Longing Heart

Longing Heart

7/10

Longing Heart

Genre:                                                 Episodes: 10                                   Year: 2018

Romance

Comedy

Synopsis:

Kang Shin Woo is a high school teacher who has been unable to forget his first love, Han Ji Soo. Ten years ago he never had the courage to confess, Ji Soo moved overseas, and Shin Woo hasn’t seen her since. After magically being transported to the past, Shin Woo works as a teacher for his own homeroom class from ten years ago, where he tries to make his 18 year old self’s love come true.

Cast:

Lee Jung Shin (Kang Shin Woo)

Seo Ji Hoon (Kang Shin Woo)

Lee Yeol Eum (Han Ji Soo)

Kim Sun Young (Shin Woo's Mother)

Kim Min Seok (Kim Min Seok)

Min Do Hee (Jang Bo Ra)

Lee Joo Hyung (Joo Geun Deok)

Cho Seung Hee (Baek Na Hee)

Lee Tae Sun (Shin Joo Hwan)

Song Ji Hyun (Kang Shin Hee)

General Thoughts:

It’s not a perfect drama, but it was really quite enjoyable, and I was always pretty bummed whenever I had to stop watching and actually go do something. Like work.

If only someone would pay me to watch K-Dramas

While it might not be the most fast-paced drama I’ve ever watched, it definitely had a nice slow burn, and left me wanting more whenever an episode finished. Cliffhangers get me every time. Time travel dramas are ones I usually tend to enjoy (unless they’re riddled with loopholes),

They even look kinda similar

and I liked the twist that the hero doesn’t actually wake up in his 18-year old body, but rather there were two of him existing at one time. Most of the time travel dramas I’ve watched recently have only had one character in that time frame. In ‘Tunnel’ we had the hero go to the future where a future version of himself didn’t exist because he had disappeared in the past. In ‘Go Back Spouses’ we had our leads’ adult minds waking up in their 18 year old bodies. ‘Tomorrow With You’ played with the idea of multiple versions of the hero, but that drama was such a hot mess that nothing really made sense. What I’m trying to say (in a convoluted way) is that ‘Longing Heart’ felt really unique by having two versions of our hero existing in one time-space. It was delightful having two sides of the love triangle being the same person, particularly when Shin Woo got jealous of himself. For me, this drama marks the series where Lee Jung Shin has come into his own as an actor.

And with this drama Yong Hwa officially becomes the worst actor in CNBLUE

He felt relaxed and natural, and suit both the comedy and the melo moments well. He had great chemistry with Seo Ji Hoon (who I have loved since I first laid eyes on him in ‘Solomon’s Perjury’), and I absolutely adored any scene with the two of them goofing around, bickering, or having a heart-to-heart. Actually, I enjoyed any scene that simply had both of them in it. Seo Ji Hoon really felt like a younger brother to Lee Jung Shin, and the two do look kind of similar, so it wasn’t a huge stretch of the imagination to think they were the same person.

Don't we all have a bit of a love-hate relationship with our teenage selves?

Seo Ji Hoon smashed his role here- he fits broken-hearted high school kids so well. My heart just bleeds whenever he gets his sad-puppy face on, but I was also happy to see him have more light-hearted and fun scenes

I will watch anything with Seo Ji Hoon in it. Literally, anything.

which I haven’t really seen from him in the past. While I think Seo Ji Hoon is one of the most talented up and coming actors, I also didn’t feel like he out-acted Lee Jung Shin in any way. Whether it was a funny scene or an dramatic scene, the two actors matched their emotions well- one never seemed sadder or lonelier than the other. It could have been a huge disaster if one of the two had been a much better actor than the other, but as it was they suited each other well, and made both characters of Shin Woo totally loveable. I was less convinced with Lee Yeol Eum, who is a new face for me, but I certainly didn’t think she brought the drama down either. Ji Soo was written as a bit of a downer, and I always think it’s hard for actors to make these characters really likeable. I found Lee Yeol Eum much more convincing in the 2007 timeline where she had a much bigger range of emotions to express. Because let’s be real, in the 2017 timeline all she really got to do was act sad and distant. Ji Soo was much more fun as the vibrant, confident student with a crush on her teacher, and it was easy to see why Shin Woo fell for her so hard.

2007 Ji Soo was way more fun than 2017 Ji Soo

I really liked the supporting cast as well. I always like seeing Min Do Hee, and she brought her usual sass to her character. I liked the story arc she got with her high school sweetheart and how both their dreams faded over time.

I'm always up for a noona romance side story

I always love a good noona crush, so I found Lee Joo Young’s character pretty reliably fun- even if I don’t always think he’s the best actor. Lee Tae Sun probably could have snagged my heart in this drama if Seo Ji Hoon hadn’t been the lead, because he just adds such an earnestness to his characters that makes you like them. The moment his character revealed all those rings he’d been buying for Ji Soo, I felt totally gutted for him. I enjoyed that we spent a bit of time with characters outside of the love triangle every now and then, as it gave us a bit of breathing space and prevented us from becoming too over-saturated with the love story. I tend to always enjoy dramas that have well-developed side characters. The drama was shot quite nicely most of the time, quite often having a lot of very pretty and visually pleasing scenes. My one complaint is the excessive use of fading scene transitions. I’ve never really been a fan of them, especially now that dramas are getting a lot more slick and modern- it just felt a bit old-school. Maybe that was the point (time-travel and all), but I kinda get the feeling it was done to play up the romantic glow or heartbreaking angst in the scene rather than highlight time differences. And it just makes it so darn hard to screenshot the nice moments when they’re constantly fading into another scene/close up.

There's a time and a place for dissolve transitions- and that's when I'm not trying to screenshot.

What Was Great:

Unpredictable:

I always enjoy a drama that’s hard to predict. Not in the way where no one really has any idea what’s going on because the plot is a mess (‘Missing 9’ I’m looking at you here),

Did not expect young Shin Woo to go to 2017

but because the show takes steps that shy away from the cliche that most dramas gravitate towards. I thought Shin Woo’s trip back in time would be so he could matchmake his past self and his first love, so each time Shin Woo found out something new or made a mistake I was pleasantly surprised. Usually time travellers from the future know the past exactly, so it was refreshing to have some of Shin Woo’s ideas that he was so sure of just be plain wrong. I think the thing that surprised me most was definitely young Shin Woo coming to the present/future. It was a twist that I just didn’t see coming, and it was delightful. The two Shin Woo’s got much closer after young Shin Woo’s jump to the future, and I adored that 2017 Ji Soo liked young Shin Woo more than 2017 Shin Woo. There was something just so delightful about her falling for the other Shin Woo in each time line. It was never plainly obvious why Ji Soo left in the first place, which kept the show interesting, and allowed for more layers of her character to be peeled back. The only downside is that I think 2017 Ji Soo’s character suffered a bit (became a bit too sad and avoidant) in order to continue the mystery.

How much do I love that he was always jealous of himself? A lot. I loved it a lot.

What Wasn’t:

Unnecessary Sacrifice:

Despite enjoying so much of this drama (it was just plain fun), I still kinda fail to understand the actual reason behind why Shin Woo’s Mum couldn’t be saved. By the time Mum is getting on the ferry of doom, she is well aware that Teacher Kang is her son from the future.

But...but why get on the ferry of destruction?

What I wish the show had made clearer is whether Mum thought she was saving young Ji Soo from dying, or whether she thought she was just sending her back so her son could confess his feelings. It would have made sense if Mum thought she was just giving her son a chance with the girl he liked, but from my perspective Mum knew that boat was going to sink. So why get on it then? It’s not like if Ji Soo wasn’t on the ferry Mum had to be- Ji Soo had already left so all Mum had to do was just not get on the boat. It’s not like Mum’s death was giving the kids a shot at love that they wouldn’t have got otherwise- in fact it was just the opposite, with her death being the whole reason Ji Soo disappeared from Shin Woo’s life. The phone message left by Mum only further supported the idea that she knew she was going to die after getting on that ferry- but there was really no good reason for her to get on it in the first place! I mean, if your son from the future explicitly tells you not to do something, you’d probably catch on right? While it was kinda sweet that Mum was giving her son this second chance, the whole situation could have been avoided by her just not getting on the d*mn ferry of death.

If Mum doesn't die then 2017 Ji Soo can't be mopey. Well...better let Mum die then.

It felt like the writers thought it would make the whole time-slip thing too complicated if Mum didn’t die on that ferry (cuz that would drastically change 2017 Shin Woo’s life), so they just killed her off to keep things simple. This whole complaint rides on whether Mum knew that ferry was doomed or not, and unfortunately the drama didn’t quite make that clear.

Recommend?

Look if you were really considering whether to watch this drama or not, I’d tell you to give it a go. Or if you’re the type who really likes time-slip dramas this would be right up your alley. I probably wouldn’t recommend this to people who enjoy a more mature feel to their dramas though.

I just adored that he was in a love triangle with himself