Jo Byung Gyu

Open Thread: Money Flower Episodes 1 & 2

| kfangurl

Welcome to the Open Thread, everyone! Thanks to all you OG group watchers on the final Chuno thread; I wouldn’t be rewatching Money Flower right now if it weren’t for your many, very infectious expressions of enthusiastic admiration for Jang Hyuk, and man, am I glad to have Jang Hyuk as Pil Joo on my screen again, heh. 🤩

I hope you guys are ready to chat about Money Flower episodes 1 & 2! Here are our usual ground rules, before we begin:

1. Please don’t post spoilers in the Open Thread, except for events that have happened in the show, up to this point. I repeat: no spoilers for future episodes please!

We have quite a few first-time viewers among us, and we don’t want to spoil anything for anyone.

2. Discussions on this thread don’t have to close when newer threads open, just so you know! But as we progress through our group watch, please keep the discussions clear of spoilers from future episodes, so that future readers coming to this thread won’t be accidentally spoiled. Does that make sense?

Without further ado, here are my reactions to this pair of episodes; have fun in the Open Thread, everyone! ❤️

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Review: The Uncanny Counter

| kfangurl

THE SHORT VERDICT:

Gritty, bloody and full of action like many an OCN drama, yet character-driven and full of heart, like you might expect from jTBC, with a fantasy bent like you might expect of tvN, The Uncanny Counter is the superhero-flavored, heartfelt, X-Men-esque demon-hunting story that I didn’t know I needed in my life.

For the most part, Show does a great job of meshing all these different personality traits into an organic whole – except for a late-stage change in writers, which admittedly causes a bit of a wobble, but which Show does recover well from.

Our cast does an all-around great job of bringing this story to life, while making their characters and their relationships pop, and Show works out to be highly engaging, and sometimes, even rather cracky.

Definitely recommend.

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Flash Review: Stove League

| kfangurl

Let me get what I think are the two biggest questions out of the way: No, you don’t need to know a thing about baseball, in order to enjoy this show. And no, you don’t even have to like baseball, in order to like this show.

Would you get more enjoyment out of this show if you actually already love baseball? I’m not sure, to be honest.

Sometimes knowing too much can be a bad thing (if you’re a doctor you probably roll your eyes at the details in medical kdramas, and so on), but I’m guessing that understanding how baseball works would probably help you appreciate the nuances that I missed.

I went into this show without much knowledge or interest in baseball, and I’m coming away with only marginally more knowledge about and interest in the sport.

And yet, I found myself enjoying this show very well, and wholeheartedly rooting for our characters, often without actually truly understanding the full details of what was happening on my screen. That’s quite an accomplishment on Show’s part, I’d say.

Also, for the record, I’ve felt rather neutral about Nam Goong Min for a while, even as everyone else has grown hearts in their eyes for him, and here, I finally actually really like him.

Lots of happy surprises overall, yes?

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