Uncontrollably Fond

Uncontrollably Fond

6/10

Uncontrollably Fond

Genre:                                     Episodes: 20                         Year: 2016

Romance

Melodrama

Synopsis:

Shin Joon Young and No Eul have known each other since high school. Now in adulthood, the two meet each other once more. Joon Young has become a famous celebrity while Eul has become a PD. Needing work to pay off her debts, Eul convinces Joon Young to let her be the PD in charge of shooting a documentary about his life. 

Cast:

Kim Woo Bin (Shin Joon Young)

Bae Suzy (No Eul)

Lim Ju Hwan (Choi Ji Tae)

Lim Ju Eun (Yoon Jung Eun)

Yoo Oh Sung (Choi Hyun Joon)

Jin Kyung (Shin Young Ok)

Lee Seo Won (No Jik)

General Thoughts:

I really wanted to like this drama more than I actually ended up liking it. While watching it I found myself constantly making excuses for the situations and the characters because I so badly wanted this to be a series that I loved.

Uncontrollably Attractive 

But as the show sloooooowly unveiled (and I mean slowly), it became more and more apparent that this drama just wasn’t quite up to scratch. There were aspects of the drama that were amazing, but also aspects that were infuriating. The general idea is fantastic- a man has only a few months to live and wants to spend that time with the woman he loves. Awesome. There’s more than enough in that situation alone to make a sweet, swoony, yet heart-breaking story. Throw in a birth-secret (because it’s a melo, of course there’s a birth secret) and things get a little more heated when our hero’s father turns out to be a man involved in the death of our heroine’s father. It sounds wounderful, and on paper it looks like a drama that should work beautifully- but it doesn’t. And the reason it doesn’t is because the writer just plain didn’t know how to tell the story. It’s a typical 20 episode series where the writer aims for more episodes than the story can actually cover, so things started getting spread pretty thin in the middle there. I think I watched about 5 episodes of Joon Young quietly acting like an ass while Eul quietly stood outside his house looking sad, and not much else happened. Yeah, yawn.

Nobody in this drama makes any sense

The story just collapsed under it’s own melodramatic weight, try as Woo Bin and Suzy may to keep the whole thing from crumbling around them. Which is really such a shame as they both put in pretty fantastic performances (despite what people say about Suzy).

I'll have him in my family if you don't want him

I found all the acting to be believable- from our stars to our support cast, and the actors did a great job at keeping me invested in the story when I actually came to not really giving a poo about the plot- because they acted their characters with such sincerity and depth that they always had an underlying likableness about them. Some characters did drive me a bit batty though (namely Joon Young’s mum- because who doesn’t want Woo Bin as their son?). I found both the mothers in this drama to be pretty incomprehensible at times. Joon Young’s mum basically disowned Joon Young because he quit studying to become a prosecutor and instead became super rich and super famous. Yeah, don’t really see the problem there, but whatever. Her character did come around as she started to care for Eul, and Joon Young through Eul, but unfortunately she returns to the realm of the incomprehensible once she decides to avoid her dying son rather than actually spending any time with him. Because what’s better than being ignored by your mother in your final dying days? And Ji Tae’s mum was just straight up evil. I mean she hits her own son with a truck in order to maintain her own status and power- need I say more? 

What Was Great:

The Acting:

Everyone was fab. Yes, even Suzy. Sadly, I feel as though Suzy copped a lot of the criticism for the drama being such a flop as she was such an easy target, but she actually did a great job.

I thought Suzy was pretty fab personally

Eul wasn’t the easiest character to act as she was a character who mostly kept her feelings hidden- which doesn’t give the actress a lot to work with. Frankly, while there were some moments when I thought Suzy’s acting could have been a tad better they were few and far between, and I’ve seen worse acing from actual actresses.

The chemistry was pretty solid too

I thought Suzy did a brilliant job, and really brought Eul to life in a warm, likeable way. Woo Bin was just phenomenal. He gave Joon Young a depth I’m almost positive wasn’t there on paper. He shredded my heart in the best melo way, and I was blown away at what an incredible actor he was in this series. Even in the long middle portion, Woo Bin was able to keep Joon Young from being a dislikable character. Sure, he was frustrating and I kinda waned to slap him a bit, but I never hated him and could always tell that there was a reason behind his actions. Even though I didn’t know what that reason was. And even though it turned out to be a pretty crummy reason. Lim Ju Hwan was awesome as our second male lead- he never really outshone Woo Bin (which is what you want in a second lead), but was likeable enough in his own right. Yoo Oh Seung was wonderful as Ji Tae’s father, as you were never quite sure how far along the villainy scale he really was. Yoo Oh Seung perfectly displayed Hyun Joon’s conflicted feelings, and his gradual awakening to what a monster he was becoming. He made it seem totally plausible that Hyun Joon would have a change of heart, and presented it to us in a natural, believable way.

Though I would have just shown the video my dying boyfriend spent a month of his life on to get myself

And Lee Seo Won was adorable as Eul’s baby brother. Jin wasn’t the most complex character to act as he mostly just had cute scenes, but it was a great way for Lee Seo Won to get his face out there and I look forward to seeing him in more dramas.

The Pretty:

Everything was pretty. Kim Woo Bin- pretty. Bae Suzy- pretty. The cinematography- very pretty. The whole show was shot in a very melancholy, broody way that reflected the sadness in the plot. Throw in an amazing soundtrack and you have the makings for a very appealing drama.

Snow makes everything better looking

The Death:

What would have killed this drama (even more so that the writing) would have been if Joon Young had somehow made it out alive. I did have a fear of this happening as they seemed to stress a little that our hero was avoiding treatment, so I thought they might swing for him deciding to get treatment at the end and somehow having a miraculous recovery.

I was a tad surprised when our dying hero actually died

Thankfully that did not happen. Sad as it was, Joon Young needed to die. We’ve known right from the get-go that the whole point of this drama is that this beautiful man is having an unfair, early demise. The wrap-up for Joon Young’s illness was handled extremely well- his symptoms became increasingly worse as the drama went on, and the last two episodes were a heart-tuggingly sad look in on the final stages of this man’s life- his gradual memory-loss was particularly emotional. It was a nice, clean finish for the star after he got the justice for Eul he so desperately wanted. He worked hard in his last months to reveal the cover-up of her father’s death, then moved himself away to live out his last days with the woman he loved (and only occasionally remembered). The start and the finish were truly wonderful highlights of the drama, and I don’t think they could have handled Joon Young’s death any better than they did. 

What Wasn’t:

The Drag:

While the start and the end were brilliant, the middle section of the drama was basically its death. Nothing happened. Joon Young was sad. Eul was sad. I was sad. For five hours. The great part about the set-up of this drama was that it had all the angst it needed- our hero is dying. That’s all that's necessary.

What the f*ck is goin' on here?

It made every aspect of the series have an underlying sadness, because even if our main couple were being very cute and very in love, we knew it couldn’t last because our hero’s days were numbered. It’s all you need. But then the writer threw in all these unnecessary complications with Joon Young hatching plan to woo the woman who ran over Eul’s dad, but fails to tell Eul anything about it.

So snoodly- but so terminal

So Eul is sad because she doesn’t know why Joon Young is acting all aloof. And Joon Young is sad because he can’t be with Eul. Only he could be with Eul if he wanted- he’s just never given her a heads up that he’s running a scam mission to get a confession. I wouldn’t have minded the whole wooing thy enemy thing if there’d been some cute couple cahoots on the side- you know, like how Jung Eun thought there was anyway. The worst kind of angst is angst that is brought on by our leads being idiots- and that’s all this was. We had wonderful, heart-wrenching melodrama in the form of finding ways to tell people that Joon Young is dying and how to cope with the fact- but it was all overshadowed by the never-changing, unentertaining miscommunication and self-destruct antics of our hero. The worst part is that it took SO LONG for his stupid plan to come to fruition. He’s just assing about being mean to Eul and pushing her away (which drastically decreases Eul agency- what’s she supposed to do when she has no information on what’s going on?). There’s also the plot line of Ji Tae standing up to his parents, but that also moves at a snail’s pace and in all honesty- do we really care?

♫ Aaaaaallllll the evil ladies, all the evil ladies ♫

I would have much preferred we spend that time going into the past relationship between Eul and Joon Young (because I feel like there was room for more exploration there) and that we have flashback episodes like episode 2 that would help explain the current personalities of our leads. Alas, that flashback episode only really seemed to be setting up the whole Eul’s-dad’s-death-cover-up plot line thing. Or better yet- they should have just axed five or so episodes. Having 20 was just overkill.

Re-watch?

No. It was uncontrollably long, uncontrollably frustrating, and uncontrollably slow. 

But Woo Bin and Suzy rocked it