6
Park Min
Lands Between
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Good cast and had a decent start but there weren't enough interesting elements to keep it alive, it fell off shortly after. Not even the thriller/mystery elements were that good. Half of it was filled with nothing. Weird and out of place injection of romance especially with Ye Eun.Was this review helpful to you?
Bad
More like "Love in Stupidity"! It's just a bad melo. If they wanted to make it driven by stupidity then they should've doubled down and went all the way in at the very least. I would also very much prefer if Park Ha Na took the "after surgery" role instead of Park Han Byul. At least that would've made the drama a bit worthwhile.Was this review helpful to you?
It's alright
I always found Go Se Won's lips being distracting and mentally uncomfortable to look at, and it's a bit amplified in this one since he got a lot of focus. Another thing that constantly bothered me, when the main leads met each other for the first time we were told that FL looked identical to his dead lover, felt like it was laying the ground for a plotline but that was never brought up again and had nothing to do with anything at all. What I hated the most about this drama is how every single character, including the female lead, became useless once their part is over. While the antagonist was the only constantly present character. On the other hand, I liked how the character didn't run away like how we are used to in other dramas. However, despite fighting back and not running away, it took a lot of time to get to each milestone in the story. Which is why there is pacing issues, just like most of the daily dramas. Speaking of pacing, the last ten episodes were amongst the most useless ones, the drama was 99.99% over at that point. They spent these 10 eps roaming around, having small talk and giving cringy overreactions. One thing that grabbed my attention, although there were a lot of baffling brain dead moments, there were also a few moments that carried a really good dialogue punching above its weigh.Was this review helpful to you?
Ehh
Every single character was as unlikable as they could be. About 90% of the characters were scummy. All relationships were bad, both romantic and non-romantic ones, especially the ones including the fathers. It's not about cats, it's about bad daddies! The entire production screams low quality. The cast performance was disappointing, especially both male leads. Despite their lack of chemistry, they couldn't pull up more than 2 reactions per episode. There weren't enough side plots or overlapping plots other than the main one, which made the main one feel extremely draggy for 119 episodes. The only side plot that had some kind of continuity was Eun Sook and that's it! The main story sucked, nothing was interesting or fun about it. I'm having a hard time to find anything to like here, maybe Choi Yoon Young because I liked her in "Seo Yeong, My Daughter (2012)"?Was this review helpful to you?
This review may contain spoilers
Typical
The usual makjang revenge nothing new nothing special. You stick around to watch them go mental and laugh at the absurdity. However, usually in these dramas once the character reach the bottom of the pit they either received a magical unforeseen help or make their way from the bottom all the way up by themselves. Unfortunately, this drama took the lazier route and spawn powerful elements to carry her through the revenge without putting in the efforts.The female lead swore on taking revenge 100 times over and over but in the end she forgave everyone and even befriended them further despite the infinite unforgivable crimes they committed. Kinda a big slap to the viewers on the face who stuck around for 150 episodes just to see the revenge finalizing. Did they really had to make the uncle turn into an obsessive psycho lusting over his nephew's girl in the last 3 episodes?
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Good enough
The drama had commitment issues and was quite indecisive in what to make out of this drama. It was swinging between making an economic/political piece supported by human drama and between a human drama themed around economics and politics. This was mostly noticeably around the middle parts. Irrespective of its narrative direction, dramas of this nature are reliant upon the strength and range of their characters, and in this case it was pretty limited in that regard. The four leads did provide that to some extent and had a good dynamic and contrast but that wasn't remotely enough for a drama of this scope. The remainder of the cast felt more or less like a background noise, of which, they were divided into two groups, the selfish ones and the lesser selfish ones.Regarding the ending, the drama built itself up to a big climax but it never got there. It didn't allow itself to manifest into something greater despite the earlier episodes indicating the exact opposite of that. One last thing, in the last episode they were throwing around new emerging ideas/topics and relevant world news that are related to economics at the time but it was a load of crap! By the way, the title of the drama is kinda cheesy compared to its actual content. Anyway, it's good enough.
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!!
Never seen a drama with a good start but flopped so hard and fast. As if there were two completely separate writers. Most of the story was packed in the first 2-3 episodes (out of 16) while the rest were almost filled with nothing. The reason behind the last episode being a time skip is because there was no content left and they had to air something for the 16th episode. Another major irrecoverable mess up were the characters. The villains had zero effort put into writing them. The female lead took the "stupid female lead" trope to a never seen before levels. Also, poor chemistry with the leads. In general, the drama progressively gotten worse with every passing minute without ever recovering. That's impressive!Was this review helpful to you?
Good
I found that Park Wan and the triangle involving her was unfitting and problematic to the drama. I understand that they wanted to draw some parallels with the old ladies but it could have been done in another way. There were plenty of other possibilities to make her intertwine with others. I would rather have that time reallocated to the elders. Anyway, it's good.Was this review helpful to you?
Infested with unlikable characters
The female lead was doing an unbelievable amount of heavy lifting to not let this drama sink under. Both the actress and the character. The romance failed even at its climax, mainly because of the male lead. He failed to redeem himself from the jerk-ass status he established earlier on. Their love always felt one sided from the FL while the ML was there to give a reaction. However, the worst part has to be the fairy tale and its association with the older cast. One more thing, the incestuous brother was a bad addition to the drama.Was this review helpful to you?
Deceiving looks
Despite being a short one, they wasted so much time on other matters instead of the main objective that's the "dead girl". The investigation/mystery became a side plot and this ended up being a short teen romance drama. Hardly okay!Was this review helpful to you?
The concept seemed appealing at first but...
Clearly not much thought was put into it. Tacky, flashy and loud. Feels less than mediocre at times. I don't want to get a 2nd season of this manufactured environmental waste.Was this review helpful to you?
Okay
Oh look it's Kim Tae Hee that every other drama keep referencing her as the beauty standard which to this day I don't understand why they keep drawing parallels to her specifically. Anyway, when it comes to inevitable death in drama I mostly prefer stories that take the terminal illness route over the "49 days" scam. Terminal illness stories can bring more raw emotions meanwhile 49-days stories lack in that regard, mainly because their death is an unchangeable fact regardless if the people associated with them moved on/still in pain/still mourning/still have regrets or not.It's still a "decent" drama, just like most of the other sad ones. They always work because we're silly little humans who like to sympathize. It's a lighter and more casual drama compared to others like it. Which is why there was less investment than usual in the characters and less focus on the characters that matter in general. This is clearly shown by how they attempted to prolong the drama, one example being the female lead started helping/observing other ghosts/spirits. Was that really needed? The lack of directional focus is its biggest problem. The concept of 49-days is a bit loose here, the concept itself seems to vague to the characters until it was told to them blatantly which is weird because isn't it part of Korean culture/tradition in funerals? Overall, not that good not that bad, just okay.
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Good enough eh....
None of the events or crimes matter. What really matter is the astonishing incompetent police work. It's really hard to ignore that and continue watching. There was no need to show the police investigation done that way. Even if it had some truth in it tied with reality. The story would've been completely fine even if the police investigation was done right and the investigation ended properly while adhering to all the procedures. All of this happened in episode 1 which makes watching the next 15 episodes a bit too bothersome. The drama started to lose its focus halfway through and the story began to stretch. Would be much better to keep it to 12 eps and cut some of the middle parts. On a side note, Sun Ho feels like the most generic NPC in any visual novel. On an unrelated note, what's up with Choo Ja Hyun exclusively doing Chinese dramas prior to this drama? No wonder I've never heard of her!Was this review helpful to you?
Not good
This drama was tough to get through. No clear direction, things were happening as they were going along. Bad characters' writing, none of them were appealing. The protagonists weren't given the treatment of a protagonist. Sang Yup seems to be given too much focus with his affairs while neglecting the leads, the leads and their story were boring anyway. Add to that lame villains/baddies. Go So Young performance wasn't good! It's also Bae Yong Joon weakest drama.The production was acceptable since it was from the 90s. I can't think of something notable to like.Was this review helpful to you?
.
The side cases were fine but the main one was too messy, weak and generic in both seasons. The comedy often relied on loudness, repetition and rattling, in season 1 mostly because season 2 wasn't comedic but just dumb silliness. There's a weird down time between some cases that could've been utilized better. Half of the cases either lacked a proper villain or a proper victim. Don't get me started on the endless dumb moves.Regarding Season 2, it was a significant downgrade. The series became straight up silly. Just from watching the first episode of season 2 I knew exactly what direction they are taking the sequel. A bad one! I was already sick and tired from the obsession over Hyun Soo but this was only amplified with season 2. Which why, in both seasons, the main case was a despicable mess. They even made Hyun Soo more important than the female lead! They could've taken the story in many interesting directions but they decided to copy the first season and make it dumbed down and sillier. There was no need to make a 2nd season in the first place. Season 2 left me with nothing but disappointment. I don't care about season 3 and would prefer not to get one at all. I would give S1 a 5.5/10 and S2 a very generous 3.5/10.
What's even the point of forcing a romantic connection between the leads in season 2 if they weren't gonna do anything with it? It didn't even serve a purpose for the climax. Speaking of which, after endless mentions of Hyun Soo, the drama didn't allow the male lead to interact with Hyun Soo after he found it her identity. After all the commotion, it ended up in vein. Even more, the female lead backstory of her parents death was given less than 10 minutes of attention in both seasons.
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