W

8/10 is my rating. This is a 2016 South Korean drama spanning 16 episodes (~60 minutes/episode).

First I provide a unique Synopsis then review

Synopsis

Oh Yeon-Joo (Han hyo-Joo) is a resident physician with a famous cartoonist as her father. Yeon-Joo's father authors a very popular Korean webtoon titled "W". Many women are half in love with the dashing and charismatic lead in the webtoon, Kang Chul (Lee Jong-suk). Oh Yeon-Joo is not immune to the charm of the webtoon character and when she finds herself pulled into the webtoon world as the savior of Kang Chul, her interest in him grows. Kang Chul was an Olympic shooter whose entire family was shot in cold blood and he was the prime suspect and spent years in prison after being falsely accused of the crime by an overzealous prosecutor with political aspirations. He is eventually acquitted on legal technicalities and goes on to become the rich and powerful CEO of a company. He also fights crime through an organization he established during his quest to find the real killer of his family. The two worlds start to collide as the artist's tablet becomes a portal between the two worlds.

Review

spoiler 🚨 I was mostly entertained by this and found the premise very unique. The chemistry between the two leads was very compelling. I did feel like the story dragged a bit and felt frustrated, at times, when there seemed to be obvious solutions that took a significant amount of time to come up for the characters. It had very little comedic element and was mostly filled with a lot of sadness and emotional turmoil. I really wanted to see more happy moments and there were some - but they were far outweighed by a variety of tragic circumstances that befell the characters. It ended well but that "happy moment" was also relatively quick. It is worth watching but I would place it mid range on any list.

#W #WTwoWorlds #LeeJongSuk #HanHyoJoo