Letter #112: Frankly Speaking

Good morning, Erin.

I went to see a work-friend’s band play at a bar the other night, and being there reminded me that I am no fun at parties. 

Not that I’ve ever forgotten that I’m no fun at parties. I just sometimes so successfully avoid being at big gatherings that, on the rare occasion that I find myself at one, I notice that I’ve forgotten just how awkward and depressing it is to be the only person standing by himself in a crowd of people who all seem to have something to say to each other. 

I mean, sure, I know I wasn’t there to socialize—and Lord knows I didn’t want to talk to anyone who was there—but…yeesh. Like, someone literally asked me why I seemed so stressed out. I wasn’t, and I’m pretty sure that dude was just drunk and confused about why I wasn’t drinking, but…still. Didn’t see him asking anyone else that. 

So, yeah—no fun at parties. (To your great surprise, I’m sure.)

But you know what is fun at parties? Pictionary! 

…or maybe I’m joking! I can’t see your reaction! Which would affect how I’d play off that statement!

ANYWAY.

I already mega-recommended Frankly Speaking to you, and I hope you’ve watched it. Because we’re going to have a chat about it, and I’m going full-spoilers. 

BUT…the question is: since I recommended it when it was only halfway done, did my feelings about it stay the same or take a turn?

Let’s find out:

1. I really, really, really enjoyed this show. It’s funny, the romance is cute, the leads are adorable, it’s got this easy charm about it—and it does the “suddenly neighbors!” trope, Erin. I quite literally said, “The only way this show gets  better is if it suddenly turns into a Korean dating show!” AND THEN IT DID.

1A. I cannot explain to you how blissfully happy I was watching the dating show arc. F*** me, it was so much fun. Just…perfect TV. Genuinely. The only problem with it was that it wasn’t the entire show.

1B. …well, okay, it wasn’t the only problem with it—but we’ll get into that in a bit. 

2. That said…the second half of this show is kind of a mess. I still mostly enjoyed it, but it was rushed as all get-out, as though the production had been set for 20 episodes and then suddenly cut to 12 halfway through filming. Episodes 7-12 all felt like a highlight reel of story beats for three or four episodes apiece. I have no idea what the actual reason is, but the first half is paced so well that I have to assume something got switched behind the scenes. (Which was not its only problem, of course, but we’ll get to that later.) And, again, I still enjoyed the second half, but I also can’t say it was well done. So, all in all, the show ends up being a mixed bag—though I still maintain that watching ‘til the main duo’s first kiss is totally worth it. 

3. But, before we continue, I think we should take a look at everyone I recognized:

• Big Sister from Start-Up as Woo-ju, our female lead

• Surly Lawyer from Extraordinary Attorney Woo as…um, 2nd Lead Guy

• Patricia from My Sibling’s Romance (she’s one of the hosts) as I-na, one of Woo-ju’s teammates

• the fruit store friend from My Worst Neighbor as (male lead) Ki-baek’s chubby friend 

• Glasses Lawyer from Vincenzo as Ki-baek’s jerk boss

• Mr. Kim (the bartender) from Hotel Del Luna as Ki-baek’s dad

• the cult leader(’s wife?) from Goodbye Earth as Woo-ju’s mom

• the bullied girl who kills the long-haired bully from The Glory as the lawyer dating show member

• Dan-oh’s friend-turned-enemy from Extraordinary You as Ki-baek’s dating show “love interest”

• the dental hygienist friend from Hometown Cha-Cha-Cha as a radio love therapy host

4. Okay, so…Surly Lawyer is frikkin’ great in this. I had no idea he was such a good actor, but he really brings it to this performance and character. I now want to see him in other things, to see how much more range he’s got. (I’d love to see him in a really serious drama.) And his character is so juicy—like, acting-wise, story-wise! It just sucks that we never really get the chance to dig into the different elements that are affecting him (his family, his feelings for Woo-ju, his troubles with fame) because there just wasn’t enough time. 

4A. And…the f*** do you mean that was the locked room?!

5. The actor who played Ki-baek is also really good, especially early on, before his inability to control what he says. Very funny, and a smooth performance. It matters less and less as the show goes on, since he doesn't have too much to do (acting-wise), but that’s hardly his fault. 

6. And then there’s my girl, Kang Han-na, absolutely killing it as Woo-ju. She’s is soooo good at being goofy and silly, and she’s obviously having a blast being able to let loose as the jovial and playful Woo-ju (as opposed to having to be cold and detached, which is what I usually see her play). I got a glimpse of how funny she could be in My Roommate is a Gumiho, how much she comes alive when she gets to be silly, but Frankly Speaking just lets her loose—and it’s awesome. Woo-ju is the sun struggling to stay lit, and Kang Han-na nails that genuine-vs-forced dichotomy as she bounces from moment to moment, from successes to failures and back. Admittedly, you can see the vibrancy leave her whenever she has to downshift into being sad, and her performance becomes more of how the actress is feeling on the inside than how she’s getting the feelings across to the audience. But she gets to spend most of the show doing what she clearly loves, and that is always going to overshadow the rest of it, in my book. 

6A. She gets to smile, Erin—have you seen her smile?! Good Lord, it is a crime that Start-Up never let her smile. I’ve told you before that Roh Jeong-eui’s smile makes me melt—well, boy-howdy, she and Kang Han-na are gonna have to have a melt-off, at this point, because I can’t decide which I love more. 

6B. And she’s just sooo…frikkin’...pretty. (Yes, I have that about 100 times in my notes. This doesn’t surprise you.)

6C. And, yes, much like with Surly Lawyer’s character, Woo-ju’s juicy character conflicts sort of get the brushoff—particularly the reappearance of her biological mother, which is an issue that is resolved in five minutes, once she addresses it. Again, it feels like the show was supposed to be longer, and they decided to condense things like this rather than cut them.

7. Relatedly: they just blew past Woo-ju’s time on the dating show. I was so frustrated when the girl from Extraordinary You left the show (because I was completely smitten with her), and I said, “The only way this would be okay is if Woo-ju had to join the show in her place.” AND THEN SHE DID. But the emotional and romantic complications of her being there (for her, for Ki-baek, for 2nd Male Lead, for First Love Girl) are sort of sped through instead of given the appropriate time to breathe. It was the most exciting beat of the most exciting part of the show, and we barely spend time on it—because there’s no time to spend on anything, at that point in the show. Which is just…criminal. Really, if it does turn out that they got cut short and had to wrap things up quicker than they expected, I think the smarter thing would have been to spend most of the rest of the series on the dating show and use that to resolve the interpersonal character stuff there (such as their struggle to support the show’s narrative vs. their feelings, the strained relationship between Ki-baek and 2nd Male Lead, the career trouble from having to pull her name from the credits—heck, you can even still do their absolutely adorable playground first kiss, just have it be at a playground near the dating show location). I mean, sure, maybe they’d already filmed chunks of the later stuff and/or didn’t have time to rewrite the script—or maybe this was the plan all along. I’m just saying, ya couldn’t go wrong with more dating show. 

8. To wit: why did we need the conceit of Ki-baek not being able to control his verbal impulses? It so rarely impacts the story—by which I mean that he could just as easily have had a series of unfortunate turns (like when he’s assaulted on TV by his co-anchor’s husband) lead him to need Woo-ju’s help getting his public image back in shape, eventually culminating in him blurting out his pent-up frustrations out of frustration rather than because of some convoluted brain injury. His involuntary outbursts generally don’t matter, so…why have them?

8A. Of course, thematically, the three leads are embroiled in a genuineness-vs-veneer struggle that’s making their lives harder to live with, so the idea that he can’t suppress his real thoughts is supposed to act as a liberating catalyst for the other two—but the same goal is accomplished if he’s just struggling with how tired of holding back he is: he’d learn to balance his frustrations, which would then inspire Woo-ju to push back against her higher-ups a bit more, which would inspire 2nd Male Lead to just admit to the world that he can’t keep being “the Nation’s Son-in-Law” all the time.

9. And holy crap—there’s even a subplot thread introduced where the rival writer lady kind of gets the hots for Ki-baek, AND IT GOES NOWHERE. Now, maybe it wasn’t supposed to go anywhere—but, y’know what? It should have. It clearly should have. You don’t have her appreciate his kindness out of nowhere and not pay it off. 

10. …okay, I swear I really, really liked this show. It’s just that the bits that annoyed me because of the rushed second half were such a disappointment because of how good not just the first half was but the seeds planted in the first half were

11. And what the heck was the point of Ki-baek’s friend with the sick daughter?! Why was that element of the story there? It’s such a heavy, heartbreaking thing for this guy to deal with, and that’s great—but if we weren’t going to spend much time on the YES OKAY I’LL STOP YOU GET THE POINT.

 

12. One of my hundred favorite things about the dating show arc was the glut of references/homages they put into it. The whole endeavor’s obviously a bit Single’s Inferno setting (down to the kitchen!), a bit Heart Signal structure (in a house, end-of-night texts), a bit Transit Love exes (with First Love Girl), a bit…other shows I’ve probably never heard of—but there were some very specific callbacks that I totally recognized, and they tickled me pink:

• the most obvious one is, of course, the fight pit (mixed with the hat-snatching game) from Single’s Inferno.

• the writing team was doing the Heart Signal “love lines” chart back in their office area to keep track of who was interested in whom. 

• First Love Girl’s game changer date is to…if not the exact amusement park from Nineteen to Twenty then at least the same kind of bouncy/spinny/toss-you-around “disco tilt” ride the kids went on after they first arrived. (Which was a very funny segment, FYI.)

• and the last one I have a note on is—to me—a pointed reference to Transit Love 2, with Ki-baek’s initial dating show “love interest” suddenly having to leave the show because it’s discovered she has a boyfriend out in the real world…which is the rumored reason for why the most immediately exciting cast member, Yi-hyun, suddenly had to leave the show.

13. For the record: Ki-baek’s initial “love interest” on the dating show was easily my favorite of the girls in that cast. (And fairplay to the actress: she looked real good. Clearly they didn’t want her looking this good in Extraordinary You—not that she’d have held a candle to Dan-oh, regardless.)

13A. Also for the record: the dating show arc was more Single’s Inferno than ALL of Single’s Inferno 3. 

14. Yes, I had to pause bits of the dating show arc to wait out my second hand embarrassment. 

15. Here’s a fun detail: they gave the young version of 2nd Male Lead the same nose mole that Surly Lawyer has. 

16. In Episode 2, the TV news mentions that it is “Wednesday, May 3rd,” which sent me running to the internet because May 3rd was a Friday, this year. So, after some quick research, I discovered that this meant the show was either set in 2023 or 2028—though, not too long after my skillful use of online calendar functions, Ki-baek goes to host that awards show, which explicitly mentions that it’s the 2023 ceremony. So…not the most impressive display of my skills as the world’s greatest detective, but I say it still counts. 

17. I wondered if the show was going to tie back any of the “sneezing = lose control” element to the fact that Ki-baek had recently quit smoking, but…no. I think the smoking thing was just to show that he had cut a stress relief technique from his life. 

18. …so, like, why was he hallucinating in the early parts of the show? Was it just an excuse to get Kang Han-na to put on an adorable shark hat? Because I can get behind that logic. 

19. “We never take a trip together as a family, so let’s do that now! But I also won’t be able to ride with you in the car to go up there. Yes, I know this all sounds like a setup for something terrible to happen to you when you’re on the road, but I’m sure everything will be fine.” —Ki-baek (essentially), circa Ep. 10

20. They do a terrible job of setting up that Woo-ju was adopted. 

20A. Also…what the f*** is this about Woo-ju’s adoptive mom wanting to kill herself? And how is Woo-ju already aware of this fact?! Where did any of this come from???

21. I love the running gag that every time the doctor sits down to eat, Ki-baek interrupts him for a consultation. Lasts the whole season. 

22. I can’t believe they did a time jump halfway through the series. Or montaged the start of the main duo’s relationship. Or did a second time jump in the finale. Or that half the finale is the frikkin’ kid’s school play. Or—look, I’m just saying, the second half of the show made some strange choices.

23. …except for the kiss at the playground. Goodness me, one of my favorite K-drama smooches, no question. 

24. I didn’t see Ki-baek’s dad having a badass fight scene coming, that’s for sure.

25. I loved that neither Ki-baek nor 2nd Male Lead had any idea what MBTIs were (because they’re too old for that trend). Their confused exchange after one of the girls brings it up amused me greatly. 

25A. (Again: INTP.)

26. Relatedly: the girls are trying to riddle out the clue that explains what all the guys on the dating show have in common, and the big giveaway that one of the girls will be each guy’s first love turns out to be “Suzy”—which, thanks to Heart Signal 4, I know is a reference to her turn in Architecture 101, for which she earned the nickname “the Nation’s First Love.”

27. Oh, and you know who else was awesome? Woo-ju’s friend-eonnie. (The one with the kid.) Of course Ki-baek’s brother fell for her—who wouldn’t? She was super-cool.

And…yeah, I think we can end it there.

So, yeah, the first half of this show felt like it was almost tailor-made for me, and I enjoyed it to the moon and back. But the second half sort of stumbles around, knocking into the half-formed plot points the writers scattered about the set. But, as much of a mess as the second half turned out to be, it was still fun—and, more importantly, heavily bolstered by the near-perfect first half. (No, genuinely—when it turned into a dating show, Erin, I just…just…!!!)

It’s going to end up falling out of my Top Three for the year, thanks to the later episodes, but I can always just stop watching after Episode 7, so…it’s all good. 

Hope all’s going well for you. Like, literally everything: hope you’re feeling good, hope you’re having fun, hope the weather’s to your liking, hope you accidentally put a hole in your bedroom wall and discovered a small stack of gold bars, hope at least one person tells you you’re swell every day. That’d make me happy to know.

Not as happy as you finally putting out that Lizzy McAlpine cover album I’ve been asking for, but pretty close. 

…ANYWAY.

More soon.

—Daryl