What I didn't like was how complicated the simple revenge plot kept getting. She just needed to seek revenge I don't know why people had to go back and forth about what they knew about each other. Near the end It should have built more on what they wanted than to add in the "running away" not running away filler.
What I disliked the most was that everyone seemed Repulsed by Sa Geum Ran, I wish, especially with Han Tae Hee that he would not have been repulsed by her in her "original" form.
Over all though I actually thought it was a pretty good drama overall. Fun, cute and even a little intriguing. The acting was very good, loved and hated almost all the characters. The story had weak points that needed some filler, but it wrapped up well.
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So many of the things that I really enjoyed about the drama came to an end around episode 15 with still 35 more episodes of almost nothing really important.
There were so many scenes where the main character just stared "meaningfully" at the camera, or into space, or at each other.
The main character Princess started off as a strong willful and fun character, but then just fell into this "ugh" phase where all she did was act like every other woman in Joseon. I was so disappointed by her. Over all the acting was sub par and the story just got dragged out more and more. Then the "special armory" people who didn't even have a real role would just show up in a scene sitting and talking to each other like they had so much free time, it was so unrealistic. I really like King Gwanghye and the actor in that role but he is not in it long enough, it would have been really interesting if they had made it more about him than her, and King Injo.
It ends with them trying to pull at some heart strings but it just doesn't work, mostly because by that point I was just irritated with all of the characters I didn't see a reason to care. Over all I would not suggest this drama to anyone.
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Personally I think the trouble started in the last 2 episodes. There was so much talking and no action. So much of this "is she; isn't she" filler and then in the last episode just NOTHING. I wanted to throw things I was so disappointed. It makes no sense as to why you would spend all this time building a love story and then in the end you cant even see the love? I mean were those his kids? her kids? together? or separate partners? and why does he look so upset in the end. Not to mention almost every other character is completely forgotten about in the last episode. I mean what happens to them?
I was so let down in the remaining 2 episodes that I wouldn't even suggest this drama to others.
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When I say cutest I mean totally the CUTEST drama ever. Lots of admissions of "like" at first and realizing that they are both messed up individuals who need each other to fix each other. Episode 4 was such a step from the norm in dramas and it wasn't even this "I LOVE YOU" type of thing made it even better.
Episode 9 there is a scene that had me ROTFL and I was even more infatuated with this drama.
A little later on around episode 12 there is a change in the story which turned a unique drama kinda typical for me and is the only reason this drama got a 9.5/10. I do not think this "twist" was needed and I wish it could be re-written.
All that said I think it ended well, the characters don't really "fix" each other but help heal everyone. Detective Jang's story was a nice little side story and even the mother and fathers stories. It was a very cute, sweet and mostly unique drama that I would highly recommend.
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I would not suggest this drama to anyone unless they just wanted to watch Hyun Joong be cute.
I am sorry to any fans who loved this drama, but I just found so little redeeming about this drama. If I didn't believe in finishing every drama I start this would have been one of the few I dropped.
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This review may contain spoilers
OMG this show was so so wonderful. I loved it. There was just the right mix of surgery's and vampires. I loved the "transformation" of the vampires. I also really liked the depiction of the vampires being infected by a virus. I did not like Goo Hye Sun (Ri Ta) acting or character. I was really disappointed in her depiction of such a serious roll. Maybe I am wrong but it just did not fit her. Ahn Jae Hyeon (Ji Sang) was also just alright- he seemed a little stiff. Of course I loved Jung Hea In (Hyun Woo) and LUVVY I mean how could you not.
The story line was very strong and though you could see some sway of the story based on viewer opinions (less surgery as it went on) it still held very well to the story. You kinda end up liking almost everyone.
All that said this entire drama was ruined in the LAST episode. Though things had gone down hill in the last 4 episodes. I held out hope, but then the last one just destroyed it. I can not say more without adding spoilers but its not so much a bad ending as a bad wrap up. Nothing is explained or resolved, we don't really even know what really happens, you just have to guess.
So while the drama had originally earned a higher score from me I had to lower it based on the last episode. So sad.
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The beginning is strong. I loved the story of Dong Soo and Woon. Another reviewer said "epic bromance" and I could not agree more. Even the young actors who played both of them were pretty amazing. I had a few issues primarily with Dong Soo's- deformity and the stupid suit of bamboo that didn't look like it could possibly do anything but those concerns were minimal.
Towards the middle of the drama however everything just comes to a stupid halt. Nothing happens that progressed the story. Ji Sun's character who they act like is integral really becomes a useless figure and I was not a fan of her acting. I think that if she had died I would have been happier with the story line. In the middle all I learned was useless things about ginseng that in no way really helped build the story. Kanzo could have been a really cool character but he too seemed to be so poorly written that even his parts were in no way beneficial.
Towards the end it became really hard to even drag my self to the end. At the end there is a few things that of course are integral and all I can say is that even though I knew he would have to die, I was still balling during his death scene. That said I also had wanted to slap him for his continued "misunderstandings" I mean WHY DID HE NOT TELL THEM THE TRUTH!!! On that note WHAT THE HELL CHO RIP???
Then at the end the "pairing" everyone up was a little unnecessary and didn't really make me feel like anything had been resolved. I was overall just disappointed in the way things started to play out after episode 14. For once it might have actually been better if it had ended somewhere around episode 22.
Overall the acting was good and I liked the characters, but they were poorly written and the writing just got worse as the show dragged on which is why I give it a 7.5
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I did not like one thing about Shin Se Gi - while he is one of my favorites the tattoo is too much. Ahn Yo Na is my favorite personality of all. Hwang Jung Eum(Oh Ri Jin) is the lead female and I was not so impressed with her or her character or her acting. That is all I can say about her really.
The acting of Ji Sung to pull off each of these characters is very impressive. For some of the personalities you can tell he has changed just by watching him. Ji Sung was the key to this drama getting as good of a rating as it did. He was spectacular.
The story over all was good, but once again they tried to wrap it up all too quick. One key problem I had was the appearance of a new personalty at the end, and I wanted more of a back story on a few of the personalities mostly the twin's (I don't feel they were explained as much).
The OST "Auditory Hallucinations" is one of my favorites right now and fits the drama perfectly.
Overall if the drama had been a little more clean at the end I would have rated it higher.
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On a side note, even if it is not your first drama choice make sure you watch it. There are very few Asian Dramas that are as well known as BOF.
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This review may contain spoilers
9 things wrong with these 9 eps. (NOT worth the watch)
Ok I have not written a review in a really long time but I felt like this one really needed a review so that people could understand just how bad it was.1st off the entire storyline is messed up to begin with I mean who fakes their death for 5 years just so that your loved one can move on. If he had broken up with him and gone to the states for 5 years that would have made sense but the fact that not only did he fake his own death but that everyone around him was in on it just makes it honestly just too far fetch to begin with. That being said I still was waiting to watch this drama and was excited even knowing that it was a ridiculous plot line to see the end story of Golf and Bank.
Ok 2nd this drama was super slow.... the writing was just bad. Fluke Natouch is an amazing actor and he is the only one that manages to pull off his character in the entire series. The other Fluke (Golfis ok) Like there is only so much an Actor can do with a bad script.
3rd the other actors were not very good I'm just gonna leave it at that....a lot of the newer characters were just bad acting.
4th almost all of our original characters are not in the series at. All of Bank and Golf's friends basically only make a cameo in the 1st and 9th episode.
5th going into this I knew that there was some shade being thrown at Fluke Natouch from the director and the producer of this show. I don't have words for that really (other than unprofessional) but I do think it put a bad taste in my mouth as to why our 2 main protagonist are such a small part of the entire series.
6th the way the Golf shows backup and is just miraculously alive (even though all the viewers knew that to be true before going into the series- bc of the 'reunion' eps) the way that they handled him and Bank meeting again for the 1st time was again just part of a bad script it didn't make sense it was poorly done and despite the Flukes best attempts to put emotion into the scene you really couldn't feel much because it wasnt written as well as it should have been. It should have been incredibly emotional for not just Banks character but for all of the viewers and it really missed the mark.
7th the attempt to add in not just one new couple but literally 4 new couples to give some meat to this drama was again poorly done. Nobody cared about any of the side couples, none of their stories were deep enough to make us want to care. If they had focused on 1 side couple that might have been interesting but 4 of them, and I'm not even sure there are 4 of them I honestly stopped paying attention, was just so redundant.
8th the 'rape/coercion' scene and the harassment and the stereotypical drunk sex and all of those scenes combined just again side story unnecessary stuff trying to add stuff in and they weren't needed they were not helpful in the story at all they were weird and creepy. Along those lines there is just a lot of like negative space a lot of slow motion movements a lot of really slow dialog where people were just like on screen looking at eachother. Trying to look emotional for long periods of time.....this is 9 episodes series and each episode was 30 minutes long and I swear 20 minutes of that was people just staring at each other as they slowly said their lines, randomly interspersed with sexual harassment.
And last The 9th problem I had with this drama (and yes there are 9 problems and 9 episodes) is the shade that they try to throw at the end of the drama....the wrap up story line stuff that they posted at the end right before the credits where they give everybody's complete story line and how Golf and Bank lived happily ever after and that kind of BS um it was just .....I don't have words...... Also them claiming that they were the 1st Thailand BL EVER (2014)---just to clarify tthis was originally a weird movie, also poorly done and "Love Sick" was the 1st Thai BL Series....so they can claim being the 1st movie, but definitely not the creators of all Thai BL.....that all other bl's are born from their creation and then the facts that they then are like "Oh Bank and Golf lived happily ever after, " even though we had all these weird scenes where they barely even talk to each other and then we don't even get a real kiss out of them at the end but the other characters are having sexual harassment and straight up sex in some of the scenes. Then on top of that the whole like let's just randomly kill off Arm he dies one month after him and bank break up and it's just it's so weird and so forced that I'm not sure that I can even explain how bad and weird and forced it was.
OK so my rant over I feel like if you are one of the people that really needs to see the completion of this story and you're OK with not watching every episode for the full 30 minutes then you might be able to handle skipping through .
If you are not highly invested in Bank and Golf OR you are not one of those people that can skip through parts of a show OR if you need trigger warnings about sexual harassment or rape then I would not watch this at all. It is not worth it and you are not missing out on anything.
Bank and Golf end up together happily ever after. Honestly I was either falling asleep or disgusted by the story or horribly disappointed in the script for the entire thing. I think this is the lowest rating I have ever given anything out of the hundreds of dramas that I have seen and I purely give it the 1.5 star that it gets because of Fluke Natouch and his ability to handle trying to get through this series despite all the shade and poor script writing and poor character development that happens.
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The action scenes are excellent and well thought out. Chang Wook does most of the stunts himself which of course makes it even more impressive. They never try to show any outlandish stunts and everything is reality believable.
The romance is nice because its sweet, there is no love triangle and it makes for a more believable romance story line. That said the romance is definitely there. This is an action romance not just action. So go into it with those expectations. I think they do a really good job at setting that up from the beginning where as in other shows it almost seems tacked on at the end.
The back story that connects all the characters together is well thought out and I was really impressed with how it managed to wrap up. Admittedly I got worried around episode 18 when there were still so many things unanswered.
Over all this drama gets a 10 from me and is strongly recommended especially if you want somthign more than just romance that you can watch with your significant other.
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Episodes 1-6 were almost a waste of time. Yes you got back story here and there and as another review put it "its like an onion pulled back layer by layer" but there was so much that wasn't part of the overall story- fluff that just grated on my nerves. Especially since they also try to set up a love story that wasn't beneficial to the plot.
Being a vampire fanatic I also had problems with the mythology and there were scenes and shots that made no sense.
The female leads part was also unnecessary, it was almost like they were going to start up a romance, we even get her back story, but it just flops and seems like it was added in to get female viewers.
All this said ep. 7-12 did get better and episode 11 and 12 were by far the best. I liked the ending which was this dramas only saving grace when I scored it.
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This review may contain spoilers
I read a few of the other reviews before I decided to post and I don't fully agree with them. Yes this is a sageuk (historical k drama) and yes it is long. 51 episodes may seem like a long show to watch but it is well worth it. There are of course artistic liberties taken with the story but the traditional story line is still there and this drama also does a good job with costumes and period accurate details. It keeps you on your toes and its not just a happy go lucky show, there is real drama and real suspense. If you can find the time for the whole drama you will not regret it, the characters good and bad make you love them. The lead female is powerful and impressive while being elegant. Leading men both pull off their characters well and while you will most definitely find your self screaming at the screen during this drama, its ability to frustrate and suprize its audience is one of the keys that kept me watching. On another note if you are interested in history or in Asian culture this drama is intriguing and can give you new insight without being opressive.
I don't want to add any spoilers so I am going to have to stop here but as a last word this is my favorite sageuk and I recommend it to everyone.
***re-watch value is only low because it is long.
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With out spoiling the plot it was nice to have a character with integrity. I actually did not care for PSH character In Ha as much because she seemed to hiccup too easily, even if she wasn't "lying". I liked that while there was obvious romance here it wasn't the overly romantic drama, romance was almost like a supporting character, explaining their roles and characters without being overwhelming.
One of the biggest problems/best things was that I did not hate the antagonist. I actually felt bad when they got in trouble at the end. In fact none of the people who did "wrong" in this show were very "bad" at least not to me. I actually really liked a few of the antagonist like the Chairman.
Overall I liked this drama, it was an easy watch, not something that maybe kept me "really" fascinated but at the same time it was smooth.
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