Autumn's Concerto had all the hallmarks of an epic romance novel. Rich, larger than life hero, sweet innocent heroine, the adorable love child, scheming parents, the ever present love triangle, grandiose declarations of love ... yeah, the whole nine yards. It SHOULD have been wildly entertaining, the type of love story to sweep any and every romantic off their feet. Sadly, it just did not happen. Not for me. In fact, I probably would have enjoyed it a lot more had it been a novel rather than this TV show. The story had enormous potential, but fell apart under the weight of crappy, disjointed writing, dubious casting and uninspired direction. I can’t have much respect for a drama when things happen to suit the writers, rather than the circumstances they’ve placed their characters in. I can’t have much respect for a drama when things aren't consistent. Couple a bad script with a not so great lead actor and you have a bit of a hot mess on your hands. I know I'm about to raise the ire of many a Vaness Wu fangirl, but I'm sorry, it has to be said: the brother cannot act. At least not in Autumn's Concerto he couldn't. There were times when he seemed really into his character and other times when he literally seemed to have lost the plot. He just did not embody that charismatic stage presence required to bring alive a larger than life character like Guang Xi. I also didn’t find him attractive enough so not even brownie points for being man candy could save him. Lead actress An Andy came across more natural and a lot more comfortable in her skin, however given the horrible material she had to work with her character didn’t amount to much. She had a good start, but not much later she morphed into a bland, uninteresting shell of what she could have been. She pretty much spent the entire drama after the first 6 episodes being frustratingly passive. Thank goodness the supporting cast were decent. I liked President Fang even though she seemed to have ice running through her vains. She was an intriguing character who I felt strangely sympathetic toward even though I couldn’t tell why until the end. The villagers of Hua were a wild, hilarious bunch. I was particularly taken with second lead, Hua Tuo Ye. It was very easy to like this guy. You know the saying ‘what stays too long serves two masters’? Well, this pretty much sums up Guang Xi and Mu Cheng’s relationship to the point where Hua Tuo Ye started to look like the better catch simply because he was PRESENT in Mu Cheng’s life, taking on duties and responsibilities that should have been Guang Xi’s. Yet another indication of shoddy script development if your audience spends most of the drama wishing somebody else gets the girl. Last but not least there’s Guang Xi and Mu Cheng's son Xiao Le. The kid’s a show stopper. I loved him, but for a 5 yr old, little man sure had some ridiculously grown up lines and was too wise beyond his years. I didn’t buy an ounce of it. Another failure of the script? I think so. Lousy direction? Yupp! Finally the music choices in this drama were atrocious. They played the grating, high pitched theme song literally every 10 seconds throughout the entire drama. When the theme song wasn’t on, random use of different genres of music were tossed in. There were a couple scenes covered with medieval tunes which had absolutely NO relevance to said scenes at all. I mean, WHAT??? Did an amateur compose the score? And it doesn’t end there. Constant flashbacks (which slowed the story down to a snail’s pace), disruptive cut-ins to repeat a scene that just played or to show spoilery future scenes ran rampant. Imagine, just when you’re getting into story … BAM! You’re pulled right out of it by these ridiculous machinations. I don't know what the producers were thinking. It had a great premise, but was executed with catastrophic results. While I was still able to enjoy it somewhat, watching this drama gave me a major headache. I can't give it more than a 6, and that's being quite generous, considering... It's okay to watch Autumn's Concerto, if only for the few romantic scenes. One thing I did appreciate about this drama is that it showed intimacy between the characters quite realistically without compromising the virtue of the actors. The Koreans could learn a thing or two from Autumn's Concerto in that regard.