camelia d – Google

The story line is very interesting and outside the usual KDrama standards - the characters, while some seem to be better defined with some growth potential, many are just cursory and their story is just muffled even when it should have been an important one - many missed opportunities in my opinion. If it will be just for the general story, directorship, editing and some of the supporting actors, this would be a 5 stars - what makes this a generous 3 stars are the ML and FL: the actors chosen, the dynamics and chemistry among these two and the missed opportunity in some important characters and story development. 1. the ML and FL ( Chi Yeol and Haeng Seon) have absolutely no chemistry so even attempting to portray something romantic looks actually very misplaced and fake and unpleasant to watch - the actors, individually are good but together as romantic partners, absolutely a mismatch - this was a very poor choice on the casting - the FL is supposed to be some years younger than the ML but the actors chosen are in total reverse by a significant gap in years and contrary to other instances, this gap in years really shows and is contradictory to the story line and then, add the lack of chemistry between the two, it makes a really poor choice in casting. This would be a 1 star at best just because negative stars are not available. 2. Some of the supporting characters are brilliant - the autistic uncle, the two vocal mothers from the 'mothers chat' (Su-He and Mi-Ok), the two male friends and classmates, the daughters (Nam Hae-yi, Dan-ji, Soo-Ah) are really brilliant and they make the series worth watching - this will be a 4 star but unfortunately they are not the main story 3. the story line gets confusing at some point and remains sort of murky all the way - the metal ball killer, motives and how it got there and then he jumps off the building .... to me, how someone gets to the point of killing is important and how it then gets to jump off the building is also important so not sure why this ark was rushed and was so muddled - this is 2 stars at best - maybe some one thought to be more important to play, and play, and play the misplaced romantic FL and ML instead of some character development related to the general story like the far reaching obsession to 'make it' to the right university, be the top score in class, etc, etc. 4. a short cameo by Kim Mi-kyung, one of the best 'mothers' in the the Kdramas - this time she plays the young FL mother that was the 'savior' for the ML. In the end, yes, the series is worth watching because it touches on some important topics like the obsession in SK culture in scoring high on tests to the detriment of actual education and learning, the stress and negative impact this obsession has on everything that it touches, the students, family, relationships, morality and ethics.

I've seen all 16 episodes and all in all was a cute show without many surprises (good or bad) that you'll see once: 1. Rowoon, this is the 3rd series that I see him in and he is actually a good actor and not just a decent dancer, even though, I will miss seeing him as part of the SF9 line up 2. the rest of the actors did a good job and they were all a good fit for the character they played. If you have watched few KDramas, you will recognize few familiar faces and that was nice. None of the actors were bad at acting or even mediocre, they were all good. 3. Production was good and cinematography was really nice. The art director was good too. 4. The story was interesting and had potential but the screenplay was again 'confused', it lacked purpose and was like 'swiss cheese' ... full of holes, timing was off on so many instances (in Ep16, the FL is shown collapsed and with a gauze on her neck soaked by blood - she was just attached by the 'landscape guy' with a pocket knife and just like that, she already had time to find a gauze in the middle of nowhere and even tape it to her neck but by the time the police and ambulance appears, the gauze and the neck wound is gone - and like these, many, many, many other instances). The story line was dragged many times while rushed or glanced over with some arks that were almost ridiculous (the ML mother pregnancy!). So much to write about the screenplay ; in short, such a wasted opportunity to write a good story to watch. 5. The FL character is annoying many times but not sure if Jo Bo-ah could have done any better than she did with the character given to her. 6. the most cute and interesting story is of the Office boss and his first love - the rest of the characters are too many and not sure why so many because they didn't make the story any better but was nice to see some familiar actors. So, I gave it a very generous 4 stars just for the actors who really did a very good job considering the low quality screenplay and for the cinematography which as really nice. In conclusion, the same good points and same critical points like for so many other KDramas - decent to good acting, good start in the series (ep 1-4, the best, then the 'kiss' or something like that in ep 10, ep 13-14 again good and then a poor ending with ep 16 being the worst) - The screenplay is probably the biggest issue with the vast majority of KDramas and even watching series from 10-15 years ago, that didn't seen much improved - maybe there is a bit more variety in story lines, but not much else - but there are a few that are very, very good, all around good ... check out MINE

So far up to E8 the script is the biggest real issue that brings the rating down, at least in my opinion. Both ML and FL are good choices even though the FL character is again written as an immature, repressed and clueless woman for her age. The idea for the series has a lot of potential but the script is confused, slow and lacks the intelligence that the brother & sister characters that vie for managing control could have created. To me, this is probably the worst missed opportunity in this series. The humorous moments are also more goofy than humorous which is another missed opportunity as both the FL and ML are capable actors and would be able to carry a more intelligent script and some character development. The supporting cast, especially the two GF and the grandmother are a bit better written and the actresses playing are a very good fit. The grandmother is actually the only one that creates humor just by her facial expressions as the consummate actress that she is. Take the episode with Prince Samir - what was THAT? no story, no humor, nothing other than all looked like a bunch of bumbling idiots. So for the cast would be 5 stars but for the script, 1 star with a Net of a very generous 3 stars - let's hope the 2nd part in the series will improve and the end will be the better than the usual KDramas. The direction is not bad and the overall production value is also decent.