So here's what I'm watching this week! Of course the list is split by country and the amount of episodes I've seen so far are written below! There will be spoilers from now on so if you aren't caught to the episode number on list, you might want to go watch that episode and then come back! If you're interested in previous reviews, click here and if you want to see a list of my Favorite Asian OTPs and Ships, click here!
KDRAMA
A Love So Beautiful (5/24): Cha Heon is a student at Chun Ji High School who has both good looks and brains. He appears to be a cold character, but he is actually someone with a warm heart who is awkward at expressing himself well. Shin Sol Yi is a bright and bubbly 17-year-old who has a crush on Cha Heon. She openly confesses her love to Cha Heon continuously, and she is a clumsy but lovable character. Woo Dae Sung is a talented swimmer who transfers to Chun Ji High School and falls for Shin Sol Yi. He does not express his feelings for her and quietly stays by her side.
I will never entirely be okay with the way Netflix is releasing this show cause the episodes are too short to enjoy fully and I can never review them without forgetting what happened in the one before! I still vaguely remembered these episodes happening in the cdrama but for some reason I thought that rather than Sol Yi just being careless with the money it was the other girls had set up Sol Yi to take the fall for losing the class funds but I think in the end I was mixing it up with another school drama since that feels like a normal mean girl plot. We also saw Sol Yi try to win money in a school fitness competition so she could buy Heon a gift and it reminded me pretty much of every school anime out there in how it stuck to the basic tropes and really didn't change anything. Sol Yi struggled to do the hurdles only for Heon to help her win and then the class realizes the prize money is much much smaller than they first thought. The third episode had to do with the school play and I'm living for every moment when Heon is jealous of Sol Yi and Dae Sung cause Heon needs to realize that if he's mean to Sol Yi all the time then eventually she'll find a nice guy and move on from him. Whenever he helps Sol Yi, I don't know why he always needs to do it secretly or first make her sad before doing the nice thing.
Ooh turns out I was wrong last week in guessing what happened 28 years ago! It really was Jung Woo that was the one hugging the older kid and talking about how he caused this mass killing even though we now know that's not entirely true. Jung Woo, Jae Woong, and Jamie all three put that lucid dream pill into the food that everyone at the Village ate from which is why they all were attacking one another and the trio tried to run away though Jamie panicked at some point when they reached the mainland and when Jung Woo chased after her, she called him a monster and ran away from him too. I'm assuming that he returned to look for Jae Woong but Jae Woong also left so Jung Woo ended up with that gangster. I'm really glad that Jamie now has all her memories back cause I've been waiting all season for it though I'm not entirely sure it'll change anything this late in the game in terms of plot or character. I have a feeling these memories aren't going to warm Jamie up any more to Jung Woo and they're not going to add anything to the mystery either. I do have to say the shipper in me was living for the fact that Jung Woo went to protect Jamie but the realist in me knows that he probs just went to use her as bait to catch Jae Woong. I think we also found out that rather than supernatural elements, our heroes have tech to help them: Jung Woo's telepathy is actually just these weird glasses while Jae Woong's lucid dream ability is just pills. On another note I'm starting to wonder at what point we'll catch the White Night Foundation cause we're two weeks from the finale and yet we're still having the trio chase one another rather than the people they should actually catch. Oh Jung Hwan is the President of the Foundation after all cause as we see, he's been taking those immortality pills that Jung Woo half created.
FINISHED Handmade Love (8/8): A romance fantasy that deals with Woven who has come down to the human world to heal human sorrows with clothes.
I actually really liked that the final cloth that Woven had to make was for Sa Rang's mom cause it's a more meaningful way of ending this show than if he had to make clothing for some random person. Having said that I do wish though that the show would have seeded problems with Sa Rang's mom earlier rather than waiting until now cause it feels a little too convenient for the plot but I guess I can let it go seeing as how it's such a short drama. I almost cried when Sa Rang found out that her mother was sick but it was really sweet seeing Sa Rang and her mom reconcile. I even liked the way Sa Rang reacted to finding out that Woven and Joey were going to go back to Heaven though of course the shipper in me would have wished it to be a little more romantically tinted. Even though the two remained on Earth, I was also saddened by the fact that there was no confirmed romance between Sa Rang and Woven in the end and it makes me wish that shows would stop tagging things incorrectly though that won't stop me from headcanoning the fact that the two will end up together off screen! Overall I think this show was very beautiful to look at even if it didn't have that much substance. I'd give it a 8 / 10!
This week was such a mix of emotions cause I started out so angry and ended up melting into a puddle!! I mentioned last week that I think it's ridiculous that Jung Won would put anything above the wellbeing of the daughter she had lost for so long and this week I'm doubling down on that and adding on the fact that I'm low key disappointed with Jung Won now. The thing is that this kind of disgusted reaction is normal from me in most family dramas where the moms give up their children for their greed or ambitions but honestly I was expecting better from Jung Won a woman who lost her child and yet we've circled back to the same question of what's more important: love or ambition? At this point if I was Chae Woon I would be like I don't need you or your company birth mother. The girl was perfectly happy before all this and she could be again cause who wants to be dragged into a chaebol mess like this? Also it's totally hilarious that the show is doubling down on this secret daughter thing as if Jung Won and Pil Hong weren't married back in the day and as if male CEOs don't have illegitimate children coming out of the wahzoo but a woman does it and suddenly it's a moral issue. Gag me with a spoon honestly. What's also important is that Jae Hee figured out that the man working for him at the construction site is Chae Woon's birth father this week but it seems like he's going to hide it for now which is not a good move seriously cause unlike other lies that Jae Hee (such as hiding that James was his father) this one affects Chae Woon personally and he knows that she's doing everything to find her birth father. I'm just hoping that Jae Hee and Chae Woon's streak of communicating will continue cause every time I think a secret will come up and divide the two, it doesn't. Having said all that I still want to squeal over the fact that Jae Hee proposed this week and I'm high key living for how there wasn't even a smidge of hesitation on Chae Woon's part before she agreed to marry him!! I wonder if they'll end up moving back to his house after they marry like most traditional families do (he is a chaebol heir even if he doesn't want to be after all.)
Wow so I definitely expected more from this show then we're getting. It's either that or the show really wants to hammer home Eun Oh and Jae Won's love story in the beginning before fleshing out the other characters cause it's high key becoming a little ridiculous that no other characters get any screen time other than a few seconds at a time in which they judge Eun Oh and Jae Won. Honestly I'm probs just a little bitter cause I don't care about the main romance that much so I'm not entirely interested in the flashbacks since we already kinda know the outline of Eun Oh and Jae Won's romance and it feels redundant to see it. I'm actually more interested in the documentary side which I think really should be played up more (ironically the opposite of how I felt in the premiere!) I do love how happy Rin Yi and Gyung Joon seem and the fact that we already saw that they had a breakup 2 years ago that didn't stick makes me feel like they're extremely solid now which makes me glad. I was actually surprised to find out that Sun Young and Geon actually dated after their one-night stand though it looks like they had a horrible breakup afterwards and Sun Young claims that it had to do with Eun Oh. Maybe Geon doesn't date cause he loves Eun Oh not knowing that she loves Jae Won? I also want to mention that I didn't actually realize that their whole romance took place this year since Eun Oh mentions that she just started her company 9 months ago so it must have been around then that they were together.
I think we're finally about to switch the genre of this show from comedy to romance. In the present day, Mr Han took the respirator off of Bong Hwan so he started to die which is why his soul was pulled back from So Yong's body though I don't know if the so-called exorcism that the Queen Dowager and Hwa Jin did added anything to it. When Bong Hwan returned to So Yong's body, his memories seem to have merged with So Yong's so he's starting to remember and feel things that she would have known and felt. As it turns out I was right last week in guessing that Cheol Jong's childhood love was So Yong and Hwa Jin somehow pretended it was hers though I'm still not sure why Hwa Jin told the original So Yong that she was the one who would suffer if he found out. Maybe Cheol Jong hid in So Yong's well and she played with him but eventually told her dad about him by mistake and that's why he got hurt but somehow he thinks that the one who played with him and the one who exposed him were two separate people? Either way I'm sure we'll find out the truth as time goes on cause the rule for when So Yong's memories pop up isn't set yet. She saw Byung In several times this week but she didn't manage to access the memory of their kiss and I really want her to see that cause I want to know whether So Yong loved him like he loved her or if her heart was Cheol Jong's all along. In the meantime Bong Hwan is starting to pity Cheol Jong for his life and you know that pity leads to love so I can see the love forming between them soon enough. I still don't entirely ship the two cause Cheol Jong is not my type of male lead but a part of me wants Hwa Jin to suffer so hard that I'm like yessss fall in love!
What's interesting about this week is how I can totally understand both Gook Hee and Ji Sung's perspectives. Gook Hee is so closed off about himself that he doesn't even tell Ji Sung the small things like his age. Meanwhile Ji Sung is digging into everyone and everything with the Fridge and it's just about time that she starts to dig into Gook Hee against his will. Neither one are the type of people that you would want to date cause one would leave you feeling emotionally distant all the time and the other is doing the same thing like reading your texts on your phone out of mistrust. It also doesn't help that Ji Sung now knows that Hwang knows about the Fridge though Ji Sung doesn't know that there's a chip involved or that Hwang is off living in a spy drama on the side. Part of me finds the tonal shift hilarious in that way that when you watch a spy drama like Good Casting or The Spies Who Loved Me and you think about the random civilian in those shows who must be exasperated by the spy not doing their civilian work. It's the same thing I adore in shows like Extraordinary You or The Romance Of Tiger And Rose cause something in me is mesmerized by the idea of supporting characters living their normal lives while judging and laughing over the drama the main leads go through. The best moment this week though definitely went to that hilariously awkward dinner the three couples had and I was crying of laughter when Yoo Jin literally ghosted his own engagement dinner out of awkwardness/embarrassment. In other news I'm now thinking that Gi Hyun's story isn't actually heading towards divorce so she can get with the hot firefighter but actually reconciliation instead.
We're halfway through this drama now and I'm still having fun even if I'm not the biggest shipper of our main romance. Like I still think they're cute at times but I think I mostly just think that cause Sun Gyeom is a giant puppy that makes you want to take care of him! I do think that Mi Joo is taking a bit more liberties than she should given the fact that the two of them are just supposed to be friends with how she's constantly jealous of Dan Ah and how pissed she was that Sun Gyeom spent the night out once. I mean obviously it's cause she likes him but the girl hasn't even confessed when she's sober so it's weird that she's so possessive when she won't even try. I did love that she stood her ground with his dad and how that completely confuzzled him and I think Sun Gyeom's mom was all about that too especially since she told him later that all she wants is for him to be happy. Meanwhile with Dan Ah and Young Hwa, he's low key finally starting to make some progress with her cause not only was he able to get her number but it's clear that sometimes she finds him cute or amusing and she clearly adores his artwork. I still don't entirely know what her story is though but I have to say that this week my heart really broke for Tae Woong cause before this it was all fun and games whenever he tried to get her attention. Something about the way he was happy that she even bothered to hate him unlike the rest of the family who ignored him just cause it means that she thought of him was heartbreaking. I want Dan Ah to seriously grow as this show goes on and I want the two to be siblings in the end! Also Tae Woong accidentally following Young Hwa killed me cause of the second hand embarrassment but I love that he refused to unfollow him as if it was on purpose.
I expected our Counters to lose their powers at some point this season cause duh they've been interfering too much in human affairs no matter how much it makes sense but I guess I didn't expect it to happen so soon or for it to be resolved in a week cause with Mun being kidnapped by a group of evil spirits there's no way that he'll be able to escape without Wi Gen going back into him especially since she's having no luck with finding a replacement. I know I should be pissed that the afterlife inspectors wouldn't even listen to explanations but at this point I'm a seasoned veteran in how kdramas use their afterlife characters as rigid unmovable walls so I wasn't surprised. In actuality I agreed with them about Mun making a truly terrible Counter cause he screwed them all so hard by fighting the evil spirit on his own when he knew well and clear that they're stronger as a group. I do have to call bullshit though cause it's getting kind of ridiculous how overpowered Chung Shin is getting to the point where I'm confused about how we'll even be able to stop him. He's stronger than our Counters, can see Yung, has psychokinesis, sees other evil spirits and can even transport himself into memories. Like I got the picture in the premiere! You didn't have to keep upgrading him show! I am also kinda curious if there's a way to send a stronger Grim Reaper or something into the world. Like what if the evil spirit is too strong for all Counters and they keep dying? Can the afterlife really do nothing? Do they have to wait until the host dies of old age? In that case, does the evil spirit revert to a level 1 in a new host?
Now that we've reaching the halfway point of this drama, I'm still living for this show though I was really starting to get confused with the writing of this show until the end of this week. Why on Earth did we do the whole Su Ho tells Joo Gyung that he doesn't like her thing if in the end he never even spent more than one episode staying away from her? Like he was trying so hard to get her to like him back when he should have already known that she likes him given that she tried to ask him out before! Was his plan that he can't date her so no one else can either? It was also super annoying cause I just wanted him to spit it out already but fortunately he finally did at the end of this week and he went in for a kiss too. Honestly I think it was more out of seething jealousy of Seo Jun than anything else but if it got the job done then I'm happy. Speaking of the love triangle, I should be more pissed about it cause though I generally hate love triangles, I have special hatred for love triangles between friends but this one is being played to be more funny than anything else. I was dying during that scene where Seo Jun's mom and sister were watching some drama and commenting on the love triangle and it ended up being Seo Jun's exact situation. I also love that Seo Jun and Su Ho are basically already friends again even if they refuse to admit it cause between the soft way Seo Jun thanked Su Ho for helping his mom, Seo Jun's regret for liking the same girl Su Ho did, and their hilarious fight in the field it's clear the two still adore one another. I also have a feeling that the Leo that Joo Gyung's sister is looking for will end up being Su Ho cause duh but I also want to shout out how Jung Geon Joo playing the baseball player seriously won me over. I was straight up like ditch both boys and date him instead Joo Gyung!
CDRAMA
Goodness gracious has Xie Yun lived like 3 different lifetimes already and yet he's still only in his early 20s! It's like the writers couldn't decide which backstory they wanted to give him so they mashed all of them together. Xie Yun was born as the Emperor of the last Dynasty only because of an uprising, his family was killed and he escaped only to end up at a monastery for his childhood. After the eunuch who saved him died he devoted himself to being the best he could be and I'm pretty sure he led another uprising or at least joined the military to help the current Dynasty and was poisoned by the Bone Chilling Poison. Returning to the monastery, his uncle traded his life energy for Xie Yun's and the monk that raised him blocked the poison in by locking his force. I do have to admit that this show did get me a little with making me think that Xie Yun really did die and that maybe Fei wouldn't see him again until the afterlife making this the most tragic show ever but in the end it looks like through this and that we'll be returning to Xie Yun being ill but alive. I was glad that the show didn't waste any time with having Fei and then subsequently the others find out about Xie Yun's illness and I was living for how Fei refused to allow him to do the noble sacrifice thing and was like I'm chaining you to my side. The demons did reveal though that supposedly this Cloud and Heaven artifact has some sort of magic healing book in it and Shen wants it to heal the woman he loves but I have a feeling that in the end it'll be used to help Xie Yun if it is what Shen says it is.
TWDRAMA
Oooh are we starting to see the first sparks of romance between Da Qi and Yu Xin this week? I still don't think Yu Xin realizes that she likes him cause when Wen Ting hugged Da Qi instead of getting jealous or anxious or anything of the sort, Yu Xin just smiled happily like she was thrilled that two people she adored liked each other meanwhile Da Qi not only took a hit for her (which okay he probs would have done for most women) but he was so clearly full of affection when he saw her sleeping by his hospital bed and not only moved her hair out of her face but also stroked her head in the universal tv show sign of romantic interest! I'm not entirely sure where Wen Ting will fit into this cause she definitely saw that Da Qi has some sort of interest in Yu Xin that he doesn't have in her and she was definitely fishing around with Yu Xin to see how she feels but I really can't see her doing anything to get in their way if things progress cause she feels too kind not to mention the fact that I still kinda ship her with Jing Tao on the side. He's still hopping around the scene and I wonder if he'll be super involved in next week's case cause not only was he there to see Wen Ting give that painting to the stranger who's going to die but since we have a new villain in the Prosecutor, it would make him redundant to be a bad guy too especially since we know that it was nothing personal when he took the case against Wen Ting and that he was Da Qi's college friend who also looked up to Yu Xin's dad.
xoxo Allie
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