had very good potential

First few episodes started strong, became a bit messy and predictable from the middle to the last episodes, although ending was somewhat acceptable and gives a feeling of "closure" but honestly could've done better. There were too many plot holes and aspects left forgotten and unexplored because too much unnecesary focus and screentime was given on the romance/love triangle. Before I get a bit more critical, I just want to say that probably the BEST part about this drama is the actors. All of the actors, from the main roles and supporting roles, did a really amazing job portraying and bringing life to their characters. Bae Suzy, Nam Joo Hyuk, Kim Seon Ho and Kang Hanna did an exceptional job in their roles and they shouldn't be at fault for how the drama's plot was written and how it turned out. I actually got interested in watching it because of 2 main reasons: (1) the "startup" and business aspect of it seemed fresh, and (2) NJH and BS in one drama was tempting enough. I first liked Suzy from WYWS and NJH from Weightlifting Fairy, that's why I was compelled to watch these two together and they didn't disappoint when it comes to their acting. But from the first few episodes alone, I can't help but also admire and be drawn towards KSH and KH, I'm surprised I didn't know or hear much about these two before.

Okay, so I'll start.

A GOOD START: Start Up had a really promising start. It was good and interesting in the first half but it slowly got boring, predictable, and much too cliché and unrealistic which was something I actually didn't expect from a drama written by PHR. I watched some of her works but I particularly liked WYWS, so I expected that Start Up would live up to that when it comes to the overall plot and keeping the strong momentum from start to end, that kind of plot that will keep you excited and curious of what will come next— with each and every small details of each scene from the camera angles, use of music, use of colors, parallelisms and symbols, etc., being interconnected and making a full circle at the end. But for this drama, PHR wasn't able to maintain the momentum, and it became so easy to predict what happens next and even predict how the drama itself will end.

ON POTENTIALS and ENDING: It had a lot of really good parallelisms, use of symbolisms, and really subtle but seemingly critical details in a lot of scenes which I loved, only if they made use of all of those to connect the plot altogether in the end to conclude the drama both in the business/"start-up" aspect and the romance aspect. Unfortunately, they didn't. They wasted all these good potentials and turned the story into a typical, cliché-ridden, and honestly, a bit too shallow, romance story. The business side of the story was slightly better in a way, but in my opinion, still too unrealistic and cliché— where for the concept of love/romance between the leads was still too embedded and made it appear like "our love and optimism will conquer it all and make us succeed in any business ventures we take" instead of depicting the more realistic and objective side of business— where there's little to no room for impulsivity and not doing enough planning/risk assessment will most certainly be your worst mistake.

CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT: Next, I am honestly not rooting for one love interest over the other, and I have no interest of siding with the "1st lead" or "2nd lead." I watched the drama objectively and considered the depth of how each character was built and reflected than focusing on the romantic aspect of their characters. Thus my second issue with the drama. In my opinion, they highlighted the second-male lead's story and character development too much that he ended up being a little too central to the entire plot than the main lead. I wish they could've focused more on building the main leads' (male and female) development and building a stronger and deeper story/foundation for their relationship. Instead, a big part of their relationship (romantically) turned out a bit shallow and forced. The 2nd male lead's story and whole character arc played a too big and too central role in the main plot that somewhere along the way, his role seemed to be more important and getting more attention that of the male and female leads. I wish I could've seen a deeper and more critical involvement of the 1st lead's story and character in the plot's "bigger picture" but unfortunately, I didn't. His backstory was not highlighted enough and just seemed to pass by without connecting it enough to the main plot. I liked his character development in terms of being successful in the business aspect of the story, but other than that, not much development and character depth was given to him for the entire series. His character had so much potential for a "wow" build up but the writers wasted those potentials as well. But despite this, NJH did well as usual in portraying this role. With all that being said, I understand why I see some of the viewers empathizing more with the 2nd lead's character because he had the most depth and most reflected and carefully-written development in the drama. Big kudos to KSH though, it was my first time seeing him here but I can say he's a really good actor with a wide range of emotions.

Another point is the obvious lack of attention given on Won In Jae's character. They also built a good separate/independent foundation for her role in the first few episodes, only to disregard her character and give too little focus on her for the rest of the episodes. Yet another wasted potential for the drama. It would've been nice to see her build up her relationship with Dalmi and her family throughout the episodes but unfortunately again, we didn't get to see much of that.

** I honestly still have a lot to say for this drama such as in Dalmi's character, the relationships between the characters, the plot details presented everywhere only to be forgotten and thrown under the rug, and plot details that could have had good potential to explored, etc. but this has been much longer than I expected so I'll just highlight those big points for this review.

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