Café Minamdang (2022)

Good Comedy but the Romance is garbage

This drama started of good & it would've STAYED good if not for that TIRED cliche of "they met when they were kids" and in this case only ONE of them was a kid the other was like 18 at least. which makes it SO weird.
But let's start over.
The MLs (can't remember his name) team was introduced in the 1st ep as these cool& useful ppl. but they tanked one of the characters right after he was introduced. he was supposed to be this super strong, super fast guy. he was introduced while chasing down a car on foot! yet every single time they need to chase the culprit he's suddenly lacking in speed? are you telling me this random psycho murderer runs faster than a car? The guy just ended up being comedic relief which is fine but why introduce him as smth else & NEVER stick to it?

THEN we have the FL. To start off her & the ML had no chemistry & she had no actual reason to like him other than the fact that she had a crush on him when she was 12 (& he was 18). and a big peeve of mine is that she's a cop, but she punches the ML who's a civilian several times! not even in self defense either, she just decks him bc she's annoyed? She also stalks him for whatever reason??

Now the biggest issue, the romance (or lack thereof).NO chemistry between the leads, the only reason they give for her liking him is bc she had a crush on him when she was a kid & was a full adult with a job! Luckily the ML had no interest in her at the time so he's not a criminal but that's the only foundation for their relationship. And the guy who's the 2nd ML was the PERFECT choice. I'm nktbsaying that bc I particularly like him or anything. but they had a solid foundation & relationship & they didn't meat when she was 12!

So all in all the show isn't horrible, the comedy aspect is actually really funny. but the romance is just garbage and that one character discrepancy. so if you ignore those things the show is tolerable, but I personally just couldn't look past the fact that the ML & FL met when she was 12 & he was 18 regardless of they had mutual feelings at that time. it's just weird and unnecessary. they just had to use one of the most dragged tropes ever in the worst way possible

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At least the OST was good.

It drags at times. The characters don't age from their flashbacks. ML and FL met when FL was a child and ML was an adult. The romance between them could have been left out. ML went from a profiler to a shaman and nobody caught on? FL went from hard detective to following ML around. The acting was great, it's the characters I have a problem with. Story line was not the greatest, a prosecutor serial killer, killing other seriall criminals. But he had help from his brother,but they were both brainwashed by a therapist who he also killed.So brainwashing children instead actually helping them is the rich and powerful way.And all the clueless merry band of detectives and investigators.This didn't need to be 18 episodes. could have been 10 or 12 if you got to the point and cut out some of the unnecessary comical scenes that were trying to hard. Episode 18 they almost redeemed themselves, but they messed with the nerd girl, and amped up crazy prosecutor.

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it's just a huge mess

I have no complain about the acting, the actors done nothing wrong. It's the writing, director and casting. OMG... Here a few example why I can't continue watching this drama. There's a scene that shows the big age difference between the ML and FL (an early teen FL meeting the already adult ML). But somehow, now when they meet again, the FL suddenly became the same age as the ML.. The forever young villain, the female villain took in a child (male villain) some 30 years ago, fast forward to now when the story is happening, the male villain now look like an uncle, while the female villain look even younger than the FL.. The ML best friend, how can a man think and act like a 5 yo kid be an ex-cop?. The forced romance storyline between ML-FL, ML & FL don't even have chemistry to make it convincing enough.
If you can ignore that much, I think you can enjoy the comedy aspect of it, but I just can't anymore, too much that I don't find it entertaining.

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Female lead is cringe, over acting.

The story is good, It HAD a lot of potential. But watching the female leads scenes leave me cringing, she is over acting so much i just have to hold myself off rolling my eyes at my screen most of the time.

Some aspects doesn't make sense too (they should've gone with something more natural and realistic, somehow the fl is flying while fighting, maybe they were trying to make it comedic but it threw me off especially with the over dramatic acting).

I'm only hanging in there for seo in guk and the squad .

Idk what went wrong with female leads character writing. I feel like she is doing too much and doesn't know when to stop. She is too forceful as well. It is too overbearing at this point and Its making the story go down way. Just very highly disappointed to see a drama with so much potential go bad because of one character.

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Unfortunately, this did not deliver...

I'll do my best to break it down.

CHARACTERS AND RELATIONSHIPS

For the ML, I was underwhelmed. I feel like I've seen Seo In Guk in this comedic role one too many times with litttle to no development. And the thing is, his character HAD SO MUCH POTENTIAL!! He was a CRIMINAL PROFILER!! They could have done so much with that but the writers underperformed. He was funny but a bit dopey. Also, he was supposed to be able to fight but hardly ever did...? And was just a scaredy-cat most of the time instead. But he really pulled off the shamanism and took his job seriously and was quite funny at times.

And speaking of underperforming, the FL... What was going through the writers' minds? In recent years, there seems to be this conflation between strong female leads and annoying female leads. Because oh my god, was she the epitome of annoying for the first half of this drama. She constantly abused her position of power as a cop and was always hitting the ML. Physical abuse is not cute. And it doesn't make her cool or quirky. I will say that girlie is getting a lot of hate and they're dropping just because of her but I don't think she's the worst part of this drama (which I'll discuss later). But yes, I do agree she's been written poorly.

And the relationship between the two? Well, the first half consists of her abusing him and just being mean af to him. And then, we are expected to ship them. It felt so forced because they wasn't any chemistry between them. They were established as enemies (despite having the same goal)but they failed trying to do the enemies to lovers trope because she spent so much time doubting him and not believing him. Instead, they should have had more playful banter if they wanted us to be able to ship them despite being "enemies". But with me being me, of course I'm going to start rooting for them. I can't not root for them. It's instinctual.

And for the side characters, I didn't care much for the characters as much as I did for the way they interacted. The Café Minamdang crew were hilarious!! The really kept the drama going with their chemistry.

PLOT
I don't even know what happened. One minute I knew what was going on, then suddenly, it became like every murder plot. To be fair, it wasn't exactly like that and I'm definitely over exaggerating. But I felt like we (the audience and the characters) weren't really get anywhere as I watched each episode. I'm not even sure how the story progressed. And it felt a bit lacklustre because even though we were aware of certain things, there was still a lot not explained for most of the drama so I found it hard to stay connected and interested. It would have been much better if there was some dramatic irony where we knew something major that the characters didn't. It would have created so much more suspense and would have kept the drama engaging. For example, the victim was a bit mysterious. We know exactly who it is but there wasn't enough tension built around why. The motive was unexplained for the most part.

It did have a strong start. It was entertaining and fun despite the characters being annoying. The middle became lacklustre even though the characters finally became tolerable. I frequently found myself just waiting for the drama to be over. The last four episodes is where things picked up and I was genuinely having a good time. But I'm not going to be annoying and tell you to tick it out and watch it despite the negative comments. You can make the decision yourself based on whether you think it's worth it or not.

And the writers did try with the romance and I guess there was supposed to be comedic relief but I don't think it was timed well. I'm not sure how to word this part well to be honest. The best way I can explain is that the comedic scene would be in the same scene as a very serious topic. And even though they weren't making fun of it, it's obvious they were trying to relieve tension. But I just don't think it worked. It would have been better if they changed the scene and setting and then made a joke I think, because it sometimes felt ill-timed and even inappropriate. But for the most part, I did like the comedy.

This is definitely a show that could have done with just 12 episodes. Cutting out the middle fluff would have made it more exciting. For example, they tried to make it kind of deep towards the end (raising questions about morality, injustices within the police, etc but it felt out of the blue). If they had tried to do this early on, then it would have made sense and would have been more unique. Instead, we got an over the top plot at the start and an action packed end, and it didn't really balance out well.

OVERALL
Not the most unique drama. But what it does having going for it is the shamanism - the most funny scenes in my opinion. I'm sad to say that I do think that it underperformed in many aspects and was just very weak overall. Not sure I'd be able to recommend it to anyone unless. I personally only watched it for SIG. My rating comes to 7 right now only because of the lat four episodes, otherwise, it probably would have been a 6.5

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How do you so badly mess up a timeline?

Spoilers, but really just annoying stuff not plot stuff:
a) FL is a police officer. She's been a police officer for ~3-4 ish years, because one of her first cases is the one that indirectly leads to her brother's death.
b) hinted about earlier, but really made a big deal about starting episode 12? or so, she's like "yes, I went to the US, but I came back to be a police officer and avenge my brother's death. and they KEEP TALKING ABOUT THAT.

YOU WERE ALREADY A POLICE OFFICER. YOU NEVER WENT TO THE US. Unless she went as a kid? between the judo stuff and becoming a police officer and then came back, to avenge his death before he was actually dead? (I suspect that there must have been some sort of plot/timeline change midway through authoring, because also he was only in jail for like a year, assuming I'm doing my math right.) But she was ALREADY A COP. She sat and talked WITH HER (alive) BROTHER in her cop gear about what an amazing profiler Nam Han Joon was and how she wanted to meet him.

Other people have raised valid points about chemistry and such, but I was just enjoying it even so, it but then the timeline went crazy and wrong and inconsistent and so now I'm just cranky (okay I just ignore the part where they keep dwelling on the timeline.)

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First of all, I don't typically enjoy over-the-top slapstick humor and usually I give it a try if I like the cast (for example, Vincenzo). Cafe Minamdang caught my eye because of Seo In Guk, and as expected, he was a delight. I laughed out loud at this shaman antics. The way he snaps open the fan! At the same time, he offers a very heartfelt portrayal of grief and guilt. I loved the first half of this drama because of this balance between comedy and a more serious storyline. Unfortunately, the second half really dragged, a lot of the antics felt like filler, and I often questioned the intelligence of these characters.

I've never seen Oh Yeon Seo in anything before, but the casting choice is a bit baffling due to the supposed age gap between her and Seo In Guk's characters. Her character was so frustrating in the beginning with her stubbornness and tunnel vision, and it just feels like she remained flat throughout. Soo Cheol's character was too over the top and really got on my nerves. Lee I was surprised when Min Kyung and Park Jin Sang kept showing up in the end in such a slapstick way. I would've liked them more if their characters had been a bit darker instead.

Anyhow, plenty of people loved this so it just may depend on if you like this type of humor!

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Interesting story , wonderful acting game !

I liked) first i deeply fall in Seo In Guks eyes and his acting game huh this man perfectly for strong serious roles / smart aristocratic characters. I wonder how he show different emotions only through his eyes ! He can kiss with eyes or tell u the story huh Amazing! The actor who's can touch u to feel emotions only through eyes is a good actor ! .. i swear even if he didn't smile but looks at u seriously u will understand all what he want to say ))
The plot is interesting too and i never tho that this "good policeman " can be a psychopath ...while , all actors playing well and really cool! But i didn't like the image about main female detective character...why they made female character as a stupid girl whos always wrong? ..
And didn't like behavior of his sister's bf ... A little weird for me ...
Also cool different music ...
So about plot , u wait every new episode coz it's really interesting, u can't even imagine who made bad things and who's is the boss of all ...even u first see that in some characters , u realize then that u was wrong and coming more interesting part "who and why " ..

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Entertaining. Fun. Great Acting.

This was a seriously enjoyable and entertaining watch from beginning till end. First intro'd to Seo In Guk in Doom At Your Service where he looked bored AF. Having watched Cafe Minamdang, I can see why. He's got a great comedic range and is effusive and charismatic in Cafe Minamdang. He goes through the roles of brother, friend, mentor, shaman, son, charlatan, detective and beau effortlessly. The chemistry between him and his movie sister, Nam Hye Joon, and his longtime buddy, Gong Soo Chul, is so genuine it's a pleasure to watch. Also Gong Soo Chul and Nam Hye Joon is a seriously cute couple.

Although it was obvious to this viewer that Cha Do Won, the prosecutor, was the villain from the moment he appeared it still did not detract me from enjoying this hilarious romp. There were enough shenanigans that were unpredictable to have kept my interest going.

Probably the only thing I'd criticise is the age consideration in the casting. Jung Da Eun is meant to be years older than Won Hyun Joon and Seo In Guk a few years older than Oh Yeon Seo. And some unrealistic behaviours like how when Cha Do Won called out for help when he caught and was decked by Goo Tae Soo, I would not expect a detective like Han Jae Hee to go to him without looking around her and seeing the assailant run away. Also, I would've liked to have seen Gong Soo Chul's character show more of the fact that he had been a homicide detective in the past. Aside from the flashback, he was consistently the clown character throughout the series and at times it was frustrating as one can't help but feel that he wouldn't think or react this way because he's been trained as a homicide detective before! But anyway these sorts of unrealistic behaviours seem to be a hallmark of many Kdramas anyway so it's tolerated.

Highly recommend.

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