A Prefabricated Family (2024)

Entertaining, heartfelt, slow at times

This drama had depth and heartache and layered characters with complicated lives and relationships. This drama did an excellent job navigating difficult topics and although certain plot lines dragged on at times, it was still brilliant and well executed. I'd say Hwang In Youp is my favourite actor and he delivered a great performance as usual in this drama! His expressions are so great and he was the perfect choice for his character. Everyone else was great too, but he really shone brightly! Definitely give this drama a chance if you like the found family trope or heartfelt, deep, emotional stories about human connections and disconnections!

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Relation père et fils

C'est Kang Haen Jun qui m’a le plus touché dans ce drama. Sans son personnage, je n’aurais peut-être pas autant aimé. Plus que l’histoire d’amour des personnages principaux, c’est la relation entre le père et le fils qui m’a captivée. J’ai particulièrement pleuré lors des départs pour l’université, des moments très émouvants symbolisant une ktransition majeure.
J'ai pleuré tout au long de l'épisode 9. 😭 J'étais très touchée. Aprés je ne comprennais pas pourquoi ils ne reviennent pas vivre avec leur pére aprés leur retour. 😏


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Kang Haen Jun was the character that touched me the most in this drama. Without his character, I might not have enjoyed it as much. More than the love story of the main characters, it was the relationship between the father and son that captivated me. I especially cried during the moments when they left for university, such emotional scenes symbolizing a major transition.
I cried throughout episode 9. 😭 I was very moved. After that, I didn’t understand why they didn’t come back to live with their father after their return. 😏

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Worth a watch with better and worse things.

Personally I am a fan of Go Ahead. The bonds, the friends and family connections and yes even the romance because from my pov, Ling Xiao loved JianJian all his life and never considered her as a sibling. Now to make more sense, about why this worth your time and what I personally thought was did wrong lets list it out..

The Good:
1. Actors did an incredible job. Absolutely made me cry a million tears just like original did. The dads were perfect and so were other, well mostly.
2. The romantic angle of Sanha and Juwon, romance was done better in this one somehow, more mature, more stable and more heart fluttering.
3. The second pairing, thank the lords for that. I wanted the best friend to fulfill her first love and I am glad they got their chance here.
4. Better ML. While Ling Xiao was good but Sanha is incredible, he is more vocal about his feelings, he lashes out when he should and also InYoup for this role was perfect. He did it more justice than the OG. For me he carried the show with the two dads. And his character was the one that made this adaption more on a good side that OG.
5. FL's career choice. I loved how she ended up as baker because she loved cakes and also how they put the sports injury line because that broke my heart.
6. Bromance, in this one brothers were better connected and more comfortable with each other. Well done!

The Bad:
1. FL. I love the actress but Juwon's character was a downgrade for me from Jian Jian. The school Juwon is not as bubbly and quirky, and the adult one is also not as good but still better. She was not as charming at the OG FL for me.
2. The living in Seoul and not meeting for 10 years with a girl you love so dearly, umm...should have send him abroad tbh to make this more believable.
3. Leaving out the adult friendships of females from the OG. I wanted to see that because I absolutely adored it.
4. The SL, he was good but compared to OG, wasn't as mature which I kinda missed.
5. Reunion and FLs reaction. It feels like FL didn't grew up all those 10 years and still whines like that. Any aspect connected to FL was better in OG.

And since Good is a bit more than Bad, I would recommend it. I binged it and it made me cry. Loved bits of it, just didn't end up loving it as much as the Go Ahead.

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#haedal4ever

nunca assisti a obra original, mas fui assisti os primeiros eps dessa adaptação e eu fiquei tão impactada pela história que já fui emocionada dizendo que seria meu top 3 do ano.

E de fato, foi uma história linda, muito gostosinha de acompanhar e com várias cenas que me marcaram, mas que com o tempo ficou claro que uma adaptação de 16 episódios seria muito pouco pra uma história que originalmente foi feita em 40+ episódios. Infelizmente o maior defeito foi realmente esse, o que é uma pena, porque eu sei que se tivesse um pouco mais de tempo o desenvolvimento seria muito melhor.

Além disso, o arco de redenção final da mãe do Sanha foi completamente desnecessário, já que não tinha nada no mundo capaz de mudar a minha opinião (acredito que a de todo mundo) sobre ela. Acho que esse tempo que deram de tela pra ela podia ser trocado por cenas do Haejun e da Dal que na >minha opinião< foram o melhor casal (torci horrores e senti falta de mais ceninhas, não vou mentir)

De forma geral, sou uma grande fã de dramas familiares e family by choice aqueceu meu coração, não entrou pro meu top 3, mas com certeza estará no meu top 10 do ano!

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funsies kdrama def recommend

family by choice is a fun drama centered around the relationships of haejun, juwon, and sanha who have a sibling-like bond but have no blood relation to one another.

what this drama does great:
- gives us a multifaceted view of all the main characters. we're able to see life/the timeline of the drama from all 3 of them which i thought was great! getting to know each character felt so personal.
- haejun and juwon's dad had some of the most sob-worthy scenes ever. their relationship was so heartwarming. haejun's healing journey was so great to watch and also to see dal and him help each other through hardships throughout their lives.
- their take on familial troubles wasn't shallow and actually felt very realistic.
- every episode while all having pretty sad moments at times always felt really giddy it's just a really fun watch overall it makes you wish you could be there too
- NO love triangle thank the lords

what could've been done better:
- while sanha's 14 year long or however many year long crush on sanha was well drawn out, we never got that from juwon. it was just her being flustered by sanha's confession(s) and then dating him. i wish they could've either added scenes where maybe in their younger years she thought of him that way too or have done like flashback scenes idk it just. for a childhood friends to lovers trope was not a very deep romantic relationship
- haejun's america storyline was idk all over the place and needed better integration to the plot. also similar to my issue w juwon he should've had a gradual liking to dal while im happy they got together at the end he literally said in that ep that they aren't good together and then later asked her out

overall lovedddd this show chaeyeon is such an amazing actress

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Interesting premise

I am not going to wade into the "which is better, the original Chinese drama or this" controversy. I have never watched the Chinese original (and don't intend to) so I can't comment.

The only thing I want to touch on is the mental and social commentary stemming from this drama. First, I find it interesting that this 'alternative' family arrangement has been highlighted, perhaps as the writer's hope that single-parent families and alternative family arrangements will one day become normalised in Korea. It is often not their fault that such families end up the way they are, and they shouldn't face discrimination because of it. Not everyone is fortunate enough to have a happy 'standard' family and as society, we shouldn't comment on what makes another family happy.

Second, what really bugs me is the lack of acknowledgement of mental health. San Ha's mom clearly has narcissistic personality disorder in the way that she manipulates everyone around her and never admits her responsibility for her own situation. Threatening suicide is one such example of manipulation. She needs psychiatric care. This in turn has caused San Ha untold mental anguish as manifested through his constant anxiety and insomnia. Just 'talking it out' won't make either sets of symptoms go away. This is unrealistic and I wished the drama could have handled it better.

Especially in a high pressure society like SK where there is already such a high incidence of suicide and other undiagnosed mental health ailments, this is the best opportunity to normalise help-seeking. As a doctor, Sanha really should have known better than to play to manipulation. There isn't even a need to make a big deal out of it - him putting his mom in a psychiatric ward would have made me feel so much better about her ending rather than letting her run away again!

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3 no-sibling

Beautiful relationship of these 3 "no-sibling", so different but so close and protective each other.
The meaning of family in this case is a choice of a "protective community" and not blood relationship.
A truly touching drama that made me cry for the difficult situations these abandoned kids found themselves in.
I appreciated how they gave continuity to the daughter's character, who was strong and determined when she was little with a predilection for one brother (the little girl was so cute) and she also had this character trait when she grew up.
I like hear dialect slang with different inflections.
I loved seeing the father who raised 3 children as his own.
I love the cast in generally.

On the contrary, it was a bit fantasy that after 10 years in contemporany come back the mother with a new child (a little sister), the other mother to pay the debt and also an unknown father.
Then the two boys left on the same day but even after 10 years they return on the same day?!
I hated the mother who pointed the finger at her poor son, again and again, even 10 years after abandoning him. Crazy! A toxic person.

PS: Bae Hyeon Seong looks a lot like Park Bo Gum.

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it gets better!!!

alright so im 12 episodes in and can i just tell you this show took a dramatic turn for me halfway through. i was thinking about dropping this show when i was around ep 6-7 because i couldn’t connect properly with the characters but oh GOD.

all of a sudden im sobbing my eyes out and can’t stop watching it. first of all i just wanna say i LOVE the relationship between kang haejun and juwon’s father. i feel like they have the most beautiful relationship amongst everyone and i cry every single time i see them together. the way juwon’s father truly raised haejun as his real son and cares so much about him melts my heart.

HWANG INYEOP. oh my god this man is absolutely insane. HE IS SUCH A GREAT ACTOR IM ACTUALLY IN SHAMBLES. his acting skills are so underrated in the kdrama world. the way he portrayed sanha’s character SO WELL, i was crying along with him. also, he is such a TEASE when it comes to juwon. he was literally giving me butterflies i haven’t felt in a LONG TIME. AND OBVIOUSLY HE IS SO HANDSOME I WAS SCREAMING INTO MY PILLOW EVERY NOW AND THEN

in conclusion, it gets better. i didn’t expect to be hooked so tightly when i first started the show. just hold on and enjoy the journey together with the characters.

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Picked up this drama as the plot line seemed quite engaging. Although I have never the highly rated and nostalgic original, I knew that this would be a great watch. The story is pretty self-explanatory and throughout the series we are introduced to both some very unlikeable and likeable characters, various issues surrounding family, health, social status, pride etc. Seems like a typical good ol' Korean drama. I really loved the cast at the beginning as well, but towards episode 8-9 I really dropped the engagement and wasn't looking forward to Wednesdays as much as I used to at the beginning when this first aired. Both couples just did not have any chemistry at all, so it was slightly hard of a watch. Safe to say it has been done and dusted, after this maybe it is actually worth watching the original and comparing the two, although I would assume my opinion would remain the same as most fans of this drama.

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Inicio promissor, porém....

Um drama que começou com um brilho promissor nos primeiros episódios, entregando uma narrativa bem construída e cheia de potencial, mas que na passagem de tempo tropeçou feio. O ritmo acelerado e a edição desleixada acabaram comprometendo a experiência, deixando as construções afetivas tão rasas que quase passam despercebidas. O casal protagonista, SanHa e JuWon, foi praticamente jogado junto na reta final, como se os roteiristas tivessem entrado em pânico: "Vamos juntá-los agora, ou não dará tempo!" O resultado? Uma química que beira o inexistente.

Por outro lado, me deixei cativar pelo casal HaeJun e Dal, mas a execução da relação deles conseguiu ser ainda mais desastrosa. O texto, especialmente em momentos cruciais, era de um nível quase embaraçoso. A cena do pedido de namoro é o ápice do constrangimento: HaeJun diz algo como "Meu sentimento por você não é tão forte quanto o seu por mim, mas vamos namorar mesmo assim." Sério? Que tipo de ogro acha que isso é uma boa ideia para um momento tão importante? Alguém precisava dar uma pausa no chá de cogumelos alucinógenos da sala de roteiristas.

No campo das atuações, o destaque absoluto vai para Choi Won Young. Mais uma vez, ele mostrou por que é um dos melhores veteranos em atividade. Seu desempenho como o pai de família foi impecável, talvez o personagem mais bem construído de todo o drama. No balanço geral, foi uma obra com um começo muito promissor, mas que perdeu o fôlego no final. Um bom drama, mas com ressalvas que não dá para ignorar. É isso.

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