Here’s my honest review, with no sugar coating!

Firstly, I went into this drama with zero expectations. It popped up as a recommendation when I was searching for something new to watch, mainly to kill some boredom… haha

Initial Impressions: The first 5 episodes were quite enjoyable. I loved the sweet interactions between (ML) and (FL). However, I was a bit confused by the (ML) being a voice actor and suddenly starting to talk about food recipes with the FL within the spam of the first episode. Some of you might find it charming, especially his voice, but for me, I felt indifferent.

The Romance: I can't remember exactly when the (ML) and (FL) officially got together ( probably somewhere around episodes 8 to 10), but those moments were super cute! HOWEVER, from that point on, the show focused wayyyy too much on the main couple. Normally, I’d enjoy that, but considering it's a 33 episode series, it just felt like the romance dragged on for longer than it should. They took things reallyyy slow…and I mean painfully slow. They didn’t share their first kiss until almost 10 episodes later…

I get that it was their first relationship and all, and that they wanted to take it slow, but it was slow to the point that I couldn’t handle it anymore. Each 45-minute episode felt repetitive, with the FL acting shy and innocent every time she was around her boyfriend. After a while, it wasn’t even cute or cringey anymore; it was just plain boring. I ended up skipping a lot of the scenes and even full episodes to find interactions with the other couples because I needed a break from the main pair.

Missed Opportunities with Other Couples: **Spoiler Alert!** There were several episodes where the main couple and their friends went on a semi-long vacation together. I thought this would finally be the moment where we’d see the other couples develop, but I was wrong. Instead, we got 42 minutes of the main couple doing the same repetitive things, and only about 3 minutes of the other couples…. Like…seriously???? At times, it felt like scenes with other couples could have been expanded, but the show would cut them short and jump back to the main couple, dragging their scenes longer than necessary.

For example, there’s a scene where Juemei and XiaoXing are at a bookstore/date. We got at most 3 minutes of them there, then the scene cuts to them waiting for the bus to arrive to go back to the dormitory, and then it immediately switches back to the main couple. It felt so rushed, and frustratingly so. To make matters worse, all the other couples only officially got together in the very last episode of the show….

Character Issues: The characters themselves felt a bit unrealistic. The ML was literally good at everything: he’s a doctor, yet somehow finds the time to do dubbing, cook, and take care of the FL. Meanwhile, the FL was overly naive, like a teenager giddy with first love. I felt like she didn’t put as much effort into the relationship compared to the ML, and as a result, there was a lack of chemistry between them (IN my personal opinion…).

Overall Verdict: My biggest issue with the show is that it was unnecessarily stretched out to 33 episodes… (I’ve seen so many good shows do this, and it’s so disappointing…) If it had been condensed to around 15-20 episodes, I think I would’ve had far fewer complaints. That said, this is just my personal take. I’ve seen plenty of comments and reviews from others who enjoyed the simplicity, the no drama vibe (in addition to the cultural aspect of the drama, sharing knowledge of ancient Chinese music, costume, etc), and the kindhearted, sweet and loving male lead. If that’s your thing, you might find it more appealing than I did.