And Nam Goongmin has been freed at last! I’m not going to lie, I felt nothing upon today’s conclusion. This show was so ridiculously stretched beyond belief that I’m glad for the sake of everyone involved that it’s over. This netizen’s comment (pulled from netizenbuzz) summarizes everything I felt about our final couplet of episodes.

“Never in my life have I seen such an unresolved final episode. Why did Kwon Jae Hee become a murderer, why did he want to take so many lives, what happened at the adoption, who killed his foster parents, did Oh Jae Pyo resolve his questions, how did Kwon Jae Hee survive the car being drowned in the Han river when everyone else died, how did he know that the interior was copied from the model house.. No answers at all. Why is a new episode being introduced in the final episode? There’s only so much the viewer can pass off as being a drama.. there’s no reality at all and nothing to tie it all together. It’s all so forced. I could write a better drama than this ㅡㅡ”

A thousand times, yes, random netizen. This drama honestly started off with a bang. The murder, the escape, her accident within just five minutes into the episode had me hooked instantly. So it’s rather sad to send it off with a ‘meh’ on my end. I mean, this show got bloated, crazy, crazy bloated (and it’s only 16 episodes!). We had random mushy talk, and minutes and minutes of our lead couple being cute to the point where I cheered when Jaehee appeared. We had more than enough time to address all the issues this netizen mentioned, including Yeom Mi’s father’s death, but they were curiously glossed over, hence the start unsatisfying ending.

Having said that, I’ll  remain mum on the subject of faults and focus on the good points. Mainly, Jaehee. Oh Nam Goongmin you have earned yourself a lifelong fan. That was some great acting. Regardless of where the show went, you remained consistent and really likeable. You played a villain with layers, despite those layers being ignored. I’m still sort of scared of you which means you’ve done your job.
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This episode was ridiculously frustrating to watch and they all boiled down the same reason. Bumbling cops. You’re out of the time, you idiots. You don’t have the hours or minutes to sit, sleep, worry or cry. Get out there and plan something, anything! It’s when the writing fails like this for the sake of stretching the plot a few episodes further that I get really, really irritated. Truthfully, we truly only have enough material for 12 episodes in this show, and honestly, if they’d kept it that way (a la Liar Game though I yearn for more on that end) this could have been a stellar show, instead we’re treating to montages of our favourite duo of bumbling cops who are great as people but incredibly frustrating as cops, and Chorim and Moogak having arguments and brushing hair gently off the other’s forehead. Lovely, adorable, you two. Now can we get a handle and save Lieutenant Yeom? Yes?

The perfume bit that I thought was going to be Yeom Mi’s ticket out was wasted in this episode as it only served to confirm that Jaehee has Lieutenant Yeom stashed somewhere in his place. Which we already knew judging by the duration between Yeom Mi’s disappearance and the drive to Jaehee’s house. There’s no way he could have stashed her elsewhere and run over to his house in time for Moogak to barge in (again). Instead, they wait three days to concoct a plan. I can understand Jaehee accepting the offer late, but not the cops and Chorim waiting this long to make the offer.
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So about those three cliffhangers of ‘Oh no! It’s Chorin and Jaehee, save her someone!” in a row. It was a rather foolish move on the writer’s part even if I do get what she’s going after. In the first cliffhanger we had Jaehee finding Chorim at the worst time possible, in the second we had him confronting whom he knew to be Choi Eunseol, in the third we have him beginning to put the whole Chorim = Eunseol equation together. Subtle differences, yet they could have been realized another way, instead of milking the same ending over and over again. Ah well, it’s not like I’m watching this show for crime procedural accuracy. The disconnect between the rom-com and crime aspects of this show are even most noticeable in these episodes though. Moogak and Chorim are adorbs as always now that we’ve gotten the obligatory angst brought on by the revelations of everyone’s pasts out of the way. Her sleeping over is cute

those faces Moogak make scream ‘pinch my cheeks’ (seriously how have I not noticed how pinchable Yoochun’s cheeks are? Must be the saeguk hats)
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Oh boy does it feel amazing to be done with exams. Slogging through hours of physics, statistics, western philosophy, history and – to top it off – french, was made slightly more bearable by the super fun slew of dramas that exploded on the scene recently. It’s hard to believe it’s been over a month since my last post (where has time flown!) but with all the nitty gritty head churning necessities of university now gone, I can thankfully throw myself into reviewing and squeeling away.

First up, Sensory Couple aka. The Girl Who Sees Smells. I was impressed straight off the bat with that first episode. I mean whoa, talk about speedy exposition, five minutes in and we have three murders and a car accident, a killer, an amnesiac, a distraught brother, and a policeman who’s making questionable decisions. Right up my alley. Add that to Shin Sekyung’s surprising talent for comedy and Yoochun’s brilliant blank faces, and you’ve got me hooked. Yoochun’s Choi Moogak is hilariously petty which only makes his overly serious (rather deadpan) side when playing good cop that much more fun to watch. Did anyone else think of Perry Park, that time he broke out the satoori in the men’s change room? (*sobs* Perry-sshi you better be going places on that boat, I’m still not over you). And please don’t even get me started on that Chuuuuuullllll. I love it when actors act without a care for looking pretty/their own image, which is thankfully occurring at a greater frequency (Lee Boyoung’s badass lawyer Jang, Chun Songyi, etc).

And so I’ll leave you with this.

Lieutenant Yeom’s face says it all. I was too busy choking on dinner to do the same.

Shin Sekyung’s Oh Chorim is as sweet and bright as they come, with enough bad jokes to make me relate to her. The two have sparkling chemistry: the warm, caring, lean-on-each-other kind, as opposed to anything obsessive and consuming (a la a certain novel about a Mr. Grey) which has to be this show’s greatest strength and is definitely what’s keeping me hooked.From their squabbles to them making up (how much do I love how he went to the head of the gag troupe and got her job back!)

to piggy back rides and both of them being unconscious at separate times leaving the other to take care of them, this couple is so much win. It’s the not-cloying sort of cute that I enjoy so much. I loved Moogak’s immediate reaction to the reveal of Chorim’s smell-seeing power, and the petty way he stuffed the candy  in his mouth instead of one of the cups, but what solidified and ensured that I would be coming back for more from this show was how it handled the reveal of Chorim’s eye. Now it is a little hard to suspend belief with regards to that eye and everyone believing her a monster because of it (sure the hospital nurses thinking may have reason to think so, I mean both her eyes were brown when she came in) but the general populace certainly has no right or reason to call her that. Regardless, Moogak’s reaction here was what I found so perfect. He just swept after her, instantly revealed his own weakness and we had this awesome moment of shared understanding only furthered by his admission that he sought his sister’s murderer. I really enjoy a show where the leads open up to each other soon instead of dancing around each other until we’re three episodes from the end. The latter sort of show goes right on my list of ‘Dramas I Hate’ including plots spun around ‘The Reasons We Cannot Be Together’ or ‘I Am A Lonely Monster Who Does Not Deserve Happiness’. Those just make me want to bitchslap everyone involved for excessive stupidity. Tangent aside, onto more reasons why I like the handling of this couple. Perhaps it’s because this is a mid-way review but it feels like I’ve so much to say on this show and not nearly enough words/time.

So off we go towards the smooching. Because that’s what really makes with this OTP. I have never seen such awesome reasons for skinship and swoony confessions before. And Moogak just laps it all up, offering a token protest before happily going along with whatever Chorim says.

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