Choi-kang Bae-dal-ggun

Here's a fable for the underdogs.

SDM follows the overlooked, everyday workers. They deliver when ☃ in winter, and 🔥 in summer, 💦 in spring, and through the lugubrious fall🍂. They are sneered more than cheered. SDM finds them forming a supportive group that gives them all a lift.

Kang-soo is the catalyst. He turns friends and acquaintances into family. His formed-family is contrasted against several actual families in the show that tear eachother apart. The family we choose is often the best we can get.

Kang-soo shows up in town and lands a job at Lively Handmade Noodles. From there, he deconstructs the whole delivery system and then rebuilds it, all while outsmarting the powerful corporate eateries. The storyline is entertaining, though formulaic. I don't see formulaic as the worst criticism, necessarily. Life, and our shared human experience, is usually formulaic. It's the journey that is most important. The journey you will take with this crowd is fun, like a Disney Channel show.

This would be a good show to watch with kids as soon as they can keep up with the subtitles. It reinforces hard work, honor, helping others and living right. In exemplifying all the above, Kang-soo is a perfect role model. He makes loyal friends out of strangers by helping others. He inspires Ji-yoon to follow suit.

The primary romance falls slightly flat. I'm not sure if the cause is the dialogue, the directing, or just a lack of seasoning. Perhaps it's a little of all the above. The secondary characters' relationship is a better story.

SDM is best suited for tweens and teens, and parents won't mind watching along. It is a simple story in the After School Special tradition, and solidly PG/PG-13.

IMHO... 🎬7 🤔5 🎭8 💓5 Suggested Age 10& up.

While we're talking about kids and family viewing, here's some recommendations:

4+ My Neighbor Totoro-8.2, Ponyo-9.1

5+ Balto-8.3

6+ D4DJ-7.5

7+ Cardcaptor Sakura-7.4

8+ Spirited Away-9

9+Trollhunters-9.5 (slightly scary. Worst language is "butt snack")

10+ C🇨🇳 Accidentally in Love-6.5 B-level scripting, acting, and directing, but still fun/strangely relaxing to watch, Howl's Moving Castle-8.9, K🇰🇷 A Love So Beautiful-7, My Dog Skip-8, K🇰🇷 Part Time Idol-5.5 (suicide addressed), Paulie-7.4, Saiki-8, K🇰🇷Spark-6.4,

11+ Belle-8.5, K🇰🇷 Flower Boy Next Door-7, Girls Und Panzer-8.1 (1 each d@mn, he!!), Labyrinth-7, C🇨🇳 A Little Thing Called First Love-8.5, Love Chunibyo And Other Delusions-8.4, K🇰🇷 The Miracle-7.7, One Piece-7.5 there is scattered PG-13 language, Watership Down-8.5

12+ K🇰🇷99 Days With the Superstar-7, Colourcloud Palace-8, Farming Life in Another World-7.7, Goonies l-8, Here Comes Miss Modern-7.8, Hotel del Luna 8.4, Jumanji-9, K🇰🇷 My ID is Gangnam Beauty-7.5 , C🇨🇳 Love Between Fairy & Devil-8.9, Piano In The Forest l-8, K🇰🇷 So I Married My Anti-fan-6.8, Your Lie In April-9

13+ K🇰🇷 Boys Over Flowers-8.3 ~ melodrama to the max; K🇰🇷 Heirs-7.3, K🇰🇷 My Shy Boss-6.5, K🇰🇷 Playful kiss-7.3, Princess Resurrection-7.6, Senryu Girl-7.5, Special A Class-8.2

14+ Toradora-8.5, Princess Principal-8.6.

A more realistic, more natural history, without exaggerations. The script is well written, distributing balanced enough interesting content in all the episodes, without falling into exaggerations. A bit of small business, stories of love, friendship, solidarity, with humor. The team of actors is made up of experienced veterans, but also young actors, at that time at the beginning such as Kim Seon Ho and others. Chae Soo Bin has a demanding role, in which he shows his talent to express different emotions, he goes from hardness and hopelessness in society, a bit of martial arts, strikes more or less delicately 😂, humor then reaches feelings and more feminine approaches than the beginning as an independent woman. Go Kyung-Pyo also does a good role, like everyone else. It's the series with the highest density of shining eyes on the screen, the cinematography would have had something to do with it😍. There would be many things to note, but the best is to see. It doesn't bore you, it doesn't keep you in suspense for nothing, it's the work of a team that does exactly what it has to do, to entertain the audience. For me, as a European, they succeeded.

I can't call this drama '' Fun '' and do it justice, this is one of the best korean dramas, I've never been so entertained and i even laughed out loud several times. The only reason i started watching it, is because of the actor Kim Seon Ho from '' Start up '' and luckily for me i wasn't disappointed

This show is cute, sweet, and light without being too silly or over the top. The acting was good, and most of the male characters were likable, especially the male lead, Kang-soo. None of the female characters were likable except the grandma who sold ox bone stew. The female lead, Dan-ah, was too violent, and the secondary female lead, Ji-yun, was just plain psychotic. It also would have been nice if the soundtrack consisted of more than three songs, but I think that's just how K-dramas are in general. Aside from that, it was an enjoyable show to watch, even if it is just fluff. You could definitely do worse.

I mean....I'll admit that it doesn't have the depth of other really well-crafted Kdramas, but it's still an entertaining show. I'd give it a 7.5 if IMDB would let me. Some parts of the show are cliche/corny and some of the acting could have been better. But still, to be fair, it had some pretty good moments too in terms of writing and acting, and I enjoyed it overall. Giving this 10 stars would be a stretch in my opinion, but for sure the 1 star reviews are just unfair. Still worth a watch.