I Order You

I Order You

6/10

I Order You 

Genre:                                   Episodes: 16                                   Year: 2015

Romance

Comedy

Melodrama

Synopsis:

Yeo Gook Dae is a talented chef who owns and runs a lunchbox restaurant. He acts arrogant and rude to cover up his pain from his last broken relationship. One day he meets Park Song Ah, a woman who has come to pick up an order, and the story follows the developments of their relationship.

Cast:

U-Know Yunho (Yeo Gook Dae)

Kim Ga Eun (Park Song Ah)

Jang Seung Jo (Kevin)

Goo Jae Yi (Ah Da Hwa)

Baek Jong Won (Han Bi Ryong)

Cho Yoon Woo (Nam Soo Ri)

General Thoughts:

It’s not a long drama with 16 20-30 minute episodes, but manages to fit a fair bit in. The initial set up of the series is delightful: it’s cute, carefree and just the teensiest bit cheesy. The ditzy heroine is likable and unique with her constant spacing out and going ga-ga over good food. Kim Ga Eun throws herself into her character and delivers a reliable, realistic performance.

It had a delightfully quirky sense of humor

Yunho does a beautiful job as the prickly chef- though his character does soften pretty quickly, but that’s probably due the writing more than the acting. He’s unexpectedly good in the melodramatic scenes that require raw emotion and tears. A couple of times at the beginning of scenes- the acting was a little weird and stoic. It was very obvious that our main leads had found their marks, heard ‘action’, and then begun. It probably didn’t help that a fair few scenes started with our leads in awkward standing positions that aren’t natural in real life. I mean- who just stands a meter or so away from someone after they’ve had a big emotional heart-to-heart on a bench. Weird.

Danced with becoming cliche- but managed to avoid it

The story was super easy to follow and didn’t have a lot of surprises- I pegged the whole mum twist from the moment Park Song Ah mentioned that Gook Dae’s cooking tasted like her mother’s. Much as I wanted to be wrong, I wasn’t. Because eeggghhh- past-connected-trauma-involving-loving-parent is so overused. I mean, childhood-friend-returning-home-to-find-his-first-love (Kevin) - suuuuuuper cliché, but bearable. Even the jilted ex-lover returning was acceptable as it had its own unique spin. But all the mum plotline did was make Yunho cry and Park Song Ah look like a massive b*tch. The side characters were pretty spot-on, not super developed (but that’s to be expected in a lightweight, short drama), but likeable enough that they weren’t just dead space on the screen. There was a lot of pretty instrumental music throughout the whole drama- which is lovely in an era of overused, irrelevant, lyric-filled songs.

What Was Great:

U-Know:

I'd order that

You know, U-Know Yunho did a pretty great job acting. I expected him to be rather abysmal as I’ve heard so many critiques of his bandmate Max Changmin’s acting, and…well…idols acting. But there you go- never judge a man’s acting by his band. He was dedicated and believable in his character, and had a nice spark with his co-star Kim Ga Eun. Also he looked fab the whole time. It was nice to see him with a bit of weight on, none of this too-skinny stick insect nonsense. Omo, my heart practically died seeing a healthy looking male gracing my screen. I’m pretty sure this was Yunho’s last drama before he headed off to military (cue the tears)- Yunho, we can’t wait to see you (and Max) back in 2017!

Snackbite Size:

Saved some time for quality snogs

This drama knew exactly how long it was supposed to be. So many series make the mistake of having too many episodes and not enough content, or try cramming too much into too short a drama. This series was well-balanced, the short episodes giving the exact amount of time needed for each conflict in each episode. The writers utilised their time perfectly, using every episode to its full potential, and never used any episodes as filler until the next conflict-arc.

General Flow:

The start...

While the drama did start out as a bubbly rom-com, by the end it was hitting the melodrama pretty hard. The gradual progression into more serious issues was handled beautifully, with each new arc of story gradually taking on a more serious tone than the last. It was never super obvious that this was what the drama was attempting to do until you reach the end and think ‘how did we get here?’- because the increasing melo is not noticeable while you’re immersed in the drama.

...and the end.

Oppa Dongsaeng:

The brother everyone wants

I adore brother characters in K-Dramas whether they are older or younger, and here we get a pleasant mix of both. No, not because Park Song Ah has two brothers, but because her dongsaeng takes it as his job to be her guardian after their mother dies and Song Ah is blaming herself. My only gripe is that I wanted to see a little more of him and their adorable relationship.

Noble Idiot Repercussions:

Okay, I’m not exactly sure that this is what the writers intended- but this is how I took it. I didn’t really like the character of Ah Da Hwa, but she fit into the story well enough, was more threatening (in a way) than irritating, and gave our main couple space to connect and grow. And here’s the bit I really enjoyed- she’s like a Candy-girl gone wrong. Initially Ah Da Hwa is a bitter ex-lover out to reclaim her man. And then we find out the reason she left in the first place is because the evil mother-in-law tricked her, so she sacrificed her love for her soon-to-be (but now never) husband.

How noble idiots end up in real life

AHAHAHA. How many dramas have we watched where this is more or less exactly what the main female protagonist does. 'Heirs'. 'My Girlfriend is a Gumiho'. 'BoysOver Flowers'. I could go on.

Has she ever not been the evil mother-in-law?

My point being- this is a move used countless times by the heroine in many dramas, and now we are given an instance where the exact same plan has failed miserably. “I’ll leave with no explanation because it will save him more hurt later, and then in two years I’ll return and we can be together again.” Except, lol- now he has a cute ass girlfriend cuz you left him at the altar. It’s beautiful and hilarious. Also does it surprise anyone that evil mother-in-law cameo is played by Park Joon Geum? Are the writers here actually just using this drama to poke fun at how ridiculous many K-Drama rom-coms are? Or will Park Joon Geum legit assassinate anyone else who dares play a vicious mum-in-law?

What Wasn’t:

Mum Melo:

I saw this coming a mile away and hated it. I was hoping we would bypass this whole ‘fated from the beginning’ town, but our last two episodes lived there. Park Song Ah’s mother is not developed enough for the viewers to care about her as a character, so we feel no great sadness at her death. The drama also doesn’t explore Mum’s relationships with Song Ah or Gook Dae beyond that she loved them and they loved her, and now they both blame themselves for her death.

The cliche connection no one wanted

The whole series has focused on the reveal of Gook Dae’s true character, his past, and how his past has hurt him. In the point of the story when we come across the mum revelation, the character we are identifying and sympathising most with is Gook Dae. And then we see Park Song Ah just rip into him. Oof. Any compassion or empathy developed for Song Ah disappears in less than a minute. Because you just don’t say those things to someone you love. You don’t destroy someone you care about that way. Okay, well yes, in a similar situation we might maybe say harsh things like Song Ah, but we don’t like to believe we can. And the fact is, the drama to question and evoke curiosity about the darkness of our souls and inbuilt selfishness is not a short rom-com starring a spunky singer. The series had built to this final, melodramatic climax- but it was just painful. And not in a good ‘I’m so invested in the suffering of these characters’ kind of way. What I really wanted for this drama was some kind of conflict that pushed our couple to grow stronger as a pair and work together.

No, no- don't say sh*t like that to our boy

I suppose you could argue that the mum-melo did bring them closer as a couple in a roundabout way, but it didn’t flow well. The middle of the drama is for internal conflict (ex-wife) for our characters to fight over and move past, the end for external conflict that they triumph over together. Unfortunately we got a second, and larger, internal conflict right at the end of our drama, which inevitably led to a time-skip (though no one knows how much time has passed- enough to write and publish a book obviously) and weird happiness because apparently spending significant periods of time apart has no impact on your relationship. Hm.

My pet peeve for this drama

Discontinuity:

I am not one for fine details, but I know for a FACT that the feel-better-about-yourself-Gook-Dae bracelet broke. It was a very metaphorical moment and those not so metaphorical beads scattered all over our cute chef’s bedroom floor. All. Over. I specifically remember because it was all about how Gook Dae’s acceptance of the accident not being his fault was shattered. And yet, lo and behold, a few scenes later he’s on the beach with Park Song Ah, bracelet perfectly intact. Okay, yes, it’s not out of the question that Gook Dae fixed the bracelet off-screen- but that’s far less likely than the writers simply hoping we wouldn’t notice. I just plain don’t believe that self-loathing Gook Dae sat on his bedroom floor drunk as a skunk piecing together a gift from his potentially now ex-girlfriend that says ‘It’s not your fault’. I know you’re short on time, but the very least give us a musical montage of him piecing it back together as he comes to accept its meaning. Or something. Jeez. Also it seemed to slip everyone’s mind that dead Mum had a son too. Like bodyguard brother seems to give no sh*ts that his mum is dead. And in all feel-good imaginings it’s Mum, kid Song Ah and kid Gook Dae. Like, where’s nae dongsaeng?

If you thought that was Park Song Joo (ya know...her actual son)- you'd be wrong

Re-watch?

Nah. It’s cute, but unexceptional. And weirdly not as much about food as you would initially think.

Aaaaand back to being cutesy