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No Gain, No Love korean drama review
Completed
No Gain, No Love
72 people found this review helpful
by Pinoy Ares
Oct 1, 2024
12 of 12 episodes seen
Completed 6
Overall 9.5
Story 9.5
Acting/Cast 9.5
Music 9.5
Rewatch Value 9.0
This review may contain spoilers

NO WATCH, YOUR LOSS!

What a pleasant surprise, one of the best of the year!

I would say Im a little bias going in to the show. Shin Min Ah is one of the few Korean actresses that i reallly really adore so I am predetermined to love this just for that reason. Casting the very good looking Kim Young Dae is just an icing to the cake. At first it seems like an off-pairing because of the age gap, but they worked that in the story seemlessly and i didn't think, not even once did the age gap seemed apparent because they jived so well together -it's all thanks to the strong performances of both leads.

The story is a little bit off-putting at the beginning. A seemingly modern liberated woman engaging the services of a man to be her fake husband to survive in a corporate environment. HaeYoung seems to be a big red flag at first that will do everything to move ahead of her career. It was done in the guise of light and fluffy early episodes. As the episodes go by we discovered the layers to the characters, with the last couple of episodes being so emotional, gut wrenching and heart harming at the same time.

What sets it apart from some of the other May-December affair specially the one which aired almost at the same time (Im not saying it's Cinderrella at 2AM) is how each episode of this series seems important. They developed the characters and cliffhangers in a way that you'll keep coming back for more each week. What's more, the second couple and even the third couple, for that matter, were all engaging to watch.

I just hoped they didnt end it at 12 episodes cause i feel like there's still so much more to tell and i would love to see more of Hae Young and Ji-Uk together. I know they are adding 2 special episodes for the Gyu Hun and Ja Yeon fans and will also be first in line to watch it but i still wanna see more of the main couple and the other characters.

For me, one proof of very good writing is when you wanna see and know more of each characters - and that is very evident here even up to the support casts. I would have loved to see more of the male secretary Ha Jun cause he was being initially primed as the 3rd party to GyuHun and Ja Yeon's love story plus his character has very strong personality. Manager Jang and GyuHun's parent's stories also seemed unfinished (and what an underuse of the actor Choi JIn Ho). And should i also dare to mention the non-closure of UJae and I Rin's characters (with I RIn not even showing up at the the last episode).

So will i recommend? Yes, what are you waiting for?! Definitely one of the best K dramas of the year!
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