Blood (2015)

With the popularity of english movies and series like Twilight and Vampire Diaries, I wasn't expecting much with the storyline but seeing as this was Ahn Jae Hyeon's first time to take on a lead role, I was kind of rooting for him. Upon watching the first episode, I wanted to drop the series all together, Gu Hye Seon's acting was annoying and it made me wonder how she was so much better before. The storyline could have worked if the actors were able to deliver them to the audience.

Story: It was refreshing to see vampirism as a form of virus. I would say Ji Sang's drive to continue being a doctor despite his vampirism was commendable. However, I kind of liked it better when he was actually doing doctor operations and stuff rather than roaming aimlessly in the hospital. The pinch of romance was okay too what with the dangers lurking just around Ji Sang, he needed something to ground him.

Acting: Ugh, I don't know if I should say sorry for saying this but seriously the acting made me cringe and ask myself why I was watching this drama at all. Ahn Jae Hyeon and Gu Hye Seon had NO chemistry together which is so frustrating. Ji Jin Hee was the only one that could act but even his acting couldn't save this wreck of a drama.

Rewatch Value: NO. Just no, I just want to move on.

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I love stories that take horror or supernatural concepts and make them seem perfectly normal. This has all the ingredients that I usually like in a drama, yet somehow Blood completely missed the mark for me. I loved the concept of a vampire surgeon, and thought the blood virus was a cool idea, but it was clear early on that the writer had no idea where the actual story was heading, and 20 episodes later I was left, confused, annoyed, and unsatisfied.

Ahn Jae Hyeon plays the vampire doc Park Ji Sang, and he does a good job coming across as cold, and wise, yet eternally youthful ... which makes him a good pick for a vampire I guess. His costar Goo Hye Sun plays his rival turned love interest, and I thought she was pretty good playing the arrogant Yoo Ri Ta. I actually thought they both did a fine job bringing their characters to life, though neither was particularly charming (even with his occasional smirk). The major problem for me was their complete lack of any chemistry whatsoever. Zero. Nada. If they kissed, which I think they did, I totally forgot it, because that's how much I cared. I wanted to see two cold characters warm up to each other and eventually heat up the screen. Instead I saw two actors sometimes hug, and suddenly I'm supposed to believe they are in love. Well, I didn't, which ruins the epic fairytale romance idea that a lot of the story was counting on. As a romance, this failed miserably for me.

As for the rest of the cast, one of my favorite characters was Jung Hae In, who I would have liked to see have more screen time (even if that meant seeing more of the stupid robot). He should have been a way more important character to the story overall, but instead he's comic relief until those few moments when he briefly explains something, or he's used for bait. His backstory even seemed like it was thrown in at the last minute. Plus his romance was much more believable than the main couple, and more fun to watch. How poorly they treated his story line is my main reason for turning on this drama completely, but I'll try to focus on a few more positives before I trash the show completely.

The show's real star is Ji Jin Hee. He's complicated, awesome to watch, kept me in suspense, and is the main reason I kept watching. I also felt similarly about Son Soo Hyeon. She even has better chemistry with the leading man than Goo Hye Sun does. I won't go into details about either character, because I don't want to spoil the best part of the show in my opinion. Some of the patient stories were entertaining, but I'll say that without these two actors I would have dropped Blood a long time ago.

The rest of the cast was fine, did their best with what was written, and made the sloppiest parts of the story at least watchable. I gave the story 5 out of 10 because although it was a great idea, what was written was disjointed, overly complicated, and at some points completely ridiculous. The over the top music did not help either. During the last few episodes smart characters suddenly did the stupidest things, secrets seemed to be revealed just for shock value, and none of the complicated concepts introduced were ever explained or resolved in a way that made any sense. Several times the story aims to make the audience cry - like use a whole tissue box cry - but instead I literally watched those episodes with a dry eyed blank stare, and the entire last episode with a confused look. This is one of the worst KDrama endings I've seen in a while, and so much suspense was built up in the first half, and well, that by the time I got to the last episodes I was majorly disappointed.

Overall this drama starts off interesting, peeks your interest enough to keep you watching, but goes completely down hill and off the track by the end. I know some people like the idea that a drama may come back with a second season, but I would have preferred a satisfying ending, or at least one that made sense.

As for whether or not you should watch Blood... I say skip it. I know I wouldn't watch it again. It's not terrible, but it's not good. It fails as a romance. It's not well conceived as a suspense story. It gets kinda boring for a hospital drama too... in fact it's like they forgot all bout the hospital at the end which makes no sense since about 90% of the drama takes place there. Maybe this would have been better as a movie, and stretching the story to 20 episodes is what made it so bad. There are way too many vampire stories out there to waste time on a bad one, and this one definitely... (wait for it) ...sucked!

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This is for you if you like a little different vampire drama. Even though the drama starts off concentrating on patients in the hospital and surgeries, around episode 5 or 6 the whole thing changes to concentrate on totally different storyline. Ahn Jae Hyun is doing a great job in here despite of how some news articles reviewed about his acting.

The plot is kind of cliche but you should definetly watch this until the end. There were some moments I didn't predict at all and this is the only drama in my drama watching history that got 'WHOA NO WAY!! NO WAYNOWAYNOWAY!!' out of me in one point. (and I've watched soon about 200 dramas).
So try this at least couple episodes, it will get better. And what I liked about this drama is that there weren't that many 'changing to vampire and be a badass' -kind of scenes, the drama actually concentrated more to tell the story.

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I guess Blood is one of the dramas you either like it, get really addicted and watch earnestly until the end, or you hate it and drop it by episode 3. I'm part of the first team, and I'll explain why.

Like a lot of vampire stories nowadays, there's nothing really special about this one. One vampire is evil, he thinks his species is superior and wants to do bad things with his knowledge; the other one is good and is fighting against his own nature through his whole existence, then he meets the love of his life and the villain and find a purpose to his life. Well, in this case, the good vampire already had a purpose, which was finding the cure to the virus that causes the vampirism.

The plot is simple, yes, but how it was developed made me like the drama. Blood is my first medical drama, and I loved the way they mixed medicine and the supernatural stuff; it had lots of wholes in the explanations, yes, hell yes, but it was mainly good.

Now, let's talk about the acting, because of course I need to. Starting with Ahn Jae Hyun, I personally think people are being unfair with him. He did well, seriously. He's only done a few dramas and Park Ji Sang being his first lead role, we can't expect him to be as good as Ji Jin Hee - and I won't even talk much about this guy; it was simply amazing, there's nothing else to say. It's hard to find an actor who won't make the villain in a vampire story seem silly. I don't agree with people who say supernatural stories aren't that big of a deal, I think it's really hard to act like all the unreal things you're saying are true, imagine doing it and still not sounding artificial (Blood had this problem sometimes, though).

My main complaints regarding the acting are Gu Hye Sun (wow, what a surprise) and Son Soo Hyun. Because when they were doing fine, it was great to watch, but when they acted badly, it just ruined the scene. I had some problems, even though I tried to not be distracted by these incidents.

The other supporting characters did fine, some better than others, so yeah, no problems here. (Hyun Woo, LUUVY and Sister Sylvia for the win!)

The soundtrack isn't extensive, I guess it only has four parts. While part one and two (Only One, by Tiffany from SNSD, and Be Alright by Song Haye) are incredible songs, part three and four (I Can't Stop Loving You by Ha Hyeon Woo and Cell by MC Meta) are kinda meh. What I liked the most, though, were the instrumental scores, specially the one that was played in lots of episode endings, mainly the ones filled with action or tension (I can't say in which part of the drama you can find this song because it would be posting a spoiler he he).

Overall, Blood's a good drama. It's fun, really. It made me cry and laugh and want to punch the wall because I got so angry. I understand why some people didn't liked and droped it, but it's always valid to give it a try. It depends on your taste, a lot, but if you start watching with no prejudices, you can have a good surprise. (And please give Ahn Jae Hyun a break, people. I won't let anyone who didn't watch the last episode tell me he's not a good actor.)

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Ahn Jae-hyun was cute

Well, at the end of the day, that's what this drama boils down to. Ahn Jae-hyun was a cute looking vampire. I wasn't expecting much from it to start out with, which I feel is the right way to approach anything vampire-related that is not "Train to Busan". Was I entertained? Yes. Was it GOOD? No. Did the end make any sense at all? NO (spoilers at end). My mostly coherent thoughts about this drama:

The medical aspect of the drama was pretty captivating, particularly as they begin understanding the nature of the virus, its origins, and how it mutates. I'm not a medical doctor, so most of it went over my head, but it did make the drama seem smarter that it probably was. I'm very easily impressed when I first finish a drama (because I try my best to get into the story and character development) and my personal notes say that the ML had good character development and that the music matched the theme well by being appropriately dramatic.

Notable characters:
- I'm still not sure how I feel about Ahn Jae-hyun's acting chops, but he looked pretty good as a broody, yet soft, vampire who wants revenge for his parents. He does seem to do a good job at balancing between hot shot and goofball (like with the "expensive glasses" he makes a big deal about that were easily replaced with some street knock offs)
- Ku Hye-sun was bearable in it. I found her completely obnoxious in Boys Over Flowers, and she had much better chemistry with Ahn Jae-hyun than she had with Lee Minho, which makes sense since she married AJH a year later. Their relationship turned from hate to love pretty quickly, but at least you could buy into their attraction.
- Jung Hae-in was great comic relief with his mothering of the ML, and robot antics.
- The two main villains (director and uncle) are both pretty hateable, so I guess they accomplished their roles.
- Intern was pretty bad ass as well.

Ending spoilers (my take on the ending that made no sense): I'm assuming this drama ran into the same type of problem that many kdramas encounter. For some reason, they either run out of money or time and need to rush the ending. After our vampire hero presumable dies on the rooftop, FL makes a trip to Romania. As she's about to get attacked by vampires, Ahn Jae-hyun's character pops out and somehow he's alive and saves her. The possibilities are that some other person saved her and she's imagining it's him, or that he truly did survive. My take is, he somehow survives the sunlight in the rooftop (why did she just leave him there then?? who knows), but had an extended period of recovery (again, why he didn't reach out?? who knows.) After his recovery, he follows her to Romania where he saves her. They live happily ever after.

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I want to say that It's so AWESOME . Maybe Ahn Jae Hyun is new as an actor , but I think he is so talented about this although this . His acting was REALLY REALLY good . Other actors/actresses too .
Actually , I don't like vampire films/dramas ect. , but this drama is very different from others . I'm serious . Vampires are so impressive in this awesome drama ! Vampires supernatural powers are so impressive too !
Another thing about this drama ... It's so dramatic and funny !!! Characters are so compatible !! Ahn Jae Hyun is so cool and I love him !! I LOVE THIS DRAMA !!! SO PLEASE WATCH IT !!! I RECOMMEND IT !!! YOU WON'T REGRET !!! TRUST ME !!!

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Technically this drama has a bit of everything: romance, revenge, comedy, solid second leads, everything. So it had every opportunity to wow me...But the acting, namely from the lead actress, fell short for me, it was a bit too heavy on the science, and I feel that the story dragged in some places but other plot points were skipped over.

Story: Don't let the poster fool you, the comedic parts of this drama are more towards the beginning and the second half gets darker than I was expecting so it kind of threw me. The overall plot was interesting and fresh, vampirism as a virus rather than a completely supernatural theme was a nice change. But it was a bit heavy on the scientific jargon at times and it made me zone out from time to time.

Acting/Cast: For me, the reason the entire drama fell short for me was the acting. For some reason I just couldn't connect with Ri Ta's character, and because of that I didn't really like the building romance between her and Ji Sang. And I love a good romance, but the chemistry is key in making me root for the couple through everything, and this totally missed the mark for me. Everyone else, I loved their characters. As a matter of fact I LOVED Ga Yeon's character more than Ri Ta, & thought that if the actresses had changed roles or if Ga Yeon had been the lead Ji Sang fell for I would have loved this drama. But as it was, the romance was not doing it for me, and that was half of the drama. Shame.

Music: Good, not great.

Rewatch: No. It was hard to get through it the first time without dropping it once i was halfway through. I will say that the comedic parts with certain supporting characters are gif-worthy and remain my fav parts. Other than that...

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This drama made me regret picking it up... The first 5 episodes was ok, it had a unique start that differentiated itself from Americanized vampire shows like Vampire Diary and Twilight. I was looking forward to a good story but somehow the director killed it by dragging things out for 10 episodes (ep 9-19 basically) where nothing was happening.

The bad guys in this drama is cliché enough to give me cancer; the boss man is all talk and no action, his minions are 2 dimensional with no personality and easily killed off by himself or Ji Sang, their goal is some nonsense that is never revealed in the drama. The good guys are not any better; in fact they are worse. I can't count the number of times i face-palmed at Ji Sang running into a 5 vs 1 and getting beaten up then repeat. Does he have some psychic powers to know the bad guys won't be carrying a gun and therefore he is in no danger of being unloaded with bullets? There is no 'cool' factor or 'wow' factor in walking into a beating over and over again, therefore i have no clue why the scriptwriter keeps pushing Ji Sang into a mob of bad guys with no plan whatsoever.

The romance in this drama is one of the few times romance just seems completely out of place. To say there is no chemistry is an understatement. Between looking for a cure and discovering who murdered his parents, Ji Sang literally has no time or effort to fall in love. That's why the chemistry between the main leads is so awful. Normally I am a pro Nona/Donsang relationship person but in the case of Ah Jae Hyun and Goo Hye Sun I believe the pairing failed spectacularly XD

The soundtrack employed in this drama is mediocre at best. The problem is that there is only ever one soundtrack for action scenes and every single time something is about to happen the soundtrack plays and gives away the scene. Nothing really stands out in the music score that really caught my attention except maybe the ending theme I liked the piano.

Overall my gripe about this drama is its failure to live up to potential. This drama would have been much better without the stereotype bad guys and romance to mess up the pace and create needless conflict.

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STORY:
The story of this drama is quite interesting and unique with its cross between medical and supernatural. This is more so medical and action rather than romance, so if you're searching for a romance packed drama, this isn't for you. There are very few dramas that deal with vampires and the idea that they are truly humans just infected with a virus is really intriguing. There are a few plot twists which were surprisingly unpredictable and caught me off guard which makes it more enjoyable. Overall, the story is different with, of course, some cliches that are present in about every drama, but still worth watching.
ACTING/CAST:
Ok, let me make this clear, I know what everyone is thinking: "I don't want to watch this because of Goo Hye Sun." I felt the same way when I first started watching, but she's not that bad here. Her character is very strong-willed and it kind of grows on you. I'm not saying that I loved her acting, but it wasn't horrible to the point where I couldn't stand watching her. If that's your reason for not watching this, OPEN YOUR MIND! Additionally, Ahn Jae Hyun is very new to acting and I think he did a pretty good job for a rookie. There were moments where his acting was just a bit too... well not good enough and sometimes I found myself laughing at how awkward it was. But the majority of the time, he did a well enough job.
MUSIC:
You know those OST's where it's so catchy that you find yourself humming it throughout the day for weeks even after the drama has ended? Well... this is not one of those. I enjoyed the music while watching the drama, but none of them really stuck. That's the only reason for its low rating, but from what I remember, none of them were annoying so I thought they did a decent job here.
REWATCH VALUE:
Yeah, this isn't the type of drama you'd like to rewatch. Maybe you might enjoy rewatching the rare romance scenes or some of the action scenes, but it's not really worth rewatching unless you want to take a trip down memory lane (the downtown region).
OVERALL:
Overall, this was a decent drama but due to certain plot twists and loose strings at the end, it's value significantly decreased. I want to say that i thoroughly enjoyed every bit of this drama, but I just can't. Some things happened which I think were just uncalled for and unnecessary (why screenwriters?) which I just won't be able to forgive and forget. There are good times, but to me, the bad times overpowered them.

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Okay, this will be my first drama review, so let's give it a try. :)

**I am a big fan of Ahn Jae Hyeon ever since YWCFTS, and he is the main reason I watched this drama.

This drama has received so much backlash in Korea ever since its first airing. It really did start off as boring and confusing, but as you go on, the episodes would get more interesting and exciting. The plot was nicely done. There are a lot of twists and turn of events, it will caught you off guard. Such nice twists to the characters, you'd go "What?!," Really?! Wow!" and more.

The acting can't be called excellent, but it isn't that bad though. I bow down to Ji Jin Hee, who did really did such a great job. The more he does evil things, the more you get crazy and mad at him.

The osts were also good. It did captured and melt my heart while watching the drama.

The ending was so painful, it makes you cry. Crying scenes were delivered naturally.
Overall, it was a watchable drama, but I personally think that the ending could have been expound as it brought confusions and big why's and how's.

I don't really re-watch dramas, so I don't know for those who loves re-watching.

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