I don't usually watch any dramas other than K-dramas, but the trailer for Dr. Cutie was very enticing! I enjoyed the drama, but it definitely isn't perfect. This drama is EXTRA CHEESY and the acting is really not good at all. The silly moments are overly exaggerated (goes beyond slapstick comedy), the crying/tragic(ish) scenes aren't convincing - the facial expressions associated with strong emotions were not expressed authentically by the actors. In this sense, Dr. Cutie felt truly inferior to K-dramas.

So why did I continue watching Dr. Cutie when the acting was so lacking? Because in all honesty, I found the plot intriguing, the pacing excellent, the OST enjoyable and well-fitting, and the overall drama to NOT be bloody or violent (which is not a common quality of historicals).

I also found that even though the facial expressions were forced and the overall acting needs sincere improvement, the writers did a good job developing and portraying the development of romantic relations between Commander Ji Heng and Tian Qi. Their relationship was not rushed and the overall change in Commander Ji Heng was well paced.

What I didn't like in regards to the romance was how Commander Ji Heng's brother, Ji Zheng was shoved into their romance to create a love-triangle. I was initially okay with it when Ji Zheng bowed out of the triangle, but then he discovered that tragic secret and decided he too was going to seek out revenge. I don't like being yo-yoed back and forth with plots like this...I actually really appreciated that the brothers had such a close relationship and that he was initially graceful in recognizing and sincerely wanting his brother and Tian Qi to be happy. By forcing the love-triangle a second time in the plot, it ruined his character for me and added an unnecessary squabble which could have been used to deepen the larger villain plot.

Which brings me to my next point - the mountain village villain felt really flimsy. The mountain village survivors had been playing a role through the entire drama, which I thought was great, because it would lead to what I anticipated to be a well though-out overarching villain plot. But by the end, we didn't really get anything specific about what went down at the mountain village to help viewers understand the deep ploy for revenge by their survivors. The time used to shove the love-triangle into the story a second time should have been replaced with these details in my opinion.

While I was dissatisfied with the above criticisms, I really appreciated how Commander Ji Heng's mother was written to be remorseful and NOT inherently evil - she even apologized in the end! She wasn't constantly scheming for her own purposes and she genuinely loved her sons and recognized when her desires could ultimately make her sons unhappy and stepped back to allow them to handle it themselves. This really sat well with me. This is so uncommon to see in any drama that it was refreshing!

In the end, I'm overall disappointed with the ending due to how it was executed. I didn't like how Tian Qi stabbed Commander Ji Heng (which was around the same time Ji Zheng's character also started to deteriorate for me). While she thought she was exacting her revenge with Ji Heng admitting to being responsible for her childhood tragedy, once the truth is revealed in the very end, she doesn't admit to her mistake and betrayal. So in the end, where Ji Heng is essentially trying to win back her affections to make their happily-ever-after, I personally feel like in the least, Tian Qi should have been trying to win him back too. Yes, I know he felt responsible and felt like he deserved Tian Qi's revenge, but at the end of the day, her love was not unconditional for him the way his was for her (you know, for example, when he discovered she was a girl and should have had her reported and executed and didn't).

But again, what kept me watching this drama even though I found the ending execution of plot particularly flawed, was the excellent pacing (even the ending epilogue was not rushed!), the great build up in tension between Tian Qi and Ji Heng, and the overall message that revenge is not something that is necessarily clean-cut as we would like.

I would likely not rewatch this drama, particularly because the acting is so incredibly cheesy compared to having so many other better quality dramas available to steal my attention. But I don't think it was overall bad either. There were definitely moments that had my chest tight with anxiety/sadness for the characters and there were some seriously beautiful fangirl-worthy moments (thank you Huang Jun Jie for being so handsome, especially in costume!).

My best advice if you are trying to decide to watch this: if you like relatively casual historical dramas that include cross-dressing heroines, love-triangles, and aren't too tragic/violent, this will fit the bill, even if not the best acting quality!