making such a harsh judgement about a character that you don't know very well since you haven't watched the drama fully is a bit unfair
But to me, LSG's character in GG is the crux of my problems with Hong Sisters' latest dramas and pacing. It's not as if I ditched GG after watching twenty minutes of first ep. I watched either four or five episodes. It's a 16 episode drama, judging the drama's overall quality or appeal on 25-30% of it that I have seen is, IMO, fair enough. By that point, in any event, you should provide me with some character development in the desired direction (I am going to give more slack to a 95 ep cdrama - 4 eps is barely prologue - but this is not 95 eps). By the end of ep 1, I was convinced that LSG's character was the most pathetic and off-putting drama hero I have ever seen (no exaggeration, I honestly thought and still think that). I still stuck around for 3-4 more episodes hoping for something to change my mind, nothing happened and I finally bailed. I wasn't going to sit through a 16 ep drama again on the slim chance something might glimmer in character department, especially not after no-character-development-until-last-two-eps YAB.
And, to me, that is a problem. By the end of ep 1, there should be something impelling me to keep watching besides desperate hope and love of past Hong Sisters' dramas. Let alone after ep 4 or 5! There wasn't anything. If you make your hero so off-putting and keep him static for those episodes, I am sorry - I am going to bail. By the end, he may be curing cancer with one hand while saving 20 kids from a burning building with another, and I won't know or care because I won't be watching. If you create a character so unappealing to me, there has to be something else to hook me - a hint he can be more (see Hong Gil Dong with its effective 2 min prologue which established HGD as a badass rebel and not slacker of early eps though there was a ton of development by ep 4 of HGD and HGD never put me off the way LSG's character did in any event), or a taut plot (obviously not something a romcom goes for) or some other characters I can really love (I am currently slogging through Chinese Paladin 3 because of prominent and cool secondary characters I love though the hero of it leaves me completely bored. If not for that, I would have ditched a long time ago and I like Hu Ge, who plays the lead in CP3 a lot more than I do LSG. I just won't persevere if nothing draws me). That wasn't the case for me in GG - I liked Minah's character well-enough but (a) she wasn't so relatable to me for obvious reasons - i.e. being a gumiho spirit - that I'd love her enough to watch for her sake (b) the problem with liking one half of OTP while disliking the other is that it makes you dislike the one you dislike even more because you don't think they are worthy and also makes you wonder if the one you like is nuts.
So, that's a lot of tl;dr but the short version is - GG didn't give me a single bone in the first 4-5 eps to either indicate the hero would ever rise past his abysmalness not provide anything else (admittedly it would have to be hefty) to keep me watching despite that. Hong Sisters have huge problems with character development pacing lately - see both YAB and this. LSG's character may not have remained a cowardly useless thing for the entire duration, but he did so for long enough to make me abandon any hope for him or any desire to sit through more in that hope - it just wasn't worth it for me.
So my point stands. I am glad they don't have LSG (who I liked fine in Brilliant Legacy - a good example of pacing btw - his Hwan was a terrible human being for a while in the beginning but there were enough other cool things going on and other character love for me to keep going, plus he may have been a bastard but he was interesting. His character in GG interested me not in the least) in the newest HS drama because the chances of his character starting out as some sort of immature or weak or cowardly nonenity are much less if his character is played by Cha Seung Won. Because, let's face it - HS could make the DoA hero the most amazing human being ever by the end, but if they start with yet another weakling or coward, I'll bail before I find out.
no subject
But to me, LSG's character in GG is the crux of my problems with Hong Sisters' latest dramas and pacing. It's not as if I ditched GG after watching twenty minutes of first ep. I watched either four or five episodes. It's a 16 episode drama, judging the drama's overall quality or appeal on 25-30% of it that I have seen is, IMO, fair enough. By that point, in any event, you should provide me with some character development in the desired direction (I am going to give more slack to a 95 ep cdrama - 4 eps is barely prologue - but this is not 95 eps). By the end of ep 1, I was convinced that LSG's character was the most pathetic and off-putting drama hero I have ever seen (no exaggeration, I honestly thought and still think that). I still stuck around for 3-4 more episodes hoping for something to change my mind, nothing happened and I finally bailed. I wasn't going to sit through a 16 ep drama again on the slim chance something might glimmer in character department, especially not after no-character-development-until-last-two-eps YAB.
And, to me, that is a problem. By the end of ep 1, there should be something impelling me to keep watching besides desperate hope and love of past Hong Sisters' dramas. Let alone after ep 4 or 5! There wasn't anything. If you make your hero so off-putting and keep him static for those episodes, I am sorry - I am going to bail. By the end, he may be curing cancer with one hand while saving 20 kids from a burning building with another, and I won't know or care because I won't be watching. If you create a character so unappealing to me, there has to be something else to hook me - a hint he can be more (see Hong Gil Dong with its effective 2 min prologue which established HGD as a badass rebel and not slacker of early eps though there was a ton of development by ep 4 of HGD and HGD never put me off the way LSG's character did in any event), or a taut plot (obviously not something a romcom goes for) or some other characters I can really love (I am currently slogging through Chinese Paladin 3 because of prominent and cool secondary characters I love though the hero of it leaves me completely bored. If not for that, I would have ditched a long time ago and I like Hu Ge, who plays the lead in CP3 a lot more than I do LSG. I just won't persevere if nothing draws me). That wasn't the case for me in GG - I liked Minah's character well-enough but (a) she wasn't so relatable to me for obvious reasons - i.e. being a gumiho spirit - that I'd love her enough to watch for her sake (b) the problem with liking one half of OTP while disliking the other is that it makes you dislike the one you dislike even more because you don't think they are worthy and also makes you wonder if the one you like is nuts.
So, that's a lot of tl;dr but the short version is - GG didn't give me a single bone in the first 4-5 eps to either indicate the hero would ever rise past his abysmalness not provide anything else (admittedly it would have to be hefty) to keep me watching despite that. Hong Sisters have huge problems with character development pacing lately - see both YAB and this. LSG's character may not have remained a cowardly useless thing for the entire duration, but he did so for long enough to make me abandon any hope for him or any desire to sit through more in that hope - it just wasn't worth it for me.
So my point stands. I am glad they don't have LSG (who I liked fine in Brilliant Legacy - a good example of pacing btw - his Hwan was a terrible human being for a while in the beginning but there were enough other cool things going on and other character love for me to keep going, plus he may have been a bastard but he was interesting. His character in GG interested me not in the least) in the newest HS drama because the chances of his character starting out as some sort of immature or weak or cowardly nonenity are much less if his character is played by Cha Seung Won. Because, let's face it - HS could make the DoA hero the most amazing human being ever by the end, but if they start with yet another weakling or coward, I'll bail before I find out.