#teamdosan

Now to start off I wanna say i watched this drama because of nam joo hyuk, more specifically to see nam joo hyuk together with suzy, i’ve literally been looking forward to this for like half a year. However as the episodes went on i gotta say i found jipyeong to be by far the most interesting character, the second male lead (and a lot of other storylines) seriously outshined the lovestory of the main couple.

But I’m not saying that jipyeong should’ve ended up with dalmi. I rooted for him but she admittedly had zero romantic feelings for him. His role as her mentor, as an older brother, honestly suited him better. However it still made no sense for her to not even give him a chance. Because listen. This girl spent her entire live longing for the guy from the letters and then she finds out it’s him and she just…does nothing? You’re telling me after all this time, after telling dosan she loves him for all the things that jipyeong actually did, she doesn’t even wanna give it a try, not even when dosan went to the US? Now look, it is absolutely possible for her to not be in love with him. Maybe she realised her love was more of an idolisation of someone who comforted her when she was struggling. Maybe she realised that although he has all the qualities she liked, there’s no guarantee we fall in love with someone just because they’re technically who we asked for. Those would have been valid reasons and would have worked well in combination with the whole "Idk why I love you I just do" part when dosan asked her at the end because that's really just how it is sometimes. But this needed to be COMMUNICATED. This needed to be TALKED ABOUT. Yet it was never addressed, dalmi doesn’t care and that’s just it. It’s frustrating, we needed an honest conversation between them where she talks about her feelings, what he meant to her in the past, what he means to her now, and why this changed. But we never got that.

For me jipyeong’s ending is bittersweet. I liked that he did kinda become part of dalmi’s family and that he decided to support the orphan pair up organisation. I think objectively this is what he needed the most, but he himself never seemed to come to this conclusion, loving dalmi until the end, which made this so heartbreaking. Was it really so hard to have him get over dalmi one or two episodes earlier, or hint at him getting a different love interest?

As for dosan, I honestly think that jipyeong’s character was just way better developed. He changed a lot after the first few episodes which is a shame because he lost a bit of his charm from the beginning. He developed these weird confidence issues towards jipyeong, like saying dalmi will choose him even without the letters but also that he has nothing and jipyeong (a guy with zero family or friends who had to work hella hard to be where he is now) has everything, then he beat him up after jipyeong was literally asked to be honest about that contract (seriously that was so random and uncalled for) and then he refused to return the letters that were always jipyeongs. His character was just kind of all over the place and i guess it can be explained by jealousy and immaturity, which doesn’t make him a terrible character, if it wasn’t for jipyeong it would have been alright, but with the second male lead just having the way more interesting personality and storyline going on, it did make dosan’s behavior become a bit annoying. Especially considering that without jipyeong, dosan would’ve probably never met dalmi and would’ve already had his technology stolen by these fake investors in the beginning.

It was also a bit weird how jipyeong’s harsh feedback was seen as such a big deal, despite always giving valuable advice. Yet when he did end up thinking that he was too harsh both the female mentor and dalmi herself said that he didn’t do anything wrong, so what was the point here?

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Now as for dalmi’s mom and sister: i was really pissed how injae and the mom just abandoned dalmi. I mean is no one questioning why the mom didn’t even tell her that she re-married? That she was gonna move to a different continent? And then the dad died and they still didn’t bother to be there for her?? hello??

Both the mom and injae redeemed themselves at the end but what was severely lacking was an honest conversation with dalmi, apologizing and saying they will try their hardest to make it up to her. Especially her relationship with her sister was really confusing, like right after that time jump they had worked together for three years already and clearly didn’t hate each other anymore but at the same time injae didn't even know that her grandma had gone blind. At the very end, dalmi's conflict with her sister and mom are resolved, without ever getting enough scenes that actually show *how* it was resolved so it feels a bit incomplete.

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To sum up, what this drama was lacking the most were additional scenes of characters addressing their past and talking about their feelings, as a lot of conclusions kind of came out of nowhere because they weren’t properly addressed.

Actually, since i’m already at it, i would like to propose this alternative storyline: Jipyeong never falls in love with dalmi. When dalmi finds out the letters were written by him, she’s torn between both. When dosan goes to the US, dalmi asks jipyeong to give their relationship a try and they’re dating for a while, but eventually realise it’s not working, so they remain close friends and he’s welcomed into their family. When dosan comes back he and and jipyeong become friends because they have no reason not to. Dosan and dalmi get back together. the end.