The story was lacking, to say the least. It didn't seem as if there really was one sometimes to be honest. The episodes were mainly made up of small conflicts that didn't seem of much importance to the central story at all. Even the the climax of the main story was resolved rather anticlimactically in the last episode. I often found myself wondering what the heck happened after an episode, not because I was shocked by the events, but because nothing really did happen. The story trudged along at a horse and buggy speed and it seemed that our lead female Ah Ro was just along for the ride. She didn't seem to have any purpose in the story, but to give our leads some angsty tension (not that it was needed because they had enough of that on their own). The main couple had no chemistry whatsoever and I even found myself bored at their scenes. And lets not even begin talking about the plot holes. There were many and they were extremely noticeable.
The acting was mediocre. This is an average amongst this large cast; some were better than others. Going back to the issue with the main couple, I believe it wasn't totally the fault of the cast. Park Seo Joon had amazing chemistry in his last drama with Hwang Jung Eum and Go Ara did well in Reply 1994. While they are not exceptional actors, they have shown good acting skills, and even they could not salvage how stale the plot was. Minho's acting became a lot more natural though and Taehyung did well with his emotional scenes.
The OST itself is pretty good and some of the songs were actually quite memorable. I did notice though that the music editing was not very good throughout the entire drama. It cut off weirdly and some of the music didn't even fit the scene, which is disappointing coming from a show that was prefilmed and edited.
Overall, it was only slightly enjoyable to watch so I will not be rewatching. I would like to give some honorable mentions though to my otp Ban Ryu and Soo Yeon, Sung Dong Il the designated ahjussi of kdramas, and Park Hyung Sik's face (it's beautiful :')).
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This review may contain spoilers
I really wanted to write a review as soon as the series had ended. Since spoilers are not tolerated in a review, I decided to do a pro/contra list in the comment section containing spoilers because there were concrete things that bothered me a lot and I needed to get them off my chest. I started watching Hwarang because it is a historical drama and I was interested in the story. I am not an expert when it comes to history, my knowledge on Korean history is particularly poor, and so I read some articles on Silla/Hwarang to be prepared a bit. Of course you have to keep the fact in mind that this is a drama, thus fiction. Some things had to be dropped for sure, and some things had to be (re-)invented to create this drama. I’m saying this because I do not want you to have extremely high expectations on this show being historically accurate. It is not. Personally I did not mind, it wasn't TOO bad for me. I will not compare real historical events with this drama in the next lines for several reasons; instead, I will provide summarized impressions of mine and tell you about the things I liked and disliked.
First of all, what _is_ “Hwarang” in my eyes? It is a historical drama mixed with modern elements, comedy, and romance; action, silliness und suspense included. It is partially somewhat of a high school drama embedded in an earlier century I would say, because you will recognize some types and things related to school dramas for sure. The supporting characters are likeable and enjoyable; I wished some of them were more vivid.
At first I was slightly addicted to this show, and I even stopped watching other dramas because I wanted to concentrate on “Hwarang”. The cliffhangers made me wanting to go on with the next episodes badly, Sun Woo was cool, and so were Ah Ro, Ji Dwi and the supporting characters. I was interested in Sun Woo’s development, but I fell for Ji Dwi very soon, and at some point, I was mostly interested in his fate because I started to see the major flaws. My addiction disappeared, but it still was enjoyable.
I had the feeling the makers were not sure on which aspect they should focus on more: The lives of Hwarang and their impact on society, that one love story going on, political stuff in general, Sun Woo’s story or on Park Hyung Sik’s role. I am perfectly aware of the fact that, usually, a story has several plots being connected to each other at some point. I liked nearly all the plots within this series and nearly all of the characters involved, but the plots are unbalanced. I would not go so far as to claim the first episodes not being important or to count them as dispensable fillers, because that is not what they are at all, but at some point, so many significant things happen one after another that all previous events become blurry. Besides, the characters are not given time to reflect on certain things properly, at some point stuff is thrown at you in raw form piece by piece; sometimes it did not make any sense to me. Instead of 20 episodes, the makers should have either made 15 or 30 episodes to avoid a very slow first half being followed by a very fast-paced second half. As it stands, the relationship between fast and slow is deeply unbalanced and harder to digest.
The thing that annoyed me the most is the main couple. It is hard to explain without posting spoilers, it really is. I did not feel it, maybe you will, I don’t know. They would have been off better as separated individuals and not as a couple because the developers wasted too much time on them instead moving on with things that I considered more important.
I liked the equivalences and symbolism. You will stumble upon analogous and opposite equivalences between human beings, humans and things, humans and forces of nature. To me, these things along with symbolism are important because you expand the meaning to create a huge substantial net without organizing a verbal orgy. The “meaning of something” is relevant to this drama. Two other things I liked are the writers’ ability to generate deep, emotional scenes and character development. Unfortunately, all of this has to face neglect soon; equivalences and relationships are created and then thrown overboard; adequate character development is avaliable in small amounts only. Ji Dwi and Ban Ryu’s progression were the only ones to be witnessed visibly.
I would divide this series into two parts, part A and part B. In part A you get to learn the characters, their relationship among each other and their motivations. In Part B things become… beyond good and evil, let’s put it that way. I really wish there would have been more interactions between all Hwarang in part A. I wanted them to talk to each other more; I wanted them to get to know each other better.
The acting was good. Park Hyung Sik and Do Ji Han’s acting skills impressed me the most. Park Hyung Sik’s facial expressions, his speech, his postures and movements are indeed that of a man of high importance, his face is made for this kind of dramas, and Do Ji Han’s emotions were frighteningly real. The others did well too, except for Go Ah Ra (and Park Seo Joon) in some scenes. I had the feeling that this is not her kind of drama, somehow.
Please do not assume I am here to simply bash her or her contribution to this drama, after all she is one of the main characters and I gladly “ship” her with one of the male leads. As I said before I liked nearly all of the characters, but they aren’t all perfect (putting the fact aside that we did not get to know them well enough). Ah Ro appears to be plain in some scenes, which is a shame. I haven’t watched another movie starring the actress so far, so I do not want to judge her acting skills as a whole. Ah Ro started out as an interesting and funny character, but in the further course I realized she was poorly written. Sun Woo is a rather irrational and static being, too one dimensional for too long, too much overkill towards the end. I think I do understand why they portrayed Sun Woo the way he is. I still think the developers gave him too much credit, even though Ji Dwi and some other boys deserved it as much, but the ending was legit, at least.
I am not sure whether the contemporary musical numbers were chosen on purpose to remind the viewers that “Hwarang” is still a drama and not a historical documentary or such, but I considered the music to be really off-putting sometimes. Sure, after five to six episodes you learn to ignore it/get used to it forcefully, but, eh, it should not be this way.
The last criterion here is “rewatch value”. To be honest with you: The possibility of me rewatching a series with more than five episodes or so is low. But if I were a person who likes rewatching things from time to time in general, I would probably watch this show again one day just to see the scenes that touched me the most/I liked a lot.
I was not satisfied by the final couple and the final scene, apart from that the outcome was appropriate. I had a difficult time while ruminating about a proper rating. First it was 8,5, then 6,5, finally I decided to rate it as 7/10. Episode 19 was a complete mess, and the final scene was screaming bruh, cliché right in my face, they rushed the ending and too many questions remain unanswered, although it is suggested that you will get the answers.* Nonetheless I liked many things about this show.
To sum up, “Hwarang” offers entertainment, some likeable characters; the plots within are interesting but things are solved poorly. This drama is neither extraordinary nor a must-watch (unless you want to get to see your favourite) and has obviously some major flaws. You can say the makers had reliable tools, but they didn’t know how to use them properly. Give it a try if you want to; after all you can still skip stuff or simply drop this drama if this isn’t your cup of tea. I hope this review is helpful!
*I like open ends, and usually I am fine with some things left unanswered AS LONG AS it has a function and is well presented.
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I honestly don't know what the writers were thinking because the characters were interesting, but not developed enough to be interesting or matter and the acting wasn't that bad, Go-Ara is a brilliant actress but her character was written so badly she couldn't show her skills. Park Seo-Joon did a brilliant job with what he was given, although he wasn't as badly written.
The worst character was by far Han-sung. His character was so interesting - A fun-loving young man who loved his peasant brother dearly, opposed his families views, and had the burden of being the sole heir. THE POTENTIAL FOR DEVELOPMENT WAS IMMENSE. But he got no development and was shown perhaps once every other episode. He was a big part of the shift in direction towards the end but his dynamic with various characters wasn't explored so it was more of a fact stated than actors showing this - again, writers fault, not the actors.
Some characters had interesting histories but weren't explored at all - mainly the Hwarang who didn't know who his father was.
The romance was just thrown in their for the sake of showing some kissing. Park Seo-Joon and Go-Ara did well enough to show that their characters cared for each other, but story wise, the romance wasn't needed. I cared much more for the dynamic between Hyung-Sik and Seo-Joon.
The plot had potential, but showrunners focused more on Go-Ara walking around depressed than moving the plot forward.
Overall, the acting wasn't bad at all but the showrunners left no room for the actors to, well, act. The characters were so 2D that it was like asking an actor to act as a lifeless corpse.
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Because if you make the rules, you can break them!
So we all know that there are two kinds of logic in this world; Real world logic and Drama world logic.When it comes to Drama world logic, you just accept it and move on but if a drama contradicts it's own logic then I'm done!
There were so many reasons I dropped this drama.
It had so much potential to be an inspiring drama about the Hwarang boys struggling and dealing with their problem. Growing, making friends, they could even have added a death of a beloved character to tugg at our hearts a little bit and in that case, it would have been totally fine to add a bit of romance but NO.
This drama contains 90% triangle love drama, 6% recapping romantic moments. 3% fighting and 1% problem solving. Not to mention that the female lead is so pathetic, there wont be an episode where they don't show a 5-minute front angle of her walking and crying...
So because the writers based most of the characters off of a real life royal family and they used the true bone ranking system to create conflict, you'd think they couldn't go wrong.... until they add fictional characters and create relationships and events that never happened while still trying to follow some of the original story. There is nothing wrong with that but if you're going to add some spice, do it right! This just ended up giving the show a lot of contradiction, odd relationships and lose ends.
(Apparently, it's okay to marry your brother if you're royal but not if you're poor.)
To me, some "emotional scenes" turned me off completely. They had so many opportunities to really rip my heart apart by adding some real brutality and feeling into it. I have a specific scene in mind and I'm thinking that they could at least spend some time on this scene to make it believable... This scene got a little over 1 minute screen time... Go Ah Ra got 10 minutes screen time for walking and crying...
Oh well... If you love triangle love dramas with a lot of romance and crying and pushing and pulling and recaps after recaps of scenes that don't really move the story forward then this is PERFECT for you! Don't hesitate to watch it! As a bonus, you get a bit of plot on the side. It's weak... not very well worked out... not very logical... and it doesn't really start until episode 16.... BUT there is one heartbreaking death scene in the first episode so maybe I should give this show 10/10
ENJOY!
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If you don't mind a drama with a not so amazing story but interesting and entertaining characters and relationships between those Hwarang is definitely one to watch.
The romance wasn't really that amazing tbh, it was a nice feature but the female lead was often unnecessary and sometimes a little annoying. There was a love triangle for a few episodes but it dissolved pretty quickly.
So my rating of 9.5 really is just because of my very non objective emotional opinion on this drama that made me cry, laugh and cry some more.
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...However, watching this drama was the best decision as it was spectacular. It perfectly combined historical, action, comedy and romance genres into a one big masterpiece. Not only did I become more interested in getting educated about whole Korean history, but about some of the cute actors as well!
Just look at all of those hot oppas on the posters of this series! Look! It was only appropriate for the name "Hwarang" to actually represent the "Flowering knights" because the actors were stunning! The OST amazed me but most of all the fact that some of the actors sang some songs themselves! I mean, every character, not only the knights, but the second lead character and the antagonists had a lot of charm and translated their characters really well.
I especially fell in love with Park Seo Joon. I loved his acting and I'm becoming more and more curious about him, so I'll jump onto this actor's train of dramas.
Overall, I'm proud to say that Hwarang was the first historical Korean drama that I've watched. If you're curious even a slightest bit, please check it out! And don't forget to check some of the interviews and the behind the scenes episodes, since they're a great addition to this as well.
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Without those expectations, I probably wouldn't have finished it either , because the story was a bit slow and lacking in different areas and mostly because the romance part was not working out at all for me.
The main leads had, in my opinion, no real chemistry and their romance had almost nothing to do in the middle of the plot .
For the rest , i really enjoyed the bromance part, the training and the maturing of Hwarang guys , and that's what kept me on this show until the end.
Some bad and good acting , a pretty good cast , i discovered Park Hyung sik's acting through Hwarang and was pleasantly surprised , he might not be the greatest actor of all time , but gives a sweet feeling!
To conclude, the plot was partly interesting (birth and development of hwarang unit) , partly out of place and boring (romance part) , the acting was not bad but not perfect either , and some very funny and light moments that ended up working out way better than the tragic ones .
I do recommend it , but without big expectations !
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This is like military enlistment but this is Hwarang version hahah thats why l love this concept of historical drama. :)
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Pass that pretty boy a sword
Hwarang was great! It was exactly what it said it was, perhaps a tad bit more, but no less. In the beginning I called Hwarang "Pretty Boys Fighting." I didn't want anything too heavy or melo and I was sure Hwarang was it. I was right. It did what it intended which was entertain. It was never boring or slow. It's also more than just PBF, too. It has a fairly solid and interesting story about a faceless king trying to come into his own and a nameless peasant basically doing the same without realizing it. Each episode was well written and often times gave me a smile or laugh.The major cast did a damn fine job, especially considering 3 or 4 are idols. The supports, many of whom were veteran actors, were excellent as per usual, but somehow allowed their younger counterparts to shine. I admit I adored the scenes between Sung Dong-Il and Kim Kwang-Kyu. They were my secret faves. Well, I guess non-secret now. I've loved Park Seo Joon since Kill Me, Heal Me. He did a fantastic job in Hwarang. His scenes with Lee Gwang Soo and Park Hyng Sik were great. I'd love to see him with one or both of them again. Overall, the male cast had great chemistry, even those you love to hate. There were a bunch of bromances going on. The only sore thumb was perhaps, Seo Ye-Ji, who joined the cast in later episodes. She was stiff and very hard to like or even dislike. She was like a weed in your yard. You know you want to pluck it, but you don't feel like bending over.
The music was good, especially the incidental aka background music. It really set the tone and helped move things along. I liked the lead song well enough. The love song was a bit annoying and is played a little too often.
Overall, Hwarang is thoroughly enjoyable. It made me laugh. It frustrated me. It gave me characters to hate. It gave me characters to love. It made me jealous. And at one point it almost made me cry (also rare). Will Hwarang go down in the annals of time as one of the best dramas ever? No. Will it win a bunch of awards? Doubtful. However, I'd watch it again in a heartbeat. Actually, I just may while at work. Nothing like Pretty Boys Fighting to get you through the day. :D
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Park Seo-joon is one of my favourite actors, and Hyung-shik is a great actor, Minho is pretty good to (i'm not gonna deny the fact that i'm a Shinee fan) and Taehyung debuting as an actor made me really excited too ( I'm not gonna deny the fact that i'm a BTS fan either), and i don't have much to say about Go Ah ra's acting, because this is the first drama i've seen with her in it. I heard from others that she was a good actress though, so i'm sure she is.
So basically...I was really excited about this drama.
Hwarang was pretty hyped up too.
I heard people talking about Hwarang as early as February/March and hyping it up like nothing else.
Originally Hwarang was supposed to air in the middle of 2016, but they kept pushing the airing date behind and my initial thoughts were that it really must be great then, if the reason they were delaying the drama was that they were being precise with the filming and editing of this drama.
(Because it is a beautiful drama, the colours and the lighting and the feel this drama gives of with just looking at it is really nice, and the people in this drama too, are really beautiful.)
But ever since this drama started airing i've just been wondering what took them so long. If their going to delay a drama and hype it up this much, it better be good. But honestly, what even is this drama's storyline?
I don't feel like there is much happening in this drama, at least nothing that makes sense to me. I've tried liking this drama, i really have. I've seen 11 episodes of it although i didn't really think it was interesting and that was to be honest just to support Taehyung and Seo-joon.
Everytime i've tried watching this drama i've been so bored that i've even fallen asleep. It's so sad to see this happening. An amazing cast, gone to waste.
If i'm going to say something nice about this drama, i can say that i thought the acting was really good (as expected from these actors.) The problem with this drama is purely the storyline. The casting and the music is great, it's just that the storyline (if there even is one) is so boring.
I've seen some people saying that it gets better from episode 10,11,12 or something like that, but honestly...if it takes 12 episodes for a drama to become interesting...It's not worth watching, unless you're watching it to support the actors of course.
(I feel like i've said the word casting and actors a lot in this review)
Overall, just disappointing. Right now it's on my "on-hold" list, but i'm pretty sure i won't be finishing this drama.
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Still waiting for my epic and mystical hwarang drama full of mountain gods and bodhisattvas
This is one of those fusion sageuks that has very intentionally made the past contemporary. That's somewhat disappointing to me, since one of the main things I like about pre-Joseon sageuks is that they tend to be more epic. You don’t just get court politics, you get wars and diplomacy. This drama really isn't something that can be taken seriously, even though it occasionally tries. However, considering that hwarang literally means "flower boys," and they were young noble men, often noted for their beauty, who studied the arts (including music and dance), presenting the hwarang as 6th century idols is actually rather clever. Though this drama failed on many counts, I think this is one of the more successful updates of a historical setting, and I actually enjoyed some of the very contemporary-sounding pop soundtrack, which is not something I would usually like paired with a historical drama. The whole “let’s change Silla so it appeals to modern egalitarian sensibilities,” not to mention some blatant contradictions of historical facts, was rather irritating to me, but this is hardly the only drama guilty of that.Unlike most people, I didn't watch this for the cast and actually didn't know any of the actors before this drama. The supporting cast of flower boys is better than you might expect. All their performances are reasonably solid, though definitely more in the wheelhouse of youth drama, rather than sageuk (which is fine for the tone of this drama). On the flip side, I felt like Go Ara was just constantly pulling faces, usually grumpy ones. Either that or crying. I think Park Seo Joon is more suited to romantic comedies than to sageuk. To be fair, his character doesn't give him much to work with, but Park Hyung Sik is really the only one among the young cast who really shines as a sageuk actor. Though not quite on par with top tier sageuk performances, his commanding presence is a definite standout in an otherwise very fluffy, contemporary-seeming cast. I'd like to see him in another, more serious historical drama at some point. I probably would have dropped this show if Park Hyung Sik hadn't made me so invested in his character.
The biggest miss of this drama (aside from everything related to Go Ara’s character, that definitely ranks higher) may have been going for a boring political plot, rather than mysterious meetings with old men on mountain tops and incarnations of the Maitreya Buddha. Where are my monks!? There’s a lot of legendary material about the hwarang they could have pulled from to make a very unique drama, but instead they went with a watered down version of the typical sageuk power struggle. I’m all for the political intrigue if it’s done well, but the writing in this drama is just so bad. Plot holes aside, some of the storylines are just laughable. Like I really could go on a rant about all the ridiculous things in this show, but I don't want to include spoilers. Moreover, this drama often didn't seem to know what is was going for. Coming-of-age story about brotherhood? Serious political sageuk? Romantic comedy? Angsty love triangle? Fluffy flower boy drama? As a result it didn't quite succeed with any of them, except for maybe the flower boy fluff. Given the ineptitude of the writing, it's actually probably better that they stayed away from the mystical hwarang legends, so someone else can make that drama at a later date. It has so much potential as a subject matter.
On to Go Ara's character ... this drama would probably be improved by cutting Ah Ro out entirely, or at least relegating her to a minor role. There's really no reason a drama about a group of young men needs a female lead, and it's not as if she had any real importance the story. I get that they wanted to add in a romance, but the main couple was just SO bland. The paring with Ji Dwi/Sammaekjong/Jinheung was marginally better, but only because Park Hyung Sik really sold his character. I actually kinda wish they had just gone for the incestuous pairing between him and his half-sister. Though her character wasn't really much better than Ah Ro, I think Park Hyung Sik and Seo Ye Ji had potential for a lot of chemistry, because the few scenes they had together were some of the show's highlights.
As for the bromance between the two male leads ... so much potential, but ultimately disappointing. I think they were supposed to be friends and rivals, while also acting as character foils of each other that represented different forms of leadership. But the love triangle is so bland that you just don't care, and it's hard to buy into their political rivalry, especially since there's no real ideological opposition between them. I’m also pretty sure Sammaekjong should have been the lead. Not that every story focusing on a ruler’s rise to power has to make him the protagonist (I never complained in Faith), but not doing so is a risk. Sun Woo has little substance or development as a character and just isn’t interesting enough to overshadow the king, who had far more compelling character conflicts. Moreover, because the writer goes through so much effort to make Sun Woo the lead, despite the story actually being about Sammaekjong, there are multiple points where the natural progression of Sammaekjong's character seems to be halted or sent backwards just so that Sun Woo could play the central role. Thus, despite being the best character in the show, his arc doesn't quite live up to it's potential either.
The most successful aspect of this drama were the minor characters' side stories and relationships. Unlike many dramas where the supporting cast feels like filler, it definitely would have been worth giving them more focus and development. If all the time spent on the boring love triangle was redirected to the other hwarang characters, this would have been a better drama.
The OST songs are fun and catchy, though not terribly unique or memorable. They really might be more of a 7.0, but I decided to bump the music score up to an 8.0 on account of some of the instrumental music, particularly Sammaekjong's epic background music (very similar to The Royal Gambler soundtrack, but Oh Joon Sung did both).
Overall, I did actually enjoy this drama (though I went in not expecting more than fun and flower boys, which it does deliver). That being said, I spent most of the time I was watching this thinking of all the ways it could have been better. Every once in a while, there was something, either in the minor characters or Sammaekjong glowering down at his mother from his throne, that made me think, “wow this actually could have been good, if only …”
It can be enjoyable if you take it for what it is, don’t hope for too much depth, and just go along with the fun. Then every once and a while you’ll be thrilled when you get a hint of something pretty cool, rather than disappointed by all the missed opportunities and ridiculous plotting. If you’re looking for a serious historical drama, definitely give this one a pass.
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