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Dear Hyeri korean drama review
Completed
Dear Hyeri
14 people found this review helpful
by DLKDramaFan Flower Award1
20 days ago
12 of 12 episodes seen
Completed 1
Overall 2.0
Story 1.0
Acting/Cast 7.0
Music 2.0
Rewatch Value 1.0

Romanticizing a Toxic Relationship Does NOT Make It a Healing Drama

I love Shin Hae Sun. My acct. pic is of her. I've raved about her other shows that were healing and wonderful and have said nothing about the ones I didn't love as much out of respect for my love of her. I cannot in good conscience not speak up and warn people of the trigger warnings in this show. If you want a healing comfort show, go look at my other reviews of her other shows.

⛔ Trigger Warnings:

⚠️ This show seems to want to convince the audience that it's a beautiful true love story between a woman who doesn't love herself & the man who doesn't love her either who reaffirms her low esteem beliefs about herself. It's shown as romantic, sweet and healing not sad, tragic and infuriating. Though the latter was what I ended up feeling anyways.

⚠️ Toxic ML says the most cruel things to the FL that's usually reserved for the villain of the show or a toxic ex that the FL escapes from.

⚠️ Abusive behavior like rejection, gaslighting, negging, abandonment, ghosting, verbal cruelty that lead to years of insecurities and pain that lead to a mental breakdown are never treated as such, it's shown as a normal part of a great love story. As long as a woman "loves" (more like obsessed & addicted to) a man, "love" of a toxic man is all that matters. Not Sanity. Not self-respect. Not mental well-being. Not self-esteem. Not self-worth.

⚠️ Gaslighting messages from both the show & the ML are normalized & romanticized. Healthy green flag men who love consistently and are good for a woman's self esteem and confidence are not good matches but a man who gives mixed messages and keeps a woman unbalanced & feeling like she was never good enough for him because he said that to her face multiple times in words and actions is a good match.

⚠️ Sexist ageism is portrayed in the show as just what happens on top of the fact that the real age of the leading actor is 8 yrs older than the leading actress but in the show they are supposed to be the same age. The ML clearly looks at least 10 yrs older than the FL but we're supposed to ignore that and believe they are the same age while being told that the FL lead is "too old" for the 3ML when she was maybe 1-2 yrs older but looked practically the same age as the 3ML.

⚠️ Severe mental illnesses like depression and Dissociative Identity Disorders (DID) are "cured" by ways in the show that in real life would most likely lead to that person ending up dead or permanently broken - or both.

Toxic messages to pick the red flag men over the green flag men were the reasons why I stopped watching American shows and "romantic comedies" and why they don't make money anymore at the box office. It's sad that in 2024 this kind of unhealthy, ignorant and even dangerous messaging still exists. I'll always love Shin Hae Sun's other shows, Thirty but Seventeen and Angels Last Mission: Love. If you want comfort shows or a love story that will make you feel good vs icky & despair, then go check out those shows.

This show was so disappointing that I don't think I can ever trust the Screenwriter: Han Ga Ram or Directors: Jung Ji Hyun, Heo Seok Won ever again. I definitely won't watch anything by them in the future until after the show ends and I see lots of ratings before ever feeling safe to watch something of theirs ever again.
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