart from Chu Lu achieving her dream of becoming her own musician, I’m really not sure what other kind of message the writers meant to convey with this. I did see that this was the first project of the director in charge of this show, so I can only hope he’s improved his skills since then. As much as I want to support low-budget dramas, sometimes I just can’t believe that certain details passed through editing unnoticed. It just gives the impression that they’re not even striving for the bare minimum of quality to at least make things make sense on screen, and that’s a pity, because I’m one of those viewers that tends to pick up on stuff like that. In any case, they definitely tried to make something of this and it had some nice themes like friendship and pursuing your dreams against all odds, so I can appreciate that. The idea had potential, but the execution just didn’t cut it for me. I’ll leave it at that.

As compensation for the lack of romantic build-up in this series, I’ve decided to break my streak and pick out my next drama by myself. I’ve been eyeing a new one on Netflix that promises a great dose of enjoyable romance, so I’m definitely sinking my teeth into that for December, as soon as I feel better.

Until then, bye-bee! x

Disclaimer: this is a review, and as such it contains spoilers of the whole series. Please proceed to read at your own risk if you still plan on watching this show or if you haven’t finished it yet. You have been warned.

Love Me Like I Do
(我的老板为何那样 / Wo De Lao Ban Wei He Na Yang / Why Is My Boss Like That?)
MyDramaList rating: 6.5/10

I love that my Spin-the-Wheel app is picking out more short and sweet Chinese dramas lately, they make for nice little pallet cleansers in-between the heavy emotional stuff I usually watch, lol. As soon as I saw the duration of this show, I knew I would be able to finish it within a week, but I had to plan it a bit because of my schedule. Now that one deadline is done, I felt like it was safe to write another review. I did not exactly remember putting this show on my list, but it started out really cute and funny and I can understand why it got high ratings on MDL. For me though, while I could appreciate it as a light romantic comedy, there were some things that kind of rubbed me the wrong way and I also didn’t really get the pacing towards the end. In any case, I’m excited to share my views on this, so let’s go.

Love Me Like I Do is a short iQiyi C-Drama with 18 episodes of about 30 minutes each, which makes it a very short and digestible watch. I watched it fully on KissKH, with decent English subtitles (🔥).
The story follows the romantic relationship between aspiring toy designer Tian Tian (played by Zhang Mu Xi) and the eccentric CEO of toy company Qiansheng Group, Liu Xi Lai (played by Liu Yin Jun). Being from completely different worlds in both social status and personality, these two initially get off on the wrong foot, but Xi Lai finds himself unexpectedly dependent of Tian once he realizes she’s the only one that can annul his hemophobia. As a repercussion of a childhood trauma in which he lost his parents in a car crash, Xi Lai has developed a fear of blood that runs so deep that he can’t even look at the color red without passing out. However, for some reason, when he touches Tian, all his symptoms cease to exist, he doesn’t get dizzy and he’s able to look at red things just fine without sunglasses. As such, he decides to hire Tian at Qiansheng, mostly so he can summon her at will to accompany him to work events where he needs protection from the color red.
Tian is a talented illustrator who aspires to become a toy designer. After getting kicked out for making a scene during a job interview at Qiansheng Group when she discovers someone plagiarized her work, she only accepts Xi Lai’s offer to work there because she is keen on developing her career, not because she agrees to being his personal assistant. However, as the two spend more time together and go through different experiences that allow them to get to know one another better, they start seeing each other as more than just a beneficial tool to help themselves.

From the bat, I’d say that the summary on MDL is quite misleading. It really focuses on the aspect of Tian being the ‘medicine’ against Xi Lai’s phobia, which creates the expectation that this is the leading plot throughout the entire story. But no. Xi Lai’s blood phobia is literally cured in the fifth episode, after Tian accidentally kisses his forehead. They bring it back a couple of times as a plot tool (for example him lying about it re-emerging), but it never actually comes back and that puzzled me. I found it odd that they would come up with this very unique preface of Tian somehow being able to ‘cure’ Xi Lai’s hemophobia, only to have it serve as nothing more than an introductory element to connect the two main leads before getting rid of it. I expected something along the lines of Crush and The Secret Life of My Secretary, where the ML’s handicap was a consistent element throughout the story that the FL had to assist him with. Practically speaking, Xi Lai could’ve severed ties with Tian as soon as he was cured, since he also didn’t have feelings for her yet at that point. I thought it was a shame that they didn’t let the hemophobia element go on for a bit longer. They could’ve at least made it last until their feelings for each other were a strong enough reason to stay together after he was cured. I’ll talk a bit more about the pacing later, but this was something that I immediately found a bit weird and unexpected.

I’d like to go through all the main characters and their relationships briefly. The story is very straightforward and there also isn’t a lot of emotional depth to the characters (apart from Xi Lai’s childhood trauma).
To start with my girl Tian Tian: I loved her from the start. She immediately exuded such a cool energy, and her fashion style was ✨on point✨. I loved how she immediately stepped up when she recognized her plagiarized work at Qiansheng Group and demanded compensation for it. Throughout the show, I kept respecting her for her valid responses to different situations and how she was just such a mature queen until the end. Not gonna lie, I got tired of Xi Lai multiple times, but she always found a way to forgive and accept him on her own terms, and I admired that. She consistently acted and responded in ways that just made sense, and that was a nice contrast to Xi Lai’s persistent delulu behavior. I really loved having such a strong and mature female lead, even if things got a bit more sappy in the end. She stayed true to who she was and didn’t let herself get swept away by the antics of others, and I really appreciated that kind of stability and consistency in her character.
I also really loved her dynamic with her bestie/roommate, Shan Rose (played by Wu Wei Miao). I’m not exactly sure how these two knew each other (I’m guessing college?) but they had such natural chemistry, and I loved how they could go from fun and gossip to actually supporting each other through rough patches. Rose was my favorite side character by far, and I’ll write a bit more in detail about her later.
One final thing about Tian that I loved was how quickly she picked up on things. It was so refreshing to not have misunderstandings dragged out throughout the entire story. It was great how she literally overheard one sentence and immediately connected the dots about how Xi Lai would always faint when seeing the color red, except for when she was with him. I don’t even care if the writers did this to save time and make things easier, because it happened at just the right moment, when I started going: ‘why doesn’t he just tell her the real reason he needs to keep her close?’ I just loved how smart and quick on her feet she was, and how she immediately snapped back at people during that party in the beginning. She was such a cool and refreshing female lead, I really appreciated her.

In contrast to Tian’s consistency, Xi Lai goes through quite a drastic transformation. He’s introduced as a rigid CEO that doesn’t like to spend any more time on things than necessary, and even walks out at the slightest delay or mix-up because ‘he doesn’t have time to deal with incompetent people’. He claims to live his life minute by minute and devotes every second of his precious time to important things, aka his work. The way he was introduced actually reminded me of the Grey Gentlemen from the book Momo by Michael Ende, which I’m currently reading. Because of this lifestyle, it’s no surprise that Xi Lai doesn’t have any friends or people to hang out with outside of work, and he’s only ever accompanied by his faithful assistant, Tang Sai (played by Zhang Chen).
Despite introducing himself as someone who doesn’t like to waste a single second, it doesn’t take long for Xi Lai to start spending every waking moment on Tian, and mostly on how to get her to confess to him. It was quite an unusual shift, and there also wasn’t a very defining moment for it. Like, if it had been a more gradual development where he suddenly realized that Tian made him want to throw away his time-regulated habits, it would’ve made a bit more sense. But no, he just started obsessing over her overnight and then the whole time-strict aspect of his personality went out the window, so that was another thing that didn’t really make sense to me. I personally think it would’ve been nice if they’d kept that characteristic of his and made him ease into his new feelings a bit more gradually, also to make him more self-aware of the sudden shift in his own attitude. They definitely had time to drag it out a little bit more, if you ask me.
Anyways, the only backstory that we get from Xi Lai is that he got into a car crash when he was young and lost both his parents. Through flashbacks, we learn that a young girl stayed with him and kissed him on the forehead, which made him relax. Of course, this ultimately turns out to have been Tian, and that explains why his phobia gets cured after she kisses him on the forehead.

While I liked that they created a psychological link to make sense of the phobia and how it got cured (it kind of reminded me of the connection between the main leads in My Demon), I still think they could’ve done way more with it. As I already mentioned, they got rid of the phobia very early on and because of that, the impact of the childhood trauma was also diminished a little bit. Because his phobia got cured so quickly, it didn’t become a very defining aspect of Xi Lai’s character, also because we don’t learn anything more about the relationship he had with his parents (except that his father apologized for not spending more time with him before he died). It definitely feels like they missed an opportunity to give Xi Lai’s childhood trauma a bit more weight in his character development. Instead of fleshing him out through more flashbacks, they only inserted some lines here and there that revealed some extra information, for example when he admits to Tian that his tendency to be so self-conceited and neglectful of other people’s feelings had to do with his upbringing after becoming orphaned. While that did make me go: ‘Okay, well, at least he admits to it’, it still felt a bit insufficient to me, like a very quick and easy solution to tie the final loose ends together.
Honestly, after the first forehead kiss, I was inclined to believe that it was just a temporary fix to his hemophobia that just had a slightly longer effect than holding hands. Being the romantic enthusiast I am, my mind immediately went: ‘Ohhh, if a forehead kiss will actually cure him for a while, I wonder what a real kiss will do’ 👀🫣🤭. I actually started wondering if they would build up their intimacy as a way to cure his phobia. In any case, I was waiting for the forehead kiss’ effect to wear off and the phobia to re-emerge, so when that didn’t happen I got slightly confused as to why they introduced it in the first place. Even now, I still think they could’ve kept it going for a while longer and used it as a more foundational plot for the story instead of just a way to create an initial connection between the main characters before throwing the whole thing out the window.

Regarding the relationship between Tian and Xi Lai, I actually had major mixed feelings. In all honesty, while things started out really funny and cute, Xi Lai’s extra personality became kind of obnoxious to me at some point. As much as I liked the idea of a completely inexperienced and socially awkward CEO trying to get into his first relationship, he just got completely delulu and only ever acted out of his own personal interest, which became a major turn-off for me.
I personally liked their romantic development best when neither of them were trying. There were a couple of scenes that were genuinely sweet and touching, like the ones with the firefly and when she helped him hug a kitten. These were moments where I felt like she was helping him see the beauty in things he used to steer clear of, moments that he would later refer to as her curing him in more ways than just his phobia. The way they both opened up to one another during these parts was really sweet and it also made Tian look at Xi Lai in a new light and go: ‘Hm, I guess he has some cute sides to him’ in a very natural way.
In my opinion, it all started going south as soon as Xi Lai became aware of his feelings for Tian, because instead of trusting the process and cherishing the quiet moments in which their worlds converged, he started lovebombing the heck out of her. Not just to express his own feelings, but mainly to get Tian to come to him, because he just immediately assumed she felt the same way. He was already picturing their life together while Tian was still at the ‘huh, I guess he can be kinda cute’ stage, and that just became really awkward at some point. This is when Xi Lai and Assistant Tang started spending every single moment thinking of plans to woo Tian while she wasn’t even into him like that yet. It was also the part where I appreciated Tian the most for her realistic reactions. She responded exactly how a normal person would to the sudden change in Xi Lai’s behavior: confused and turned-off. From her perspective, they were just starting to warm up to each other, and then he suddenly started acting all close and clingy. He saw a sign in everything she did and said to him, while she was actually getting annoyed at him for constantly summoning her at work, as it made it impossible for her to focus on her ambition to become a designer, which was still her priority.
I appreciated how they balanced the perspectives of both characters through these situations, for example when Xi Lai thought posting on social media that he’d go on a blind date would make Tian realize her feelings for him, while it only made her go: ‘Oh, I guess he doesn’t like me, after all’. Like, he literally just told her not to look at other men the previous day, and then went on a blind date with someone else the next: of course that’s going to come across as insincere! But no, in his head everything seemed like a successful plan to make her realize her feelings for him. The fact that he also didn’t give her any space and just kept interrupting her meetings with her senior got pretty annoying.
Speaking of this senior, Luo Ci (played by Yu Yan Long) is a famous designer that Tian looks up to a lot. Although he develops feelings for her, Tian has always made it clear that she only admires him as a senior, and that her feelings for him never became more than that. Still, Xi Lai keeps seeing Luo Ci as a threat and feels increasingly insecure when he keeps seeing the two of them together. At some point, Xi Lai manages to see eye to eye with Tian and she agrees to him becoming her ‘probationary boyfriend’. In other words, Tian agrees to consider Xi Lai as a potential boyfriend, meaning that she’s willing to see where it goes and doesn’t have any interest in other people at that point.
But then, Xi Lai pulls the worst move of the entire show. I’m not gonna lie when I say that this still bothers me. Tian wins a contest at work that allows her to go on a very special 3-month training with top designers from all over the world, including Luo Ci. To Tian, this is a major breakthrough and she’s over the moon with excitement to follow her ambitions. Xi Lai, on the other hand, is immediately intimidated by the idea that she’ll be with Luo Ci for three months, and decides to do the most despicable thing ever: he lies to Tian that his hemophobia has re-emerged in tenfold and that he can’t be apart from her for even a single day.

Honestly, this part baffled me to the bone. Xi Lai only acted out of his own insecurity and didn’t even think about what this training meant to Tian, which was incredibly selfish and childish of him. The worst thing is that Tian was willing to give up on her training without a second of hesitation, that’s how worried she was and how much she wanted to help him. In turn, he just went along with it without a shred of guilt. I think he uttered: ‘Hm, did I go overboard?’ like TWO times, no more. He very conveniently decided to ‘find a good moment to tell her the truth’ right after the deadline for the training had closed. In the end, she found out in the worst way possible, because he let his guard down helping her when she cut her finger and then she overheard him talking on the phone about it. Honestly, as soon as this whole charade started, I just wanted to skip to the part where Tian found out he’d been lying, because I was going to ✨savor✨ that slap in the face. It was such a stupid, immature move of Xi Lai, and I never truly redeemed him for it until the end. After being busted, the only way he knew to apologize was, again, lovebombing. It never felt like he actually realized the opportunity he’d taken away from her purely to satisfy his own insecurity against Luo Ci, even though Tian already told him she didn’t have feelings for him. The fact that he explained his reason to her as if he was expecting her to go: ‘Oh well, if that’s the reason, it’s OK’ was unbelievable. Xi Lai became so immature at some point, it got very annoying and frustrating.
Apart from this, I also really didn’t agree with the first two kissing scenes between Tian and Xi Lai. While the kisses in itself were fire (no complaints there) I just couldn’t fully condone them. As much as I welcomed the idea of using kisses as a means to fix his phobia, the fact that he used it as a trick to get her to kiss him while he was actually lying about his phobia really didn’t sit right with me. The second kiss happened while she was completely drunk, so yeah, it wasn’t very satisfying to sit there watching them kiss while all I could think was: ‘You’re still lying to her, though’ and ‘She’s drunk, though.’ The first real kiss between them happened on the hot air balloon, and then Tian suddenly forgave him and the last three episodes were filled with teeth-clenching sappy romance. Even after they slept together for the first time (which they completely skipped, of course) they were just super giddy with each other the next day, it was a bit stereotypical. It would’ve been interesting to see the actual emotional impact of their intimacy on them, especially on Xi Lai, since he was so inexperienced.
All in all, while their development started out really sweet, it completely turned me off when Xi Lai started bulldozing and thinking of selfish ways to keep Tian by his side. I appreciate that they at least made him acknowledge that he didn’t handle certain things very well in the end, but in the moment itself it just didn’t feel right to me. I kept thinking that Tian deserved better, and I still do. I guess some male leads just really aren’t my cup of tea, lol.

Moving on to the next set of characters – the second main leads, if you will – we’ll have to take a look at Xi Lai’s family. After being orphaned, his uncle Liu Jing (Shang Bo Jun) raised him together with his own son Liu Xi Zhao (played by Zhao Huan Ren). Xi Lai is very fond of his younger cousin/new brother, and has always tried to treat him well. Xi Zhao, on the other hand, has never truly warmed up to Xi Lai, and even harbors some grudging feelings towards him. His father has always treated Xi Lai like a son to be proud of while Xi Zhao only ever got criticized and reprimanded. He was always told to learn from Xi Lai and become better, and this has fuelled his annoyance with his cousin all the more.
I actually found the dynamic between the two cousins quite interesting, mostly because I could really relate to Xi Zhao’s feelings. When I was young and had a friend over, I also sometimes got jealous of the way my parents catered to them more than me, so I can imagine the agony of having to go through that every single day. From the few flashbacks that we got, I could totally understand why Xi Zhao was fed up with Xi Lai. It was quite relatable, seeing how oblivious Xi Lai was and how everything he said and did, no matter how good the intention, tended to come out wrong. His gestures to be thoughtful tended to come across as tactless, even as adults. I can’t deny that this was also something that bothered me about Xi Lai, so I really couldn’t blame Xi Zhao for feeling the way he did. I’m just glad he didn’t let his negative feelings towards his cousin get the upper hand and still ended up siding with him in the end.

Apart from Xi Zhao, there’s also the cousins’ childhood friend, Wen Xian (played by Ma Qian Qian). Xi Lai, Xi Zhao and Xian grew up together and even used to call themselves ‘The Golden Trio’ or something along those lines. Xian has always had a crush on Xi Lai and is initially very hostile towards Tian. As the story progresses, Xi Zhao develops more than just brotherly feelings for Xian, and while she initially refuses to see him as more than a younger brother, she ultimately realizes that he’s always been by her side, and she reciprocates his feelings. In contrast to the build-up in the main leads’ relationship, I actually really liked how the romance between Xi Zhao and Xian developed, and their first kiss was genuinely sweet. It really made me go: ‘Ah, see, it can be unproblematic!’ No, but seriously, I appreciated that they didn’t keep Xian purely as the bitch character that wanted to break Xi Lai and Tian apart. As soon as she switched to Xi Zhao, she didn’t even care anymore when she heard that Xi Lai and Tian had already kissed. It was also cool how she told Tian that she’d be handing over her former crush to her at the end. I appreciated that they made her more than just a spoiled little princess, and that she was mature enough to realize her own worth and the fact that she’d been missing out on Xi Zhao while fruitlessly pining for Xi Lai.
One scene that made me feel really bad for both Xi Zhao and Xian was when they celebrated Xian’s birthday at the beach. Here, Xi Lai exhibited some of the most insensitive behavior of the whole show. Not only did he literally copy Xi Zhao’s birthday present, which he had designed specifically for Xian’s birthday, but he also rejected Xian’s confession in the most brutal way ever. While we already knew Xi Lai was living in his own little bubble, I could not believe how socially incompetent he was in this scene. He didn’t even let the confession sink in, he just immediately scolded Xian for making ‘such a ridiculous joke’. That was so awful and uncalled for. I guess people can forgive him for being eccentric, but his lack of social skills, emotional maturity and self-awareness really made it hard for me to like him. At some point it just wasn’t funny anymore, just annoying. It was like talking to a robot that only followed his own programming and didn’t even stop to think about the feelings of other people.

The relationship between Xi Zhao and Xian served another purpose than just a cute romantic side story. Xian was the daughter of one of Qiansheng Group’s most influential directors (I believe), Wen Zhi Cai (Pei Yi). Since their families were also connected through the business, Wen Zhi Cai was initially set on having Xian marry Xi Lai, so he could get his hands on part of the shares as an in-law at some point. However, after Xi Lai rejects Xian, Wen Zhi Cai starts a little conspiracy against him together with the guy who plagiarized Tian’s work before, Kai Wen/Kevin (Wang Hao Dong). He also starts sweet-talking Xi Zhao into applying for the CEO position, claiming that he will help him and support his relationship with Xian all the way. In doing this, he played right into Xi Zhao’s beef with Xi Lai. He may have even succeeded if it weren’t for Xi Zhao’s vigilance, because he picks up on his manipulative tricks and informs Xi Lai about it. I loved how Xi Zhao ultimately stood up for Xian against her own father, saying that he shouldn’t use his own daughter as a transaction tool. He didn’t even care about the CEO position, he just wanted to be with Xian, that was enough for him. Although Xi Zhao did have some rash tendencies at times, I appreciated him for being so solid and never losing sight of what was important, even if he had to set aside his personal qualms for it.

Moving on to the final ‘couple’ of the series: Rose and Jack. 😆
I already introduced Shan Rose in Tian’s part, but I wanted to elaborate on her a bit more since she was my favorite supporting character. As I mentioned, she was Tian’s best friend and roommate. I assume they met in college and just remained super close. Rose is an aspiring journalist, which also means that she’s not afraid to walk up to people and ask the real questions. In this regard, she and Tian were a really good match, as they both didn’t let anyone walk over them. You could tell from the way the two friends interacted that they were at that level of closeness where they didn’t need to mind their words around each other. I really loved the scenes where the two of them were just hanging out and having a drink together, they had all the bestie vibes going on.
On Xi Lai’s side, the only person that came close to being his friend was Li Huai (played by Gao Kai), who was also the doctor in charge of his hemophobia. I’m guessing he was more of a psychologist or a health expert or something? I don’t think he did surgeries or anything like that, but he did do house calls. In any case, I liked this guy, mostly in the scenes where he got dragged along with Xi Lai into things that he really didn’t care for. I loved that he was the friend that just sat in the back rolling his eyes and facepalming while Xi Lai was acting like his weird and delusional self. I took a lot of comfort from him since I would probably be the exact same way around Xi Lai, lol.
At some point, Rose and Huai get into a fender-bender while they’re both heading to pick up Xi Lai/Tian when they’re stuck in the countryside somewhere. After this, the two keep bumping into each other and it’s later revealed that they actually used to be classmates. More than that, Huai actually used to bully Rose for being fat. Before this was revealed, I was already shipping these two because I thought the way they met made for a really cute encounter and I liked how Huai kept sending Rose unsolicited health advice articles that just made her go 😒😒😒, lol. It was also funny when Huai revealed that his English name was Jack and they even played the Titanic tune in the background for a moment, lol. I wasn’t really sure what to think about the revelation that they used to be bully/bullied, not just because it brought back the whole typical and nonsensical fatshaming trope, but also because it was added quite last minute. Their ‘relationship’ was only confirmed in the very final episode, when Huai offered to write up a healthy diet plan for Rose. As far as I could see, Rose was the exact same size as Tian, so I don’t know where the fat aspect suddenly came from. Compared to the other two couples, their development was quite stagnant throughout the story and they only allegedly started dating in the final episode, without any physical intimacy to prove it, except for linked arms and a head on a shoulder. I would’ve personally liked to see their relationship get covered a bit more in-between, just like with Xi Zhao and Xian. It would’ve been nice to see some more romantic sparks between them, instead of bringing in the whole unnecessary diet plan to kickstart their relationship.
My absolute favorite Rose moment was when she and Huai came to visit Xi Lai and Tian at the place where they stayed when Xi Lai took a break from the company, and Rose witnessed how lovey-dovey they suddenly were with each other. This actually made me laugh out loud, so I made a GIF of it. The way that ‘Kill me’ came out SENT me. 😂 I expected her to comment something, but it still caught me off guard, lol.

Before I move on to my other criticisms, I just want to briefly comment on some side characters from Qiansheng Group.
To say a bit more about Assistant Tang, despite the fact that he was mostly a comic relief character that only kept feeding Xi Lai in his delulu, I did appreciate him for being so consistent and loyal. Besides his funny banter with Xi Lai, it was nice to see that he also served a proper purpose at the company, and he definitely cracked me up multiple times.
Some characters that I would’ve liked to see more of throughout the series were Tian’s teammates at the designer team of Qiansheng. I really thought they would become regular characters, as is common with a main character’s workplace, but they all kind of disappeared at some point, which was a shame. There was Zheng Qian (Lin Zhi Min), the chief designer and leader of the team, who was initially quite harsh on Tian but then acknowledged her talents, and I also liked Brother Guo (De Bai) and Jiang Jiang (Li Song Ci), the two gossipers who kept complaining about how everyone around them was a couple, lol. Even as filler characters, they created a nice atmosphere at the company and I honestly wouldn’t have minded seeing a bit more of them.

I would now like to go over a couple of personal qualms I had with this show, besides the ones I already mentioned. First of all, in relation to the previous paragraph, I found it a pity that they kind of dismissed Tian’s work at Qiansheng altogether at the end. One of the things I loved most about her was how driven she was to fulfill her dream of becoming a toy designer, and the scenes where she got to work on projects in the beginning were really defining for her character development. If it wasn’t bad enough that Xi Lai kept dragging her away from her work because of his selfish reasons, at some point Tian just didn’t return to the company at all anymore, and her teammates also disappeared from view. I thought that was a real pity. I would’ve liked to at least see Tian continue to thrive as a toy designer, since that was such an essential part of her character, but then they just dropped it and focussed completely on the romance.
In relation to this, I was kind of surprised when we suddenly started seeing the story almost exclusively from Xi Lai’s POV instead of Tian’s. I honestly thought we would follow Tian, as the story started with her job interview, and we also got the scenes between her and Rose at their apartment. But at some point they started showing mostly scenes in which Xi Lai was overthinking everything and Tian just occasionally popped by in response. As the number of her personal scenes decreased, so did her cool individual traits, as she really kind of shrunk into the forgiving and smiling girlfriend. I thought that was a pity, because I loved Tian’s spunk so much and she really didn’t seem like the type who’d settle for being a housewife. She had actual ambitions, she should’ve been allowed to explore those.

Next, I have something to say about the pacing of the story as a whole. It started out pretty good in the beginning, and I appreciated that they dealt with certain things very quickly, such as Tian already finding out about Xi Lai’s phobia in episode three. But then at some point it started feeling like the writers realized they’d taken a bit too long to drag out Xi Lai’s delusional attempts to lovebomb/apologize to Tian, and then there were only three episodes left.
I found it so weird how they literally went about solving all the remaining important plots in back-to-back scenes in one single episode. They really went:
Scene 1. Fix the relationship between Xi Lai and Tian (‘I love you, can you please forgive me?’)
Scene 2. Establish their encounter as kids (‘Did you happen to kiss the forehead of a kid in a car crash in the past?’)
Scene 3. Officially cure the hemophobia (‘Your hemophobia has been completely healed forever’)
Scene 4. Wrap up the final company issue (‘We busted Wen Zhi Cai’s conspiracy, the company is safe’)
Scene 5. Get Tian and Xi Lai married (‘Will you make me your little miracle’ ‘You already are my little miracle’)
The End.
The way they just skipped through these one after the other in such quick succession made me feel like they were in a rush to tie up all loose ends as quickly as possible. It even felt like they had that random guy attack Xi Lai with a bat on the beach, just so they could briefly put him in the hospital and reenact that forehead kiss to come to the realization that it had been Tian all along. Although I had really enjoyed the pacing of the break between Tian and Xi Lai after the latter’s lie came out (Xi Lie?🤔), the final three episodes made their reconciliation feel very rushed all of a sudden.
The addition of the company issue in the very last episode felt a bit rushed to me as well. I already mentioned that I found it a pity that they didn’t cover more of the work that was being done at Qiansheng, because a toy company is definitely an interesting area to explore and I would’ve loved to see more work-related content covered in the story. Instead, they suddenly threw away all of Tian’s work ambitions and only featured one company issue in the very final episode. I never thought I’d use this, but I think even Lucky’s First Love did a better job at this. Especially as the company was so important to Xi Lai, I would’ve liked it if they’d raised the stakes a little higher and spread the issue more evenly throughout the series, instead of just adding it in the final epsiode, as a kind of afterthought. The way it was, I really didn’t feel any kind of connection to the company, even though it should’ve been such an important setting to the main leads. It felt like they just lost sight of it halfway through and only started focussing on the reconciliation between Tian and Xi Lai. As another result of this, all of the intimate scenes were stuffed into the last five episodes. I don’t know what happened, but they really started rushing things in the final couple of episodes, and that made me feel like they suddenly realized they’d taken too much time for the first half and didn’t have enough time left to pace out everything the same way in the second half.

Moving on to more practical things, I would like to comment on the title, as the English title is again quite different from the original Chinese one. What’s interesting to me is that ‘Love Me Like I Do’ seems to be written from Xi Lai’s perspective, as he’s the one who falls in love first and persistently tries to win Tian’s affections. However, the Chinese title ‘Why Is My Boss Like That?’ is clearly written from Tian’s perspective, as Xi Lai is her boss and she frequently comments on how weird he is. The latter also gives me major What’s Wrong With Secretary Kim? vibes, lol. But yeah, it’s funny how the English title was decided as something that pertained more to Xi Lai’s POV, as opposed to the original title. If I had to choose, I’d say that the Chinese title definitely represents my feelings about this show better, because I still have no idea why Xi Lai was like that, lol. Also, the persistent tone in the English title immediately brings me back to Xi Lai’s delulu lovebombing of Tian, which I didn’t really like. It could even refer to him saying ‘love me as much as I love myself’, which makes it even more narcissistic, lol. Anyways, I do wonder how they came up with the English title, since it’s a lot more generic than the original title.

In terms of dubbing, I thought this show was a bit sloppy at times. It felt like they only used voice actors for the main leads, and those voices occasionally didn’t match the actors’ mouth movements at all. On the other hand, other characters like Rose looked like they weren’t dubbed at all. I’m not sure what the usual procedure is, if they sometimes only dub certain actors and not others, but it was definitely visible and audible in this series, especially with the main leads.

To end my review on a positive note, I just want to jot down a couple of things that I did like about the series. As I mentioned before, I thought it started out really funny and cute. The humor and the timing in combination with the sound effects were really effective and I genuinely enjoyed how it started out. I respect that a lot of people find this a very good romantic comedy, and I definitely started out on a positive note as well. It’s just that, for me personally, characters that seem a bit more eccentric and animated can get a bit too much sometimes, and Xi Lai just went too far for me at some point. It felt like his behavior mainly stemmed from a comedy purpose which stopped making sense in a real-life setting, and that’s where they lost me. Apart from that, there were a lot of enjoyable parts, I liked the female lead and the supporting characters and their respective dynamics really made me laugh out loud at times. It also really helped to have decent English subtitles, because now I could actually understand all the jokes and word puns for a change (unfortunately, these often get lost in translation).

As is common with Chinese dramas, I didn’t know any of the actors, but I’m very excited to make comments since I thought the overall acting was pretty good!

I can’t get over how pretty Zhang Mu Xi is. I really loved her look and specifically her fashion style in this series. The way I constantly got distracted by what cool earrings she was wearing, lol. No, but in all seriousness, I really liked her performance as Tian Tian. She brought such a cool and likeable energy to the character, it immediately made me want to be friends with her. Her acting was really natural and even though there weren’t that many emotional outbursts, I think she tapped into Tian’s deeper emotions very well, for example when she found out Xi Lai had been lying to her. I also really liked her chemistry with her co-stars, especially with the actress who played Rose. They showed a couple of behind-the-scenes clips at the end of the final episode that made them look very close in real life too. I always love it when they manage to make two best friends actually feel like besties, as it’s often more in the body language than in the dialogue. I’m happy to say that there’s a couple more dramas with her on my watchlist, so I’m really excited to see more of her!

To be completely honest, Liu Yin Jun was the only actor in this series that I sometimes would’ve like a bit more immersion from. He just got so caught up in playing the caricature that was Xi Lai that he often didn’t seem to be acting ‘in the moment’. I think that was also part of the reason I found it hard to relate to Xi Lai, because he just didn’t seem like someone I’d be able to properly communicate with. I don’t want to assume anything of course, and it’s not that I found his acting awful, but I do feel like he often laid it on quite thick in terms of words and less in terms of feeling. I also thought his face sometimes just went blank, which made it seem like he wasn’t even taking in what the other characters were saying since he was too occupied with himself. Of course, this could all be intentional since Xi Lai did live in his own bubble, after all, but as a viewer this made it hard me to relate to him on a deeper level. Again, I don’t mean to say that his acting was bad, he did crack me up with his pure little ‘Unbelievable’s and his kissing scenes with Zhang Mu Xi were absolutely there. There’s at least one other show on my list that he appears in, so let’s see what more he has to offer!

Zhao Huan Ren looks so familiar to me, but from what I can see on MDL I’ve only seen him before in Meteor Garden, which I don’t remember him from. I see that he’s also in a bunch of other dramas that are still on my list. I thought he did a solid job as Xi Zhao. I liked that, despite his immediate negative attitude towards Xi Lai, he never became a nasty person because the reason for his behavior was so well-supported. I also thought he performed the genuinety of Xi Zhao’s feelings for Xian in a very disarming way. I loved how he initially got puppy-eyed and flustered, and then immediately pulled her close as soon as he didn’t have to hold back anymore. I thought he was a very good casting fit for Xi Zhao, also in how he portrayed the discomfort with the CEO position and switching dynamics between Xi Lai and Xian. I liked his performance.

Ma Qian Qian is such a little doll, and she also looked really familiar to me even though MDL tells me I haven’t seen her in anything yet. I was really worried that she would be the token bitch character, but I’m really glad she came around and showed she was much more than just a spoiled little princess. I liked that she took the time to reflect on Xi Zhao’s confession and figure out how she really felt about him, that was really mature of her. She and Zhao Huan Ren also definitely didn’t disappoint in the kissing scenes, I may have actually liked their kisses more than the main leads’ 🙉🙉. I liked that her acting became more genuine as soon as Xian’s character developed, she did a nice job.

I just realized that Gao Kai was one of the prank brothers in The Big Boss! I knew he looked familiar, lol. I liked Huai’s character, mostly because he stood in such stark contrast with Xi Lai. He was like the voice of reason that Xi Lai never chose to listen to, lol. I enjoyed the scenes in which he got dragged around because his annoyance was just so relatable. I also liked that they paired him up with Rose. Some dramas pair up side characters purely for the sake of giving everyone a romantic plot, but in this case I actually thought it was cute. I just wish we’d have more development between them, more Jack and Rose time🛳️. I have at least one other show with him on my list, so I hope I’ll get to see more of his acting.

I can’t believe Wu Wei Miao isn’t even credited on MDL! I was only able to find her on DramaWiki, which says that she’s only done this drama. I find that very hard to believe that, since she was such a natural and she also looked really familiar to me. Anyways, as I said, I loved Rose. She and Tian were probably my favorite characters, both as individuals and together. Her natural chemistry with Zhang Mu Xi was addictive to watch and I really appreciated how she portrayed Rose’s unfiltered realness throughout the series. I would’ve loved to see her get more sparks with Huai, as well. I really hope I get to see her again in something else, because I refuse to accept that this is the only thing I’m going to see her in.

According to MDL, this is also the only drama that Zhang Chen has ever done, which again surprises me. Just from his face I thought he’d be a regularly appearing actor, that’s how natural he looked. That final scene during the wedding when all the couples were linking arms and he was like ‘It’s okay, I can grab my own hand🥹’ lol, I felt that. In all seriousness, I really liked his performance as Assistant Tang. Even though he was mostly a comic relief character, he took himself very seriously and still contributed a lot to the story, which was nice. I certainly hope he hasn’t completely stopped acting after this!

I know I’ve barely mentioned Luo Ci in my review, but I still wanted to comment on Yu Yan Long’s performance since he was essentially the main love rival standing between Tian and Xi Lai. I actually liked Luo Ci, he was a stand-up guy. I didn’t care much for the scenes where he and Xi Lai competed for Tian’s admiration (and then completely lost of in the process, I really don’t seen the point of drinking competitions😒), but apart from that I thought he was a nice addition to the story. He also completely disappeared after getting rejected. It’s like they just completely got rid of a character once their ‘arc’ was done, which was kind of a pity. I would’ve like to see more of him, even if it was just a glimpse of what he got up to in his designer work.

I think that’ll be it for my cast comments! It always helps when the main cast is small and the story is simple and straightforward. All in all, I did enjoy watching this, it was entertaining and had some funny and touching moments. I personally just got turned off by Xi Lai, he really wasn’t my cup of tea as a male lead, and that occasionally made it hard for me to really root for the main couple since I did really love Tian. Anyways, it was a cute little story with an interesting premise and cool side characters. In conclusion, I would say that I just wished they used certain aspects of the story more, specifically the blood phobia and the toy designer industry, since those were two very original and unique elements that could’ve made the story way more interesting if applied more elaborately.

I’m curious to see what my next watch will be. I honestly didn’t expect I’d be able to finish more than one review within November, but depending on the length of the next one, who knows! I might be able to share another before the end of the month (don’t pin me down on it, tho).

Until then! Bye-bee! x

Disclaimer: this is a review, and as such it contains spoilers of the whole series. Please proceed to read at your own risk if you still plan on watching this show or if you haven’t finished it yet. You have been warned.

Strangers Again
(남이 될 수 있을까 / (Nami Doel Su Isseulkka / Can We Become Strangers?)
MyDramaList rating: 6.5/10

Hello hello, and welcome to a new review. My schedule suddenly became busy and I was debating on postponing this review, but then I really didn’t feel like waiting a whole week for the last episode and I just really wanted to finish this and move on. When I looked up this drama on MDL, I saw a lot of negative reviews, but since I always want to see something for myself before believing what other people say, I went into it with an open mind and no particular expectations. In hindsight, although there were definitely some frustrating and annoying bits, I was actually able to appreciate the overall message of the story and the different perspectives it offered through various relationships and court cases. I’m excited to share my thoughts on this series, so let’s get started.

Strangers Again is an ENA K-Drama with twelve episodes of little over an hour each. I watched it on Viki this time, as I couldn’t find it on KissKH. The story revolves around the relationship between two attorneys, Oh Ha Ra (played by Kang So Ra) and Goo Eun Beom (played by Jang Seung Jo). These two met in college and had a sweet romance before getting married. However, at some point during their marriage, Eun Beom suddenly announced he’d been having an affair and asked for a divorce, leaving Ha Ra in complete shock and confusion.
At the start of the series, the two have been divorced for two years. While Ha Ra has built herself a stellar reputation as a divorce lawyer, with the nickname ‘goddess of litigation’ and frequent talk show appearances, Eun Beom hasn’t been doing so well financially ever since he quit his job after the divorce. Since he and Ha Ra used to work at the same company, he left to avoid the awkward tension between them. However, probably due to his ongoing connections with his former CEO, Eun Beom suddenly appears at Ha Ra’s firm again. The prospect of having to work with her ex-husband at the same company again when she still harbors so many grudging feelings towards him isn’t a very nice one for Ha Ra, but she grits her teeth and bears it. Luckily, she has most of her team on her side and can always vent her feelings to her colleague and close friend Kang Bi Chwi (played by Jo Eun Ji), who in turn gets into an office relationship herself with the conservative Kwon Shi Wook (played by Lee Jae Won).
While working together, old feelings and memories come flooding back, together with past secrets and truths that weren’t spoken out loud before. Ha Ra and Eun Beom go back and forth between forgiving and fighting, redeeming and remembering until they finally work out their true feelings for each other. In the meantime, they have to deal with several court cases that bring new insights into their own feelings and situations as well.

If there’s one thing that I appreciate about this show, it’s that it took a different approach in framing relationships and marriage. Since K-Dramas tend to over-romanticize and often depict marriage as the final confirming seal on a romantic relationship, I actually thought it was very original to focus on a relationship that didn’t work out, even after several attempts. I also thought using the court cases as plot tools to help the main characters reflect on their own situation was very clever, especially towards the end. Even though they were all divorce cases, every case focussed on a different issue, whether it was an affair or a custody claim or something related to the in-laws. It reminded me a bit of how Extraordinary Attorney Woo was structured, in how the main characters grew throughout their cases and learned from them both personally and professionally.
I also really appreciated that the series ultimately didn’t end with the main leads getting back together. From the way it started, I was really worried that they would push Ha Ra and Eun Beom back together and make everything that happened between them water under the bridge. Since the part where they got back together was the biggest ick for me in the whole series, I really didn’t want that to happen. That’s why I was so glad that they ended it with them finally acknowledging their own insecurities and flaws and starting to work on those individually. Honestly, after all the annoying parts where they kept trying to make things work between them, I actually thought the ending was pretty wholesome and satisfying, and I want to give the show credit for that.

While I was watching this series, I found myself looking at the main characters as couples more than as individual people. I think that’s because in this story, the characters are pretty much defined through their relationships, or at least through their attitude towards relationships, both in a familial and romantic sense. Both Ha Ra and Eun Beom are established through their respective upbringings -their first main difference- and then through their divorce and lingering attachment to each other. Bi Chwi and Shi Wook are both framed through their respective attitudes towards relationships and gender roles, in which they initially clash but then manage to find a consensus.
Because of this, I’ve decided to frame my character analysis a bit differently than usual, focussing on one couple at a time instead of going one by one. Of course I’ll cover each character individually as well, but as I said, everyone was defined most clearly through their relationships. There also wasn’t a lot of background information on everyone’s pasts besides Eun Beom’s childhood trauma, so there isn’t much to cover regarding everyone’s individual backstories.

Let’s start with our first female lead, Ha Ra. From the very first impression that we get of Ha Ra and Eun Beom in the first episode, we are led to believe that Ha Ra is the bigger person, literally looking down on Eun Beom as he’s dangling from a cliff, asking him to pay the due alimony. From the way she’s introduced and presented during her talk show segments, Ha Ra seems to have come out of the divorce the strongest, getting her alimony and thriving as a famous divorce attorney. When Eun Beom is suddenly reinstated at her firm, she initially seems very determined to stay away from him as much as possible and refuses to be in the same space as him for longer than necessary. And validly so. After all, Eun Beom was the one who cheated on her and divorced her out of the blue, why should she accept to suddenly work with him again? Her discomfort with the situation was relativized even more through the fact that Eun Beom just happily reinserted himself in his old position and was able to look and smile at Ha Ra as if nothing happened between them. I mean, that would annoy the heck out of me, as well.
However, what quickly started to irk me was that, while Ha Ra did seem to be the most self-assured person at first, she was also the first to fold again. While it was realistic that the person who seemed to be the most decisive actually tended to doubt and overthink things the most, I can’t deny it made me a bit disappointed in her at times. Of course I haven’t personally experienced the emotional repercussions of a divorce, and I can imagine that Eun Beom’s return to the office brought back old feelings that she thought she’d already buried, but I kept wanting her to remain as casual as Eun Beom and let him get nervous around her more. Because let’s be real here, Eun Beom did some very insensitive and unsolicited things in the beginning that she just rolled with instead of putting him in his place. I got so mad when he invited her to dinner only to reveal that he was setting her up on a blind date, like, who the heck are you to decide on her next relationship, bro? He kept giving her mixed signals: one moment he’d act like nothing happened between them, then he suddenly acted like he cared about her again, and then when she started reciprocating that, he’d act like she was being too clingy. I had a very hard time understanding why Ha Ra kept finding ways to redeem him and came crawling back to him time and time again. Even after getting mad at him for a very valid reason, she always ended up second-guessing herself or found another excuse to blame herself for ‘overreacting’, which really wasn’t necessary in my opinion. Although there was nothing wrong with self-reflection, I think Ha Ra occasionally tended to do a bit too much of that, to the point where she didn’t need to do it at all.
There were two parts in the story where I found Ha Ra really annoying. The first part was when she suddenly decided she still loved Eun Beom and wanted to get back together with him, and she just started lovebombing him every single day, at the office and through text. From one day to the next, she suddenly barged into his office saying: “I love you, let’s get back together” and the way she kept sending those texts was just really childish. The fact that this happened when Eun Beom was working on a very demanding case didn’t help either. That was actually really immature and unprofessional of Ha Ra. She knew she was bothering him during a time when he had a lot on his mind at work, and she still acted like a clingy child. During this part, honestly, I was completely on Eun Beom’s side because, heck, even I got annoyed with her.
The second part had to do with the issue of having kids, which I’ll elaborate on more after discussing Eun Beom. Overall, I did like Ha Ra’s character. As annoyed as I occasionally got with her, her self-awareness was very refreshing. I’m very glad that she, out of the both of them, was ultimately the one that really ended it between them because she admitted that they were just too different and she wouldn’t be able to embrace all of him. I think the fact that she was able to recognize their incompatibility despite her lingering feelings for him in the end was a major development for her. I actually felt proud of her when she acknowledged to CEO Seo at the end that she felt like it wasn’t enough for the two of them to just ‘like each other a lot’, no matter how many times they tried to make things work. They were just too different, both in their upbringing and in their outlook on marriage and starting a family. In hindsight, no matter how unsatisfying it was, I could respect that Ha Ra gave in to her feelings for Eun Beom one more time before coming to the conclusion that it really wouldn’t have worked out between them, even if they hadn’t gotten divorced before.
Something that really resonated with me in the end was that Ha Ra seemed really anxious about the fact that she hadn’t found her ideal kind of love yet in her mid-thirties. As a thirtysomething with zero relationship experience myself, this actually hit quite close to home, also how her mother assured her to take her time and find what she was looking for at her own pace. It also kind of redeemed her childishness for me, because when I think about it, I can also get pretty childish about things knowing fully well that I’m being petty. And, admittedly, Ha Ra did go through something very chaotic and confusing with Eun Beom, so I can imagine that would stir up a lot of insecurities regarding finding new love as well. In any case, I just mean to say that I was happy with Ha Ra’s development through the story, and it was very satisfying to see her finally put her lingering attachment to Eun Beom to rest. It was quite symbolical that she chose to move to another law firm as well, because that really felt as if she finally detached herself from Eun Beom to focus on her own life and career. The way her team fully encouraged this decision spoke volumes as well.

As I said, I think the first major difference between Ha Ra and Eun Beom lay in their upbringing. Ha Ra came from a pretty well-off family, her father was a respected college professor, and she never really wanted for anything during her school and career paths. Eun Beom, on the other hand, grew up without a father and was raised by a single mother alongside two other siblings. As the only son, he was pressured from an early age on by his mother Seon Myung Hwa (played by Jeon Gook Hyang) to focus only on his studies. At eleven, Eun Beom (as a child played by Ki Eun Yoo) always had to take care of his younger sister, Eun Byeol (Ki So Yoo – Ki Eun Yoo’s real life sister, cute detail). What’s worse, little Eun Byeol died after Eun Beom left her alone ONE TIME to play soccer with his friends. After being blamed for his younger sister’s death by his own mother, Eun Beom developed a deep trauma that still fuels the estranged relationship he has with his mother as an adult. Besides his trauma of losing his younger sister, Eun Beom has also looked on sadly as his older sister tired herself out while taking care of two children on her own. Looking at his past and family, it’s not too hard to understand why Eun Beom isn’t too keen on having kids himself.
Honestly, the part where Eun Beom’s trauma was revealed was the only part in the story where I really felt for him. Being expected to achieve the highest points at school and take on full responsibility for a younger sibling at such a young age will always leave a mark on a child. And let’s be real, despite the fact that I really felt for his mother to have to work twice as hard to support her family, I didn’t think it was right of her to be so harsh on Eun Beom in the meantime as well. She would actually take away his lunch money if he didn’t get straight As, causing him to lose precious break- and playtime at school. She made him always stay at home to study and watch Eun Byeol instead of letting him play outside with his friends. When raised under such a strict regime, it’s only natural for a child to start yearning for the things they’re missing out on. Even if it was just an instinctual reaction of his mother to blame Eun Beom for what happened, that actually ended up traumatizing him for life. I have to admit I also found it quite irresponsible of her to be like: “Of course that wasn’t your fault, how could you think that” in the last episode, like uhh, maybe because YOU made him feel that way?! She didn’t even know how much she scarred him, and that was very problematic of her. I don’t know if this is controversial to say, but I fully blamed Eun Byeol’s accident on her mother’s neglectful parenting, despite the circumstances. It wasn’t Eun Beom’s fault for giving in to his desire to play with his friends – he even made sure Eun Byeol was asleep when he left and probably planned to come back before she woke up – and it wasn’t Eun Byeol’s fault for going out to look for him. This entire situation wouldn’t have happened if the mother had been watching her kids herself, or if she had gotten another adult to watch them while she was away, like a neighbor or something. It gave me major Nobody Knows vibes. Even if you have a son that’s slightly mature for his age, you can’t forget that he’s a kid: he shouldn’t be burdened with his family’s financial struggles to the point where he’s not even allowed to play outside anymore.
As I said, considering his past I could get behind Eun Beom’s reason for not wanting kids hundred percent. Having children isn’t for everyone, and it should be completely valid to say that you don’t want them. Referring back to the second thing that annoyed me about Ha Ra, it was the way that she kept pushing him to change his mind about that. As if it wasn’t already icky enough that they got back together, it really weirded me out when she IMMEDIATELY started mentioning having kids. Like, girl, you didn’t even get remarried, it’s literally your first day of dating again after two years of separation and you think you can immediately pick up where you left off? Especially considering the fact that Eun Beom wanted a divorce in the first place because she wanted kids and he didn’t, which Ha Ra also knew by then. It just didn’t feel right. I couldn’t believe she thought of a plan with Eun Beom’s mother to actually BRIBE him into having a kid, that was so inappropriate. While we could redeem Ha Ra by saying that she didn’t know about Eun Beom’s underlying reason and trauma at that point, that in itself was also a good enough reason to give up on trying to make their relationship work. The fact that she didn’t even know what he went through, even after having been married to him, should’ve been enough to go on: as long as they couldn’t be transparent with each other and properly communicate their respective feelings, it was never going to work. So yeah, the fact that both Ha Ra and Eun Beom’s mother kept pushing him to change his mind about having kids was really frustrating to watch – that actually made me feel for Eun Beom.
Other than that, there were plenty of things that Eun Beom did that legit pissed me off. Besides the fact that he seemingly thought he had the right to set Ha Ra up on a blind date without her consent and his constant back-and-forth feelings for her, his tendency to jump to conclusions and decide things by himself without discussing them first really set my teeth on edge. Just like the male lead in Lucky’s First Love, who also couldn’t learn from his mistakes, this habit of Eun Beom also kept coming back.
First of all, this man actually faked an affair to get out of his marriage because he couldn’t bring himself to tell his wife honestly that his heart wasn’t in it anymore. I’m not gonna lie, I felt like something was fishy about their divorce from the start. The way Eun Beom acted when he appeared at Ha Ra’s office did not rhyme with how someone would act after being confronted with their ex-spouse that they cheated on. He was way too casual about it. Also, from the way he acted around the woman he allegedly cheated on Ha Ra with, I didn’t get any (former) lovers vibes whatsoever. After claiming he’d been having an affair with this woman, it was never even mentioned what happened to them afterwards, or if they were even still together. It just didn’t feel right. So yeah, when Eun Beom panickingly confessed that he’d faked an affair to divorce Ha Ra (great cliffhanger, by the way) I definitely was like: I KNEW SOMETHING WAS OFF. As if that wasn’t already a huge enough shock to Ha Ra, I really couldn’t understand Eun Beom’s reasoning when he tried to explain it to her afterwards. He actually said that telling her he’d committed a crime or gotten a terminal disease would’ve been easier than admitting that he got annoyed with her because it was ‘too mundane’ of a reason. That’s a wild excuse. What the actual heck, bro. Aren’t issues like ‘when should we do the dishes’ and ‘do we put the airco on or off at night’ the most basic compromises in a marriage? It’s like they started living together while knowing nothing about each other’s preferences, and he immediately got sick of it. But instead of talking to his wife and finding ways to work things out and compromise to give each other the space that they needed, he just made up an excuse to lie about having an affair to get a divorce. What a spineless freaking manchild. And the worst thing is, he kept blaming it on Ha Ra for being too pushy and clingy and not giving in to him. Bro, how is she supposed to know she’s bothering you when you don’t tell her?! You’re newlyweds, of course she wants to be all lovey-dovey with you. If you want to watch a movie by yourself, you can just tell her that you need some alone time. You should be able to say that to the person you’re married to, right?
All in all, Eun Beom’s toxic trait was that he never expressed his pet peeves, figured out a way to get out of it without too much hassle, and then blamed it on the other person for forcing him to go that far. It was unbelievable. Also, I couldn’t understand why, even after his real reason for divorcing Ha Ra was revealed, he still didn’t even blink while acting friendly and flirty with Ha Ra, and even said things like: “You’ll never find another guy like me”. Are you actually delusional? After everything that just came out, I sure as heck hope she never finds another guy like you. Get real, bro.
Another toxic trait that he exhibited at least two times in the story was that he’d jump to conclusions without first checking whether it was actually true. Which is a strange habit for an attorney, if you think about it.
The first time this happens is when the case with Ha Ra’s father comes into play. Somehow, Eun Beom finds out that Ha Ra’s father has another daughter from a mistress. Around the same time, Ha Ra gets a new client who fits the description of said mistress perfectly. From one glance at the woman, Eun Beom just assumes that she is Ha Ra’s father’s ‘other woman’ and starts acting all weird around Ha Ra because he’s afraid that she’ll find out about her father’s affair when taking on this woman’s case. I’m actually glad that they turned out to be different cases, because that would’ve been really typical, but the fact that Eun Beom just assumed that this was the same woman based on one very general appearance description instead of her name or something more definitive was really stupid. Because of him, Ha Ra actually found out about her dad’s affair in the worst way possible.
The second time was in the last couple of episodes, when Eun Beom overheard Ha Ra talking to her mother on the phone about ‘convincing someone’ and he immediately assumed that it was about him and the issue of wanting kids. Again, without even checking with Ha Ra what she’d been talking about, he just assumed that that’s what was happening and he immediately distanced himself from Ha Ra and started acting like a jerk before straight-up breaking up with her again. He even had the audacity to blame it all on her, that he was only breaking up with her because that’s what she really wanted. He just made up a story about how she didn’t want to be with him because he didn’t want kids, while he was the one breaking up with her. That was so twisted. I hated how he actually managed to gaslight Ha Ra into thinking that it was her fault AGAIN.
In the end, Eun Beom finally acknowledging that he needed therapy was the best thing that came out of him in the story. Truth be told, it all came down to the fact that he couldn’t talk about his feelings and didn’t know how to take responsibility for his actions. He chose avoidance over confrontation and then deflected it by justifying it as that he ‘didn’t have another choice’ or that he was ‘driven into a corner’ by the other person. I read some comments on MDL beforehand that already warned me for the lack of improvement in his character, but I did feel like him finally going to therapy to talk about his issues was the best ending for him. He came a very long way, and it got incredibly annoying to watch at times, but he did eventually get to a place where he could set his pride aside and work on himself, and that’s honestly the best I could expect from him.

I guess there just has to be one show where the relationship doesn’t work out, right? Nevertheless, this was definitely one of my least favorite main couples in a K-Drama ever. I didn’t want Ha Ra and Eun Beom to get back together from the get-go, and that’s not a very common feeling to have when going into a K-Drama. Looking back on it, I didn’t actually feel anything real between them, either. The flashbacks of how they fell in love was really sweet, but since Eun Beom already got the ick so quickly after they started living together, it just seemed like they weren’t even meant to take their relationship to the next level. Although Ha Ra kept saying that she still had feelings for Eun Beom, even the way she kept pestering and pressuring him to get back together didn’t really have any feeling behind it. It’s like she was just announcing it to the world, but the true love that she felt never really came through. Same with Eun Beom, because it honestly didn’t feel like he was still interested in Ha Ra anymore at all. He’d somehow throw her a wistful look, but even when he was nice to her, it never felt like it was meant to mean more than that. Even when he briefly became affectionate after agreeing to Ha Ra’s pushy request to get back together, he just switched back to being distant and rude to her the next day. So yeah, chemistry-wise, this also definitely wasn’t it. The only parts that I felt anything genuine between them was during the flashbacks of how they first got together, and the scenes in which they were intimate, even though those also felt weird since they went back and forth between such different energies.
In hindsight, I think it’s safe to say that what stood between Ha Ra and Eun Beom wasn’t even the kids issue, but the fact that they couldn’t communicate. Eun Beom had the tendency to keep everything to himself and take distance from Ha Ra without explaining anything, which caused Ha Ra to get anxious and start second-guessing everything to the point of drunk-dialing Eun Beom every single night while they weren’t talking. No matter how much they liked each other, once they committed to a new attempt at a relationship they would always reach that same point, so it really wasn’t any use. While I can understand the urge to give it one more try, I’m glad that it became the final lesson for them. Admittedly, it’s the same for me and dating apps at the moment.

Let’s move on to the characters I did like in this series! 😀
Honestly, it didn’t take too long for me to get completely into the relationship between Bi Chwi and Shi Wook. They had such a contrastive and interesting dynamic from the start, and I loved the ‘open-minded older woman versus conservative younger guy’ trope in this case.
Bi Chwi is slightly older than Ha Ra, who calls her eonni, and she’s initially the bestie that keeps urging her to ‘get under someone new’. Bi Chwi herself is a free spirit, she’s not looking to bind herself to anyone or settle down and just wants to have fun with men while she can. I liked that she was like a voice of reason whenever Ha Ra started hesitating about Eun Beom again. The fact that Bi Chwi was always a supporter of her and Eun Beom going their separate ways made me appreciate her from the start.
In stark contrast to Bi Chwi, Kwon Shi Wook is a very conservative guy with a rigid mindset when it comes to gender roles in a marriage. He and Bi Chwi often go at each other during meetings because they’re just so different. However, their dynamic takes a shift when they end up having a one-night stand after getting drunk at a team dinner.
I really loved their respective reactions after waking up in that hotel room. I kind of expected Bi Chwi to be appalled by herself, but it was actually really funny how unfazed she was while Shi Wook immediately panicked. Also, the fact that he was immediately ready to ‘take responsibility’ and date her after sleeping together while it was ‘just another’ meaningless one-night stand for Bi Chwi really stirred things up. The way Shi Wook became super antsy and avoidant around Bi Chwi and she responded by sneaking up on him and teasing him just to make him nervous was pretty funny. But then Bi Chwi suddenly started getting nauseous by the smell of certain foods and I was like: “there we preggo”.
I’m not gonna lie, I initially didn’t like this reveal at all. I was hoping for a slowburn romantic development in which Bi Chwi would ultimately realize her true feelings for Shi Wook. I felt like the pregnancy kind of forced them together prematurely, before the buildup in their romance was at its peak. This was strengthened by the fact that I found it really peculiar how Shi Wook, after finding out about the pregnancy, immediately threw away his conservative mindset and willingly agreed to become a stay-at-home husband/dad. Like, of course it was a major green flag that he immediately agreed to cater to all of Bi Chwi’s needs, but it a pretty sudden switch when looking at the buildup in their relationship. They hadn’t hooked up again after that one-night stand and Shi Wook had taken a respectable distance from Bi Chwi after she made it clear she didn’t want to commit to anything serious with him. While I did think he’d take responsibility because that would be ‘the right thing to do’, I honestly didn’t expect him to immediately jump at the prospect of dropping everything to devote the rest of his life to Bi Chwi. I personally found it kind of a weird switch.
Still, I can’t deny that I found the relationship between these two way more enjoyable to watch than the main leads’, probably because the tension between them was more fun than irking. Although I personally would’ve liked them to get to that final “I love you” stage without the push of a pregnancy, it was nice to at least see one functional relationship in this show where both parties were able to find a middle ground despite their differences.

The friendship between Ha Ra and Bi Chwi was also something I really appreciated. Sure, they didn’t always tell each everything that was going on, but they never let that influence their bond and they remained to be each other’s go-to person when something happened. It was interesting to see how their respective storylines passed each other, like how Bi Chwi felt additionally awkward about getting pregnant because she knew Ha Ra really wanted kids but was stuck with someone who didn’t. I’m glad that didn’t become a major issue between them and Ha Ra could still bring herself to be genuinely happy for her friend. I hated it when Eun Beom used this tension point in his breakup speech to Ha Ra. In any case, I liked Bi Chwi as a second female lead and consistent supporting character to Ha Ra, she was really cool.
Shi Wook also grew on me while he became more open-minded through his cases. At some point, he and Bi Chwi were on opposite sides in defending one part of a couple in a divorce case. It was really satisfying to see Shi Wook’s opinion change as he realized that the man he was defending was actually a lazy bum who didn’t lift a single finger and dumped every single chore on his wife. I loved how he too, as a conservative man who initially agreed that women should take the lead in the childrearing, ended up telling the guy that he was being ridiculous and refused to take up his case, lol. It was nice to see him become a bit more open-minded, because he definitely said some problematic things at the start and initially tended to take Eun Beom’s side against Ha Ra’s. I feel like he also changed his mindset throughout the different cases he worked on, and that definitely worked in his favor.
I really liked that the relationship between him and Bi Chwi was so much more dynamic than Ha Ra and Eun Beom’s, which was purely based on lingering attachment from a problematic marriage. The addition of his dialect was also nice, it made him such a distinctive character. The ‘Son of Bi Chwi’ joke about their baby’s nickname made me cackle – I just knew there was going to be at least one wordpun about Bi Chwi’s name at some point, lol.

Before I go on to discuss the other people at the law firm, I just want to discuss Ha Ra’s interim boyfriend, Min Jae Gyeom (played by Moo Jin Sung). Jae Gyeom is the guy that Eun Beom sets Ha Ra up with at the end of the first episode. Although I first judged Ha Ra for actually going along with it instead of just walking away, Jae Gyeom actually turned out to be a very decent guy, and he and Ha Ra even date for a while. I loved that Jae Gyeom fell for Ha Ra despite knowing that she used to be married to Eun Beom, and that he didn’t make any deal about her being a divorcee, which apparently is quite a stigma in Korean culture. Not only did he express genuine interest, he was even willing to wait for her to come around after she admitted still having feelings for Eun Beom. I’m glad they at least got one proper kissing scene, too. Honestly, I was shipping Ha Ra with Jae Gyeom so hard. I expected it to fail, because everything pointed at that she was going to get back together with Eun Beom at some point, but I still really hated the way they ultimately broke up. Jae Gyeom was a really good guy and, in contrast to Eun Beom, he was very open to discussing any kinds of qualms Ha Ra had with him.
The reason why I hated their breakup wasn’t just because I shipped them together, but also because I felt like they initiated it very suddenly and forcefully. Jae Gyeom had always been nothing but a green flag to Ha Ra, but then he suddenly became super judgemental out of nowhere. He didn’t seem to acknowledge Ha Ra’s feelings at all anymore, not when he relentlessly started bashing her dad for having an affair, or when he basically forced her to become friendly and spend a lot of time with his mom. It was like they just came up with a reason that would lead to their breakup and initiated it without any buildup, so it felt a bit forced to me. Despite this, I really rooted for Jae Gyeom, because he was the most patient and understanding person ever. Of course he was anxious about Ha Ra working with her ex-husband who he knew she still had feelings for, but he never doubted her or acted out of jealousy or anything. They also ended things on a very mature and friendly note, wishing each other the best without any grudges or shade. I’m not gonna lie, as soon as the relationship between Ha Ra and Eun Beom was wrapped up for good, I found myself thinking “can’t she just go back to Jae Gyeom now? 🥹”. If there was anyone that treated Ha Ra the right way, it was him.

Just one more sidestop before moving on, because I want to quickly say something about Ha Ra’s parents in a bit more detail because in my opinion, Oh Dae Hwan (Park Ji Il) and Im Sook Jung (Lee Ji Ha) also contributed to some interesting new perspectives in this story.
When faced with her husband’s infidelity and urged by Ha Ra to divorce him, Sook Jung initially didn’t want to go ahead with it. When asked why, she came up with a reason that I found very interesting. She said that agreeing to the divorce would mean giving in to her husband’s mistress, and that holding on to him would also be a kind of revenge. That was such an out-of-the-box way of thinking to me, honestly. I hadn’t thought about it like that before. In the end, she still agreed to it because she couldn’t take it, which was probably for the best, after all. I loved how she just immediately found another lover after that, lol, that was really “What, like it’s hard?”💅🏻of her.
I honestly couldn’t really gauge what Oh Dae Hwan’s intentions were in the whole affair thing. I got the feeling that he just felt responsible for his other daughter (who was an absolute brat, by the way) because she had a health condition, but then he actually ended up choosing his other family despite initially insisting he wanted to cut ties with his mistress. Anyways, I liked that we got to see a little bit of interaction between Ha Ra and her parents, just like we got to see a bit about Eun Beom’s family history. It was nice to at least have their backgrounds a bit fleshed out to show what kind of family they grew up in, because that was definitely relevant to their character building.

The law firm that Ha Ra and Eun Beom work at is called Doohwang, and at the start of the story it has two acting CEOs, Seo Han Gil (played by Jeon Bae Soo) and Hong Yeo Rae (played by Gil Hae Yeon). From what I understood, CEO Hong joined when CEO Seo was struggling with his marriage, but I’m not actually sure it was explained, exactly.
I’ll start with CEO Hong, since she is the most active boss at the office. I really loved this woman. She was so just and strong and awesome. I loved the way she consoled Ha Ra after she found out why Eun Beom had truly wanted to divorce her. Ha Ra was getting emotional over the fact that she’d wanted a baby so badly, and complained about how marriage seemed to go so well for some people, to which CEO Hong said:

“There’s no one who has it all. Everyone lives at a crossroads of some amount of happiness and some amount of misfortune. It’s fine if you want to dig down, but I’ll hold your hand, so come back up. You went so far already. You’re done digging, right? You’ll come back up, right?”

It was such a warm and sweet moment, and it meant a lot coming from CEO Hong, who had gone through such an incredibly toxic marriage herself. CEO Hong was a divorcee as well, and at some point she was appointed to defend the new in-laws of her former husband, who appeared to not have changed a single bit. My favorite part was definitely her threatening to drive her ex-husband into the ocean if he didn’t sign the agreement for divorce, that was such a cold-blooded power move. She was such a nice headfigure at Doohwang and I really admired how she balanced her professionality with her genuine sympathy for all her team members. It was so cool of her to encourage Ha Ra to go bigger by moving to a different firm without a single shred of judgement. She was like a cool aunt, and definitely one of my favorite characters.
My confusion regarding the dynamic between the two CEOs mostly came from the fact that CEO Seo barely did anything, lol. At first he only appeared to introduce Eun Beom back into the team, and after that he was always shown dozing off during meetings and stuff, so I have no idea what he was doing. He only got his own little arc towards the end of the series. Rather than getting divorced, he agreed to an ‘open marriage’ with his wife, which supported the fact that he really wanted to appear as a modern and open-minded person. However, after he helps his wife get custody of her dog from her foreign boyfriend and she tells him she already found a new lover, it definitely kills him a bit inside. I guess he was trying to appear chill but secretly wanted to get back with her exclusively? It was kind of sad for him. Despite the fact that he only made a few appearances, mostly as a comic relief character, I did appreciate that he ultimately started getting involved in the matter between Ha Ra and Eun Beom. During the final episode he actually voiced my thoughts exactly when calling Eun Beom out on his BS, lol, so I couldn’t help but agree with that. All in all, I thought he was an interesting character, but it was a pity that they only zoomed in on him towards the end. I would’ve liked to see more CEO sides of him, rather than just him being a useless seat-filler during the meetings, lol.
Despite the difference in their active contributions to the team, I actually quite liked the dynamic between the two CEOs. They seemed like they were really close, and it was nice to see how they’d always drink a cup of tea together in CEO Hong’s office. Honestly, I wouldn’t have minded if they’d ended up as a couple, that’s how comfortable they seemed together.

The remaining three people at Doohwang were Jeon Min Kyung (Kim Ro Sa), Sung Chan Yeong (Shin Joo Hyeop) and Ji Ye Seul (Min Chae Min). Their exact functions weren’t really clear to me, but since they had no office of their own and sat in the general area where clients came in, I figured they must have been administration/reception. While these three weren’t exactly a part of the main plot, I really liked them as side characters. They brought some welcome lightness to the tensions in the office, and it was fun to see them gossip among each other. I also liked that Chan Yeong and Ye Seul didn’t become a couple, because I feel like that would’ve been a very obvious choice. We don’t get any background information about them, for example on how they came to this firm, but I liked the casual banter between them. Their energy balanced out the emotional chaos of the main characters in a very nice way.

I want to briefly go over some of the court cases that contributed to the main characters’ stories. By the way, am I the only one who found it peculiar that so many of the cases were tied to the lawyers’ own families? I thought that there was a rule that attorneys aren’t put in charge of people they personally know because of potential bias, just like how doctors aren’t allowed to operate on their own family members. I guess not, but I couldn’t help wonder if this was actually realistic.
As I mentioned before, I thought the variety of court cases in this series was really interesting and relevant to the main plot. Although they all essentially revolved around divorce, the circumstances of each case were different and it was cool to see how they kept highlighting different elements each time. I also liked that, just like in Extraordinary Attorney Woo, they kept introducing new opposing attorneys and judges, which altered the dynamics within each courtroom. The cases varied from centering on affairs and child custody claims to insufferable in-laws.
I think the cases that were most important for Ha Ra and Eun Beom were the case involving the woman Eun Beom allegedly cheated with (the Ki Seo Hee vs. Jung Joon Kyung Case), the case that mirrored Ha Ra’s father’s affair (the Kim Ga Eun Case), the case of Ha Ra’s cousin (the Lee Sung Joo vs. Sun Hyo Jung Case), and the case of the couple that had already gotten divorced three times (the Third Divorce Case).
The case of Ki Seo Hee (Park Jung Won), the woman Eun Beom claimed to have cheated on Ha Ra with, was important first and foremost because it resulted in the revelation that this affair had been fake. I’m still not entirely sure how Eun Beom and Seo Hee knew each other, but I believe they found a friend in each other when they were both struggling with their respective marriages. Even though the affair was fake, Seo Hee did seem to be interested in Eun Beom, but he rejected her advances as soon as the case was closed.
If I remember correctly, Eun Beom was on the Kim Ga Eun case when Ha Ra started lovebombing him, which in hindsight was even more unprofessional since Eun Beom had taken that case from Ha Ra since she had to sort things out with her parents’ divorce. I remember that this was a particularly emotional case since the defendant ended up stabbing her lover because he wouldn’t acknowledge her child as his. Since Ha Ra was going through a similar situation with her father’s other daughter, so I thought this was an interesting parallel.
The case of Ha Ra’s cousin hit close to home because he had married his wife under a DINK agreement while he actually wanted children, and she had an abortion without telling him. DINK stands for Double Income, No Kids, so it’s a childless marriage where both spouses earn an equal income. This case came around the time that Ha Ra and Eun Beom were also discussing the kids issue again. I like to think that this case strengthened both Ha Ra and Eun Beom in their stances regarding the matter, how it really wouldn’t do to give in to the other for the sake of the relationship, because it would become an obstacle again at some point, anyway.
The Third Divorce Case was a very clear wake-up call, since it again mirrored Ha Ra and Eun Beom’s relationship. They kept coming back because of lingering feelings and memories, but then they also kept breaking up because they never solved the fundamental things that were wrong between them. It really felt like this was the case that finally made Ha Ra see the truth about her relationship with Eun Beom. Personally, this case pissed me off because neither of the two wanted to take care of their child and I found that incredibly irresponsible. Normally custody cases are fought by two parents that both want to keep their child, so it was baffling to see that it could happen the other way around, as well.
All in all, I feel like every case had something of essence to the main story, because Ha Ra and Eun Beom took something from each and every defendant’s story, and I liked that they made all those stories equally relevant. It felt like the majority of the people at Doohwang got their characters fleshed out through their respective arcs that focussed on their own past experiences with relationships and marriage, including the two CEOs. Although this did contribute to everyone’s personal growth, I couldn’t help but feel like it was executed in a different way than usual. Normally, the main leads are introduced as individual people, whether they know each other already or not, and their worlds collide when they get together. Here, it seemed to be the other way around: Ha Ra and Eun Beom had to rediscover their individual selves after the collision of their worlds. Personally, I thought that was quite an interesting approach. I recently watched Welcome 2 Life, where the main leads were also a divorced couple, but that show also took a different approach and worked towards a more redeeming conclusion of rediscovering the love they once felt for each other and getting back together. In Strangers Again, the whole point seemed to be for Ha Ra and Eun Beom to figure out if things could have been different after the true reason for the divorce came out, trying again, and still coming to the same conclusion.

Lastly, I just want to briefly comment on the series’ title. The English title is ‘Strangers Again’, while the Korean title is a full question, ‘Can We Become Strangers Again?’ Besides the slightly on-the-nose title drop in the last scene of the final episode when Ha Ra and Eun Beom went their separate ways, I did like that this question was also part of the daily discourse at the law firm, since their whole work revolved around people ‘becoming strangers’. I thought it was a fitting title because it didn’t just refer to the main leads as a divorced couple, but to their whole work field, as there were so many characters that became became estranged in one way or another.

I think that’s all I really wanted to say about this series content-wise, so let’s move on to the cast comments!

It’s been so long since I last saw a drama with Kang So Ra! I know her from Doctor Stranger and Revolutionary Love. Strangers Again is her last drama to date, and according to MDL she gave birth to her second child in 2023, so maybe she’s taking a break from acting for a while? I’m not sure. In any case, it was nice to see her in a lead role again. So far, her performance in Doctor Stranger is still my favorite, and I have to admit that the rest of her performances still haven’t topped that one for me. Although I did like seeing her in another more emotionally layered role, I feel like the other roles I’ve seen her in so far all kind of blend together. Despite the fact that she’s gorgeous and a decent actress, I always feel like she keeps getting roles that don’t really make her shine that much. There always seems to be a sense of awkwardness that I get from her, although I can’t really put my finger on what that is and where it comes from. I still liked her performance as Ha Ra and I definitely saw a new side of her acting, but I still wished there’d been a lot more to her character that set her apart. I also had mixed feelings about her chemistry with Jang Seung Jo. Their more intimate scenes looked very natural, but then they would immediately shoot back to that awkwardness as soon as the scene changed. Still, I’m really curious to see more of her, either in old or new dramas. Also, everytime I look at her face I just feel like she needs to play the younger version of Park Ji Young in something, they look SO much alike.

I’ve only seen Jang Seung Jo before in supporting roles, in The Package, Wife I Know and Encounter. This was the first lead role I’ve seen him in, so that was cool. As I already made clear in my review, I didn’t exactly warm up to Eun Beom and I found it difficult to understand his logic and way of thinking. He was very hard to gauge, as well, and until the end I never really understood whether or not he actually still had feelings for Ha Ra or not. Of course, a character is as frustrating as the actor makes them, so in that sense I still think Jang Seung Jo did a good job at portraying Eun Beom. Although his chemistry with Kang So Ra was a bit meh and I would’ve liked to get a clearer insight into his character’s mind, I’m still curious to see him in more dramas and get a better feel of him as an actor. There are some more dramas with him on my list, so we’ll see. If I had to say, his performance in Wife I Know is still my favorite, since his character was the most pleasant I’ve seen him play, lol.

I kept wondering where I recognized Jo Eun Ji from, but apparently she appeared in Personal Taste, Oh My Venus and Madame Antoine – although I don’t have a clear memory of her character in those shows. I’ll definitely remember her as Bi Chwi, though. I can’t deny that I initially feared she’d be this over the top comic relief character (like the ones Hwang Bo Ra likes to play), but I’m glad she remained a serious character throughout. From her look to her personality, she did a really good job portraying Bi Chwi as a cool individual, and I appreciated how free-spirited and progressive she was. It was like being surrounded by unhappy couples at work strengthened her even more in enjoying her single life, which I can understand. Her chemistry with Lee Jae Won as Shi Wook was really nice to see, I loved how she kept flustering him. I wonder if I’ll get to see more of her acting in the future!

I’ve seen Lee Jae Won before in The Master’s Sun, Doctor Stranger, The Legend of the Blue Sea and While You Were Sleeping, and there’s a bunch more dramas with him on my list. While I can’t exactly picture his characters from these shows, he did look familiar to me and it was nice to see him in this. He brought a really fun energy to Shi Wook, not only because of his dialect but also because of his pure and conservative nature. It was really nice to see him shrink when cornered by Bi Chwi, and how he ended up being the most loving and doting husband to her ever. I thought he and Jo Eun Ji made quite the unusual pair for a second lead couple, but that actually made it refreshing. I really liked their dynamic and performances in general.

Jeon Bae Soo is one of those familiar faces that pop up everywhere. So far I’ve seen him in Fight For My Way, Revolutionary Love (where he played Kang So Ra’s father), Thirty But Seventeen, Abyss, The King: Eternal Monarch, Forecasting Love and Weather and Extraordinary Attorney Woo. While I didn’t really know what CEO Seo’s function was, since he was never paying attention during meetings and even winged his defense for the dog custody case to get on the judge’s good side, for some reason he always brings a certain presence with him in his performance that makes you want to like him. Looking at the last role I saw of him in Forecasting Love and Weather, I’ll take CEO Seo and all his uselessness any day, lol. I still liked seeing him in this.

Gil Hae Yeon is one of those actresses that makes me either absolutely love or hate the role she plays. Which is a compliment, I guess. I will never forget how her character in Something in the Rain partially ruined the show for me, while her performance in Melting Me Softly touched me to the core. Apart from that I’ve seen her in Sassy Go Go, Encounter and The Silent Sea, and many more that are still on my list. As I mentioned in my review, CEO Hong was probably my favorite character in this show. I loved how she was written as such a strong woman, having gone through an awful marriage, who still didn’t back away from her toxic ex-husband. Her support towards Ha Ra was really touching as well. I think this might be my favorite role of her to date. Gotta love Gil Hae Yeon.

My first thought at seeing Moo Jin Sung was that he somehow reminded me of Lee Jong Seok, lol. I didn’t know him from anything else, and according to MDL I also don’t currently have any other dramas with him on my list, but that can change, of course. While I initially wasn’t sure what kind of guy Jae Gyeom was going to be, I was glad that he turned out to be such a catch for Ha Ra. I really liked that they at least got to date seriously for a while, and I think he portrayed the underlying conflict in Jae Gyeom’s feelings pretty well. I shipped them. 🥹 He was a nice new face to discover, so I definitely hope to see him again in something else.

I’m going to leave it at that for the cast comments. I knew that this wasn’t going to be too long of a review since the story was pretty straightforward and there weren’t too many characters or complicated storylines to cover, but I’m still glad I got to finish this review in one day and squeeze it in within my busy schedule. I can’t deny that I’m happy that I got through it, especially since the episodes were quite lengthy. Still, I’m glad that I get to watch it and form my own opinions on it.
Again, while I understand the negative reviews and I definitely support the mixed feelings about the main leads, I still rated it positively because I appreciated that they focussed on the other side of the over-romanticized concept of marriage. I found all the cases very interesting and I’m mostly happy with how things ended between Ha Ra and Eun Beom. People often judge a K-Drama based on whether or not the main couple ends up together, but that just wasn’t the point here. In essence, I felt like it was about figuring out life and love, finding peace with taking your time and processing your feelings. Ha Ra and Eun Beom needed one final try to determine if they really weren’t meant to be, and as a result they both got to work through their own personal issues and came out stronger. I think that’s the most important thing to take away from this drama. For me personally, it gave me confirmation that it’s okay not to have everything figured out yet, and that sometimes it really is for the best to let lingering feelings towards someone who hurt you where they belong: in the past.

Thank you for reading all the way through this review if you did, and I’ll probably be back with another review before the end of the month. I’m really excited to find out what I’ll be watching next, so until then!

Bye-bee! x

Disclaimer: this is a review, and as such it contains spoilers of the whole series. Please proceed to read at your own risk if you still plan on watching this show or if you haven’t finished it yet. You have been warned.

Summer Guys
(썸머가이즈 / Sseommeo Gaijeu)
MyDramaList rating: 6.5/10

So glad I didn’t actually jinx myself when I predicted my next watch to be short at the end of my previous review, lol. I got to finish this show and review it earlier than expected. I have to say it was quite interesting to watch a summer story in autumn.
To be honest, I don’t even remember putting this one on my list, but I guess I do pick up on some cute-looking mini series every now and then, and this must’ve been one of those. Although I definitely prefer my dramas to be a bit more layered, I do think they did a nice job at giving dimension to the characters and it was a nice and refreshing summer story. It was also a nice pallet cleanser after all the lengthy shows I’ve watched recently. Let’s get it!

Summer Guys is an AbemaTV K-Drama with ten episodes of about thirty minutes each. You can watch the full show on Viki – I couldn’t really find any other streaming sites that had it.
The story takes place on Jeju Island and centers on a young woman called Oh Jin Dal Rae (played by Kang Mi Na). She lost her parents at the age of seven in a tragic car accident, which both made her an orphan and gave her a crippling fear of fire. Now in her twenties, Jin Dal Rae has taken over her father’s old cocktail bar Summer Guys, but struggles to keep the business going. Her uncle, Yang Paul (Jung Kyung Ho), a Catholic priest, is dealing with a lot of loan sharks and even seems prepared to put the bar up as collateral to pay back his debts.
To make matters worse, Summer Guys is right in front of a large beach resort called Partner’s Resort, and its CEO is looking for ways to expand it, preferably by getting rid of the bar. The resort is currently run by the CEO’s daughter Yeom Ah Ran (played by Im Na Young), who is also against Summer Guys for this reason.
It is around this time in the summer that three handsome young men travel to Jeju Island, all for their own reasons, and end up working with Jin Dal Rae at Summer Guys. They are Seon Woo Chan (played by Lee Jung Shin), Ma Tae Oh (played by Lee Jung Shik) and Park Gwang Bok (Kwon Hyun Bin). Despite their initial personal motives, once they actually get the bar up and running again they grow closer and become a real team, even going up against Partner’s Resort together in the end. While the summer heat gets to the team members in different ways, they all ultimately find a new reason to keep going and live life to the fullest, which I personally think is the most important message of the story.

I’d just like to start out by saying that the intro song to this show is an absolute banger. I haven’t been able to find it anywhere online, but my Shazam app tells me it’s called “SG_Boom up” by Lee Jung Min (it’s instrumental). I was immediately pulled in by the exotic summer beach vibes in the intro, so that was a good start. All in all, the intro sequence really reminded me of Single’s Inferno, lol, especially that quieter part at the end where they’re all chilling on that boat. The story had such a typical vibe to it as well, with Jin Dal Rae reminiscing about ‘that one summer’ in the beginning. It was like The Summer I Got Three Handsome Guys to Help Me Save My Cocktail Bar (arguably better than The Summer I Turned Pretty).

While there is a storyline in the sense that it’s about restoring Summer Guys to its former glory and going up against Partner’s Resort to save the bar from being demolished, I felt like the series focussed more on the characters and their respective developments. As such, I would like to go over the main characters in some more detail before commenting on certain other aspects of the story.

Starting off with our heroine, Oh Jin Dal Rae. I always get confused with four syllable names, so I’m glad they clarified that her first name was Jin Dal Rae, as it refers to the azalea flower (‘jindallae’). Although I believe some people did call her Dal Rae in the beginning, I will refer to her as Jin Dal Rae in this review. I think it’s a beautiful name.
As mentioned in the summary, Jin Dal Rae grew up at an orphanage from the age of seven onwards. I’m not sure why her uncle didn’t take her in, since he was the only family member she had left who also lived on Jeju Island. Anyways, Jin Dal Rae went through a really hard time as a child (played by Lee Eun Chae). After losing her parents in an accident that only she survived, she was sent to an orphanage where she got bullied for her fear of fire by the other kids. The only kid that stood up for her was a young boy (played by Nam Gi Won) who unfortunately left the orphanage after only spending a short time there.
As a young adult, Jin Dal Rae doesn’t have any friends and is only focussed on saving her father’s cocktail bar. Her struggle to keep the business afloat is definitely not a result of her poor skills – she’s a very talented bartender and cocktail maker. If anything, her drinks are what initially draws the three guys in and makes them want to help out with the bar – they immediately see its potential.
I liked the aspect of Jin Dal Rae making new friends and learning to open herself up to others more through the bar. Initially, it seemed like her trauma made up the majority of her personality, so it was nice to see her develop in both social and professional ways throughout the story.
I did feel like she was quite naive at times, for example in how she just accepted whoever claimed to be her childhood friend without any second guessing. Also, despite her being an alleged loner, she didn’t seem to have any trouble drawing people in with her bright smile and bubbly personality. It was interesting that, as someone who’d never had any real friends, she had no trouble interacting with and befriending new people. Maybe it helped that it happened through working at Summer Guys, as that was her comfort zone which allowed her to pull her new friends into what she was the most passionate about. She does admit at some point that she got attached to the guys because she wasn’t used to spending time with friends and they immediately brightened up her so far empty life when they first came to the bar.

Regarding this first meeting, I have to admit I still don’t fully understand the whole ‘who started the fire’ argument. Since Jin Dal Rae was outside when it happened, she instantly blamed the guys, and that was the main reason they agreed to help her out for a month, to compensate for that (even though they should’ve known whether they were actually responsible or not). The blame shifts to different people – for some reason everyone wanted to take the blame at some point – but in the end it’s revealed that it happened because of a blown electricity plug, and Jin Dal Rae blames herself for neglecting the bar’s maintenance. However, the way she revealed this made it sound as if she let it happen on purpose because she didn’t want the guys to leave (although I distinctly remember her getting annoyed at how drunk they got during their first meeting). Thinking logically, I guess what happened is that she found out about the blown plug at some point and didn’t tell the guys about it because she’d grown attached to them. Still, they made it sound like she found out right after they just met, when they weren’t that close and comfortable with each other yet, which was a bit confusing to me. I thought it could’ve been made a little bit clearer, seeing as that fire was the inciting incident that made the guys stay and help out with the bar. Anyways, it wasn’t that big of a deal and it didn’t distract much from the rest of the story, but I still wanted to point it out.

I think it was a nice touch to symbolize Jin Dal Rae’s growth through the way she overcame her fear of fire, as well. That was a very gradual and intentional development and I’m glad they used the fire as more than just a trauma in the end. It was really touching to see how, as she became closer with Chan, he started helping her out more, even to the point where he urged her to face her fears. The final challenge she had to overcome – creating the pillar of fire during their cocktail flair show – was a defining moment for her character in general as well. It didn’t just help her win the contest, but it also helped her overcome her biggest fear and confirmed how much she’d grown. I thought that was a nice development.
All in all, I liked Jin Dal Rae for all her different traits. It was cool to see how passionate she was about the bar and how far she was willing to go to save it, even if that meant attacking the loan sharks head-on.
On the other hand, she had to learn how to trust and depend on others in order to maintain friendships. She was occasionally a bit blunt, for example in rejecting someone’s affection, but I think that’s also because she wasn’t used to receiving (romantic) attention from anyone before. It’s because she cherished their friendship so much that she got angry when they lied to her, even if she later realized that she still cared enough about them to forgive them.
Despite the short length of the series, I think they did a nice job at establishing Jin Dal Rae’s character. They made her just layered enough to give her personality and valid reasons to respond to things a certain way. I found myself rooting for her when she finally succeeded at that fire pillar because it felt like she’d come such a long way, even in ten thirty-minute episodes.

Seon Woo Chan, who starts going by Chan once he becomes part of the Summer Guys team, is introduced as a rich chaebol son of a large company called Seon Woo Construction, which I believe would help with Partner’s Resort’s expansion. He studied with Ah Ran in the United States, as well. I’m not sure if he and Ah Ran were arranged to be married or that their parents just wanted them to get together, but Chan was definitely not planning on that. I do believe he came to Jeju for business purposes – maybe his parents wanted him to check up on the resort or something? – but he definitely meant to pay Summer Guys a visit while he was there.
From the way they hinted at the fact that he knew the bar from when he was a kid, it wasn’t a very big surprise to find out that he was actually Jin Dal Rae’s childhood friend. He was adopted by that rich family after being abandoned by his biological mother on a beach in Jeju Island. When he met Jin Dal Rae again and started working at Summer Guys, he clearly became more and more detached from his adoptive family and the construction project he was supposed to help out with. I believe he even went by ‘Chan’ to reject the full ‘Seon Woo’ part of his name, and he even ended up returning his car to them.
Despite being the most serious and poker-faced of the three guys, Chan doesn’t repress his growing feelings for Jin Dal Rae. He initially seemed like the kind of guy who would act unnecessarily cold to the female lead, so I was really glad he was actually upfront about his feelings. His straightforwardness in expressing his affection was also very nice and their kissing scenes were really sweet. I loved how he gradually started challenging Jin Dal Rae to face her fears by leading her through that candle-lit path before confessing his love for her, and how he kept encouraging her not to give up on the fire part in the flair show. Despite his aloof demeanor he made no bones about how much he cared about her and wanted to help her, in more ways than just with the bar. He confessed all the things he’d kept hidden from her out of his own volition before confessing his love to her because he didn’t want anything standing between them. I loved that his experience at Summer Guys taught him what kind of person he wanted to be, and that he also became that person to Jin Dal Rae.

Although the short duration of the series definitely leaves some things to be desired in terms of build-up, I really liked the natural development between Jin Dal Rae and Chan. Regardless of that typical accidental kiss in the first episode, I thought they grew towards each other very naturally. In a way, it was nice to see things develop between them so quickly. I admire the fact that they managed to build up the relationship between them with so little time and still didn’t make it feel too rushed. Even if they needed a drink to get over that initial hurdle, Chan’s immediate response after Jin Dal Rae kissed him the first time was very satisfying. It was so sweet how he kept shielding her from instances of fire at first by covering her eyes or ears – apart from that scene at Ah Ran’s birthday party when Jin Dal Rae fell into the pool, I don’t know what he was doing there, he was standing right next to her – and how he ultimately started challenging her to overcome her fear altogether. Even though they’d been tied together by what I like to call a ‘destiny element’, as they’d known each other as kids, I liked that they didn’t fall for each other because of that. They got naturally close through mutual effort and a genuine affection to care for and help each other, and that’s what made their relationship very healthy and sweet.

While Ma Tae Oh’s reason for coming to Jeju is the last one to be revealed, it’s clear from the start that he’s hiding something. His first encounter with Jin Dal Rae and Chan is when he walks in on their accidental kiss, and then he immediately stands up for Jin Dal Rae in what later turns out to be an attempt to earn her fancy from the get-go. Throughout the story, Tae Oh is the only one who doesn’t lay out all of his cards on the table, even after genuinely confessing his love to Jin Dal Rae. I admit I was quite confused about his true nature at first, and how he was connected to Partner’s Resort, but I’m glad they also clarified that in the end.
Tae Oh, whose real name is Jin Oh, became a conman to earn money for his father’s hospital bills. After sitting out a prison sentence, he got the offer for one final job: seducing Jin Dal Rae into giving up her bar to Partner’s Resort. Honestly, the fact that the CEO hired a conman to seduce the bar’s owner to get this done is so petty, I can’t even. But yeah, Tae Oh initially comes to Summer Guys with this motive, and even pretends to be Jin Dal Rae’s childhood friend for a while. As time passes, he finds himself actually growing attached to the bar and his new friends, and even tells his employer (Shin Yeon Seo) that he wants out of the job when she visits the bar at some point. When the truth about his lies finally comes out, Jin Dal Rae immediately sends him away, after which he goes to stay with his sick father at the hospital. But no matter how angry and disappointed the team is at Tae Oh, they immediately find out they’re lost without his serving skills at the bar, and everyone ends up forgiving him quite quickly. Tae Oh’s time at Summer Guys helps him decide to become a better person and leave his conman days behind him.
I appreciated that Tae Oh also wasn’t made into too much of a stereotype, and that he got a proper backstory and character development. I actually quite liked him, even when he was still working as a spy for Partner’s Resort. It was really satisfying to slowly see him become his own person and stand up for what he felt, instead of choosing ‘the bad guy way’ just because that’s all he saw himself as. He was quite an interesting character in my opinion, because he was not as black and white as the rest. He had to fight a battle within himself to come out as a better person, in a different way than Chan and Gwang Bok. He never lost his womanizer charm, he just chose not to use it to scam people anymore, and that made the biggest difference. The fact that they brought in the backstory of his dad helped me empathize with his character a lot more than if they’d just made him the token playboy character.

I’m not gonna lie, I’m still a bit confused as to what the idea for Gwang Bok’s character was. In the summary on Viki it says ‘a former baseball player’, although I don’t believe that’s ever mentioned – at least it doesn’t play any part in his character. But then in the series itself it’s revealed that he’s a former gang member, and then they suddenly add in that he’s a musician as well. Whereas Chan and Tae Oh were established very clearly from the get-go, switching between and bringing in these different aspects to Gwang Bok’s character made things a bit confusing to me. Having said that, he was the one that first made me go “I like him”, and also the first one to fall for Jin Dal Rae. It’s kind of a pity that they didn’t really do anything more with his feelings for her until his actual love confession. Like, it was already clear from the start that he was the last one to stand a chance at winning her heart, so it almost felt a bit awkward to put him in as the one who fell for her first. Still, I really appreciated that he confessed his feelings just to express them, without expecting anything in return, and how he handled Jin Dal Rae’s ‘let’s just stay friends’ so maturely.
Because Gwang Bok is initially introduced as the most uncomplicated character among the three guys, I was quite shocked when they suddenly made his backstory so dark. When he started crying at receiving a birthday cake, I went from “aww don’t cry my baby 🥹” to “wait what do you mean you wanted to die 😢”. It’s revealed that Gwang Bok, who was also raised as an orphan (they named him after National Liberation Day, the day he came into the orphanage), got involved in some dark networks and started working for the mob as someone who beat people up. Through this, he became so miserable that he actually lost the will to live, but right as he was trying to hang himself (dark) he suddenly got an invitation to stay for free at a luxury hotel in Jeju, and he ended up coming across Summer Guys on the way there. I’m still not entirely sure if they really needed to make his backstory that dark and serious, because I already loved him plenty without it. I wouldn’t have minded it if he was just the innocent baby bean of the group. Personally, I thought the revelation of his gang member past was a bit extreme and out of tune with the rest of the story. It only made the reason behind his tears of having his birthday celebrated extra emotional. Still, it didn’t make me love his character any less.

All in all, I really appreciated that all the main characters were properly established with clear backstories, motives and developments. They all went through something and overcame their dark sides through their time at Summer Guys, and I think that’s the most important thing to acknowledge in this story. It’s cool that, even in such a short series that didn’t have room for too much elaboration, they still managed to at least validate all the main characters in their choices and emotions. I was reminded of how badly this was done in Love of Summer Night, where they introduced a whole basketball team but didn’t even bother to give everyone a personal development arc despite having enough space for it. This show was more than just fun beach vibes and cocktail trivia, it actually told a story with a small set of well-established main characters that all contributed to the plot in their own way. Even though I didn’t feel as emotionally connected to everyone as much as I would’ve in a longer series, it still made it fun enough to watch.

The only character that I did not come to like in this story was Ah Ran. Seeing her depicted along with the rest of the team on that boat in the intro, I was expecting that she’d start helping out at Summer Guys at some point and ultimately turn against her own father as well. That would’ve at least given her a learning curve and a personal connection to Summer Guys in a similar way to the other characters, and it would’ve definitely made me like her a lot more. Unfortunately, Ah Ran remained unpleasant until the very end.
Honestly, I thought it would’ve already made a difference if they’d created some history between Ah Ran and Jin Dal Rae, like that they used to be friends but grew apart for some reason. The fact that Ah Ran’s disrespectful behavior towards Jin Dal Rae was purely based on her disdain of Summer Guys and her jealousy of Jin Dal Rae’s relationship with Chan made her all the more immature and shallow. She literally blackmailed Jin Dal Rae with her trauma of fire and laughed about it behind her back with her mom (who was equally bad). It didn’t even help that she acknowledged her own pettiness, because she clearly didn’t feel bad about it at all.
It was so weird how she just appeared out of nowhere and slapped Jin Dal Rae in the face without even knowing her. Jin Dal Rae and Chan were having a personal conversation and she just started butting in, like, why the heck are you getting involved, girl?🤨 She didn’t even know anything about Chan’s past and she immediately went at Jin Dal Rae for even suggesting that he’d been at an orphanage at some point in his childhood. I always hate it when girls go at each other in these situations. She could’ve also asked Chan why he was hugging another girl, but no, the other girl is immediately the homewrecker. 🙄
The birthday party was such a joke, as well. Like, I get that she was planning on confessing her love to Chan and that’s why she got upset when he left early after saving Jin Dal Rae from the pool, but COME ON, SIS. You triggered someone’s trauma (probably on purpose), making that person nearly DROWN, and still all you can think about is your own missed opportunity at confessing your love to a guy who was going to reject you, anyway? The way she purposely spilled the cocktails Jin Dal Rae made her was so disrespectful as well, it actually made me mad. As accomplished she may have been at running Partner’s Resort, she lacked a lot as a human being, and she never came to reflect on anything. Even when she triggered Jin Dal Rae AGAIN by making her do a freaking fire show to let her keep her bar, she just went “Yep, I’m just being petty :D”, like… Seriously.
While they did such a good job at fleshing out the Summer Guys team members, they really missed the mark with Ah Ran. I don’t know if they even wanted to invoke empathy for her at all, but it definitely didn’t work on me. Even when she went all wannabe girl-boss when she bid Chan farewell to study abroad at the end I was like, “…nobody cares but sure, bye Felicia”. 👋🏻 I thought it was kind of a pity, really. They could’ve at least come up with a proper reason behind her attitude towards Jin Dal Rae. I think that’s what irked me the most, that there was no base reason for her character to act the way she did, and they actually made her the token bitch girl while making sure the other main characters all had valid reasons and character developments. They could’ve done so much more with her, but I honestly feel like they didn’t even try to come up with anything that could possibly redeem her.

As such, in hindsight I find it quite weird that they featured her alongside the Summer Guys members in the intro, as if they were all good buds. She only had a link to Chan, was a complete bitch to Jin Dal Rae and never even interacted with the other two guys. They probably did it to highlight the idol cast, just like they featured Cha Eun Woo and Bona on the poster for The Best Hit despite them only having minor supporting roles. If you look at Ah Ran’s contribution to the story it’s actually kind of weird that she’s featured so friendly with the others in the intro. As I said, seeing them like that the first time made me think that she was going to be a member later on, so it’s actually kind of misleading, as well. This misconception was only emphasized through the summary on Viki, which says: “Yeom Ah Ran (Im Na Young), daughter of a local corporate boss, watches their efforts with interest.” I don’t know what they watched, because she did a lot of things, but definitely not ‘watch their efforts with interest’. She literally came inside the bar ONCE and never even bothered checking what they were actually up to. It was more like she “(…) tried to sabotage their efforts with petty actions”, if you ask me.

I’d like to go over a couple more supporting characters, starting with Father Yang Paul. Again, I’m not sure how close Jin Dal Rae actually was to her uncle, because he didn’t seem to have raised her after her parents passed away despite being a nearby-living family member. I’m guessing Jin Dal Rae was dependent on her uncle to a certain extent since he officially owned the rights to the bar (he was able to sign it over to the loan sharks, at least). Still, there didn’t seem to be any bad blood between Father Paul and Jin Dal Rae, except for when he bought her that busted popcorn machine and almost got the bar taken away. I was curious to his history with the mysterious lady, as he seemed to recognize her when she first showed her face at the church, but that was never explained.
Despite the fact that he wasn’t a very dependable uncle, I did like Father Paul. He had Jin Dal Rae’s best interests at heart when it came to the bar, and he was cheering the Summer Guys team on in their efforts, even if he didn’t do much himself. It was nice that there was at least one supportive adult around to occasionally drop by to check in.
As for his Catholicism, I believe they explained why he turned to God very briefly, but I kind of forgot. 🙈 Was it because he used to be a gambling addict or something? In any case, while there was nothing wrong with him being a Catholic priest, in the end I felt like that only came into play when the mysterious lady came to make a confession. They didn’t really utilize the church that much in any other aspect of the story, which sometimes made me feel like it was a bit random. Also, Father Paul was still pestered by loan sharks, so it’s not like shifting to Catholicism and becoming a priest made all that go away and allowed him to finally live in peace. Anyways, I liked Father Paul as a supporting character, but I thought they could’ve made his role and contribution to the renovation of Summer Guys a bit bigger.

I’d also like to briefly comment on Ah Ran’s parents, Mr. Yeom (Jo Deok Hyun) and Yeom Jang Mi (Jang Ga Hyun). While Mr. Yeom is only ever depicted as a scheming person that’s looking for ways to sabotage Summer Guys, Mrs. Yeom gets a little storyline of her own at some point when the mysterious lady appears and they seem to know each other. To be perfectly honest, I didn’t really care about Ah Ran’s parents because they weren’t very nice people, and I also couldn’t be bothered with their emotional ‘My happiness has always been you’ scene at the end. Just like Ah Ran, they didn’t really contribute anything to the main story of ‘The Return of Summer Guys’, so it felt kind of weird to suddenly have one last scene of them expressing their true love for each other at the end. I wasn’t even paying attention to the fact that there were cracks in their marriage, because I wasn’t interested in them as characters. Sorry to say, but it had the same effect on me as the epilogue scene of Ah Ran preparing to confess to Chan. It just made me go: “so what, am I supposed to feel something for these people now, all of a sudden?” Clearly, the entire Yeom family wasn’t granted a validating backstory or development like the main characters were, so why bother putting in a single ‘sweet’ scene of them? The only satisfying scene with Mr. Yeom was when Tae Oh came to tell him he was officially breaking their contract.

Finally, I just want to mention the mysterious lady who occasionally came to Summer Guys and ultimately turned out to be Chan’s birth mother. She’s credited as ‘Linda’, although I don’t remember anyone ever calling her that in the series. Anyhow, Linda (played by Park Mi Sook) initially appears when the team is holding a promotional sangria tasting at the beach one day, and every time she comes to the bar she seems to single Chan out, although she never stays long.
We only find out in the second-to-last episode that she’s actually Chan’s biological mother, the one who abandoned him when he was a kid. Why she suddenly came back and what she wanted to achieve by seeing him again, I’m still not sure. She didn’t get him to forgive her, that’s for sure. I was a bit conflicted by her sudden transition from smug mysterious lady to emotional mother because it made me wonder why she made such a scene of her appearance in the first place. Also, she was able to maintain a straight face every single time in the beginning, when she took Chan for a walk or when she ordered a drink with him. I get now that that was supposedly an act, but she took on such a different demeanor than the desperate mother at the end. The only ‘backstory’ we get about her is that she was friends with the Yeoms – I believe Mrs. Yeom had a picture of them together, but I don’t even remember if she talked about why she left Chan on his own, or why she came to see him again after all this time.
Whereas the main story around Summer Guys was so clear and well-established, they really left a lot to be desired when it came to the supporting characters, because that’s where the major ambiguities lay. It’s a pity, because Linda started out as a really interesting character, but it felt like they kind of let it slip through their fingers towards the end with the sudden revelation of her identity.

All in all, I think there was a very clear distinction in writing when it came to the different characters. The main characters were all fleshed out well and had significant backstories and individual developments, but the antagonists and the supporting characters all felt a bit incomplete. I don’t want to blame that on the short duration of the show, because I do feel like they could’ve gone a different way with for example Ah Ran in the same amount of time. So yeah, that was a bit of a pity.

Using the end of my character analysis as a segue to my general remarks regarding this series as a whole, one of the biggest pities for me in this drama was that they basically spoiled every episode in the preview sequences. Normally, an episode ends with a short preview of the next episode which reveals just enough to get you excited, but never spoils anything major. In this series, probably because the episodes were so short, the previews actually gave away almost the entire next episode. All the kissing scenes and the incidents, but for example also the outcome of the flair contest and the revelation of the mysterious lady being Chan’s mom (because there would be no other reason for him to hug her while she was crying). That was such a pity. I actually stopped looking at the previews at some point because I didn’t want to get spoiled. They should’ve just rolled the ending credits during the stills and ended it with the epilogue sequences, because those were actually interesting. The epilogues at least revealed some extra ‘background’ information that wasn’t featured in the main story, like how Ah Ran prepared to confess to Chan or how Linda confessed to abandoning her child to Father Paul. As it was, that confession scene lost all of its impact because they already strongly suggested that she was Chan’s mom in the preview just before that. I really wished they hadn’t included those extensive previews, it took away so much of the wonder and suspense of what was going to happen next.

I also felt like they sometimes elaborated too much on scenes that weren’t as relevant as others. For example, why did they put in such a lenghty slow-motion scene of the team beating up those loan sharks when taking literally one minute of screentime for the renovation of the bar? Restoring the bar was one of the main objectives of the story, so why did they brush over that so quickly? I honestly thought that would’ve been a much more extensive process that they might even stretch over several episodes to have a grand reveal at the end, but no, it was done in like one minute and then only hyped up by Father Paul when he saw the new interior for the first time. I feel like they could’ve shifted the importance of certain events a bit better, according to their relevance to the story.
Admittedly, whereas the renovation itself went by way too quickly, I really liked the way the bar looked. It had a really fun vibe to it with all the colors. I also really appreciated the focus on the cocktails, that was the least they could’ve done to highlight the exotic bar element of the story. Every episode was named after a cocktail, and they gave each cocktail a special feature accordingly by mentioning the recipe and all. It was fun to learn a bit more about bartending and making cocktails, because that’s another very obscure specialization that you normally wouldn’t know about unless you’re into it yourself. I also liked how the cocktails ended up playing a part in each episode, like how Jin Dal Rae made Ah Ran a ‘Quick Fuck’ to embarrass her, lol. They ended with a fictional cocktail that Chan made and named after Jin Dal Rae, which was a nice and sweet twist at the end.

The final criticism I have has to do with the ending. As far as I understand, this mini series was made as a way to promote Jeju Island and highlight its exotic beachside. It says at the beginning of each episode that it was sponsored by the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, and the Korea Creative Content Agency. It was never meant as a full-fledged K-Drama, so why the heck did they leave the ending open like that?
They literally end it with a new love interest for Gwang Bok and Tae Oh (played by Lee Hyun Joo) and some mystery guy (played by Kim Dong Joon) that announces he means to buy the bar and acknowledges Chan as if he knows him. Why? The ending was fine as it was, with the guys all deciding to stay at Summer Guys and them continuing to run the bar together. Why would they suddenly add new elements at the last minute, even when they already know there’s not going to be a second season? I really don’t understand that. Sure, they could’ve let Kim Dong Joon make a guest appearance, like they did with Bobby Kim, but to have him actually introduce a new storyline when it’s already clear that there’s not going to be a continuation? Now people are asking for a second season, which I doubt will ever come. I really don’t see the added value of that ending.

Despite my criticisms, which in part are inevitable because of the short duration of the series, I still had a good time watching this. It was a light-hearted yet straightforward story with a nice romance element to it, and I liked that at least all the main characters were fleshed out and worked through their personal issues. I think it served the purpose it was meant to, to create a simple yet engaging story whilst promoting the attractive beachside of Jeju Island, and for that I appreciate it.

On to my cast comments! Since it was quite a small cast of characters, the story didn’t deviate into too many irrelevant side storylines, which was nice. Overall I thought the actors did a really great job.

It was so cool to see my girl Kang Mi Na again! I originally know her from Produce 101, but I’ve seen her act before in 20th Century Boy and Girl, Gyeryong Fairytale, Hotel Del Luna and Café Minamdang, and there’s a couple more of her dramas on my watchlist. I really love Mi Na. She was already one of my favorite contestants on Produce 101 because of her natural bubbliness. She just has something so likeable about her and she always brings such a nice energy to her acting performances. She always delivers on the romantic scenes too, which I admire. I thought she showed a lot of emotional variety as Jin Dal Rae, and her chemistry with Lee Jung Shin was really sweet. I’m glad I get to keep seeing her in things, she always brightens my day. Having said that, she does typically get cast as quirky and bubbly characters, so I would like to one day see a completely new side of her that I haven’t seen before. I’m sure she’ll pull it off.

Apparently, Lee Jung Shin was one of the four ‘knights’ in Cinderella and the Four Knights, but I honestly don’t even remember him from that. 🙉 He did look familiar to me, but I guess I’ve seen him before somewhere in a CNBLUE-related clip? Not that I’ve seen much of that either. Anyways, I liked his performance as Chan. As I said, it was nice that he was so proactive about his feelings and never actually gave anyone the cold shoulder, as his appearance would suggest. It was nice seeing his cold exterior thaw as his feelings for Jin Dal Rae deepened, and how he ultimately broke into a smile more often. I was impressed with Lee Jung Shin’s emotional acting as well, he performed those very sincerely and naturally. He made a good co-star to Mi Na and their kissing scenes were 👌🏻👌🏻👌🏻. I will be seeing him again in other shows that are still on my list, so I’m curious to see what else he can bring to the table.

Apparently, Lee Jung Shik changed his stage name to Lee Do Yeon a month ago, but I’ll just use the name he was credited as in this series here. He also looked familiar to me, although I’ve never seen anything with him in it before. He kind of reminded me Im Si Wan at times. All in all, I think he was a really good casting choice for Tae Oh. He has that easy charm about him and was able to tap into the darker parts with much ease as well. I could tell that he approached his character with a lot of sincerity, because it showed in his portrayal. He switched between the arrogance-exuding conman/playboy to the hurt rejected loverboy very naturally and never once became too much. I think he was the only one among the main character cast that wasn’t an idol or musician, but he fit right in. It would be cool seeing him in something else in the future.

I thought I remembered Kwon Hyun Bin’s name from a survival show and I was right, he participated in Produce 101 Season 2. He also goes by the stage name VIINI. While I get that when an idol appears in a drama they like to promote their musical talents in some way, I still feel like suddenly introducing Gwang Bok’s musical skills came a bit out of the blue. By the time he suddenly started playing the guitar I’d already forgotten that he indeed bought a guitar at the beginning of the show, lol.
Anyways, to me, Gwang Bok was an absolute cinnamon roll. The instant tears when they shoved that birthday cake under his nose got me so bad. I was actually going teary-eyed myself seeing him get so emotional over a simple birthday celebration like that. Other than the scenes about his dark past, his acting didn’t go much deeper than goofy and oblivious, so I’m actually grateful for that darker insight into his psyche, because he did really well in those. I haven’t seen him in anything else so far, but I did read somewhere that he’d started acting more besides his musical career, so who knows when I’ll see him again.

I also know Im Na Young from Produce 101, but I’d never seen her act in anything before. Apparently she also started acting after wrapping up her career as an idol. It was interesting to see her and Mi Na act like rivals in this series while they actually debuted as idols together in real life. Despite my dislike of Ah Ran, I was actually quite impressed by Im Na Young’s acting, especially in the emotional scenes. I remember her nickname at Produce 101 being ‘Stone Na Young’ because of her pokerface, so it was nice to see her show more emotional expressions. As immature as Ah Ran was, those were legit tears of hurt and frustration, and she delivered those very well. There are a couple more shows with her on my watchlist, so I’m curious to see how well she performs in an actual full-length drama series. In a way, it’s a pity that her character in this show was left as the token bitchy second female lead, because I feel like she could’ve easily given a new color to Ah Ran. I really hoped they would actually end up on that boat together in the end as best buddies. But she did very well!

As expected for such a short show, this isn’t a very long review, and I’m actually relieved to finally be able to finish one in a single day again. As I said, despite my criticisms I had a good time watching this, it was straightforward and simple but still had a clear objective and well-established main characters. I’m not sure why they went for an open ending when they clearly made this as a light promotional mini series, but it’s not going to keep me up at night, either. I liked the vibes, I liked learning a bit about cocktails, and I liked that it connected the main characters in a significant way that contributed to them both individually and as a team. It was nice seeing them work towards that final end boss of a flair show together. If it were summer, it would’ve probably made me want to go to the beach myself, lol.

So there we have it for this short and sweet mini series. These days, I don’t even expect to upload two reviews in one month anymore, so this was a fun little surprise. Thank you for reading all the way if you did, and I will get started on my next watch.

Bye-bee! x

Disclaimer: this is a review, and as such it contains spoilers of the whole series. Please proceed to read at your own risk if you still plan on watching this show or if you haven’t finished it yet. You have been warned.

The Tale of Nok Du
(조선로코 녹두전 / Joseonroko Nokdujeon /
The Joseon Romantic-Comedy Tale of Nok Du)
MyDramaList rating: 7.5/10

Happy spooky season, everyone! Welcome to this review of my first historical drama of the year – I don’t know what it is, but there’s just something so cozy and atmospheric about watching a historical drama in autumn.
When this title popped up on my Spin The Wheel app, I let out a yelp of excitement, not just because I had been looking forward to this drama for a long time, but also because it’s been a full year since my last historical drama, The King Loves, so I was really in the mood for another one. I took my slow and steady time watching this to indulge in the full historical K-Drama experience, and I’m excited to share my thoughts on this. Overall, while there were some things that remained a bit vague and unsatisfying to me, I really enjoyed it and it grew on me a lot while watching it.

The Tale of Nok Du is a KBS2 K-Drama which you can either watch in 32 back-to-back episodes of about 30 minutes each, or in 16 episodes of little over an hour. I watched it in the latter format on my new go-to site kisskh.do. Besides it being an adaptation of a webtoon by the same Korean title (created by Hye Jin Yang), the story is also based on historical events surrounding the reign of King Gwanghae of Joseon, which ended in a revolt led by his nephew, the later King Injo of Joseon. As such, it can be deduced that the story takes place in the 17th century.
Jeon Nok Du (played by Jang Dong Yoon) grew up on an island with his parents and his older brother Hwang Tae (Song Geon Hee). His mother passed away due to an illness, and his father Jung Yoon Jeo (Lee Seung Joon) has been raising his two sons by himself ever since. One day, Nok Du’s uneventful peaceful life is disrupted by a group of assassins that’s clearly set on killing his father. Nok Du manages to wound one of the assailants and decides to follow them back to their leader to find out who targeted his family and why. This journey leads him to Hanyang, the Joseon name for the current capital city Seoul. During his pursuit, Nok Du encounters a young man who also seems to be chasing someone – the two immediately start off on the wrong foot and swear not to meet again after spending a night in prison together. While continuing on his journey, Nok Du finds out that his attacker is actually a woman – as it happens, the whole group of assassins that attacked his family consisted of women. Eventually, his pursuit ends when the assassin retreats into a widow village that only women are allowed to enter. Determined as he is to find out who gave the order to murder his family, Nok Du disguises himself as a woman and enters the village under the name Kim Nok Soon or ‘Lady Kim’.
The village is a place where widows and other women deemed ‘damaged goods’ are allowed to live and work in peace away from men. They are supported by a nearby gisaeng house that provides them with any necessary essentials. Once he makes his way into the village, Nok Du once again encounters the young man he met before, only to find out they were a woman all along as well, and a trainee gisaeng at that. Her name is Dong Dong Joo (played by Kim So Hyun). Nok Du is immediately impressed by her strong spirit when she publicly cuts her hair off to snap back at a rude client of the gisaeng house.
After being forced to share a sleeping chamber, Nok Du and Dong Joo inevitably grow closer. Dong Joo does not immediately recognize Nok Du as the man she met before in Hanyang and starts viewing ‘Nok Soon’ as a dependable older sister. In the meantime, while keeping his identity hidden and dealing with his growing fondness for Dong Joo, Nok Du finds the group of assassins responsible for the attack on his family. He even manages to gain their trust and become one of them. However, the truth that he ultimately finds doesn’t only explain the reason for the attack on his family. It goes way further than that, back to his own birth and real identity that he never knew of.

Although it took me a couple of episodes to get into this, in hindsight I do think the pacing of the story was quite good. I liked the clear transition point of moving the story from the widow village to Hanyang halfway through. The first half focusses on Nok Du’s stay at the village and the build-up of his bonds with Dong Joo, the widows and the assassins, and the second half focusses on Nok Du and Dong Joo’s respective intentions to enter the palace and the revealed truth about their individual connections to the King, next to their unfolding romantic relationship.
While I appreciated this clear build-up and things definitely fell into place more as the story progressed, I can’t deny that I still had some trouble following the exact timeline, especially with regards to Nok Du’s birth and the prophecy and all that. Thinking back now, I still feel like some points weren’t established as clearly as I would’ve liked, to clarify from what point on things started unfolding as they did. Besides this, I also had trouble following some of the flashbacks. I felt like they didn’t necessarily make the transition between the present and flashbacks to the past as clear as they could have, and they also sometimes showed flashbacks in a non-chronological order, which made the exact timeline a bit hard to grasp. Still, I feel like this happened mainly in the first half of the story, because the second half really grabbed me and pulled me in, even when I didn’t fully catch on to some practical details.

Before I start with my character analysis, I would like to give some context to the events of the story. The reality of both Nok Du and Dong Joo’s pasts is only revealed throughout the series gradually, but for my review I feel like it will help to establish what happened in the past in advance so it doesn’t get tricky explaining things later on.
King Gwanghae (played by Jung Joon Ho), the current monarch, only became king after his older brother passed away. Having been second in line from the start, he has always been very apprehensive of anyone that could potentially take the throne from him. Shortly after succeeding his brother as King, Gwanghae learned of a prophecy that said that ‘a royal offspring born on November 19th will take the throne from him’, and this only fuelled his paranoia. So much so that he gave the order to have anyone that seemingly opposed him or formed any sort of threat, however minor, killed. So much so that when his own first son was born on November 19th, he immediately gave the order to get rid of the baby, much to the devastation of his wife, Queen Yu (played by Park Min Jung).
One of the families that got slaughtered during this reign of paranoia was the Yoo family – Dong Joo’s family (she was born as Yoo Eun Seo). Being the only survivor of her family’s massacre, she was found and taken in by the lady of the gisaeng house where she grew up with a constant hatred for the King and a desire to kill him in order to avenge her family. That’s also what she was trying to do in Hanyang when she first met Nok Du, and why she occasionally dressed as a man to get close to the palace.
The King’s baby that was supposed to be killed is of course Nok Du. Jung Yoon Jeo used to be one of the King’s most trusted friends, and he ended up taking Nok Du to the island to raise him as his own son far away from the palace instead of killing him.
The only other person who knows about what really happened to the baby is Royal Chancellor Heo Yoon (played by Kim Tae Woo), another old trusted friend of both the King and Jung Yoon Jeo. The Chancellor has always been loyal to the King and he was also the one who set up the Muweol Corps, the female assassins, together with the lady of the gisaeng house.
In all his raging paranoia, the King failed to notice the true threat that would ultimately become his downfall: his own nephew, Grand Prince Neungyang (played by Kang Tae Oh). Although he was still only a child when his father, the first King, died, Neungyang has always held on to both his claim to and his desire for the throne. While initially introduced as a harmless second male lead character, he eventually reveals himself to be the main villain of the story which, again, is based on true historical events: Grand Prince Neungyang did become King Injo of Joseon after undertaking a coup d’état against his uncle, King Gwanghae.
Some other characters that appear who are also based on actual historical figures are King Gwanghae’s sister, Queen Dowager In Mok, and her young son Grand Prince Yeongchang, who was also sadly murdered as a part of Neungyang’s revolt.

To quickly refer back to my confusion regarding the timeline of the historical events, I also found the dynamics between the members of the royal family incredibly hard to follow. I was only able to establish the above list after looking it up on Wikipedia. I don’t think it was ever properly clarified how exactly everyone was related to one another. As a matter of fact, I spent the entire series thinking that little prince Yeongchang was King Gwanghae’s youngest son and that the Queen Dowager was his second wife. I thought they were just terrified of him because of what he did to his first child, which would’ve made sense. I was just sitting there wondering how there could be two Queens while one of them actually turned out to be the King’s sister.
Of course we have to keep in mind that K-Dramas are foremost made for a Korean audience and that they contain references that only people with knowledge of Korean history and culture can understand. I guess that a lot of Korean people and people who know about Korea’s (royal) history would be able to understand these things without much clarification, but for me as a foreign viewer it was quite hard to follow. While the most important things to understand were the reason why the King decided to get rid of his newborn child and the fact that Grand Prince Neungyang was the King’s nephew, it would’ve been nice to have a clear understanding of all the other royal family dynamics as well.

The last thing I’ll mention that got a little confusing was that a lot of characters frequently changed names during the series. Both Nok Du and Dong Joo use about three different names throughout the story, Neungyang is initially introduced under a different name, at some point Hwang Tae also takes on a different name… It made things a bit unnecessarily complicated at times.

With the historical context now out of the way, I’d like to get started on my character analysis.
Even though our titular hero Nok Du is raised on a desolate island far away from the capital, he’s not by any means estranged from reality. He knows how to fight with both weapons and his fists, he is quick on his feet, determined and resourceful. He doesn’t hesitate for a second to go after that assassin, even if it means leaving the island he grew up on and entering unfamiliar territory. Apart from these heroic traits he also has a very playful streak and is very honest to his own feelings. I actually appreciated the fact that he cried so much throughout the story, he was really forthcoming about his emotions and didn’t try to pretend to be tougher than he was or feel differently than he did. I also loved how straightforward and provocative he was sometimes, like when he – as Nok Soon – smooched Neungyang on the mouth in front of everyone in the village to aggravate Dong Joo and get her to admit who she really had feelings for.
What got me the most about Nok Du’s character development is that we accompany him as he finds out who he really is. We watch him while he finds out that he is the King’s biological son and heir to the throne, and see him crumble at the discovery that his biological father tried to kill him and still wants him dead when he finds out he’s alive. It was so impactful to see him try to process all these new pieces of information at the spot while continuously adapting to what his next step should be. He came to Hanyang to find out why someone gave an order to murder his family on the island, only to find out that it all had to do with a prophecy that was associated with his own birth. As if that isn’t complicated enough, in the middle of this, he finds himself falling in love and somehow manages to make that relationship work as well.
Nok Du is a classic hero: selfless and loyal to a fault when it comes to the people that mean the most to him. When his adoptive father Jung Yoon Jeo got captured and tortured by the King, he worked his way up to Royal Guard so he could visit and check up on him. Even when his brother Hwang Tae seemingly joined forces with Neungyang and started blaming Nok Du for condemning his family to a miserable life on the island, Nok Du kept coming back for him. After Dong Joo agreed to stay with Neungyang on the condition that he’d let the injured Nok Du go in the final episode, Nok Du returned to get her back as soon as he was able to. He stayed true to his own chosen family from the island and the village, and never once considered actually taking up his rightful position as heir to the throne.
I thought Nok Du’s character was really admirable and I couldn’t help but love him. He embodied such a just and genuine spirit. I also really liked the dynamics he had with all the other characters. It was nice to see that, after the first half of the series built up the trust between him and the village, no one actually cared anymore when he was exposed as a man, and they just went on treating him the same way.
I also loved how Nok Du and the Muweol Corps became such a good team, and how well he ended up getting along with the village widows. His reunion with the Queen, his real mother, was also really heartfelt, the way they immediately hugged and accepted each other so warmly was very touching.
While it was of course meant to sting when Nok Du met the King in disguise and befriended him thinking he was just an Administrative Official, even the comradery between them was nice to watch. It actually made me wonder if maybe the King would change his mind if he found out who Nok Du really was. If he hadn’t been so paranoid, he might have actually realized that Nok Du would never come out of nowhere to steal the throne after finding out about his birthright. Even though they were ill-fated as father and son, it was nice to at least see a friendly side to the King as he warmed up to Nok Du and supported him in entering the palace as an official.
Even though we knew it would be painful to watch Nok Du and Dong Joo find out that the nice elderly man they’d been meeting up with was actually the King, the target of both their revenge plots, the revelation for both of them still hit really hard. That cliffhanger of the King revealing himself to Nok Du, thinking it would just be a fun surprise, while Nok Du’s face just paled with dread at the realization was really effective.
All in all, I really liked Nok Du as the main character. He went through such an emotional rollercoaster and faced everything that came his way in the best possible way. I couldn’t help but admire his determination and the fact that nothing could dent his sense of humanity even in the slightest.

Of course, Nok Du couldn’t have grown into such a splendid human being without the fostering of the people he grew up with, so let’s look at them for a moment.
As mentioned before, Jung Yoon Jeo used to be one of the King’s closest friends and most trusted men, together with Chancellor Heo. The two of them watched with a heavy heart as King Gwanghae slowly lost himself to his paranoia, and they worked together in secretly bringing the child he wanted to kill to safety. In the end, no matter what kind of new feelings were raised between Nok Du and the King, Jung Yoon Jeo remained Nok Du’s only true father. He raised him as his own son, making no distinction between him and Hwang Tae, even if that meant having to risk his life when he came back to Hanyang. I can’t express how scared I was that this man wasn’t going to make it – even if he wasn’t killed he was constantly coughing so I felt like he might as well pass away from an illness at some point. Even after being locked up in a prison cell and being tortured by the King himself, he still had the courage and strength to tell the Queen that her son was alive – he actually risked so much to make sure Nok Du would be protected by the right people. Unlike his wife and other son, he never blamed Nok Du for anything and he always considered him his son. I loved that they all ended up going back to the island to live together in peace again in the final episode. Throughout everything that happens in the story, nothing changes between Nok Du and Jung Yoon Jeo, and I think that says enough about how deep their father-son bond was. Honestly, props to Jung Yoon Jeo.

To be completely honest, I’m still not entirely sure what Hwang Tae’s real feelings were towards Nok Du. It seemed like they were close as brothers and got along very well, so I was quite surprised when Hwang Tae made such a turn and started blaming his ‘miserable upbringing’ on Nok Du. Part of me feels like he was pretending to be mean to Nok Du and push him away in order to gain Neungyang’s trust. Maybe he was even trying to sacrifice himself to keep Nok Du away from him? I don’t know, but what I do know is that it was BS and came completely out of nowhere to blame Nok Du for being born as the King’s son and ‘causing them’ to move to that island, as if that was Nok Du’s choice.
Admittedly, it is possible that a part of the deal between Hwang Tae and Neungyang went over my head. I just understood that Hwang Tae claimed that he wanted revenge on Nok Du, and he would get some position in the palace under Neungyang’s reign as a reward or something? Also, I still don’t really understand why Hwang Tae suddenly said he wanted to be called by a different name. I think it was Jung Yi Hyung – I remember him saying that that’s how his grandfather had wanted to name him, but why did that matter? Maybe that would’ve been his name if they didn’t have to move to the island and he wanted to claim it back as another thing that Nok Du ‘stole’ from him? I’m not sure.
And then, after I actually started worrying that he might truly betray Nok Du, when push came to shove Hwang Tae suddenly switched sides again and chose to stick with Nok Du, after all. Suddenly the alleged bad blood between them was gone and they just went back to being close brothers as if nothing happened. So yeah, I was a bit confused. On the one hand this only strengthens my idea that Hwang Tae was really just pretending to Neungyang about wanting his brother dead – we did see him flinch every time Neungyang mentioned he wanted him to watch as he killed Nok Du, so it might be that that’s what was going on. Maybe I’m just bad at reading between the lines, but I don’t think Hwang Tae ever actually clarified to Nok Du what his real intentions had been. I guess he was just trying to survive after Neungyang caught him on the island? It wasn’t really clear to me. It actually surprised me that he made it out alive – I wouldn’t have put it past Neungyang to suddenly break his promise and kill Hwang Tae when he didn’t have a use for him anymore. In any case, I guess Hwang Tae was a good guy in the end, but I was kind of lost on what he was trying to do whilst being in Neungyang’s custody.

In another episode of ‘here’s what Mei missed’: it completely went past me that Mr. Hwang (played by Lee Moon Shik) was a martial arts master – I’m sure they mentioned it when they first introduced him and it makes total sense now, because how else would Nok Du know how to fight so well (duh 🤦🏻‍♀️) but the whole time I genuinely thought he was just an old man who randomly turned into Drunken Fist Rock Lee when he was attacked. 😂 But yeah, it would make sense that he was a skilled fighter, because otherwise he probably wouldn’t have lasted long and he wouldn’t have appeared together with all the soldiers in the final battle. Just like with Jung Yoon Jeo, I was really scared that he wouldn’t make it through that battle. He kept saying things like, “oh this scratch? it’s nothing” which is often code for “i’m actually seriously wounded and probably bleeding out as we speak but don’t you worry about that”. I’m just glad he made it out.
I really liked Mr. Hwang, he was a very good supporting character who contributed both to the comic relief and to the action in the series. It was nice to have him around Nok Du while Jung Yoon Jeo was away, he was like a nice uncle to their family.

In addition to Mr. Hwang, there was also his young daughter Aeng Du (played by Park Da Yeon). At the start of the series she is comically introduced as Nok Du’s fiancée-to-be since there aren’t any other women on the island, lol. I loved Aeng Du to bits. She was such a sassy, lovely little girl. I didn’t even care that she sometimes interrupted a romantic scene between Nok Du and Dong Joo, she was just such a great little lady. Although she mostly contributed to the comic relief, she acted in such a self-assured way that no one could say no to her. I really loved how she kept telling people off and always went for the food no matter where they ended up at. She just made her way into everyone’s hearts and even Neungyang seemed to develop a soft spot for her, as he made sure that she and her father wouldn’t get caught in the crossfire when he planned to attack Nok Du. Honestly, if anything would have happened to Aeng Du, I would’ve crashed out. She was such a little treasure. I’m glad that she and her father remained regular supporting characters until the end, and I loved how Aeng Du ultimately gave Dong Joo her blessing to take over Nok Du as her fiancé, lol.

As mentioned before, Dong Joo was born as Yoo Eun Seo, the daughter of a family of considerable status that was massacred due to the suspicion that her grandfather (I believe) was conspiring against the King. Dong Joo watched her mother die in her arms after she urged her to leave this sad past behind and live on strongly and happily by herself. After this, Dong Joo made a promise that she would avenge her family by killing the King (even though her family never asked for this), and hid away at the gisaeng house pretending to be a trainee, while actually honing her own skills in secret.
If I’m being honest, I was initially really worried that Dong Joo’s character would gradually be diminished to a passive damsel in distress throughout the series. There are so many shows with a female protagonist that’s made out to be really strong and hard-headed at first but then gets drained of her resilience more and more throughout all the drama and misery, and I always find that such a pity. I didn’t want Dong Joo to end up like the female lead character in Ruler: Master of the Mask (coincidentally also played by Kim So Hyun) or even the one from The King Loves, as she also visibly became more troubled and meek after starting out so tough and strong.
I’m really glad to say that Dong Joo didn’t disappoint me as a female lead for a second. I really loved her.
Even through her emotional breakdowns, she remained mentally and physically strong until the very end. She was literally making her own weapons and planning assassination attempts on the King on her own without a shred of fear to get caught and killed herself. She was prepared to follow her family in death as long as she could take the King with her.
In hindsight, I feel like this is exactly why falling in love with Nok Du came as such an unexpected thing for her: she wasn’t prepared to find a new reason to live happily when she’d already made peace with laying down her own life as a result of her revenge. Sure, she tried to push down her feelings for Nok Du in the beginning, but she never actually denied how she felt about him. The avoiding of her feelings didn’t get annoying because there was such a valid reason behind it, and I really appreciate that she vocalized her side of things clearly to both Neungyang and Nok Du. I felt like it was only natural for her to feel hesitant about anything that potentially gave her something to live for when she’d already made peace with the outcome of the plan she’d been focussed on her entire life.
As opposed to the overused trope of couples purposely pushing each other away to ‘protect’ their lover without ever telling them the truth, I love that this drama took a different turn. Clear and honest communication is such a satisfying thing, especially in K-Dramas (where it often doesn’t happen). I’m so glad that Dong Joo never pulled away from Nok Du without being clear about her actions. The fact that her first reaction upon seeing Nok Du after learning that he was the King’s son was to run to him and hug him tightly instead of quietly disappearing and painfully pushing him away was so gratifying.
It was refreshing to have a female lead character that wasn’t forced to just stand by and watch while the men fought their battles: when the revolt happened, Dong Joo snuck into the palace with her crossbow and actively tried to help Nok Du and refused to leave his side when he was wounded.
In terms of their romantic relationship, I was positively surprised with how bold and unfazed she was when they finally got physical. While Nok Du was getting all flustered and fidgety, she just smiled reassuringly, saying “what are you getting nervous about, all of a sudden?” I really loved that, also because it was so different from the typical passive historical drama FLs. She even took the initiative in the hugs and kisses from time to time, which was a welcome change.

Honestly, I loved the relationship between Nok Du and Dong Joo so much. The way their dynamic changed from friends to lovers was really subtle, but then they became so naturally affectionate. I enjoyed every single scene of them together. Their walks through the flower fields, their small interactions as a couple, their hugs and their kisses were all so adorable. I specifically loved the scene at the washing lines in the palace courtyard, when Nok Du offered her that flower ring and she back-hugged him and they just had their quiet happy little moment together. 🥰🥰🥰 The recurring element of Nok Du remembering to light a candle for Dong Joo at night because she was afraid to sleep in the dark was also really heartwarming. I feel like it’s been ages since I last saw such a natural and unproblematic romantic development between two lead characters, it really made me smile. Even before they became a couple they had such beautiful moments together, like when Dong Joo got on that swing for the first time – that actually brought a tear to my eye.
Additionally, although this may sound weird, I also really loved their crying scenes together. I mentioned this scene before, but there’s this moment when Nok Du has just found out why the King had wanted him dead as a baby and Dong Joo just learned that Nok Du was the King’s son. Dong Joo spots Nok Du near the swing and runs to him to hug him from behind. In this moment, they are both crying for their own reasons, without seeing each other cry and I actually screenshotted this because I found it such a heartbreaking moment. Here, suffer with me.

I don’t know for sure if Dong Joo hugged Nok Du here because she acknowledged how much he must have suffered as well, but it was just so touching to see how, in this moment, she put her love for him before her resentment towards the King. She could’ve chosen to immediately break things off with Nok Du and focus on her revenge, but she already couldn’t bring herself to do that anymore.
The look in her eyes in that scene when she confirmed to Nok Du that she already knew who he was, and how they were just standing there crying, knowing that their love for each other hadn’t changed but they just had to go their separate ways for a while was heartbreaking. I just loved how they sometimes didn’t need words to express how they felt, their chemistry was so good that the emotions just flowed naturally and there wasn’t a single shred of doubt regarding how they felt about each other. I loved them to bits, they’re definitely one of my new favorite K-Drama couples ever. ❤️

Of course, historical or not, a K-Drama wouldn’t be a K-Drama if there wasn’t at least one person that opposed the relationship between the main leads. Add to that a pinch of delusion and the inability to deal with rejection, and you’ve got Grand Prince Neungyang.
Initially, he is introduced as Cha Yool Mu, a young man of high status who acts as a kind of benefactor to the gisaeng house. It’s clear from the start that he is fond of Dong Joo. When she’s still at the gisaeng house, he always defends her and tries to take care of her, but we also see that Dong Joo seems uncomfortable with this and always tries to brush him off. At some point it’s revealed that he’s had a crush on her ever since they were children, and he’s looked after her ever since she lost her family.
Having had my fair share of tragically rejected second male lead characters, I initially had no idea that this man would turn out to be connected to the plot in a far more brutal way than just being the yearning guy with good intentions who didn’t get the girl. From the way he was introduced I was really surprised to suddenly see him change into a bad guy. That was quite a plot twist in itself.
All things considered, I found Neungyang a bit inconsistent in his sentiments. While he didn’t seem to have any real attachments to others – seeing as he was able to cut people down without a second of hesitation – he didn’t even try to hide his weakness for Dong Joo. As soon as she said: “alright I’ll come with you, so stop”, he would literally drop everything and call off the attack/pursuit. I was actually surprised that he kept acting like that even when he knew he couldn’t break her and Nok Du apart and he was already too far gone in his desire for the throne. In the end, he didn’t even seem to care anymore whether Dong Joo actually came to love him or not, as long as she stayed by his side, which I found kind of weird. He literally went: “I don’t care if you don’t love me, I just need you to stay by my side forever, but it would be nice if you at some point could bring up some sincere feelings for me”, lol. After everything he’d done, including multiple attempts at taking her lover’s life, he still thought he could sway her? Let’s not forget that he actually gave the order to burn down the widow village just because she rejected him, all in an attempt to make her come run to him. This guy was on a different level of delusional. After knowing what she went through and how she lost her family, he actually destroyed and burnt down her second home, and he didn’t even consider that would be a major turn-off.
Not like we needed any more confirmation that Nok Du and Dong Joo were meant to be, but I actually really liked that they brought back the element of the lit candle in the end. Neungyang blew it out, clearly not aware of the fact that Dong Joo couldn’t sleep in the dark, and then Nok Du instantly appeared to light it for her again, as he’d done back in the widow village. That was such a nice moment, not just because it revealed that Nok Du was still alive, but also because it confirmed that they really couldn’t live without each other. It was also a defining moment for Neungyang, because this made finally made him give up his desperate pursuit of Dong Joo. After this, he was finally able to let the both of them go.

The only time we ever see Neungyang sincerely hurt – apart from Dong Joo’s rejections – is when Dan Ho dies. Park Dan Ho (played by Hwang In Yeop) was Neungyang’s best friend and most loyal swordsman. He did everything Neungyang ordered him to do, no questions asked or issues raised, which meant he also killed people in an instant at his command.
Since he didn’t even speak for the first couple of episodes after being introduced as Yool Mu’s friend, aka the ‘pushover’ who even cut his ice cubes for him, I initially thought that was going to be his gimmick. Not gonna lie, I initially thought Hwang In Yeop was just making a guest appearance, lol. When he suddenly started talking I was like “IT SPEAKS!!!” 😂 No but seriously, I actually found Dan Ho quite an interesting character. It would’ve been nice to see a flashback of how he and Neungyang became close and to get some insight in his personal thoughts: did he really not have any personal opinions about his friend’s ambitious plans and brutal orders? He was actually one of the characters that I would’ve liked to grasp a bit better, for example by having him express his own feelings independently from Neungyang. I guess he was really just loyal to the point where he didn’t think twice about what his friend ordered him to do. I can’t help but feel like he would actually be a good guy, and I lowkey hoped that he would unexpectedly help someone and go against Neungyang once he completely lost it. In the end however, he dies during the revolt, and I’m sorry to say it didn’t make me feel very sorry for him. He unapologetically assassinated innocent people, and it caught up on him. Karma’s a bench.
As I said before, we don’t get any flashbacks about how Neungyang and Dan Ho became friends and we also never see them interact casually while they’re just hanging out, so it honestly didn’t strike me that they’d actually been that close until seeing Neungyang’s reaction to Dan Ho’s death. I thought they could have explored the depth of their relationship a bit more. I honestly thought Neungyang only appreciated Dan Ho for his unwavering loyalty, but I didn’t imagine him responding this emotionally if he ended up dying. While it was nice to see Neungyang at least have a place in his heart for someone, I still feel like they could’ve done more with the friendship between him and Dan Ho, even just to increase the slightly impact of the latter’s death.
Although generally no one likes a villain, I had to hand it to Neungyang, because he did a very good job at misleading the King and feeding his paranoia. He was great at pretending to be a victim and then smile smugly behind the King’s back when his words were taken for the truth. I also feel like he got away with things really easily in the end. I’ll say more about the ending in a separate section, but all in all I felt like Neungyang managed to get things done quite smoothly. A little too smoothly, even. Of course we could’ve expected that he would succeed in the coup d’état because it’s based on an actual historical event that happened, but something about the way the story built up still made me hopeful that they would be able to stop him. I was constantly waiting for the moment when the King would realize he’d trusted the wrong person all along, but unfortunately that didn’t happen. Instead, we get to see Neungyang on his new throne with an empty smile on his face after being warned that he would always remain lonely at the top.
I actually felt a bit sad for him in that final moment. He’d lost his father at such a young age and then his best friend, and he couldn’t get the woman he loved to love him back. Maybe he just accepted that he would always be alone and made peace with that. He may have just been really sad all this time, yearning for a sense of power to distract him from that. It’s kind of tragic.

Speaking of sad, it’s high time we start talking about the monarch himself, King Gwanghae.
From what I gathered, he used to be a very promising and righteous leader. There’s one flashback in which we see his emotional response to a massacre caused by the Japanese Invasion and how this impressed and strengthened his friends Jung Yoon Jeo and Chancellor Heo in their admiration and support for him. I’ll talk about my opinions regarding the prophecy a bit more later, but I will say in advance that I didn’t really understand the King’s paranoia. As in, I understand that he got nervous after hearing a prophecy that someone from his family would take over his throne, but I found his reaction to that a bit extreme. In hindsight, it feels like his paranoia blinded him into waving his sword around at invisible threats, while it would’ve probably been wiser to stay calm and vigilant, without losing track of the kind of King he set out to be.
Having said that, I think framing his transition from a just Crown Prince to a paranoid King would’ve worked a little better if they’d given us an insight in how King Gwanghae used to be versus how he changed, like a before and after. Apart from that one flashback, we don’t really get any footage of how exactly he changed after hearing the prophecy. I feel like seeing the contrast of how that prophecy truly messed him up would’ve made it a bit more impactful for me, personally. Now it just felt like he was overreacting.
I guess the only traces of his good side came out when he befriended Nok Du and Dong Joo in disguise. It was really nice to see him so free and open-minded when talking to them despite their lower ranks, and how he even took Dong Joo’s advice about not sleeping alone to heart – she might have actually fixed his marriage with that. It was also interesting to see him open up to Nok Du at the palace, for example when he told him that ‘he hoped he would never get to see the man he really was’. I find it interesting that they introduced us to this side of him. It’s as if they wanted us to empathize with him only to ultimately burst our bubble extra hard by still turning him into an merciless King who, even years later when it didn’t matter anymore, just couldn’t put his fear of losing the throne beside him.
I’d honestly hoped that he would give Nok Du the benefit of the doubt, even after he found out he’d been pretending to be someone else. He could’ve calmly asked to see him and get an explanation from him first, but even in this situation he immediately went: “HE BETRAYED ME”. I guess the paranoia was always just simmering right underneath the surface, and the kind demeanor was just a cover for his real temper?
I actually found it a pity that the King kept being blindsided. I was waiting so impatiently for him to finally find out that Neungyang was the real threat, but he kept trusting the wrong people. He actually ended up killing a close friend and torturing another, and even though you could sometimes see him shocked at his own aggression, he never really tried to stop it. Even his own family members had become terrified of him, so I guess it really was just the nature of the beast, although I still feel like he could’ve been better – he certainly seemed better before. He’s kind of a tragic character as well, if you think about it, because he ended up living his life consumed by doubt and suspicion.
One thing I did appreciate was that he came back after falling in the river that one time. I just knew that that couldn’t be his real death, that was way too anticlimactic. It would’ve been really cool if his return had resulted in him finally acknowledging Neungyang as the actual villain, because I was really waiting for that to happen. Unfortunately, it just went back to how it was and he continued to place his trust in the wrong people. Oh well.

The fate of Chancellor Heo actually surprised me more than I anticipated. I wasn’t really sure whether he was a good or a bad guy at first, but as soon as it became clear that he was actually good and he just couldn’t compete with Neungyang’s manipulation, I felt really bad for what happened to him. I definitely didn’t expect him to be killed off like that. His death was one of the reasons why I wanted the King to figure out Neungyang’s betrayal so desperately. I just wanted to see the realization on his face when it dawned on him that he’d killed his friend for no reason.
From what I understood, Chancellor Heo had been at King Gwanghae’s side ever since he was still Crown Prince. They may have even grown up and fought many battles together. I’m not sure exactly when he set up the Muweol Corps in collaboration with Lady Chun, but it was definitely meant as an extra defense. I’m still a bit lost with regards to who ordered the attack on Nok Du’s family on the island – I believe the King said that he’d ordered it himself, but if I remember correctly he didn’t know Jung Yoon Jeo was still alive at that time, so that would be weird. I also remember Neungyang going to the island, but here the flashbacks got kind of mixed up and confusing to me, so I’m not entirely sure.
What I do know is that the Muweol Corps was just following orders, and maybe they’d been informed that they were meant to kill a deserter or something. They were misguided by Neungyang, who turned them against Chancellor Heo and even made them falsely testify against him.
Although I found Chancellor Heo a bit suspicious at first, he really turned out to be loyal to the King and he spent his final moments desperately trying to open his eyes to the truth, unfortunately to no avail. It was sad that he had to die like that, and much earlier than I expected, too.
As if Chancellor Heo’s death wasn’t sad enough, I was strangely shaken by the reaction of his loyal guard, Chil Seong (Oh Kyung Joo). His emotional response to his master’s death, and the fact that he willingly gave up his life to follow him was really touching. The sight of him laying next to his master had something really powerful to it, almost like a ceremonious gesture of loyalty, even in death. It made quite an impact on me.

As confused as I was about there being two Queens in the palace, I’m glad they at least didn’t create any misunderstanding about who Nok Du’s mother was. I thought the plot about the two halves of the norigae was really sweet. I loved that, as complicated as Nok Du’s feelings towards his father were, there wasn’t a shred of doubt when it came to his mother, and that hug they shared was so very touching. She was such a Queen, both in status and title and in actions. After learning that her baby was still alive, she didn’t even care about defying her husband anymore. She was so brave, honestly. I really loved her character. It was so cool to see how the love for her child instilled a kind of silent strength in her. The ending of her fleeing the palace to be with her son and his new family on the island was really wholesome, that was such a nice way to end the story and it made for a great ending shot as well.

Besides Queen Yu and the King’s sister, there is one other queen that we cannot forget to mention in this review, and that is Lady Chun. Lady Chun ran the gisaeng house that provided for the widow village, and she was also the one who found and took in Dong Joo as a child after what happened to her family. She basically became like a second mother to her and raised her between the safe and comfortable walls of the gisaeng house. She’s later revealed to actually be the leader of the Muweol Corps, and she even used to be one of them herself. It was so cool to see her in action rather than just be a defenseless gisaeng, and I loved learning a bit more about her own history with the Muweol Corps. The fact that she brought these women, who were cast out from society and had nowhere else to go, together and ensured them a peaceful life while simultaneously teaching them how to physically defend themselves was everything. She was the GOAT and I really hated that she had to die. The way that she accepted it so gracefully as well, it was such a loaded moment. Seeing both Ssook and Dong Joo’s emotional responses to her death said everything we needed to know about the impact she’d had on all these women’s lives. Lady Chun was the best.

Of course we can’t end this analysis without touching on the people that led Nok Du to the widow village in the first place. As evil as they were made out to be in the beginning, I really came to love the Muweol Corps. It was cool to get to know them and realize that they were so much more than just mindless assassins that blindly followed orders.
The assassin that Nok Du follows into the widow village is Min Deul Re (played by Song Chae Yeon), and she is one of the four main Muweol Corps members. After Nok Du manages to infiltrate the village, there’s a temporary sense of danger since she seems to vaguely recognize him, but she’s murdered by Dan Ho before she can connect the dots. I admit I didn’t fully follow the circumstances of her death because, again, the timeline and the flashbacks became kind of confusing to me at that point.

The remaining three main Muweol Corps members are Kim Ssook, Noh Yeong Boon and Ahn Jung Sook. If there’s one character that grew on me throughout the story, it was Ssook (played by Jo Soo Hyang). While she initially appeared to be the most stonecold member of the Corps, I really enjoyed seeing her warm up to Nok Soon. She actually ended up being one of the people to forgive Nok Du for his pretense because she’d seen with her own eyes that he’d been willing to give up his life for the women in the village. It was cool that they continued to work together even after Nok Du entered the palace, and that they even became something resembling friends in the process.
While I would’ve liked to get some more insight in the psyche of a couple of other characters, I really liked Ssook’s character development. Seeing her emotional response to Lady Chun’s death, followed by the flashback of how she was personally saved and taken in by her helped me sympathize with her character so much more. She actually became one of my favorite characters.
Also, I totally called that she would get some sort of revenge after Lady Chun was killed. I just felt that she would get back at the person responsible, whether that was Neungyang or Dan Ho, who fired the arrow. It would’ve been so satisfying to see her slay Neungyang, not gonna lie, but I also couldn’t help but feel a sense of justice when she killed Dan Ho. It just needed to happen, and I’m glad I was right. Nevertheless, I was still terrified that she would end up sacrificing herself for Nok Du or get killed during the battle in some other way in the end. I’m so glad she made it out, and it was nice to see her smile more in the end. She really deserved a happy ending, so I’m glad she got one.
In contrast to the collected and pokerfaced Ssook, Noh Yeong Boon (played by Ahn So Jin) was very candid and expressive. She spoke in a dialect that made her sound a bit crude at times, but I thought she was cool. She may not have been as observant as Ssook and tended to take things at face value, but her heart was in the right place. Her reaction to realizing that she’d actually condemned Chancellor Heo to die because she believed Neungyang’s accusations of him was enough to prove how much she cared about being on the right side of things.
Although Ahn Jung Sook (played by Yang So Min) had less memorable characteristics than Ssook and Yeong Boon, it was cool that she remained part of the unit of three throughout the story as well. I loved how these women just stuck together and always showed up at moments of need. Every single time they showed up I was like “YESSS MUWEOL CORPS LET’S GOOOO!!!” 🔥🔥🔥 They made such great supporting characters and I loved how they also joined the rest at the island in the end. I loved how all the awesome people just ended up becoming one big happy family.

Just like there were three main members of the Muweol Corps, there were also three main members of the widow village. Kang Soon Nyeo, Park Bok Nyeo and Lee Mal Nyeon (played by Yoon Sa Bong, Hwang Mi Young and Yoon Geum Seon Ah, respectively) were the designated strong women trio of the village who were basically in charge of beating up and chasing out every man that tried to sneak in. As a matter of fact, Nok Du’s first attempt at sneaking inside the village as a man also ended in him getting his ass kicked by these three.
To be completely honest, at first I was a bit sceptical about the three strong widows. They were introduced so clearly as comical characters and I was worried that they would only contribute to scenes that threatened Nok Du’s identity to be exposed. I’m glad to say they didn’t become a distraction to the plot, and it was actually nice to see them reunited again in Hanyang. I also found it cute that Bok Nyeo and the Vice Curator ended up as a couple, that was surprisingly sweet.

Speaking of the Vice Curator, as I believe I haven’t mentioned him yet, he was a predominantly comical relief character as well. Yeon Geun (played by Go Geon Han) was the only man allowed in the widow village – they probably chose him because he was so visibly weak and harmless, lol. He becomes a comic relief character firstly because he falls in love with Nok Soon at first sight and keeps stumbling over his feet to try and impress her. Since his feelings for Nok Soon (and his lingering attraction to Nok Du even after he’s revealed to be a guy) were such a big part of his character, I was curious to see what would become of him after inevitably having to move on. It came as a fun surprise when he suddenly developed feelings for Bok Nyeo, who couldn’t have been more different from Nok Du in both appearance and personality, lol. In any case, he did help Nok Du get into Hanyang and offered him the name Yeon Soo so he could pretend to be his relative. Despite his clumsiness and unfiltered weakness, he actually helped out a lot and I appreciated him for that.

Finally, I just want to give a shoutout to my girl Mae Hwa Soo (Lee Joo Bin), one of the most popular gisaengs at Lady Chun’s house. When Neungyang burned down the widow village and everyone was saving themselves and running away, Hwa Soo was the only one who went back to rescue her friend and attack her assailant at the risk of her own life. That was such a power move, I loved how she proved her true strength there. It was a pity that the gisaengs kind of disappeared after that, but I guess they must have dispersed to different houses after Lady Chun died. It would’ve been nice to see Hwa Soo again somewhere, though. I really liked her.

That’ll do it for my character analysis. All in all, I thought the cast was really cool, it was nice how they gave everyone a purpose and I specifically appreciated all the strong women in the story.
I was really upset when the widow village was destroyed because by then we’d learned enough about the backgrounds of these women to know that this was quite literally their safe haven. Everyone in that village had been ostracized and chased away to survive in the woods by themselves as they were no longer of any value to their families. It’s so sad to realize that this was literally how women were viewed, and how they are viewed to this day in certain parts of the world. The way this show visualized the bond between these women, and how they stuck together even after losing their home for the umpteenth time was really heartfelt. I loved how the gisaengs, the assassins and the widows all grouped together and helped each other find a new place to live after the village was destroyed. They all looked after each other until the end, and I loved how this caused Lady Chun’s legacy to be be passed forward. Every single female character in this show was strong in her own way, and I really compliment the writers for creating them like that. I’m not surprised to see that this series was screenwritten and co-directed by women. It really shows. 🔥

Now that I’ve concluded my main analysis, I would like to make some separate remarks on certain parts of the story that I found a bit confusing or disappointing, starting with what I’d like to call: The Logic of the Prophecy. I mentioned before that I found the King’s response to it a bit extreme, but I feel like there was a potential plothole to it, as well.
First of all, isn’t it kind of weird to think that someone who is already an heir to the throne would overthrow his own father? As in, even though they’re going to succeed him at some point, anyway? Unless they’re just really impatient, it wouldn’t really make sense to prematurely kick him off the throne, right? This is what I kept thinking, and what made King Gwanghae’s decision to kill his own child because of that prophecy so unrealistic. The fact that he was too blind to even calmly think it through really bothered me. It just made the whole reason behind his actions so weak. You killed your own son because you were afraid he would overthrow you? Sir, he would have become King after you anyway, why would he overthrow you? Wasn’t it more logical to look at the people who weren’t able to obtain the throne despite being royal descendants?
In that train of thought, why didn’t he just conduct an investigation of all his family members’ birthdays as soon as he heard the prophecy? It literally said ‘a’ royal offspring. Not ‘his’ offspring or ‘this specific person’. How could he have overlooked the fact that Neungyang was born on November 19th as well? If he was so paranoid, it would’ve made more sense if he’d thoroughly scrutinized everyone in his family to make sure he didn’t miss anything. The fact that all this misery happened because he didn’t even think to double-check whether or not his nephew had actually been born during the Japanese Invasion or not just bothers me.
Also, in my opinion, the King remained quite neglectful in his paranoia until the end. Am I the only one who found it really weird that he didn’t even check whether it was actually Nok Du’s body that Neungyang brought him? It was so uncharacteristic of him to suddenly be like: “I don’t need to see it, I believe you” after going through such extreme measures to make sure his son was dead.
The delay of execution in the final revolt was also kind of weird to me. Why would Neungyang wait another nine years to finally do it? He could’ve done right after he fooled him with Nok Du’s fake dead body, why wait another decade? That was such a random time jump, and they also didn’t even age any of the other characters. They never mentioned any specific years in the story either, so it wasn’t that they needed to follow specific numbers to make it align with actual history, either. As a matter of fact, the reason for Neungyang’s desperate desire to take over the throne wasn’t even clear to me. I guess something must have changed within him after his father died, as I do remember him saying something about that he always listened to and learned from his father’s stories, but in hindsight I’m not actually sure where his bloodlusty greed for the throne actually originated. I get that it only mattered to the story that both Neungyang and King Gwanghae were both desperate about claiming and keeping the throne, but I would’ve liked a valid reason or argument that explained why they let themselves get swept away by their greed like that. It would’ve made it easier to understand where they were coming from.
Another thing that I didn’t really understand was that final interference from the King’s sister. After little Prince Yeongchang (Seo Eun Yool) had been killed, we never really saw Queen In Mok (played by Oh Ha Nee) again, but then she suddenly appeared during the revolt only to point accusatory fingers at Nok Du instead of Neungyang, even though she also didn’t want Neungyang on the throne. What was up with that? Did she just want to pin her brother against his own son after he got hers killed or something? Was it some sort of weird revenge thing? I didn’t see the added value of her suddenly showing up again to ruin things for Nok Du again for no clear reason. That was kind of annoying.

Generally speaking, I found the order of events in the final episode very strange. After that whole epic battle episode, Dong Joo gave herself to Neungyang so that Nok Du could be evacuated safely, but then the next moment Nok Du just reappears, completely recovered, and takes her away to live happily ever after. Just like that.
Sure, the main danger was gone since the King had by then officially proclaimed Nok Du dead and ended his pursuit of him, but somehow I just couldn’t help but feel like things weren’t finished. I expected they would first wrap up everything that needed to happen at the palace before ending it with a big happily ever after wedding party on the island.
The way they went from Dong Joo’s captivity to that blissful wedding sequence to the final confrontation nine years later just felt unnatural to me. It kind of debunked the effect of Dong Joo giving herself up to Neungyang to save Nok Du as well, as it literally felt like he came to get her the very next day. Neungyang might have just as well taken that as his final sign to tell the King that Nok Du actually still wasn’t dead – I know he couldn’t do that because he was the one who brought him his body, but I just mean he could’ve still retaliated. Instead, everything was suddenly good and well and no more worries, and the final confrontation was also a lot less satisfying than I’d anticipated. Of course, since it’s based on actual historical events, Neungyang was always going to succeed in his revolt, but I still hoped for a proper “Oh my God what have I done” scene with the King. I just wanted him to fully realize his own stupidity, but even that effect was diminished by how the final confrontation ultimately played out.
So yeah, I can’t deny that I was a bit disappointed by how very easy and conveniently everything ended, even though I’m glad Nok Du and Dong Joo got to actually live their happy life together, of course.

It’s time for the cast comments! As I mentioned before, I really loved the cast of this show and the energy and sincerity they brought to their characters. I really don’t have any negative comments about anyone’s acting, everyone was really into it and it showed.

I’ve only seen Jang Dong Yoon twice before in School 2017 and Drama Special: If We Were a Season, but he definitely made a very strong impression on me in this show. I really loved the energy he brought to the table as Nok Du. He showed a wide emotional range and also fully went for the scenes where he pretended to be a woman. It was really cool seeing an actor I’d only seen in smaller roles/dramas before in such a turbulent main lead role. I thought his performance was really good and I also liked his chemistry with Kim So Hyun. As I mentioned in my character analysis, I really appreciated that Nok Du cried a lot, and I really respect Jang Dong Yoon for being so unapologetically sad and emotional. Honestly, it was more than natural for him to cry about all the things that were happening around him. The actor was able to express all these complicated feelings so naturally, it was really admirable. I will definitely keep an eye out for Jang Dong Yoon in the future. He did a great job.

KIM 👏🏻 SO 👏🏻 HYUN 👏🏻. I am so incredibly proud of my girl. This might actually be my favorite performance of her so far. I’ve seen her grow up from a child actress to a main female lead, through The Moon That Embraces the Sun, The Girl Who Sees Smells, Rooftop Prince, Missing You, I Hear Your Voice, Who Are You: 2015, Bring it On Ghost, Goblin, Ruler: Master of the Mask, While You Were Sleeping, Radio Romance and Love Alarm. My only criticism on her acting has always been with her romantic scenes, and I remember I was just wondering if it’d been the same in this show… and it wasn’t. You cannot imagine how I screamed when she actually kissed back, that honestly felt like such a defining moment!! From all the shows I’ve seen her in so far, this is the one in which she shone the most, in my opinion. She handled the emotional range so well, she went from bright and cheerful so genuinely heartbroken and she managed to maintain Dong Joo’s strength in her energy, expression and body language throughout the whole series. I am so glad I got to see her in this and to see yet another great development in her acting skills. She was so natural with Jang Dong Yoon and her fellow co-stars as well. I really, really loved her performance. It’s a new fave for sure!

I will say it again and again: nothing could ever make me hate Kang Tae Oh. Even seeing him as a villain in this, I could only just admire how well he pulled it off. Call me biased, but I really think he did an amazing job at Grand Prince Neungyang. I’ve seen him before in Short, That Man Oh Soo, My First First Love, Run On and Extraordinary Attorney Woo and because he’s typically always cast as a good guy it was really interesting to see a different take on that perfect smile of his. Honestly, I had no idea in advance that Kang Tae Oh was even in this, or that he was going to be the villain, but his portrayal of Neungyang actually gave me goosebumps. He was so good. I wonder if he’s done more troubled or problematic roles, because now I’m curious to see even more variety in his acting, lol. It was really cool seeing him in this in such an unexpected role. I believe it’s also the first time I’ve seen him in a historical drama, so that was nice, too. I’m already looking forward to the next I’ll see of him.

According to MDL, I should have seen Jung Joon Ho before in True Beauty and Backstreet Rookie, but I don’t remember him from those. He did look very familiar to me, but maybe he just has one of those faces. In any case, I really liked his portrayal of King Gwanghae. It was cool to see him switch from serene kindness to intense paranoia and rage. Seeing the good that was still hidden in him, I actually found myself wishing that they’d deviated from the historical events to create a satisfying ending in which Neungyang got caught and the King came to terms with his past mistakes. It was quite cruel that he and Nok Du would’ve been able to get on so well had they been strangers, because they would never be able to see eye to eye as father and son. The way Jung Joon Ho balanced the two sides of King Gwanghae was really impactful. He fit the role he really well and did a great job at portraying this turbulent character. Now I find myself wanting to see him play a loving father role, just to see the difference, lol.

It’s funny to think that the last role I saw Kim Tae Woo in was a psychopathic murderer, lol. I’ve seen him before in God’s Gift: 14 Days, Romance is a Bonus Book (still my favorite role of his) and most recently in Missing: The Other Side S2. It’s the first time I’ve seen him in a historical drama, and the first time I’ve seen his character undergo such a tragic fate. I kind of liked how it was kept a bit ambiguous at first whether Heo Yoon was actually evil or not. It can go either way with Kim Tae Woo, and it was nice to be put on the wrong track at first, because that made the discovery that he’d actually been loyal to the King the entire time even more painful once he was accused. Next to the ‘extra’ roles I’ve seen him play, it was nice to see him in a calmer and more subdued role for a change. I love getting the chance to see different sides of actors that I already like, it just makes me appreciate them even more. I honestly think Heo Yoon could’ve stuck around for a while longer, his death was quite sudden and unexpected and he would have loved to see the resistance against Neungyang once the Muweol Corps also learned about his betrayal. In any case, it was nice to see Kim Tae Woo in this and to witness a new side to his acting.

Yoon Yoo Sun is another one of those faces that I’m always happy to see in K-Dramas. I’ve seen her before in My Girlfriend is a Gumiho, Mary Stayed Out All Night, King of High School, Producer, She Was Pretty, Shopping King Louie, Weightlifting Fairy Kim Bok Joo, The King Loves, Just Between Lovers, Abyss, Yumi’s Cells and Extraordinary Attorney Woo. She’s typically cast as a mother, in my experience, and that’s also really the vibe I got from her portrayal as Lady Chun: she was like a mother to all the women she’d taken in. I really loved her role in this series, even though it unfortunately ended way too soon. Just like with Heo Yoon, I think she would’ve loved seeing her assassin squad head into that battle at the palace, she would’ve been so proud of Ssook. 🥹 I always really like Yoon Yoo Sun’s energy, even when she plays less friendly characters, she always fully goes for it and just exudes this kind of warm and motherly energy. It was really cool to see her as a gisaeng mama in this show, I hope to see her again soon!

I’ve seen Lee Seung Joon before in Hyde, Jekyll, Me, Madame Antoine, Descendants of the Sun, The Package, Thirty But Seventeen, He is Psychometric and Hotel Del Luna, and there’s a bunch more of his shows on my list. It was nice seeing him in this as Nok Du’s real father. I think this is probably the oldest I’ve seen him as, too, but he pulled it off very well, lol. I initially thought Nok Du would just leave his father and brother behind on the island and they wouldn’t actually come back that often, but I’m glad they weren’t forgotten and actually remained important supporting characters throughout the story. It was cool to find out about Jung Yoon Jeo’s past as a guard and friend of the King, and how he got entangled in this mess. Lee Seung Joon did a great job at expressing Jung Yoon Jeo’s sincerity from beginning to end, and I really liked seeing him in this.

You know that feeling when you see a certain actor in something for the first time and then suddenly they appear in everything you watch after that? That’s my experience with Song Geon Hee now, lol. As soon as he appeared on screen as Hwang Tae I was like: “THOMAS?!?!” 😂😂😂 I got introduced to him very recently through Missing: The Other Side, and now I’m happy whenever I see him. As I mentioned in my review, I wasn’t really sure about Hwang Tae’s true feelings regarding Nok Du, although I do still believe he never actually resented him, and that he just pretended to hate him in front of Neungyang. In any case, I still enjoyed Song Geon Hee’s performance, he approached the character very genuinely and I’m glad he still came round in the end. The subtly suggested shipping of him and Ssook was a bit random, but kind of cute as well, lol. It was really nice seeing him in a historical drama, and I hope I’ll get to the other shows on my list that he appears in soon.

I’ve seen Lee Moon Shik before in Rooftop Prince, Healer, Moonlight Drawn By Clouds, The Secret Life of My Secretary and Move to Heaven, but I’ll probably remember him best from his role in this show. Despite his general funny uncle vibes, I really liked that he actually got into the action part of the story as well. He balanced the silliness and the seriousness very well and became a character that I came to like and respect a lot. I feel like he was a really significant supporting figure to Nok Du while he was separated from his father. He was dependable and trustworthy, and those kind of allies were very welcome. I really liked his energy, how he switched from being goofy to the martial arts master in battle. I liked his performance a lot!

Park Da Yeon was eight years old when this show aired, yet she managed to come across so incredibly mature that it actually surprised me. I know the talent level of child actors in Korea is quite high, but she is definitely another one to look out for. Honestly, I LIVED for her portrayal of little Aeng Du. It was a blast to see such a young girl nail that level of wit, sassiness and charm all at the same time. She only has five dramas to her name so far, but I’m definitely going to keep an eye out for her, because she’s a very promising little star. I hope she’ll continue to develop her acting skills while she grows up, because going by her performance in this show alone, she’s going to be absolutely brilliant.

I was so surprised to see Jo Soo Hyang in this! I’ve seen her before in Who Are You: School 2015 (where she played Kim So Hyun’s relentless bully), Drama Special: What is the Ghost Doing?, Weightlifting Fairy Kim Bok Joo, Vivid Romance, Duel and Something in the Rain. I was really impressed by her portrayal of Ssook; this is definitely my favorite role of her so far. As I mentioned before, I loved Ssook’s character development, and it was so cool to see her go from her usual pokerface to expressing more lively and emotional expressions as the story progressed. I said it before: Ssook was one of my favorite supporting characters in this, and it helped that I got to see such new colors in Jo Soo Hyang’s acting. It was really cool to see her in such an intense role, and in a historical drama for the first time. I’m really curious to see what else she’s put out!

Last but certainly not least, my boy Hwang In Yeop. I’ve seen him before in True Beauty and The Sound of Magic. As I mentioned earlier, at first I thought he was just going to make a guest appearance since he initially just appeared to cut ice cubes with his sword and didn’t say a word, lol. I’m glad they gave him more lines and things to do. I would’ve really liked to get some more background information on him and his friendship with Neungyang, that would’ve probably gotten me attached to his character a bit more. Now, because he was just a loyal follower of the bad guy, he didn’t really instill that much empathy in me, especially after killing Lady Chun. In a parallel universe, his character would’ve probably grown on me much more, but as it was, Dan Ho remained like a silent enigma to me. Hwang In Yeop did great though, it was cool seeing him as this collected, silent swordsman. I also hadn’t seen him in a historical drama before, so that was cool.

I feel like I’ve said all I wanted to say about this drama, so I’ll end it here. All in all, I really enjoyed it. The story may not have been the most original, but it had a lot of beautiful and touching scenes and the different storylines came together very naturally. There may have been some confusing details here and there that occasionally made it hard for me to keep up with the exact timeline of things, but the overall quality of the series was great, the acting was really good and I loved the music and the beautiful cinematic shots they included. I want the shot of Nok Du and Dong Joo walking together in the flower field framed, because it looked just like a painting.
It was nice getting into another historical drama with a straightforward plot and a happy ending, even though I still think it was wrapped up a bit too easily in some aspects. The romantic storyline was also included very naturally, it’s been a while since I’ve been so fond of a main couple. I think the writers did a good job at establishing the characters, even if some had a bit more depth than others. I liked that it put a spotlight on underprivileged women as well, because I don’t think that’s shown very often. The fact that it featured strong, independent women and female assassins and showed women actively participating in battles was really cool, I loved that. Seeing Kim So Hyun in such a strong and self-assured lead role was also definitely a bonus, I really enjoyed her performance in this.
I’m glad I finally got to see this series, it had been on my list for quite some time, and the autumn season made watching this extra cozy. I’m kind of settling into this monthly reviewing routine, so I’m probably going to keep that up. Unless my next watch is really short, then I’ll probably be back sooner (watch me jinx it).

Thank you for taking the time to read my review, and I will be back as soon as I can.

Bye-bee! x

Disclaimer: this is a review, and as such it contains spoilers of the whole series. Please proceed to read at your own risk if you still plan on watching this show or if you haven’t finished it yet. You have been warned.

Girl From Nowhere
(เด็กใหม่ / Dek Mai / New Girl)
MyDramaList rating: 7.0/10 (both seasons combined – S1: 7.5 / S2: 6.5)

It seems like I’ve officially jinxed myself into pulling every single double-season show that’s on my list, lol. There’s not even that many, but my Spin-the-Wheel app just keeps picking them out one by one. Anyways, in the case of this drama it wasn’t that big of a deal since the episodes were quite short (under an hour each), and the series as a whole was episodic rather than that it had an extensive storyline that spanned two seasons. I was very excited when this show popped up on my app because this is actually THE FIRST THAI DRAMA I’ve ever watched. There’s only a couple on my list, so the fact that I was able to pull this one feels quite special, in a way. Although I had a certain idea of what to prepare myself for when I started this series, I went into it with an open mind and was surprised to say it was quite different from what I’d expected.
I am very excited to share my thoughts on this.

First of all, I’d like to give a general trigger warning – I’m honestly surprised they didn’t give one before every single episode – because this series contains graphic depictions of bullying, violence, self-harm, physical and psychological torture, murder, rape, and (sexual) assault.

Girl From Nowhere is a GMM25/Netflix Thai drama with two seasons of thirteen and eight episodes, respectively. The length of the episodes varies from between 38 to 50 minutes. I personally watched it on Netflix, but you can also watch it on KissKH. The series is structured like an anthology, reminiscent of Black Mirror, in which all the episodes are standalone stories that don’t necessarily refer to each other. The only consistent element throughout is Nanno (played by Chicha Amattayakul), an enigmatic teenage girl who transfers to a new school every episode to expose all sorts of corruptions, not just within the schools and their education systems, but also among the teachers and students themselves. To be more specific, these corruptions stretch from systematic issues (eg. schools that either heavily restrict their students in their freedom or encourage them to go to extreme lengths to secure their own success) to personal qualms (eg. teachers and students that get pushed to the edge after acting on their feelings of lust, jealousy and greed).

Just to clarify before I start, when I went into this show I didn’t know it would be episodic. From the short clips I’d seen of it before, I thought Nanno would just be attending one single school and create chaos and drama among different groups of people there. I didn’t know there would be a fantastical element, either, so it ended up exceeding my expectations in several ways.
While I was watching this, I was strangely reminded of The School Nurse Files, both because of the wild and bizarre nature of some episodes, and because it uses the backdrop of a high school to amplify the level of teenage drama. It’s often said that teenagers aren’t fully capable to make big decisions in life and love because their brains aren’t fully developed yet, and with that in mind I did find some depictions of student characters going to extreme lengths in terms of romance and popularity quite staggering.
To me, one of the most interesting things about this drama is that it plays around with morality issues, and sometimes leaves you wondering if it was really necessary for Nanno to get involved and go so far in pushing people over the edge.

Just like with The School Nurse Files, I actually consulted some other reviews to see if they shared my sentiments and/or offered any insights that I might have overlooked. Since some episodes actually blurred the lines between what was real and what wasn’t, I just wanted to make sure I didn’t miss any major symbolism. On the other hand, I sat through this show with a mindset that allowed me to take in all the absurdity and craziness without ending up with a genuinely frustrated “WTF” feeling. While I definitely found myself thinking “what the helly did I just watch” several times, I’m glad to say I was able to appreciate the bizarre nature of the show as a whole. No matter how weird and surreal things got, there was a lesson to be found in each and every story, even if the episode didn’t end with a satisfying conclusion.

Since Nanno is the only consistent character in the series (with the exception of Yuri in season two), I’d like to first give my analysis on her and then elaborate on her actions throughout the episodes.

When I say that Nanno is an enigmatic girl, I don’t just mean that she acts mysterious: she is an actual enigma. We don’t get to know anything about her, where she’s from, what her intentions are, or even who she really is. She just appears ‘from nowhere’ as the new girl at a new school and typically leaves behind a trail of destruction in her wake. In some cases, just showing her face is enough to draw the attention of a male and the jealousy of a female student. In other cases, she actively approaches someone and provokes them by planting a seed of doubt, jealousy or greed in them, as if to see just how far they’ll go. She goes back and forth between helping, provoking, seducing, and punishing, and never lets you know her next move. All in all, it seems like it’s her intention to bring out the worst in people by playing on their weaknesses and insecurities, only to sit back and watch the chaos unfold with a sinister excitement that often comes out in almost robotic bouts of manical laughter.
For people who are used to main characters that they can (learn to) relate to and empathize with, Nanno is definitely a very unconventional protagonist. While she does expose corrupted school systems and teaches bad people a lesson, she doesn’t seem to have any conscience whatsoever with regards to who gets involved in her schemes, and tends to go very far in her punishments. It doesn’t seem like she’s there to help anyone out, as she even goes so far as to provoke timid people that probably wouldn’t have acted out if it weren’t for her push, however slight it might be.
What also surprised me (and threw me off in some cases) was that Nanno doesn’t shy away from getting caught in the crossfire herself, either. While in most episodes she takes the position of a bystander that subtly edges someone on, there are also instances where she lets herself get murdered, raped and disfigured in order to prove a point and record evidence – it went pretty far in some cases.
The only intriguing thing about these horrible scenes was that, much to the horror of her assailants, Nanno always appears back at school in perfectly good health the next day, even after being murdered or beaten bloody. Practically speaking, if she was a normal human being, of course this wouldn’t be possible. Even if she regained consciousness and got her injuries treated, you’d think that there would at least be scars or some sort of proof that she was physically harmed. And that’s when the question of Nanno’s immortality comes in.

The first time Nanno shows uncommon abilities is when in Apologies (S1E2), new versions of her keep popping up next to her assailants while they’re burying her, almost like a ghost that’s haunting them. Since this is the first ‘surreal’ event in the series, I wasn’t really sure what to make of it and if I should even take it at face-value. It could just be a visualization of how much the reality of their deeds haunted her assailants. Then, of course, Nanno appears back at school the next day, which might suggest her immortality but still doesn’t explain whether or not those different versions of her were real or not.
This element is confirmed in Liberation (S2E6), when she actually shows different versions of herself to the whole class and teaching staff and even has them operate individually for everyone to see. While the first time there was still the mystery of whether it really happened or not, the second time it’s not even disguised as a possible hallucination anymore, and it actually proves that Nanno isn’t human to a full room of people.
Apart from creating multiple versions of herself, Nanno is also able to spawn just about anywhere, in any random place, and seems to possess all the necessary information about her targets before she even gets to know them personally. We never see her on her way somewhere outside of the school, she’s just suddenly there. Throughout season 1, we get more and more hints that she’s not normal, but it still remains very much a mystery what exactly her deal is.
From the way Nanno keeps showing up unscathed after everything that’s done to her, it almost seems like, whenever she’s physically incapacitated, a new version of her just spawns to take her place. The fact that multiple versions of her are able to appear simultaneously should at least mean that it’s not just one and the same Nanno that undergoes all the physical damage that’s inflicted on her throughout the series. It might even be possible that every single episode deals with its own Nanno, in a multiverse kind of way. That would at least explain why there’s no mention of her between different schools – because surely people would’ve shared their crazy experiences online and figured out the same girl was reported in different places.
Apart from her respawning tendencies, Nanno also seems to be able to have some sort of supernatural abilities. In Wonderwall (S1E6/7), a female student discovers that everything she writes on a certain bathroom stall wall comes true, and all hell breaks loose when the entire school finds out and starts using it as well. I think this was the first episode that actually felt fictional to me, especially with how it ended. While it’s never explained how this even worked, we are just led to believe that Nanno had something to do with it, as she also comes to taunt the student with her misuse of the wall’s power in the end.
In BFF (S1E12/13), a group of ex-classmates ends up gruesomely slaughtering each other for an antidote, only to wake up and find that it wasn’t real and they’re all still alive, even though the syringe is still there.
In JennyX (S2E7), Nanno takes over someone’s life, with no one being able to see she’s not actually the same person. There is no explanation for how she’s able to pull these things off, but it does hint at the fact that she must possess some sort of magical powers. Honestly, these episodes reminded me of that reality-bending device from the Black Mirror episode Bête Noire (S7E1). Maybe Nanno had one of those too, lol.
One thing I’ll say about these more surreal-feeling episodes is that I definitely preferred it when they kept things as more of a mystery. In that sense, I felt like season 1 was much more intriguing than season 2, where Nanno’s superhuman-ness almost became like a running gag and they didn’t even try to be mysterious about it anymore.

Once I started thinking that Nanno might not be human, my mind immediately went to a more metaphorical explanation of her character. It occurred to me that, rather than an actual person, she might be some sort of human-shaped manifestation of people’s darkest emotions. Maybe she is just that little voice in someone’s head that goes: “Do it”, and her disguise as a high school girl is only meant to help her blend in unnoticed and to give her targets something physical to rage at and put all the blame on. Whenever people point their fingers at her, she just shrugs and says: “I only helped you get what you wanted. The repercussions are all on you”, which could also simply be the voice of reason that people get after realizing the full extent of what they’ve gotten themselves into.
The final shot of season 2 is narrated by Nanno’s voice saying: “It’s a world with absolute freedom in which people will take rights into their own hands. Will the world even need me after this?” Doesn’t that just mean that people will continue to choose to be evil, even after a mirror has been held up to them?
Despite my own ideas, I am aware of the common theory that Nanno is actually the Devil’s daughter, and I agree that this would explain her behavior in a couple of specific episodes when faced with the bond between a child and their parent. It comes out most clearly in Lost & Found (S1E8), the only episode in season 1 where Nanno genuinely seems to empathize with her target. She recognizes the void the boy feels because of his father’s absence and eventually manages to bring them back together. This episode stood out to me because it was the first time that Nanno showed compassion and didn’t seem like her usual sadistic self. In Yuri (S2E4), she has a strangely melancholic look in her eye as she watches Yuri and her mom’s interactions. Finally, in The Judgement (S2E8), Nanno finds herself interfering with a heartbreaking confrontation between a mother and a daughter as well. These might all hint to the fact that, besides using such sadistic methods to exploit people’s bad sides and push them over the edge, Nanno secretly misses a parental figure herself – maybe she’s just filling up her loneliness by flaunting around and punishing mortals to keep herself entertained because Daddy Devil never has time for her.
If this would be the case, I can’t deny that I would find that a bit of an anti-climax. I actually love the fact that we never get to find out what exactly Nanno is and why she’s doing what she’s doing. What kept the show so intriguing and interesting to me was the mystery element of it all, and that’s why I didn’t even find it necessary to redeem Nanno or give her some sense of humanity. I liked going back and forth between appreciating her and despising her and being able to form my own theories and opinions about her, so I didn’t really want that filled in for me. This is also part of the reason I liked season 2 less than season 1, because even though the truth is never fully filled in until the end, season 2 definitely reveals more explicit information. With the introduction of Yuri, Nanno actually starts explaining her actions more often, and I honestly found that kind of a pity because it felt like she lost some of the invincibility and confidence she’d had throughout season 1. It reminded of how I feel whenever The Doctor from Doctor Who says he doesn’t know something. When a main character is introduced with so much self-assurance that they never even feel the need to spell out their intentions, it just feels weird to suddenly see them in a position where they need to explain or seem unsure of themselves.

I don’t want to go into too much detail about every single episode, so I’m going to pick out a couple that stood out to me for a specific reason.
In Trophy (S1E3), Nanno enters a school that blatantly rewards students for excelling in a specific field. She sets her sights on Mew (Chonnikan Netjui), a girl who feels inferior for not excelling at anything in particular, and encourages her to copy and edit something from online and just make sure she doesn’t get caught. Instead of getting in the middle of things herself, here Nanno takes the role of a supporting character, a bystander who just encourages her classmate, who washes her hands of Mew as soon as her lie drives her into a corner.
What I liked about this episode was the plot twist at the end, that it was never about Mew’s personal deception as much as it was about the corrupted nature of the school. Even after Mew gets publicly exposed for not actually being good at art, the school covers it up, seemingly unbothered by whether or not their students’ talents are legit, as long as their creations benefit the school’s reputation. This changed my entire view on the story, including Nanno’s intention. While at first it seemed like she just wanted to push Mew over the edge by letting her indulge in her fake success, maybe Nanno actually wanted to expose the true core of the problem – the school itself – which had driven its students to become so desperate to prove themselves, even if that didn’t lead to a clear solution. In the end, Nanno only exposes the true nature of the school, but isn’t able to stop the school from letting its students get away with forgery and plagiarism. I don’t know if it was just me, but she didn’t seem as satisfied at the end of this episode. I wonder if she actually meant to accomplish more but ended up accepting that some things were just too corrupt to change.

One episode that frustrated the heck out of me for being unfair was Social Love (S1E5). So far I’d always accepted Nanno’s actions to at least a certain extent, but here I really didn’t understand what her intention was. She ‘accidentally’ gets herself paired up with a popular boy named Hann (Tatchapol Thitiapichai), which leads them to become the most admired couple in school (ship name: ‘Hanno’) and actively goes along with the act while knowing that Hann already has a girlfriend, Yui (Chanicha Boonpanuvichit).
What made me empathize with Yui the most was that she was the first character to actually get mad at her boyfriend instead of Nanno. She kept telling Hann to own up to his lies and quit the act, and couldn’t bring herself to physically harm Nanno when push came to shove. It was so cruel that she kept being punished for Hann’s cowardice. He kept urging her to do things that would discredit Nanno, and then stood back when the entire school started ostracizing her. Heck, she even got the shit beaten out of her and all this guy could say was: “It’s Nanno’s fault, she needs to go for this to be over.” He never took any responsibility for his own contribution to the situation and continued to put Yui in danger, all to protect his own popularity. I felt so bad for Yui, she deserved so much better. #JusticeForYui.

Another episode that made a big impression on me was the two-parter Wonderwall (S1E6/7). I thought it put a lot of things into perspective. In this story, Nanno evokes the jealousy of a female student named Bam (Morakot Liu). When Bam vents out her frustrations towards Nanno on the wall of a bathroom stall, she discovers that everything she writes on there (at least, all the hateful things) end up coming true. If she writes that someone is a stinkface, that person’s face starts to stink, if she writes that someone is a stupid dog, that person starts acting like a dog, if she writes that someone should kill themselves…
Honestly, while of course it’s mean to write such things where everyone can see them, I think writing things down is a way more acceptable way of venting than physically acting on harmful feelings. In my opinion, after getting a taste of the power her written words held, Bam became fully aware of the harm that she did, especially when the power of the ‘wonderwall’ became known to the entire school and created absolute chaos. I’m just saying that I could relate to how guilty she felt. No matter how good her intentions were to tell that bullied girl about it, she never foresaw that it would escalate like that. I guess the moral of this story was that the oppressed won’t hold back once they get a chance to overthrow their oppressors, even in a seemingly innocent school setting.
I actually empathized with Bam a lot. Maybe not to the same extent as Yui in Social Love, but I did appreciate her confessing to Nanno that everything was her fault and that she was sorry for cursing her as well. As such, I found it quite cruel that she ended up in freaking Borderland after writing that she wanted everyone to disappear. I get that Nanno wasn’t as forgiving, but I personally would’ve let her go after she apologized so sincerely. Bam acted in the heat of the moment without any real intention to hurt anyone, and ended up facing consequences she never wished for. Wasn’t that enough punishment?

One of my favorite episodes was Liberation (S2E6). Besides the fact that the black-and-white effect only emphasized the grim and restricted nature of the school even more, I also thought it was really powerful that everyone stayed black and white even after they got out, as if to show that their experience at that school was a stain that they’d never be able to fully wash off. I also appreciated that this was the first time Nanno ever helped an entire class stand up for and regain their freedom.

Looking at overarching themes and elements, I think we can categorize Nanno’s behavior based on specific episodes. In The Ugly Truth (S1E1), Lost & Found (S1E8), True Love (S2E2) and Liberation (S2E6), she comes out as a kind of moral crusader, either by punishing a wrongdoer for their misdeeds or by helping people that needed to come to terms with their own loneliness. Even in Pregnant (S2E1), where Nanno punishes playboy Nanai (Teeradon Supapunpinyo) for carelessly impregnating girls by getting him pregnant in return, it felt like a proper punishment because he actually came to reflect on his actions and ended up loving and keeping his baby. As I mentioned before, although I didn’t personally need Nanno to be humanized, these episodes were definitely interesting in the sense that they revealed a deeper layer to her character, a different look in her eye that we usually didn’t get to see.
It also occurred to me that, in all the cases where Nanno actually did ‘the right thing’, she’d end the episode with a little triumphant ‘my work here is done’ stretch, whereas in other cases she’d just walk off or disappear without showing a clear reaction to her accomplishments.

In contrast to this side of her, BFF (S1E12/13), Minnie and the Four Bodies (S2E3) and SOTUS (S2E5) evoked a brutal and unforgiving side from her. I have to admit that I found these episodes, specifically the last two, quite hard to watch. I personally think that the best lesson for a wrongdoer is to be made aware of the consequences of their actions and learn how to be a better person while carrying the guilt of their past misdeeds. The fact that Nanno retaliated against these students in tenfold, by submitting them to excessive physical and psychological torture actually made me feel like she was stooping to their level and showing that she was just as bad as them. I honestly didn’t feel like there was a valuable lesson in these harsh punishments whatsoever, it just made the episodes needlessly cruel and hard to watch.
On a side note, it was interesting to see the recurring element of Nanno’s immortality in the way she allegedly retained the same appearance for decades, and that she would actually come back to haunt and punish people after several years had passed. It also seemed like she saved the cruelest payback punishments for people that had personally harmed her.

Another couple of episodes, like Trap (S1E9), Thank You Teacher (S1E10) and The Rank (S1E11), left me hanging with a question mark regarding what exactly Nanno meant to accomplish.
While I usually love scenarios in which a group of people is confined to a room and people’s true colors come out through tensions and heated arguments (my mind immediately went to the Doctor Who episode Midnight, one of my all-time favorites), in hindsight I really didn’t understand the message Trap was meant to convey. The switch from a suspense story about a serial killer on the loose to a detective about who killed Koh (Awat Ratanapintha) to a moral lesson about how people can be manipulated to lie from a young age on was a bit confusing to me. It made me wonder what the real message of the story was, and what Nanno actually meant to accomplish here.
In Thank You Teacher, I honestly don’t feel like Nanno did anything, except trigger Teacher Aum (Claudia Chakrabandhu Na Ayudhya)’s trauma because she happened to look like the student her husband cheated on her with. The revelation that Teacher Aum even killed her own child and had been hallucinating the entire time was also very unexpected and dramatic. The only lesson I learned from this episode is that it’s important to seek psychological help, and I’d at least expected Nanno to do a bit more than just sit around and watch how Teacher Aum’s mental health deteriorated every day.
The Rank reminded me a bit of the Black Mirror episode Nosedive (another favorite) and was honestly one of the more absurdly comical episodes to me because it was so ridiculous and over the top. As aggressive as it got, the idea that it was based on was actually ridiculous. Of course, just like with Trophy, it all came down to the school being incredibly toxic as they raised girls to only care about how they looked to the outside world, but in contrast to Mew, Ying (Apasiri Kittithanon) never saw this corruption for what it was and continued to beg for her crown until the very end. I’m also quite sceptical regarding the fact that the token ‘fat’ girl ended up winning after getting a complete Birth of a Beauty-style makeover that made her skinny and pretty. This episode also didn’t really have a satisfying ending, and really just ended with the exposal of the true damage that the school inflicted on its students’ minds.

Honestly, I think there’s something to say about every single episode and they all left an impression on me, beit in a positive or a negative way. The main conclusion that we can come to is that there is a lot of fluctuation in Nanno’s behavior and it’s always unpredictable what she’ll do and who she’ll target. As I mentioned earlier, I preferred season 1 to season 2 because I liked the mysterious element for what it was, without needing an explanation and I actually was a bit disappointed with the turn that season 2 took.

When they first teased The Girl With the Red Ribbon in Pregnant (S2E1) and then in True Love, I was actually expecting a nemesis to show up, someone who somehow knew what Nanno was and tried to warn people about her. I thought it would be kind of cool to give Nanno an opponent who was her equal in strength but had the opposite intentions. However, when the true nature of The Girl came to light, I can’t deny I was a bit disappointed.
Yuri (Chanya McClory) is one of Nanno’s previous targets. In Yuri, she’s introduced as a poor student who clings to the toxic friendship of her two influential friends, even if they treat her like their servant. When Nanno offers to help her expose these friends, Yuri turns on all of them, revealing an unexpected sadistic side that ends up killing everyone in the room, including herself. However, we are provided a key piece of information on Nanno’s powers when Yuri is revived after ingesting some of Nanno’s blood, allowing her to become something similar to her.

To be completely honest, I didn’t really like Yuri’s character. She was basically a less patient and more bloodthirsty version of Nanno, and I didn’t feel like she had anything new or interesting to offer. She was very blatant and vocal in her approach, and just kept trying to one-up Nanno in beating her to punishing certain people. While Nanno had her occasional shifts in sentiment, Yuri was just straight-out cruel, and that made her a bit one-dimensional in my opinion. She just wanted to kill people, whereas Nanno’s intentions, however vague, seemed more layered. I also didn’t like how Yuri made Nanno look weak by drawing more literal explanations out of her and pointing out to her that she was losing her touch. It was kind of a pity that a new recurring character like her, who was teased in such a promising way, basically turned out to be nothing more than a copycat.
Apart from the introduction to Yuri, I found the increasing addition of senseless violence in season 2 a bit off-putting. Seriously, I don’t think there was a single episode that didn’t include anyone bleeding or being beaten the shit out of. In contrast to the changes of focus in the season 1 episodes, I had a harder time watching season 2 because it seemed to focus purely on inflicting physical pain while that shouldn’t have been the main point. There was no need to kill Minnie or Mr. Lucky, or to give Junko (Ploy Sornarin) Nanno’s blood to strengthen her desire to kill even more.

In conclusion, while Nanno remains, so does the question regarding her innate evilness. Before she dies for the last time, we see that she actually gets a scar that doesn’t heal, after which Yuri suggests that she’s becoming more and more mortal. While she still respawns after her death in The Judgement, Nanno doesn’t seem to intend to take any action against her new bloodthirsty copycats and accepts the fact that evil will continue to spread, either with or without her influence.
As a whole, while I appreciated the moral questions this series posed, I can’t deny that it lowered my faith in humanity to the pits of Hell, lol. The rare depictions of a good deed were like a drop in a desert of despair. It’s definitely not a ‘fun’ show to watch. Nanno brings out the darkest sides of people, even in cases where this could’ve easily been avoided. In terms of reflection and redemption, it leaves a lot to be desired. Be that as it may, it definitely makes you think, and I found myself strongly confronted with my own views on right and wrong. As I said before, there is a lesson to be learned from each and every episode, and sometimes that lesson lies in the bigger picture rather than in how Nanno deals with certain people and situations. In that sense, I found it an incredibly interesting show to watch.

I just want to make a couple more remarks on certain elements of the show that deserve a shoutout.
First of all, the strong messages that it conveys are only amplified by the amazing cinematography. Every episode was a movie in itself, and it was cool to see how much detail and attention went into framing every single story. From the shot angles to the transitions to the changes in color and perspective, they did an incredible job. Even if the content of the episodes was sometimes painful to watch, the aesthetic of how it was visualized definitely made up for it.
Personally, I also appreciated that, despite the arthouse style of the series, they kept a lot of graphic details out of shot. Don’t get me wrong, there was still a lot of blood and the images of Nanno’s eyeballs rolling over the floor and Junko pulling out a girl’s entrails are imprinted on my brain forever, but I was happy that we didn’t get to see any nakedness and genitals during rape scenes and that the majority of the murder scenes where filmed from one angle. I don’t know if this was a good thing or not, but Nanno’s death scenes kind of de-sensitized me at some point because I knew she would turn out fine.
Apart from how high-quality the series looked in terms of cinematography, the acting was just as next level. I just want to give a standing ovation to every single actor that appeared in this. What I really appreciated was that, in contrast to for example Korean shows that focus a lot on beauty in their casting choices, these actors actually looked like they belonged in their respective settings. The student characters looked like regular students, pimples and braces and frizzy hairstyles included. Everyone went the extra mile in their acting, which was amazing to see. Even in episodes that were more fictional and absurd than others, everyone went for it as if they experienced it in real life. Every single actor’s performance had me sitting on the edge of my seat and managed to evoke an emotional response from me, which doesn’t always happen.

Before I move on to my (very short) cast comments, I just want to make one final remark on the opening sequences for each season and the posters. The opening sequence for the first season features a figure in black that looks like Nanno getting ready. She pulls up her socks, puts on her jacket, buttons her sleeves and cuts the hair hanging in front of her face up to just above her eyes, creating her iconic hairdo. Since this clip initially shows her all in black with her face covered, I can’t help but wonder if this was maybe her getting ready to step out for the first time after coming out of the darkness – the place she was born from.
The opening sequence for season 2 focusses on the bond between Nanno and Yuri. It shows Nanno literally walking backwards and looking over her shoulder, almost as to retrace her steps to go back to where she ‘merged’ with Yuri: the bathtub that they both emerged from in the Yuri episode. It also clearly shows the two girls in a shared red garment that seems to symbolize the blood that they now share. I thought this was a really aesthetic and cool way to depict the origin of their bond, and it makes a lot more sense when you know how they relate to each other.
Speaking of this symbolism, I actually find it quite interesting that, while the poster for the first season makes sense because it centers on Nanno, the poster for the second season actually depicts a more ‘mainstream’ kind of image that features a couple of main characters from specific episodes of the season. Besides Nanno and Yuri, we also see Nanai, Minnie, Kaye and Jane. It may be a really trivial thing to think about, but I just wonder why they chose to put different characters instead of simply an image of Nanno and Yuri, like from the opening sequence of season 2?

To match the effect of the poster for the first season, I think it would’ve been a bit more impactful if they’d chosen a different, slightly more mysterious image for the second season as well. In a way, the fact that the second season’s poster differs from the first season’s is also fitting since, at least in my opinion, there was a distinct difference in tone between the two seasons as well, but I just wondered why they chose for this image. Also, if they were going to depict specific characters, why not Junko? She’s the person who is enabled by Yuri to continue her cruel legacy, after all? Guess we’ll never know.

For my cast comments, I’m just going to cover the two recurring characters. I’d like to emphasize that I was blown away by every single actor in this show, but since this is my first time covering Thai actors, I’m afraid I won’t have anything more inspiring to say about everyone than “they were amazing”, lol.

Chicha Amatayakul really knocked it out of the park as Nanno. Of course it’s easy to say that no other actor could have possibly pulled off a role as well, but she just ticked it all the boxes that were needed to create all those different sides and layers to Nanno. Her natural beauty and cute smile could go from innocent to genuinely creepy, and her typical smirk and fierce gaze never ceased to make an impact.
The weird thing about Nanno is that, no matter how evil she got, I just ended up loving her as a character, and couldn’t help but enjoy when she showed her sinister excitement again. The one thing that did occasionally put me off a bit was her manical laughter because it sounded kind of forced at times, but on the other hand the unnatural sound of it also contributed to her weirdness.
This woman – apparently she’s only one year younger than me?! – had to act out so many disturbing scenes. She had to exude confidence during physically intimate scenes and repeatedly immerse herself in fake blood and bruised face make-up, jumping off of things and lying down on all sorts of surfaces. She must have gone through rollercoaster after rollercoaster while filming this, and still managed to put out an incredible performance. I would say I’ll definitely remember her, but I think that speaks for itself because it’ll actually be quite difficult to forget her face after this, lol. Anyways, it would be cool to see her in another Thai drama sometime! See if I can get used to seeing her as someone other than Nanno, haha.

I’ve seen a lot of comments sharing my dislike of Yuri’s character, but I just want to clarify that that had nothing to do with Chanya McClory’s performance. She was really good, and I’m glad that I got to see her transformation from her poor past self to Yuri the Menace, lol. On a more serious note, I read that she actually discovered that she had a brainstem tumor right before the second season came out, which means that she has fought through that while filming this as well. If anything, that just makes me appreciate her performance even more. Again, the fact that I wasn’t too impressed with Yuri’s character was in no way related to my opinion about the actress’ performance, because just like every other actor in this show she really poured her all into it. I guess it just goes to show that even the most poor and desperate person can succumb to the darkness once they’re exposed to it, and she did great in portraying that transition. I hope I’ll get to see more of her acting in the future!

Well, that’s it for this review. I have definitely been sleeping on Thai dramas, because dang, these people can deliver! I don’t even have a proper excuse for never watching any before, but I’ll definitely be adding more to my list from now on. By the way, in contrast to how long it took me to write the actors’ names out in this review (some took me three checks 😭), I really appreciated that they gave all the characters such short and memorable nicknames. It’s so much easier to remember ‘Oh’ and ‘Bam’ than ‘Sattawat Phupha’ and ‘Wiphada Cheunchom’. No disrespect to Thai names, but I’m new to them so it’s definitely something to get used to. 🙏🏻

In conclusion, I’ll just say that this series is a very unique little gem. It’ll make you uncomfortable in every single way, but it will also make you laugh out loud and gasp for breath with its unpredictable twists and gutwrenching scenarios. I think the main lesson to draw from this series as a whole is that evil doesn’t have to be born, but it can spread like wildfire once someone lights even the smallest of candles. In this day and age it’s more important than ever to remind kind and compassionate and not give in to instinctive hatred – that’ll only makes things worse for everyone. The idea that even the most innocent person can be persuaded into the darkness with a single bite of chocolate is quite scary, and this show will definitely keep haunting me for a while. On the other hand, it was really intriguing and it put a lot of things into perspective as well regarding certain issues of morality. Besides the many profane and graphic aspects of the show, it highlights many sociological issues such as sexism, beauty standards, social media, social class differences and capitalism. It places the seemingly mundane issues of teenagers within a bigger picture of social pressure, with quite the disturbing outcome. After all, if people willingly start choosing to act on their darkest thoughts from an early age on, how will that impact the future of this world?

I swear to God, if my Spin-the-Wheel app picks out another double-season show, I’m gonna be mimicking Nanno’s manical laughter, lol. We’ll find out soon!

Oh, and remember to keep an eye out for this girl.

Bye-bee! x

Disclaimer: this is a review, and as such it contains spoilers of the whole series. Please proceed to read at your own risk if you still plan on watching this show or if you haven’t finished it yet. You have been warned.

Missing: The Other Side (S2)
(미씽: 그들이 있었다 / Missing: Geudeuli Itseodda / Missing: They Were There)
MyDramaList rating: 8.0/10

Hello everybody, and welcome to my review of the second season of Missing: The Other Side. You can find my review of the first season here. Despite my week-long holiday in-between and the fact that this season was slightly longer than the first one, I was able to go through it quite quickly. As I thought, it was a good idea to watch it in one go, since there were a lot of references to the events of the first season. It was also a good idea to split the reviews for each season, because altogether it would’ve become an incredibly lengthy monster review that no one would probably take the time to read, lol. In any case, I really enjoyed the journey on which this whole series took me, and the way it consistently touched me from start to finish will definitely stay with me. I’d just like to thank my Spin the Wheel app for picking this show out for me now, because otherwise it would’ve probably taken me a very long time to get to it.

Since I already spent such a long review on the first season, for this one I’ll try to remain a bit more concise (although I can’t guarantee anything, knowing myself). The premise of the full story is that there are two men, Kim Wook and Jang Pan Seok, who for some reason are able to see and enter specific ghost villages that are invisible to the regular eye. These villages house ghosts of people whose bodies haven’t been found yet. Through communicating with these ghosts, Wook and Pan Seok set out to assist the police units in charge of missing persons cases in order to locate the bodies. Once found, the ghosts are able to pass on by disappearing from their village.
In season one, Wook and Pan Seok deal with the ghosts in Duon Village, a place in the countryside, while simultaneously dealing with their own losses – Wook’s mother who disappeared and Pan Seok’s young daughter who got kidnapped. At the end of season one, after the two help locate pretty much every single ghost in Duon Village, it is hinted that there might be another ghost village, one where Pan Seok’s daughter may have resided before she was found. The second season deals with this village, hidden in an abandoned industrial complex. Wook and Pan Seok set out to deal with a whole new community of villagers, including a shocking number of young children, and a new overarching case that ties in with the events of season one.

Let’s just start like we always do. Missing: The Other Side (S2) is a tvN K-Drama with fourteen episodes of about an hour long. I watched the full series here. The story takes places two years after the events of season one. After locating the bodies of all the villagers from Duon Village, Kim Wook (Go Soo) and Jang Pan Seok (Heo Joon Ho) haven’t been able to see any ghosts ever since. Together with Lee Jong Ah (Ahn So Hee), they now continue Wook’s original business of catching scammers and frauds, occasionally assisted by officer Shin Joon Ho (Song Joon Cheol/Ha Joon) and detective Baek Il Doo (Ji Dae Han) from the missing persons police unit.
However, their newly acquired ‘peaceful’ life is disrupted when a ghost suddenly appears in front of Wook and leads him to another ghost village, referred to as Industrial Complex 3. This ghost, a young man named Oh Il Yong (played by Kim Dong Hwi) is somehow able to leave the village, although he still can’t physically do anything when he’s outside. When other ghosts try to escape, they just respawn at the big tree that forms the entrance to the village (like the basement room in Thomas’ café in season one). When Wook and Pan Seok enter the village for the first time, they are shocked to see an entire school of children there. It doesn’t take long for some kids to spot Pan Seok and inform him that his daughter Hyun Ji used to be there as well.
At hearing this, Pan Seok immediately forms a strong connection with this new village and ends up spending a lot of time there. Even without Hyun Ji present, he can’t let go of the fact that she was there for fifteen years. He decides to stay there and gather as much information as he can to visualize how Hyun Ji lived in this village all this time.
The appointed ‘leader’ of Industrial Complex 3 is a middle-aged woman called Kang Eun Shil (played by Lee Jung Eun), nicknamed Captain Kang as she used to command a fishing boat. She runs a supermarket right across from the big tree and is always the first one to welcome new arrivals and put them at ease. Having lost her own husband and son while she was still alive, she is an incredibly warm and motherly figure to everyone in the village, especially to the younger people and children.
As Wook and Pan Seok get acquainted with all these new people, Il Yong leads them to a new case involving a drug dealing gang, which turns out to be connected to Lee Dong Min (Lee Yoon Jae), one of the main culprits from the first season, who’s still in jail. Whilst they unravel Il Yong’s involvement with this gang, Wook and Pan Seok set out to find the bodies of all the ghosts from this newfound village.

I just want to say right off the bat that I was slightly thrown off by the opening sequence to this season, because it specifically depicted the disappearance of children under a very mellow and hopeful soundtrack. Overall, the fact that this season predominantly focused on finding missing children and dealt with a considerable level of child abuse and suffering left me quite distraught. It occasionally got a bit too much for my heart to take, and I won’t deny that I’ve cried multiple times while watching this. It was definitely on another level than season one.
Also, the general focus seemed to have been a bit different in this season, as it centered more on people that had already been missing for a longer period of time rather than people that were currently missing and investigated by the missing persons unit. In this season, it was mostly Wook and Pan Seok bringing a missing person to Joon Ho’s attention and having him pick it up at his police unit instead of the other way around. As such, I was initially a bit worried that this would be a continuous case-by-case story where they just covered a new person in each episode. Although that’s kind of how it started in the first couple of episodes, I’m really glad they strayed from that as soon as the connecting story of the drug gang came into play. In the end, I was just as touched, heartbroken and flabbergasted by the plot twists and cliffhangers as I was in the first season, so props for the writers to pull off another very successfully written season.

Just like in my previous review, I’d like to start by giving a brief summary of the overarching storyline of the drug gang that plays out while Wook and Pan Seok look for the villagers’ bodies, because this ties in to Lee Dong Min, Choiseung Construction and other specific events from the first season. Basically, the drug squad police unit now led by Captain Lee Man Sik (Kim Jae Cheol), who was in charge of the missing persons unit in season one, is currently in charge of tracking down a drug deal gang that doesn’t only illegally deal drugs but also for some reason kidnaps and murders people, which brings them back into cooperating with the missing persons unit. The ring leader of this gang calls himself ‘Goliath’, and while the police have confirmed his existence through the dark web, they keep being one step behind in the drug gang’s schemes, which keep leading to new innocent victims, mostly young women.
For some reason, Il Yong keeps hovering around these drug dealers, suggesting that he knows them and/or that they had something to do with his death. The person he specifically identifies as his killer is Kim Pil Joong (Jung Yoon Jae), who at some point is thought to be Goliath himself. However, it turns out that there are even more people behind him, like the mysterious ‘Steve’ – later identified as Noh Yoon Goo (played by Kim Tae Woo).
I just wanted to introduce this plot in advance before I move on to my character analyses to make it easier to refer back to.

Since I’ve already written elaborate character analyses on the main recurring characters in my first season review, I’d just like to write a bit about how their dynamics developed in season two and address some new plot tools that were added to flesh out their personalities even more.
As we know, Wook’s mother disappeared when he was seven. In season one, he finds out she was murdered, meets her ghost in Duon Village and helps locate her body in the final episode so she can finally move on. Now, two years later, Wook doesn’t have a real job anymore and just goes around catching bad guys together with Pan Seok and Jong Ah. He and Pan Seok also live at Jong Ah’s place since they can’t afford something for themselves. In the first episode, Wook heroically manages to track down a voice phishing scammer and is awarded a Brave Citizen award. This is where he meets Il Yong for the first time, although he doesn’t realize he’s a ghost yet at that point.
Besides re-awakening Wook’s ability to see ghosts and find a new ghost village, this season adds one more storyline that significantly contributes to Wook’s character development. One of the women that gets kidnapped by Goliath’s drug gang early on in the story is Moon Se Yeong (Im Seon Woo), a single mother. Her teenage daughter, Moon Bo Ra (played by Choi Myung Bin), one day appears in front of Wook’s apartment, claiming that Wook is her dad. As it happens, Wook used to date her mother Se Yeong back in the day, but he keeps denying that he’s her father because “he’s never been married”. Of course, this is kind of a vague argument because we all know marriage isn’t a condition to have a child – it would’ve been clearer if he’d just said “we never slept together” or something. I have to admit I didn’t really understand why they had to keep this so vague until the end, even in the conversations between Wook and Se Yeong. I guess it’s because they had to wait until the end for Bo Ra to finally accept that he wasn’t her real father but that he still came to care for her like one, but I honestly don’t think it would’ve made a difference if they’d at least made it clear to the viewers that he wasn’t her biological dad. I don’t think it was something that needed to be kept ambiguous to that extent. Anyways, even though it turns out that Wook isn’t her dad, his acquaintance with Bo Ra and reunion with Se Yeong does contribute significantly to his character development. You could say that he actually learns how to be a dad without being one. I loved how, in the final episode, he told Bo Ra that there are father-daughter relationships like theirs everywhere, like with Pan Seok and Jong Ah. I just thought this was cool since I literally described the relationship between those two as a father-daughter bond in the first season.
While Wook starts off with the same vibe as in season one, quite careless and free, he definitely matured even more after meeting Bo Ra and keeping her safe, both while her mother was missing and after she was found, and that was cool to see. It honestly made me feel like he came to understand Pan Seok’s fatherly sentiments towards the kids in Industrial Complex 3 a bit better as well.

Speaking of Pan Seok, I definitely felt like he became more sentimental in this season. Of course, as if finding out what happened to his daughter and locating her body after looking for her for fifteen years wasn’t enough, he’s now actually able to see the place where she stayed during all those years. In a way, it was really sad that the wasn’t able to find it before, while she was still there, but he takes all the gratitude and closure he can from what everyone in the village can tell him about her, and she even left a letter for him. I have to admit I was a bit worried at first when he kept insisting to stay at the village more than returning home, because I didn’t know if it was a good thing that he would start spending more time with ghosts than with the living, but in the end it all turned out okay. Additionally, he was already used to spending more time with ghosts during his entire time living by Duon Village, so I guess my worries were invalid, lol. Nevertheless, he still definitely kept me on my toes in terms of naivety. In hindsight, most situations that initially made me go “are you kidding me?!?!” luckily turned out to be staged and/or part of a plan, but I definitely didn’t think it was wise to drink any kind of beverage when he visited that poison lady’s house, for example. Apart from the new things he found out about Hyun Ji, I didn’t feel like there was that much additional development to Pan Seok’s character. Which is fine, of course, since we already got to see so much of him in season one and he just remained to be the soft goofy old man we knew and loved.

Now that I think about it, we definitely found out more about Wook’s past than Pan Seok’s in this season. Not only did we get a glimpse into his dating history and that Se Yeong was his first love, but we also found out that Noh Yoon Goo was the one that actually killed his mother. I actually gasped out loud when they suddenly revealed that and literally showed the footage of him killing both Wook’s mother and Detective Park. The fact that he was revealed to be the henchman that killed those people for Lee Dong Min was wild. It made the connection to the first season much more tangible and I thought that was pretty cool. Aside from that, it was nice that they kept adding to Wook’s character and development with news pieces of information instead of just letting him stay the same after getting to know him throughout season one.

If Jong Ah wasn’t already my favorite supporting character in the first season, she definitely stepped up her game in this one. I loved how she came to join Wook and Pan Seok in their quest to find those missing bodies, even when she couldn’t see the ghosts herself. I also really loved the bond she built up with Bo Ra when she came to stay at their place. Despite her initial disapproval of the idea that Wook had a daughter (her crush on him was definitely more apparent in this season), she became such a great eonni to Bo Ra, and it was nice to see how the young girl started opening up to her more and more as well.
One other thing I appreciated was the consistency in Jong Ah’s personality. I still remember how thoughtful she was for making those new flyers and banners of Hyun Ji for Pan Seok in season one. If that didn’t already warm my heart, her literally building an entire café at the industrial complex and gathering her friends to set up a full-fledged campaign to find all those missing children, even putting their pictures on the cupholders and everything, definitely did. Honestly, I loved how she just refused to stay behind and kept thinking of ways to help despite not being able to see the ghosts herself. Her growth throughout this season really touched me, and I thought it was all the more fair when the last episode revealed that she also became able to see ghosts. She opened up her mind and helped out so much, it almost felt like a reward that would allow her to keep helping out even more.

In this season, we are introduced to two friends of Jong Ah who end up helping her out at the café that becomes their new headquarters to locate the missing people from Industrial Complex 3. These friends are Geun Hyung (Lee Kyo Yeob) and Seul Gi (I can’t find this actress credited on any of my source websites, but I’m guessing from the ending credits – yes, I went there – that she might be called Lee Hye Ryung). We first meet these two when Jong Ah visits her hometown in one of the first episodes. This particular trip ends in a tragedy since the friend whose wedding she was going to attend ended up as one of the victims of the drug gang, wedding dress and all. After this, when Jong Ah sets up the Chamjoeun café, she asks Geun Hyung and Seul Gi to come work there and help her promote those missing people. They two of them are kept in the dark about the whole ghost business, of course, but it was still nice that Jong Ah found some allies who agreed to help her in such an important cause. I also liked getting some insight into Jong Ah’s personal life and family history through seeing her meet her childhood friends and visit her parents.

After the events of season one, I was really glad to see Shin Joon Ho so fresh-faced and cheerful again. We all know he really went through it, so it was refreshing to see him suddenly be much more animated and smiley in this season. Of course, the edginess was still there when he visited Lee Dong Min in prison and stuff, but all in all I think he processed everything very well. It was cool to see how he now immediately took up Wook’s requests and actively promoted the missing persons cases while working around the fact that the clues he got came directly from ghosts.
I remember saying that I loved how he came full-circle with detective Baek at the end of the first season, and now that we actually got to see him work together at the missing persons unit, everything just seemed to fall into place. He and detective Baek became such a fun duo together and it was great to now have that origin story of how far they came after initially dismissing each other’s sentiment so much. Honestly, I didn’t even realize how much Joon Ho had grown on me until the part where he got stabbed and I was like “NONONONONONO”. I actually panicked there for a second! I really liked how he cleaned up in this season and became an even stronger ally in helping out Wook and Pan Seok and becoming more friendly and supportive towards them.

One thing that I also picked up on in season one but that struck me again in this season, was the nature of the relationships between Wook, Pan Seok and Joon Ho. Even though they went through so much, both individually and together, and saw each other through a lot of heartbreaking and traumatic events, for some reason I still wouldn’t define them as ‘friends’. I don’t know if it’s because they’re all manly men who don’t need to express how much they actually care for each other, but I can’t help but feel that they consistently remained more like partners in crime than actual buddies. I think this is quite a unique aspect of the series as a whole. These men came into each other’s lives under the weirdest of circumstances and ended up helping each other out with the most personal and emotional stuff, and it still feels like they’re more like allies and work partners than chums. Honestly, when Wook gave Joon Ho that hug towards the end, even I was like ‘oh, wow’, haha. I feel like the growth that these men went through, also in relation to each other, is one of the greatest aspects of this series. The way they keep it so mature and professional while always having each other’s backs and even crying along with each other when the occasion arises brings a really unique heartwarming depth to their dynamic. I really loved that.

Now that I’ve covered the main recurring characters, let’s move on to the new people that this season introduced to us, starting with the living ones – I’ll save the sob stories until the end.
I quite liked the introduction of Bo Ra and Se Yeong. It was nice to get some more insight in Wook’s past, but they also ended up being really nice supporting characters that contributed to Wook’s growth. When they showed how Se Yeong was being held captive, I honestly already abandoned all hope that she was going to be found since that had never happened before. I did wonder why her kidnapper was keeping her alive for so long and kept telling her that she’d put them both in danger if she escaped, but I just assumed she would end up being another unfortunate victim. After the first season, I wouldn’t have been surprised if they’d ended up killing her even after her desperate escape attempts and established attachment to her daughter. That’s why it came as such a surprise when they managed to rescue her in time and she was happily reunited with Bo Ra.
I was really interested to hear more about Se Yeong’s past relationship with Wook. Not just because of the “is he Bo Ra’s dad or not” question, but also because we haven’t actually seen Wook involved in any romantic relationship before, be it in the past or in the present. In terms of his character development I was quite interested to find out what he would be like in such a dynamic. From the way they spoke with each other, I thought they were really sweet. Despite the fact that they must’ve broken up on bad terms, they actually still acted kind of shy with each other, which was cute to see. It was also nice that Se Yeong just went along with the new relationship between Wook and Bo Ra and didn’t even seem to care that he wasn’t her real dad. I feel like she ended up instilling some new sense of responsibility in Wook without even meaning to, and I really liked seeing that.
Se Yeong’s dynamic with Bo Ra was also really heartwarming. We’re introduced to them after she’s been kidnapped, so all we initially hear about her is that she’s a sloppy single mom that goes out every night and neglects her daughter. Bo Ra still seemed very attached to her, so I was hoping to see them reunite and interact at some point. I remember how sad I felt that we only got to see a couple of flashbacks of Joon Ho and Yeo Na when the latter was still alive, so I knew it was going to be hard to only get to know Se Yeong and Bo Ra separately from each other as well. Luckily, that didn’t happen this time and mother and daughter were happily reunited.
I really liked Bo Ra. She was such a mature kid for her age. It was so brave of her to just go out to seek help when her mom disappeared, first with the police station and then with Wook, after recognizing him both from her mom’s picture and from the Brave Citizen award ceremony on TV. There are many movies and series that depict someone introducing themselves to a parent they’ve never met before, but I gotta say Bo Ra didn’t seem to be that nervous at all. She just walked up to him like “Hi, dad”, lol.
I also appreciated how smart she was, both when Noh Yoon Goo suddenly came up to her and introduced himself as a friend of her dad’s and when she confronted Wook with the fact that she knew he, Pan Seok and Jong Ah were somehow finding missing people and offered to help. Even after finding out that Wook wasn’t her real dad, she stayed so calm and mature. Their hug after he told her he’d still be her father was really sweet. She was a nice new addition to the cast of characters, one that was both linked to one of the covered cases and Wook’s character development.

Even though they did bring back two guys from Lee Dong Min’s gang in season one – Jang Do Ri (Yoo Il Han) and Mangchi (Park Won Seok) – we got a whole new set of bad guys this season. I actually liked that they linked this gang to Lee Dong Min to establish the history of his crimes even more, instead of just creating a whole new separate gang that had nothing to do with the events of the first season. I just love it when you think something is over and done with, and then the show suddenly provides you with a new piece of unexpected information that contributes even more to the story as a whole.
Noh Yoon Goo, who is only introduced in the final six episodes of the season, is revealed to have been working for Lee Dong Min for many years. I found it kind of interesting that he, with his flair and presence, was actually someone who did another person’s bidding, calling someone else “hyungnim” and doing their dirty chores for them. He talks about his history with Lee Dong Min in some detail at some point, saying that he came from nothing and started working in construction at sites that were owned by Choiseung Construction, and that Lee Dong Min sought him out and brought him up as one of his henchmen. It’s even revealed that Noh Yoon Goo was the real culprit behind the murders on Wook’s mother and detective Park – we even get to see him kill them through flashbacks.
I would’ve liked seeing Noh Yoon Goo and Lee Dong Min interact a bit more in person. They had one phone call, but we only hear Noh Yoon Goo’s side of the conversation. At some point, it seems like Lee Dong Min changed his mind about something and Noh Yoon Goo ends up bribing another prisoner to kill him in his cell. When asked by Jang Do Ri why he did that, he just says that he’s a changed man now and that he’s not desperate enough anymore to “start a fire at an orphanage for chump change” – suggesting that he was also responsible for setting those orphanages on fire. In the end, he definitely worked his way up as a more intimidating enemy than Lee Dong Min. I mean, if you look at how easy it was to track down and arrest Lee Dong Min in season one, Noh Yoon Goo had nothing on him.
I’ll say a bit more about the open ending of this season at the end of my review, but one thing that kind of bummed me out was that Noh Yoon Goo was introduced so late into the series. Although we got some solid information on how he knew Lee Dong Min, there was still so much to find out about him. I was really hoping we’d get to at least see a final confrontation after Wook would find out that he was the one who killed his mother. Honestly, for someone who was just walking out in the open and doing some casual sightseeing, Noh Yoon Goo remained a very mysterious person right until the end.
I also would’ve liked to get a bit more conclusive info on Kim Pil Joong. Despite the fact that he was introduced as a cold-blooded killer who betrayed his friend, he did end up making sure Noh Yoon Goo wouldn’t get his hands on Il Yong’s body. It explained all the more how confused he was to see Il Yong in the village, because of course he knew he was still alive. It would’ve been nice to get a bit more insight in the friendship between him and Il Yong and how exactly he turned on him. In hindsight I felt like they could’ve done more with his character, just like how they kept Sang Cheol in the village for a while longer to gradually reveal his innately good nature. It’s kind of ironic to say, but in Pil Joong’s case it was actually kind of a bummer that he was found so quickly – they just had him and I feel like he could’ve told them way more. Not gonna lie, I would’ve liked seeing him and Il Yong rekindle things in the village some more before he disappeared, so at least Il Yong would’ve known it was never Pil Joong’s intention to kill him.

Before I move on to my character analyses of the Industrial Complex 3 ghosts, I first wanted to comment on some general similarities to the first season. Not that it really bothered me or anything, but I did find it interesting that they repeated the event of a new ghost appearing just when Wook discovered the new village (Yeo Na in season one, Alice in season two), and how this new ghost became a key character throughout the story. Secondly, I also thought it was typical that they introduced at least one “bad” ghost that still bothered people in the village. Seriously, the fact that they sent a child rapist to the village that happened to have the most children in it was pretty sickening, but I thought the way they dealt with him was actually quite similar to how they dealt with Woo Il Seok in the first season. Having said that, the similarities mostly lay in the way and timing of their introductions, because their stories were definitely very different from the ones in season one. I just wanted to make note of it, since it wouldn’t have surprised me if they purposefully reused some tactics from the previous season. In fact, that would actually be a logical thing to do, since the ghost villages essentially all worked the same way.
One thing that did strike me was that, at some point, whenever someone died, they just immediately ended up at Industrial Complex 3. Like, it almost became a running gag and I was a bit worried that it might end up de-sensitizing me to the impact of their deaths: after all, they just ended up at the village and could be further questioned from there. Especially seeing how for example Thomas got separated from his comrades and Alice got separated from her mother in death, it would’ve made sense if some people got sent to different villages. In that sense, I found it a bit typical that every next now dead person just arrived at Industrial Complex 3. Despite this, I really appreciated that the writers found new and innovative ways to deal with the ghosts, like making Pil Joong disappear almost as soon as he arrived, and introducing ghosts that were either able to leave the village or forced to stay even after their body was found. I really liked that it wasn’t just a repetition of the first season but that they raised more questions that only added to the depth of the world they created. I’ll keep saying it, but the writing of this show is without a doubt one of its greatest assets. They used the second season to both flesh out what we’ve already seen and to open up new loopholes and possibilities to elaborate on.

Let’s start talking about the residents of Industrial Complex 3, starting with Captain Kang.
In terms of the similarities I just mentioned, I really wondered what kind of “leader” Captain Kang would be, and how much she would differ from Thomas. I’m really glad that they managed to flesh her out as such a strong individual character that I just couldn’t help but love. Just like with Thomas, there was a moment at the beginning where I feared she might have had some shady intentions – Lotso the Bear traumatized us all – but she really turned out to be the warmest and most empathic person ever. Her own story only came out in the final episodes, but it already became clear what kind of person she was through everything that led up to that. She literally treated everyone in the village as her own children, and despite getting used to everything after spending forty (!) years there, she would still tear up at the thought that all these children could’ve grown up to be such wonderful adults. The scene at the sports field day when she got emotional as she visualized the kids at the age they would’ve been if they hadn’t ended up at the village actually broke me. The way she and Mr. Jung talked about them as “pretty flowers whose stems had been cut too soon” was heartbreaking.
I also thought it was so touching that she actually kept a whole archive of important artefacts that former villagers had left behind, and that the objects they’d given her didn’t disappear with them when they were found. It meant so much to Pan Seok to have something tangible that Hyun Ji had left behind for him. I thought it was a really nice touch that they added in something that remained after the ghosts left the village, so that the remaining residents still had something solid to remember them by.
Through Captain Kang’s own story, we find out that she drowned at sea five years after she buried her own husband and son, who also died during a fishing accident. She always assumed her body had to be somewhere at the bottom of the sea, and so she also told Wook and Pan Seok not to bother looking for her. When it was revealed that her leg started acting up each time her death anniversary came around, I assumed that meant that something may have been sticking into it in the water or something. Until those two old friends of her were introduced and they revealed that she was the only one of her crew that disappeared from that boat, I didn’t even expect there to have been a different truth behind her death. As it was revealed that not every single ghost had lost their life because of murder, I also thought that maybe Captain Kang really did just get unlucky. Her own acceptance of this truth and the fact that she’d probably stay in the village forever due to the alleged location of her body only made it all the more painful when it was revealed that her old friend had actually killed her for her insurance money and stored her body in the freezer of her old warehouse, which he took over after her death. The discovery of her body literally sent chills down my spine. The realization that she’d just been sitting there propped up against the wall, completely frozen, for forty years was horrible. Her response to finding this out and the frustration at still not being able to leave the village really gave me goosebumps.

Speaking of this, I really wonder why she, and Thomas for that matter, weren’t able to leave the village after they were found. Season one starts off with Thomas back in Duon Village, talking about the living people that helped them to what’s later revealed to be Il Yong. I actually thought he left at the end of season one, since they found the bodies of his comrades and also suggested that he must be among them as well. I saw some comments online from people speculating that people like him and Captain Kang, the established ‘admins’ of their villages, might not be able to leave since they’ve somehow been assigned the role to welcome new arrivals for all eternity. The only difference here is that, while this would make sense for Thomas as he was the first one to arrive in Duon Village hundreds of years ago, I’m not actually sure if Captain Kang was the first one to arrive in Industrial Complex 3, and if it really didn’t exist before she came there, much later than Thomas. While Wook and Pan Seok did promise her to find out the reason why she couldn’t leave, this season also left us hanging on that question. It ends with her welcoming yet another new arrival, seemingly accepting that she has no other choice but be there for every new poor soul that ends up there.
I just felt so bad for Captain Kang, because it seemed like, even though she acted just like Thomas in how she’d accepted her role and made peace with the thought that she’d stay behind forever, when push came to shove she still had hope that she would be allowed to move on as well. The way she screamed into the void about the unfairness of being forced to stay behind in the village after what was done to her, even after her killer had confessed and her body had been found was incredibly heartfelt. For what it’s worth, I really hope they manage to find out a way to help her move on, because this was actually cruel.

On a side note, I actually didn’t fully understand the testimony Captain Kang’s killer’s wife gave at the police station. The only things they made clear was that her husband had killed Captain Kang on the boat during that storm and somehow ended up putting her in that freezer. His wife never knew about this, but slowly started going crazy after allegedly being haunted by Captain Kang’s ghost.
In her testimony, she says the following:

“I did it. I never even dreamed she was in that freezer. If I’d known, when I found her with the leg caught in the net, I wouldn’t have untangled her and let her drown. I thought my husband had pushed her into the sea. I hoped she’d move on without losing any limbs.”

What I get from this is that the wife found Captain Kang’s body in the water with her leg stuck in a net, and that she untangled her so she could at least sink without any inconveniences to her limbs. Saying that she was under the impression that her husband had pushed her into the water would suggest that she was aware of the fact that her husband killed Captain Kang. This would at least explain why she started hallucinating that Captain Kang was haunting her, because why would she be haunted if she didn’t even know about her murder? She just didn’t know that her husband put her body in the freezer afterwards.
All in all, I found it quite a roundabout way of admitting to what exactly she’d done, especially since she started out with “I did it”. I guess she just meant that she was the one who ‘killed her’ by letting her drown, and regretted that after finding out her husband had stored her body. Still, I had to read through this several times to analyze her testimony. I feel like this series occasionally tends to hint at things and revealing certain truths in a very vague and roundabout way.

The first really mysterious ghost we meet in this season is Oh Il Yong, who for some reason is the only resident of Industrial Complex 3 that’s able to leave and enter the outside world. Initially, Captain Kang is the only one who knows about this, and they have this silent agreement that he will check up on the relatives of the villagers so that Captain Kang can let them know that their families are doing okay without raising suspicion, attributing it to the fact that ‘she has her sources’. As she’s been in the village for so long and is such a trusted figure to the villagers, no one would think to doubt her, and that would be her way of covering for Il Yong.
I have to say that, for someone that finally managed to track down one of the living people able to help him that Thomas talked about, Il Yong definitely remained very vague and suspicious for quite some time. I actually agreed with Wook when he complained to Captain Kang that Il Yong had the tendency to just appear at random places but never explain anything. To be fair, I can imagine that Il Yong was probably caught off guard when he met Wook after screaming into a void for three years and he might have been struck in a “now that I found someone, I don’t actually know what to ask of him” kind of situation.
From the way Il Yong kept lingering around Pil Joong and the other drug gang members, I already had a feeling that he might have been involved with that gang himself before he died. It could be that he was kidnapped and killed himself, but seeing as he was dressed the same way as them, I thought it was more likely that he was a part of that gang and tried to get out of it or something. Turns out I was right, but they still did a really great job at supporting his decisions. Same as with last season, I loved that even when my hunch about something was right, the way they revealed it still managed to touch me in some way.
In the end, I really couldn’t bring myself to blame Il Yong. He showed his true nature in his response to realizing he gave drugs to a father who went on to kill his own kid in a blind rage. The fact that his mention of “I can still see his face” turned out to refer to the crying kid was so painful. Being confronted with the destroying consequences of his first ever job, he immediately wanted out and ended up getting stabbed by his trusted friend. He was still so young and his heart was in the right place. He got involved with the wrong people because of his underprivileged background and immediately came to regret it. He ended up in the village while carrying the guilt of causing an innocent child’s death, and this information only supported all the more how kind and brotherly he acted towards all the young children that ended up there. I loved how literally his clothing style and his personality started to become lighter and brighter as soon as he and Wook cleared the air and started working together more amiably.
With regards to the continuous genius of the cliffhangers that this series uses, I’ll just say that the revelation that he was actually alive and being nursed by that mysterious woman Wook kept seeing in his dream really got me. As much as his comatose state explained the fact that he was still able to visit the outside world, I actually didn’t see that coming. It immediately reminded me of Kim So Hyun’s character from Let’s Fight Ghost, who was able to help the male lead with solving crimes as a ghost while her real body was actually in a coma the whole time. I remember that the girl in that show didn’t retain any memories of her time as a ghost when she woke up, so I’m glad at least Il Yong ended up remembering it in the end.

In both Captain Kang and Il Yong’s cases, I was actually not prepared for the discovery of their bodies. In Il Yong’s case it wasn’t immediately clear that he survived (🤜🏻that bloody cliffhanger🤛🏻), so when he suddenly disappeared I was more in denial than distraught. While Captain Kang was crying her eyes out over his abrupt disappearance I was just sitting there like “huh?!” Like, I was convinced he couldn’t have just died, he was established as a way more important character than that.
I had the same when they found Captain Kang’s body in that freezer and they didn’t even show her disappearing in the village. I thought there was no way there were just going to let her leave like that, without a proper send-off. Regardless, I still gasped when she was revealed to be still there. Honestly, this series was so good at never letting me know its next move, my goodness.

I think it’s safe to say that the school was a very prominent place in Industrial Complex 3. It’s where a lot of scenes took place, as many of the depicted events involved activities with the children and taking them on field trips. It’s no wonder that most of the adults that arrived at the village ended up working at the school.
The first person we meet, who’s also the first missing persons case that gets solved in the story, is Yang Eun Hee (Kwon Ah Reum), a young woman who was killed by her jealous boyfriend twenty years prior. It was really touching how they revealed that Pan Seok knew her mother from when they were both looking for their missing children in the past.
After Eun Hee is found, the two people that remain in charge of the children are Jung Young Jin (played by Jung Eun Pyo) and Ahn Hye Joo (played by Yoon Ji Won). Mr. Jung, a former Korean literature professor, is initially very hesitant about the truth behind his death. He has told Captain Kang that he took his own life so his wife could get a pension, and that he’s too ashamed to be found. There were several moments where I found his behavior a bit suspicious, but he was alright. When he wasn’t working at the school he was usually tending to his garden or helping Captain Kang out with chores at the supermarket. The way he ultimately revealed that he had lied about his death and that his son had accidentally killed him was so well played out. He had been acting like such a calm and patient man that I assumed he’d made his peace with staying at the village forever, just like Captain Kang, so it was a pretty big shift for him when he finally asked Pan Seok to search for his body in the end. Seriously, it didn’t even matter who it was, every single time they found a body that was hidden out of sight somewhere, it gave me goosebumps. Even if some discoveries and disappearances from the village hit me harder than others, the underlying notion that those bodies had been there for so long, just dismissed even by their own family members in some cases, was absolutely horrific. It never ceased to give me chills.

Hye Joo was a young woman who used to be an art therapist. I’m not entirely sure how long she’d been in the village, and it was only ever revealed that she had an elderly father left that Il Yong occasionally checked up on. She’s one of the only ghosts that doesn’t end up being covered in this season. Since I’d assumed they would locate every single person in the final episode like they’d done in season one, this actually came as a surprise to me. I’d expected her to also get her own arc of how she died and get closure by being found. I liked Hye Joo, she was really nice and it would’ve been interesting to get a bit more background information on her.

If there’s one character that unexpectedly grew on me, it was Go Sang Cheol (played by Nam Hyun Woo). Sang Cheol is initially introduced as Se Yeong’s kidnapper, and a part of Goliath’s drug gang. It’s only after he is killed by one of his gang mates and ends up at Industrial Complex 3 that we find out he was actually an undercover police officer from the drug squad who infiltrated Goliath’s gang. He’d been instructed to kidnap and kill Se Yeong but ended up keeping her away from him. Despite initially appearing very guarded and grumpy, it’s quickly revealed that he’s quite the crybaby and kind of a tsundere. In the village, he takes on the role of sports coach at the school. Being surrounded by the children and the warmth from the villagers, Sang Cheol gradually becomes more amiable with everyone and even starts patrolling around the village, keeping true to his original job.
I really loved the way he bloomed into being such a sweetheart. I think he particularly became more expressive in his more sensitive feelings through Ro Ha’s arc, which I’ll talk about after this. I’m not gonna lie, even though we saw him get killed and knew what happened to him, it still gave me goosebumps when Joon Ho found him behind that wall in that abandoned house, accompanied by Noh Yoon Goo’s secret stash of drugs. The fact that they actually went through the effort to hide him there and build a whole freaking wall to hide from sight, bro. We’d already seen how he looked when he got killed, but the shot of his face in the plastic bag peeking out from that hole in the wall was actually chilling. I’m not even lying when I say that I was sad to see him go. They were sitting around the campfire after the field day, all cozy and all. He really grew on me as a character and I would’ve liked to have him stay in the village a bit longer, since he also actively started helping out with the safety of the village and became like a hyung figure to Il Yong.
Also, something that specifically touched me in Sang Cheol’s case was Captain Lee’s attachment to him. Captain Lee, the head of the drug squad team, was the one who’d brought him into the undercover case and was constantly worried about what had happened to him. I can’t really put my finger on it, but the way he genuinely cried when Sang Cheol’s body was found and kneeled down when he informed his parents of their youngest son’s death was heartbreaking on a different level. I actually felt bad for him, thinking of how guilty he must have felt bringing Sang Cheol into that job. There was something really admirable about the responsibility he felt for his death. It was quite touching to see this side of Captain Lee, I’m glad they brought him back and gave him more to deal with in this season.

I hope you’ve prepared your heartstrings, because I’m now moving on to the main child characters from the village. Even if they ended up not locating every single child, I thought it was a really nice gesture that Jong Ah at least set up that campaign to raise awareness and direct attention to all the children that were missing. I don’t know if all those children were in Industrial Complex 3, but it was suggested that this village was assigned to mostly fragile and defenseless people – which leaves me with the question how freaking Choi Yeong Bae ended up there, but alright.
The first child to be investigated and found by Wook and Pan Seok is Lee Ro Ha (Kim Ha Eon). He always appeared as a cheerful kid with a talent for drawing. Before they actually start investigating his disappearance, Hye Joo is able to give Pan Seok a nudge in the right direction by showing him some drawings that Ro Ha made after he just arrived, which ultimately lead them to the location of his body. This happened around the time that the annual sports field day approached, and Ro Ha became visibly anxious with regards to his running ability. He kept getting upset for not being able to run faster and became really insecure about not being able to win the race. While Sang Cheol was encouraging him in the village, Wook and Pan Seok were out to figure out what had happened to him.
This particular story also put things in perspective for me regarding the fact that not everyone ended up in the village because of murder. As it turns out, after Ro Ha’s father (Son Kwang Eob) had been sent to prison for ‘accidental homicide’, Ro Ha and his mother ended up homeless, and when his mom collapsed at some point, she was taken away in an ambulance that left Ro Ha behind. While running after the vehicle to catch up to his mom, Ro Ha ended up falling off a mountain cliff.
Just like how Captain Kang’s leg kept acting up because it had gotten stuck in a net, I just had a hunch that Ro Ha’s obsession with running faster must have had some additional meaning, but it still gutted me that it was because he never got over not being able to run fast enough to reach his mom. By the way, am I the only one who finds it really weird that the ambulance didn’t take him with them? Maybe he arrived just when they took her away or something? I just can’t imagine they would’ve left him there if he’d been sitting and crying by his mother’s side when they came to get her. Anyways, I just had this feeling that they would probably find his body as he was crossing the finish line of the sports field day. It was just such a typical euphoric moment for it to happen and I could already picture how it would happen. In the end, it happened exactly as I’d imagined. And I still cried my eyes out. I really can’t get over the way they frame these moments so that, even when you know what’s going to happen, it still punches you in the heart. I think that Ro Ha’s disappearance from the village was the first scene where I didn’t just tear up but actually had tears rolling down my cheeks. His little euphoric face as he was catching his breath after just winning the race 😭😭😭.
Also, can I just say how bad I felt for Ro Ha’s dad? I don’t know exactly what he did to get sent to jail, but from the way he acted I really don’t think he was that bad of a man. The first thing he did after being released was go home to his family only to find out that 1. his wife had been admitted at a psychiatric ward and 2. his son, who he hadn’t seen since he was eight years old, was missing. The scene where the dad broke down at the site where they found Ro Ha’s remains and they showed him his little shoe was gut-wrencing. Ro Ha would’ve been in high school if he was still alive. Excuse me, I got something in my eye again.

When Wook and Pan Seok first arrive at the village, the first children to greet them are Choi Ha Yoon (Kim Seo Heon) and Lee Yeong Rim (Lee Cheon Moo). I think Ha Yoon was supposed to be the girl that came up to Pan Seok at the end of season one and told her friends that he was Hyun Ji’s father. Since Ha Yoon had been Hyun Ji’s best friend, she was able to tell Pan Seok the most of about her and even showed him Hyun Ji’s headband that she received from her; just like with Captain Kang’s archive, every item that had been given to another person in the village remained even after the giver disappeared.
Ha Yoon and Yeong Rim are two peas in a pod. Apparently, they had already been friends when they were alive and arrived at the village together. Ha Yoon is very protective of Yeong Rim, who’s a bit of a crybaby and, according to their own words “not very smart”. She has to keep reminding him of things and gets mad whenever she spots him with banana milk. Apparently, the two of them disappeared after a strange lady approached them in the playground and gave them banana milk to drink. Even though they don’t seem to remember what exactly happened after that, at least Ha Yoon had recognized the banana milk as ‘dangerous’, just as the logo of the Blue Bird Care charity, which became a big lead in their case.
Honestly, I loved these kids so much. I especially loved how smart Ha Yoon was. She actually figured out all by herself that Pan Seok wasn’t dead like them because he didn’t appear in the picture she took of him and knowingly kept it a secret because she was convinced that he would find her just like he’d found Hyun Ji. It gutted me seeing them as college students in Captain Kang’s imagination of them at the age they would be if they’d still been alive.
By the time Wook and Pan Seok start looking into Ha Yoon and Yeong Rim’s disappearances, we’d already seen several people disappear from the village, including Ro Ha, so I actually had the audacity to think that I was mentally prepared for whatever came next. Even after learning about the circumstances in which they disappeared, I thought I would be able to handle it. Boy was I wrong. The moment they found those pots buried in that lady’s greenhouse and Ha Yoon and Yeong Rim disappeared while they were happily riding the swings in the sunset, I was once again bawling like a baby.

Like I mentioned before when I was talking about the similarities between the two seasons, there was one ghost that appeared in the village right when Wook and Pan Seok first discovered it. This is a five-year old girl called Lee Alice (played by Kim Tae Yeon). I swear, I could cry just be looking at her. She was so freaking tiny 😭 I didn’t even want to think about what might have happened to her. Throughout the story, we see her slowly but surely become more comfortable in the village, and it was particularly sweet to see how quickly she warmed up to ‘Uncle Wook’. Although the fact that they lost sight of her a couple of times was quite concerning, she really became the baby sweetheart of the village. I loved how she ended up staying close to Captain Kang and kept consoling her, she was such a sweetie 😭.
Although Alice’s case ultimately doesn’t get solved, we do find out that she had an abusive father, which I think explains enough. Interestingly, Il Yong ends up finding Alice’s mother (played by Filippino actress Cherish Maningat) in a different village that even Wook and Pan Seok can’t see. Il Yong manages to convey that Alice’s mother got beaten by her Korean husband because she couldn’t speak Korean fluently. What can I say, if that’s a dealbreaker for you, you probably shouldn’t marry and have a kid with a foreigner. Anyways, for some reason Alice got separated from her mother in death. I honestly found this really interesting and hoped they would elaborate on that more, but that didn’t. The husband fled away to Guam, so they couldn’t easily track him either – I can only hope his plane dropped him above that island full of prehistoric animals from Cage of Eden.
Because Alice had been introduced at such a specific time and they kept bringing her back into focus, I just assumed that they would leave her discovery for the end as one final tearjerker. Honestly, it’s because I was mentally preparing myself for Alice’s arc that I wasn’t as shocked by the unexpected discoveries of both Il Yong and Captain Kang’s body. This was another thing that they left open, and I wondered why. I was completely convinced they’d pull the same trick as in season one and just finish off all the discoveries in the final episode. I really hope they’ll still get to it and manage to bring Alice and her mother together in some way in the end. I just want this little baby to find peace 😭🙏🏻.

I’d just like to discuss a couple more side characters before I move on to my final remarks and cast comments. Of course I can’t talk about every single thing that happened here, and there are bound to be aspects that I don’t discuss, I still want to point out two villain characters that gave me proper chills.
The first one, whom I’ve already mentioned, was Choi Yeong Bae. He was a child rapist that for some reason was sent to Industrial Complex 3. Captain Kang had made sure to drop him at an island surrounded by water and hid the boat in the woods so he wouldn’t be able to get back ashore to the children, but at some point he still manages to swim to the edge of the map and respawn at the big tree. He actually ends up kidnapping and gagging Ha Yoon, after which literally everyone jumps on him.
Now it wasn’t as much his character that made an impression on me, but his wife, Jo Yoo Seon (Lee Seung Hee). Wook manages to track her down and get her side of the story. This woman actually murdered her own husband because he couldn’t even keep his hands off his own daughter. There was something so eerily powerful about the way she immediately believed Wook when he told her about her husband’s ghost and handed his ashes over to him. There’s always something to be said about reasons for murder, but I honestly found this woman so strong. She was walking around like a zombie, coughing up blood and looking like she could pass out at any moment, but as soon as a strange man approached her telling her that her husband was still harming children in the afterlife, she was like “do what you have to do”. The quiet rage of her consent really stuck with me. Like I said before, I really appreciated how this season kept finding new ways to deal with the cases of each ghost, and this one definitely jumped out to me. It just goes to show that there’s a different kind of mourning for the relatives of criminals.
The second person that made a big impression on me was Kim Geon Joo (Oh Yoon Hong), the lady who killed Ha Yoon and Yeong Rim. She might not have been as mysterious and intriguing as Kang Myung Jin from season one, but she was so. freaking. creepy. I mean, look at her in this screenshot, man.

Can we just acknowledge how fricked up this woman’s psyche was? The fact that her own mother had suffered so much that she ended up begging for death messed her up so much that she started to believe that everyone going through a heart time wanted to die. She would literally see a child cry at the side of the road for a trivial reason such as fighting with a friend, and be like “ah, they’re in pain, I should just end their life right here to ease their suffering”. Excuse me, ma’am. No matter how much you may have believed that you were ‘nursing’ or ‘helping’ people, that way of thinking is just messed up. The freaking audacity of her to be like “I saved those little children, if I hadn’t ‘helped them’, they would’ve still been in pain.” If you hadn’t ‘helped’ them, they would’ve grown into beautiful smart college students, making the world a better place. They would’ve been in the bloom of her lives. They didn’t ask you to take away their lives for them, so don’t you dare give yourself credit for that. Honestly, that pissed me off so much. The realization that she approached Yeong Rim because he had been crying about his parents getting a divorce, and Ha Yoon had probably just been there with him and ended up as collateral damage really sets my teeth on edge.
Of course, there’s something to say about her psyche, she was clearly not well and should’ve received help herself, but this honestly doesn’t make up for anything she’s done. This woman had every single drink in her fridge drugged to get rid of any kind of unwelcome visitor and she killed so many people, from children to the elderly, in her conviction that she was ‘saving’ them. It was messed up.

Now that I’ve finished my character analyses, I’d just like to make a couple of final comments before moving on to my cast comments.

First of all, to keep things happy, I just want to mention that I literally YELPED at the sight of Pan Seok’s puppies (now doggies) again and realized they had a puppy of their own 😭🙏🏻❤️. I finally remembered their names: Junggoon and Manggoon, and their little Jjamppong 🐕🐕🐕. I loved that they kept these doggies in the story and gave them their own proper houses. They may not have appeared as much throughout the story, but they still made everything better whenever they appeared on screen. I also loved that Jjamppong was able to travel to the village and interact with the ghost people. The scenes of little Alice playing with him were the cutest. Honestly, big shoutout to these pups.🫶🏻

Despite the fact that the writers of this series did another amazing job at filling in blanks and linking events together, in hindsight there’s just one tiny plothole that I noticed. I clearly remember that the children that recognized Pan Seok as Hyun Ji’s father at the end of season one came up to him in the street and disappeared through another portal, meaning that they were able to leave their village as well. Since this season established this was only possible if the person wasn’t fully dead yet, and Il Yong’s case was a very rare one that no one else had ever heard of, it seems that this may have been a slip-up, although of course I understand there was no other way for the children to catch a glimpse of Hyun Ji’s father before he ended up going to their village. They must have been from Industrial Complex 3, since that’s where Hyun Ji was, so that probably shouldn’t have been possible, especially not for a group of them. I just realized this while I was writing this review and referred back to the way they teased the second season in the first season’s finale. Anyways, again, it’s a tiny inconsistency that didn’t have any further repercussion on my experience of this show, and apart from this they really did an amazing job at clarifying and wrapping up things.

It’s time for the cast comments! I really loved seeing both the familiar faces from season one and the new faces from season two come together. Once again, I was really impressed by the overall acting performances, these actors have made me both laugh and cry out loud and I just want to make sure I credit as many of them as I can.

Can we just agree that Go Soo pulled off that long hair so well? I actually liked it more than his hair in season one, haha. I have to say Wook definitely grew on me in this season, compared to season one. I remember that I kept getting kind of annoyed in the beginning that he kept so much to himself, but he definitely opened up way more in this season and immediately consulted others when he found something out, so that was a huge improvement. I loved how natural he was with the kids, specifically Alice, and how well he ended up taking care of Bo Ra, even while knowing she wasn’t his real daughter. He actually became a dad, in one way or another, and it suited him.
This is still the only series I’ve seen of Go Soo so far, but I really hope I’ll get to see more of him. I’m glad I got introduced to him through this show!

I was more than happy to enjoy some more good guy action from Heo Joon Ho. I really hope I’ll get to see more performances of him where he isn’t a bad guy, because now that I’ve seen him as Pan Seok I don’t want to go back. 😭 I’m glad Pan Seok was able to get even more closure through discovering the village Hyun Ji stayed at, and that Industrial Complex 3 was basically like an intermediate station for him as well, despite the fact that he was still alive. I feel like he cried a LOT in this season, more than in season one, and his emotional portrayal hit me every single time. He is such a good actor, and I really can’t wait to see more dramas of him.

It was great to see Ahn So Hee back as Jong Ah again. I loved that everyone started calling her Jjonga, as kind of a fond nickname, haha. I really love that they brought her back as more than just a supporting character this time, and that her contribution to the cases just kept growing and growing. I would love to see her in a third season with the ability to see ghosts for herself, that would be such a boost for her. There’s just something about her energy and determination that is so fun to watch. Ahn So Hee really stepped up her game this season. According to MDL I have at least one more show with her in it on my list, so I’m already looking forward to seeing her again. I’m sad to say goodbye to Jong Ah (for now).

I loved seeing Ha Joon as a more cheerful Shin Joon Ho in this season. He did a really good job at turning a new leaf without losing any of the anger that still bubbled under the surface regarding what happened to Yeo Na. He actually became one of my favorite characters in this season, purely because of his new-found determination and alliance with Wook and Pan Seok. It was also great to see him be more expressive of his emotions and sentiments towards the cases he dealt with. It’s because I got to know him through the traumatic events of season one that I managed to feel so much more for his character, knowing what lay underneath. I was kind of hoping we’d get to see him visit his grandmother at some point, but I guess he really didn’t form any new ties with Choiseung Construction (which is probably for the better). It was nice to see him again, and I hope I’ll get to see him in more shows from here on out as well.

Moving on to the new cast additions, I was so excited that Lee Jung Eun was going to be in this season. She’s one of those ahjumma actresses that always manages to blow me away with her performance, no matter which show she appears in. I’ve seen her before in King of High School, Who Are You: School 2015, Oh My Ghostess, Let’s Fight Ghost, Weightlifting Fairy Kim Bok Joo, Tomorrow With You, Fight For My Way, While You Were Sleeping, Wife I Know, The Light in Your Eyes, Our Blues, Yonder and the movie Parasite, and there’s still a whole bunch of her dramas on my list. Lee Jung Eun just has this undefinable balance between steadfast & tough and warm & motherly which was a perfect fit for Captain Kang. She’s able to express an incredible range of emotions with such natural ease that it always impresses me. I love all the layers that she managed to convey through her portrayal of Captain Kang, from the stern to the heartbroken parts. I really enjoyed her performance in this drama.

I was convinced that I knew Kim Dong Hwi from something because he looks so incredibly familiar, but it turns out I haven’t seen any dramas with him before. As a matter of fact, he’s only done five dramas so far, two of which are still in production. He has been appearing in movies since 2014, but his drama debut was in 2020, according to MDL. In any case, I really loved him as Oh Il Yong. The new sense of mystery that he brought with him immediately pulled me into the story, I loved his dynamic with Wook and how he gradually opened up more throughout the story. At the end of this season, he turned himself in after awaking from his coma and had his final conversation with Wook in jail. If there’s going to be a third season, I would really like to get a bit more backstory on him, as well as some explanation for how he was able to link minds with Wook while he was comatose. Could be that it was just the strength of his desperation to find a living person to help him, but since Wook also ended up dreaming about that merry-go-round I’m just curious to find out what that dream link is about. In any case, I thought Oh Il Yong was a really nice new character and I think Kim Dong Hwi did a really good job portraying him. He seems like a very natural actor and I hope he’ll get the chance to make more drama appearances soon.

I’ve seen Choi Myung Bin before in Tunnel, Chicago Typewriter, 100 Day Husband, Itaewon Class and Twenty-Five Twenty-One. I really liked her portrayal of Bo Ra. She exuded a very mature vibe from the start and her dynamic with both Wook and her mother was really sweet. I definitely didn’t expect Wook to be approached as a father figure, but I think the way they made him adapt to that was really natural, and I would actually love to see him spend more father-daughter time with Bo Ra. Choi Myung Bin was only fifteen years old when this show aired, which only makes me applaud her performance more. It just always impresses me when such young people are already able to convey such deep and heartfelt emotional performances. Can’t wait to see her in more things, which I will, according to MDL.

I honestly think my initial distrust for Mr. Jung came from the fact that I somehow associate Jung Eun Pyo with a scheming eunuch, lol. Not that I’ve actually seen him as a scheming eunuch before. 😂 My first memory of him was from The Moon That Embraces the Sun, where he did play a eunuch (a loyal one), but I guess through my history of historical dramas I’ve generally started associating eunuchs with being scheming. 😂 Other than that I’ve seen him in My Love From Another Star, God’s Gift: 14 Days, Fated to Love You, Kill Me, Heal Me and Café Minamdang. It feels like it’s been a while since I’ve seen him in a bigger role, so it was kind of a throwback seeing him in this series. I was positively surprised by his performance in this show, it was nice to see him again.

Apparently I had the exact same thing with Nam Hyun Woo as I did with Kim Dong Hwi: I was positive I recognized him from something, but according to MDL I haven’t seen him in anything before. Curious. Anyways, as I’ve already said in my review I really liked Sang Cheol, he was one of the side characters that actually grew on me and that I was sad to send off. I guess I just generally have a soft spot with tough-looking guys that are big softies on the inside, because as soon as Sang Cheol started opening up more I just melted. I loved the way he tried to comfort Ro Ha and how he cheered him on as he was reaching the finish line. His death was very tragic, just like the way he was found. Nam Hyun Woo did a really good job at portraying a character that may have experienced something miserable, but was in no way pitiable, even in death. We need more heroes without capes like Sang Cheol.

One actress that I did recognize correctly from something was Yoon Ji Won. I remember her being the copycat girl from Cheese in the Trap, who was quite a nasty piece of work. She also appeared in Fantastic, but I don’t remember many side characters from that. Luckily her portrayal of Hye Joo was much kinder. I keep repeating it, but I really wanted to get to know more about her. We didn’t even know how long she’d been at the village and how she met her end. If there’s going to be a third season (I know I keep saying it, but that’s just how much I want closure for everyone), I’d like to see the team investigate her disappearance and bring her to peace as well. I thought she was a nice new addition to the cast.

For some reason I keep mixing up Kim Tae Woo with Kim Tae Hoon, and not just because of their names. 😆 They just have the same vibe over them. In any case, I was really impressed by Kim Tae Woo’s performance as Noh Yoon Goo. I don’t think I’ve seen him in a villain role before. I’ve only seen him before in good guy roles like in God’s Gift: 14 Days, and I specifically remember how much I loved his character in Romance is a Bonus Book, which is still one of my highest-rated shows. Seeing him with his funky hairstyle, clothing and his flashy way of talking was definitely something to get used to. Noh Yoon Goo was definitely one of these villains that act all chummy and smiley before showing the monster within. It was actually chilling to see him flip a switch and just strangle that other prisoner in the bus like that without a moment’s hesitation. I guess it was all the more scary because he consistently kept his own hands clean so far, he was just flaunting about and dining at restaurants, and the finale actually revealed his criminal tendencies for the first time (apart from the flashbacks we’d seen of him from when he still worked for Lee Dong Min). Seeing Kim Tae Woo portray that kind of malice was actually very impressive, he pulled off a very intimidating villain. I always like to see actors in dramas that I haven’t seen in a while, and he was definitely one of them. Bravo!

Finally, I can’t end this cast comment section without a huge shoutout to the amazingly talented child actors that appeared in this show: little Kim Seo Heon, Lee Cheon Moo, Kim Ha Eon and Kim Tae Yeon. All of these kids were under ten years old when this show aired, and they all managed to break my heart into tiny little pieces with their heartfelt performances. Korea’s drama industry has a bright future with such talented little sweethearts. Seriously, despite being quite an emotional person I don’t usually cry that easily, but these children really managed to steal my heart. I hope they’re all growing up happy and healthy wherever they are, and that they will grow up to be as beautiful and mature as the characters they’ve portrayed in this show. 🙏🏻❤️

In conclusion, while I may be wrapping up this review as the final installment of this series since there hasn’t been any news about a possible continuation, I think we can all agree that the finale of season two HEAVILY suggested a third season. In fact, they left more things open than the first season did.
The first season ended purely with the suggestion that there was another village, and that that’s where Hyun Ji might have stayed at. This in itself could’ve just been an ending without further elaboration, apart from the confirmation that there were more ghost villages.
This season ended with the introduction of several new plotlines, and didn’t finish all of its existing ones. First of all, they didn’t end the season with locating every single villager’s body, as both Hye Joo and Alice remained together with Captain Kang. Apart from that, they also left us hanging with the promise of finding out why Captain Kang couldn’t leave the village even after she was found (just like Thomas). Noh Yoon Goo ends up escaping during his transport to jail and Wook still has to find out he’s the one who killed his mother. Then there’s the revelation that Jong Ah suddenly becomes able to see ghosts as well, and the introduction of at least two new villages. We never find out why Wook was able to dream about the room that Il Yong’s body was in through his eyes and why he started dreaming about that mysterious merry-go-round. And what about freaking Im Si Wan as a potential new village head welcoming us under said merry-go-round?
Concerning that last one, Im Si Wan’s cameo appearance might just be a tease, just like how Hotel Del Luna ended with the revelation of Lee Joong Gi as the new owner – it doesn’t necessarily indicate another season. After all, we already got enough confirmation that there are more ghost villages, through this season and Alice’s mother. Still, there’s a lot that they left us hanging on.
In my opinion, the story definitely asks for a more complete ending than this. I’ll actually be a bit mad if there really isn’t going to be a season three, because there’s no way they’re writing off Noh Yoon Goo’s escape as “oh well, sometimes people don’t get what they deserve”. I need more closure than that. There is still so much more to figure out about Noh Yoon Goo and how he ties in to everything, especially after the revelation that he’s not the real Goliath either. I am more than positive that the writers of this show are able to pull off a perfectly satisfying conclusion to this story. Let’s just keep it at that: I’ll be waiting.

I would definitely recommend this series. I think it’s important to note that, besides the chilling and heartbreaking aspects of the story, the heartwarming and touching elements are just as significant. Yes, the world is an awful place full of scumbags that feel entitled to take other people’s lives, I’m not going to sugarcoat that. But, as I mentioned before in my review of season one, it’s kind of comforting to imagine that those who met such a chilling end at least get to experience some final peace in a beautiful quiet village where everyone enjoys the small happinesses of eating a warm meal and spending time with loving, caring people. As much sadness the villages are filled with, they thrive on the temporary relief from the horrors of the outside world and create a comfortable intermediate station before the afterlife. It’s just as important to keep our eyes open to the cruelties of the world we live in as it is to acknowledge the warmth and beauty that we can find in it. I think this series mirrored this contrast very aptly by juxtaposing the awful body finds to the way the ghosts disappeared from the village. A tragic discovery versus a heartwarming depiction of closure. The beginning of a painful road of mourning versus a long-awaited chance to move on. I’ll leave it at that.

It’s never happened before that I got to watch two double-season shows in a row. I’m happy to watch whatever I can, of course, but as much as I love writing reviews, it takes a lot of time and energy to finish them, especially if the story is stretched out over multiple lengthy seasons. I know I have a couple more multi-season dramas on my list, but for now I hope my app picks out a good old single-seasoner next, lol.

Until then! Bye-bee! x

Disclaimer: this is a review, and as such it contains spoilers of the whole series. Please proceed to read at your own risk if you still plan on watching this show or if you haven’t finished it yet. You have been warned.

Missing: The Other Side (S1)
(미씽: 그들이 있었다 / Missing: Geudeuli Itseodda / Missing: They Were There)
MyDramaList rating: 8.0/10

‘Ello ‘ello! Welcome to a new review. Seriously, after finishing my monster review of the two seasons of Yumi’s Cells I was not prepared to immediately get another double-season show thrown at me, lol. As you can see, for this series I’ve decided to cut the review in two, so one for each season. This is because, from what I’ve read, the two seasons for this show aren’t one continuous story – they have their own plot and cast of characters. Also, looking at my work and holiday schedule for this month, it was easier for me to split the review into two separate ones. It’s probably also more easily accessible like that. Now, without further ado, let’s dive into this hidden gem of a show. When this title popped up on my Spin the Wheel app, I felt like it hadn’t actually been that long since I put it on my list. I feel like I only watched the trailer quite recently and thought it looked good. Surprisingly, I also didn’t know the majority of the actors, and it really grabbed me from the start. I’m excited to share my views on this, so let’s go.

Missing: The Other Side (S1) is an OCN K-Drama with twelve episodes of about one hour and ten minutes each. I watched it on my new go-to website KissKH.
The story begins with the introduction of several characters, starting with Kim Wook (played by Go Soo). Wook is a conman with seemingly little empathic tendencies. He and his small team, consisting of Lee Jong Ah (played by Ahn So Hee) and Kim Nam Gook (Moon Yoo Kang), solve their own little cases, Café Minamdang-style. Apart from this business where they hack and scam bad guys, Jong Ah is a proper company employee and Nam Gook runs his own pawn shop, so everyone has a cover. It’s revealed early on that Wook and Nam Gook know each other from the orphanage they grew up at together, and it’s later shown that they met Jong Ah as adults, when they helped her from getting conned. The three of them are very tight.
Next, we meet Shin Joon Ho (played by Ha Joon), a police officer in the Violent Crimes unit. Since he mainly deals with wrapping up cases such as aggravated robberies and burglaries, he never really gets too involved with the victims’ stories and is initially portrayed as quite stoic and cold-hearted. We learn that he is getting married soon, but it seems that he’s been fighting with his fiancée a lot and she stopped picking up his calls, which only contributes to his irritable behavior.
We are also introduced to Detective Baek Il Doo (played by Ji Dae Han) from the Missing Persons unit as he keeps bumping heads with Joon Ho. Since his team deals with ongoing cases that involve a lot of emotional implications for both the victims and their loved ones, Detective Baek is baffled by Joon Ho’s lack of emotional empathy towards his cases.
And then there is Jang Pan Seok (played by Heo Joon Ho), an initially quite mysterious middle-aged man who lives by himself in a rural area called Duon-ri. From the flashes we get before we are properly introduced to him, he also seems to be looking for bodies, although it isn’t immediately clear why.

Things get set in motion when Wook one day witnesses a young woman getting kidnapped, and ends up getting chased by the abductors himself. While outrunning them, he falls from a steep cliff and ends up near Duon-ri. Pan Seok finds him and brings him to his house to take care of him.
It doesn’t take long for Wook to discover a strange village near Pan Seok’s house, where a whole lot of people, including children, seem to live happily away from the city. After being initially greeted by the enigmatic café owner Thomas (played by Song Geon Hee) and getting suspicious looks from the “village mom” Kim Hyun Mi (played by Kang Mal Geum), he comes across a crying little boy called Seo Ha Neul (Jang Seon Wool, bless him). Wook’s confusion grows when he realizes he recognizes this kid from a missing poster.
It takes a while for Wook to come to terms with what’s happening, but it turns out that Duon Village – which only he and Pan Seok are able to see – houses the spirits of the dead. Specifically, people whose bodies haven’t been found yet. Pan Seok has been around Duon Village for ten years already, trying to locate the spirits’ bodies and passing anonymous evidence to the police to help them get found. While initially stubborn and unruly, Wook ends up helping him. As they gather more information from the spirits themselves to aid in their respective investigations, the two men start acting as mediums between Duon Village and the real world, passing on information from one side to the other in order to locate the spirits’ bodies and allow them to pass on.
Joon Ho starts getting involved with the Missing Persons cases as well when his own fiancée, Choi Yeo Na (played by Seo Eun Soo) turns out to be missing. Wook is put in a tight spot when he realizes that Yeo Na is the woman he witnessed getting kidnapped, and she also arrived in Duon Village as a spirit.
While dealing with all these heartbreaking cases, Wook and Pan Seok come to terms with their own family losses as well: Wook’s mother who disappeared when he was seven, and Pan Seok’s young daughter who went missing fifteen years earlier.

The way the story was built up kind of reminded me of He is Psychometric, because it starts with one incident but then throughout the story you find out it goes way back and there’s a lot more behind it than you initially expected. I personally loved the way they gradually gave away more and more information. Even when I predicted things correctly earlier on, I still liked the way they eventually revealed it through subtle hints and transitions. Admittedly, there were a few things that felt a tiny bit anticlimactic, but all in all this show had me sitting with my mouth open A LOT, lol. There was just something about the writing that worked really well and made everything fall into place in a very satisfying way.

I’d like to give a concise summary of all the storylines that play out throughout the series, because a lot happens and a lot of cases are intricately connected to each other.
It all basically comes down to two separate serial killers, Kang Myung Jin (played by Kim Sang Bo) and Lee Dong Min (played by Lee Yoon Jae). These two guys are responsible for the disappearance of several residents of Duon Village and other victims that are revealed throughout the story, such as Pan Seok’s daughter Hyun Ji (Lee Hyo Bi).
Kang Myung Jin is arrested by Detective Baek’s team fairly early on, after he is linked to the case of Kim Mi Ok, one of the spirits in the village. After Pan Seok managed to locate her body, he left a clue leading to Kang Myung Jin for the police to find, causing him to get arrested quite quickly. However, there’s something about this killer that makes Detective Baek feel like this isn’t the only crime he’s committed. I also felt like there was more to this guy, because they kept bringing him back into focus with the humming and stuff. Detective Baek is determined to get Kang Myung Jin prosecuted for everything he’s done, not just the murder of Kim Mi Ok. Ultimately, it is revealed that Kang Myung Jin has been murdering women for a very long time ever since he was a student, and unfortunately Hyun Ji was one of his victims as well.
While Detective Baek is mainly on the case of Kang Myung Jin and helping Pan Seok in whatever way possible to find a lead on his missing daughter, Joon Ho’s search for Yeo Na ultimately leads him to Lee Dong Min, a director at a construction company called Choiseung. He, along with two other directors, is entitled to part of the shares Chairwoman Han Yeo Hee (played by Jung Yeong Sook) has signed away in her will. However, his entitlement falls through when the Chairwoman suddenly finds out that her daughter Soo Yeon, who passed away 27 years earlier, gave birth to a child before she died. If there truly is a grandchild, then that child surely must become her new heir (this gave me Birth of a Beauty vibes).
Being responsible for killing the Chairwoman’s daughter in the first place – and two spirits in Duon Village who posed a risk to this coming out – Lee Dong Min goes so far as to track down every single survivor of the orphanage fire he orchestrated back in the day, including Nam Gook and Yeo Na, just in order to make sure that they are not related to the Chairwoman and won’t pose any threat to his claim to the company shares.
Honestly, this bothered me so much. The fact that he didn’t just take their DNA to check if they were the grandchild but actually killed them first and THEN compared their DNA only proved that he was a serial killer. It was so senseless. In the end he “justified” this by saying that they were “leading lives they weren’t entitled to, anyway” because they were orphans. That made me so mad. The whole stigma on orphans that seeped through this story was aggravating, to say the least.
Throughout the investigations of these killers, mostly led by Joon Ho’s search for Yeo Na and Pan Seok’s ongoing search for his daughter, we find out who all the villagers are and what happened to them, even the ones that aren’t connected to these cases. In-between the two major storylines, Pan Seok and Wook keep passing on new leads to the police that help them locate new bodies that will allow more spirits to pass on.

I just want to go over some of the main characters in a bit more detail and discuss some dynamics that I really liked before moving on to other comments regarding the series as a whole and aspects of the story that touched me in particular.
Let’s start with Kim Wook. Honestly, as much character growth as he got in the end, I thought he was a very whimsical protagonist. After his mother disappeared when he was seven, he grew up in an orphanage and learned to fend for himself, which ended up turning him into quite a selfish person. Apart from his friends whom he grew up with, he doesn’t have anyone to rely on, which makes his life very easy but also quite lonely. He simply chooses not to stop and think about it, but we later find out that he’s actually been dealing with a lot of grief and resentment regarding his mother’s disappearance. So much so, in fact, that it’s part of the reason why he’s able to see the village.
As I mentioned before, the people closest to Wook are his friends Jong Ah and Nam Gook. Jong Ah is a young woman with amazing hacking skills who even seemed to have a little crush on Wook. From the way she called him “oppa” to how her face lit up when he complimented her or told her she’d been of help to him, I think it wasn’t too much of a stretch. There wasn’t any romantic build-up or anything between them, though, so she ultimately felt more like an affectionate younger sister.
Nam Gook was another story. He was like a brother to Wook. They grew up in the same orphanage after Wook was abandoned by his mother and Nam Gook’s previous orphanage burned down in a fire. I really wished Nam Gook could’ve gotten a bit more screentime before he was taken away so tragically, but they did establish his character just enough to make his death shocking. When it happened, I was actually in denial about the fact they really just killed him off like that so soon. I thought the whole team would be in on all the action until the end.
After seeing Wook tear up when dealing with Ha Neul’s case in the first three episodes, his reaction to Nam Gook’s death was absolutely GUTTING. That’s the first time we actually see him completely break down, and this becomes the trigger for him to chase down the killer and cooporate with Joon Ho in locating Yeo Na, who was presumably done in by the same culprit.
On the other hand, from here on out I couldn’t help but get a little frustrated by Wook’s tendency to keep all the information he’d acquired to himself.
For one, if he’d told Joon Ho beforehand that he’d witnessed Yeo Na get kidnapped and that he placed a tracker on the abductors’ car because he already feared they might go after Nam Gook, they would’ve been able to proceed with the investigation much faster and maybe even prevented Nam Gook’s death. Of course, for plot purposes, they couldn’t let everything get solved within a couple of episodes, but it bugged me that I didn’t understand why Wook didn’t come out with the fact that he’d been tracking the suspects until AFTER Nam Gook died. It literally went like: “oh btw, I placed a tracker on their car” “wait, what?! are you kidding me?! pass me that info, now!” Like, even Joon Ho set his pride aside at some point to BEG him for his help since he acknowledged Wook’s contribution to certain cases. It really reminded of Café Minamdang, where two teams basically tried to solve the same case individually while they could’ve just worked together from the start. Of course, he went through a very confusing and surreal ordeal with the discovery of a spirit village only he and one other living person could see, and he also later admits that he was still way too confused to process everything properly. Still, I think he could’ve dealt with certain things way better. Even if he wasn’t able to share the testimonies of the spirits, there were enough things that he could’ve shared that would’ve sped up the investigations.
To give an example, I honestly felt like he could’ve done a much better job at easing Joon Ho into accepting that Yeo Na was dead. I get that he couldn’t exactly tell him that she was a ghost and he could talk to her, and that it would be hard to inform Joon Ho of her death after seeing him so convinced that she was still alive. But I still feel like it would’ve been better if he’d prepared the both of them for the truth a little sooner. It was heartbreaking enough to know that they wouldn’t be able to reunite and we had to wait for Joon Ho to finally figure this out about by himself.
The way Wook eventually ended up telling him the first time was the WORST. It was exactly what I dreaded would happen, that he wouldn’t find the right timing (if there was one) and end up blurting it out in order to get him to focus on saving someone else, someone who was still alive. That actually hurt, man. And then, when Joon Ho came to ask him afterwards what he’d meant by saying Yeo Na was dead, why didn’t he just tell him what he told Pan Seok, that his abductor had said he’d sent Wook after Yeo Na and then ordered his men to throw him into the sea? That was something he picked up in realtime, not in the village, and it was a direct link to what they’d done to Yeo Na. Honestly, that was probably the worst timing to suddenly bring up he’d met Yeo Na’s ghost, as it understandably aggravated Joon Ho even more. Why create more tension when he could’ve just shared some solid facts that he acquired directly from the culprits and that would’ve actually helped them speed up the search?
Honestly, it was pretty frustrating to see Wook constantly withhold evidence and information from Joon Ho about what really happened to Yeo Na. This got additionally messy when Yeo Na herself sent a scammer to Joon Ho in order to lead him back to the village where she was, because she also didn’t immediately accept the fact that she was dead. She and Wook went right past each other in their attempts to guide Joon Ho to where they needed him to be, which was pretty chaotic.
Besides this, I also didn’t really get why Wook didn’t tell Pan Seok and Thomas about the fact that Yeo Na was Joon Ho’s fiancée from the start. What use was it to keep that to himself? I kept thinking that, the more people knew about everything that was going on and how everything was connected the better, and the more they could find out together. As a viewer, it was quite annoying to see the main lead hold onto all that information without sharing it with the people that would’ve benefitted from it the most. Although again, I get that they had to fill twelve episodes and couldn’t just solve everything in one go, I wish there had been a better explanation for Wook to be so secretive about everything he found out.

Also, when that killer Woo Il Seok ended up in the village and started assaulting the spirits, why did Wook let him off the first time? Why did he let him roam free to keep attacking people? It’s not like he was going to lay low after Wook warned him ONCE. I guess he just wanted him to get lost until they found a way to make him disappear from the village? Still, surely it would’ve been better to look for his body in the outside world after making sure he was locked up so he couldn’t attack anyone else in the village?
By the way, I found it lowkey funny that they actually went to look for Woo Il Seok’s body to get him to disappear from the village. For most spirits it was a really special and emotional moment to be found, and they would be waved off by the rest, all: “Go safely, we’ll miss you”. But then for Woo Il Seok they were like, “let’s get this guy out of here asap cause he’s annoying”, lol.

One of the major developments in Wook’s character occurs when he finds out that Hyun Mi, the beforementioned “village mom” who was continuously suspicious of him, is actually his mother. She used to work as a housekeeper for Chairwoman Han’s daughter at the time, and she was murdered by Lee Dong Min because he thought she’d witnessed him murdering Soo Yeon, not realizing it was actually little Wook who’d seen him. Wook finds out about this when he realizes Hyun Mi is holding on to the same pendant his mother used to have, with a picture of him as a kid inside.
To be completely honest, I totally expected him to confront her with it as soon as she grabbed the pendant back from him. I would’ve probably immediately blurted something out along the lines of: “Why do you have my mom’s pendant?”. But even after figuring out she was his mom, he kept quiet about it, out of some sort of consideration. In hindsight, I feel like this silence may have been caused by the fact that he had to come to terms with the fact that the resentment he’d felt towards his mom all this time was misplaced. He’d always thought she’d abandoned him, but it turns out she was murdered and didn’t have a choice in leaving him behind. They hit a really delicate chord with that, creating all these additional feelings of regret and guilt people developed regarding the deaths of their loved ones.
I have to say I actually thought it was very realistic that, after they found out about it, Wook and Hyun Mi initially remained a little awkward around each other. It would’ve been very typical if it had been an instant emotional reunion, and so I thought it was very well-considered that they wouldn’t immediately jump into each other’s arms. Despite being reunited, the fact that Wook hadn’t seen her since he was seven hadn’t changed, so it wasn’t odd that he felt estranged from her. Hyun Mi also kept a respectable distance until he opened up to her, which was probably the best way for things to go. This made it even more touching when they did eventually give each other that long overdue hug.

All in all, I think I can redeem Wook’s actions through the fact that he grew up alone, without anyone to rely on, and even became a conman. It was in his nature to keep things to himself and not be an open book to everyone else. As a viewer, he may have been a slightly frustrating protagonist at times, but I do appreciate that they kept him true to his character. Also, as I said before, his character development was really satisfying. Although I admit I never completely warmed up to him because of how he kept his guard up until the end, I did come to feel for him, especially seeing how he responded to the cases that involved kids. The way he teared up during Ha Neul’s goodbye and when Pan Seok found out what had happened to Hyun Ji actually hit hard.

Speaking of Pan Seok, my heart actually broke for this man. He is initially depicted as quite hard to gauge – he seemed very stoic and intimidating, but on the other hand he had really silly and sensitive moments as well. The first thing I came to like about him was how he only lost his chill in reaction to super minor insults, like when Wook commented on his dog or called him “tacky”. Then he suddenly went all grim in the face and went: “wHaT dId YoU sAy”, haha, that actually cracked me up.
Other than that, it immediately becomes clear that he’s a very trusted and loved person in the village. It’s later revealed that, in the ten years after he lost his daughter and wife, he spent all that time around the village to help everyone out as much as possible, both with their new stay and by trying to find their bodies for them. He’d treated the entire village as his family, even after losing his own, and it kills me to think he might’ve also stuck around in the hope that Hyun Ji might one day come to the village. Everyone knew about his search for his daughter and wished so hard for him to find her. Even though they couldn’t physically do anything to help him, they kept thinking of ways to show their support and gratitude to him through meaningful gestures, such as feeding him a grand meal.
Honestly, I just loved how there were so many people that wanted to help Pan Seok find his daughter, from Detective Baek to the guy from the theme park she disappeared from. This man told Pan Seok he’d keep putting up the missing posters until the day he retired. It just showed so well what a kind person Pan Seok was and how much sympathy he evoked in the people around him. He was just a concerned father, determined to go through the very end to find his daughter, all the while making sure he never caused anyone any unnecessary trouble. His reaction to the new posters Jong Ah designed for him was so touching. She even made banners to hang up around the theme park. Pan Seok remained so genuinely humble and grateful for even the slightest bit of help, it really warmed my heart.

On the other hand, his desperation for help also caused Pan Seok to be quite gullible whenever someone shot him a hint about Hyun Ji’s whereabouts, which unfortunately led him to get scammed a couple of times.
I’d just like to use this opportunity to say that people who take advantage of families that are looking for their missing relatives and actually try to make money from their grief and loss are the absolute worst scum of the earth. That shit isn’t just mean, it’s inhumane. Not only are they interfering with an ongoing investigation, they are actually disregarding a human life that may have been found earlier if it weren’t for their selfish and needless interference. It’s despicable.
Pan Seok had been looking for his seven-year old daughter for an entire decade. He and his wife took her to a theme park on her birthday, he took her eyes off her for one second to buy her ice cream, and then she was gone forever. When they couldn’t find her, his wife unalived herself. Pan Seok was a desperate, grieving husband and father who NEVER stopped looking for his little girl, and even kept promising his wife that he’d bring her home one day.
It should be a crime in itself to take advantage of someone like that. Pan Seok was naive, and he admitted himself that it had happened before and that he got irrational when it came to Hyun Ji. He was just that desperate to get his hands on any kind of lead, and I can’t blame him for that.
Whenever I hear stories of people pulling things like this – because yes, they’re out there, I’ve even heard of people prank-calling the victim’s parents pretending to be their child – I get so freaking angry. You were born with a beating heart, so at least try to be a human being.
The only good thing about this part was that Jong Ah was able to track down the sucker who pulled this trick on Pan Seok and force him to return the money.

Speaking of Jong Ah, she might’ve been one of my favorite supporting characters. She was so smart and spunky at the same time. I was actually scared something might happen to her, but luckily Wook managed to locate her super fast after she got kidnapped that one time. I love how she just sank her teeth into Wook’s business and helped him so well in tracking down all the people he asked her to look up. She was such a great contribution to the cast of characters, honestly.
I loved that she basically figured out by herself that the “clients” Wook and Pan Seok kept asking her to look into were all missing people, and how she immediately believed the story about the spirit village. It was so refreshing to have such an uncomplicated, open-minded character like her. Honestly, I wanted to high-five her when she said that she was convinced that another version of her existed somewhere in an alternate universe, lol.
I really loved her dynamic with Pan Seok, in particular. I admit I actually theorized she might turn out to be Hyun Ji at first. The bond between them was built up with such a natural father-daughter dynamic, her always helping him out and him always treating her to food when she came by. Of course she couldn’t be Hyun Ji, because she ended up looking into her disappearance as well, and it would’ve been a bit of a cheesy plot twist now that I think about it, but that’s just how much I loved them as a team.

I also really liked the dynamic between Wook and Pan Seok. They started out as such an odd pair, almost like a reckless nephew and a concerned uncle, and I wouldn’t even say that they became “friends” as much as that they became true partners in crime. They just became a team that relied on each other and helped each other out without getting too emotional, and I really liked that. They even got to rely on each other when they both became unable to see the village anymore at the end, and even without access they still kept looking for all the remaining spirits’ bodies.
I don’t know why, but it actually made me emotional when Wook and Pan Seok both lost their spirit vision as soon as Hyun Ji and Hyun Mi were found. That just proved that their ties to these missing people, and the grudges they held onto regarding their disappearances were linked to their ability to see the spirits. That was an unexpectedly touching twist, and I like that it kind of “explained” why they were able to see what others couldn’t. I guess the fact that Joon Ho couldn’t see Yeo Na was because he didn’t share a similarly long grief or resentment towards her disappearance? Maybe things would’ve been different if she’d gone missing years before and he’d been looking for her for longer? Guess we’ll never know.

To talk a bit more about Joon Ho, I also really liked his character development. Besides the fact that he came full circle in the end, I also really liked the budding bromance between him and Wook. It’s not even that they really became friends throughout the story, but they definitely starting warming up to and relying on each other. I loved how, when Jong Ah was kidnapped, Joon Ho still ended up coming there despite being initially ticked off by Wook’s sudden declaration that Yeo Na was dead, and how he immediately tracked down Wook when he went to the Chairwoman’s villa. The image of him dropkicking Lee Dong Min in the head made my day, that was awesome.
What got me the most was how losing Yeo Na actually changed Joon Ho and allowed him to become much more expressive in his emotions. It’s actually so sad to realize that the only scenes they had together were flashbacks and situations where he couldn’t see her. The first time he mentions Yeo Na, he’s annoyed because she isn’t answering his calls. The fact that they parted on bad terms because of a stupid fight and never got to tell each other they didn’t mean it made it all the more painful. In his flashbacks with Yeo Na, Joon Ho seemed like a completely different person with how affectionate and dedicated he was to her. We only get to know him as stoic police officer Shin Joon Ho, so it gave his character a very reassuring layer seeing him care for his fiancée so much. He honestly showed more warmth towards Yeo Na than towards his mom, which tells you just how much he adored his bride-to-be. The flashback scene of how he proposed to her, with a quote that she loved so much, was really sweet.
Joon Ho was raised by Jo Myeong Soon (played by Kim Jung Eun), the former director of the orphanage that Lee Dong Min ended up burning down, Pureun Hessal (Blue Sunshine). She never approved of Yeo Na as his wife, and was actually quite mean to her – as I mentioned before the stigma on orphans ran through this story very strongly. In hindsight, her behavior towards Yeo Na was actually really misplaced for another reason, which made it all the more wry.
The first time I started suspecting that Joon Ho might actually be Chairwoman Han’s lost grandchild was when she was talking about her daughter and it just cut to a shot of Joon Ho walking down the hall on his way to speak with her. There was a period of time where I thought it might be either him or Wook, since they both had a link to “sunshine”: Joon Ho’s mother ran an orphanage with the word “hessal” in the name (which is what Soo Yeon called her unborn baby in her diary), and Wook was always going around telling people his mom named him so he would “brighten the world”. I thought maybe Wook had been secretly Soo Yeon’s real child and Hyun Mi just adopted him to shield him, but when it turned out that he really was the housekeeper’s child, my bets were on Joon Ho. Like I said before, even when I guessed things correctly before they were revealed to be true, I still really liked the way they revealed this. I loved how they subtly hinted at the necklace Joon Ho gave Yeo Na during their proposal, how they made Lee Dong Min squint at it a couple of times before actually revealing the connection through the Chairwoman, who recognized it as Soo Yeon’s necklace. That was really clever.

What was also clever was that the writers were very aware of all the implications of their plot twists. Instead of just revealing that Joon Ho was the long lost heir to Choiseung Construction and reuniting him with his grandmother, they actually made him realize that this meant Yeo Na got killed while he had been the actual target, causing him to crumble down with guilt even more. It happened on several occasions that the killers gaslighted people by saying: “they got killed because of you”, and at this point I really didn’t want things to get even more painful than they already were, but on the other hand it was a very realistic depiction of how everything wasn’t just “alright” in the aftermath. I’m glad Joon Ho pulled himself together after this, but it was really painful to see him and his adoptive mother cry out their regrets and feelings of guilt to one another.

Moving on to Yeo Na, I really liked her. I loved how she didn’t just wallow in self-pity after finally accepting she couldn’t go back to Joon Ho, but that she still kept thinking of ways to see him. It was cool to see how resourceful she was, for example in trying to create a smoke screen and letting up those lanterns in the hope someone would find her. I’m glad at least she and Joon Ho scolded Wook for not telling them earlier that he’d known about their relationship and kept the fact he’d been communicating with both of them this entire time. Still, she didn’t hold a grudge for long. It was nice to at least get a glimpse of how she and Joon Ho had been as a lovey-dovey couple before things went south. It was really sad to realize that she, and all those other spirits, had died for such senseless reasons – no reasons at all, if you ask me – and how they just needed to sit and wait around until they were found.
I’m not going to lie, when Thomas built her that chair to wait by the spirit portal and encouraged her to find a way out, I actually believed she would try to sneak out when a new person arrived or something. Of course this wasn’t going to work since her body was in a suitcase on the bottom of the ocean, but I still think the way they retained that sense of hope throughout the story was really touching.

I’d like to go over some supporting characters in a bit more detail now, starting with the villagers.
First of all, we need to talk about Thomas. Before we hear who Thomas really is in the final episode, he is possibly the most mysterious person in Duon Village, and the only one who’s claimed to have already been there for a hundred years. He built a café around the spirit portal, so that when people first came in, they would have to go past him and he could immediately put them at ease.
I love how they kind of played with Thomas’ credibility, like how they made you debate whether or not he really was a good person by revealing he’d actually been locking up alive people in an abandoned building in the village. I’m really glad he turned out to be a proper bean. When they finally found his body at the end and he smiled back like that, I actually found myself smiling back. I couldn’t help but feel bad for him, always looking on as everyone eventually got found, without a single hope that he himself would be located after such a long time. In the final episode, he tells Wook that his real name is Cha Gwon Mook, and that he’d been an independence fighter at the time that Korea was still one country. The fact that he was actually revealed to be a hero that fought for the country’s independence, and that he never so much as bragged about that said so much about him. He was literally the guy that everyone came to in need of help, he was always building stuff for people and just making sure everyone was at peace. When it was revealed that he had been locking up bad people that had come to the village, he literally went: “You’ve all been through so much bad stuff while you were alive. I just wanted to make sure that this place would be your safe haven”. He was the best. I really liked the way they built up his character and made the viewer wonder about his intentions before inevitably falling in love with him.

I’ve already mentioned Hyun Mi in terms of that she was Wook’s mother, but she wasn’t exactly alone in Duon Village. After she came to the village 27 years earlier, she met Detective Park Young Ho (Lee Joo Won), who’d been murdered around the same time, and they actually fell in love in the afterlife. By the time Wook discovers the village, these two have become the main couple that shelter all the children that end up there. It’s so sad to realize that Hyun Mi was so protective of the village children because she hadn’t been able to stay with her own child while she was alive.
As it turns out, she and Detective Park (who actually used to be Detective Baek’s senior) were both murdered by Lee Dong Min to cover up his murder of Soo Yeon – Hyun Mi was her housekeeper and Detective Park was in charge of her case, as he suspected she didn’t die because of an accident. Their bodies were buried together underneath a building. It was kind of bittersweet that they ended up there together and fell in love in the afterlife.
While they took care of several children, the two that were always with them were Beom Soo (Ahn Dong Yeob) and Joon Soo (Go Dong Ha). Beom Soo was a young man with a developmental disability, which meant he had the mind of a much younger kid. He is the first spirit that Wook meets in Duon Village. It’s ultimately revealed that his body was hidden after his killer hit him in a hit-and-run incident.
We never find out exactly what happened to little Joon Soo, but it is suggested that he was attacked by “a scary man” as he got particularly triggered when unfamiliar men approached him. Wook eventually managed to win his trust, after which he became a much more lively and affectionate kid.
One more resident that is introduced is a young woman named Jang Mi (played by Lee Joo Myung) who was killed by her abusive boyfriend. She’s also one of the cases that gets solved about halfway through the series, and she had a really touching goodbye, dissolving after she’d brought the other villages roses (jangmi) to remember her by.

I have one more thing to talk about with regards to Duon Village: Pan Seok’s puppies. Seriously, I got teary-eyed whenever these fluffy balls of joy came on. It broke my heart to find out that they could still see their mom even though she was dead. 😭 I don’t remember their names, but they were so freaking adorable and I couldn’t help but squeal whenever they appeared on screen.

The final character I want to mention is Mr. Wang Myung Chul (played by Kim Nak Gyeon). I haven’t mentioned him yet, but he was the gang leader that executed all of the kidnappings and murders for Lee Dong Min. I don’t even know if he was aware of the bigger picture – he did seem a bit flustered when he was questioned by the police, almost as if he didn’t actually know everything – but he was a pretty good villain character. The fact that Lee Dong Min never did anything himself but just paid other people to do his dirty work for him was very typical, and Mr. Wang also didn’t seem to have any hesitations on whether or not to get involved. He ended up getting killed while in prison, from food poisoning by the looks of it, but they never really showed how that happened exactly. I think it’s safe to say that he was silenced before he might actually give away too much about the client he worked for. That was kind of a shame, because I was curious to find out how much Mr. Wang knew. Anyways, I thought he was quite an interesting character.

Now that I’ve completed my character analysis, I’d like to move on to some comments regarding the series as a whole and parts that particularly spoke to me or touched me.
All in all, I would say that I thought this series was just the right combination of thrilling and heartful. It kept me on the edge of my seat in anxiety and excitement, and it simultaneously kept me emotionally engaged and teary-eyed throughout.
The specific concept of focussing on victims whose bodies were never found intrigued me. As it happens, earlier this year I translated a novel about deceased people that got the chance to return to their loved ones’ side as an object, so I’d been involved with a story that dealt with death from the side of the deceased before. I guess that might have been part of the reason why this particular perspective spoke to me so much. It was such an original and interesting spin on regular detective stories, and I though they executed the interplay between the two sides very well.
In relation to this, I also think the title of the series is very fitting, as it literally tackles missing persons cases “from the other side”, the side of the victims. It might be a strangely soothing thought that victims who are still waiting to be found at least get to experience a peaceful stay at an intermediate station like Duon Village before they pass on. The writers did an excellent job at portraying such raw emotions and heartbreaking cases while retaining an indefinable sense of hope, love and acceptance. The way they wrapped up the first season was so wholesome, and I also loved how they subtly hinted to the existence of other villages and consequently a second season: in the final episode, Thomas talks about how his freedom fighter friends might have ended up in a different village than him, and the series ends with a couple of children skipping off into a different portal after identifying Pan Seok as Hyun Ji’s father, suggesting that Hyun Ji had also been at a different village during the time she’d been missing.
There were so many ugly truths and wry and senseless situations, from how Joon Ho and Yeo Na got separated to the fact that Hyun Ji had actually been buried so close to Duon Village all this time. But apart from all these unfair and painful side, there was also so much beauty and hope in it. I can’t express enough how well-balanced and well-written it was, also in how they kept explaining things and tying up loose ends in terms of the plot. They really thought of most things, which contributed greatly to the consistency and solidity of the story. I had a really good time watching it.
One more thing that I wish to applaud is that this show had the best cliffhangers. I can’t get over the way they suddenly brought in Joon Ho as a contender for being Chairwoman Han’s grandson through the mention of “hessal” from Soo Yeon’s diary, or how they revealed that Kang Myung Jin was responsible for Hyun Ji’s disappearance by overlapping the song Pan Seok used to sing to her with the tune Kang Myung Jin had been humming the entire time. I said it before, I already had the feeling that something else was up with this killer since they kept bringing him back into focus, but it was still such a good and unexpected twist.

I would like to highlight a couple of scenes that particularly shook me and/or made me cry, in chronological order.
First of all, the way Seo Ha Neul disappeared while running towards his mom, who couldn’t see him. As I said before, the fact that they started off the series by depicting a child murder was absolutely heartbreaking. The fact that his stepfather killed him for accidentally damaging his limited Gundam figure while playing with it and hid him in a freaking water tank on the roof of some building, not to mention the fact that he actually went back to the body just to get the figure parts out of his backpack because he could sell those. These depictions might have been fictional, but knowing that these things actually happen in real life as well made it incredibly painful to watch. It was heartbreaking seeing little Ha Neul go all: “Mommy! 😃😃” and run towards her while she couldn’t even see him.
Then there were Yeo Na’s attempts to let people in the outside world know where she was before she could accept that she was really dead. The way her glowing lanterns just dissolved at the edge of the barrier, and how Joon Ho couldn’t see or hear her yell at him from the hot air balloon was really sad.
The flashback of how Hyun Ji went missing was actually haunting. The fact that it was her birthday and Pan Seok literally took his eyes off her for ONE SECOND to buy her some ice cream. You could just see the guilt settle in Pan Seok at that very moment, and it made it even more devastating to know that he would soon also lose his wife and keep on searching for his little girl for fifteen more years to come.
Hyun Mi’s emotional reactions to first finding out Wook was her son (specifically the fact that she thought his presence in Duon Village meant that he was dead as well) and the way she thanked the heavens when she found out he was actually still alive.
When Joon Ho finally allowed himself to break down completely about Yeo Na in the art gallery where he proposed to her and when the notification of their wedding day popped up while he was in the middle of an interrogation. More than that, the ENTIRE scene of Joon Ho and Yeo Na sitting side by side at the edge of Duon Village on their wedding day, both bawling their eyes out while Joon Ho still couldn’t see her.
The moment Pan Seok found out what happened to Hyun Ji when Detective Baek showed him the picture of her hairband which they’d found amongst Kang Myung Jin’s “victim trophies”.
These were just a couple of instances were I actually got goosebumps by the actors’ portrayals of their characters’ emotions. I was so impressed by how genuine and raw these emotions were expressed, each and every one of these depictions hit me straight in the heart.

As I mentioned before, there were a few minor anticlimactic aspects to the show, and although they didn’t impact my general impression of the series too much, I’d still like to share them.
I have to say that I was actually a bit underwhelmed by how quickly Lee Dong Min gave himself away as the killer. We’d already seen that he was Soo Yeon’s murderer from Wook’s memory (the glasses gave him away), but given the way the series had been dealing with plot twists and cliffhangers so far, I was actually prepared for another surprise with regards to this. We didn’t actually see him kill Soo Yeon firsthand, we only saw him stand over her body, so it might’ve still turned out differently. But when Wook confronted him, he immediately went shifty-eyed and “I don’t know what you’re talking about”, which kind of made me go like: “oh, okay, so he just admitted it.” Fair enough, there were only two more episodes to go and they had to start wrapping things up, but it was still a bit anticlimactic to me how he immediately folded during his very first sit-down with Wook.
Secondly, I HATED that Kang Myung Jin unalived himself. There was still so much to uncover about his character and I hate that he got to take the easy way out like that. Pan Seok didn’t even get to find out about the fact that he’d been the bunny mascot at the theme park! I kind of wanted to know more about Kang Myung Jin’s psyche after he responded so peculiarly to the fact that he didn’t get to keep all his victims’ trophies. Ever since Crash Course in Romance, I’ve been very sensitive to killers “getting away with their actions” by unaliving themselves to escape the punishment they deserve, so the fact that they pulled this with Kang Myung Jin of all people was really dissatisfying. It definitely felt like an easy fix to wrap up things quickly in the final episode. In the end, no justice is served for either Kang Myung Jin or Lee Dong Min’s victims, and the only “peace” is found in the fact that Wook and Pan Seok manage to locate all the Duon Village residents’ bodies. Which is wholesome in its own way, but it still bugs me that they kind of rushed the ending to Hyun Ji’s case like that.

Finally, it’s time for the cast comments! As I mentioned before, this was a rare occasion where I didn’t know the majority of the actors in this show, so I’m excited to voice my first impressions on these amazing cast members.

While I have one other show with Go Soo on my watchlist, this was my first introduction to him. From MDL I can see that he’s done a bunch of movies as well. I just want to emphasize that my comments on Wook’s whimsicality and my occasional frustrations with his character stand completely separate from the actor’s performance. I was very impressed with his portrayal of Wook, and especially with how he handled his character development throughout the story. The conman that first came into Duon Village was a completely different person from the person who got reunited with his long lost mother. It was really clear to see how Wook changed seeing all this injustice and senseless killing, not only in his experience of Nam Gook’s death but also in his efforts to solve the cases of every single Duon Village resident. He was written as a very realistically flawed human being, and that’s part of the reason why I can redeem him for not knowing what to do with all the information he obtained. I really liked that he got to show so much variety in his expressions in just this role alone. I’m curious to see more of him, starting with season two.

Heo Joon Ho was one of the few actors I already knew, but I can’t even begin to express how great it was to finally see him as a good guy. After his evil roles in Master of the Mask and Come and Hug Me (his character from that show still haunts me), he really blew me away in his portrayal of Pan Seok. I loved seeing him in the role of a concerned father who would do anything to get justice for the people he cared about, be it his daughter or any of the people in the village. Honestly, I really wanted to see him in a good guy role because he’s so easily typecasted as a villain, and this show was the best choice for him to display that he is so much more than a grim face. I really loved seeing him as Pan Seok, and his emotional delivery was amazing. I can’t wait to enjoy his character some more in season two.

Apparently, Ha Joon was also in Radio Romance and Arthdal Chronicles, but I don’t really remember him from those roles. I will definitely remember him from this, though. I loved how we got to know Joon Ho and how he became more and more expressive and emotional throughout the story. He was probably one of the characters that I came to feel for the most, since he ended up shifting perspectives the most through losing his fiancée. If you think about all the shit that he went through, first losing his fiancée and then finding out he was actually connected to the reason she was killed, it honestly made sense that he would fall apart. Instead, he managed to pull himself together, transferred to the Missing Persons unit, and went on doing the exact same thing to ensure this would never happen to anyone else. Now that’s what I call character development. I’m really excited to see what he’ll bring in season two.

Seo Eun Soo also appeared in Jealousy Incarnate, Romantic Doctor Teacher Kim, Duel and Hotel Del Luna, so she was another familiar face. I feel like she pops up a lot in shows that are less hyped or mainstream, but she always delivers on her performances. I’m definitely going to remember her portrayal of Yeo Na. As I mentioned in my review, I really loved the fact that she was written as so much more than just a damsel in distress. Despite being a defenseless young woman, she was prepared to do whatever she could to get back to Joon Ho, and I also thought it was very realistic to have at least one character in the village that didn’t automatically accept the fact that she was dead. It was cool to see her come up with her own plans, even reckless ones like setting that conman free in order to give Joon Ho yet another hint of where she currently was (or thought she was). Seeing her go through all those attempts only to keep being confronted with the fact that Joon Ho couldn’t see her and there was nothing to be done made her sympathize with her a lot. It warmed my heart seeing her pass on with an accepting smile at the end. I always end up being pleasantly surprised by Seo Eun Soo’s drama appearances, and this was no exception.

Apparently Ahn So Hee used to be a member of WONDER GIRLS! I hadn’t seen her in anything before either. Jong Ah was definitely one of my favorite supporting characters, as I said. I loved how she was able to remain a funny sidekick and still contribute so much to the story. I did wonder what happened to that idol trainee that came to work for her when she took over Nam Gook’s pawn shop though, he kind of vanished into thin air at the end. I kind of hoped they might end up together, lol. Anyways, I really loved how they positioned Jong Ah’s character within all the drama that was going on, and how they made her such a relevant addition to the character cast. Ahn So Hee gave Jong Ah a really nice dash of adventure while also nailing the more emotional scenes. I saw that she’ll be in the second season as well, so I’m really excited to see her again!

Apparently I’ve seen Ji Dae Han before in Vivid Romance, Chicago Typewriter and Thirty But Seventeen, but I don’t actually remember him from those shows. Honestly, from his presence in this series I felt like he must’ve been in way more dramas, but I guess he typically does more movies. Anyways, I really enjoyed his performance as Detective Baek. It meant so much to have a loyal ally that was willing to help out Pan Seok to the best of his abilities in the police force. I really liked the dynamic these two men had, they really felt like old friends. He was such a welcome contribution to the cast of characters. I loved that, despite his grumpy demeanor, he was so invested in obtaining justice for every single victim that he became in charge of, and it actually killed him to deliver the news of Hyun Ji’s fate to Pan Seok. I did wonder if he was actually allowed to be so aggressive towards the people he interrogated. Like, of course you’d want to beat up a bad guy when he’s not talking, but I couldn’t but wonder if this was actually allowed, lol. In any case, I see that he will also return in season two, so that should be fun.

Song Geon Hee looks so familiar to me, but according to MDL I’ve only glimpsed him before as minor roles in My ID is Gangnam Beauty, Love Alarm and Arthdal Chronicles (I don’t recognize anyone from Arthdal based on their usual appearances lol). I really liked his portrayal of Thomas. It was so cool how they managed to keep him so mysterious throughout the show, even after he came clean about who he had been, which only attributed more glamor to his character. I also liked that they explained how he got the blond hair, lol. I still wonder how he got the name “Thomas”, though. It seems interesting that he ended up with such a western image after being possibly the most traditionally Korean spirit in Duon Village, even in his way of speaking. He was such a good and cool character, honestly. It might just be my interpretation, but I somehow got the feeling the writers must have really loved him as well. Honestly, it would be so great if everyone could get themselves a Thomas, a beacon of calm that would literally craft you a bicycle if you asked for one. He was the best boy. I’m really excited to see him in more shows now!

I’ve only seen Kang Mal Geum before in The Silent Sea and although I remember her character I can’t say I have a very clear memory of her performance. As such, she’s another actress that I’ll remember mostly because of her role in this show. I thought she was amazing as Hyun Mi. There’s a reason I pointed out her emotional scenes in the parts that particularly touched me: her emotional responses to first finding out Wook was her son and then realizing he was still alive were both gut-wrenching. She made such a great transition from suspicious village woman to warm mother figure. I actually really liked her mother-son chemistry with Go Soo, even in all its awkwardness. It just fitted their circumstances so well to carefully open up after first feeling kind of estranged from one another. I actually gasped out loud when she dissolved and Wook suddenly found himself unable to see the village anymore. There’s a couple more series with her on my watchlist, so I’m really curious to see her in those.

I knew I recognized Lee Joo Myung from something, she’s Seung Wan in Twenty-Five Twenty-One! It was kind of weird seeing an actor portray an adult character when you’ve only seen them as a high schooler before, and this show even came two years before that! Anyways, it was really cool seeing her in this. Jang Mi’s story was so tragic, and I appreciated that it contributed to the endless cases of hostesses or “women in lesser jobs” that get into abusive relationships because of their circumstances. I’m glad they gave her a proper arc and a proper goodbye. Honestly, there was one moment when she hugged Thomas and he flinched a little that immediately made me think they’d be a cute couple, but unfortunately she passed on soon after that so there was no chance for anything to bloom between them.

Ahn Dong Yeob is another actor that I’ve apparently seen in Thirty But Seventeen and Dali and the Cocky Prince, but I don’t remember him from those. I’ll definitely remember him as Beom Soo, though. His portrayal of this developmentally disabled boy was really heartwaming. I loved how they kept bringing him into the story and how he kept showing that he was actually much more aware of the situation than people would expect him to be. It was cool that they made him utter the license plate of the car that hit him earlier on before actually connecting that to finding his body at the end. He was such a sweet boy and I loved how he didn’t go too far in making his character a stereotype of someone with a mental disability. He made a really beautiful contribution to the cast of characters.

Out of all the bad guys, I want to make a special mention of Kim Sang Bo, who played Kang Myung Jin. I hadn’t seen him in anything before either. I don’t know what it was about him, but his acting actually gave me goosebumps. The way he would go from looking dead inside to a very subtle smirk, or how he’d switch from mindlessly humming to suddenly crying actually made me think like he had some sort of personality disorder. I was so intriguid by his character and how he’d become the psychopath that he was. I guess that’s why it bothered me even more when they just let him off himself like that at the end. Kim Sang Bo actually brought a serial killer to life that I wanted to understand better, and that says a lot. He was incredible. It’s been a while since I’ve been so genuinely intrigued in the performance of an actor I had never seen before. My compliments!

Lastly, I just want to give a big shoutout to all the amazing child actors in this show. There was Jang Seon Yool who played Seo Ha Neul (he also played the child version of Yeol in Alchemy of Souls), Go Dong Ha who played Joon Soo, and Lee Hyo Bi who played little Hyun Ji (she also played the younger version of the female leads in Thirty But Seventeen, The School Nurse Files and Dali and the Cocky Prince). These kids did such an amazing job. The fact that they were able to express such genuine emotions in a story that was so raw and heartbreaking in itself was enough to hit me in the heart. I’m telling you, South Korea’s acting industry is in good hands with this next generation of talented little actors and actresses.

To sum up my review, I’ll just say that I did not expect this story to tug at my heartstrings so much from the get-go. I’m not even lying when I say that I was already bawling my eyes out by episode three. Starting out with the case of a missing child was BRUTAL, but it did set the tone for the rest of the story in a very powerful way. I don’t think I’ve ever teared up so much throughout an entire series as I did while watching this one. They definitely did a great job at depicting heart-wrenching situations and raw grief.
Another thing that I really admired about this show was that, despite the fact that it started out a bit confusing with all the different units and they had several storylines playing out at the same time, they managed to bring everything together in such a great and wholesome way. I loved how Joon Ho ended up coming full circle, transferring to the Missing Persons unit with a newfound sentiment for the victims and their loved ones after he went through it himself. Seeing him come eye to eye with Detective Baek in contrast to how they clashed in the beginning was really touching.
I’m also surprised that they actually managed to locate every single spirit in the end. It initially felt like they were rushing it a bit by wrapping up all the remaing people in the final episode, but because the episode was so lengthy it ended up not feeling rushed at all. I actually finished the show with a smile on my face. They did such a great job at building up the dynamics between the characters and creating links between their cases that I couldn’t help but get super invested. I’ve seen comments saying that there were boring moments in-between, but I honestly can’t think of a single one. It had me on the edge of my seat the entire time and there wasn’t a dull moment whatsoever.

I honestly feel like there’s so much more to say about this show, but I’ll save that for my review of season two, which I’ll be moving onto immediately after uploading this. As I said before, after the initial dread of facing another double-seasoner I did NOT expect to be hit in the feels so much while watching this. I’ve really come to appreciate using an app to pick out my watches for me, because otherwise it would’ve probably taken me ages to get to this one. It really made a big impression on me, and I’m very excited to start on season two. I can’t wait to meet Pan Seok, Wook, Joon Ho and Jong Ah again, along with a whole new cast of characters to get attached to.

As soon as I finish my review of season two, you’ll be able to find it here.

Until then! Bye-bee! x