Robert Durst voice....what a disaster.

I will never understand how this show fumbled the bag so badly down the stretch. I forgave this show a lot because I liked the leads so much and their romance worked for me. I tolerated the thin, slowly paced (non)plot, the potentially compelling but ultimately uninteresting supporting characters, the half assed fantasy world building, all because I was confident at the very least that the show would deliver a well earned and emotionally satisfying happily ever after, a baseline expectation for the genre. How did anyone think audiences would want to see a cute, silly comedy devolve into boring, mopey dreck and then end with a poorly executed unhappy ending. The writers should be ashamed of themselves.

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"Marriage is war without guns"

Angsty domestic drama doesn't get any better than this. I loved how this was able to deliver jaw dropping twists and capital D drama while also providing the audience nuanced characters and enthrallingly thorny, complex relationships. You also get excellent SKY Castle-esque social commentary about how soul destroying it can be to have to constantly maintain the facade of perfection, the "show window" life.

I would feel shock and excitement but at the same time each character's behavior was always understandable given their psychological make up and background. Since the characters remain in constant forced proximity at home and work and can't just switch off their emotional and logistical ties to each other no matter how badly things go awry, so many scenes crackle with tension. The dialogue is sophisticated and clever but what remains unsaid as the leads try to retain some element of public decorum is also powerful. Even the corporate maneuvering is riveting.

I loved everything about this and can't recommend it highly enough.

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In my husband's words: this was inept yet adorable

This show is cheesy and ridiculous in so many ways. The characters are cartoonish, the plot is nonsensical, the production values are student film quality. The "romance" has a few really cute moments but is mostly comprised of childish tantrums, miscommunications, and contrived separations. And yet, I can't deny this had a certain charm to it and I did (usually) enjoy watching it. I came into this with a strong pre-existing fondness for Jang Na Ra and Jang Hyuk and I loved watching these early career performances of theirs. Even at this early stage they both had such a star quality about them. It's amusing how the show ping pongs between the lightest fluff and hackneyed attempts at gritty intensity. Sometimes the show would get flat but thankfully I never had to wait too long for it to pick back up again.

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Flawed but worthwhile watch

This show has its flaws for sure: the first few episodes have so many flashbacks the narrative feels choppy, the pace is too slow from episodes 4-14 or so (this would have been great at 16 episodes), the actress playing the FL stays a bit too placid and quietly weepy to sell the desperation and longing and pathos of her character in the final third of the drama. Yet for all these issues when this show is in the groove, it works really well, well enough to justify the 24+ hour time commitment. There are a lot of poignant moments in this drama that will stick with me. The best thing this drama has going for it is Lee Dong Wook's incredible performance as Joon Soo. This character, and his performance, are the highlight of the drama and the glue holding everything together. Joon Soo is so complex and volatile that LDW needs to switch on a dime from the ardent lover to the menacing sleazebag to the suicidal depressive to almost child like innocence and vulnerability and he nails it every single time.

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A good show that could've been great.

The first 8 episodes of this are pure romcom excellence: captivating characters, strong chemistry (romantic, platonic, and familial) between the actors, lots of fizzy comedy seamlessly blended with more substantive, heartfelt moments and some smart analysis of workplace discrimination against single women. I also appreciated the refreshingly open and mature attitude the characters (with one notable exception) have towards their own sexual appetites. The way the show engaged with common romance tropes in a fresh, creative way was just a joy to watch. Another banger of a performance from Shin Min Ah, I can't praise her work highly enough in this.

However, things started to go awry in episode 9. The second ML acts like a hardcore jerk to the leads in episodes 9 and 10, and never makes amends. This made it hard for me to enjoy the cutesy scenes between him and the second FL, as winning as their performances were. While I enjoyed his performance for the majority of the drama because I think he did a good job with the comedy and his dryer, low key delivery contrasted well with Shin Min Ah’s effervescence, Kim Young Dae was flat and didn't emote well when he had to play angst. The other lead actors are so good the difference in their skill vs his was apparent to me. Finally, the the show had too much plot to cram into 12 episodes and as a result we were really short changed in terms of good couple moments between the leads. I was so annoyed they’re barely on screen together in the finale.

This is still an enjoyable watch but I'm a bit frustrated it faltered down the stretch.

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Disappointing

Didn't care for this one. The first half is slight and low key but pleasant, with charming scenes between the leads and appealing wintry production design to get the viewer in a cozy frame of mind. However, the second half was boring and/or frustrating. The show failed to develop the leads as individuals or their relationship satisfactorily. The extremely half assed gesture at the idea of a love triangle and the seemingly obligatory trip abroad+separation period were both maddening distractions. The shallowness of the story made the leads' inability to acknowledge their feelings toward each sooner feel contrived. We get one short scene with the leads as a couple and that's it, unacceptable!

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Well crafted procedural

I really enjoyed this. I was a little worried it might be stodgy or hard to follow for someone ignorant of Korean history but that wasn't the case at all. Lee Je Hoon was excellent as usual, I always appreciate his range, intensity, and charisma. His Unit 1 colleagues aren't deep characters but I enjoyed their camaraderie with each other. It was interesting how in most of the episodes the mystery wasn't "who's the perpetrator" but rather "how will we bring the perpetrator to justice given the constraints we're working under." The characters come up with smart workarounds to the municipal corruption that stymied legitimate police work at the time, such as forming strategic allegiances with beggars, staging rogue undercover operations, and tricking a gangster into attacking an American soldier which changed the jurisdiction of the case. I wasn't totally on board with how the show dispatched it's multi-episode villains (quickly and anti-climatically) but I was consistently pleased with how they resolved the cases of the week. The romance subplot was really nice as well, they were such a sweet couple.

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What a great show. The high quality and brutal intensity of the action scenes, the production design, the colorful and compelling supporting characters and flashily demented villains were reminiscent of John Wick in the best way. They did a great job building tension and suspense in each episode, I was on the edge of my seat no matter what timeline I was in, equally captivated by the flashbacks and the present day scenes.

The centerpiece of the show, the devoted yet unconventional uncle/niece relationship, was beautifully done. In addition to all the high octane spectacle this show had a lot of emotional weight to it. I simp so hard for Lee Dong Wook his own mother would tell me to take it down a notch so I really enjoyed watching him play a character that was so simultaneously reserved yet charismatic and he did a great job being deadpan yet still expressive and dryly funny. The acting was excellent across the board.

I do wish the show had shown us what Uncle Jin Man was up to while Ji An was battling for her life. I can intuit how/why he faked his death and that he was fighting Bale (who was MIA from the protracted showdown at the house) but I would have actually liked to see some of it. Since it felt like they recycled some previously seen footage in episode 7 I think they could have used that time to wrap that subplot up more definitively.

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Excellent thriller but needed more time travel

This show certainly keeps you on your toes. It's fast paced, unpredictable, and exciting. Very bingeable. Some of the 10 "resetters," who start getting killed off after they travel back in time one year to fix their lives, are just cannon fodder, but the majority of characters still manage to make an impression even when the busy plot doesn't leave a ton of time for character development. Deceptively crazy Se Rin was my favorite, loved her. The actual time travel element of the plot was underwhelming though. 90% of this just feels like a regular murder mystery, the time travel shaped the plot less than I expected and we spend too little time learning about how time travel works in this universe.

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Well executed weepy

Sometimes I love being shamelessly emotionally manipulated. This show has its flaws for sure (such as the ML's improbable transformation from random angsty teen to powerful gangster that is never required to actually do on screen gangster business, paper thin secondary characters with inscrutable motivations) but I was so swept up in the central romance that I could forgive these things. I loved how the show juxtaposed the brutality of the characters' circumstances and the forbidden nature of their love (they're briefly step siblings) with the sweet wholesome innocence of many of their interactions. Park Shin Hye and Lee Wan gave such raw, powerful performances and they have a naturalistic yet potent chemistry with each other that gave the narrative a feeling of authenticity no matter how overwrought some of the story beats were. Even when their relationship was dysfunctional, I yearned so badly for them to be able to be together despite all the obstacles put up against them. Also, the 10 episode length ensures this is all killer, no filler. I was really moved by this.

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Drop what you are doing and watch

A masterful exploration of the psychological and social role of money. This show expertly explores how money functions as a both builder and destroyer of relationships, and how acquiring and either lavishly spending or hoarding it becomes central to a person's sense of self and understanding of the world. It functions both as a tense and riveting thriller and a tender, haunting look at loneliness and the need for human connection. The cinematography and the set design are gorgeous. Every character no matter how small feels richly conceived with a vivid internal life. Flawlessly acted, plotted, and paced, I cannot rave about this show enough.

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Heartwarming story of personal growth

This worked really well for me as a chronicle of the ML's personal growth. He was such a lovable guy that my heart ached to see him suffering so much, and I was so invested in watching him work on overcoming his anxiety and self esteem issues. The show did a good job balancing its comedic and dramatic moments. I also liked how the drama focused primarily on him changing his mindset rather than his circumstances and that his happy ending didn't come from making lots of money of getting a super fancy career. I'm not sure I 100% buy into the leads as having some great love story (it didn't help that time that could have been spent developing their relationship was wasted on an engagement misdirect between the FL and the second ML near the end) but I did enjoy watching them bond as they worked to solve his ED together and I was convinced the FL had also engaged in some much needed personal growth over the course of the series.

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Strong revenge drama with some uneven acting

At its best this was intense, exciting, but also heartfelt. I was emotionally invested in the ML and his quest for revenge every step of the way and Jang Hyuk's performance was excellent as usual. I enjoyed the main antagonist as well, and much of the supporting cast. Happily, I was also still able to enjoy the gambling scenes even though I don't understand the rules for Go Stop. Things did start to drag eventually, right around the time the ML was framed and went to jail, though his imprisonment itself wasn't the issue. I think that's because the FL and and the second ML, while compelling in theory, were pretty flat characters in practice . I don't think either actor had the range to do justice to their parts which hurt the show as they become more important to the plot as it progresses.

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