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Love Next Door korean drama review
Completed
Love Next Door
12 people found this review helpful
by thz89
Oct 9, 2024
16 of 16 episodes seen
Completed
Overall 8.0
Story 6.0
Acting/Cast 8.0
Music 8.0
Rewatch Value 4.0
This review may contain spoilers
Just finished it. Objectivley spoken, it was good and well executed show.

But of course, some things can be criticized and could be done way better:
1. The stomach cancer theme. It was unnecessary and way over the top for a show which doesn't focus explicitly on this topic. (like 39 for example)
2. The lavender-gang took too much screen time. Yes, they were funny but they didn't contribute to the overall plot progression and rivaled the 2nd lead couple in screen time.
3. The last episode or better, the ending was needless and not satisfying.
a.) the whole Mo-Eum / Dan-Ho / Yeon-Du part was rushed in the end and the last major scene they got, was the decision making process of Mo-Eum where she was unsure how to tell Dan-Ho they south pole thing. Comparing this to the screen tim, the lavender-gang got, it's kind of underwhelming. I mean, it feels like Mo-Eum / Dan-Ho / Yeon-Du was the support while the lavender-gang was the second lead.
b.) on the last meter, Seok-Ryu and Seung-Hyo decided to postpone their wedding and the final impression is an argument and a walk together. In general, not a bad idea, but the built up to this scene was unfitting. First, the expectation for the wedding was risen (not only in ep16, but also in ep15 AND ep14 (!) where it was the major cliffhanger), then it was dropped and then the lavender-gang had a never ending scene and then, only a couple of minutes were left to set the correct mood. The lavender-gang scene should set the mood, but that works only if the viewer likes them. Usually, the second lead should set the mood and these are also the characters and actors the viewer want to see, not the support group.

The 3rd bullet point is interesting, because they did fairly well on the individual endings and cliffhangers of each episode. I can only explain it that way, that the second leads were really unpopular or the support cast was super duper popular. Or, the audience shifted to a different group. (maybe an older group) It would be interesting, to see statistics about that.

What was good?
The rest. It lives from it's high production standard. Good cast, good music, good settings, good camera work etc. But to be honest, it wasn't exceptional in any form.

I would rate it 8/10.
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