disappointment is an understatement

well, this is bout to be lengthy, brace yourselves
this is all nothing but my personal opinion, no hate to any of the actors, i bet they hated it too

so first of all, i only watched this because of byeon wooseok. for the longest time i delayed watching it because of the cover, thinking it would be stupid but the ryu shioh edits had me thinking it could be a serious drama with a solid plot. well... it was a mix of both, it was very naive overall although they really tried to make it serious and to raise the stakes (but ultimately failed).

the first few episodes had me hooked and i had hope for the story and the characters as they set up interesting situations, however my hope quickly died by the 5th-6th episode when i realized i'd been watching for a while and nothing had really happened. the episodes were exploding with filler, specifically the scenes with the grandma and her love affair. those had absolutely nothing to do with the plot, that was all just there to make the show longer but those scenes were simply unwatchable. i patiently waited and watched them the first half of the drama but i found myself skipping them at one point as they were insufferable. how come the grandma and her romance have more screentime than the romance between the two main characters ?? speaking of the two of them...

Namsoon was so clearly forced into that relationship with Heesik immediately after arriving but honestly, she barely showed any interest in him. the two of them had almost no scenes together that focused on them as a pair and their romance felt way too one-sided. yeah, Namsoon was first to say she loved him, but she never really showed it because there were almost no such scenes. the chemistry was not it and the romance was definitely underdeveloped with Hwang Geumju constantly brainwashing Namsoon into getting herself a man to reproduce. that really made me cringe as a concept by the way.

next up, the family as a whole. they were the most annoying characters ever. they were there to be a filler, they didn't really have their own personalities. they are only there to interact with the main characters, not to have their own arc. they did kind of all have something personal going on, but everything about them remained unresolved. the relationships in the family were highly toxic and nobody reflected on it. their son Namin almost died trying to lose weight after everybody shamed him for it instead of trying to help him become healthy and when they realized they had screwed up, they just let him eat all he wanted and continue being unhealthy, instead of teaching him anything (speaking from a strictly health-motivated pov, it's unhealthy to constantly binge fast food, fried food, spiked with sugar). additionally, hwang geumju was so uninterested in her children almost the entire time but was so dramatic every time something happened to them. that was so funny and ironic when you have in mind that she couldn't really care less 99% of the time. the only one who actually cared about his family was Namsoon and Namin's father, who called out their mother multiple times on being money and business obsessed. yet she didn't reflect on that and she didn't change it.

Ryu Shioh was ironically the only good part of the drama, despite being the "bad guy". he started off obsessed with Namsoon and her strength, wanting to use her, but she was starting to heal his inner child and he could've gotten better. of course, he was a bad person who did horrible things but Namsoon, who happened to be the only one who mattered to him and the only one who could change his mind, decided to stick to her ways and completely ignored his calls for help. she approached him wanting to take him down, he opened himself to her and all she had to do was sympathize with him, hear him out and she could have found a way to help him. instead she chose to hate him and not to care, even though he was ready to tell her everything. she could have reached out, instead she lied to him and betrayed him, despite REALIZING that he was really a victim. she admitted it herself AFTER he died. so then why let him die? when they were getting close he asked her what sort of a light he is, a real or a fake and she said he could be real if he tried hard enough, something that got him thinking. furthermore shows that she had some hope for him but then why didn't she try to help him? all he did was an attempt to escape the people above him and live a free life, he went crazy only when she betrayed him. he did deserve SO MUCH BETTER. he was the only character i rooted for and he could have had an amazing redemption arc just like Hwaja, who for context literally tried to kill Namsoon. why did they forgive Hwaja and gave her a chance to live a good life, but ignored Shioh's calls for help and let him die? the entire time Namsoon wasted to spy on him without hearing him for a second. if she heard him, he could have been saved. instead he just died as one of Pavel's pawns.

opulenta. that was an amazing example of plot armor. it was always there to conveniently give the needed information for the investigation, something big that was never even explored. they set it up as something they wanted to tell more about but they never actually did.

speaking of the investigation, the logic was just not there most of the time, everyone was jumping to conclusions based on information, fed to them by opulenta, the plot armor. it wasn't a proper mistery, tracking down the big bad guy behind Ryu Shioh.

next up, hwang geumju, the rich, money-obsessed lady who kept repeating how she wanted to change the world. well then... why keep all your money to yourself and only investing in more companies just to get more money? the kdrama made a point that it's exactly because of stinky-rich people why there's so many poor and homeless. hwang geumju has an excessive amount of money that she never even used to for example donate to people or build a school, an orphanage? nah she just kept them to herself.
this is a perfect example of why you should show and not tell, because telling the viewer that she wants to use her money to change the world but then never showing her actually do something feels like a slap to the face. for all 16 episodes only at the end did she kind of do something for charity and it wasn't even that major.

lastly, Kang Namsoon herself. you know it's bad when the main character that you're supposed to root for is an annoying adult who acts like an infant. Namsoon is a super immature character who doesn't really have the ability to think critically, instead she acts impulsively and things conveniently go her way (oh no, it's the mary sue symptom). she does whatever, illegal stuff as well !! and mind you, they recruit her as a policeman at the end! literally save all those people in that universe TT
this was the most overly-stretched plot i've ever watched with the most frustrating and dissatisfying ending that made me despise the main characters for essentially not having any empathy or ability to read the room. a lot of what happened wasn't a result of bad circumstances, but rather a result of the stupid decisions that the stupid and clearly blind main characters made (Namsoon, i'm looking at you).
Namsoon and Geumju were simply unlikeable, Heesik was a bit mehh, didn't really have a distinctive personality, the grandma and the rest of the family were annoying and Ryu Shioh was the only character who had depth and was likeable, yet they did him so wrong and i don't think i've ever been this frustrated

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why do people hate this?

i waited so long to watch this movie and when it was finally available for me i saw that people rated it rather poorly...
i personally thought it was a very interesting movie with a really cool concept that explores something serious and interesting. i also think the actors did a great job, all of them, however i must admit that the storyline was a bit questionable at times and there were definitely some plot holes. i don't think like i fully understood some parts like bai li's husband and i can't tell if it is because they didn't explain it or because i just didn't get it. i would rewatch because it was the perfect amount of tragedy in a movie with a happy ending. the most important part for me was that the movie's idea was really beautiful and provoked me to think about what the future holds in terms of AI and the concept of death. it had its flaws but it was by no means a bad movie.

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