Imagine going to a restaurant, ordering a sirloin steak which you haven't had in months. Your mouth is running watery while ordering the dish and as soon as you swallow your first bite, you dig into it as if you have starved for months.

Then when you're halfway finished with it, the waiter suddenly takes your meal away and puts the most common dessert in front of you. You know it, you've eaten it so many times and you like it because it's delicious but you just don't want to eat something sweet now. You want your spicy, juicy steak back. But that won't happen. And that leaves two options: Swallow the pill or cancel the rest of your meal. If you do decide to continue eating, be aware that at the very end you might bite on a forgotten nail or something. It sounds disgusting, I know. But don't say I didn't warn you.

One of the worst things that can happen to a drama is mixing up genres the wrong way. You always have one main genre and only glimpses of other ones. It's important to stay true to your roots and never let any side genre take over. Because if that happens, it will ruin the mood like nothing else, especially if they allow the most common plot holes to occur along the way. The story becomes sloppy and all over the place and you just feel like being on a very bad trip. One part of you feels angry and frustrated, the other one feels pity for the impressive first half of the drama that got you so damn invested in the story.

I know that I sound very negative right now and many might wonder why I still gave such a (relatively) high rating considering everything that went wrong. Well, as I said before, those first 9 episodes were almost brilliant. And I would recommend them without a second thought. After that it feels like a sharp clean cut and everyone has to decide for themselves if they are willing to watch the messed up rest. I finished this drama because I was curious about that ending everyone was complaining about. Well... it was indeed something I would have never imagined. It's not explosively unexpected, it's more like the tip of the iceberg after a chaotic and way too long aftermath.

I gave this drama a 8 because there were many things I really, really liked. First of all of course those first 9 episodes that take you on a thrilling journey full of surprises and "what the hell"-moments.

Then those 9 survivors. Believe me when I say that the actors were doing a great job with their characters, most of all Jung Kyung Ho who I avoided for a long time. I didn't even like his role in this at first. He was pissing me off and I never expected to grow fond of him. But I did. He became my most favorite character, along with Baek Jin Hee's role. Those two had amazing chemistry till the very end, and regarding every relationship I've seen in dramas until now, they have become one of my dearest. I loved how they became fond of each other, how they supported each other. I loved their warmth as well as their teasing, and I loved how they encouraged and gained strength through each other. But most of all I loved how Seo Joon Oh (Jung Kyung Ho) became a better person through Ra Bong Hee (Baek Jin Hee).

The music is playing an important role in this drama as well because it literally takes you away. It sets the right mood when the show drifts to the island and focuses on every single person, their endurance, their personal development and different realizations while facing extreme hardships. After listening to it again, it reminds me of Hayao Miyazaki's movies. There is something dreamy about it within the instrumental pieces.

Sometimes their time on the island didn't seem to take itself serious and the group looked like they were on a picnic trip or something. But those scenes never lasted too long, the anxiousness remained and unfolded in no time afterwards again.

After those incredible 9 episodes you get thrown into your typical k-drama world filled with clichés and plot holes and an unexpected overwhelming comedy that makes the drama look like it doesn't take itself serious any more. While confronted with corruption from all sides (one of my most hated tropes in dramas), they behave like they got all the time in the world, calmly chit-chatting at home and meeting up in public as if there's no danger closing in at all - but the villains don't seem as clever either. Not to mention the ridiculous ending that will only hit you during the last five minutes.

Don't get me wrong, I loved most of the subtle comedy parts as well, if I look at them individually. But in combination with the first half of Missing  9, it felt off and ruined the initial expectations I (and probably many others) had. The mix between mystery and later corruption/comedy didn't go well in my eyes.

A few things that remained the same (thank god) were Joon Oh's and Bong Hee's special relationship, me growing fonder of them every time they appeared on screen and those genuine talks between two characters, filled with meaningful closeness and honesty. Contrary to everything that went wrong and could have made me drop the drama, those few consistent things were strong enough to keep me at bay and complete the drama. I've seen way worse than this. What makes this drama such a disappointment is the brusque change in the script that started off great in the beginning and remains brilliant in its core.