This review may contain spoilers
When you're not sure whether you should smile or cry
I felt like this is a great drama and often I wasn't sure myself how to react to scenes. Some were particularly sad, but still the next second I felt like smiling. Tragedy and humour are not far away from each other, I guess this is clearly here.
Furthermore I felt like the conflicts were often reasonable, it was interesting to watch and though I'm not an expert to judge people acting I still felt impressed. Especially regarding Moon/Mun Sang-tae.
The characters moreover changed significantly over the show and character development is certainly portrait well - and I felt like it's a good decision not to make up with everyone or run away for no reason. During the last episodes when Kang-tae consulted Oh Ji-wang I started thinking "drama characters should more often consult others to avoid ridiculous impulsive acts". Certainly I didn't agree on everything, but all over it was rather reasonable and the characters actually learned how to react to the things they had to face.
Therefore it's a story about how to love yourself, how to rely on others and how to become independent. That's rather clear. In addition it's about family. What's family? How can you become family? ... And it's fine to not be an adult in all kind of aspects.
Still I was rather surprised that you can become a caretaker without proper education, but well, it wasn't clearly mentioned either (but I mean they were on the run since Kang-tae turned 12...).
What disturbs me slightly is again the villain (similar to "My love from another star"). Certainly because this a drama about mental issues one could argue "she's nuts anyway", but what's her point for murder? It was pretty weak in my opinion. Furthermore I don't think she had much of a reason to disappear either after her husband got hospitalized. I mean, she had the chance to monitor Moon-young even better if she didn't pretend to be dead. Therefore I'm not that convinced about these.
The romance was rather persistent and certainly cute to watch. They even switched roles regarding "hunter" and "prey" in the end - but well, even an unlikely romance can be the perfect match in the end.
They way they arranged the scenes were a showoff, especially at the beginning, later on I didn't notice it as much anymore, but I liked how they linked different scenes at the beginning.
Last but not least I think it's a good thing to address the topic itself in a drama. I can imagine it's not a likely topic in South Korea or East Asia in general, furthermore disabled people don't show up as much in dramas, at least not to this extend. So it's good to watch these two brothers finding their way - and how difficult it often must've been for them to continue. At the same time I like it that they mentioned child abuse - KDramas often made me feel like it's normal for parents to hit their children for all sort of reasons though I find that horrible. This behaviour wasn't justified here though, but instead the talked about the consequences.
All in all "Saikojiman gwaechanha" is worth watching. It worth watching all of these rather different characters struggling and finding their way in the long run.
Furthermore I felt like the conflicts were often reasonable, it was interesting to watch and though I'm not an expert to judge people acting I still felt impressed. Especially regarding Moon/Mun Sang-tae.
The characters moreover changed significantly over the show and character development is certainly portrait well - and I felt like it's a good decision not to make up with everyone or run away for no reason. During the last episodes when Kang-tae consulted Oh Ji-wang I started thinking "drama characters should more often consult others to avoid ridiculous impulsive acts". Certainly I didn't agree on everything, but all over it was rather reasonable and the characters actually learned how to react to the things they had to face.
Therefore it's a story about how to love yourself, how to rely on others and how to become independent. That's rather clear. In addition it's about family. What's family? How can you become family? ... And it's fine to not be an adult in all kind of aspects.
Still I was rather surprised that you can become a caretaker without proper education, but well, it wasn't clearly mentioned either (but I mean they were on the run since Kang-tae turned 12...).
What disturbs me slightly is again the villain (similar to "My love from another star"). Certainly because this a drama about mental issues one could argue "she's nuts anyway", but what's her point for murder? It was pretty weak in my opinion. Furthermore I don't think she had much of a reason to disappear either after her husband got hospitalized. I mean, she had the chance to monitor Moon-young even better if she didn't pretend to be dead. Therefore I'm not that convinced about these.
The romance was rather persistent and certainly cute to watch. They even switched roles regarding "hunter" and "prey" in the end - but well, even an unlikely romance can be the perfect match in the end.
They way they arranged the scenes were a showoff, especially at the beginning, later on I didn't notice it as much anymore, but I liked how they linked different scenes at the beginning.
Last but not least I think it's a good thing to address the topic itself in a drama. I can imagine it's not a likely topic in South Korea or East Asia in general, furthermore disabled people don't show up as much in dramas, at least not to this extend. So it's good to watch these two brothers finding their way - and how difficult it often must've been for them to continue. At the same time I like it that they mentioned child abuse - KDramas often made me feel like it's normal for parents to hit their children for all sort of reasons though I find that horrible. This behaviour wasn't justified here though, but instead the talked about the consequences.
All in all "Saikojiman gwaechanha" is worth watching. It worth watching all of these rather different characters struggling and finding their way in the long run.
Was this review helpful to you?