catwitch
Delightful, heartwarming, beautiful, and never dull.
This drama took me back in time - mix tapes. rubiks cubes, going crazy for stars, reading trashy teenage smut... I could go on and on. The same teenage experience, just on the other side of the world from me. Even the fashion was recognizable. The storytelling device of having their older selves being interviewed gave the feeling that everything in the past was simply reminiscing about their journey into adulthood, which gave it a pleasant feeling,. Just for the nostalgia alone this is easily worth 10 stars, but it is so much more than just that.
The thing that struck me the most about this drama was the sense of community. This is not the first time I have found this in a Korean drama, but every time it moves me a lot, and every time it is presented in a different way. Here in this alley there were clearly people better off than others, but at no time was this division made into a wedge to drive people apart - everyone shared. Food, house chores, watching children, gossip, laughter, tears, troubles - this is a list that could go on and on. The adults shared a bond, and so did the kids. The flashback scenes of them all as very small children growing up together made it easy to see why they were all so close. In this drama the community was essentially one big family - emphasized by the fact that they called for all the neighbors to jump into the family photo.
The acting was superb. The young people were all so well-performed that it was a particularly immersive show - they truly seemed like kids just living their daily lives. They were not all perfect students or perfectly behaved, but they were all good to one another and to the people around them. The adults were played nicely also, all with humanizing quirks and well-developed personalities.
The music was nice; presumably comprised of Korean songs well-suited to the late eighties to mid-nineties. In general it did not pull me in as much as other aspects of the show did since it wasn't the popular music of my youth, but it was all quite enjoyable anyway.
Definitely a show worth watching - despite the long episodes I kept not wanting to stop because the story is so compelling.
The thing that struck me the most about this drama was the sense of community. This is not the first time I have found this in a Korean drama, but every time it moves me a lot, and every time it is presented in a different way. Here in this alley there were clearly people better off than others, but at no time was this division made into a wedge to drive people apart - everyone shared. Food, house chores, watching children, gossip, laughter, tears, troubles - this is a list that could go on and on. The adults shared a bond, and so did the kids. The flashback scenes of them all as very small children growing up together made it easy to see why they were all so close. In this drama the community was essentially one big family - emphasized by the fact that they called for all the neighbors to jump into the family photo.
The acting was superb. The young people were all so well-performed that it was a particularly immersive show - they truly seemed like kids just living their daily lives. They were not all perfect students or perfectly behaved, but they were all good to one another and to the people around them. The adults were played nicely also, all with humanizing quirks and well-developed personalities.
The music was nice; presumably comprised of Korean songs well-suited to the late eighties to mid-nineties. In general it did not pull me in as much as other aspects of the show did since it wasn't the popular music of my youth, but it was all quite enjoyable anyway.
Definitely a show worth watching - despite the long episodes I kept not wanting to stop because the story is so compelling.
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