The Gentlemen of Wolgyesu Tailor Shop Review

Title: The Gentlemen of Wolgyesu Tailor Shop

AKA: Laurel Tree Tailors / Bay Tree Tailors

Genre: Family, Comedy, Drama

Episodes: 54

Broadcast period: 2016-Aug to 2017-Feb

Cast: Lee Dong Gun, Jo Yoon Hee, Cha In Pyo, Choi Won Young, Hyun Woo, Shin Goo, Kim Young Ae and Oh Hyun Kyung.

This drama follows four men, who get affiliated with a small tailor shop called “Wolgyesu Tailor Shop”.

Lee Man Sool (Shin Goo) is the second-generation owner of the Wolgyesu Tailor Shop. After being unable to get anyone to take over the shop, he decides to leave his family, leaving them with a letter. His son Lee Dong Jin (Lee Dong Gun) is wealthy manager in a clothing company owned by his wife’s diseased father. Due to internal conflict he is outed of the company and returns home. Here he meets Na Yeon Sil (Jo Yoon Hee), a seamstress that was supposed to get married, but her fiancé was arrested on the wedding day.

Due to the vacancy of a tailor in the shop, Bae Sam Do (Cha In Pyo) a former pupil of Man Sool, finally manages to persuade his aggressive wife Bok Sun Nyeo (Ra Mi Ran) to close down their chicken shop, to start living in the Lee household. At the same time Lee Dong Sook (Oh Hyun Kyung), the daughter of Man Sool and sister of Dong Jin, persuades their mother to let her first crush and forgotten singer Sung Tae Young (Choi Won Young) live in the house, only to create even more havoc. Kang Tae Yang (Hyun Woo) is the youngest of four, who is the childhood friend of Yeon Sil. After getting dumped by his longtime girlfriend for a rich CEO, Tae Yang decides to join the company - which happens to be the company Dong Jin was fired from.

Soon enough the four create an alliance and together they fix the issues surrounding their family and new home…

I remember reading about this drama long before it came out, and I was more than excited to watch it because of two of the leads, Cha In Pyo and Lee Dong Gun. Besides the fact that they are great actors, I have never seen them act together in a movie or drama - which made it even more exciting. Unfortunately, I felt quite confused in the beginning, because of the huge number of plots entwined in the main plot - making me forget not only names, but also the relationships between the characters, both kinship and other. This made me forget about the two leads, as I tried to wrap my head around it, and when I finally figured it out, they all kind of became less ‘famous actors’, and more their characters. The story and screenplay were great, even though I felt the acting could’ve been a bit better, I was satisfied with the overall.

So, all in all, it is a good family drama that made me laugh, and happy.

☆☆☆☆ / 4 out of 5 stars

♥♥♥♥ / 4 out of 5 hearts

Second Time Twenty Years Old Review

Title: Second Time Twenty Years Old

AKA: Twenty Again

Genre: Drama, Romance,

Episodes: 16

Broadcast Period: Aug-2015 to Oct-2015

Cast: Choi Ji Woo, Jung Soo Young, Ban Hyo Jung, Lee Sang Yoon, Choi Yoon Soo, Choi Won Young, Kim Min Jae,

36-year-old Ha No Ra dreamt of becoming a dancer in her high school years, but met her husband Kim Woo Chul when she was 19. After having a child, she focused on taking care of her family and had to give up her dreams. In hopes of becoming a proud wife and mother to her college professor husband and her son Min Soo, she strives to enter college and ends up getting accepted into the same college as her son.

A cute heartwarming story delivered with an encouraging performance by TvN. I really love that channels drama, they are so cheering and not so dramatic and complicated like those typical Korean melodrama. This drama almost made me study for my exams instead of watching it, almost. It teaches the young people that you don’t have to have your whole life figured out now, take it step by step and make sure you’re happy too. The concept really reminds me of Angry Mom, the only difference is that this is in college instead and not high school. I really enjoyed the drama, it was not complicated at all, what I liked was that there were no evil/bad people or good people. They all acted according to their surroundings and very realistically, humanly. The acting was also very good, even the college students were adorable. If I had to point out something negative it would be how weak the main character were, I don’t know why, but weak female MAIN characters bugs me. Like when they can’t do anything themselves and need help with everything. Although Choi Ji Woo (Ha No Ra) had a good performance and her character grew stronger in the end, but she was still dependent on others. All in all a good drama to watch with a nice flow.

☆☆☆☆/ 4 out of 5 stars

♥♥♥♥ / 4 out of 5 hearts

Kill Me, Heal Me Review

Title: Kill Me, Heal Me
Genre: Romance, Comedy, Medical, Mystery
Episodes: 20
Broadcast Period: Jan-2015 to Mar-2015
Cast: Ji Sung, Hwang Jung Eum, Park Seo Joon, Oh Min Suk, Kim Yoo Ri, Kim Young Ae, Shim Hye Jin, Choi Won Young

Cha Do Hyun (Ji Sung) is a wealthy businessman with a warmhearted personality who loves to help others. However, 11 years ago, after he realized that he suffers from dissociative identity disorder, he has been desperately trying to hide it from his families and friends. He has six other identities: Shin Se Gi a vehement guy with a devil-may-care demeanor who appears when Do-hyun experiences violence. He may be violent, but he never hurts children and women. Perry Park is a 40 year-old man with an aficionado for fishing and building bombs. Ahn Yo-seob a suicidal, intelligent 17 year old boy and artist. Ahn Yo-na's twin brother, she is an extrovert and mischievous 17 year old girl who loves idols. Cha Do Hyun tries to regain control over his life with the help of Oh Ri Jin, a first-year psychiatry resident who tries hard to maintain her seemingly perfect image to cover for her real personality. At first glance she looks elegant and genteel, but she is actually messy and short-tempered. Ri-jin then becomes Do Hyun's secret psychiatrist, and slowly falls in love with him. Ri Jin’s twin brother, Oh Ri Ohn, often gets mistaken for a goofy simpleton, but he is actually a famous mystery novelist under the pseudonym Omega who investigates about Seung Jin Family.

Oh God. Oh God. Oh God. I knew this would happen. I tried to prepare my heart and mind for the ending since episode 1, but then the ending came and I’m left alone with thousands feeling I don’t know what to do with. How do I go back to living my life again?  Where do I start… That couple. What kind of chemistry is that! First they overwhelmed me in their previous work Secret, and know they do it again, just stronger! Although Ji Sung did a lot of the work this time, I mean he singlehanded made me fall in love with SEVEN amazing characters with the same face! Before he was on my favorite list of actors, but now he is THE TOP ONE! No.. He need another list only for him, this man need an award already! Also Hwang Jung Eum did a pretty good job, she just nails those feels, and throw them at us so we just end up sobbing like her. Throughout the drama what I liked the most about them where that they don’t seek recognition or validation from anyone but each other, that’s all they need… That’s all I need(hahah). The storyline, the journey they go through to put back together the broken puzzle was just a delight to watch, even the message of the show, leaves us with no less than satisfication, that it’s energetic to depend on our loved ones, and to seek out the truth despite our fears.
Okay, so just to be fair I want to pin out a little detail that might have been a little too much in the drama, and that was the flashbacks! There were too many and too much, but I didn't think it would reduce from my experience as an audience. *happy face*
This dramas soundtrack is also an example of how much impact a song has on the drama, I dare to go as far to say that if not for one specific song in the drama I don’t think it would have been able to deliver everything the way it did.
After a rather-dull 2014, I must say 2015 kicked off with a loud bang. With dramas like Pinocchio and Healer concluding in the first two months, setting solid standards, it was rather difficult to surpass them. But Kill Me Heal Me did exactly that. I wouldn't say it exactly 'surpassed' them. More like it carried on their legacy.

☆☆☆☆☆ / 5 out of 5 stars

♥♥♥♥♥ / 5 out of 5 hearts

Bunji's Verdict

Hmm, this drama was one of the few extremely popular ones of 2015, and yeah I was expectant. It is good, it just didn’t satisfy me. Actually I dislike dramas (and movies) where the lead actor/actress falls in love with a look-alike of the lead or a person reminding them of someone else (like someone falls in love with the lead that looks like his/hers first love, or like in this case: the same person but different personality). It just feels wrong, and already from episode 4 I was kind of annoyed - and that went on for another 16 episodes. And tbh I didn’t really feel the leads chemistry as I did in Secret, but I guess it’s kind of the idea - like so have her fall for both personalities. I dunno, I disliked it - Also I didn’t really fall (like most did) for the violent Se Gi like everyone else did, nor did I feel bad for him, which just shows that the director and screen writer didn’t do a good job.

Besides that the drama was okay. The psychological part was okay: quite reasonable actually, though I didn’t get why all personalities come out - only a few of them make sense, but then again it’s a drama.

I won’t spoil anymore, so a good and interesting drama - which you might like more than I did.

☆☆☆☆ / 4 out of 5 stars

♥♥♥♥ / 4 out of 5 hearts