I wanted to write this review while my feelings are still fresh! If you're not in the mood for an emotional trip, this is the wrong drama for you. The story is about trauma, and recovery. It's about love, but also pain, and healing. There's no intricate plot with twists, instead there are beautifully complicated relationships. I couldn't wait to watch the lives of these characters each week. It's a different kind of escapism. The kind where you see beautiful moments in an often painful and unfair world.

The story revolves around a Mall's tragic collapse 10 years ago, and the plans to rebuild a new mall in the same spot. In the beginning I thought I would get bored by that plot pretty quickly, but the real story is all the characters directly or indirectly affected by this tragedy. Yes, it's also a great love story, but there are so many other interesting characters besides the main couple with their own struggles, romances, and personal battles.  The characters are also extremely diverse as far as their circumstances (age, status, abilities...), but they all deal with their own frustrations, and self realizations. The cast is basically perfect.

Lee Jun Ho and Won Jin Ah were amazing together. I was impressed by how realistic their pain, angst, and chemistry felt. They never felt melodramatic or over the top, no matter how heavy the story got. Moon Soo has a cool no matter what personality, while Kang Doo has a dangerous charm, and both are frustrating at times, and heartbreaking at other times, but also incredibly cute together. I will say that Jun Ho was exceptionally good, and I was extremely impressed by his range. Whether he was tough, sensitive, smirking, crying, sickly, seductive, or just charismatic... he nailed every single emotion.  I guess this proves once again that you can't underestimate someone by their past boyband status. I look forward to seeing many more awesome roles in his future!

This is the kind of drama where it's hard to pick out a few members of the cast because the whole cast is stellar. This review would be pages long if I tried to mention all the reasons why, just know that they are all realistic, sympathetic, imperfect, and that I genuinely cared about all of them. I will mention one MVP of the cast, which is saying a lot considering how good everyone was, and that's Kim Kang Hyun as Sang Man. There were many times that I thought his humor, wisdom, and emotional observations stole the show. It may be a stereotype to have the slowest person be in many ways the smartest, but he executed it so well. I loved Sang Man way too much not to mention him specifically.

I know I keep giving a lot of credit to the cast, but the writer and director deserve much of the credit too. The whole story feels extremely intimate. We get a sense of the Mall collapse's impact without it becoming too melodramatic.  The images were also more haunting than gruesome, which gave them a stronger impact. The writer also avoids having everything work out perfectly, or making everything doom and gloom, which is part of why it all felt so realistic. Even during moments where the story felt a little slower, everything still felt connected, and necessary. There was one point where a character kept repeating the same frustrating action, and just as it was about to drive me crazy, they explained why they kept doing it and it all made sense. There's also enough balance in the story where it's never too sad, or too happy, for too long. If you like character driven stories, you will definitely not be disappointed.

The question of whether I would watch this again is tricky. While it's certainly good enough to watch again, you have to definitely be in the mood for this kind of story. Some of the suspense in wanting to know what decisions characters would make would be gone, which may make some episodes feel slower. Still, the cast is so phenomenal  that I would enjoy watching these characters again even knowing the outcome.

I also really enjoyed the soundtrack. It was mellow, and moving, without being too distracting. I though that was perfect for a drama like this.

Overall, this is a must see drama, but be prepared for some tears... or many tears if you are a crybaby like me. With a story surrounding so many different characters, know that the ending is extremely satisfying (which I was worried about), as far as not leaving any characters hanging or forgotten about. I expected to be depressed when it was over, but instead I felt inspired to appreciate each day, even when life isn't exactly what I want it to be.  From the beginning until the end I was totally invested in "Just Between Lovers", and I'm so glad I took a chance on it when I had no idea what to expect.