Extraordinary You (2019)

I was intrigued by this show's plot and have been watching it since the first week. I am writing this review since I saw the top reviews weren't flattering and I have seen better top reviews for shows way less appealing. I will discuss the show's strengths and weaknesses in this review:
Strengths:
Plot: I know it had several flaws but I still appreciate it as it was something new and certainly different from the usual stuff we see in kdramas. So if you are in the mood to see something new while having elements you are familiar with as well, I think you can try this show out.
Performances: The show had stellar performances from all the young actors, be it Hye Yoon for Dan Oh or Young Dae for the living cliche Oh Nam Ju, these young actors showed potential and I hope to see them in more shows.
Characters: This is one opinion that many will disagree with it, since I saw many complaints with the characters that were quite valid but in my case I could understand all characters and their motivations which is enough for me, I am not bothered by a character crying a lot if I can understand why they are doing so. I may not agree with all the things the characters do but if I eventually understand them and their motivations that is enough.
Weaknesses:
Exploration of main theme: My biggest problem with the show is that they could have explored their plot more, I have read the webtoon the show is based on, the webtoon really explores what it means to be an extra, the show does too but it could have done it better.
Messy Plot: I think the show got messy at points and some things never really got explained much which I don't mind that much as I don't mind making my own theories and assumptions but I will say it got confusing at times.
There is another plot point I have issues with but that would be a spoiler.
I say its a show worth watching even if you don't like how it resolves because it is still a very fun watch and leaves an impression. I am someone who really enjoyed W: Two Worlds which is a bit similar you can say and also has a good amount of flaws but still I enjoyed watching it. These shows are a great ride and I actually am interested in knowing what will happen next, I appreciate these shows a lot even if the execution could be better because both these shows were good efforts at doing something different.

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The show had potential and the script was just dumber than usual. The beginning build-up of our male mc was nice to reveal his face but everything after that just felt unnatural and forced or a last-minute plugin for the plot to continue. I especially hate Lee Jae Wook's role. They try to make him understandable and a confident male lead, but he ends up feeling and looking like an a**hole no matter what he does. I'm not saying he doesn't have a scene where he's nice but it's just forgotten because of the future scenes after it where he goes back to his roots and starts b*tchen about how he's the lead and the other's are extra's for the story. Our main characters try to be different from the people with no role in the story but end up not feeling any different from the cliches they were complaining about on others. I only survived watching this show through because I wanted to know the ending and that was my only motivation after episode 12. Watch this show if you want but that's my take on this so of course, this is just my OPINION. Please don't bash without an actual reason and Thank You for Reading.

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Clear and fair without spoilers

Befor starting sorry for length

I started watching this drama because of it's
9.1 ratting I thought it's like drama ' w ' (two world's ) but it's different and I like dramas with happy ending ,even drama was good but if it has sad ending I don't get satisfaction , thank God this drama has happy ending and in some reviews about this drama says the ending is in rush but it's wrong

Story:
The story is good but the flash back is the biggest drawback of this drama the link between present and past is a bit confusing
And we will have a lot of questions with out answers even after the drama end apart from that drama is good , In this drama is not a single character in this drama is killed even the bad character changes into good that's a relief for me

Music:

BGM is the best in this drama I enjoyed a lot
Some scenes are elevated to peaks because of bgm

Acting:

I like the female lead Dan oh acting so much IAM
Amazed by her acting and the male lead is also good but Dan oh dominated mail lead completely


Thank you for reading

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The META layered in "Extraordinary You" continously impresses and keeps it afloat.

I will not lie, I didn't have the foggiest of clues what I was in for when I pressed play. I did not know a single actor that made the main cast. I had not seen a commercial and thus was fully reliant on the MDL description, which we all know how that can be, cough cough. And the main reason I was giving it a try was I was having some side effects from my Covid vaccine shot and wanted to watch something sweet, easy, and fun as I dealt with fatigue, headaches, and general under-the-weather-ness.

I was lead here from the recommendations area under "True Beauty", and while I have mixed feelings on that drama (You can read my review of it as well) it was generally a show that fit the easy bill I just described. Thus I took my second shot of the day and gave this a chance.

Now a little about me, I am a bit of a fan of META works. I like the idea of deconstructing the constructs of a media's design. I feel it says a lot about us, as the audience, in what the world has come to expect, want, and generally accept as entertainment or art. It says a lot about art itself and how we manufacture it, mass supply it, and the shallowness that most works have become in being a product for consumption over something of true intrinsic value. I also like that META works also many times reveal the flaws of their own designs, the flaws of the genres of their creation, and the true gulf of distance that exists between media and the real world or characters versus people.

However, many META works end up succumbing to their own genres archetypes, become judgemental of the works they or critiquing, or end up just simply not entertaining and instead get lost inside their own deconstruction. You can have excellent works such as Stranger than Fiction, fun enough jaunts like The Man Who Defied the World of BL, or horrible monstrosities like Why R U. So its always a mixed bag on what you are going to get.

Extraordinary You surprised, and though I wouldn't put it in the ethos of Adaptation or Stranger than Fiction. It is very much on the stronger side of the genre, especially poignant considering it hides itself in the school yard female manga romance Kpop fiction genre. It had, honestly, a lot working against it. Does it pull everything off, no it doesn't, but it succeeds much much more than it fails.

Our main heroine Dan Ho, (Kim Hye Yoon) is an awesome character that looses her way. In one of my main gripes that keep this from being the best of the best, is that her character becomes sidelined in her own story. At the start she is energetic, driven, strong, funny, and determined. She awakens others from "the matrix" of their existence, brings characters from the obscure background of the comic world to the forefront and gives them identities and names, and is determined to take control of her own story. However, somewhere in the middle of this, she becomes a damsel accepting of her fated death at the hands of a heart defect, whose survival hinges on the actions of the two men in love with her.

How did that happen?

Our two Male leads Ha Ru (Rowoon) and Baek Gyung (Lee Jae Wook) are nothing if not polar opposites of each other as they try to be the leading man to our self realized lady. Ha Ru is a beautiful nothing who has no point to existing other than to fill the frame of a scene or an empty desk in a classroom. While Gyung is an arrogant 'it boy" who is one of a triumvirate in the school known as A3 ( I believe a tongue and cheek reference to Boys Over Flowers or Thailand's soon to be released remake F4, I haven't seen either.) a wealthy ruling all male elite team. He is also the predetermined fiancee of our heroine.

Early on this set-up is more than winning. Dan Ho scoffs at the ridiculousness of the school hierarchy, she quickly sees the toxicity of her betrothed and the relationship shes forced to endure, and curses the heavens, I mean writer, for the set-up of her heart condition. Change must happen, even if it takes every last bit of strength she has in her.

When the blond dyed Dried Squid Fairy (Lee Tae Ri) enters the fray as he flags our Heroine as a fellow self-realized character, the story's true META begins to take hold. He enlightens our lead, in what is a short but funny repeating gag when most who gain their ego's think themself the protagonist, that she is only an extra in this comic. She is there, to be nothing more than figure for use to ensure the main couple find eternal love. We begin to see how high school romances are designed. We get the bullies, the villains, the heartthrobs, the nobody's and the tragically expendable. We learn how each role is meant to interact, the basic arch they will all take, and the beats that are formulaic paint-by-numbers of what makes these cliched romances that are churned out non-stop, especially by Korea.

The story spends ample time here and always comes back to visit these tropes again, one of the greatest strngths is how it deconstructs the comics main Cinderella heroine and has her come to terms with the truths of her own character, throughout its runtime. But the real glory comes with how Extraordinary You begins to manipulate this META and the players of it. We learn rules that govern this world even when the players or not on a drawn panel or in the "shadow" versus on "stage." As more awaken we see characters confused that they are even the same when they are controlling themselves "shadow" as when they are controlled by the story "on stage." While other's personalities completely transform as if two different people. Some like their stories and want them to continue, while others, like our heroine, will give their last dying breath to change their fated path.

We begin to get emotional scars as we watch characters forced to do and say things against their will because the writer wants it so. We watch as hardship after hardship are placed upon extras by "the writer" to the point of cruelty just for the sake of the stories drama or to ensure the main couple fall into each others arms. And finally, as our core team learns a way of tricking the story to change what is happening "on stage" we learn the punishment for such interference as others are put in harms way or forced to do the stages biding instead. Ultimately characters become erased, redrawn, and the stories path becomes unknown.

If you came here just for the romance, you likely will not leave as happy as I did. It isn't that the romance isn't fun, lovely, or even beautiful, it is. It isn't that the romance doesn't drive the entire tale, it does. It is just, that the romance doesn't shine brighter than the interesting world around it. Watching these characters trying to beat their own creator (if you don't get God references by this point I don't know what to tell you.), trying to make their own choices and walk their own paths (a look at Societies conformity, expected societal roles and behaviors) and come to terms with the fact that this isn't their first story together (Yep, I'm spoiling that bomb to let you know reincarnation, karma, fate or Buddhist ideas get treated here as well) becomes far more exciting to me than the simple "we love each other and will endure it all" story. The tapestry that gets woven here is quite intricate and continuously ropes in more ideas to explore.

Just as the romance begins to get stale, someone or something is changed. You think someone is evil, then good, then no evil. Some you think are good you then are sure are evil, and then become neither. You get to venture into and entire world set into Joseon times, and see the tropey vying for the throne story that exists there. While a few characters do end up being pretty pointless, and you trying to understand where they will eventually fall was fruitless, spending time with at least one of them was always a joy anyway. And when the story starts to close in on itself, and the writer starts wrapping up all the characters and places, making them disappear into the abyss of story-less-ness (The Nothing from The Never Ending Story comes to mind), at least one actually made me choke up a bit as they go off into the unknown.

In the end it is bittersweet, beautiful, poignant, and annoying all in one my friends. It soars high and also hits turbulence. The big bad gets off Scott-free and easy, in what again goats my anger and continues to be a running problem I find in Kdramas. This story even deconstructs how romances have the audience, shippers, and friends rooting for, forgiving, and overlooking toxic characters, behavior and situations just for the sake of story and romance. It shows us how when characters subjected to these relationships are given free will they immediately try and get away as no sane individual would really want this now matter how hot, rich, or popular the men might be even though these stories keep telling us otherwise. Yet, then the show ultimately forgives these same characters at the drop of a hat with no ramifications.

Again, this isn't a perfect journey and thus not getting a perfect score. But it is much better than it I thought it would be, and by far one of the strongest stories I have yet to come across in Kdrama even if it falls victim to some of the tropes it highlights and lives in the candy coated world of high school made for teenage girls and their Kpop boy fantasies. For a high school romance it is exceptional, for an adult romance its okay, and for a critical META analysis of the world it exists, its pretty damn strong with a nice dose of unexpected originality. 9.0/A/4 1/2-Stars. Definitely one of the best of its genre.

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Chefs kiss.

The story is so fresh and I always say this but I have no Idea why I put off watching this one. So good. I really love the vibes of fantasy kdramas because they usually always make me cry. (I love to cry) This one did not disappoint. This show was excellent and literally had me crying through the whole thing. I loved how I started off hating Baek Kyung and then that character developmentttt. Love how Nam Joo never gained awareness and was the only one in A3 running around oblivious 🤣 which leads me to... they could have done Do Hwa a little less dirty... But Yeo Joo Da asking if they all could date was a total vibe. Felt that girl 🤣 The casting wasssss amazing. Man I could watch Rowoon and Kim Hye Yoon cry forever. Beautiful cries. make me bawl. (did I mention I like crying)
anyways first review how did I do?
Can You tell I liked this kdrama.
The tears! And a happy ending. 32 episodes wasn't enough though. it never is.

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This drama isn't your typical school drama. Every school drama shares the same thing: focus on the leads and the second leads only, the supporting cast is irrelevant. Extra-ordinary You changed the basic ways school dramas are shown. Usually, with school dramas, the main classroom doesn't have that open friendly element. Everyone is so serious but the viewers don't get to know every single person in the classroom. Only the most important roles. What this drama did was take the viewers out of the main lead land and allow the supporting characters to contribute to the show. These characters made the show enjoyable and fun. They are always supporting each other and in the end, they all had a happy ending. School dramas are supposed to be fun and this drama took advantage of that and made it exciting. The one thing school dramas fail to do is keep that light-hearted element school dramas are meant to have. This series really created a new expectation for school dramas. School is always seen as stressful and serious. The viewers rarely get to see the fun side of it mainly because drama is the biggest part of the school. There aren't many comedic school dramas. Nowadays, there has been a decrease in school dramas. Future school dramas should take this show as an example of how to make school look fun. This drama is very very funny. They even made the last episode still have humor. Despite the sad/reliving conclusion, the drama ended on a good note that makes us viewers crave for more.

Now for the plot. This plot was very different. Something out of the ordinary. What caught most of us was how the lead Dan oh realized she's in a comic. Of course, we all expected her to be the main but twist was that her role is only there to help the main leads get together. We don't often get to see from the perspective of supporting characters. Through her perspective, we got to see more lively parts of a student's life and the harsh reality of knowing that your life could end at any minute. The lead Dan oh really sold this show with her phenomenal acting. Seeing the drastic contrast with her scenes in the stage and shadow is so intriguing to watch. Things got more interesting when more characters started becoming self-aware. It was at this point the show started to lost its charm but it still kept going strong and gave the viewers many memorable scenes. The second lead syndrome is strong in this one. Sometimes it was hard to decide who should get the girl. Both male leads are so brilliant and in some type of way, they both got the girl in the end. But did they really? In the stage yes, but in the shadow, no. The actors really made this show fun to watch. It was a real rollercoaster. The great thing about this drama is when they do the unexpected. This ending was part expected part unexpected. It depends on how you look at it.

The costuming is brilliant. They don't keep basic uniform attire, they modify it to match each character's personality. The cinematography is very great. The soundtrack is gorgeous. It has that school drama type sound to it. More upbeat and livid. The acting: phenomenal. I'm glad there was a bunch of rookie actors/actresses' that took part in this. It shows you that you don't need a big famous celeb to make your show special. Overall, this show is a 8.5 for me. This show deserved another season but you know Korea, they haven't even given us a moon lovers sequel yet. At least the show ended on a good note. If only we knew who the writer was...

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Don't hesitate for a second just go and watch it already! It's a great drama, with a great plot and an AWESOME cast. I definitely fell in love with Haru and Rowoon in real life. The female lead has a cute personnality and even if you'll dislike her face she's just has an adorable character. Personnally, the character I dislike the most is Oh Nam Ju for being so cheesy >.< And I LOVE LEE DO HWA he's a great man. This drama is an average rollercoaster of feelings but it's definitely worth your time!
❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️
Dont mind me just filling lines with hearts... I cant write a 500 character review!

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Extraordinary You !!!!

I love fantasy/romantic dramas and indeed I have seen a lot of them, according to the content of the drama I thought I would watch something like the drama w two worlds with the actor Lee Jong Suk, which was great, arranged chronologically and easy to understand the plot and the gradually developing scenarios, in this drama Extraordinary You I read conflicting reviews and stood out whether to see it, the decision to see it in the end was also because of the excellent cast like ro woon and... Lee Jee Wook and also because of curiosity, the drama turned out to be one big disappointment, that even at a certain point I wanted to stop watching it but I still gave it a chance and together with I already wanted you to get to the end.
The talented cast has to say, did a good job and amazing acting, they managed to convey their turbulent emotions in a professional manner. My problem was in the confused content, and very unclear, the plot line is so messed up that I felt like I was losing myself, there were many chapters where I felt that the plot was not progressing anywhere, and the chapters felt unnecessary, there were many open questions left at the end of the plot, even though the drama apparently ends with a happy ending, There are still unanswered questions, like How did this manga world happen? Who is the writer? Why were two comics written and if the writer (the unknown) wanted to change the historical plot why did he repeat the same story ? How did Kyung's brother become self-aware and what is his role? Will all the characters be stuck in this loophole forever? What is the strange portal? Why is the comic book stored in a library where everyone can easily find it?

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Maybe on some meta level it works otherwise it fails

The first few episodes are a total fake out, they're interesting and mysterious as characters start to figure out that they're in a comic. After that, the meta comes in...if the characters are intentionally one dimensional and vapid to represent that's what a comic book character is...then success! I doubt this is the intent, and either way it makes for an excruciating watch. The FL quickly wears thin and bounces around with little logic and an incredibly excessive cute speak style while her main interest (Haru) is the most vapid character ever...basically an empty bag of air. I could go on, but why bother, it's a good idea drowned by the banal.

Added a star for the cameo in True Beauty. That was funny and almost pokes fun at the excesses in this show.

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"Extraordinary You" was one of those dramas that I started watching not really expecting anything. I had just finished watching another drama and wanted to start a new one, but didn't really have any in mind. I kept seeing this title online so I thought I might as well try it out.
I was completely blown away, at first. The plot was very original and featured characters that seemed different from the normal. Dan-o, who lived her whole life not knowing that she is, in fact, a mere extra in a comic book, realised that what she really wants is to decide her own fate. In order to do that she needs the help of a boy with no name that, however, seems to have a connection with her that not even the writer of the comic book can control. The story was set-up really well in the first episodes and established all the characters and their backgrounds excellently. I caught myself wanting to watch more and more each time and I was so interested in the direction the story seemed to be going. I was especially surprised with the way Ju-da's plot progressed. Ju-da, the female protagonist of the comic book who, at first, follows all the cliche decisions of the writer and is completely dependent upon Nam-ju who is the male protagonist, slowly finds her own self. I would never expect for her to gain the freedom to stand up for herself in such a way, nor that she would end up choosing Nam-ju for the reasons that she did.
However, by half-way the drama fell into the classic trap that seems for some reason difficult to avoid, especially for fantasy/romance dramas like this one. The point of the story was slowly being lost, as a lot of the same things were happening without an actual impact on the general story (e.g. someone losing their memories but conveniently getting them back within the same episode, Dan-o being rushed to the hospital but nothing really happening besides that). The dialogues seemed to be dragging forever with no real value and there were so many filler scenes and scenes that were being repeated over and over. I felt especially bad for poor Baek Gyeong that was always saying the same lines. Even the main mystery of the story in the previous comic book was unfolded in such an anticlimactic way.
By the end of the story, so many important questions regarding the writer, the comic book world and the truth to the characters' individuality and bonds were left unanswered and the only thing that seemed to kept going was the relationship between Dan-o and Ha-ru. It felt like there was no real resolution,
Overall, this drama had a lot of potential and even though the last few episodes were really disappointing, it had a very strong start, so I wouldn't say I regretted watching it. If you like light-hearted romance dramas with no serious plot twists this might be a drama that you enjoy. But don't have too many expectations from the story because you are bound to be disappointed. Instead, focus more on the romance between the main characters and be grateful that you, yourself, are not a comic book character!

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