Reviews

The first four episodes were cute, but it falls of till episode 7

I was quite hyped for this BL, and the beginning was really nice great.
But episode 7 killed some of it. I would have wished they could communicate without "Keitas" help and I would have even more flashbacks to communicate that they were really, really close. While the slow pace does not kill it for me, Ryotas behaviour does to some extent. I would have wished episode 7 did not happen or that he could break out of his shell and confess then which would have been much better.

Of course typical of such JBL the kissing was lacking as well. If you long for someone, you just not touch lips and let it be. You may be shy and start slowly but I prefer kissing which conveys the feeling of the characters. It's lame and unrealistic, so why do they do it all the time?

This series was enjoyable with some length and a frustrating moments in episode 7, but overall it was good.

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Silly, goofy, and imaginative rom-com for kid-ish adults!

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Disclaimer: At this point in time, I have only completed two episodes of this drama. I will comeback once this drama finishes to finalise my review.


OVERALL

To explain, this show feels like a third-rate cinderella story in the best way possible (I promise this is a compliment). It reminds me of the narrative style often employed by Japanese shows. It's refreshing and imaginative. A light-hearted and fun drama with minimal seriousness. The cherry on top, is our two beloved leads and their superior acting skills.

I wouldn't recommend this to anyone who hates romance and comedy because that is the very essence of this show. Still, I am not a fan of rom-coms and is an avid lover of thrillers but I enjoyed this drama so far.


STORY

The premise is the well known and heavily overused story of a modern cinderella but with a refreshing twist. Although, this is your average couple dynamic of a rich man and poor woman, from the short snippet I've watched, I can already tell that the characters are though out and have gone beyond surface level. A female lead that actually wants to be a Cinderella and a male lead with an actual personality other than being a "tsundere" (cold on the outside, soft on the inside). The first impression you get is that both leads are your run-off-the-mill crackheads. They are bound to cause trouble wherever they go together (in a humorous way).

Jae-Rim's (the female lead) story is a mirroring of Cinderella's story. Jae-Rim's father passes away leaving her at the mercy of her step-mother and two step-sisters. The twist is that once you take an inside look into their family you can see that Jae-Rim's not a typical cinderella. Jae-Rim's step-mother is actually nice (albeit clueless) and her step-sisters are nothing more than typical siblings. However, this dynamic lets the audience look at one of Jae-Rim's flaws, she somewhat seems to force her situation to fit a Cinderella story.

Then comes Cha-Min (a literal pun to Prince Charming) who hates Cinderellas. However, he's different from your average jerk male leads that hate true love or their future love interest for no reason. He's not a holier-than-thou figure or a typical boss on their high horse. Cha-Min is close with his employees and purses a good work balance. He's a bit fcked in the head (but are well all also a little fcked in the head).

In contrast to your typical K-dramas, this drama spares on time on the romance. First episode in and you practically dive head in to romance in the most hilarious and nonchalant way.

I can already feel that this drama is going to be an absolute hilarious and sweet gem.


ACTING & CAST

The first thing I have to say is that I started watching this drama for Pyo Ye-Jin and Lee Jun-Young (Jun) and I am going to continue watching this drama for Ye-Jin and Jun.

Ye-Jin and Jun are two of my favourite actors. They are experts at playing silly goofy characters with serious back stories. I absolutely adore Jun and will watch anything and everything he is in. I strongly think that both Ye-Jin and Jun are severely underrated actors. I hope to see them in many more lead roles across different genres.

I can't think of any two better people to play these two leading roles. Their chemistry is off the charts. They really do give twin troublemaker vibes.


CINEMATOGRAPHY & EDITING/ DIRECTING

I actually love the format of this drama. It gives me 2010's J-drama/ J-movie vibes. The narration is over exaggerated and expressive. It does feel like your reading a comedy spin-off of your favourite fairytales (which it literally is). It's colourful and seemingly childish. It gives you nostalgic feelings about your own childhood imagination. It almost allows the audience to enjoy kid things in an adult way. All of this, truly adds and emphasises the premise of the story. They've added colourful and comical scenes, that make it even more novel-like. I guess, these scenes remind me of Japanese variety shows (mostly the romance ones). This style of 2000s - 2010s style of format has not been seen in the K-drama industry for long time. So, it's refreshing and new.


thank you for reading my review!! have a nice day <333

o(>.<)o ♡

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CRYING MOMENT 101

I can’t believe I only found out about this drama now when I have been watching cdrama/kdrama since 2018. Esport genre is not my go to, actually the only esport drama I watched was “the kings avatar” when it released. I finished watching “falling into your smile” and I loved it. So I started looking for other esport dramas.

When I first read the synoptic of this drama, I thought I was not going to like it because the main FL is not playing esport. She’s not a gamer. But I still gave it a shot and best believe I was wrong. The story line is cute. Has the classic tale where the ex love comes backs for the male lead and causes a disturbance to the current relationship. However it also had elements that I thought were different. It had a balance of both romance and gaming. I loved the male lead. The character he played was enjoyable. Never gave up, always persevered and made sure he protected the people he loved; like a true leader. However, I did feel like there was not enough hype for him. His known as ‘battlefield swindler master’.. known to have great tactics and has a fanbase so somewhat of a celebrity in the esport industry yet it didn’t feel like that. I feel like there should have been more interactions with the fans. Regardless, I genuinely loved the story line. I loved how while he was trying to win the world championship, she had her own goals. They both made a promise and the both kept that promise. And let’s not forget the enemy to lovers trip in this drama. I was all for it. I really loved every supported role in this drama. for instance, yi xuan, pei xi, lu yi yi. They made the show 10x funnier. The bromance between pei xi and male lead had me dying. Honestly, I can go hours praising this drama, but if you’re reading this and contemplating to whether watch it… Watch it. Such a underrated. Made me laugh, angry, cry but was all worth it. This drama has become my fave esport gaming cdrama along with ‘falling into your smile.’ Now I’m going through the hard part to find a new drama just like this :(

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Uneven. Enjoyed S1 better.

S1 was also uneven. But I watched it in near ideal condition. It was my first modern cdrama. On youtube, they have comments that explain the references/wordplay/bad translations/etc. And I also didn't know most of the major spoilers. None of them is true while I was watching S2.

There are a lot of observations I can make about S2. Some of the more important ones:

+ The returning younger casts leveled up their acting skills. They really couldn't hold a candle to the veteran actors in S1.
+ The new casts are mostly great too.
+ The returning female casts sound better in S2. Not sure if it's my stream or something else, but their high-pitched voice was really grating in S1. Not so much in S2.
- Fan Jian's actor stopped giving a f imo. He just winged it in all of his scenes.

+ Fight scenes are better in S2.
- Too many closeups to hide their lack of action/stunt/martial arts skills.
- Some movements still look really strange. But can't fault them too much, they are not action stars.
- Honestly, they can do it with zero obvious CGI. I'm not sure why they need to force unnecessary CGI arrows and whatnot.

= I prefer the songs in S1. They also cut the songs for intro and outro strangely. The complete songs are actually not bad.

- I think they have difficulties getting the casts together. Not sure if it's scheduling or budget issue. The writings need to work around that. As a result some of the episodes/arcs are pretty weak. And characters literally just don't show up for a long stretch of time, or didn't even return from S1. Even though it's natural for them to be there in the story line.

Anyways, on average, S2 is pretty much the same quality as S1. They also both have the same appeal. If you like S1, you'll watch S2 regardless of the reviews and internet discussions. If you don't like S1, I can't really recommend S2. Unless you literally ran out of things to watch.

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It was humm not wow

I want to make it clear that this is my own opinion and choice. The whole idea behind the story is interesting, but it could have been better. Let me explain: I have a serious problem with the lack of action (drama). Maybe they didn't want to do the same drama we all know, but it could have been better if Pleum had struggled a little bit more before winning him over(KhonProt). P Jess didn't try hard enough and lacked consistency to win him over. When did KhonProt realize that he liked the P pleum? 1 full episode could have been good to explain what P pleum did to make him fall in love , and how was it for KhonProt from high school to university to see the man he love been with a lot of them? I didn't feel like he was really "in pain" only felt that he was angry at the end not angry but jealous Why didn't he try to confess his feelings again at the university or at least make him fall in love with him instead of always saying "sorry" every time Pleum is rude, or the gentle but why KhonProt is the one to apologize? Yes P plaum did but most of the time it was KhonProt. It could have been a little bit spicy to have both friends fighting (not a real fight). I mean, show some tension between them so that we have that thrilling moment of uncertainty about who he is going to choose, even though he was and still is madly in love with Pleum. We should been like "Will P Jess be the one to make the change of heart?" Those are the little details that I think could have made it better, but overall, it was good. Also, please check your subtitles; they are not right at all.

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This drama is recommendable.

The story is presictable that they let the villain be know earlier than expected. The male lead is awesome portraying his role, I would love to see him with Peng Xiaoran in another costume drama. ? The female lead is also great portraying her role as a strong willed woman in the first few episodes but it seems surreal that she lost her martial art ability once you lost your memory. Like REALLY?
The female lead looks like a coward and so weak suddenly. ?
But anyway, hmmm good luck to this series I just hope it would be a hit.
I'll give this 8/10 rate but would highly recommend to past time. ?

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Awesome plot, but FL’s acting is a bit much.

The story is seriously awesome, with a plot that keeps you hooked and subplots that add depth. It’s the kind of stuff that really grabs your attention. But let’s talk about the FL – her acting is just too over the top. Actually, she’s always like that in most series she’s in, including this one. In my opinion, she shines the most when she plays the villain role.

Now, about the FL’s character... It felt a bit off in the first couple of episodes. Like, the writer couldn’t quite figure out what to do with her. She came off more like a crazed fan club of the ML with her obsession that drives her do quite a few embarrassing things. I almost gave up on the show at the start because of this sasaeng-borderline behavior of the FL, but it got better after that.

And I gotta mention about the ridiculous details in the first half. For example, when the house gets on fire, the FL's brother help a girl out of the house by going up to the roof of the building without extinguishing the fire. Ok, not only that he doesn't stop the fire, but when escaping the fire, who would go upstairs to trap themselves when it's possible to go downstairs out of the building?? And there's this scene where the FL and ML see a rainbow that appears on the same side as the sun – that totally goes against science. It’s like the production team has no basic knowledge and common sense.

But despite all that, the plot is solid. I ended up enjoying the series a lot.

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lovely time travel story with good romance

I am glad for people's positive reactions which made me decide to give this drama a try.
overall I loved the story including the time travel element, found the love story endearing with good chemistry, the acting through was solid and strong, maybe the FL's facial expressions and reactions sometimes annoyed me but I still appreciated her strong character overall which for me is a very strong selling point for any Korean RomCom.
The comedy parts were pretty well done as well and I liked most of the side characters that helped provide comic relief, I particularly enjoyed the scenes that included the FL's mom and ML's dad bickering and being petty.
the OST was lovely though there were not many tracks that particurarly stuck with me tbh.

For me, the only negative aspect to the story was the villain and the whole serial murderer arc. I know that the story needed a plot device to push it forward and into the danger and angst zone, but our bad guy was just that, too bad and psycho down to the core, but the story never bothered to show us any sort of background story to flesh him out or show us his motives, so he ends up as a 2D caricature of a bad guy, whenever he pops up on screen I am rolling my eyes rather than being on the edge of my seat.
And also there is just too many times that the writer is allowed to use the exact same plot device before it becomes too repitive it essentially is no longer surving its purpose but rather it's cheapening the worth of the whole story. I mean to sum up all troubles the lead couple could ever and will ever face together in the mere existence of one villain, who mind you has no long or deep running grudge against them to begin with, was too much for me. I understand that if the story was that she was going back in time to save her love after getting hit by random traffic or someother accident, it might have had its uncertainties and felt like defying fate, but I just felt it would have been better than overusing the same bad dude like he is some sort of bad karma in their lifes, like his psycho switch only turns on when he's around either of them.
I guess the writers were playing at the concept of destiny involving both good and bad bonds, so people who were meant to cross path are destined to for good or for worse, but I couldn't help feeling like I would have appreciated more if there was more time given to delve deeper into our bad guy's story and psyche so he would not feel like a wack-a-mole puppet popping put every couple of episodes.
I noticed some reviewers expressing their view that they would have preferred if the drama was only 12 episodes long, and I have to admit I agree to a certain point. I didn't find that the pacing was bad per se, but if the story didn't include that many resets and time slips I would have liked it more, it just had one too many, and maybe if the drama was shorter there would have been no need for at least one of them.

Overall this drama is not perfect but it was still really a nice watch that I would recommend to any K-RomCom fan. the fantasy element might have been utilized too much for its own good, and the concept might not be considered the most original out there (what with all the other time slip dramas that come out each season), and some scenes (coincidences and chance encounters in particular) bordered on cliché but each time they somehow made me feel that they're aware it's being commicaly clichéd, so it somehow never felt downright hackneyed. Still I can't say that the negative aspects overweighed the positive, great chemistry strong acting and an epic love story that spans mutiple timelines.

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775 / 5 000
I have to admit that I was worried about this series. That's because I didn't know what to expect from Kim Hye-Yoon. I saw her in Snowdrop, so I didn't know how her role would fit here in this series. Concerns were removed very quickly. The series looks good. The plot is fluid, tense, funny, entertaining but also serious and sad. The theme of time travel is not new, but the creators handled it well. The story has its own mystery and nice processing. But I have to admit that she was nervous about the last part, and I was waiting to see if there would be some twist at the end. And yes, Byeon Woo-seok charms many a woman's heart. You can also find his singing performances on Spotify under the name of the fictional serial group Eclipse:-D. And singer 10CM also released a great OST song - Spring snow.

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adorable

much like all of these special episodes it’s packed with cute moments and kisses.

honestly I liked this ending better than the series ending. we get to see them progress through their life now and have an adorable date at an amusement park (might I add Huang Li Feng in all pink looks amazing)plus we got another scene with out stay by my side MCs. and truly it was hilarious. the play fighting back and forth about their “man” had be smiling for ear to ear.

honestly this was super heartwarming and fun. you also can’t go wrong with lots of kisses :)

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A portrayal of China's Stealth Surveillance Security Forces

THE PLOT
Miao Fei (brilliantly portrayed by Dai Si), stars as the eldest daughter of Miao Huan Yang, a successful wealthy businessman who founded Ding Hua, a privately owned company that deals with valuable mineral ore. Life looks plush and rosy for the her until she is confronted with news of her fiance's sudden suicide as well as her father's remand by the China National Security Agency for suspected illegal smuggling activities. With all this sudden chaos and disruption, Miao Fei plunges into grief and becomes an unwillingly pawn for an unnamed Person, who threatens to expose her father's past illicit deeds to the police. At the cusp of leaking the entire core data behind her Father's company's proprietary technology, Miao Fei decides to cooperate with the China National Security Special Ops team to induce the main mastermind behind the Criminal Organisation to come out of the dark. Under the operative "Storm Eye", the China National Security Ops team and Miao Fei eventually work together to piece the missing clues behind the bigger conspiracy linking her fiance's murder, Ding Hua's data theft and related illegal ore trading activities.

THE PROTAGONISTS
The China National Security Special Ops team are portrayed as the main beacon of hope and justice in this story. All security agents are trained to work silently in the background and surprise their unsuspecting targets, because their sophisticated surveillance monitoring system is able track any individual's location and identity from their gait and bug every single phone conversation where there is a signal. The main leads are An Jing (played by Yang Mi) and Ma Shang (played by Zhang Bin bin). The former ex-lovers are uncannily reunited in this "Storm Eye" operative and are forced to work together in order to penetrate the mystery enshrouding Dinghua's proprietary data leaks.

THE BADDIES (SPOILER ALERT)
The shady characters whom the viewers are made to suspect, are not the real criminals. Instead, they are portrayed as imperfect humans who are honest enough with themselves to admit that they will behave in less-than-honorable ways to pursue quick advantages and financial gains.

"Sleeper", the main mastermind behind the information theft of Dinghua's proprietary technology and murder of Miao Fei's fiance literally lies "sleeping" throughout most of the drama because he is very successful at manipulating people around him in order to advance towards his goal: leak out the coveted trade secrets of Dingua's technology. Lawrence Wang is convincingly sinister as the unsuspected villain.

"Bat", a mysterious man of few words and little-known origins, is the Criminal Organisation's gun-for-hire. Zhao Wei Lin's portrayal is rather comedic, as he weaves in and out of the scenes to strike when he is being instructed to by his boss, without having a clue who the highest boss in the organisation is, or what their main agenda entails. As the show's tropey psychopath, he appears scary but is in reality, an aimlessly wandering and cluelessly blind bat.

ZHANG BB SHINES
I really enjoyed watching Zhang Bin bin's portrayal of Ma Shang as a suave, affable and quick-witted NSM agent and filial caring son. I am okay with Yang Mi's portrayal of An Jing as a perfectionist workaholic seemingly devoid of any human warmth or emotion.

PREDICTABLY STRAIGHTFORWARD ROMANCE
Romance isn't the core focus of the plot. Your heart is more likely to flutter from the anticipation of the NSM nabbing a criminal than a romantic confession from the lead actors. Ma Shang's yearning for his old flame, An Jing, is believable as he appears to constantly take the initiative to woo an ice-queen who is too hung up on the past. There is only one romantic rival for An Jing's romance, but he eventually dies off as most sacrificial martyrs do. An Jing eventually warms up to Ma Shang only when the mysterious circumstances surrounding her late father's car accident and death starts to come to light and they track down the culprit. As with all happy endings, they rekindle their romance as the Storm Eye mission concludes.

CEREBRAL PIECING OF A PUZZLE
There isn't a lot of impressive fighting or chasing scenes in this drama, only a couple of physical brawls seen in the last few episodes. Most of the "action" lies in how the NSM agents piece the missing clues together through countless interrogation interviews, surveillance footage and insider inputs. But the clues are intricately spread out throughout the first few episodes, so the main conspiracy linking the proprietary data theft, planned murders and underground smuggling only make sense after the 10th episode. Overall, this drama gives a fairly realistic portrayal of how criminals and security agents operate and I like there is a happy decent ending.

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