SPOILER WARNING: DO NOT READ IF YOU STILL PLAN ON WATCHING THIS SERIES OR HAVEN’T FINISHED IT YET!!

Our Blues
(우리들의 블루스 / Urideurui Beulluseu)
MyDramaList rating: 9.0/10

Hello everyone! I’m back with a new review! I want to give a little context to my personal situation this time since it really affected my view on this drama. I started out this year super stressed and anxious because of work and just when I’d decided I wanted to quit, my work actually dismissed me a couple of weeks ago, so I’ve found myself unexpectedly unemployed. Not that I really mind that in itself, but it was very abrupt and weird and I didn’t really get to have any closure on anything, including finishing pending tasks and saying goodbye to people I’d worked with for two years. It happened a week after I finished my last review, so I had just started this series and I can’t express enough how much this show healed me in that period of confusion and mixed feelings. I just wanted to state that before I even started this review, because my circumstances really created a frame of mind in which I was able to appreciate this drama even more than when I would’ve watched it without all this happening in the background. I would’ve still loved it, no doubt, but now the healing came at just the right time for my heart, and that’s why this drama is ranked so high (I rarely give ratings this high). Besides my personal mindframe, this series really is an absolute gem and it was definitely worth spending almost an entire month to finish it. I’m going to construct my review a little bit differently this time, as going through my analysis based on the story would take way too long. As there are so many characters and so many intertwining storylines playing out at the same time, I decided to go through my summary and analysis based on the characters. I hope this will allow my arguments to pan out in a constructed and coherent way. There’s just so much to say about everything and everyone, I can’t bring myself to skip certain things. So let’s get to it!

Our Blues is a 20-episode Netflix K-Drama with each episode lasting about an hour and a half. It’s quite lengthy, both in number of episodes and length of each episode, and that’s why I also took considerable time in-between, I never watched more than two episodes in a row because it would be simply too much. Not in a bad way, but there’s just so much going on with every single person, I just liked taking breaks in-between and get back into it after clearing my own head, haha.
Our Blues focusses on a community that lives in a village called Pureung in the city Seogwipo on Jeju Island. It’s located by the seashore and the sea is a very big theme in the villagers’ lives, both in good and bad ways. Many elderly people living on the island have lost family members to the sea, either to drowning or ‘harvesting’, an activity executed by a group of female divers (haenyo) in which they go diving for abalones. One rule to this ‘harvesting’ is that the group of divers has to be ‘one’, they can’t go too far from the group, they can’t get too greedy and swim farther down for more, it’s simply too dangerous. The community consists of people from each generation, in which the elderly are respected the most. The middle-aged generation commonly all have some sort of business and an associated stand on the local marketplace. The teenagers all go to school together, etcetera. In Pureung, everyone knows each other, it’s one big family. Even when you have beef with someone, they’ll still come running when you’re in trouble, everyone helps each other out. That’s the main vibe I got from this community. There’s people that never left, who raised and lost their families, people whose children may have moved to the mainland but would never leave themselves. There’s people that went to school together and never moved away. All in all, everyone is really tight and connected throughout the generations. It would be a bit hard for outsiders/mainlanders/people not born on Jeju to fit in at first, but with the right communication, they’d always be welcomed. The scenery shots taken from the island and the sea are absolutely stunning, the surroundings are beautiful and there’s also a mountain called Hallasan nearby.

Within this village, we are introduced to several members of the community one by one. The episodes are structured by character, and there are different ‘chapters’ or ‘arcs’ per character. Each chapter typically features the relationship between two people, either romantic, friendly or familial. There are chapters between childhood friends, neighbors, lovers and also estranged family members.
Let’s just go from there.

One of the first characters we are introduced to is Jung Eun Hee (played by Lee Jung Eun). Eun Hee is a middle-aged lady, born and raised in Seogwipo, and despite the fact that she’s never had an academic education after high school, she has managed to build a franchise through her fishing business, causing her to have acquired a lot of money. She’s one of the most financially accomplished women in the village, and she’s always out and about driving her truck back and forth to tend to her establishments. She’s often found buying fish and selling it on the local market, but as she also owns a bunch of restaurants and cafés in the vicinity, she’s constantly busy. She’s always been single, she never married and doesn’t have kids. The only time she’s had feelings for someone was in high school. Despite her success she’s never felt very confident about her looks or female appeal, she’s just content being where she is, surrounded by her loyal high school friends. However, there are inevitably times when she’s confronted with the fact that she never got much luck in the romance department.
In the first chapter, her first love from high school, Choi Han Soo (played by Cha Seung Won) returns to Seogwipo for a reunion with his high school friends. He’s one of the few people from Eun Hee’s friend group that moved to the mainland after studying in Seoul. His life’s journey has been quite the opposite from Eun Hee’s. Despite his high education and being able to secure a stable job in finance, he is struggling with money problems. He’s sent his wife and daughter to the United States since his daughter is pursuing a professional career in golfing there, and he has taken it on himself to provide for that, but it’s not going so well and he ends up loaning a lot of money which he then isn’t able to pay back. His wife is begging him to let her and daughter come back to South Korea, as they’re being targeted by hate crime there and they don’t feel safe. Also, his daughter is now saying she doesn’t want to golf anymore. Han Soo keeps ignoring them, keeps saying he’ll take care of the money. When he goes to Seogwipo and meets his high school friends there, he finds out that Eun Hee has a lot of money. Even though he feels terrible about taking advantage of Eun Hee’s lingering attraction to him, he is determined to ask her for money, but it plays out quite painfully as Eun Hee finds out his motives from her friends after he’s taken her on a ‘trip down memory lane’ in Mokpo, recreating the memory of a meaningful high school field trip. While Eun Hee is initially very angry with him (and with herself for starting to believe there was still hope for her first love to play out successfully after all this time), she still wires him money, but he decides to return it and get his wife and daughter back from the States. He quits his job and is able to start a new life with the pension money from there (if I remember correctly).
Eun Hee’s other chapter focusses on her friendship with Go Mi Ran (played by Eom Jung Hwa). The two women have been best friends since high school. As Eun Hee was seen as a bit of a weirdo in high school, she was saved by Mi Ran a bunch of times. Mi Ran’s family was quite rich, so she would offer Eun Hee lifts to school and brought lunch for her. It feels like they never really talked about the things that were a little toxic about their friendship, the fact that Eun Hee knowingly made use of Mi Ran’s generosity, or the fact that Mi Ran never said anything about this despite occasionally feeling like Eun Hee was leeching off of her. On the other hand, even as adults, Mi Ran is basically worshipped by every single person in Eun Hee’s life. She’s tall, beautiful and always surrounded by men – she’s just divorced her third husband. Mi Ran runs a massage salon in Seoul, but when her daughter rejects her coming along on a trip to Europe with her, she goes back to Seogwipo instead. Eun Hee, in her turn, has opened her eyes to the fact that Mi Ran has always used her as a doormat. All her other friends are saying this too, that Mi Ran is the princess and Eun Hee is her servant. She’s started resenting Mi Ran for it, and writes her rancorous thoughts about her in her diary. When Mi Ran stays over at Eun Hee’s house, she finds this diary and there’s a conflict between the two. They are able to resolve it quickly, though, when Eun Hee goes over to Mi Ran’s massage salon to make amends.

Further part of Eun Hee’s friend group are Bang Ho Shik (played by Choi Young Joon) and Jung In Gwon (played by Park Ji Hwan). These two guys are both single dads (both their wives left them) and now they’re stuck with their respective kids. Ho Shik lives with his teenage daughter Bang Yeong Joo (played by Noh Yoon Seo) and In Gwon has a son of the same age called Hyeon (played by Bae Hyeon Seong). Their kids go to school together and are secretly in love with each other.
Ho Shik and In Gwon are the typical guys that are considered to be best friends, but they also cuss each other out daily. Especially In Gwon, who used to be a thug before he decided to become a soondae sausage seller to provide for his son’s college fees, has a hand in being very foul-mouthed. Ho Shik is a little bit milder, but the two are still both very hot-headed, especially towards each other. Something happened in their past that made Ho Shik resentful towards In Gwon and he’s never forgiven him for that, even though they’ve made up pretty much for the rest and are still, despite their constant bickering, on relatively good terms with each other. That is, until their kids’ storyline is introduced.
Yeong Joo discovers that she’s pregnant, and that it’s already been six months. The father is Hyeon, without a doubt, and her first instinct is to get an abortion. Giving birth will go against all her plans, all her father’s plans, and she just knows she and Hyeon won’t be able to deal with this right now, they’re still in high school, they’re both supposed to go study in Seoul after graduation. Yeong Joo is one of the few people who actually can’t wait to get out of Jeju, she really wants to go to Seoul so this really gets in her way. However, Hyeon, kind-hearted and gentle as can be, manages to persuade her to keep the baby. After they’ve established their own plan, the next step is to tell their dads, which they’re both very much NOT looking forward to. They already expect their dads to respond badly and are not disappointed in that aspect. But the whole situation eventually leads to Ho Shik and In Gwon coming face to face about their own issues, besides their kids’. In the end, they finally agree to Yeong Joo keeping the baby and in the last episode, she gives birth to a healthy girl.

Then there’s Yeong Ok and Jeong Joon. Lee Yeong Ok (played by Han Ji Min) is a thirtysomething woman who came from the mainland. She’s the only person in the village who wasn’t born on Jeju Island and despite her integration in the community, she’s still viewed as an outsider mainly by her fellow haenyos. Yeong Ok loves Jeju Island, she loves the sea and she loves harvesting, but she’s the type of person who tends to drift off from the group in her greed to bring in as many abalones as possible. She brings a lot of anxiety to the haenyos as she goes against their ‘code’ multiple times and they even start threatening to throw her out. Another thing working against her is that no one really knows anything about her, she keeps her family and background very vague, so rumors start spreading about her having a husband and child back on the mainland for whom she’s saving up money. Yeong Ok works in a café and besides harvesting she also helps Eun Hee out at her fish market stand.
Park Jeong Joon (played by Kim Woo Bin) is a few years younger than Yeong Ok, but he’s a born and raised Jeju Island guy. He and his younger brother captain the boat that the haenyos dive from and he also helps out at Eun Hee’s fish market stand. He’s a kind of handyman in the village, he’s tall and strong and always happy to help out wherever he can. From the beginning we can see that he has a crush on Yeong Ok, even though he initially tries to hide it while Yeong Ok occasionally flirts with him. But it becomes clearer and clearer that he is interested in her. Despite his easygoing nature he can’t help but find himself interested in Yeong Ok’s background as well, and wonders if she might really be lying about things. In any case, the two get together and have a nice time until Jeong Joon starts bringing up things like living together and even marriage. Yeong Ok seems to value her freedom above everything. She doesn’t lie in her feelings for Jeong Joon, but warns him that it can’t get too serious between them. There’s something mysterious about her in general, as she also continuously gets calls and messages from an unknown number. It even seems like she’s being stalked at some point, as the messages get quite persistent and someone is clearly bothering her to ‘come back’. It is later revealed that Yeong Ok has a twin sister back on the mainland. Lee Yeong Hee (played by Jung Eun Hye) has Down Syndrome and ever since the sisters’ parents died when they were 12, Yeong Hee has been a big liability for Yeong Ok. Her past few boyfriends have consistently dumped her because they couldn’t deal with Yeong Hee being ‘part of the package’. Yeong Ok has been trying to move away from her sister as much as possible, hoping that she’d forget about her at some point, she’s never felt free from her. When Yeong Hee unexpectedly comes to Jeju Island to visit Yeong Ok, she’s forced to introduce everyone and this is when Jeong Joon also finally finds out why Yeong Ok has so little faith in his devotion to her – she expects him to be just like her exes, someone who promises to stay with her and support her in taking care of Yeong Hee but eventually will give up. Jeong Joon proves to be different, and Yeong Ok and Yeong Hee manage to make amends as well.

Hyeon Choon Hee (played by Go Doo Shim) is one of the village’s elders. She’s a well-respected elderly lady who can be seen as the OG Jeju Island villager. She grew up there, build a life and a family there, lost half of that family there. Her only living son is living in Seoul with his wife and daughter, Choon Hee’s 6-year old granddaughter Son Eun Gi (played by Ki So Yoo). Choon Hee may be elderly, but she’s still a very active member of the community. She sells vegetables at the local market and she still goes out harvesting as the head of the group. Her life on Jeju Island has hardened her visibly, but she keeps herself together formidably, never letting anyone see her weakness. One day her daughter-in-law announces that she’s bringing granddaughter Eun Gi over to stay with Choon Hee for two weeks before mother and father will join them. What Choon Hee doesn’t know, what’s kept a secret from her, is that her son, Eun Gi’s father, actually got into a major accident with his truck and has already been comatose for a month. Eun Gi is sent to Seogwipo while her mom stays with her dad in the hospital, and works some extra jobs until he (hopefully) wakes up. After finding out the truth, Choon Hee finds it impossible to keep lying to Eun Gi, especially since the child has such trust in that her dad will wake up soon. Miraculously, he does wake up in the end.

Finally, there’s the storyline of Lee Dong Seok (played by Lee Byung Hoon). Dong Seok was born and raised in Seogwipo, but suffered a harsh childhood. After his own father passed and his older sister died during harvesting, his mother married another guy with two sons of his own. His former wife, the sons’ mother, was very sick and Dong Seok’s mom ended up taking care of the ex-wife of her new husband while Dong Seok himself was being beaten by his new brothers every day. The only person he found solace in was a girl from his neighborhood, Min Seon Ah (played by Shin Min Ah as an adult). Family-wise, his mother was the only person he had left, but she didn’t even seem to care for him anymore and even slapped him and told him not to call her his mother anymore, to refer to her as an aunt from now on. Dong Seok has grown up as a guy with a very bad temper. He has a truck in which he sells all kinds of stuff, from clothes to handywares and utensils. Like Eun Hee, he’s always on the road, driving from the mainland to Jeju Island and back to buy new stuff to sell to the elderly in Seogwipo. He also regularly parks his truck outside the local market to sell there, and there he sometimes runs into his mother, Kang Ok Dong (played by Kim Hye Ja), who sells vegetables together with Choon Hee. She’s also a respected elder in the village, but Dong Seok treats her coldly, as she’s treated him all his life. Ok Dong is a very frail old lady, she’s illiterate and seems very stoic when it comes to Dong Seok, but she’s very warm and kind towards younger people, children and stray animals. She even feeds some stray dogs and cats in her own garden. At some point it’s revealed that she has terminal stomach cancer, and she refuses any chemo treatment. Her condition deteriorates throughout the story. When she eventually asks Dong Seok to drive her to Mokpo to attend his late stepfather’s memorial, he initially declares her crazy for expecting him to get involved in that, but he ends up doing it and this evolves into a final trip for the estranged mother and son, in which they ultimately make amends. Just when they’ve made up and Dong Seok starts wanting to involve his mother in his life again, she passes away. Ok Dong is the only village character who passes away in the story.
Dong Seok ends up meeting Seon Ah again by coincidence and while he’s immediately back to square one in his feelings for her, Seon Ah has had to deal with her own mess. As a child, she too was comforted by Dong Seok while her own family was a mess, and her father ended up driving his truck into the sea, leaving her alone with her mother. She eventually moved to Seoul where she met her future husband, but was diagnosed with depression along the way. She ended up marrying the guy and they had a son called Yeol. Her husband eventually divorced her because he couldn’t deal with her depression and it started causing her to neglect Yeol when they were alone. Seon Ah is desperate in wanting custody over Yeol, claiming her son to be her only necessity to live. She met Dong Seok a couple of times in-between, when the custody case was still pending, and he took her back to Jeju Island for a while after her custody claim was denied. Even though she consistently rejected Dong Seok’s advantages, after going back to Seoul and figuring out how to deal with her depression, she eventually comes to appreciate his presence in her life again and Dong Seok even builds her a house in Seogwipo.

In the last episode, all the characters featured in each episode arc meet up together for this annual Athletic Meet in which Pureung competes against another village, and it’s one big reunion party, a very warm and welcome event after all the dramatic things that have happened. It truly ends in one big healing reunion, the perfect way to wrap up the series.

I’ve tried to go through all the characters and their respective chapters as briefly as possible! I will now shine some light on the stories in more depth and give my own views on them in more detail. I will highlight some arcs that had a big impact on me, but in principle all stories and events were equally meaningful in my opinion.

To start with Eun Hee, I just thought she was such a typical countryside fisherman’s lady. I really liked how much of a character she really was, her slightly boorish nature, setting up a big mouth even though she had a heart of gold and how she was actually touched pretty easily. Her genuinely kind nature really came out whenever something bad happened to anyone, she was always there to offer support and food. Her quirks only came out when she was with friends and people she felt genuinely comfortable with – her love for dancing and singing, and her talent for it!. Especially when she took that trip to Mokpo with Han Soo in the beginning, she really went back to her high school self with him and that was really nice to see. She’s just such a humane character, you could tell how she busied herself and focussed on the money so she wouldn’t have to think too much about the fact that she never really felt beautiful, or that she wouldn’t have any kids. I believe Ho Shik was still a bit interested in her though, and she’d also been with him for a short period of time in the past, but I guess she just never felt anything real for anyone after Han Soo.
I felt so bad for her throughout the whole Han Soo arc, because you could see that she was getting her hopes up while we as viewers already knew what he was going to ask her, that it was all about her money. It was so painful when she had to find out about it via her friends, who’d all been asked for money by Han Soo apparently, and to have him admit it face-to-face to her. And STILL she found it in herself to forgive him, because he was STILL a friend who needed help. Looking at both this arc and the one around Mi Ran, I actually can’t help feeling like Eun Hee is indeed a bit of a doormat, but more in the sense that her loyalty towards her friends is just so strong that she can’t help being there for them when she can. I could relate to her feeling useful when her seemingly better-off friends would ask for her help, too. It gave her a feeling of purpose. She mostly held her head high and threw herself into her business as much as possible, but when it came to the people around her, she was always very lenient. A bit too much, at times.
Han Soo only appears that first episode and then again during the Athletic Meet in the end. While I sympathized with him in his situation, I still felt pissed at him for knowingly taking advantage of Eun Hee’s lingering feelings for him. I really didn’t agree with the way in which he was going to ask her, how he recreated this fondly shared memory and treated Eun Hee nicely, made her feel special, only to betray her trust like that. I’m just glad he reflected on his actions and found a way to solve his problems by himself in the end. He really didn’t seem to be a bad guy, and it was interesting to immediately be introduced to a couple of characters with a double side to them and intentions of which they were aware weren’t pure.
I couldn’t help but feel like Eun Hee’s friendship with Mi Ran was quite toxic in the beginning. The event in which Mi Ran had Eun Hee come all the way to Seoul only to prove to her friends that ‘See? She comes at my beck and call!’ was really nasty. Especially because she’d lured her with a message indicating possible self-harm and all replies stopped after that, causing Eun Hee to get really, super worried and scared about her wellbeing. I didn’t blame Eun Hee for being genuinely pissed at her for that. And then when Mi Ran discovered her diary and confronted Eun Hee, I also felt like Mi Ran (and everyone else for that matter) was putting everything on Eun Hee. Eun Hee was the one who needed to be more considerate towards Mi Ran, Eun Hee had taken advantage of Mi Ran’s generosity. That just felt wrong. Even if Mi Ran wasn’t aware of what her behavior had instilled in Eun Hee, she still did some really hurtful things herself as well. I don’t know, it just felt weird between them. I’m glad they made up, though, and I really felt like they truly cherished each other’s friendship in the end, but what happened between them was definitely not all sunshine and rainbows. I also found it very clear that Mi Ran reminded Eun Hee of everything she didn’t have in terms of popularity and appeal based on her looks. Mi Ran was basically jumped on by every guy in the vicinity, even In Gwon and Eun Hee’s other guy friends all became puppies when Mi Ran entered their field of vision. In that sense, I did appreciate Ho Shik’s objectivity as he was the only person on Eun Hee’s side throughout the whole thing. He had been on Eun Hee’s side ever since high school and he never truly liked Mi Ran for how she treated her.

For some reason, the arc featuring Ho Shik and In Gwon hit me really hard in comparison to other arcs. I guess it had to do with the fact that you had these two prideful alpha males who were basically stripped down layer by layer until they just couldn’t help getting emotional. The build-up in their respective self-destruction when it came to what was happening to their kids was incredibly raw and powerful, and I found myself actually crying asn both guys, as well as their children, came face-to-face with each other.
To start with Ho Shik, I mentioned before that I found him the milder of the two. He genuinely doted on his daughter, but also had his own plans of buying a boat and sailing off as soon as Yeong Joo went to college (he currently runs an ice cutting business to provide all the market stalls (like the fish one) with ice. In any case, his daughter’s unexpected pregancy comes at a very bad time for him personally as well. I had the feeling that he was against her keeping the baby out of genuine concern for her future, he’d seen how hard it had been for his own wife and he worried that the stigma would ruin his daughter’s life forever, that she wouldn’t even be able to study anymore.
The whole arc posed an interesting discussion because indeed, the kids were only teenagers, what could they possibly know about raising a child at that point? But they still managed to be so mature about it. Hyeon immediately took his responsibility, immediately gave up his own aspirations of studying in Seoul, he didn’t hesistate for a second. I think Yeong Joo really needed that affirmation from him, he immediately set out to prove how responsible he would be and that must have been a big factor in her agreeing to keep the baby. But Ho Shik and In Gwon were both very much set in their ways that it was too early, they wouldn’t be able to deal with it. It was really painful to watch how Ho Shik couldn’t even face Yeong Joo at some point.
In the meantime, we get insight in the history of the friendship between Ho Shik and In Gwon, and we see that, when Ho Shik’s wife left after he’d gambled their money away and he didn’t have any way to feed Yeong Joo by himself and went to In Gwon for some money, In Gwon basically shamed him for ‘using his kid to beg for money’ and this angered Ho Shik to no end, even after years and years later. It seems that Ho Shik is the type of person who generally holds grudges for a long time. We see it also in his resentment towards Mi Ran for something she said to Eun Hee back in high school. He just doesn’t forget these things. And he’s always resented In Gwon for saying that in front of his child. When he confronts In Gwon about this when they get jailed for getting into an intense fist fight at the market, In Gwon also seems generally ashamed. This is the first time the two men get so overwhelmed by everything that’s happening that tears of emotion come out.
I’m not entirely sure what In Gwon’s past of being ‘a thug’ entailed completely, but it seemed like he became a kind of loan shark or maffia-affiliated figure at some point. Later, he did something that made him a target, and this (indirectly) caused the death of his mother-in-law. After that, his wife left him. Hyeon has always claimed that she didn’t abandon him, he let her go, so he never blamed his mom for anything. In Gwon is very hard on his son, even for ‘tough love’ he’s pretty intense as a dad. He started the soondae sausage business in order to provide for Hyeon, so he initially sees it as a sort of betrayal when Hyeon tells him he’s going to be a father to Young Joo’s baby rather than resuming his plans to go study.

What’s also typical is that both dads’ first response is to point fingers at the other party – Ho Shik immediately supposes Hyeon must have done something to Yeong Joo against her will, while In Gwon immediately accuses Yeong Joo of seducing his son. They both plead that Yeong Joo should get an abortion, and In Gwon even goes as far as to drag her out of the motel she stays at after leaving home to force her to go to the hospital. The respective conflicts between In Gwon and Hyeon and Ho Shik and Yeong Joo, as well as the guys’ own ongoing feud just make the whole arc super intense. I guess this was because it happened to two people who would normally NEVER have a heart-to-heart, who always resorted to fist violence and cussing first before baring their honest feelings. It really broke me for a part. The scene where Hyeon and In Gwon had that confrontation in the sausage factory with the rain pouring outside, that shot of Hyeon hugging his dad from behind while they were both bawling their eyes out… My goodness.

Yeong Joo and Hyeon were such a lovely couple. Even though Hyeon seemed to care more about Yeong Joo than the other way around in the beginning, when we are introduced to Yeong Joo’s narrative, she immediately says that Hyeon is the only person who makes life on Jeju Island bearable for her. Of course, the pregnancy is not planned. The two argue about it, Yeong Joo a bit more fierce in her tone. She initially plans to get an abortion before anyone finds out, and visits an OB-GYN by herself.
This scene made me so angry, by the way. First of all, I would personally be kind of uncomfortable with having a male doctor as my OB-GYN, I think I’d just feel more comfortable with a woman who was at least able to relate a little bit. But this guy?! The way he openly judged her for getting pregnant?! I was like, excuse me sir? How unprofessional was that?! Not a shred of compassion. I really hope not all OB-GYNs are like that with unwanted/teenage pregnancies. And then, when she had already decided to have it removed and Hyeon went with her one time to an appointment before the procedure, the lady started literally guilt-tripping Yeong Joo while showing her the baby in her belly, knowing the girl would have it removed. She saw how much Yeong Joo was struggling and she just went, ‘Look, there’s your baby, it has a heartbeat you know, don’t you want to hear its beating heart?’ Like, what business of hers was it to get involved in that? It’s not their place to guilt-trip a young girl into keeping a baby if she doesn’t want it. Anyways, they do decide to keep the baby after that and they – ultimately- also manage to convince their dads and get married soon after.

Then we have the Yeong Ok, Jeong Joon and eventually Yeong Hee arc. I found it really refreshing that a character with Down Syndrome was introduced, and that they utilized her character so well. It went so much deeper than just making you feel bad for someone with a handicap, she really wasn’t used as a factor of pity at all. I think it was a very important factor in Yeong Ok’s character, because we actually get introduced to her mean side. I initially really liked Yeong Ok for her quirkiness, her mysterious aura of being ‘the outsider’ while not caring one bit about other people’s opinions. Yeong Ok really wanted to have fun in life, she wanted adventure and challenge, and she wasn’t keen on settling down any time soon. Even when she meets Jeong Joon and is attracted to him, she keeps telling herself as well as him that ‘this is just fun’. In a way you could say that she has always kind of victimized herself when it came to her sister. She just accepted that, when people would find out about Yeong Hee, they would just abandon her. She’d always seen Yeong Hee as a factor in her life that would chase people away, as it had with her several ex-boyfriends. Little did she know that Pureung would be that one place that would completely embrace Yeong Hee for who she was. Even despite the initial hesitation, because the villagers had never seen someone with Down Syndrome before, they were quick to accomodate Yeong Hee as one of their own.
I got a little annoyed with Yeong Ok when she was being so persistent in pushing Jeong Joon away. He was very clear in that he wanted to prove to her that he was different, but she just treated him kind of coldly, immediately putting him in the same box as her exes, who’d also promised the same thing. I mean, I can understand that she had lost trust in those words, but I found the way she treated Jeong Joon in that a little petty and childish. I’m glad it wasn’t how she truly felt and she just needed the confirmation that Jeong Joon really was all that he promised to be. I guess she was just a bit of a tsundere in the end, haha. Also when she refused to meet his parents when she was actually just super nervous.
At the end of their arc, in which Jeong Joon had exhibited all of Yeong Hee’s drawings through his bus and Yeong Ok had that heartwrenching scene where she went past them one by one, the final one showing Yeong Hee watching Yeong Ok enjoying her freedom was what she needed. I’m not entirely sure what exactly Yeong Ok’s closure was, to be honest. I guess it was having Yeong Hee reveal that she knew about Yeong Ok’s attempts to abandon her, and the fact that Yeong Hee acknowledged that Yeong Ok desired freedom so much? And as soon as Yeong Hee acknowledged that, it was suddenly much easier for Yeong Ok to keep in regular touch with her? Because in the episodes after their arc ended, Yeong Ok is regularly shown videocalling with her sister, and she is also present during the Athletic Meet. I guess it really was just about breaking the obligation to take care of her sister? To just have it out in the open what their respective feelings were, that those feelings were respected so that they could just keep more casual contact? In any case, it was good that they made up. I personally couldn’t find it in me to get annoyed with Yeong Hee at all, she seemed like such a precious lady. But I do get how Yeong Ok may have felt like she was tied to her for the rest of her life after their parents died. Watching their relationship, I couldn’t help but be reminded of It’s Okay to Not Be Okay, in which the younger brother has come to terms with giving up his own life in order to care for his brother, keeping his lingering resentments hidden forever. Yeong Ok is the opposite of that, she actively moves away, out of her sister’s life, in the hopes that Yeong Hee will get used to her absence and she’ll get to live her life free from her. It was just her nature, and I liked how they brought into that her love for being underwater, because that made her feel like she was finally all alone and could do whatever she wanted.
Jeong Joon’s feelings for Yeong Ok are pure from the start. Even though he may have doubted her at times, he was determined not to part from her side, and not to let her get rid of him either. He refused to break up with her, and he genuinely felt for her in her situation with her sister. He was the ultimate good guy in this show, he stood up for the right people, he was just always a loyal presence in everybody’s life. Whether it was driving the grannies somewhere, helping Dong Seok paint his house, helping Eun Hee at the market, etc. He was generally liked by everyone and didn’t have any major baggage himself, so it seemed. Maybe it was good that someone as uncomplicated and pure like him, ended up crossing paths with Yeong Ok. He was the best supporting pillar she could have asked for. I loved how mature their relationship was. It’s funny in a way, because even though we got a lot of insight in Jeong Joon’s life, for example how he spent his time at his bus on the shore, we generally see him taking part in other people’s stories. Like, he was one of the main featured characters, but he didn’t really seem to have anything dramatic going on in his own life. He really seemed to be there purely to support and assist other people in the village, because that in itself was his nature.

Moving on to the other arc that made me bawl my eyes out, the one about Grandma Choon Hee and Granddaughter Eun Gi. The whole concept of this pairing, two different generations that were still so very much alike, was so refreshing and heartwarming. I loved every moment of it. Choon Hee may have been a really warm person, and she never shied from showing her affection towards Eun Gi, but she was also still very strict and hardened in her ways. The way she lived her life so primitively but still enjoyably, she took pleasure in simple things, she ate what there was to be eaten, she didn’t have the luxury to be picky about food. This was such a big contrast to spoiled little Eun Gi, who refused to eat anything she didn’t know, who refused to walk long distances if Granny wouldn’t carry her, who just fell down crying at any given moment when she wouldn’t get her way. And still, I found that they were alike in their stubbornness. There was a very clear distinction of not only generation but also upbringing. Of course, Eun Gi had been spoiled by her parents, her dad especially doted on her and told her all these fantastical stories. Eun Gi definitely seemed to be a daddy’s girl, and she wouldn’t let anyone speak badly of him, or let anyone tell her that some of her dad’s stories weren’t true. This combination of young and old was so refreshing and original. I was incredibly impressed with the acting of the little girl, I wonder if she was able to cry on command or something, because the tears really came out so naturally, she was really a typical child. I actually didn’t think she’d be six years old by the way she was acting. Spoiled kids sometimes tend to be a little immature for their age because they are never expected to do anything by themselves and just expect their parents to pick them up and fix everything for them. I feel like this was also the case for Eun Gi. She didn’t seem to take any initiative to help her Grandma out if she wasn’t asked, and she acted really childishly in situations where she didn’t get her way, or when Grandma was a little strict on her.
The scene in which the two characters aligned the most was, of course, the scene where Choon Hee snapped after having visited her comatose son, the scene in which she lost her patience with Eun Gi, who was still claiming that her dad would pick her up the next day as promised. There they were, both bawling their eyes out, Choon Hee because she feared she would lose her last child, and Eun Gi because she refused to believe that her dad would lie to her.
The final scene of that arc, in which the villagers created Eun Gi’s imagined ‘100 moons’ on the water surface, was beautiful. I still don’t understand how they did that exactly with those boats, but it looked amazing. And then, miraculously, Eun Gi’s dad woke up from his coma. I didn’t expect that, per se. I had thought that maybe it would’ve also been a clear message if her dad really just passed away like that, I mean, they’d just gotten word from the hospital that morning that they should come to pay their final respects, that’s how bad it was looking for him. So the fact that he woke up was a little bit unrealistic to me. Of course I wanted him to wake up, so it was a relief as well, but also a little bit too idealistic.
What I found so touching about this arc was the dynamic between Choon Hee and Eun Gi, how they were such different species, two completely different generations, and yet they still meant so much to each other. It was definitely a learning experience for both of them.

Finishing off my character and story analyses with the story that is – I believe – considered to be the main one, let me talk about Dong Seok, Seon Ah and Ok Dong a bit more. So yeah, when Dong Seok was first introduced, I initially didn’t really like him. He just didn’t seem to be very sympathetic, he was grumpy and impatient and he lost his temper really quickly. We also initially see a scene of him and Seon Ah together on the beach, but when he kisses her and she pulls back, rejecting his further advances, the way he reacted to that also turned me off. He just didn’t seem to be very ‘nice’. On the other hand, I dare say that he got the most character development out of every single character in the series, and that build-up was really well done. I actually started liking him more throughout the story, especially when his relationships with the people in his story developed as well.
So we are introduced to Dong Seok as he’s returning from Mokpo to Jeju Island on the ferry. It seems like he basically lives in his truck, he sleeps there, it’s crammed with all kinds of stuff. He’s not a person who’s accustomed to luxury, in situations that involve sleeping over he usually takes the high road and offers to sleep on the floor, or just returns to his truck for the night. His truck itself is filled with the stuff he sells. He is constantly busy purchasing stuff in bulk, recording his own voice to promote the stuff he is selling, and he’s always on the road, always busy. From the beginning on, we learn that while Ok Dong is his birthmother, for some reason he seems to despise her. He doesn’t even refer to her as his mother, he ignores her messages and calls as well as those of other people telling him to contact his mother more. When she contacts him, he just gets angry at her for ‘suddenly acting like a mother’. He keeps saying that he’ll just regret his behavior toward her after he’s held her funeral. Other villagers definitely have their opinions about his behavior and the way he treats his mother, who is a respected elder in the village, but he never takes note of that. Through the flashbacks of him and how he got to know Seon Ah, we learn a bit about his childhood in which his mother seemed to have neglected him a lot. It seems like he felt abandoned by her after he lost his father and sister, as his mother just went on to another family right away.
Seon Ah, as I mentioned, suffers from depression. The way this was visualized was very clear and powerful. It literally showed all the lights going out one by one as soon as she was alone. She’d look out the window, and all the city lights just died, leaving her in complete darkness, phantom water dripping from her body. She describes it herself as feeling like a heavy, damp blanket is draped over her entire body. A hillbilly like Dong Seok would never truly understand a mental illness like that, so it’s hard to explain the intensity of this to him. Seon Ah claims that she wants to get better, but it seems like she can’t bring herself to actively fight it. This has resulted several times in cases where she unwillfully neglected her son as well. There were times when she’s not able to get out of bed while she was alone at home with her son. In the beginning there’s this really powerful scene in which we literally experience through her an entire day going by without her even noticing. It’s like, her husband takes her kid in the morning, she takes a shower, and suddenly it’s already evening and her husband is scolding her for again not taking care of any of the household chores he asked her to do in his absence. This is how Seon Ah has been living her life, trying to convince herself that she has it in her to get better.
She takes a trip back to Jeju after having her interview with the custody lady, feeling very gloomy about it since she’s seen her own child on screen admitting to being aware of her sickness. ‘Mom is very sick, so she can’t play with me’, in contrast to him referring to his dad as ‘his friend’. On Jeju, Dong Seok meets her coincidentally on the ferry and helps her fix her car, but takes care not to get too close to her as their previous meeting ended in that awkward rejection of a kiss. However, then an incident occurs in which Seon Ah either jumps or falls into the water. Luckily the haenyo, just sailing out, witness it and she’s rescued. She claims that she just fell, but honestly it wouldn’t be too far of a stretch to think that she may have jumped. In any case, after this Dong Seok kind of takes it upon himself to accommodate her, even takes her back to Seoul and then supports her after her custody claim is rejected. Seon Ah said to the custody lady that the reason she should get custody was because she couldn’t live without Yeol. After getting desperate in returning his son to her ex-husband, she even ends up hurting Yeol physically in an attempt to keep him in her arms, and then even her son doesn’t want to see her for a while. I honestly can’t remember exactly the timeline of when she came and went to Jeju Island, but in any case she decides to stay in Seoul while getting her life back together. In the meantime, Dong Seok works on the house he started building for her on Jeju. After some time has passed, Seon Ah realizes she now does have room for Dong Seok in her life, she misses him, so she ends up coming back to Seogwipo, even bringing Yeol with her.
While Seon Ah is in Seoul and the two are deciding on a time when she might come visit, Ok Dong suddenly asks Dong Seok for an outrageous favor. She wants to go to her stepson’s house in Mokpo to attend her ex-husband’s death memorial. Dong Seok eventually agrees to taking her there, and isn’t planning on joining her at first, but stuff happens and he’s confronted with his past as soon as he gets there. He witnesses his mom standing up for him against his stepbrother, something he’s never seen her do before, and this softens him a little bit. They end up taking quite the unexpected road trip together, all the way back to Jeju and even halfway up Mount Hallasan.
Let me just say that through this road trip I really got to understand Dong Seok’s point of view and the way he’d been acting all this time. In truth, I also thought he really just longed for his mother’s warmth, and always blamed her for neglecting him after he’d just lost his father and sister. I can also understand his frustration with the fact that Ok Dong never said anything about how she felt, or something that may have redeemed his memory of her. She never apologized and never said she loved him. I actually think that, just hearing those two things from her might have been the cure. Especially as Dong Seok later narrates himself, when he finds his mother has passed away, he realized he never actually resented her, he just wanted her to hug him. I think it was a very powerful way to conclude their story arc, because the way it still didn’t solve everything between them but they just decided to forgive each other was also very human and realistic. Dong Seok still didn’t get the closure he had wanted, Ok Dong still didn’t say anything to him from her perspective, but he got enough from her to see that she did feel bad about what had happened. And that may have been enough for him. He just wanted to know if she’d felt bad at all, and she definitely did.
I kind of saw it coming, as in, it was a bit typical to make amends between them so that at least Ok Dong wouldn’t die with a heavy heart, and that also reminded me a little bit of Hometown Cha-Cha-Cha, as the most respected elderly lady in that show also passed away after being reassured her ‘son’ was in good hands. It was just very serene that she got to take a whole trip to mend old wounds with Dong Seok, she even got to meet Seon Ah, she got to make her son’s favorite doenjang stew and feed her stray animals one last time, and then she went to lay down and didn’t wake again. It must have been very peaceful for her in her final moments, so at least that was a good thing.

Finally I want to give a shoutout to some important side characters, starting with the MoonStar sisters. Dal Yi and Byeol Yi (respectively played by Jo Hye Jung and Lee So Byeol) were two sisters who also grew up in Jeju, they were younger than Yeong Ok but older than Yeong Joo. I think they were in their early twenties, maybe. Dal Yi was one of the haenyo and she also helped out at Eun Hee’s fish market stall, besides helping her sister Byeol Yi with a coffee stand at the same market. Byeol Yi is deaf, or at least hearing-impaired. She can understand people well enough if she sees their mouths move and she can also talk well enough. Byeol Yi is a bit scared of the sea, so she’s always nervous when Dal Yi goes harvesting. The two sisters are also always helping out somewhere.
Then there’s Gi Joon (played by Baek Seung Do), Jeong Joon’s younger brother, who has a crush on Byeol Yi. It’s funny because it first seems like he is into Dal Yi, and everyone assumed that to be the case. But then suddenly he was like, nope, it’s the other sister, haha. Anyways, Byeol Yi isn’t really into him, it seems, but I guess there’s always hope. I saw some review referring to them as ‘my semi-sailed ship’, lol. In any case, I thought it was cute that Gi Joon was so head over heels for Byeol Yi, and it also made me feel like these people really weren’t judgmental at all when it came to people with disabilities, people who may be deemed ‘unfit’ by their future inlaws. It really didn’t matter to anyone at all.
Then, one of my -in hindsight- favorite side characters, haenyo Hye Ja (played by Park Ji Ah). She’s initially introduced as a very straightforward member of the harvesting team. She’s mainly getting on Yeong Ok’s bad side, constantly scolds her for coming to pick them up too late, and then for always being so greedy. She’s the first person suggesting they kick Yeong Ok out of the team, after she brings more people in danger when her flipper gets stuck in a net underwater. But then, after hearing Yeong Ok’s story about her sister, she immediately makes a turn for the better. She reveals that her own granddaughter (I believe) is autistic, that she knows how hard it can be having to take care of a mentally handicapped family member, she just immediately opened her mind to Yeong Ok’s good side, and that showed a really strong character, I think. I just really appreciated that someone who doesn’t seem to know anything outside life on Jeju, still turned out to be so open-minded welcoming to minorities, for example. For the rest she was always such a typical character, she fit right into that haenyo team, it was as if she really belonged there.

Something I overall enjoyed about this show was how human all the characters were, and that it was so realistic because they didn’t even try to make all the characters ‘nice’. There were different sides to everyone. As I mentioned, I initially really disliked Dong Seok, because he just seemed to be really bad-tempered, impatient, and kind of childish at times. The way he acted when some ladies started buying things from another truck, and then when Seon Ah rejected his kiss at the beach that one time. In the latter case, yes, he didn’t know about her circumstances, but it had been years since they last saw each other – he couldn’t just assume she still held the same feelings for him as he did for her. He just assumed now that hung out again for one night, everything was back to how it used to be between them, and when she pulled back from his kiss and immediately wanted to get away from him, he just got all grumpy and offended by himself.
I also liked seeing other sides to characters I did like from the start, like Yeong Ok. It made her all the more human and realistic that she felt burdened by her handicapped sister, and went to look for freedom. Same went for Han Soo when he went to ask Eun Hee for money. The duality in feelings, knowing that you’re doing something bad, and still going ahead with it because of your own ideals, taking time to reflect and realize you really did something bad, that’s a really human thing in my opinion.
We also saw how Ok Dong treated Dong Seok in the past, and he is able to forgive her even though she never apologizes to him. We can blame Ok Dong for her behavior towards her son, but I personally believe that she’s been living her life punishing herself for it. Maybe enduring the cancer in itself was also a kind of self-punishment for her.
There were always people that were acting mean or nasty, I mean, it was hard to like In Gwon as well since he was constantly cussing and speaking rudely to other people, getting violent for no reason. There were some members of the haenyo club who were being mean to Yeong Ok, like I also thought Hye Ja was really harsh a lot of times. But it all came down to going beyond the surface. As soon as they knew the full truth, the meaning behind what was happening, people were able to change their mindsets pretty easily. In the end, I came to actually like Hye Ja a lot, she turned out to be much more open-minded that you’d initially think. My point is that I learned to love all these characters despite their ‘bad’ characteristics, because it made them exactly the character that they were, it made them all so real and human and likeable in their own way, even if it took some time to get there.

The construction of the series was really nice. I liked how, even after an arc about a specific character had ended, their story still went on in the background of other stories, and we’d hear about it ‘through the grapevine’. For instance, the arc about Yeong Joo and Hyeon ends with their dads finally agreeing to Yeong Joo keeping the baby, and then in the next episode that focusses on someone else, we hear someone mention that the two have gotten married in the meantime and that Yeong Joo is doing very well. After we’ve seen Yeong Joo being carried to the hospital a month before her due date, we hear in a later episode that she gave birth safely to a little girl. Everything keeps happening, even though we don’t actually see it, and that also kept the feeling of community going, developments still travel through the village, people keep each other updated on events, and it really strengthens the feeling of everyone being connected to one another.

All in all, the arcs all feature a certain conflict between two (or three) specific characters and they all end well. Every storyline is wrapped up in a positive way, people make amends, people come to terms, people heal, etcetera. I have to say that I really liked the way this series was structured, also with the intros for each respective chapter being featured as a literal record of their own ‘blues’. Speaking of the title, apart from the ‘blues’ referring to a specific kind of soothing music, I think it also refers to the emotional load of the word ‘blues’, like a dip in someone’s daily life, a moment of gloom and melancholy.
On the topic of music, by the way, I can’t forget to mention that the OST was amazing and I downloaded the majority of it. Not me humming along with the ‘Tell me quando, quando, quando~’ every time it was played, lol.

What I also really appreciated was that, in the final ending credits, literally every single person who appeared, even as a guest or cameo appearance, was featured one last time, and they did the same in the crew appreciation pictures. It was the most extensive ending credit sequence I’ve seen so far. Usually they show a couple of backstage photos and then one group picture of cast and crew at the end, but in this case, I feel like every single person who participated in one way or another got credit and that was really nice to see. I also liked that the intro for the final episode wasn’t just ‘Dong Seok and Ok Dong Pt.3’, even though it was their final chapter, but it featured the whole cast and even gave a kind of recap of the whole show so far. I really appreciated that, certainly because I knew I was going to write a review as soon as I finished it and it was nice getting a little recap from some episodes that already felt like a long time ago. It just felt so wholesome having everyone featured again one last time in the end, at that Athletic Meet. It really was a great way to wrap up the show.

And now, coming to another extensive part that I’ll try to keep as brief as possible: the cast comments! The entire cast of this series was incredibly well picked, everyone fitted their role so well it was like every role was written for that specific actor. I enjoyed everyone’s performances, and it was nice to see both familiar faces and new ones. I’d seen several people act together in dramas before, so it was nice to see them in a completely new dynamic here.

This is by far my favorite performance of Lee Jung Eun so far. I’ve never seen her in such a quirky, youthful, energetic role before. I honestly think I’ve only seen her play moms and crazy cameos so far, so this was a very unexpected side of her, in a good way. I loved how natural the boorishness of Eun Hee came to her, and how she was still able to convey so much emotion, Eun Hee had such a good heart, and I feel like she was bluffing a lot of her toughness to her friends. She had really nice chemistry with the people around her, I loved how she just couldn’t stop herself from caring about others. Like how she immediately became concerned about Yeong Joo after meeting her outside the OB-GYN, and how nervous she was when the girl was taken to the hospital a month before she was due. It was nice to see her also display grudgeful feelings, we really got to see multiple sides of her personality.
I’ve seen Lee Jung Eun before in High Schooler King of Life, Who Are You – School 2015, Oh My Ghostess, Jealousy Incarnate, Weightlifting Fairy Kim Bok Joo, Tomorrow With You (where she played Shin Min Ah’s mom), Fight For My Way, Wife I Know (where she played Han Ji Min’s mom) The Light in Your Eyes (where she played Han Ji Min’s mom), and of course the movie Parasite. She’s always such a nice familiar face in dramas and I always love it when she appears. This definitely made me see her in yet another light, I saw another kind of versatility from her, and I think she did great. I feel like she is really the kind of actress who can be funny without even trying. Also, I want to know the stylist’s contact because she may not have been the most fashionable lady, but I loved every single pair of pants she wore throughout the show!
I also really liked Eun Hee’s high school younger version, played by Shim Dal Gi. I loved how quirky she was, in every scene. The one with the pig on the bus, the one where she brazenly kissed young Han Soo, the one where she passed out in the school gym… She really didn’t hold back in her expressions either, I loved it!

I hadn’t seen Cha Seung Won in anything before, but I thought he was an interesting casting choice for Han Soo. It was nice to see how much he changed in comparison to how depressed he looked in the first episode. You could see how little he thought of himself there, how badly he felt for asking this of his friend, but still couldn’t change his mind not to do it. It was good that they managed to redeem his character in the end, so that there were no lingering tensions during his final appearance at the Athletic Meet. He did very well! I was honestly intriguid by his character the moment he busted his toe on that chair the moment he was introduced, lol.

I also didn’t know Eom Jung Hwa from anything, but I really liked her performance here. She really had that duality to her as Mi Ran. You know when you have that friend that, when you hang out with them it’s all good and you get along so well, but then when they’re not there, you’re suddenly able to see clearly that they’re not 100% green flags? I guess it was a bit like that with Mi Ran as well, at least until Eun Hee opened her eyes to see her from a different perspective, as someone who’d always just taken her for granted. And still I couldn’t dislike Mi Ran either, because her heart was still in the right place. She also felt bad about the things she’d said and done to Eun Hee to make her feel like that, and even though I believe Eun Hee still had to make the most effort in making things right between them, it was clear she really didn’t want to fight with Eun Hee either, she truly cared about her. I liked her performance.

I didn’t think I knew Choi Young Joon from anything, but then I discovered he was one of the Daekan soldiers from Arthdal Chronicles! Not only that, he also played a police detective in The Sound of Magic, apparently. Anyways, he never really stood out to me until now. His performance as Ho Shik was really memorable. I liked that he wasn’t such a badass as In Gwon, and also wasn’t that impressive in physique, but he still used his voice and he didn’t stand down easily. He had his own kind of strength, even though he was milder in temperament than In Gwon. I really liked to see his dynamic with his daughter as well, especially in the way you could just see how conflicted he was. One scene that comes to mind is that one where Yeong Joo told him she was pregnant, and then the top of the fan kept toppling over – how he used his frustration towards the fan in his outburst to his daughter… It was such a subtle addition but I thought it was genius. It just added an extra tension to the scene because it was a funny element in a very serious situation, and I just felt like ‘I’m not supposed to laugh here but GOD THAT FAN’. Anyways, I was really impressed by him, I doubt I’ll overlook him next time I see him in a drama series! He got my attention, for sure!

Not me realizing that Park Ji Hwan was the shady-looking but poetry-loving guy from Touch Your Heart! I would have never recognized him. The role of In Gwon fitted him so well it was almost scary. He just WAS In Gwon, from top to bottom, he completely had the character down, the hunched back, the way he walked, his face that was set in a constant growl… Amazing. He may not have been the ‘nicest’ character in the bunch but I loved him mainly because of how well he was performed. You just knew that shit would go down when Hyeon would tell him about Yeong Joo’s pregnancy, and then to still devote an entire scene to it in which Hyeon really had to spell it out to him, building up the tension with each step…
I believe In Gwon’s heart was buried under way more layers than Ho Shik’s. It really took a lot for In Gwon to stop screaming and finally letting the tears flow. I guess that the moment where he broke, was the moment that I broke as well. It just seemed impossible for him to ever have a heart-to-heart, sharing emotional feelings, especially with another man, but they actually got him to that point. The build-up in his character going through that process was really well executed, I was really impressed by him. Another actor I won’t easily forget after this!

I hadn’t seen Noh Yoon Seo before, but I saw that she’s also now appearing in a new show called Crash Course in Romance that I also want to watch. She doesn’t have a DramaWiki page yet, but it seems like this was actually her drama debut and she hasn’t done anything else besides one movie. Considering that, I believe she’s a real upcoming talent. She portrayed very well the uneasiness with which Yeong Joo was living on Jeju, not feeling at home there. She was awkward in greeting people, she didn’t really have a lot of friends at school either. She was just the top of her class and it was her goal to graduate and get off the island as soon as possible. It was such relatable teenage behavior, wanting to get out of the countryside village, wanting to break away from all those people (including her dad) who were so set in their ways. Her struggle with the pregnancy and her conflictedness regarding the abortion was also very credible. I just found myself feeling for her, having ended up in this situation, knowing what other people will say and how your dad’s going to take it. She did really well!

Apart from that he apparently had a cameo in What’s Wrong With Secretary Kim?, I haven’t seen anything with Bae Hyeon Seong either. I thought Hyeon was such a sweetheart. He really was the opposite of his father, with the kindest heart that seemed to beat solely for Yeong Joo. As I mentioned (and captured with a picture), that scene of Hyeon and In Gwon hugging each other and crying really pulled at my heartstrings. I just love it when men finally dare to cry. There was definitely a lot to unravel in the relationship between Hyeon and his dad. He was always second in school (after Yeong Joo), but In Gwon was always telling everyone that his son was top of his class and boasted with the fact that he would study in Seoul after graduation. I really admired Hyeon for having the guts to even confront his dad about the pregnancy in the first place, like, he knew he was going to get beaten, but he never wavered. He always faced his dad, no matter the punishment he got, and that in itself, his unwavering determination, was what made him strong in his own way. His unwavering determination in wanting to take care of Yeong Joo and their baby. I really loved Hyeon, he really was the sweetest boy ever, and the best dad Yeong Joo could wish for her child. The way he was always there to hold her hand and the way they tackled the situation together, made the decision together that Yeong Joo would continue school and he would eventually take the GED. And it was nice to see how, when everything was settled with their dads, In Gwon also took pride in how hard his son was working for his wife (as they’d gotten married by that point). I really liked him.

Han Ji Min, I’ve mentioned it before in previous reviews, but she’s really working her way up to becoming a favorite actress of mine. There’s just something about her that makes me like her, in whatever she does. Even if she has a nasty side to her character, she always performs it in a way that still makes me sympathize with her. I thought she really fit in this story as the outsider mysterious girl from the mainland trying to fit into this village community and finding her place in the harvesting and fishing world. I think Yeong Ok’s deal was that she made herself into the bad guy too much. In regards to her sister, she kept emphasizing that she was trying to push her away by continuously moving further and further away from her, but at the moment she actually tried to abandon her when she was a teenager, she went back to fetch her because she couldn’t bring herself to do it. Even when Yeong Hee came to Jeju, she wasn’t trying to neglect her, she tried to make Yeong Hee feel comfortable. So I was a bit confused about what exactly her intentions were with her sister. I guess she just wanted to leave and not look back, but when the occasion rose that she needed to take care of her, she still turned up for her, despite her unwillingness. I initially thought something really bad had happened between them since she referred to Yeong Hee as ‘Disaster’, like, she must have really done something bad to earn that name. But then it seemed like Yeong Ok was shining a bad light on her sister while she was the one treating her badly. Anyways, her selfishness in that also made her very human, in a way. I still couldn’t bring myself to dislike her! I’ve seen Han Ji Min before in several shows, like Rooftop Prince, Hyde, Jekyll, Me, Wife I Know and The Light in Your Eyes (where she also acted alongside Lee Jung Eun and Kim Hye Ja).

I was so glad to finally see Kim Woo Bin again! I missed him so much! T^T And he looked so healthy, too! I was really wondering how he would be doing after finishing his chemo for his nasopharyngeal cancer. I loved him in this show. This is without a doubt the least problematic and most sympathetic, uncomplicated character I’ve seen him portray and it suited him so well. I’ve seen him in a bunch of shows, like Drama Special: White Christmas, To The Beautiful You, School 2013, The Heirs, and his most recent work (from 2016), Uncontrollably Fond. I really liked seeing him in a different kind of role than he got before, not the bad boy or the delinquent, but a really straight-up nice guy. Jeong Joon and Yeong Ok were really cute together, they had a really nice chemistry. I didn’t even mind that much that there wasn’t an actual kissing scene, because it was clear enough from the scenes they had how they felt about each other. It’s funny how I now realize that Jeong Joon didn’t really have a story of his own except for Yeong Ok’s, but that was okay in itself, it just showed how easygoing and uncomplicated he was. I’d love to see more roles like this from him, to highlight his sweet and kind side.

I can’t forget to give a shoutout to Jung Eun Hye, who played Yeong Hee! I loved seeing this kind of diversity, I’ve never seen a character with a handicap ever get such a highlighted role in a drama before. She did so well, even more so considering she’s not even an official actress. I saw that she appeared in a movie about her own life as a caricature portrait artist. The drawings that appear in the show are all drawn by her, as well, a really nice addition. I loved that they showed this little ‘behind the scenes’ at the end of the show in which Han Ji Min was prompting her lines in the scene where she was accusing Yeong Ok of abandoning her in the subway and she didn’t break character even once! Maybe it wasn’t easy for her to remember all her lines, but I still think she did a really good job. I thought she was adorable.

Choon Hee was one of my favorite characters in this show, and it was all thanks to Mrs. Go Doo Shim. I’ve seen her before in Gyeryong Fairytale, High Society and My Mister. This role fitted her beautifully. I loved her duality as well, the tough and hardened surface of being born and raised on this island, losing half her family, living with the dangers of the sea everyday, and all the while she was still so kind. She still had a really good bond with her son, she loved it when family and friends came over. I also really loved her friendship with Ok Dong, these two grannies really conquered the world together, haha. She really stuck by her friend throughout her deteriorating illness, and I just realized that time they said goodbye in Mokpo really was the last time she saw her. T^T I kind of had the feeling during that scene like, she’s acting like she’s never going to see her again, but then she actually didn’t. 😦 She spoke to her on the phone, but she didn’t see her friend again before she passed away. 😦 I also really loved how naturally it came to her to act as a strict but still doting grandma to Eun Gi, their happy scenes together were really adorable. This lady is 71 years old and she still plays the stars from the sky. Or should I say, the 100 moons? I loved her to bits.

Speaking of Eun Gi, what in the world of what. This child, Ki So Yoo, now six years old, was FIVE at the time this was filmed. I have never seen a five-year old act SO well before in my life. She wasn’t just adorable, she got all her cues down, the tears came naturally, it was like she wasn’t even acting. I was completely flabbergasted! I just found out that she’s the younger sister of the little boy from Hometown Cha-Cha-Cha, so hey, another link there, haha. But seriously, I was immensely impressed by this little lady. Just seeing her and Go Doo Shim together, the tiny human versus the veteran, it just healed my heart. Their chemistry was amazing. I’m sure it would’ve been very challenging for her, amongst all those veteran actors. She was really good, I’m impressed with Korean child actors! I really loved the scene where Choon Hee took her to the market and asked Dong Seok to lift her on his shoulders, and he ended up asking Ho Shik and as a result Eun Gi got hoisted around the market, first on Ho Shik’s shoulders, then on In Gwon’s, then on Jeong Joon’s. That was really cute, and again it captured that beautiful community feeling. Everyone considered Eun Gi to be part of the family, which she was, in a certain sense. I really was amazed by her performance. Well done, little lady!

To be honest, even though I know Lee Byung Hoon to be a very famous actor, I’ve never actually watched anything he appeared in. I once attempted to watch IRIS, but I couldn’t finish it. It was cool to finally see him in a drama! I thought he was really good, the character also fitted him very well. I actually liked the fact that I didn’t like him at first, haha. I found it refreshing to introduce a character as not being very sympathetic. But as I mentioned, I believe he really got the most character development out of everyone, or at least his development was spread out over the entire show rather than just in the chapters with his name on it. In the end I completely understood his behavior, and most importantly, he reflected on himself. What was funny was that, in one of the first scenes, I was randomly thinking that Kim Hye Ja could just as well play his mother, because somehow I could see some similarity in their expressions, and then she actually turned out to play his mom! I swear, I thought it before I knew about how their characters were connected. In any case, I just mean to say that I could really feel the dynamic between them. Despite trying to remain stoic, Dong Seok just couldn’t help lose his cool, he kept lashing out even when he’d decided he wasn’t going to. Everything about him just screamed ‘neglected childhood’. It was sad that he’d been through that, and also that his mother had seemingly turned her back on him, but it made perfect sense that he’d become the way he was because of it. Also in his connection with Seon Ah, I guess he really wanted to impress her, but he still was that teenage boy with a crush who was just waiting for her to finally say she liked him too. That boyish aspect of his character just confirmed to me in hindsight that that was really what it was: he just wanted someone to acknowledge him because of the familial warmth he lost as a child. He really wanted to have some of that warmth. I think he did a really great job, he’s a very good actor.

Seeing Shin Min Ah in this series just immediately pulled me back to Hometown Cha-Cha-Cha. Here as well, she was kind of a mysterious outsider even though Seon Ah actually did grow up on Jeju. I think the visualization of her depression was very well done, also because it seemed to happen automatically as soon as she was alone. Tiny events that improved her mood were just that, tiny things that didn’t weigh up against the complete feeling. I think she did really well in performing that heaviness, the forcing of a smile, the tiredness in her body. I have never seen Shin Min Ah in such a melancholic role before, but I think it really suited her. I’ve mentioned this before, but I think Shin Min Ah has a really mature appeal to her, and acting cute doesn’t suit her. I think the character of Seon Ah, the maturity of her even through her depression, fitted her really well.
I was wondering if she and Kim Woo Bin would have any scenes together, but I think maybe they appeared in the same scene just once, in the café, and they never even exchanged any pleasantries. It’s nice that they could be a part of this together, especially after Shin Min Ah allegedly took such care of Kim Woo Bin during his chemo. I hope they continue to be happy together. 🙂 I’ve seen Shin Min Ah before in My Girlfriend is a Nine-Tailed Fox, Oh My Venus, Tomorrow With You, and most recently in Hometown Cha-Cha-Cha. I liked her performance here.

I just know Kim Hye Ja from The Light in Your Eyes, which was also her latest project before this one. I guess she’s kind of a national treasure, and I can understand why. She’s 81 years old and still delivers such a heartfelt performance. She’s such a curious frail old lady. I did find it hard to gauge what she was thinking, also because she very rarely spoke, but it always feels like she knows exactly what she’s doing. She did show a lot of emotion, both as a result of her illness and her reunion trip with Dong Seok, but I would’ve liked to hear her talk a bit more about what her feelings were during that time in which Dong Seok felt so neglected. She referred to herself as a crazy woman, and that she didn’t want him to have a crazy woman as his mother, or something, but it was still a little vague. I still wonder why she never apologized for making her son feel like that, but on the other hand I guess she didn’t really feel the need to. She did what she did at the time without feeling sorry for it, so why would she apologize now? Or maybe it was something else. Actually it’s okay that not the entire truth came out, it was most important that they reconciled anyway. It was peculiar of her character, because I felt like she actually really wanted to get along with Dong Seok but kept being thrown off by his bad temper whenever she tried to extend a reconciling hand. I also wondered what she saw in all those stray animals. Like Dong Seok also inquired, ‘how can she look so lovingly at a dog but not at her son’? I guess now that she got old and didn’t have long to live anymore, she really just wanted to enjoy the things that made her happy, like seeing newborn babies, feeding stray puppies, and seeing beautiful landscapes. Her stubbornness also came through a lot, she never actively asked for help until someone else noticed she was struggling. She actively refused any treatment for her cancer, she always just wove it away like ‘it’s nothing’. In that way, I also recognized a part of Dong Seok’s stubbornness in her. I think she gave a really nice ‘own’ twist to her character, and kept her a little bit mysterious up until the every end.

It was nice to see Jo Hye Jung in a drama again! I haven’t seen her since Go Back Couple from 2017! I further know her from Cinderella and the Four Knights and Weightlifting Fairy Kim Bok Joo. She looked really good in this drama! It was nice to see her getting some action as well in the harvesting department, and how she and her sister were also a really integrated part of the Pureung family. Even though she wasn’t a main character with an arc of her own, I liked to see that she too got involved in the dynamics of the town. She got along really well with Yeong Ok, for example, but also felt the tensions rising within the haenyo team and also kept telling her to just apologize and not take such risks. It was funny how excited she got when Gi Joon told her he liked her sister, I bet she was probably relieved that it wasn’t her he was confessing to, haha. Anyways, it was really nice to see her in this.

I see this was Lee So Byeol’s drama debut as well! I thought it was nice to integrate a hearing-impaired character into the village community so smoothly. Everyone accepted her the way she was, there was never any kind of discrimination against her, and she even got a cute guy to like her! Living the life, girl! Haha, no but I really liked the normalization of her handicap in this series. This show seems to be a really good start of one’s acting career, so I hope she’ll get many more chances in the future. I don’t even know if she’s hearing-impaired for real, it doesn’t seem so, but in that case she also pulled that off really well, with the voice and everything!

Apparently, Baek Seung Do appeared in Andante, but I haven’t seen any other shows with him. I thought he was a nice side character, not just because of his semi-sailed ship with Byeol Yi, but because he got some nice brotherly scenes with Kim Woo Bin as well. He really suited the role, like basically everyone in this series suited their role. He didn’t have a lot of screentime, but I thought he added nicely to the community feeling of the village, as he was also everywhere, at the boat, helping out at the fish market, etc. I liked him.

I see there are still some series on my list in which Park Ji Ah appears, but she hasn’t done much drama acting yet! I really liked how well she fitted into the scenery of this show, she really looked like she could’ve been a local haenyo, haha. I love it when actors get so immersed in their characters they just come to life in such an authentic way, and I really liked that about haenyo Hye Ja. I’m curious to see her in further watchlist dramas!

There are so many characters to name so I’ve just stuck to the ones I’ve covered in my analysis, but honestly I thought every single person was casted so well, everyone looked like they belonged there, and I wouldn’t be surprised if there were some locals in there too. The whole vibe was just so authentic, I really, really enjoyed watching it. It gave me a kind of healing that no other show has given me before in the same way. All in all, vibe-wise and cast-wise it felt like a combination of Hometown Cha-Cha-Cha and The Light in Your Eyes, which I both watched last year. It was so nice seeing all these great actors in one show together, some of whom I’d seen perform together before as well. Lee Jung Eun played both Shin Min Ah’s and Han Ji Min’s mom in other series, just like Kim Hye Ja played Lee Jung Eun’s mother-in-law before. I really loved the whole vibe, the whole setup, the whole build-up. The fact that there can be such deeply rooted conflicts between people in a place where life is supposed to be so simple, where life is about harmonizing with nature and the ocean. Emotions come out more intensely in a place like this, and that sets such a great contrast to ‘normal’ city-based drama stories. Events of life and death taking place in a community where everyone knows each other, where there are normally no daily dramatic occurrances, it just gives it an even deeper strength.
I love how unpretentious this series was. In general romantic comedies you sometimes see actors really ‘try’ to be funny, they really ‘try’ to perform in a way that induces laughter from the audience. It may sound strange, but in this series I didn’t feel like the actors were performing for the audience. Everyone was so immersed in their character that I felt like I was a bystander looking in on these events, looking in on these conflicts between these people, while the characters weren’t even trying to involve me in their lives. It was just really authentic, nothing was ‘pasted on’, so to speak. The actors were funny without even trying to be, they were just acting out what their character would do. One thing I learned in acting class is that it’s the funniest when the character takes himself seriously, when he’s not even trying to make a joke. Here too, no one ‘tried’ to be anything, everything just came out so realistically. Even in emotional outlashes and dramatics, nothing was too much, everything was ‘just right’. No overacting, just pure, genuine immersion. I’ve not seen anything like this in a very long time. I also loved feeling like I became a part of the community at the end. During the Athletic Meet, I found myself cheering and laughing as if I was sitting in the audience myself. That’s not a feeling I usually get from dramas, and it’s definitely something that makes this one stand out even more.

It was definitely worth it to take my time finishing this, it deserved all the time, and I don’t feel like I wasted a single minute. This is a pure gem, truly one of a kind. I can’t even compare it to the two series I mentioned before, even though I was reminded of them in terms of cast and vibe. Our Blues exceeds both of them in my opinion. An incredible project, it really exceeded my expectations. I’m already sorry for what comes next, haha. Just kidding, I’m just going on with my list! Next up is a Chinese drama, as it’s been a while and I’m trying to switch it up a little more. I’ve spent an entire day on this review, but I think I managed to structure it as well as I could. I hope it will be relatable and enjoyable to read.

Okay then, until next time!

Bye-bee! x

SPOILER WARNING: DO NOT READ IF YOU STILL PLAN ON WATCHING THIS SERIES OR HAVEN’T FINISHED IT YET!!

That Man Oh Soo / Evergreen
(그남자 오수 / Geunamja Osu)
MyDramaList rating: 6.5/10

The thing I like best about having an extended drama-to-watch list is that I always have something to look forward to. Whenever I start a new drama, I always feel the thrill of starting something I’ve been looking forward to, something that’s been on my list for a long time and I finally get to watch it.
That was the same for this one. I’m not sure where I heard or read about it, but it probably looked cute and that’s why it went on the list.
The only thing I remembered was that it was about a cafe or something with coffee. I always like to be surprised by series.

So, the English title of this drama is ‘Evergreen’, but the literal translation of the Korean title is ‘That Man Oh Soo’.
The story is about a young man named Oh Soo (played by Lee Jong Hyun), who doesn’t believe in love. He’s a promising IT engineer who specializes in artificial intelligence. The reason he doesn’t believe in love is because of a magic tree that’s in possession of his family. In the courtyard of his house is a big tree with all sorts of colorful flowers that give off certain pollen. Oh Soo’s family is cursed with the ability to see the colors of these pollen – and also the color of people’s auras. Also in possession of his family is a cafe. When customers come to the cafe, Oh Soo can see their auras and based on that determines what kind of pollen he can add to their coffee.
One time, he serves coffee with the love pollen to a couple from which the guy seemingly is about to propose. Instead, to everyone’s astonishment, after drinking the coffee he suddenly breaks up with the girl and leaves her behind at the cafe. This unfortunate girl is Seo Yoo Ri (played by Kim So Eun). She had been dating this guy for three years, and this was the day he’d sworn he would propose. Yoo Ri is also a police officer.
After that, Oh Soo and Yoo Ri meet several times, first under not such great circumstances, but gradually they grow closer. Oh Soo finally discovers what love feels like and eventually they end up together.
However, I didn’t say that Oh Soo’s family was ‘cursed’ for no reason. It turns out that, if the successor (in this case Oh Soo) gives coffee to the person he loves, she will end up dying. And Yoo Ri just so happens to have had a sip before. The more their relationship starts to grow, the weaker Yoo Ri becomes. In the end, it seems that the only way for her to live is for Oh Soo to sever ties with her forever, but will they be okay even after falling so passionately in love?

First of all, to explain from the start Oh Soo’s family history in a nutshell: he lives with his grandfather (played by Park Geun Hyung) and older brother Oh Ga Na (played by Heo Jung Min). His grandfather and father inherited the curse of the tree, Ga Na didn’t. He isn’t able to see the auras or the pollen. Their father used to run the cafe. One day, in a period where his parents were fighting, Oh Soo brought a cup with love-pollen coffee that his father had made to his mother in the hope it would help them reconcile. However, this was a grave mistake. His father came too late, mom already drank the coffee. And from then on, the curse started working. Mother gradually started getting dizzy spells and got into multiple accidents. In the end, father couldn’t bear it anymore and ended his own life to save his wife from suffering because of this curse. And though the curse was lifted after he literally severed ties with her, mother was so unhappy after losing her husband that she too withered away. This is what makes Oh Soo so scared of falling in love.

First of all, I would like to say, it wasn’t the best drama I’ve watched. There were a lot of discontinuities in the editing, the acting was occasionally sloppy and there were a lot of plotholes. However, I still enjoyed it. It was cute and a typical K-Drama romance and I really liked the main couple.

I would first like to comment on the casting and the characters before I go on with some more elaborated criticism.

I didn’t know Lee Jong Hyun although I found out he’s a member of CNBLUE. I haven’t seen any other dramas with him so I can’t really judge his acting based on earlier performances, but I think he did generally well.
At first I thought Oh Soo was going to be this standard coldhearted guy only interested in work until a bright-spirited girl would show him the way of love, but he’s actually really pure.
He explains in the beginning that he doesn’t believe in love, that it only distracts people, etcetera etcetera, but in the end I think that he’s actually afraid of love rather than that he doesn’t believe in it. Because when he does fall in love himself he doesn’t attempt to get rid of his feelings, he actively pursues them. He’s just never experienced it before, and that’s why it’s easy to say he doesn’t believe in him. The only example he has is of his parents, which ended cruelly because of the tree’s curse.
Despite the angsty background story I thought he was a real bean, trying to hide his smiles when watching Yoo Ri and trying to create as many opportunities as possible to be near her. Living in the same neighborhood, a day wouldn’t usually go by without them running into each other, so that helped. And even when a love rival turns up, he doesn’t back off and only works harder to be there for Yoo Ri instead of the other guy.
The only other role I’ve seen of Kim So Eun is in Boys Over Flowers as Geum Jan Di’s best friend. It was funny to see her as a main lead, although I wasn’t very impressed by her performance. In the beginning it didn’t bother me that much, but I don’t know, Yoo Ri’s personality remained really bland to me until the end. Seo Yoo Ri is a very confident woman, she’s been taking care of her younger sister Soo Jung (played by Park Na Ye) ever since her father died and her mother got admitted to the hospital. But she didn’t really seem to have a social life, or any friends for that matter. The only time we see her drinking, if it’s not with either Oh Soo or Jin Woo, is with people from her neighborhood, and I’m talking middle-aged ladies. Apart from her police work and neighborhood charity work, she didn’t really seem to have a life, however cruel that may sound. There were no details to fill in to enrich her personality, like specific traits or hobbies. After finishing the series I really couldn’t say what she likes or what kind of person she is.
While I didn’t have the second male lead syndrome watching this series, I did feel for the second male lead, because it was Kang Tae Oh. I’ve now seen three series with him in total and I just love the actor too much to dislike him. Kim Jin Woo (played by Kang Tae Oh), is Yoo Ri’s childhood friend who finds her again after a long time, him now being her younger sister’s homeroom teacher. Jin Woo makes his intentions to Yoo Ri clear from the beginning, he’s also the first person to ask her out. Until the end, no matter how much he dislikes Oh Soo, he keeps supporting them and is basically the best guy friend a girl could have.
If there was a second female lead, I would probably say it was Han Hyo Jin (played by Kim Yeon Seo), because she went after Oh Soo in the beginning, but she ended up with his brother through a drunk one-night stand so she wasn’t really a love rival and Yoo Ri never felt threatened by her. I assume that this actress is relatively new because she doesn’t have her own page on dramawiki and AsianWiki only lists one other drama and movie with her.
I’ve seen Heo Jung Min before in Another Oh Hae Young, where he had a similar kind of role as here – the crazy brother. I get that he has this weird thing going on and that he’s cast as a comic relief because of his hysterical acting, but I am actually really curious to see him in a serious role. The way he would sometimes just start screaming his lines started annoying me a bit, making me think ‘why can’t he just say this in a normal way?’ And I personally didn’t like the blond hair look on him.

On the basis of beforementioned characters I will now work my way through my criticisms and take it from there.
First of all, I find the whole idea of a cafe that puts stuff in your coffee to mess with your emotions without the personal permission of the customers kind of disturbing. Of course it was all innocent and it was meant to give people a nudge in the right direction, but when I thought about it I really thought, what gives these people any right to meddle in the emotional affairs of people? Especially after finding out the true nature of the tree and that it was cursed and all… I would not be happy if I found out I made some radical emotional decision because someone put something in my coffee without my knowledge. So there was something wrong with that whole concept. If they’d made it a special cafe that people could go to who needed help with their emotions, okay. If you have a magic tree, add actual magic to the story. This, and the fact that the women in Oh Soo’s family (his grandmother and mother) were kept out of the whole curse story. They weren’t allowed to know. I mean, what kind of a marriage is that? Oh Soo’s mother seriously died indirectly because of a magical curse she knew nothing about. She never knew what actually happened to her and why, she never understood why her husband killed himself and no one ever thought to include her in knowing. I don’t know man, it stinks.

Back to Yoo Ri, I found it weird that they only showed she was a police officer in the second or third episode. Before that, it’s not even mentioned. They just suddenly showed her in a uniform and I was like… uhh okay? At first I even thought they were filming a drama in the drama in which she extra’d as a police officer or something.
And then there’s the story about her not being able to drink coffee, so that her mother made a special vending machine with warm milk and stuff for her that she has to take care of now. And then she’s drunk at the cafe and in a thirsty mood she just grabs a cup of coffee and drinks it like it’s nothing and also acts really casual about ‘yeah I was once rushed to a hospital because a drank coffee’. Girl, then why are you willingly drinking the coffee? There was literally a VASE of water in front of her. Bad writing. Of course for end motives they needed her to drink some of the coffee, but it could’ve been written so much better. Also, Oh Soo not finding out what happened to that cup of coffee -although it was thrown randomly on a couch somewhere- until months later when she literally tells him she drank the coffee that one time. Bad writing.
And I found it weird that the curse worked on them the same way as it did on his parents because 1. Oh Soo didn’t love Yoo Ri when she drink the coffee and 2. He didn’t give it to her, she drank it by accident. There were too many grey areas there.

One thing that really bothered me, and I mentioned this before, was the discontinuity in a lot of scenes, especially ending scenes and opening scenes. Every episode would start with the last scene from the previous episode. For example, one episode ends with Oh Soo and Yoo Ri coming across each other on the street and Oh Soo asks Yoo Ri something. While they are staring at each other, Jin Woo approaches and joins them, showing the love triangle in an actual triangle. End. And the next episode starts with the same scene, except now Oh Soo and Yoo Ri have an entire conversation before Jin Woo joins them. Details like this confused me.
Also, ‘accidentally’ not seeing someone while they were right in front of them, a cop not recognizing a culprit without his mask though she literally held him and stood next to him and saw his eyes.
Actually, this is what brings me to my next point: Yoo Ri’s credibility when it comes to being a cop. Because she did not seem like a good cop to me at all.
In scenes where she’d be chasing someone, she was clearly struggling. I could see that the actress did not have the stamina Yoo Ri claims to have.
She literally caught the culprit of the sexual assault case and was just about to take off his mask when she fainted, but when he appears before her as a food delivery guy, she does not see anything (height, eyes, whatever she WAS able to see) that alarms her. She actually lets him into her house and has dinner with him. So I would say sufficient wariness as a cop: no.
And it annoyed me that she didn’t honestly tell Oh Soo that she was having weird dizzy spells, even when he started pressing that these dizzy spells were important and dangerous.

Which brings me to my next point (I’m on a roll): the revelation of Oh Soo’s secret. Because as much as I liked his character, he ruined it for me when he started to do what every stupid boy in every Asian drama does when he finds out he is endangering the person he loves: instead of telling them the truth, he started being an ass. He broke up with Yoo Ri out of the blue and just started making up jerk reasons for not wanting to be with her anymore. He could’ve just told her the truth, she would’ve believed him. Because when he does tell her the truth a little later, she immediately believes him. There was absolutely no need for this unnecessary heartbreak. And it didn’t solve anything, because he could push her away as cruelly as he wanted, his true feelings for her still made the curse work. So it was actually not necessary. I was so pissed at him for doing it like that. Ending it like that without a normal explanation and then still crawling back to find out how she was doing. I mean, wasn’t he trying to get away from her? Anyway, it didn’t work, so he could’ve just told her the truth in the first place. Because after he did that, she understood why they had to break up.
I was actually happy when Jin Woo punched him in the face after he came back and asked how Yoo Ri was doing after breaking her heart. He deserved that. And he was a coward for trying to flee to Germany as an excuse to get away from her. In any case, what I’m trying to say is that the breakup was unnecessary.

My final major criticism is about the ending of the series. Oh Soo ‘sacrifices’ himself for Yoo Ri by drinking pollen from the dead rotten black flowers of the tree to save Yoo Ri and then falls into a sleep or coma, or something that he doesn’t wake up from. Yoo Ri doesn’t know any better than that he’s gone to Germany. Even Ga Na calls her to say that he’s gone to Germany.
The last thing we see of Oh Soo is that he’s in bed and his grandfather is shaking him, trying to wake him up to no result.
Then, all of a sudden, there is a time jump to three years later. But except from Yoo Ri wearing a different uniform and another woman having a child, everything and everyone is exactly the same. You’d say more changed in 3 years. I’d expected Ga Na to at least have dyed his hair another color or something. Not a very succesful time jump if you can’t show anything’s changed. Anywho, we suddenly see Oh Soo back in Korea (nothing is explained about what happened to him, how he got better, or anything). The only thing we learn is that he went to Germany and apparently lost part of his memories because he’s trying to find ‘that woman’ but he doesn’t know who she is. Of course, we know it’s Yoo Ri, but nothing is explained about what is going on. He still remembers his family and his colleague, but not Hyo Jin or Yoo Ri. Very weird. In the end, he finds Yoo Ri but still doesn’t remember her and then lastly there’s a scene at the sea they promised to go to together and he just smiles at her and she smiles back and they go for a walk. The end. Like. The whole series leads up to their passionate love for each other. They had a perfectly fine love story, it could’ve been wrapped so nicely, he was able to save her and himself, happy ending. Why end it in such an open and vague way?? I was so confused why they couldn’t have just made it a closed ending. Their relationship was so solid, it could’ve just ended with him remembering her and it would at least have been a satisfying conclusion. What’s the additional meaning of leaving things open like that? I mean, of course it’s suggested he might eventually remember her or learns to know her again, but what’s the point when he could’ve just shown up on her doorstep again, lovely kiss, and they lived happily ever after? After what they went through I would’ve preferred them visibly ending up together for good.

As I’m approaching my conclusion, I have one more thing to comment on. There was this additional storyline about Oh Soo’s work colleague Nam Ji Seok (played by Choi Dae Chul) and Yoon Chae Ri or “Cherry” (played by Lee Hye Ran), one of Ga Na’s former flings and Nam Ji Seok’s junior from their high school times.
Even now, I have no idea what their story was about. Nam Ji Seok and Cherry meet again through Ga Na and it’s shown that Cherry used to be into Ji Seok but he turned her away. But now, after meeting again, Ji Seok starts pursuing her while Cherry is busy going on blind dates and marriage meetings because she wants to get married and have children quickly.
He eventually persuades her to date him, but she gives the condition that she’ll continue to go on blind dates. It might’ve been that she liked him but didn’t see a future with him because he didn’t want to marry and she did…
But then all of a sudden Ji Seok was wanting to break up with Cherry…
And after the three year jump Cherry had a child and Ji Seok was with him so I first thought naturally that he was the father… and then he turned out not to be the father and… I don’t know what this was about. Although it could be that I did not pay enough attention to their story.
In my defense, they threw a lot of storylines into the 16 episodes of this drama. Besides the main line of the relationship between Yoo Ri and Oh Soo, there was the line of the police investigation of the sexual assault culprit, Yoo Ri’s mother in the hospital who had to get surgery for cancer, Soo Jung and her two friends making trouble at school, the two middle aged ladies from Yoo Ri’s neighborhood who started showing up at people’s houses and poking their noses into everyone’s business, the relationship between Ga Na and Hyo Jin, Yoo Ri and Jin Woo, the curse of the magical evil tree… There was a lot. It could’ve done with less. It had a solid enough core story, it might not have needed all these extra storylines. For example, Soo Jung’s friends and the middle aged ladies shouldn’t have been made into more regular characters. They could’ve just appeared once or twice, because to me they didn’t feel like truly important characters.

I want to say one more thing about Jin Woo before I conclude. As I mentioned before, I might be a bit biased because of Kang Tae Oh, so I couldn’t dislike Jin Woo. I felt sorry for him the whole time. I read comments from people on the episodes bashing him about being annoying and not able to take a hint and leave Yoo Ri alone, but I never thought about it like that. I mean, he is the only one in the whole series who made his intentions clear from the start about how he feels about Yoo Ri, gave her all the space she needed to be honest with him, and she never gave him a clear answer. She just kind of semi-accepted his confession and told him she’d give him a chance, but after falling for Oh Soo she couldn’t even honestly tell him she liked someone else. She just kept him on a leash the entire time until he himself came up and said ‘You don’t have to apologize, I get that you’re not in love with me’. The scene where Yoo Ri got into an accident because of a dizzy spell and he arrived at the hospital first but she went home with Oh Soo, she didn’t even say a single word to him, not even a ‘sorry, I’m gonna go with Oh Soo’. Nothing. He was the best friend ever to her and she did not treat him well at all. He really deserved better than this.

Okay, so despite all the criticisms listed above, I repeat that I still enjoyed watching the series. It was a cute love story. The first real kiss between Oh Soo and Yoo Ri was super satisfying and real and even though the writing and the characters weren’t all as well established, apart from the above-listed confusions it didn’t take away the fun of watching.
I just think they took a lot on their plate in terms of things they wanted to throw into the story while it would’ve been very nice in its simplicity of being a romantic comedy.

The next drama on my list is, I think, going to be really angsty, so I’ll be back with another review another time! Keep you posted!

Lyrics: Mizuki Nana, Fujimori Shinichi (Aobozu)
Composition: Fujimori Shinichi (Aobozu)

3. Searchlight

In the pitch-dark night sea, clouding even the lighthouse,
Holding out the light from my cellphone, I followed the horizon
I have the feeling that this light can illuminate wherever I go
Connecting me to companions in an invisible new world

‘To make the possibility of 0 into 1, you need a little courage and a smile’
The song that youth was humming made me bounce up

Searchlight, searchlight, oh steady route
Please take me to the unchanging truth beyond
There’s nothing, there’s nothing, I knew within the darkness
That this pain is surely not in vain

I hear a nostalgic voice, the bells of the beginning ring
Right now, let’s make sure one more time amidst the applause
the happiness to experience love after receiving life within this world
and the fact that the drops falling down my cheeks snuggle up inside my heart, too

It’s okay to forget the spell that heals sadness
If it’s for the magic called ‘encounter’, you’ll be able to make it through those scars

Searchlight, searchlight, oh dazzling path
Please take me to the thrill within the undecided
There’s nothing, there’s nothing, I knew within the darkness
That regrets can only be erased in the future

Reverse-day, reverse-day
Re-birthday, re-birthday

If you just aim for the distance and run out intently,
your true self will fade away
Look at the little flowers that blossom at your feet
What you vowed for was your determination to live

Searchlight, searchlight, oh steady route
Please take me to the unchanging truth beyond
There’s nothing, there’s nothing, I knew within the darkness
That this pain is surely not in vain
Reverse-day, reverse-day, today is the day I journey on
I will walk on, basking in the morning light of a new world

Destiny’s Prelude is Nana Mizuki’s 35th single which was released on July 19, 2017.

Underneath, you will find my translations of the songs from Destiny’s Prelude. Because English is not my mother tongue, please kindly let me know if there are any grammatical errors: I am open for corrections and like to learn from my mistakes 

1. Destiny’s Prelude (opening theme for anime movie Mahou Shoujo Lyrical Nanoha Reflection)
2. Invisible Heat (insert song for anime movie Mahou Shoujo Lyrical Nanoha Reflection)
3. Poison Lily (ending theme for Tokyo FM program Mizuki Nana no M no Sekai)

Starting Now! is Nana Mizuki’s 34th single which was released on July 13, 2016.

Underneath, you will find my translations of the songs from Starting Now!. Because English is not my mother tongue, please kindly let me know if there are any grammatical errors: I am open for corrections and like to learn from my mistakes

1. Starting Now! (opening theme for anime Kono Bijutsubu ni ha Mondai ga Aru!)
2. Antiphona (theme song for iOS/Android game THE TOWER OF PRINCESS)
3. Rensou Hanabi (CM song for restaurant chain Nakau)

My friend introduced me to Maiko Fujita and I immediately fell in love with her songs and her voice.

Maiko Fujita has released 7 albums so far…:

Aitai

Futari no Kare

Sawatte

Mou Ichido

1%

one way

Renai Shousetsu

…1 mini album…:

Nidome no Koi

…2 best albums…:

BEST ALBUM ~Hiiro no Kakera~

LOVE STORY BEST ~Hiiro no Kakera~

…and 12 singles:

Koi ni Ochite

Kono Shiroi Yuki to / Wasurenaide

Yokogao ~Watashi no Shiranai Sakura~/ Imademo Anata ga

Anata ha Shiawase ni Naru

Shunkan

Naitemo Naitemo / Hanabi

Nee

Takanaru

Tegami ~Aisuru Anata he~

Namida ga Tomaranai no ha

Kono Koi no Story

Oborozuki

“Kimi to Ai ni Naru” is the spin-off about the relationship between JnM side characters Kagemi Yamiko and Manama Riku. Yamiko is the best friend of Takamoto Haruhi, who has a slightly bigger role in Jinsei no Minna itself.

I picked the title “Kimi to Ai ni Naru” from a song by Oda Kaori which seems to be exactly about their relationship (I was really baffled when I found out the lyrics). It’s a phrase that’s difficult to translate, it’s really Japanese. If I were to try anyway, it would be something like ‘Becoming Love With You’… sounds a bit weird, doesn’t it?

It has a very simple shoujo genre story. A girl who seems to be the most common girl in the world and who has an alarmingly low sense of self-worth starts her new school year, where she gets challenged from day 1 on when she is appointed class representative by her homeroom teacher. Her fellow class rep is a boy who doesn’t seem to have any emotions. At first she thinks he is a real oddball, but as time passes she learns how to deal with him and his socially awkward way of handling things. They both grow closer to each other than they’d ever imagined they would when they first met.

Characters
Kagemi Yamiko
The story’s heroine. She is an introvert girl who yearns for something special to happen in her life. She sees herself as the most common girl ever, she lives in a normal house in a normal neighborhood where nothing ever happens. She lives with her mother and little brother. Her father is always away on business trips and he rarely comes home, so Yamiko is angry at him for making her mother feel lonely. Despite that, her parents are still together and life is peaceful except for her monster-like little brother who always pulls pranks on her. Yamiko’s best friend is Haruhi, they’ve been together since elementary school. They share everything with each other.
Besides Yamiko’s desire for a miracle to happen to her, she also suffers from a severe minority complex which causes her to occasionally fall into a state of depression, in the worst case for a few days. She gets envious of other people easily and turns it back onto her own incompetence and commonness. This also has to do with the fact that her mother is a bit conservative and doesn’t go along with trends or new modern times, which makes Yamiko feel left behind in both social experience as issues to talk about with friends and classmates.
Yamiko’s worst fear is lightning. When she was on a family picknick when she was small, she once saw someone getting struck by lightning, and that has caused a trauma for her. Whenever she sees lightning, she experiences that moment again, so to say. Other things she doesn’t like are History, bugs and unfaithfulness.
Aside from her gloomy aspects, Yamiko is a sweet girl and a loyal friend. She is realistic enough to know that love isn’t all rose petals; her parents are living proof. She is a bit naive, trusts people easily and has a weak spot for both people and objects that give off a certain amount of innocence and cuteness.

Manama Riku
The male protagonist of the story. He is a boy who lost his emotions at a certain point in his childhood. He used to be a sweet, energetic and kind boy who was respected and loved by his classmates and friends. However, things changed as his alcoholic father returned home one night in a violent mood and started throwing a fit. When Riku had to be taken to hospital to recover from his mental and physical injuries, his father abandoned them. Riku hasn’t been the same since. He lives with his mother, who has been caring for him more than anyone. When he gets accepted into Yume High, the principal and his homeroom teacher make a promise with his mother to help him regain his emotions gradually in any way possible.
Riku slowly finds his place within his class, he gets appointed class rep and eventually even manages to make friends.
Things that he doesn’t like are alcohol, people who bring themselves down and lying.
A peculiar characteristic that he has is that he is drawn with his eyes closed. This is to emphasize his emotionless state, but to stress it even more, there are cases where his eyes open. This special phenomenon only occurs when he experiences a very strong emotion – it turns him back to how he was for a moment. In the previous years, this has never been the case, but as he meets Yamiko, it tends to happen more and more occasionally.

Kagemi Makiko
Yamiko’s mother.

Kagemi Shouta
Yamiko’s little brother.

Manama Anna
Riku’s mother.

Takamoto Haruhi
Yamiko’s best friend.

Murashima Kei
Riku’s best friend.

Murakita Suzuko
A girl who befriends Yamiko when she gets placed into another class in her second year.

Midorizawa Yuiko
Homeroom teacher of Class 1-B.

Yume-sama
The principal of Yume High.