I was torn between giving Midas a 7.5 or an 8 but I rounded up because I think the overall rating on MDL should be higher. This is a pretty tightly plotted drama about the battle between Jang Hyuk's character, a person who grew up poor and became a brilliant financial broker, and his mentor, a woman who's a Wall Street veteran from a chaebol family who has no scruples and a heart of ice.

The drama's main focus is on the financial battles and it's obvious that whoever wrote the script did their homework since it's stuffed with terms like M&A, financial holding companies, hostile takeovers, white knight investors, etc. I don't think you need to understand all the terms to understand what's going on because it's generally explained in the context of the drama but I can see why this might turn off viewers. I personally found it interesting because the stakes throughout are sky high with family betrayals, stints in prison, affairs and even a few murders.

Jang Hyuk is uncharacteristically restrained here. You won't see him screaming or fighting (much) or taking off his shirt (except for one memorable sauna scene). It's still a good performance as you see the cogs turning in his brain as he tries to outwit the woman he once worshipped but who betrayed him and is now trying to destroy him.

Kim Hee Ae is terrific as the rich bitch who seems to have everything under control until she becomes locked in a battle with Jang Hyuk and is threatened by her partners, the owners of a shadowy hedge fund that launders money from illegal sources. She and JH had great chemistry and I wish her character had been romantically involved with him instead of Lee Min Jung. A love to hate story would've been a lot more interesting than the anemic romance we got (more on that below).

I enjoyed the chaebol family betrayals between Kim Hee Ae and her older brothers as their father pits them against one another to get a piece of his fortune. But the youngest brother was completely useless. You could completely cut him out of the story and you wouldn't miss a thing. I'd say the youngest sister is pretty useless too except there's a plot twist involving her that becomes very important to the story in the end.

The only thing I really disliked was Lee Min Jung as the female lead. Her character was boring and self righteous and spent most of the drama lecturing Jang Hyuk. I've enjoyed this actress in other dramas so I think it was mostly a writing problem but the actress also had zero chemistry with JH, which really became noticeable when contrasted with the sexual tension between JH and Kim Hee Ae.

A lot of people disliked the ending because it wasn't the typical "bad guys get punished" ending but I thought it worked for this drama.