This started out really promising, with a heartrending set up, beautiful direction, and gorgeous cinematography—using empty spaces and silences as effective storytelling devices. However as the drama progressed, this began to wear a bit.

The silences and innumerable silent glances became unbearable and continued long after a relationship between the two leads had been established. And the writers kept montaging the same 4-5 bits of dialogue between the 2 main leads to establish connection. I began wondering in the final act what was really connecting these two so strongly together when they hardly ever talked on screen. (Just talk to each other!)

Yes, one could argue that they had a soulful, unspoken connection, but it was perhaps too unspoken. I just would have like to see more substance between the leads and less needless angst.

Also wasn’t a big fan of how Woojoo just crumbled under the weight of her family’s disapproval in the last few episodes. She could’ve fought for their relationship. She was so headstrong and confident in the beginning and I just did not enjoy the trajectory her character took in the last few episodes.

All that said, I really loved the second lead romance. Sung Joon stole every scene he was in, and that romance was just so sweet. Their communication was adorable and was so fulfilling, and it just served to highlight how unfulfilling the interactions between our two silent leads were.

Anyway, I’m glad I watched it, but probably not one I’ll watch again.