Realistic kdrama portraying teen athletes
I want to note that Racket Boys is the first kdrama I watched while it was airing. This means I had to deal with waiting for new episodes to come out instead of just clicking next. Why is this important? I feel like many dramas are good for binging but not enough for waiting for new episodes to come out. Racket Boys definitely survived the test of me wanting to know what happened even though they made me wait two weeks for the final episode.First off, I like how this drama focused not only on teen athletes but also on the people around them. We get the backstory of Haekang's parents which I think was interesting and definitely contributed to the character development of the parents. Yes, you heard that right, even the parents have a solid character development even though the show is teen-focused. Some people might not have liked the extra storylines involving the villagers (I originally did not), but I started fall in love with each of the villagers featured from the city couple to Big Grandma from Busan (lol I really love how she had a lasting impact if you know what I mean ;P).
Onto the teens! I thoroughly enjoyed the acting displayed by the actual teen actors! Yes, you heard that right! The teenage characters are actually portrayed by actual teens! A lot of them have been featured in works before inclusing Tang Jungsun (who I loved both in CLOY and Move to Heaven). Although later on, the writers decided to focus on the romance between the teens, I think each of them have solid character development, even the class president lol. He turned out to be one of my favorite characters. I really liked how they brought cameos into the show to show the teens interacting with other adults (aka badminton players) and didn't have them just interacting with their parents.
For the episodes themselves, I felt like they were always laggy in the middle, but they made up for it on a lot of cliffhanger endings. I'm the kind of person not to watch previews, but in this case, I always watched them several times to figure out what could happen in the next episode. I also really enjoyed watching all of the badminton scenes 10/10 for cinematography there.
While I would not say this is the best kdrama I watched, it was definitely different and intriguing enough for me to enjoyably remember even after it ended.
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Negative:
At first, I didn't really get into this drama that much. I decided to watch it because I like Sports/Teen dramas, and it looked good. I'll be honest, I have a few issues with the filmmaking.
Issue #1:
They often don't show the ending of a badminton match. It'll show the middle of the match and right at the height of the game when tension is high, they'll cut away to a later scene where the characters will verbally mention who won. I don't get why they don't show the ending of it so that you can watch a character win for yourself. It's super tacky in my opinion to just tell who the winner is without showing it. It's very unsatisfying and doesn't make sense from a filmmaking perspective at all. (After Episode 8-9 this issue resolves and they show you the ends of all the rest of the matches)
Issue #2:
Sometimes they would introduce a small plotline and resolve it almost immediately without developing it or using it as something to really push the main plot forward. I think there are a lot of scattered storylines and conflicts in this drama and sometimes it kind of interrupts the flow of the main story. In my opinion all conflicts should add to the overarching plot, but they failed to do this well often and sometimes this caused dragged out or boring scenes.
Positive:
(I loved this drama after I got over my initial issues)
#1: Great character relationships
There is a really strong joy that I took from watching the boys in the team develop their friendship. It's truly heartwarming and meaningful, and the drama does an excellent job of portraying very realistic and wholesome teenage relationships, both platonic and romantic. I liked it because it wasn't cringey or overly sappy, but it still felt very meaningful in a purposeful way. You really start rooting for the boys and their friendship.
#2: A Good Balance:
Often Sports dramas struggle with giving their characters a realistic amount of wins and loses. The leads of these dramas tend to always win, and on the rare occasion that they do lose, it's something that they really struggle to overcome. I found that in this drama, you felt the frustration of the characters when they lost (which they did a lot at first), and that made all their wins (both in badminton and regular life) feel very powerful and satisfying. It was easy to root for them and cheer them on, and I appreciated the fact that they supported each other even when they lost.
#3: Amazing Acting:
I really appreciated the actors, especially Tang Jun-sang. They did an excellent job of portraying their roles, and I became very attached to each character. Tang Jun-sang does a beautiful job of portraying Yoon Hae-kang in a way that makes you really love the character.
I felt very satisfied when the drama ended, and I plan to watch it again one day in the future.
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A sports slice of life that hits just right
Are you a fan of Hospital Playlist and the Reply series? Do you like Slice of Life shows with varied pacing, cute side stories of its side characters and multiple couples? Then this show is for you. I also call any Haikyuu fans who love the sports storyline of "from nothing to something again".I loved watching each episode of this show. The characters were loveable, the timeline and pacing was chill and you didn't necessarily have to keep clicking to the next. But whenever I would watch the next, it would be a fun experience. I didn't realise this might be a sub-genre of kdrama that I might be into so I'll be sure to check similar plotlines in the future.
I personally am not the biggest fan of youngster couples - personal pref, but things were cutely done. Don't come into this expecting the usual romance developments though. Come for the general family, soft vibes.
A 9/10 from me :)
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A feel good drama
It's a slice of life, feel good, sports comedy that captures people's sentiments. I won't say anyone can watch this since slice of life is a genre that even i don't usually watch. But this drama is like a good dessert.You can binge watch this or can even watch an episode a week without that anxious feeling of what comes next.
Its a sweet comedy that is also a platter of numerous moral values too. One feels the rush and anticipation of the badminton matches as well as serenity of the village scenery.
My rewatch values are always low because im the kinda person who cannot watch a drama or movie more than once. And even then i gave this 6 considering.
Also its a treat for Prison Playbook fans (≧∇≦)/
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A feel good slice of life masked as a sports drama (at least so far)
EDIT/REVISEDSo much potential in this one has been relegated to a cliche drama.
Like mentioned before, this drama is less of a sports drama than it is just a slice of life drama. And that is what made it great for the first couple of episodes, however, the moment it started to get serious about the sports aspect, it has completely fallen off the rails.
That's because it practically tells us nothing about the sport of badmington, except that some players are
good" and that some players are bad. Unless it fixes itself soon, I'm afraid I'm going to have to drop this.
___
Previous review 4 episodes watched
Racket Boys has so far been nothing short of amazing.
It tells the story of a student who loves baseball and is their top player at his school, who due to having a poor family and other factors, can not continue to play the sport he loves to play. The family moves to a country side school when the father is asked to coach their badminton team. The story follows the family and the badminton team.
By reading the synopsis, you may not think that there is anything particularly new, or innovative. Low class kid enters a badminton team and probably goes on to love and win in a heart felt sports drama right?
But the way the drama fleshes out each character introduced, the way the drama tells engaging stories that shines a light onto hidden emotions behind the rough exterior that the characters' have built up over time. It all just feels so... human.
And its all expertly done by a great balance between humour and emotion.
Don't get me wrong, its not perfect. It still has a few corny sports moments, but because they are so few and far between, and because it is not the focus of the show, I still find it a perfect example of how a drama like this should be executed. Every moment of the show just feels like it has purpose.
Give this one a try, you will not be disappointed.
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RACIST
Not so long ago the United States was racist towards Asians, especially towards those with fair skin and slanted eyes and it was very painful.But in Asia itself, namely Korea with SBS as a pioneer, doing the same thing to other Asian countries, namely Indonesia.
Indonesia is not a perfect country, and maybe the world only knows Jakarta and Bali, Indonesia does not have an entertainment industry like global Korea, but it is still a country with a population of more than 250 million people, and many Korean entertainment lovers from there.
If Koreans can get angry with something that demeans them, how much more other countries.
This is not true, this is racist and vilifies Indonesia, even though this is just a drama, it still creates outside opinions that judge Indonesia as very bad in every way.
Korean entertainment has gone global and that is enough to make Indonesia's reputation very bad in the eyes of other countries!
Imagine if your country was also insulted?
I admit that Korea is the fastest country to become a developed country in every way, but they have no right to look down on other countries!!
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This review may contain spoilers
Make a country looks bad.
I haven't write any reviews on MDL and English is not my first language, so please kindly ignore the grammar error. The story is good and worth to watch at first. I was excited too bcs it says it will bring Indonesia country which is well-known in Badminton world. Whoever, when the preview episode 5 aired, my expectations dropped. It's a fiction but still doesn't sit right with me. They make Indonesia looks bad. In reality, the Korean athletes got tons of fans in Indonesia. I would give the overall rating 8.0 if they didn't do that thing tbh, but nah. I dropped it right away.Was this review helpful to you?
surprisingly i loved it
i think you should give this drama a chance, i personally really enjoyed this drama as it has comedy and touches upon the importance of family and friendship.to me i felt a sense of joy and suspense every time i finished an episode
although most comments give a negative light about racism as a black person myself i grew to enjoy it (even if i didn't agree about the racist parts)
especially the actors expressed their roles exceptionally well, especially the kid actors i really felt like i was there with them in every scene
especially because BTS was vaguely mentioned which i found enjoyable and comedic and each scene was fun to watch, it really felt like a feel good drama
romance was such a lovely add on in this drama even tho it was mostly related to friendship and sports
however some parts were not the best like how i mentioned before the slight racism and sexism which i wish the director could have changed.
nevertheless i hope there is a season 2
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Racism and streotype
I dropped this drama as it is promote racism and streotype. The drama take good Korea by put a bad side of another countries. The story is a bit of delusional.I don't need racism entertainment. In the earlier episodes, the writer did not say bad about New Zealand team and focus on their game. But, when it comes to Indonesia, they talked bad and not about the game. I don't think that this drama is about badminton but more to discrimination and racism toward other nation. It is not worth to watch it.
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This review may contain spoilers
Study the field before making the drama
Was happy to see a drama about badminton. However, was disappointed after watched it. There were lack of input from the coach to players and mostly after I watched the episode 5, it made my heart boil. Indonesia is famous for Badminton, it may have passed its peak, but Indonesia has many achievement in badminton. The drama should not trash other country, specially if the country has such a prominent record in the Badminton field. To say that Indonesia had often cheated and gave bad treatment to other countries athletes are really unacceptable.Was this review helpful to you?
This review may contain spoilers
Disrespectful and irrational.
Initially it has a good story and very interesting to watch how the team work hard. But I decided that I'm not going to watch after what happened in eps 5. The story became so cheesy with cliche scenes such as being cheated so bad by the home country. Mind you the home country is known with their reputable world class badminton team, so it become so irrational to make such exagerated plot. Off course it's a fictional drama, but it's so exagerated that it feels insulting and disrespectful. They could've just create a fictional country if they want to insult like that.Was this review helpful to you?
DROP THIS DRAMA AND MOVE ON TO ANOTHER
this drama starting with good vibes, but recently (eps 5) SBS or production team make something stupid, they dare to do negative depiction of Indonesian.This so dumb, SBS can do better than throwing some gas to chroal for gaining audience. The production team of SBS's TV series "Racket Boys" should apologize to the audience who took offense and remake the eps 5 as gratitude.
If you keep support this Drama than its the same you support Racism, and i belive korean people stand againts racism.
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