6
Park Min
Lands Between
How!
The lack of resemblance between the younger and older versions of the cast was striking. This drama was like one of those scuffed TV Novels, just a tad bit detached from reality, trying to mimic humans but not quite there yet. The drama consistently followed a peculiar and sporadic direction, which hampers any potential for viewer engagement. This inconsistency, coupled with incoherent pacing, weak plot elements, and dull execution, contributes to a well packaged disappointment. The drama fails to deliver something substantial, leaving viewers longing for literally anything worthy. Furthermore, the drama features one of the most underwhelming last episodes, further adding to the sense of disillusionment. It almost made me reach the point of detest if it wasn't for some of the cast's performance. Highly not recommended!Was this review helpful to you?
Man!
It had an interesting concept and I liked the first chunk of episodes but that was such a poor storytelling. It irks me to no end how this was utterly wasted after a good start. Also, it doesn't make effort in building the world nor in setting up concrete rules. Logic is completely neglected and everything is made up along the way. The later parts were just not good.Was this review helpful to you?
Poor!
When it comes to teenage/school dramas, bullying/hierarchy/classes and school pressure aren't doing it for me unless they take an interesting angle of which this drama failed to do. It fell into the endless pit of vexing mediocrity. On another note, sloppy writing that is sincerely flawed and only focuses on the shininess of teenage fluff and antics, further demoting its poor efforts in creating a story. On an unrelated note, I wonder when Kim Hyang Gi would graduate from playing student roles, it's getting stale. Also, it's a waste for the adult cast to be involved in such drama.Was this review helpful to you?
Failed delivery
Jung Hee the dullest character in the drama, would be better to remove her. The story was too shallow to function and the younger cast ain't helping either. I wanted to see more of the older cast and less of the younger cast. It also had too many plot holes to ignore.Was this review helpful to you?
It's alright...
I couldn't stomach most of Dong Yup scenes. They gave him too much attention and screen-time. Would prefer more focus on other characters. The drama itself was decent with a handful of funny scenes but unfortunately not memorable.Was this review helpful to you?
Awful beginning...
The first 23 episodes were really painful to get through, mainly because they are flashbacks with the young version of the cast. The flashbacks didn't add anything to the story and they could have been easily summed up in 3-4 episodes. Even after the flashbacks there was barely anything happening. It's almost just a slice of life until the last portion. Relationships were awful and unnecessarily tangled in a love square where none had any emotional weight by the end. The drama has one of the most awkward endings, you can feel the characters melting from awkwardness. Even if I disregarded the flashbacks and the relationships, there wasn't anything else appealing to me, not even the cast performance. You might like if you are looking for a slice of life set in 1970.Was this review helpful to you?
Hmmm...
The drama is definitely unique. The director went all out with his own style. Not necessarily objectively good nor bad just different. I personally enjoyed what it tried to do. The quirky direction is the drama's biggest highlight. There were no eavesdrop where characters happen to stumble upon a secret, instead there are very long extended cut open dialogue scenes with no interruption which makes all the difference to see the characters actually talk. Some episodes may consist of only two scenes for this exact reason. The drama doesn't shy away from throwing experimental scenes that are completely unrelated to the story for fun. Although some scenes are just too bizarre like that one scene where an old lady reminiscing a young guy's body after the funeral. These scenes will probably make most of the characters seem insensitive. Then there's ep79 coming out of nowhere completely unexpected! The characters sometime step outside the boundaries of their character and do something unlike their character. This also resulted in inconsistency and showed the characters in a bad light. At least the drama doesn't attempt to "fix" the character, sometimes it's okay to remain broken. I ended up enjoying the drama for all the wrong reasons and that's cool. I liked Ha Na as the antihero, she did great and it might be her best work so far.Was this review helpful to you?
Ew....
Well, the poster is completely misleading this is a full fledged makjang from the first frame to the last. Mo Ah & Nam Goo are one of the worst pairings in daily makjang. It's strange when the support cast get better pairings. You got also the usual idiotic forgiveness accompanied by a lackluster ending so don't expect anything at all. Anyway, the verdict is... it's bad. It's a certified stinker.Was this review helpful to you?
Idiots
The only possible way to be able to produce 140 episodes is through extremely improbable coincidences, absolute negative IQ characters and intense cartoonish overdramatization. Feels like a robbery in broad daylight to have this kind of ending/wrap-up after 140 episodes of numbness. I hope the cast got paid enough because even for them it must have been difficult to endure. I can't stress enough how dunce the writing was. Anyway, it's designed to be this way so whatever.Was this review helpful to you?
Okay but lacks a lot....
Well, the drama is a little bit different but ends up following the same footsteps of its melodrama predecessors, mainly after the 1st half. The drama is definitely one of the tamer ones, the writer just doesn't let things get too far even when things have all the right to be fully escalated. This is why the envelop of forgiveness was aggressively pushed beyond its limits. This is also why the drama had a very very long 12 episodes epilogue just to stress on that one single point. This is also why you may see the influx of positive comments. This is also why feelings in general became disingenuous at the end.
Both main leads had a weak performance and even a weaker written character especially the female lead. The actress is just too stiff, the only scenes she showed some expressions was the ones with the baby while the remainder mostly poker face. Her poorly written character suffered greatly due to its saint-like personality. You know how these kind of personalities go in dramas. Anyway, the 1st half was promising but it didn't live up to my expectations.
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Too empty....
One of the most boring love squares ever! There was no need to even have it. It would have been infinitely better to spend the time in developing each couple individually since Bo Ra & Dae Ro were the weakest part in the drama. Speaking of which, you can't even count Bo Ra & Dae Ro as main characters, they are more like support characters throughout the entire run. Meanwhile Ah Ri and Joon Soo are the real leads. Speaking of characters, the adults' story was dull and uneventful. The same thing can be said about the other side stories. The drama just feels too empty. Too much time was wasted on Ah Ri's life that there wasn't any room for any development elsewhere. I wanted to see real development between the step sisters. Anyway, the drama had a decent start but there are just too many shortcomings.Was this review helpful to you?
Almost there....
Suk Bin's mother wasn't punished enough for being less than a subhuman junky nor did Suk Bin himself. Both the female lead and her mother were absolute doormat characters, letting everyone have their way with them and completely surrender passively without even attempting to bite back. Completely infuriating to watch this behavior for 50 episodes. Even at the moment of the reveals if it weren't for the other characters acting on their behalf nothing would have been accomplished. Many characters were introduced but were never done anything with or even appear more than few times like Suk Bin's sister. The leads relationship had a decent attention and screen time in the first half but they were completely neglected in the second half. The drama also needed more characters and stories. The only independent side story was the FL's uncle which sucked anyway. It's safe to assume that the writing was very problematic when it comes to its characters.It seems to be the writer completely forgot about the pink notebook.
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Barely serviceable....
Personally, it was a little rough to get through because I really don't like "Zo In Sung" as an actor. Tedious, annoying and predictable love triangle. The moment the "accident" happened, I knew the drama was a goner and I was 100% right. Ngl a bit annoyed that it went on for 20 episodes just to get this conclusion, didn't like the finale pairing either. The female lead classifies amongst the unlikable female leads in Kdrama world. Anyway, Go Hyun Jung & Ji Jin Hee deserve to be in better projects.Was this review helpful to you?
Amazing...
I absolutely love this director, it's been 10 years since his last project, I really hope he comes back to direct a modern drama. Yang Dong Geun and this director are the perfect match. I'mma say the obvious, they don't make them like this anymore. This is the earliest performance I've seen from Gong Hyo Jin so far and it's amazing, vibrant and full of life. The OST was straight up a certified banger! It's had been 1 eternity since I rated a drama 8.5 and it's well deserved.Was this review helpful to you?
NO....
The looks are too deceiving in this one, this is 5% family drama and 95% melodrama with the usual violent violin playing in the background every 2.1 seconds. This is not a family drama and the tag should be removed. For the length the drama had there was barely any story and the writing wasn't passable at all. I was losing my mind because of this "James" plot line, 100 episodes of endless tease and hundreds of close encounters to reveal the father identity. That's mostly the main story, what's even worse is that the exact same scenario step by step is being repeated for another 30 episodes for the grandparents identity. The last 30 episodes were random shenanigans and cringe.This drama definitely had one of the laziest dumbed down writings out there. The writer was relying heavily on the mentally challenged mother to create tension, I lost count how many times a character threaten the mother that result into a problem and people shouting. It also extends to the characters' writing, all of which were bland, one dimensional, single digit IQ and unlikable. The writer was also trying to push her political agenda of pro-life antiabortion so damn hard with multiple extensive dialogues sequences.
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