Woo Do-Hwan never fails!
Woo Do-Hwan never fails to please!My two top Korean actors right now are Woo Do Hwan and Lee Do-Hyun.
I first saw WDH in Save Me and my favourite ones out of his dramas would have to be:
My Country and Bloodhounds.
With Mr Plankton I really enjoyed it for the first 7 episodes and then I'm not sure where it quite started turning for me, but it did.
I hesitated to watch this drama because I knew the fate of his character and didn't want to go through that all again like with My Country.
With Mr Plankton the ending was sad, but not as devastatingly sad for me like what happened in My Country for some reason.
Have seen others of his dramas in full like: Save Me, Tempted and Mad Dog which I really enjoyed as well.
As for Joseon Attorney (4-6 episodes) and King Eternal Monarch (half) and didn't mind these either except maybe Joseon Attorney would probably be the least liked one out of them all. Not because of him, but rather the story itself.
King Monarch I would probably finish only he isn't the male lead.
In regards to Mr Plankton it is about the main character being diagnosed with a terminal disease (less than 3 months to live) so he goes on this personal journey to find his real father only decides to kidnap his ex girlfriend at the start just as she is about to get married with a gang on his tail out for revenge.
It has a great mix of humour, a solid story line, drama, action, a sad or bittersweet feel, romance and adventure.
The music is so so - nothing really stood out like Stay With Me (Goblin) or Butterflies (Wedding Impossible).
A major dislike for me would be the female in this as she got on my nerves with her crying - it is the worst, also, her hissy fits. I really wish I could have reached through the screen to slap her out of it. Really annoying!!! Far too many scenes for my liking and she grated me the wrong way as she sounded terrible. Couldn't stand it! Her other scenes were mostly fine - just the sobbing and hysterics were irritating. Terrible! She really did come across as being idiotic quite a bit of the time which was unfortunate - I'm not sure what he saw in her. Another minor peeve was the way she ran. Weird!
Wouldn't it be something to have a female that is mature even when annoyed yet sassy, full of spunk, charismatic and adorable even if not dropdead gorgeous. Just not a cry baby, nagger, whiner or screamer.
I need a female actor that can pull it off like WDH, who in my humble opinion, is one the BEST actors in the industry for crying, laughing and emoting expressions and feelings. His crying or sobbing scenes in My Country were believable, but especially that one scene inside the room with that silk item and his name embroidered on it probably due to the significance of what it meant.
Simply the BEST!!!
The gut wrenching moments in this drama definitely have momentum, but not as impactful as two specific scenes in My Country.
What else?
I really enjoyed the bond that was made on the road trip back to Seoul between the Heir and character played by WDH - the bromance was fantastic and seemed better than what was between WDH and the main female lead at times!
WDH has a beautiful laugh, way of chuckling and tantalising manner with particular words or expressions.
Him and only him!
Anyways, Mr Plankton is recommended for those that like a good mix of everything, but after episode 7 it doesn't seem as exciting and seems rushed or done so as not to leave any loose ends. But...done so without depth.
Maybe one loose end actually - I don't remember seeing anything about the test results of the 3rd candidate. đ§
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Mr. Plankton Review - ZyKuu
"Two drifters embark on their final trip together" - The story is very chaotic but entertaining, and there are many valuable life lessons taught throughout the show. The cast was sweet and sour for me. I am a huge fan on the main lead Hae-jo, I thought he played his role well and was the most excellent amongst the cast. The female lead Jae-mi was wonderful as well and she really displayed her acting ability. Their romantic chemistry was great. Other roles that I enjoyed were Bong-suk and KKari. I found them to be great side characters that added to every moment and made the show more memorable. The OST was good and I was pleased by the shows aesthetic. This drama is somewhat random, but everything ties together neatly. The show is very eventful, and the lessons taught within are golden.Vond je deze recentie nuttig?
Good Enough
Korean Drama '' Mr. Plankton '' is a dramedy with a crazy plot mixed up with a tragic core.The drama has some pretty tragic characters who fight against the odds to be happy, often, however, failing to achieve that happiness. Also, the process of that was filled with many comical elements.
Alas, that mixture was a failure. The comedy didn't blend smoothly with the drama, and the plot was more often than not all over the place, with the characters constantly moving from one place to another so quickly that the plot didn't organically develop. Thus, the story fails to engage.
Fortunately, the performances were stellar and the actors and actresses handled their characters nicely.
So, overall, six out of ten.
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Please make her stop screaming
A new judging criteria should be added: scream level. FL starts as a little girl always smiling hoping that a happy and nice child will be more easily adopted than a sad and crying one, but as an adult she cries and above all screams a lot..maybe too much. A good story is somehow ruined by this interpretation, like it happened with Kill me Heal me.And talking about comparison, here you can't help but compare Woo Do Hwan with Kim Woo Bin (Uncontrollably fond) and Lee Jun Ho (Just between lovers) and I'm sorry to say that the result is not so positive. Maybe his performance is ruined ruined by the over the top acting of Yoo Mi Lee.
Anyway, I enjoyed whatching this drama even if it didn't involve me emotionally as I thought.
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Worth watching for the acting
I was very excited when I started watching this drama because of Woo Dohwan who is basically one of my favorite actors (yes he is handsome but his acting skills are pretty amazing too).At the beginning, I was really intrigued about his character Hae Jo. And the first half of the drama was really exciting and fun!!! the whole chase through the country, the drama, the funny moments were on point, if only the drama had continued like thatâŠ
Basically, after they got rescued from the island and came back to Seoul everything went down the drainâŠ
In my opinion there was a lot of unnecessary drama and the plot was not moving on. The main lead was sulking and treating Jae Mi like trash and it kept on going back and forth. I got quite bored during a few episodes to be honestâŠ
And then the scene when Hae Jo leaves Jae Mi in front of her motherâs door and runs away! Why??? Why did he have to run away??? I was sooo confused! What was the point anyway if you were gonna go back to Seoul afterwards? I thought he was gonna start his journey to look for his father with Heung but no they just went back to Seoul!!! I got really annoyed tbh and I also got annoyed at Jae Mi a couple of times. At the beginning she was acting like a spoiled child, punching Hae Jo and telling him to die etc. I think thats a little bit too much to say to someone, no matter how shitty they treated youâŠ
Ofc I was also a little bit annoyed at Hae Jo at times. Why did he have to agree to kidnap the first woman from her wedding? And why did he say such mean things to Jae Mi in their first relationship? And then being so egocentric and kidnapping her and throwing away her shoes etc.
In general I also found it kinda sad how quickly and easily Jae Mi got over Heung and the treatment of his mother and how easy it was for her to move on and fall in love with Hae Jo again⊠I donât think she was really in love with him⊠he was just a nice man she wanted to have kids withâŠ
And finally, I was reallyyyy annoyed about how the drama started with the search for Hae Joâs father but was never finished!!!! Like what was the point of watching (except for Woo Dohwanâs naked upper body)??? We already knew how it was gonna end (him dying in the snow) so what other new information did we gain??? I was very confused and quite disappointed to be honestâŠ
The storyline is definitely lacking and most of the characters were very problematic too. However here are some good points:
1. The quotes: Hae Jo had some impressive quotes and it brought me to tears many times.
2. In general it did have some tearjerking moments. I dont understand why the movieâs genre is romance/comedy⊠it is more of a drama imo.
3. The acting skills!!! Like no matter how annoying some characters were, the actors brought them to life sooo well and authentically⊠Kudos to all of these high class actors.
4. The music especially the instrumental one in dramatically sad scenes (for example when Hae Jobwas dying in the snow). It was one of the reasons I got hooked on the show. The music, directing and screenplay were done sooo well!!! I couldnât stop thinking about itâŠ
In general I think it is okay to watch it if you are interested but be prepared for some toxic characters and relationshipsâŠ
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Chaotic plot and cast
I really wanted to love this drama but the MLS feel like having toxicated relatioahip. The FL character really become so annoying..very loud most of the time.I like that the ML do his things that he wanted to do before he died. Its sad but it losses my sense bcoz of the FL exaggerated acting. MLS is not bad however the 2ND ML is just not suitable for the FL visual it gives me the cringe feeling. It would be more so saddest if the FL have soft spoken those heartfelt lines. Maybe its just me feel annoyed.Vond je deze recentie nuttig?
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100 points for the Chemistry, some deductions because of the pain
After what feels like ages, was so happy to get to watch a drama which was gripping and had the right balance of humour and pain. My only gripe was with the premise of the story-dude broke up with her because he fell in love with her, and dude got back with her because he was dying? Poor girl.. as if she didnt already have issues of her own.Vond je deze recentie nuttig?
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The Writers Forgot...
I watched this as part of a watch party. For the most part, the first six episodes of the show, although not perfect, were fun, and the story surrounding his biological father had me intrigued. The comedy, although exaggerated, had me cackling. I enjoyed them a lot. Up till then, the show was an 8 to an 8.5. Then, episode 7 happened.The show went on a downward spiral from there. I thought it would recover before the end, but it didn't. The female lead was annoying and childish. Her crying started grating on my nerves and the way she kept hitting the male lead's head despite knowing his condition baffled me. She was completely devoid of critical thinking. Hae Jo, the male lead, had strong douchebag tendencies. I know the way he tried to push people out of his life stemmed from the neglect he suffered while growing up, but there were times that I had to shake my head at the comments he made to the people around him. They were honestly kind of perfect for each other... There were also too many filler scenes and dubious relationships. At times, it felt like the writer(s) were suffering from the same terminal illness as the male lead. Why would you write all this tension surrounding Eo Heung and John, only to have her ask him to be her second son? What? Come again? That was not the only strange relationship dynamic, there were others. It was like they simply forgot what they had written previously. The reconciliation with the trash father was also irritating, anticlimactic, and felt like an afterthought as it was not well developed. I am not going to delve deeper into that. This show could have also been 8 episodes. It did not need 10. This story had so much potential and it could have been one of the better 2024 K-dramas.
The show features California Dreaminâ by The Mamas & the Papas which is honestly one of my favorite songs and the other OST songs are decent too. It also had beautiful cinematography. There were truly beautiful shots.
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Entertaining Plot, Annoying Leads
My 4 categories are Acting/Cast, Writing, Direction/SFX/Music, Entertainment Value.I decided to watch this because people seemed to really like it and it stars Woo Do Hwan (ì°ëí). I want to like him, but I havenât liked him in anything Iâve seen him in so far. Maybe this drama will be the one that changes my mind.
Acting/Cast: Many familiar faces in this drama. That was nice. I can say Woo Do Hwanâs acting was better in this drama, but unfortunately his character wasnât likable. The female lead started off alright, but she became increasingly annoying over the course of the drama. The second male lead was a decent character though. 4.5/10
Writing: Iâm just not into the red flag male leads at this age. I want more green flags and healthy relationships. The constant fighting between the leads, the constant psychological abuse (the female lead is an orphan and, knowing this, the male lead repeatedly abandons her)âŠit was justâŠnot cute at all. And after all the torment the male lead puts her through, she is the one that needs to repeatedly prove her love for him. By the end of the drama, I was thoroughly irritated by the whole thing and I was completely okay with the idea of the male lead dying. I wasnât buying their chemistry as a couple. I actually thought her chemistry with the second male lead was better, although I couldnât support their relationship either. There are also questionable things in this drama that was difficult for me to even want to watchâŠrelationships with large age gapsâŠeven grooming?? The humor is also very cringey to me. Instead of laughing, Iâd be saying âwtf??â or âewâŠâ (for instance, the second male lead had a habit of exposing himself in public as an act of protest, as well as having scenes that insinuated that he might whip it out randomly and sexually assault someone.) The male leadâs character didnât feel realistic. He would be a broody asshole one moment and then suddenly be super goofy and happy the next. The female leadâs character also didnât feel authentic. After all the psychological abuse sheâs endured, thereâs no way she would be that cheerful. The message of the drama was lame as hell. Thereâs two storylines happening and both are all about the importance of bloodlines. By the end, the two leads and the second lead and his mom (all with their own issues regarding their own bloodlines) finally realize that blood isnât what makes people family or makes people happy. Well yeah, no shit...welcome to the 21st century. So, nothing revolutionary here at all. The basic plot of the drama is actually entertaining â a guy kidnaps his ex from her wedding to have her go on a quest with him to find his biological dad before he dies, while getting chased by gangs and falling in love again â but this bloodline obsession stuff is just weak. This drama was fun when it wasnât taking itself too seriously. 1.5/10
Direction/SFX/Music: I didnât have much complaints in this area. Itâs definitely a well-produced drama, which is a big reason why it held my attention despite all the issues I had with the writing. The music is ok, but there's something that bothers me about it. They used an American song called California Dreamin'...maybe that's why? It doesn't fit? 6/10
Entertainment Value: The plot is pretty exciting, especially for the first half. The characters werenât likeable enough for me to really care about them by the end of the drama though. Their toxic behavior becomes repetitive and annoying. The overall message was too basic to have any lasting impact on me. The toxic relationships left me feeling weird about the whole thing (especially the groomingâŠwtf?). 4.5/10
Overall, I gave this drama a 4/10. This was tough to rate. It was entertaining, well-produced, and well-acted. But there were so many things in the writing that just didnât work for me personally and I felt like it was a waste. I canât recommend this drama, especially to those who have been in abusive relationships (I feel this drama normalizes psychological abuse in relationships and even romanticizes it). However, it is a quick watch (only 10 episodes) and easy to binge.
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Toxicity is just io much here...
So i started watching this series casually and was hooked at the beginning until became just too much.... It started off ok, a kind of angsty romance which I'm usually here for. This is until the the ML became just too toxic, which the FL was somehow increasingly ok with.- For the good
I really liked that in this series, the FL wasn't this shy girl who is scared to touch a guy, not mentioning sleeping with him. Same goes for the ML. When they are romantically close, they seem to be quite open and grown up, which I always appreciate in a series. No need to make a kiss sth so scary when u r a full grown adult.
-For the not so good....
The dynamic between the FL and ML is just bad. All the shouting, shaking, grabbing and forcefully pulling.... you would think it was some old school romance kdrama from 2010 but no. The writers were trying their best to make him this complicated character with complicated past, which should somehow excuse his awful behaviour but I was having none of that. Just because you have a brain tumour doesn't mean you are allowed to treat people like shit. Nor does it allow you to completely ruin the life of your ex girlfriend just cuz u feel lonely. Even if it's only for 3 months.
While this whole mess of a human being was looking for his father, the FL fell for him all over again, to the point where her low effort escape attempts were just.... pathetic. And her telling him, basically screaming, that he ruined her life is.... very dramatic but very useless because he manhandles her and she just gives in, always coming back to him.
The dynamic between those 2 characters was incredibly toxic but the way it's written, we should cheer for this couple and be happy that each time she has an opportunity to run away, she doesn't. Look at him, he saw that she liked some shoes and got it for her such a great guy (sarcasm) ...... bleh.
We shouldn't forget that there's the SML, the man the FL was supposed to marry and another guy who is the friend of the ML, both being the comedic relief of this angsty drama. Jokes about 2 guys acting gay, a guy pissing him self from fear, a dumb spoiled mammas boy... how are those even funny ? Those "comedic" moments made me feel as if I'm watching an old poorly aged kdrama.... cmon, we r in 2024...... we can do better than that....
Overall, I'm not gonna even finish the drama. The development so far has been meh and I'm tired of seeing the FL just accepting all the harassment coming from the ML just cuz. And im also tired of this series trying to put the ML in the positive light using the most low effort things. Their relationship is awful and I'm not here for it.
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Life and death are in the power of the tongue.
The only goal of this review is to explore spiritual themes and messaging in Mr. Plankton. I'm not analyzing on any other level, so if that's your thing, let's get into it.The story begins with the fulfillment of two curses, previously spoken by the leads over each other at the end of a very unpleasant breakup. Jae Mi tells Hae Jo that he'll die alone in the street and Hae Jo tells Jae Mi that she'll never be a mother. Unseen, the forces of darkness leap to bring about the circumstances necessary to enact these words and several years later, on the same day, in the same hospital, Hae Jo is diagnosed with a terminal case of tangled blood vessels in his brain, and Jae Mi is told she's entered premature menopause.
Hae Jo is the more intuitive of the two and seems to understand that the road to redemption is through Jae Mi, so he kidnaps her from her wedding. Her wedding is a farce, a play where everyone is playing their part no matter how ridiculous. Jae Mi has no real self-esteem and has built a house of cards with her fiancé that will come crashing down the moment his family realizes she's not pregnant nor likely to be in the future. Hae Jo recognizes that she is not being honest with herself because of her desperation for family. What he doesn't recognize is that his own repeated abandonment of Jae Mi is a different reaction to the same desperation.
A series of adventures begins in which Hae Jo looks for his father and drags Jae Mi along with him. The story bounces back and forth between outrageous shenanigans and moments of genuine connection and soulfulness. In a particularly moving scene, Jae Mi asks Hae Jo to sing her a song. "You were made to receive the greatest love. You'll feel it in every part of your life." He sings life over her. Not an exact reversal of the original curse but powerful nonetheless.
Later in the story, when Hae Jo has flatlined once and seems near to death, Jae Mi decides to sneak his unconscious body out of the hospital. It's completely ridiculous, but in a moment of desperation she finally tells him she doesn't want him to die. She pulls back a corner of the curse blanketing him and he awakens. She buys him some time.
Unfortunately for this story, and the swollen eyed writer of this review, neither Hae Jo no Jae Mi ever fully understand the power of their own tongues. Reversing a curse requires repeated application over a period of time and so we're left with a story of limited redemption and a pretty heart wrenching ending. Here's hoping that radical, destiny changing, curse reversing redemption becomes increasingly common in future endeavors in storytelling in Kdramaland.
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I liked it until it lost me
TRIGGER WARNINGS of this series: Infertility issues, illness, death.Comedy is on the thinner side and there is also melodrama.
Looking at the ratings of this drama I feel like I watched a different one than everyone else.
I really wanted to like this series because the premise and the start had potential and there are things I liked in the portrayal of flawed characters that don't do the best of things, but sadly this just progressively lost me as episodes went on and things started to annoy me.
Overall my main two issues here are:
The execution of the plot is a mess at times, it wants to do too many things at the same time but none are necessarily solved or are just there for the pure chaos of it, it got kind of boring. I certainly didn't expect to find this show boring considering its length and how much I wanted to like it because the characters are not presented as perfect like in many other dramas. At points I felt kind of disappointed in myself for not finding it engaging enough but I literally fell asleep a few times, and I never fall asleep with series or movies. Funny enough is how I didn't even bother in going back and I don't feel I missed anything even though I missed in total probably about an hour and a half or a bit more of the total series.
Until the later episodes most of it it's just going and coming from places without enough of a substance to me, felt like a lot of padding. They're just looking for the potential father while he's dragging the girl around and the other two are following them, and the scenes with SML's mother and all that I still don't know what they added to the plot.
The second worst thing in this drama is once again the obsession with the bloodline. At points I thought it was presenting different ideas here because of the main characters and the plot in general, only to fall into the same silly ideas with the blood and how once you see your parents "you know" just because and unconditional love and blah blah blah. Equally silly was the expectation that some dude that might be his potential father would care about him just because he gave the sperm once, this is when they were theorising what that potential father might do or not for him as well as potential inheritance. And then only in the end to go back to a father that was a piece of s*** and abandoned him back in the time. "Oh, but he did go to the school though!!" someone might say, yeah, and after he was missing he didn't move a finger to find him, and apparently didn't care about her blood daughter either. I get ML needed the closure so to speak, but he said it more in the line of getting back some kind of relationship with him again, what falls again into this korean idea that parents don't do wrong and that at the end of the day everything needs to be forgiven because they're your parents, blood and "unconditional love" again.
The whole series revolves too much around "daddy issues" and I'm not a fan of this plot device.
I get it wanted to be comedy at some points but at times it was simply bad taste to me, like how FL wanted to take that baby in the beginning or when she takes ML from the hospital towards the end.
I also didn't appreciate much the duality of going from comedy to melodrama from one scene to another. I don't like melodrama in general either but I think that the comedy bits fell even more flat at times when straight before or after everyone was having a melodramatic moment. One second they're crying about something and the next it's like it never happened and everyone is happy to then remember and cry again.
There are quite a few side characters for such a short drama and I don't feel any of them was explored in depth what it would be fine if it wasn't because it feels they wanted me to care more about them than I did. SML is explored more but it could have been better in my opinion, his whole personality is more or less following the girl all around for most of the drama and it's progressed quickly to have his ending as it is.
I liked the ML for the mess he is, but I would have liked a tiny bit of growth, why is everyone still following him around when he's trying so hard to push everyone away? just leave him get lost then. It's funny that of all the things he did that was the worst for me, because as a viewer this dynamic got repetitive. He's a bad person but a good character, but I wish there had been some progression and that we didn't get the same dynamics of him rejecting people to then leave to then the others try and follow him, it got old quickly.
FL was ok for the most part until she started annoying me with her extremely childish tantrums, she spends half the show screaming. So she might be a good character again but in her case I didn't enjoy watching her.
Her side of the story is never explored enough anyway, we're given some pieces but there is never more exploration about it. She didn't even ask the bio mother anything either, she just spent the time screaming once again. We're also not given any other answer or even conclusion to her menopause thing, because it's not a black or white topic that it's how they presented it here, she's told, that's the end apparently. Her character in general revolves too much around ML and she's just a girl with two personality traits.
The ending was expected considering how the show starts and still was a bit anti-climactic in my opinion, even more that credits scene with the car driving, it's that FL with ML's body inside or what? It also felt a bit rushed since we got so many bits of their trip in a few scenes, I really wished this had been a good chunk of the drama instead of the thugs pursuing them in the first half for example.
Overall it's not an awful drama and it can be watched. I wouldn't rewatch it personally and I wouldn't recommend to people that wants happy endings, perfect characters nor to those that might be triggered by some of the topics.
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