Had I relied too heavily on the reviews here on MyDramaList, I wouldn't have given this show a fair shot. I'm *so glad* I took a chance because I thought it was easily one of my favorite kdramas (and I've watched over 70 so far in the past 1.5 years). It wasn't perfect, but it was engaging, well-acted, well-choreographed, well-thought-out, and well-executed. I notice that I tend to agree with the reviewers over at Dramabeans in their assessments of shows and was pleasantly surprised to see that they rated it a 9.6/10 and with good reason. I breezed through the entire series without skipping any scenes and absolutely gobbled it all up. I'm sad it's over.

Acting:

ML & FL
I'd only seen the FL (Kim Sohyun) in Love Alarm and since her character frustrated me immensely with her romantic choices (I'm still so salty she didn't choose Song Kang in EITHER SEASON), I had a bad bias toward her and thought her acting felt a bit forced and wooden. She totally caught me by surprise with her acting in this show. She was wonderful, emotive, and had great physical acting as well. Her chemistry with the ML (Jang Dongyoon) was natural both during the show and especially in BTS. They're so cute together!

I've been meaning to watch Jang Dongyoon in something and I'm so glad this was my first experience watching him act. He did an incredible job as Widow Kim and as Nok Du. He had such subtle shifts in his body language and voice depending on whether he was near the other widows and in his female persona, or when he was around Dong-Joo. It was so fun to see his body language suddenly shift into a more masculine gait and posture, and hear his voice drop several octaves lower all while still dressed as a woman. He was able to easily come across as a beautiful woman, and also give me butterflies with his masculine physique.

Side Characters

Antagonist
TOTALLY UNEXPECTED. I had only seen Kang Tae-Oh in Run On as a sensitive, overly nice, overly aloof character who spent the majority of his time fawning over his CEO noona, so this was a complete 180 and I *loved* it. He first comes across as that same love-sick, funny friend then totally whips into the most unexpected and vicious villain who arrested my attention whenever he was on screen. He also looks *fantastic* in his black war regalia.

I also want to give points to his right hand, Dan-Ho. I'd never seen him before and he was a scene-stealer as well. His gaze was lethal as was his sword.

The King
I both empathized and hated him. This is one of the highlights of The Tale of Nokdu that I couldn't get enough of. Characters you're meant to hate still tugged at your heart and made you pity them. The story had so many layers and the King, at moments, made me feel like he could be redeemed.

The Queen
I *LOVED* the Queen. Oh my heart. She was a beautiful, strong, and heart rendering character. I'm so glad she was able to finally reunite with her son.

Dongyoon's Family
- Great chemistry. The relationship between Nok Du and his brother was heartbreaking and I rooted for them throughout the series to reconcile. I also really loved Aeng-du. She's a firecracker.

The Widow Village
I loved these women. I rooted for them and thought they were an admirable, brave bunch.

OST
Very pretty. Aided in painting the picture of every scene immensely.

Overall

I really, really, really loved this drama. I laughed, I cried, I laughed some more. The plot was well layered and well-executed. The plot never meandered long in one spot so it always felt like we were going somewhere. Nothing felt overly forced. The length of each episode and the overall length of the series gave each character and storyline plenty of room to breathe. I had minor issues with how long it took our ML and FL to FINALLY tell each other the truth. That part did feel like it ran in circles a little bit. I was also a little frustrated with the outcome of the show but was overall very happy that our main group of protagonists had their happy ending.