Honest Review for "Love Next Door" Drama | Jung Hae In and Jung So Min

It's been a week since Love Next Door got finished airing. Since I got a lot of time today, I think I can finally react to the whole run of the show so I have a record here on my blog. I'll be truly honest with my review so I can finally move on from it. 

Tbh, I have anticipated this drama before like everyone else. I was thinking that it could be the next big thing and it's my first time ever to watch Jung Hae In and Jung So Min fully in a drama. First 2 episodes were really good too when it started but as it goes by, the excitement I initially felt for it diminished to the point that I'm having a hard time already to finish an episode. There's just so many things going on here tbh, and it felt like it wanted to be so many things at once. It's trying hard to be so deep that it's throwing a lot of unnecessary angst to justify the depth of one's character now. Everything about the story went repetitive too, the bickering of childhood friends, the shouting and the push and pull romance between the leads became way too annoying. It was a letdown for me, tbh. I know you're gonna be mad more about to what I'm gonna say now, but I just had to let it out. I didn't feel the chemistry between the two leads at all. It felt really hard to believe they're a couple on-screen. I feel like I was watching just two childhood friends growing up all throughout. Hmmmm...

I promise, I did my best to really hook myself in it. I've tried, I even watched from the start to finish, but I just couldn't find myself loving it like the rest of the kdrama viewers. Hmmmm... there's really something about how it's written and directed for real. People say they have great chemistry behind the scenes, then why can't the director bring that on screen? That should have been the goal because not everybody could watch the behind the scenes. 

Do you know what really pushed me to finish this drama even though I really don't like it anymore? It's the side character's story. The second lead romance as well as the grown ups were my saving grace for this drama. The friendship between the Lavender and the husbands as well as the character story/development of Dan Ho and Mo Eum. Those are the ones that made me stay till the very end... but Seok Ryu and Seung Hyo... I felt Seok Ryu was too much and Seung Hyo had no character development because he's developed/mature since day 1. He's entirely the one holding everything together for him and Seok Ryu. 

P.S. This is just my own take of the drama. If I didn't like it, it can or cannot be the same with you. We can have different views and preferences so, I respect that. 

Love Next Door Soars to a Personal All Time High Nationwide Viewership Ratings with Episode 12

Finally the dramatic scenes are over and viewers are rejoicing and returning to tune in for the fun and romance between the protagonists Seung Hyo and Seok Ryu as well as Dan Ho and Mo Eum. Episode 12 recorded 7.3% nationwide viewership ratings. That's good news to a lot of Love Next Door fans out there!

Seokryu's stomach cancer is not recurring and Seung Hyo's mom got cleared from Alzheimer's disease. Not only that, Seung Hyo and Seokryu are officially together! These are the very reasons for a celebration! However, there seems to be a little problem going on with my favorite character Mo Eum's love life. She already confessed about her real feelings with Dan Ho during their camping but Dan Ho declined her confession. I think he's afraid of losing someone again that's why he's having a hard time accepting a new lover in his life. The only reason I see that could push Dan Ho to accept Mo Eum is when Mo Eum went away. She passed her interview to get a position in Antarctica after all. Hmmm.... 

To be honest, I'm already contemplating whether to drop this drama or not. Thankfully, I still watch the latest 2 episodes available and I'm glad I did because I love how everything is fun again. I signed up for the romcom after all. I really like angst, my followers and readers knew that by now, but only if the actor/actress is capable of giving the right emotions. It's not that LND's actors/actress ain't capable, it's just that... I find it hard watching them deliver emotional and heavy scenes. I literally skipped Seung Hyo and his mother's confrontation about their feud... hmmm... I feel like there's too much shouting.. there's obviously anger in there but the eyes are so dead that I had to skip or else I'm gonna cringe. I've had enough with Seokryu's family feud and confrontations after all.

No more heavy and emotional scenes for this drama and I'm gonna watch it until the very end of it. It's actually the fun parts and the visuals of the actors/actresses that I find myself hard to drop this. I feel like I'll regret not to witness all those things in this drama while it's on-going. kkk

Love Next Door Declines in Viewership Ratings from Episode 8 - 9 Comparison

Seokryu is all okay and is now heading towards a new chapter of her life with Seung Hyo and her family. It's really goodbye now with Hyeon Jun, the ex boyfriend of Seokryu. It's sad that their relationship did not work out due to that one mistake of Hyeon Jun being insensitive to her condition. But I guess that's huge manifestation already how Hyeon Jun ain't ready to settle with Seokryu who's now forever binded with uncertainties due to past health history with cancer. 

It's never easy dealing or taking care of a sick person, so it's understandable how Hyeon Jun got tired at some point. He may had gone through Seokryu's stomach cancer before, but her going through depression is another. Seokryu might've thought that, if Hyeon Jun cannot accept her now and is having a hard time... what more if the cancer recurred. It's best this way to set him free... even though she obviously still loves him. 

Oh well, it's gonna be tough for Seung Hyo to beat Hyeon Jun being that green flag. How will we view Seung Hyo more than Seok Ryu's bestfriend since childhood? Hyeon Jun is a man while Seung Hyo.... hmmm he needs to work hard. I was thinking that it'll be tough for Seok ryu to choose Seung Hyo as her new lover considering how different Seung Hyo is to Hyeon Jun. But then again I remembered that Seokryu's first love is Seung Hyo so... it won't be that hard, isn't it? Right? Riiiight?! 

Let's talk about now the reactions of the viewers from last week's episode wherein Seokryu was found to have stomach cancer. Episode 8 last week got 6.47% in nationwide viewership rating and in episode 9 it became 4.5% quick. There's a significant decline there, obviously. Hmmm... honestly, I can't blame the viewers getting frustrated with this drama. It was promoted as a romcom so people signed up for it. And now that Love Next Door is following the footsteps of Queen of Tears, serving us an illness of the FL as plot twist, it was a let down for real! Well, QoT was better because as early as episode 2 we knew what is going on but LND is different. Hmmm... 

How about you? Whag do you guys think about Love Next Door? Are you still watching it?

It Turned out that Jung So Min Got a Heavier Reason to Rethink Her Life All Over Again in "Love Next Door" Episode 8

We're finally halfway through this drama and it already served us all the problems of each characters that needed resolution in the second half. The biggest and shocking revelation came from Seok Ryu's side, wherein we found out that she had been diagnosed of stage 2 stomach cancer and had 70% of her stomach removed in the US. And it seemed like her illness has recurred as she experienced a very painful stomachache in the latest episode 8. 

Now that this truth got revealed, my perspective towards Seok Ryu's situation changed greatly. All this time I thought she's only going through self reboot after going through slump and marriage failure but there's more into it than I had expected. It's a terminal illness that made Seok Ryu stop her fast paced life routine and made her rethink her life again. This became one of the main reasons why he quit her depressing job, go home to spend more time with her friends and family and look for her dream. Seok Ryu's life decisions were greatly influenced after going through a life and death situation as fighting cancer. Gosh, why are romcoms becoming too depressing lately? To be honest, I really love angst in any form of drama but... a dying character is just not my thing. It's too much! Not that I'm saying Seok Ryu's gonna die though... it's just that... terminal illness in a kdrama stands for a lot of crying and my heart is too fragile now for that. Sigh.

Anyways, looking at the bright side... just like in Queen of Tears, this illness of Seok Ryu would bring her family close together for sure. Seung Hyo would become even more loyal to her and stay by her side till the end once he finds out the truth. Sigh.

Jung Hae In and Jung So Min Teams Up for "Love Next Door" | Episodes 1 and 2 Quick Review

Another romcom of the year that will make me cry due to relatable painful scenes. lol First 2 episodes are already out on Netflix and I'm loving every bits of it. The writing is really good, you know, every word the characters are saying really marks to your soul when it give a lesson. The jokes thrown here and there will make you cackle and the painful relatable scenarios would really make you cry! I really like it when the characters are making sense as well as the plot is really on point. No boring fillers. Love Next Door feels like Queen of Tears when it comes to the anticipation from Kdrama fans. I hope it'll continue to be interesting till the very end. 

Anyway, Love Next Door's main characters are Choi Seung Hyo (Jung Hae In) and Bae Seok Ryu (Jung So Min) who are childhood friends and will soon step onto the next level as love will bloom between them. Choi Eung Hyo is an architect and he recently just opened his own office, so far, he's been successful in the profession but soon gonna face some work related problems as no new projects are coming into his office. Bae Seok Ryu, on the other hand, is a product manager working in the US. All her life she has been working out which caused her to suffer from burnout and she also called off of an engagement due to her cheating fiancé. She's basically on slump. In the end, she went back home to SK only to be welcomed by her angry mother. Thankfully, after some confrontation, Seok Ryu and her mother reconciled and is now officially staying and resting in their humble home. These two characters are very close despite them bickering non stop since they were children. For sure, they felt a spark of feelings for each other but no one's admitting or talking about it as they're afraid to lose their friendship.

Side characters/side couple is quite interesting too. My most hated character in Serendipity's Embrace is here too. lol Actor Yun Ji On's switch of characters this quick really play with our emotions. He made us hate him at first but loved him the second. kkk Amazing actor for sure! Anyway, as I was saying, the pair up of Kang Dan Ho (Yun Ji On) and Jung Mo Eum (Kim Ji Eun) is quite interesting too because they complement each other. Mo Eum is a strong independent woman while Dan Ho is a weak but kind type of person. They sure have chemistry too! I'm looking forward to them!