Longtime Coming !
For years I've put off watching this drama. Initially after reading the synopsis I felt a little uncomfy potentially seeing Dylan wang play the ML who falls in love with his superior. I thought the storyline would be a little weird and similar to the drama "Find Yourself." Surprisingly I actually enjoyed "find yourself" after giving it a chance but it was something about this drama that I assumed I wouldn't like. I can confidently say after finally finishing it, that I found it to be very enjoyable. The storyline had a lot of depth and the lead characters were very likable (not counting FL's mother).The FL was extremely formidable and excelled at her job. She had amazing leadership skills in the workplace and I loved her tenacity. Especially when it came to dealing with hardships at work and how she handled them in such a professional matter. As a woman many men found her ambition and capability to be threatening and would try to evoke emotional responses out of her. In every circumstance she remained calm, and used reasoning and "rationality" to find a suitable solution to the problem. I found this to be incredibly refreshing and inspiring as a young woman in the work field who has ambitions on her own. I suggest other young women watch this drama as it shows how to resolve workplace conflict in such a professional but also direct way that leaves no room for misunderstanding. I found the ML to be a good character as well in that he was very likable and advanced the storyline. One issue I had with the ML was that his character wasn't written with nearly as much depth as the FL. As we see her progress in the workplace, we only see the ML follow her around like a puppy dog for majority of the drama. I will also mention that I initially liked their mentorship in the beginning where the FL showed the ML the reins at work. My issue began when it became apparent that they started having feelings for each other and the ML almost totally lost his depth. I also believed the writers knew the potential conflict of interest by having the FL and ML work together which is why he suddenly resigned from his job. I feel like all progress in the ML's character was lost after he set his sights on the FL. I wish that the writers would've gave him clear path and not fit him in to advance the storyline. I also took issue with how the end of the series stopped focusing on workplace politics and almost entirely focused on the romance between the FL/ML. I felt it was rushed and wasn't paced correctly. Throughout the entire drama the FL should've started to show some interest in the ML earlier and not wait until the end of the drama to finally embrace her feelings. The pacing was a little off and some characters lacked depth which made the FL outshine nearly all other characters. But for the most part I'd say this drama was enjoyable and I'd recommend people watch it. It has a lot of valuable lessons that are important for young professionals to learn.
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Give it a Chance:
This drama was like therapy for me. I can’t really explain it. It truly touched my heart and made me feel endless emotions. I went into it thinking it’d be lighthearted and similar to hometown cha cha cha. To my surprise the storyline is way deeper and in a lot of aspects darker. Each character is deeply complex. Usually kdramas have a habit of straying away from really dark topics and tend to be unrealistic. When watching you may think why is it so tragic ? But in reality it isn’t. What happens to every character is apart of the human experience and many issues they face are similar to the circumstances person face in their everyday life. This drama shows you the beauty of life, the ups and downs and all the moments in between. It teaches you that you’re going to have really dark moments that may seem to hard to overcome. But after every storm the sky clears and things become brighter once again. Life is a cycle that’s made up of all happy, sad, and scary moments. All of which is a part of the human experience. This drama certainly took on me an emotional rollercoaster and I’m so glad that I clicked on it on a random Saturday night.Was this review helpful to you?
DECENT SHOW BUT I DEMISE MALE LEAD
Honestly I saw a comment saying only watch this if you're into rom dramas and they're 100% right. Dont even give it a chance if you're not into romantic drams because you'll find it boring. Personally I feel like they could have done more, I honestly expected more from this drama but it gave me enough to recommend it to another personNow let me address why I dislike the male lead, this is definitely a bias that comes from having watched LOVE, MARRIAGE, and DIVORCE, but I like actually hate his face. Every time I watched this show I just imagined the character he plays in that drama and it made so irritated. That must mean his acting is pretty good if I felt such strong emotions towards him.
Anyway I recommend watching if you're a romance junky :)
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This review may contain spoilers
THIS IS BETTER THAN WHAT PEOPLE SAY !!!
After reading some of the reviews I've seen people call this show cheesy and comment on the poor acting skills. I want to start by saying that Luke Voyage aka Luke Ishikawa Plowden is not only from America but Thai is not his first language. This was his first major role and being that Thai isn't his first language he did a pretty awesome job. He also had to learn Japanese for the role so he did major studying and practicing on the sidelines to prepare. A lot of people aren't appreciating the effort he put into this role nor the lack of experience he has with acting overall. Everyone has to start somewhere and for him to get over all the hurdles and still make a decent lakorn is quite impressive. I'd also like to mention that this is NOTHING like LOVE PHANTOM. I saw people mention that over and over, but Love phantom was honestly horrible and it made no sense. It went from 0 to 1000 in a matter of one episode. This drama definitely has more substance than that, a better storyline, and it even comes with a TWIST!I also want to comment on the actual story line I saw a lot of people shitting on the storyline saying they've seen it before, but this show actually comes with a twist. I think the problem is the way it's introduced can confuse many watchers. At first glance you think the show is one way but it turns out to be another.
PLOT TWIST DONT CONTINUE READING BECAUSE I'M SPOILING THE ENDING
The problem I personally had with the show is the way they progressed Luke's Character. As him and the Noonmnin started dating the audience starts to see that he's hiding more than we expected. Most could have guessed this since we saw many scenes where an unnamed woman kept calling him and then she shows up to his apartment while Noon is there. We can obviously suspect they had some kind of either romantic or intimate relationship in the past by the way this mysterious woman comes on to him. I don't think there's anything wrong with that because in a rom drama there's often a person put in place to make the other jealous and to cause tension. The issue is where the producers and writers take this drama leaves everyone confused.
HERE IS THE TWIST !!!!!
It's not even that Akitsuki had a previous relationship with this woman he was her secret prostitute. Now listen.. this would have been mind-blowing and cool if they introduced it better, but it also seems so thrown together at the end. They finally tell the backstory of Akitsuki towards the end which leaves many of the audience confused. The story totally went a different direction than expected.
WHAT I'D DO DIFFERENTLY :)
Okay so this drama would have been a lot better if they'd make the BOSS more dark and mysterious. In some scenes he's super aggressive, but it isn't consistent. He also lacks the edge and darkness that's needed if they want to reveal a huge secret like the fact that he was a male prostitute at the end. They made him to lovey and bubbly throughout the lakorn so when they dropped the bomb on us that he was a prostitute it just seems like it came out of nowhere. I'd also like to say again that this was not all of Luke's fault as he did his best with what he had and for someone who had to learn two languages for this role I truly think he did better than most people would.
In conclusion I'd take everything I wrote into consideration before watching this lakorn, but I definitely recommend it!
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