I don't understand why this one has such an ultra low rating. This is a show with many so-so episodes and this ain't the worst or anything.
It feels their absurdly annoying Jar Jar Binks has 35% of the screentime allocated to him. IDK why.
It's much better than the 4.4 IMDb rating would suggest, with both some decent acting and uninhibited film-making creativity (for better or for worse). However, beyond disjointedly adapting a lengthy work into little runtime, it's also filled with content that really didn't need to be there – from the involuntarily comedic to the potentially disturbing.
I personally thought the classical music was quite fitting, whereas any other attempts at incorporating music were a train wreck.
Chemistry is alright, but not like it's been hyped.
Adverts are out of place / intrusive (and really dumb).
The comedy characters are all overwhelmingly unfunny.
(( Stuff at the end is stupid, but not as painful as it could have been. ))
Probably the best one between this, Knight and Day, and This Means War.
Sadly, in hindsight, the plot premise is dumb nonsense.
With his friendly naïve face, Woo Do Hwan channels Lee Je Hoon for me (which isn't a complaint or anything!), especially in the first episodes, when he's all smiles and super polite.
Besides a few minor complaints that would be spoilers, the action sequences are very very good.
Tonally inconsistent (in the Vincenzo way) and the script relies on a lot of zero-IQ stuff to add, well, extra melodrama?
The last third veers a bit far into nonsense, especially the outcome – to a large degree presumably due to the FL actress being nuked from Korean society.
The writer's ill-conceived whodunnit from the early episodes ruins everything. It comes to an absolutely idiotic resolution and the last two or three episodes are far out there. I feel generous giving it a 5/10.
Some plot ideas get regurgitated so much that dialogue bits are copy-pasted as well.
The more Game of Thrones-y elements feel like they've been thrown in for pure shock value.
The OST variety is sub-par; the camerawork / direction / acting are fairly so-so. Every time I have excessively high hopes for a drama, they're crushed bitterly.
Starts out as light romcom, becomes super random, then makjang, and finally finishes how it started.
Sometimes it's quite funny, the FL's dual role is sufficiently charming, and the frequent songs don't hurt either.
Acting, production and sound aren't great. There's more than enough plot holes and scenes that serve no purpose.
Unfortunately the whole middle of the show is full of filler scenes (while it's not that bad early on, one episode near the end is almost entirely made of adverts!).
Towards the end the writing goes into some really absurd directions, with obstacles being created and torn down again just because. Many spoiler reviews lash out at a particular arc that really shouldn't have been added. – self-harm as extortion.
The final episode only wraps up about two thirds of the characters, with the others disappearing never to be seen again.
As is common in CN dramas, the audio dubbing is very noticeable and sometimes quite bad.
P.S.:
I've seen shows that have cliffhangers meant to make you tune in for some revelation every single episode.
I've seen shows that just stop between scenes and don't try to fake excitement.
But I've never seen a show where plenty of episodes just stop like it's in the middle of somebody's sentence.
Becomes a different show after episode 3.
Didn't like where the story ultimately headed.
the ending ("special 1"): https://vimeo.com/217260805
I found this a lot less captivating than the Korean original.
It's a bit like a word by word remake with cheap production values.
IMO it would be enough to watch the KR series, then the 2021 JP special, and finally the 2021 JP movie (and skip this 2018 JP show).
Director's Cut version is more than two hours (~135 minutes) longer.
Found the last 30 minutes rather alienating. Think the 5 is still generous.
For people that loathe Reply-likes (including Prison Playbook and Hospital Playlist), Noh Hee Kyung's attempt at writing one could be the least offensive of all – simply because there's more of an actual plot, episodic crimes, and sort of normal character arcs. There are no supposedly-funny animal noises, and you don't see the same scenes repeated with more detail except to resolve episode cliffhangers. However, not all is rosy here either. 'Live' cannot fully commit to being a serious show with a believable or even real characters, ultimately for two reasons: there is a degree of paid product placement that is at odds with these goals, and, occasionally, outlandish makjang scenarios are sprinkled all over the place.
It's a pity that it cannot "keep it real" because it comes pretty close. Characters seem human, and only the parents of the leads have at times inconsistent personalities with a crazy switch that is flipped when the writer feels like it. I didn't find it too jarring that, frequently, four or more of the cast turn into something like public service announcement drones to let you know about problems plaguing police officers (like the evergreen of how the police should have the 'power to indict' and their struggle against the prosecution, or spouting out statistics about recent stabbings, or the suicide rate among the police force). From cleaning up after drunks to crimes committed by children, happy slapping and serial crimes, you see all aspects of police work, and it's clear a lot of thought (and research) went into the show. You're frequently reminded that patrol officers will also have to keep the bathrooms clean and pay for all sorts of work-related expenses out of their own pockets, despite performing a hazardous job with poor pay and questionable job security.
Compared to your average drama, some very serious topics are touched upon, notably a lot of sexual crimes, often against teenagers. I feel these were handled tactfully, but a trigger warning is nonetheless appropriate.
Especially around a quarter into the show, there is so much bickering and mostly pointless fighting between the various characters, including the elderly ones, that at its worst, 'Live' has you observe children in adult bodies swimming (or just flailing about) in the vast product placement ocean. Not only is there the mandatory sponsored plastic water bottle, the sponsored canned cold coffee, but also the sponsored sometimes-talkative rice cooker (owned by every household, identical colour scheme), and the occasional appearance of a wireless vacuum, but it even reaches the deepest depravities of intellectual bankruptcy: sucking what there is to suck out of red ginseng plastic satchels (guaranteed to extend your lifespan). Needless to say, much like in The K2, any serious conversation about your relationship must be had at Subway – sandwich in hand.
OST-wise, you find memorable songs (and characters singing) in the first few episodes, but later on the music supply gets a bit thin considering the drama's length. The romance scenes have very generic k-drama love songs. The episode outro montages often have absurdly unfitting songs playing, and they're cut short by preview spoilers anyway.
Speaking about romance: besides for one pre-established relationship, I don't think the romance-related plotlines added very much.
In episodes 14 and 15, it's like the filmmakers realised they are paying Sung Dong Il and Lee Joo Young for very little plot relevance, so some old material gets recycled to make them seem less superfluous. Fortunately after that the show is wrapped up in a tolerable way, instead of drowning in an onslaught of replays and flashbacks as it so often happens. I don't like the ending given to one of the leads, but compared to the truly disrespectful way Prison Playbook treats its characters, that's a very, very minor complaint. Unlike that show, and Reply '97 and '88, 'Live' is the only Reply-like I've imbibed that I will be able to look back on somewhat fondly.
On Netflix and other streamers like iQIYI, you don't get the complete unaltered show.
The (allegedly 11 minutes longer) extended edition seems to only be available in Mandarin. A pity, as I thought it was a tad nicer watching the movie in Cantonese.
In the Mandarin version, when Zixia accepts the Bull's marriage proposal, she says "I do" in English.
The very early scene with the toad and peacock that was even teased in Part One and is not usually part of Part Two in my opinion helps establish the logic of Zixia's character and also helps another scene further in make more sense.
I would also say that a repeat viewing greatly helped me keep track of who is who.
I expected this to be worse. I was prepared for a completely nonsensical plot full of holes and jumps, as well as the worst CGI seen in decades. The CGI is just mostly murky with a few endeavours into terrible, and the plot is merely meh.
4.5/10 from me, which is a a lot better than the 3.6/10 it has on IMDb. :grin:
Compared to The Thousand Faces of Dunjia:
In this one at least the demons aren't censored into being aliens. Otherwise slightly worse across the board.
There seem to be weird audio mixing issues: you regularly hear people breathe way too loudly in quiet scenes, while at other times fight scenes are too silent.
Can't tell if it's originally Cantonese or Mandarin.
At some point a bit dissonant with a sudden slapstick scene that did not fit the tone before and after.
6.5/10 from me.
If you enjoy any Reply series, you will enjoy this too.
If you hate Reply, you will hate this all the same.
More production/editing mistakes than I can recall from any of the other 60+ SK shows I've watched, and a few episodes in the middle are really dreadful. The premise and wrap-up are pretty decent.
The plot veers too wildly with how much Jack the Ripper is directly helped, and by whom.
Considering he is essentially tasked to do this by the highest levels, his murder assistant should be a more competent creature.
Didn't like the tacked on "unhappy" ending. One point deducted for that.
A bit too Burton for me, and the plot isn't the most logically sound.
For a lot of its runtime, it felt like a wannabe-Tarantino movie more than anything else.
It's unfortunate that some crucial plot developments are left to the viewer's imagination.
Besides a rather high level of graphic violence, the other thing that distinguishes it from your average Tarantino-inspired film is the at times extremely pretentious camerawork – the one year younger Memories of Murder does this much better.
The bog-standard English subtitles for this are terrible, they're missing crucial stuff.
Decent subtitles will have a translation for the sticker on the wall a bit more than 4 minutes in, as well as something about the manifesto 11 minutes in. (Subtitles can be missing everything from background voices to the 'communicated thoughts' of the main character.)
On Netflix or I guess other license international streaming services you will be missing out on:
- Star Wars music (and other 'real' referential music)
- a lot of random atmospheric music
- music actually playing in the background in studios
- the bulk of Kim Soo Hyun singing
- some pointless comedy noises
Netflix cuts some unnecessary things, but I'd say there's a substantial hit from the loss of commercial music, maybe 1/3 as much as in any of the Reply series (where it's a REALLY big difference and sometimes half the screen is blurred out too).
However, Netflix has a intro that you otherwise don't get (characters getting on a bus together, which doesn't actually happen in the show since everybody drives their distinct largely sponsored cars).
To me, a very mediocre k-drama.
The characters are predominantly caricatures, and VERY inconsistent ones while at it.
The plot is boring and the plight of the leads isn't interesting. It throws in makjang elements, but those never serve to make the overarching storyline interesting.
The production is of course excellent, though I wouldn't say there was any memorable music / OST.
The legal angle is in some ways very good, in others the typical ridiculous case-procedural in which a court battle takes a week from start to finish rather than a year. (Yes, how else would a TV show work.)
There were a bunch of filler episodes, especially the double episodes, and I wouldn't call the ending satisfactory.
As boring as the 2008 remake. All the actors are pretty terrible in this one. Well, the phone does a solid job, I guess.
The villain's redemption ark took way too fucking long.
