Started off boring, was good in the middle and went off the rails towards the last 3-4 episodes.

This was promised as an upbeat, youth drama. Instead what I was served consisted of some bits of what was promised with a heck lot of makjang. I think this drama was poorly written and executed. This should have remained as a underdog to riches story instead of the unnecessary revenge, crime and what-not being included.

Kim Dami stole the show. But even an actress of her caliber felt like she was struggling towards the end because the direction in which the plot went made no sense. Park Seo Joon had an ugly hairstyle and was mediocre at best throughout the entire drama. Shame, because this drama could have been one of the best roles he would have had. Kwon Nara is okay for me - never does much, but I believe she did the best to her potential.

There were some cool offbeat things about the drama like the youth culture of Itaewon and a diverse cast with issues like LGBTQ+ and racism being addressed. Some characters were great, others were okay. I feel like my time was wasted while I was impatiently waiting for episodes to come out. I won't even categorize this drama as a one-time watch. My recommendation would be to either skip it altogether or do a lot of skip-watching to get through this.

Park Saeroyi reminds of old-time self-sacrificing characters in old Bollywood films. They only live by principles and only want to be the better person in every situation, no matter how unforgiving the other party may be. Romance felt forced and the friendship focus drifted off pretty badly. Not to mention the time jumps made it all the more uninteresting.

At least the drama had a decent soundtrack.

It wasn't worth my time if not for those few good Itaewon-centered episodes and beautiful city and Namsan Tower views in a lot of scenes. It made me miss Seoul a lot.