Superb story except for ending

gata86

This was a stellar series. I have seldom watched anything that gave me as much true enjoyment. Right up till the ending...

The first 2/3 were pure heaven. Gae In mistakenly assumes Jin Ho is a homosexual, and he allows her to continue thinking that so that she will feel comfortable renting out a room to him. The two overcome their differences, becoming friends, and eventually develop romantic feelings for each other—much fun ensues. This section of the series had endless amounts of charm, warmth, comedy, and romantic tension. It always kept me guessing and avoided clichés like the plague.

Then, in episode 11, the cat came out of the bag—Jin Ho was not gay, he loved Gae In, and wanted be loved by her. At first I thought, "This is good; we get to enjoy seeing them together." However, I found that "Personal Taste" lost a lot of its peculiar charm at this point— it became another when-will-they-have-sex story. Still, it gained another kind charm. It became the story of a man and woman who were trying to make their relationship work, about two lovers who were trying to figure out how deal with past wounds and personality flaws, about two people respectfully combating parental disapproval, about a man lovingly waiting for sex until his woman was ready. Again, the series steered clear of clichés.

And then we spent the last three episodes on a completely unnecessary clichéd plot twist—guy decides he should convince girl not to care about him, so guy treats girl worse than he ever treated his enemies.

One of the things that made this series really great was the way Gae In and Jin Ho argued. They would get upset and say things they didn't mean, but then later apologize. It was realistic and compelling, but in the end the creators threw this away with both hands.

Another thing that was great in this series was that Jin Ho spent a lot of time teaching Gae In to respect herself and not let people trample on her. However, in the end Gae In goes to Jin Ho and finally sleeps with him, though he has treated her like dirt, saying "I will trust you no matter what, even if I get hurt." This completely went against everything that came before. I personally think that it is good to wait until marriage to have sex; however, I realize I am in the minority. Still, the series had led me to hope that the consummation would at least be happy and loving, but it was just sad and depressing.

To add insult to injury, the creators left most of the subplots hanging in order to spend three episodes on this ghastly cliché, and then wound everything up quickly, saccharinly, and unrealistically. A very, very poor finish to a great story.

Yes, I understand this is a romantic comedy, but there is no law stating that romantic comedies have to be dumb; and this one had constantly shown itself to be so much more. A sad waste of excellent writing and acting.

So, if you read this and think you are like me, you might want to stop watching this series after the first 20 minutes of the 11th episode.

score /10

gata86 13 October 2011

Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw2502670/