CONFUSING, SHOULDN'T'VE REPLACED SOME ACTORS AND MESSY

Now I feel bad that i watched the first movie at 1.25 speed... because i got hyped when i saw on netflix new releases, i saw Han Hyo Joo in the poster.

Okay first thing, so they've replaced 3 actors, like the actor of Rak, Jin Ha Rim, and If I'm not mistaken Jin Ha Rim's Girl which was played by Han Hyo Joo. Them Replacing Rak's actor was really off putting to me because it's not the same vibes at all. The actor in this is great, he's good, but he's acting the Cold, can't be mind read character, in the first movie the reason Rak is soo good is because you got the backstory-ish of his family dying and pet getting caught as well, and the actor in the first movie portrayed the emotions really well, because you got this soulless character, with the only goal of finding the person who did it to his family and his pet, but the Rak that he's portraying here has still the same motif and that's to find Mr.Lee, but again the vibes is just not there.

Then jin ha rim also got replaced as seen in the back stories, but i don't care about that anymore since he's dead already and the girl that's played by Han Hyo Joo. Now Han Hyo Joo, my 2nd fav actress, as always she's great, she portrays the character really well. She's matched the energy of the previous actress who played the character but with an extra tinge of Han Hyo Joo.

Now, the story got me really confused. So the first few minutes or so of the movie are cliff notes of what happened in the first movie and then we pick where the movie left off, after all the seon chang and ha rim shit. Already, I'm confused because of the different rak and now, it's revealed that rak is not actually Mr. lee, so okay... and as usual won ho is still on about this case and the other characters have now band in together to get down to this mystery of who actually this Mr. Lee is, like.... just moments ago you were all on each other's throat. And speaking of throat it was revealed that Keunkal and Ha Rim were actually step siblings and i was like "weird... but okay..." and then how they revealed Mr. Lee was the most unsurprising and effortless sequence i've ever seen. Like we got a call and then boom a camera shot of Mr. Lee, no music, no tension or sound effect whatsoever, it's just there. They could've just left the first movie alone, i don't think it needed to have a sequel, like you just unveiled the curtains behind the first movie which you didn't need to. After watching this movie, i was just left confused, like what?! And the later parts of the Film were fast paced, they didn't even bother showing a few scenes of how these characters found each other.

So yeah, i think i'm just gonna forget that this existed. I'm just here for Han Hyo Joo, though i was kinda disappointed as to why this film even landed on her portfolio, but hey, as a fan I'm glad i have something to watch from her. The First film was good i would recommend it and if you wanna watch this one go ahead if you want more, but for me, i wouldn't bother, just the first one is enough.

Read More

A Very Great Movie

I waited for this and Thank god it delivered. The moment I saw this uploaded on *cough* sketchy sites *cough*. I immediately stopped everything that I was doing and sat down to watch it.

The story is predictable and formulaic, but hold on! Let me explain. I don't really read the synopsis. None at all. I like going in blind whenever I watch something and just let the story do its job. Now, what I mean by "predictable and formulaic" is that the way the story is structured already follows a blueprint that I'm familiar with because when I watched it just 5-10 minutes in, I was like "Ahh, so the movie is gonna about the struggles and the challenges that they have to face, like this and that" just from how they are speed running the build-up on how they become a couple in the beginning. And I didn't mind that just because I've seen it being similarly done before a thousand times doesn't mean I'm not going to enjoy it. I still kept watching because I was curious how they gonna do it. Even though I already called it what the movie is going to be about, I was still wrong when it came to the story beats because how they did it is pretty unpredictable. I even cried at some scenes for how impactful it was.

When it comes to the characters, I felt the same. It's heavily focused on the main couple. They're readable, but I love their chemistry. Even though the movie doesn't tell, it is more about just showing you what it can do. And that's how you know that the actors did a great job of conveying the thoughts and emotions of the characters through their acting. I was so engrossed by the character writing that my attention is sucked in and the main couple are Writer and Artist, basically my 2 aspirations. Also, oh my god!!! Zhang Jing Yi's hair😭😭😭 The stylist has to go to jail for that!!! Thank god it got fixed after the time skip. ML is handsome and cute, I wish they'd added some extra details to his illness to make it more relatable and scary.

While watching this, I kept pausing every time just to commentate and analyze what just happened, as if I had someone beside me, I might as well have made a reaction video at that point and posted it online.

Overall, a very great movie, despite the story structure being familiar to me. I highly recommend it.

Read More

Clustershit Teledrama

Man... this is such a train wreck of a drama. It's soo bad, but at the same time, I can't stop clicking the next episode. This is the type of shit that my parents and grandparents would love, the story and writing is your very typical television drama.

Like the ML and FLs relationship is sooo toxic. They kept breaking up and then making up again... if not, the FL would keep bouncing back from ML to 2nd ML. I have friends in real life who had relationships like this and I just can't stand it. It's sooo annoying and toxic, like just make up your mind already and break up, don't keep coming back, but in this drama, it's so bad that it's funny. It's like you're watching this car crash that you know it's gonna be bad, but you just can't close your eyes. After the car crashed it kept tumbling over and over, and if you think it's gonna land on its own 4 wheels perfectly, it still managed to roll over and exploded in the end.

As a comedy, this is really good, because it made me laugh so hard many times, but it failed in the romance aspect. Well, not that it's not good, there are times when I find it really sweet and cute when it's just focused on the romance, but then they've added the family drama and business politics and that's when I find it really boring.

The only thing that the family drama did bring something good to this series is when they added the Fiancee or Marriage part, that's where the series for me started becoming really good, and it's really funny because the moment the fiancee got introduced, the writing became really good and the characters were well fleshed out, even the interactions and dialogues were really good. I think it turned into a Romance-Drama instead of a Romance-Comedy. They've built up the fiancee well that it made me root for her instead of the FL, I think i almost cried when they gave Mingsi and Xiaozi a closure and after that, the series returned to being a train wreck of a rom-com.

What is actually going on in that family drama?? I don't know if it's really bad or they've just written it to be toxic. There were some good points in that aspect, but there are some parts where it's really exaggerated. I think the one thing that really put me in such disbelief was when Shancai and mingsi were doing a challenge like 'We didn't eat for days to convince my mom', that was such a cap for me. I think Mingsi was on the fortunate side because he was lying in bed so at least he could sleep, but Shancai... she was just standing outside for days, did not eat or sleep, that I cannot believe, I doubt you'd be able to do that in real life, especially without sleeping?!?!?! you got to be kidding me.

In the earlier parts of the show, there are also some side plots that I think are just fillers to stretch out the runtime, especially where shancai got kidnapped, like what on earth was that, I think you could actually remove the part from the show or maybe even skip it, cuz that did not do anything in the later parts. There are a select few where it actually contributed something in the later parts, like caina, I think her and meizuo's romance was really interesting, it really helped meizuo's character development, though it was also annoying at times when caina couldn't make up her mind and kept making ye come back to his house, i think the dude is too forceful of a character, it's creeping me out.

One thing that i was really annoyed with in this drama is, why they kept using those western songs?!?!?! Especially the 'River' song i don't know what that sound designer was smoking or whoever is in charge in that department, but seriously??? you kept putting that song in scenes where it shouldn't be.. who knows maybe the director is a fan of that song.

Also, in this drama, they are sooo shameless at doing product placements. They put it and the characters would use it and would do an ad read as if they are actually doing an ad. At least in kdramas when they do a product placement, it is just there and they wouldn't highlight it, if you notice it and you think you wanna buy it, then good. For how expensive to pull off this drama was, considering you have rich characters, i think it's understandable that the people behind this drama were a suck-up to the sponsors, that's why they were really highlighting those products.

And then in the later parts, i got super bored, because they had to resolve the issue with the mother, and my god... i can watch dramas at 1.5 speed when i'm not invested, but this drama made me surpass my limit and taught me that you CAN watch a drama at 2X speed if you put your mind to it. This was a good training arc for my reading speed skills and brain processing skills, which i can thank in this drama because i came out leveled up.

I don't know what was i expecting in this drama. Maybe it's because it is a remake of the old classic meteor garden that i've watched as a toddler. Regardless, i think if you like the old clustershit stories that you see on old TV back in the day, i think you would like this, but not for me. I had a rollercoaster of a ride and now my brain has rotted for how dumb-fun this drama was.

Read More

Great blend of Horror to Heavy Drama, but too short

Man! They had me in the first half. I came in thinking I was gonna be watching horror, It's going to be great, but I ended up getting sad at the end.

I didn't know this was the Chinese version of the upcoming Korean version as well and also, I didn't know it had a manhwa source to it. I wanted to read the original source at first, but I chickened out because I didn't wanna be that person who's like "No!!! It's not faithful to the original source TTTT". So, I watched this first to avoid being biased towards the manhwa.

The story for the first half was like sloooow burn light horror and mystery. I'm thinking... man, my TikTok brain rot attention span is slowly kicking in, when are they gonna start showing something scary? Because everything that has been shown so far has been vanilla af. I feel the eeriness, the color grading is very dark, the sound design is on point, and everything aside from FL is sus, I thought that, but she was sus as well, and then plot twist! things started happening and I'm like woah?!?!

In the Second half of the story, the genre started shifting, and honestly? They did a pretty good job transitioning the story and who to focus on. Like what is this that I'm feeling right now? And then I understood "Ahh, that's why they took their time to build up everything in the first half". There was like twist after twist, and they tried their best to tie everything, though not perfect, but good enough to make sense.

The characters, I must say, since it was a movie runtime, there wasn't enough for me to care, but they've shown enough story-wise for me to get invested and stick till the end. For FL, it's been a while since I've watched Zhang Ruo Nan. She became even prettier (ughhh!!!), like flowers around me every time she showed up on the screen. I was basically in love with this girl. Her acting? even great, she did a good job. ML, mostly about him was shown in the last minutes of the movie, but imo he's aight. The LGBT couple is what really tickled my heart because the moment Sun Qian's character showed up, I felt the feels man and they had a good chemistry. It's my first time seeing Sun Qian take on an LGBT role/pairing and honestly, you could take those two, have them do a GL drama and it'll probably work. The mother and daughter were also very sad, like goddamn. I went from hating the mother to understanding why she was presented the way she is and the child actress was so good, she didn't have to go that hard on her acting delivery. The old man was aight. His side plot was like another extra variety.

Overall, a good movie, would recommend you check it out. The upcoming Korean version is a series, so it'll probably fix what this movie couldn't show in the 98-minute runtime it had.

Read More

Probably My Love & Hate Chinese Fantasy Drama

Honestly, i watched this because it just wouldn't leave my netflix front page, it would always show up. So bet, watched it and i did not expect how good this show was going to be.

First off, I'm very much that guy who's really eagle eyed when it comes to CGI and cinematography as well since i studied animation for a year. Immediately, i noticed the CGI Effects, i really like the vision that the people behind this wanna show to us viewers, it's fire and that's the thing that will always draw me in in these types of shows, is the VISION, but i can't really help but judge the effects since sometimes it's very jank and it doesn't blend in sometimes. You see, i just watched 'The Longest Promise' before this and that drama had the cleanest cgi that i've ever seen from a Chinese Fantasy drama, it's not perfect it had some flaws, but it's not jarring for the most part, but mind you that dramas doesn't have a grand vision unlike this one. And it's very EPIC as well, like the opening episode of this drama, so epic, again it's the OVERALL VISION URGGHHH!!!

The story honestly, what sold me in this like around episode 3 is the Romance Aspect and the Dynamic of ML and FL as well. The Romance aspect is so so good. In the beginning, the romance is non-existent cuz i thought this was something like a revenge drama, i mean it is, but i actually did not expect it to turn out the way it did, though it's kinda very obvious as well that there's a chance that it might happen, but what really carried it in the early parts of the show is the dynamic of the Main Couple plus the off the charts chemistry from their actors, that's what i kept clicking the next episode for and the way it developed later on, is soo good! Literally every turning moment in the later parts i kept saying "ugh! i can see why it's till the end of the moon, shit! literally till the end of the moon!". I hate it in dramas where the characters are playing tug of war with each other's feelings like the break up-make up cycle, i find that really toxic, especially in real life, but here, i don't know how the writers did it, but it's done really well, it's not annoying at all. I haven't mentioned the other plot of this show, which is the fighting/magic aspect, that's because i find it just okay, again mostly because of the jarring effects, but i like the vision that they're trying to portray, i don't think i have much to say about it, i mean it's there, it's okay, but i think if you set that all aside and look at only the Romance aspect this is more than just a 10/10 because they really nailed the part, but in my heart, i know it's a 10. Also, that dream arc, really surprised for how well written that arc was, they actually invested a lot of time and effort for that arc, but i just couldn't really get invested in that arc, because this is just a dream, why else would i care about it? and it was such a long arc as well, i almost got checked out in this series by the end of that arc, i know it had a contribution to the overall story, but i think they could've made it shorter.

The Characters, i think all of them got overshadowed for how good the Main Couple were and their actors as well, ugh!! Like this is my first time with these actors/actresses and My gawd... ML and FL didn't have to go this hard, you can really feel that they are being pushed to the limit. Like the director on the set was probably like "Come on! I know you can do more!" they are so goated actors that i don't know why i feel bad because there's a lot of blood spitting scenes here, especially with ML. And FL, was trying to stop myself from liking her as an actress because i still have a lot of drama from other actresses that i want to watch. I don't want to add more on my plate, i don't wanna get invested, but oh my god! she's just such a good actress you know? and i really like her playful/bubbly acting, she's really really cute when she does it. The writing of their characters itself is also good, i really like how it started and how it developed along the way, though there are some few ass pulling plot convenience, but that's just a minor complaint of mine. And i say overshadowed by ML and FL, i joke, there are other side characters that i really like as well. For example Ye Qing Yu, i love him as a brother character, he is done really well, especially in the later parts when he's standing before ML not as his General, but as a brother of FL, the scripting is so so good and I love her dynamic with Pianran, their side plot romance is really cute and really tragic as the same time. I also like Nian baiyu as well, he's such a goated side character because he has a big contribution to ML's characterization. Xiao Lin, i think he's a decent character, he was ok written, and when he's on screen he's hitting all the points to make his character standout. During the dream arc as Sang You, he was mostly passive, and as Gongye Jiwu he's also great, but i wish they spend a little bit more on him questioning his own existence you know, that was really good and at the end as well though he kinda became annoying a little. I really don't like Ye bingchang, she was written to be that weak minded character and i don't get how she didn't even develop that much at all, all of her incarnations are annoying as well, though her devil incarnation was really good because its the culmination of all her incarnations combined into one. The rest of the side characters, most of them are okay, there are a lot of them and most of them we didn't even have the time to explore so it ended up most of them getting wasted

The music, oh my god! it's so good, i love all of the OST here, they know how to do it and when to put it in which moments, combine that with the top tier acting and well written scenes, it's soo good. The music really did a good job at elevating this drama, though i would minus a point for it since sometimes it's loud, like louder than the dialogue of the character.

Other than that, i don't think i have any more critiques or complaints for this drama, it is really good, though i hate to rate it higher, but i just can't deny how good it is. Go watch it if you like these kinds of drama and the chemistry of Main Couple Actors here is so good too.

Read More

EXCUSE ME?!?!?????

What the heck?! I did not expect myself to come out at the end of this film thinking "You know what? I somehow enjoyed my time with it". I went into it like "I'm feeling mindless right now, I only have 2 brain cells working left, so I wanna consume something shitty, something that I can forget" so I opened up a fresh incognito tab and clicked a random movie that would pop up on youtube. I even watched it on 2x speed as well, but here I am making a review.

First 5 minutes of the film, I was already regretting my decision, I thought "Oh my god! Why am I here? What have I done to myself?...". The first half of the film is like a shitty comedy-horror. The horror aspect didn't even scare the living shit out of me, I'm like stone-faced during the horror moments, but the comedy parts are somehow landing though, so that's good I guess. And then around the middle, it somehow turned into a life drama with mild romance in it and like "Wait?! It's actually cooking something" because the writing became somewhat good, it was wholesome, I'm loving the character development, the dynamic, the chemistry is tickling my heart and I thought "Ah! I know where this romance is going, I've seen a lot of scumbag MLs, I can see what their tryna pull from a mile away" but then they went into a direction that I did not expect and then resumed the shitty comedy-horror from there, then turned the film to action-comedy, with life lessons at the end.

That's the whole film. It was such of a mess, but they still somehow tied everything well and it made sense, I don't know why.

The acting in this film was good as well. In the beginning, since this was a throwaway film, I was expecting the actors/actresses would just deliver a bog standard job and call it a day, but no, it wasn't the case, or maybe some of the side characters. The main actor did a great job, he's funny, even though his character was such a scumbag, I liked the development, but how it ended was dumb fun. The main female though, did a great job acting as a blind poor person, she didn't stand out in the beginning that much, but when the romance part came in, it gave her character the time to shine. Side characters, they're all good, but there's that one side character that really stood out to me. And it's that old lady who's overseeing this ghost marriage during the ghost wedding part, I don't know. It's just the way her voice acting really caught my attention and I was like "Woah! I like her. she's doing a great job for a minor character."

I don't know if is this my true opinion or if it's the coffee because I'm making this review with 2 coffee bullets of americano in. So yeah... again I can't believe I somehow enjoyed that film, but I wouldn't rewatch it again though, that's for sure.

Read More

It was aight

Okay, so picture this: you're settling in to watch this short film called 'Wedding', and at first, you're like, 'Wait, is this a documentary or what?' That's exactly what went through my head halfway through. The way the actresses were looking straight at the camera and interacting with it had me questioning reality for a second. But then I figured, hey, maybe they're going for that whole documentary vibe.

Let me tell you, the acting in this thing is solid. The dynamic between the characters is on point. I mean, I wouldn't be shocked if someone told me they were a real-life couple because the chemistry feels authentic... for the most part. Sure, I didn't feel the sparks flying as much as I'd hoped, but hey, you win some, you lose some.

One thing that caught me off guard though – there's no background music. It's just pure dialogue and ambient noise, which, I guess, adds to the whole 'documentary' feel they were going for, but personally, I missed having a soundtrack to set the mood.

Overall, 'Wedding' is an interesting watch. It might throw you for a loop with its documentary-style filming, but stick with it for the performances. Just don't expect any romantic symphonies in the background.

Read More

Didn't tear my heart enough, but still left feeling sad

After watching Lighter & Princess, I wanted to watch zhang jing yi's other works and this one caught my attention. Just from the title that has 'Tear' in it already giving me that "Ok, My heart is gonna be ripped into shreds in this one" plus the poster is already looking so sad.

The beginning of the movie might be fast paced in some sense, they've only shown how they met and this is how they've developed for feelings for each other, but the way they've written and filmed it feels so pure and innocent. Then as we jump to them as young adults facing the challenges of the wider world, that's when it starts "tearing" your heart out, because it's so grounded, it may not look like it, but you could actually see this happening in real life, especially in this day and age where it's already hard to buy your own place that you could call "Home" because of the housing prices.

The movie for me was predictable since i've already watched similar films like the choices that both leads make, i can already sense what's gonna happen next and the only thing I'm gonna look forward to is how are they gonna do it and each choice that leads to bad consequences is where the characters love for each other really shines. I love the way they did the silent moments in this film because that's where the actor/actress acting really shines, it doesn't have dialogues at all like the characters don't talk, but you can feel it through the actions and the emotions that they portray, like ughh!!! sooo good!!

On a side note, the moment i saw Sun Ning here i was like "What the hell? you're here too???" because, i've watched 'A love so beautiful' recently and i hated his character there and i probably still must have that hate in my heart which carried on in this film, so immediately, didn't like his character and actually deserved it for how he'd done wronged the male lead which led to an even bigger and hardest choice that he had to make.

Although i came to this film knowing that i would be sad at the end, i actually did not cry and that's probably my fault because my expectations are off the roof, cuz i've watched 'More than blue: the series' recently and that's sadder than any media that i've ever watched in my entire life, so i expected this film to actually destroy my heart leaving nothing but this film still made me sad deep inside. I would still highly recommend this, even though i didn't come out crying like a motherfucker at the end and this actually confirms that i'm actually into dramas that end on a sad note and it's fine if it's that way, because it's the same in real life as well, not all love stories have a happy ending.

Read More

There's No Beautiful Love At All...

I watched this 4 years ago when it was the hot topic in my country. However, I immediately got bored after 2 episodes and dropped it. But this week, I decided to give it another go and see if I'll like it since I've been really into cdramas this year. Sadly, I still did not like it, but I still managed to force myself to finish it.

First off! OH MY GOD... I don't get the hype for this. The audacity to call this "A Love So Beautiful" when this is such a fetish fantasy, poorly written drama. There was no beauty whatsoever, the characters make me fucking angry for how dumb they were all written, there was no redeeming arc, it felt like they were all the same as they were in high school when they became adults, they didn't mature at all.

In the beginning, it was BORING as hell, too many side plots to drag out the show, that don't even contribute that much to the story. I'm all for slow burn story and no matter how many side plots you're going to pull... IF you can pull it off and tie it all together. But here.... *sigh* oh my god, they were all just distractions.

Around the middle, it kinda started getting heated, because finally, the ML started moving and that's because 2nd ML is really doing that grind on getting the FL's attention. It was kinda exciting, but that's where the bad character writing really shows...

Out of all the characters, I think the 2nd ML is the only likable character here. The goated character. I would've understood if they ended his character after the High school part, but no, he showed up again when they were all in college, clearly to be wronged again. It would've been great if he and FL were the endgame.

ML is too cold as if he's some kind of robot, a character with no soul. Like the dude didn't even smile throughout the show... well, he did twice... like one in the early episodes if you watched the extra bits after an episode and second when Xiaoxi made her smile about something related to food???? When he was a doctor, I get it, you're too busy doing operations, I can also see he really wanted to spend time with FL, but he didn't do SHIT to at least explain his side to make FL understand as why she can't spend that much time with her. They only brought up the "Oh my patient died that day that's why I didn't say anything when you broke up with me, because I had a lot going on my head" like get that shit outta here... when you're girl is trying to break up with you, always try to save it and see what you can fix or did wrong, no matter how busy you are.

Xiaoxi. like, girl??? how can you be so dumb?? In the beginning, her character is only to annoy ML for how in love she is with him. I think 'When I Fly Towards You' did this well, But here it's sooo insufferable. and she kept bouncing back from ML to 2nd ML like she's soooo fragile when it comes to ML, but when they finally broke up, I don't get why they did this, they time skipped 3 years, right? and she got back with ML only in the span of 2 episodes?!??!?! It would've been great if they showed 1-2 episodes of FL healing from the breakup and what 2nd ML filled to help her with that.

Jingjing. I really had fate in her to be a good character since she was FL's best friend, but most of the time, she's so useless. When FL is going through struggles about love, she could've been there to give her the words of advice that she needs, but when she is actually there instead she would just "It's alright" and then a few moments later would encourage FL to fix her relationship with ML, like what?!?!?! I don't get how as a girl she can't see how red flag ML was. There was no moment for at least once to consider advising FL into loving the 2nd ML. smh...

Lu Yang. Also a dumb character. I understand you want to help your bro get his crush but at least point out his own red flags first. But what do you expect from a clearly idiot written character. Also, in what rights does he have to be angry with jingjing and throw tantrums, when jingjing admitted her love for the school doctor?!!??! he's just a friend?!?!? I would've understood if he pointed out that "no, you're still a minor, you're too young for him". On top of that, he finally confessed and tried to get closure, but the dude pushed her away, so wtf?!?!?

In the later episode, it kinda got fast paced a little and the ending is soooo anti-climactic, like wtf was that ending?!?!? and as I've said the characters didn't mature at all, because the way they act and talk is still the same, like you're all adults now, so at least act the part, mygoood...

I will admit this was a cute drama, I think I will like this IF I too was still in high school and didn't have a loved one, but sadly I'm not, so I wouldn't recommend watching this. was planning on doing a review without spoilers, but I couldn't really help it, as I need to point out where this drama fell off(in my opinion).

Read More

VERY GOOD HIGHSCHOOL DRAMA

I watched this since it is the talk of the internet along with Hidden Love

Immediately after episode 1 I was hooked and my god the FL was soooo cute. At first, it's all about FL wanting the attention of his crush and trying to get him, but as you progress through the story they slowly expand to the other cast and deep dive into their lives, while maintaining the dynamic of FL and ML, and I like it since the other characters are really interesting.

Slowly you see the development of each character little by little, you'll notice it from the way they act and their facial expressions, then the moment you realize it you're already in love with all the characters.

The way they do the interactions of FL and ML tho, ITS SOOO GOOD. it's sooo five head since they make sure, it's not for the sake of "they need to interact" like they always build it and you won't notice it building up to an interaction

I love how good the writer is at limiting the characters to a certain number, so you won't get overwhelmed by who is who, like why don't we explore this person and this person, there's none of that. Like the intention is very clear, they only want you to focus on the main characters and their friends. The way they did it was so tasteful like they only give the small parts to the extra side characters that don't ruin the flow of the dynamic and story.

Something took me off of my immersion with this drama though and that was when I thought "will this get dragged on?" because around ep 18-19 they're still in the high school side, but you can already see they're trying to build it up to the pay off that you've been waiting, and yeah long and behold it was worth it, nothing grand, nothing special, but still great♥

After all of the high school shenanigans, now we're finally on to the college side of things and this is where the story gets fast paced, like a little fast paced. I was kinda amazed how they are rushing the story, while also maintaining the key points that they want to show on the college side and even on the adult side of things. I get it, I think the story already ended in the payoff, but I guess they still wanna show the audience, what's beyond.. and I realized that this is the closest to real life couple, like how a couple would act that I've ever seen. you look at 1st Couple and they're so grounded. Like the adult side of the story, I watched it and they're so similar to couples that I've seen in real life.

Very good cdrama i love it♥

Read More

Was expecting it to be shit, but boy oh boy it blew me away

Since the live action felt mature, i really felt the family drama between garp and luffy, that was really good that it almost made me cry.

The acting of the main actors are good, but since i watched it in jp dub, there will be times where the voice acting is top tier, but the facial expressions of the actors doesn't match at all, but i didn't mind it nonetheless... but some of the side characters acting are shit.

The story felt rush sometimes, but it would slow down on important moments, but i guess that's the result of the time constraints. Like every crew gets introduced every 2 episodes and would get resolve within the span of 2 episodes as well... i don't know, but somehow it still works.

CGI is decent as well, it's honestly not bad, like it's kinda similar to dc

Lastly, a minor critique is that i cannot get used to the western cinematography. as someone who watch mostly asian shows, you know how they love trying out different kinds of camera angles, but here you can tell they love the camera angle where the subject is in the center and it's very up close as well... it's like they're filming a horror movie. And I'm kinda getting disney beauty and the beast vibes..

And of yeah, I'm kind of disappointed that they didn't show arlong's other power that he could do with his teeth's here....

All in all it's still good, would recommend it to others and I'm hype for season 2, I'm really curious how

Read More

Boring....

When watched the first episode, i thought "Ohh, this is something new" so i kept watching, but then later i realized "Ahh, that's why my friend watched this at 1.5 speed"

I was 10 episodes in, but nothing is happening.. they just kept showing back stories of the characters, showing us what happened and commenting on it, characters kept blaming each other and kept depressing over what they did. I get you're trying to build up these characters for us to care about them, but there's just something about it that it didn't really landed well, hence why i find it boring.

The later episodes where the drama started picking up, but even then there's not much development, but the writer did a ok job wrapping up the show as you're approaching the end of the drama

The characters are ok i think they are well written, but that didn't make up for the story, so.. that's still an L

Read More

Great Concept, Poorly Executed

The idea of the story being a Mafia Game, everybody knows if you watch a lot of K-content. It was so great on paper, but if watch the show, there's so much that wasn't well explained and built up, leaving a lot of plot holes. It started fine, but you can tell right away that it's gonna be a mediocre show because they just went straight to it without easing us into what's about to come. And as you went on, it just kept dwindling, then crashed itself with the most tacky ending.

I don't know if the producer had more to show because there were some tidbits of backstory here and there, but it just wasn't delved deeper into at all, like can you at least explain how did that came about? and how would that impact the story? They could've cut down the unnecessary drama between the characters to make room for meaningful interaction and scenes. Instead, the characters were just busy being so emotional and blaming each other, just mindlessly voting because "I hate this person or that person" or "this person did that or this " without even trying to bring up a shred of conclusive evidence, NOT UNTIL episode 4, it took them four episodes!!! I don't know how many days have passed in the game, just to realize "You know? Maybe we should try and figure out who the mafias are". The bullies also realized that, so they tortured someone till they admitted they were the mafia and the bully was like "Aha! told you my hunch was right!" No! you just picked a random nerd in your list and got lucky, but what if that guy was innocent? Then you'd be basically torturing an innocent person to death. I get that you'd be emotional in that situation because I for sure would be traumatized in that situation and they are high schoolers as well, but I wouldn't just wimp around all the time knowing the killers are busy making moves all the time trying to get ahead of us.

One thing that I hate in stories right, especially in mystery and you see it a lot in the bad ones, is that whenever they show the plot twist, but in the form of a back story and show it first sometimes before the actual twist. OH MY GOD! I hate that so much and it's so prevalent here. STOP IT! The writers must have thought that it was a good sequence, Yes, it's a good "Oh shit!" moment, but it doesn't make things interesting at all if you just hand it out to us without any merit. I want the characters to actually figure it out themselves and have them reveal it to us. The reveal of the final mafia was so obvious to me because it's always gonna be the one that's closest to you, like the saying "The most dangerous place is the Safest place" so all this time I was just waiting when she's gonna come out, but I would like to be proven wrong because clearly she and FL had a good bond, but nope! and again they revealed her plot twist through a backstory first before she could even say it herself... The only time they did it right was probably when the Police decided to reveal itself in front of everyone. That's when I was genuinely shocked by the twist.

The characters here have no characterization, just some generic stereotypes that have no depth to them at all. The acting is super great. All the actors did very well, I'll give them that, but their characters are so empty that I couldn't get attached to any of them. I was genuinely surprised that for a Death Game show there's no "The Smart One" archetype. FL has that potential because she's perceptive. They could've used her for that and then made her grow to be that archetype, but they didn't. ML also has that potential since he's observative, so he and FL could've been a great combination, but they didn't, so it's just a waste of potential characters that could've made them stand out in the show. Instead, they were busy being annoying. The couple clearly has a strong presence within the characters, but I don't know why they're not taking advantage of it. ML is a risk taker also, so I don't know why he stopped taking risks after being blamed as the mafia for the first 2 and just wimps around.

It's a shame how this drama did turn out because I really liked the Concept and Idea of everything, but it just wasn't executed properly. To be fair, It was so engaging that it made me want to finish it still till the end.

Overall, good concept and idea, but it just wasn't executed properly. It had a big potential, but they just wasted it. I don't recommend it and won't be rewatching it for sure.

Read More

I Was Enjoying it, Until I Wasn't

Right off the bat, this drama felt mid-sized budget. I don't know, I'm not an expert, but it just kinda of gives that vibe.

Story for the first 10 episodes, I was genuinely enjoying it, BUT I did notice from time to time that there are some sketchy things in the writing that would feel very off to me. For example, its pacing is weird sometimes, and the way the dialogue exchanges is sometimes a bit off, though it wasn't deteriorating my enjoyment. It's just a minor thing that's there. Then as you go deep into the series, those small cracks that I noticed would slowly creep in and would start getting bigger and worse as you approach the ending.

The story beats feels so disjointed, there were a lot of ass-pullings everywhere, but it somehow still made sense, if you can puzzle it all together. I feel like the writer or producer, whoever is in charge in that department, must've had good(or cliche) ideas and chucked it all in without considering how to make it all flow well. Also, I feel like this drama, even though I'm thankful that it's just 24 episodes, could've benefited from the 30-40 episode runtime. You see, there are not that many fluffy scenes, they just get on with it with whatever they want to show and a lot was built up, but couldn't explore it all because of the time constraint (and maybe budget as well?). Although kudos to them, because even though it had flaws, it was still entertaining enough for me to finish it.

As for the Characters, I think they are the hard carry in this drama. Without them, I would've dropped this mid-way. The characters are not perfectly written, but they are still dynamically funny. I loved the bantering. The chemistry of the couples is good. I must say, I think the 2nd couple stood out to me, though their beginning was such a mess, the writing of their relationship gets better as the story goes on. The first couple was all right, they were cute but felt vanilla. Since they've built it up that there were seven families in the alliance, but because of the time constraint they couldn't explore them all one by one.

I thought "Is it just me?" but I looked at the comments mid-series even when I was trying my hardest not to look at it because I'm still not finished with the drama, but yeah... it wasn't only me.

Overall, it was a decent drama. You could give this a watch, but just look at it from an entertainment standpoint and you'll enjoy it, but if you use too many brain cells, then you're probably gonna end up hating it.

Read More