Story: It was like I was watching three different dramas because the plot changed so much and there were many time jumps. The first part is about Ji Sang growing up meeting both his loves and discovering he is a Seer. The second part is romance, political war, and the journey of Lee Sung Gye to be come King. The last part is tragedy central and the eventual crowning of Lee Sung Gye. The ending is bittersweet so expect both sad and happy endings for our main characters.
Acting: I'm going to start with our 3 male leads since they got the most screen time compared to the gals. Ji Jin Hee mostly has played stiff characters from the dramas I’ve seen but I got to say you haven’t seen him play a character like Lee Sung Gye. His character development was so awesome as he starts off as what seems like a crazy lunatic eventually becoming what you’d expect from the King of Joseon. I’ve only seen Ji Sung in Protect the Boss but he plays a different character in this. He did a great job portraying his character that experiences different personality changes from playful to serious/dramatic due to circumstances. Song Chang Ui played the villain well and his chemistry with Lee Yoon Ji was so great that I was rooting for their characters to get together and find their own happiness. As for the 2 female leads, they were perfect, as I would expect from them. There were MANY supporting characters and they all were able to make their characters stand out because a lot of them came and went as the plot kept changing, I found myself wondering what happened to them or I felt bad when their character was killed off.
Music: What you would expect from a historical drama but nothing particularly memorable.
Rewatch: I wouldn’t mind watching this again cause the plot was fresh but not for a while cause the drama is long and it was kind of sad.
Overall whether you like historicals or not the Great Seer will not waste your time and it’s a very intriguing ride.
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The acting is really well done as well as the cinematography. Ji Sung, Ji Jin Hee, Song Chang Ui, Lee Yoon Ji, and Kim So Yeon are well worth the watch if you are into this genre. I didn't even realize that Kim So Yeon was the same girl that I like so much in Iris. Good for her, she is versatile.
The music is fine.
I WILL NEVER REWATCH THIS.
Again, if you like historical dramas, then I'm sure you will like this.
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What I just don't get is if ur the king y in the name of all that is holy do u have to follow anybodies kind of law? As king don't u make the law? That is how things would work if I was ruler of any country. What Mel says goes ppl & the rest of u mugs just have 2 deal w/ it...mawhahahaha!
Oh well! It was an ok drama, but I rly am not into all the palace b/s that was part of this drama. Historical drama's r just not my thing. They r interesting in the fact that they have such a long history & can make a drama out of all that (unlike here in the US where we only have 200 yrs of history & it is all a bunch of convoluted b/s). Watch it if u want it isn't bad, but expect it to be rly slow at times & the whole story drawn out w/ a lot of b/s.
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I'll give it a 4.5/10. I think I would give this a higher rating if the episodes would be much more shorter than 35. It took me almost a month just to finish this Korean drama. I wouldn't recommend it for you to watch this.
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The great bore
The first paragraph of the synopsis felt like and turned out to be a big copium moment to whoever wrote it. The first couple of episodes started with a big bang, big sets, big budgets, a few sex scenes here and there, a casual killing for the sake of it, and a god awful laughable open mouth kissing scene. It was obvious they were trying to pull all the strings to attract viewers because none of that lasted shortly after. The cast performance was attractive at first before they turned into generic soulless zombies right after the first half. In fact, the second half in general was a significant downgrade in all regards. It was almost incomparable to the first half. It became as dull as you can imagine without any "character" left in these characters. They stripped every ounce of character from Ji Sung.The trend continued towards the end since it ended abruptly, I refuse to believe this was planned. When zooming out and looking into the drama as a whole, nothing seems to be properly planned from the beginning.Was this review helpful to you?
"Acting/Cast" score clarification:
The actors were not bad at acting, but the characters they played as were ridiculous. I'm therefor not sure how to rate this category properly.
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The were way too many side stories, too much time spent on supporting characters and their stories, and the main (or so I thought) story of the seer helping bring the first Josean King to the throne was a side, side, side, double side story. It was so far off to the side that I almost forgot it was in there somewhere. Too many side stories and it gets distracting and deluded. This is my main complaint. First, the side stories were not interesting, causing the drama to painfully drag on. I must have skipped over 35 minutes of each episode. I was really only interested in the side, side, side story of the king making part. I even excepted the strange depiction of General Lee (the future king). The character, though it was hard to believe he would become King, was actually cute and funny, hilarious actually. I could have preferred that the entire story revolved around that character/story. The rest of the characters were lukewarm. Watching someone look for land was dreadful. At episode 20 (out of only 35 episodes), I was still waiting for some king maker drama. The main character, the seer himself, was unimpressive even though I liked the actor in another drama and I like his face. :) I waited to see what was so special but I haven't seen it yet, maybe by episode 35. Maybe he will do something bad ass right at the end like, I don't know, actually do some "seer" stuff.
Though I like historical dramas, all the palace intrigues and betrayals can get a bit much and repetitive. However, the intrigue in this drama was more like a nagging fly or mosquito. It wasn't even worth getting annoyed over. Skip, forward and move as fast as possible through the so called intrigue.
The romance was actually annoying because it seems to take over the main plot. I think the writer/director lost his/her original hopes and motivation for this story. I wanted to stop watching it so desperately but I kept waiting and waiting to see the development of the king to be and some up the momentum of other historical dramas when change like creating a new country happens. And I waited. I am on episode 21 and cannot see how this drama can redeem itself in just 15 more episodes. I may have to take a peek at maybe episode 30 to see if it is worth the boredom to watch the rest. Sigh...so disappointing. I'm running out of good historical dramas while waiting for 2020 releases. Ugh...this was so disappointing!!! Maybe this drama was meant to be a spoof or purposely not so great. I won't say it awful but I won't say it is in the least bit satisfying. Manage your expectations....in my humble opinion.
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