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Tough Love
Based off of Taiwanese drama In Time With You, The Time We Were Not in Love is a romantic melodrama depicting how two best friends eventually fell in love with each other. The premise is really quite simple and even a bit too plain for my taste. But I decided to put away my prejudice as the drama boasts two of my all time favorite actors, Ha Ji Won and Lee Jin Wook, playing the main characters Oh Ha Na and Choi Won. It also has nearly the exact same supporting cast that helped make Pinocchio a massive success. But beyond a charming start, I quickly found myself getting bored from the slow pacing, losing interest in the shallow characters, and becoming frustrated at the predictable storyline. I really wanted to fall in love with this drama, but was disappointed that the time I spent with it indeed turned out to be “a time we were not in love”.
Beyond a charming start, I quickly found myself getting bored and losing interest.
Episodes 1-3 Review
The beginning of The Time We Were Not in Love is good: natural acting, adorable chemistry, glamorous visual impact, and a dose of surprise all add to the entertainment value of the drama. Let me break it down further. First, it’s a rare treat to see Ha Ji Won play a confident and charming career woman full of sass compared to her past roles. Her flawless acting makes her character Ha Na, a 34-year-old marketing team lead of a shoe company, very memorable and relatable. Her great chemistry with costar Lee Jin Wook makes Ha Na’s 17-year-long friendship with childhood friend and flight attendant Choi Won extremely convincing.
Secondly, the drama is truly a feast for the eyes. From eye-candy actors to Ha Na’s impeccable fashion style, every scene of the present day feels modern and cosmopolitan. The flashy present is contrasted with frequent vintage 1990’s-themed flashbacks to showcase Ha Na and Won’s history since high school. Through the flashbacks, we see various traces of Won’s “more than friend” feelings towards Ha Na despite his adamantly claiming he will never love her. As much as I anticipate seeing Ha Na’s daily outfit and shoe changes, I’m equally eager to find out why Won’s turning a blind eye to the obvious mutual attraction from Ha Na.
Last but not least, The Time We Were Not in Love‘s attention-grabbing intro is complete with the addition of kingka intern Ki Sung Jae (Kim Myung Soo), who immediately spices things up with a heart-melting noona romance. Sung Jae makes Ha Na’s (and every female viewer’s) heart flutter with dreamy gestures like bringing her snacks, walking her home, and shielding her from the rain. Unfortunately for Ha Na and I, the too-good-to-be-true fantasy love story ended quickly when Ha Na inadvertently finds out the real reasons behind Sung Jae’s attentiveness. Feeling devastated, Ha Na calls Won to vent and he drops everything to come to her rescue. While I regret the early exit of flower boy Sung Jae, I too look forward to the new possibilities between Ha Na and her guardian angel Won.
Episodes 4-6 Review
These episodes kick off the main arc of The Time We Were Not in Love — falling in love with the best friend. Spurred by the return of Ha Na’s former boyfriend, pianist Cha Seo Hoo (Yoon Kyun Sang), Won begins to wonder for the first time if it’s okay for him to love Ha Na and advance their relationship beyond just friends. At the same time, Won’s colleague Lee So Eun (Choo Soo Hyun) continues to chases after him persistently, causing Ha Na to feel a sense of jealousy that she is quick to deny and dismiss.
Just when I’m given a ray of hope in seeing further advancement of our main character’s relationship, the rain comes pouring down with Seo Hoo’s aggressive confessions of wanting to get back together with Ha Na. Seo Hoo’s self-centered and arrogant ways take Ha Na by a storm, despite her grudge against him from leaving her without a word three years ago. Not thrilled to see an unwelcoming and unlikable character appear suddenly out of thin air, I begrudgingly watch on to find out how he’s going to ruin the party for Won.
Episodes 7-9 Review
Seo Hoo uses his partnership with Ha Na at work as an excuse to spend time with her and tries to win her over at every opportunity. To my disappointment, though Ha Na tries to reject him on the surface, she secretly reminisces on their past times together. While Won naively trusts Ha Na’s resolution to not get back together with Seo Hoo and finally tells Ha Na how he really feels about her, I know things won’t work out so easily for him.
As much as I have feared, the storyline begins to develop towards an incredibly predictable outcome. Sure enough, after an unnecessarily long tug-of-war with Seo Hoo, Ha Na ends up admitting that she can no longer push him away — even at the risk of alienating Won. I’m beginning to dread how much longer I’ll have to bear with Seo Hoo’s annoying character and the equally awkward acting.
As a side effect of Won accepting his feelings for Ha Na, he turns down Seo Eun’s affections, which practically renders her character useless from this point on. Yet Seo Eun is just one of the many seemingly meaningless secondary characters ranging from Ha Na’s family members to Won’s colleagues. They take turns to fill up each episode with random acts of dull comedy or senseless romance, making it that much harder for me to hold onto any remaining interest in the drama.
Episodes 10-12 Review
These next few episodes of The Time We Were Not in Love can only be described as grueling. As Ha Na and Seo Hoo’s relationship heats up, my interest in the drama drastically cools down. I can’t wrap my mind around why Ha Na would give Seo Hoo a second chance when he’s just as stifling, sporadic, and selfish as ever. The only consistent thing about him is his mopey expression universally applied to all circumstances.
Meanwhile, Won intentionally tries to create distance and hide his feelings for Ha Na to respect her space. But the drama literally turns his character into a meaningless vagabond without Ha Na — wandering around doing random things aimlessly and lifelessly just to get his fair share of screen time. The only new thing we find out is why Won chose to not allow himself to love Ha Na for nearly two decades. And it’s a reason so silly I nearly scoffed.
With half of the key characters like Won and Seo Eun having no purpose at the moment, the pacing of the drama practically slows down to the speed of a crawling turtle. Supporting characters and their pointless side stories reign the screen while I count down the hours until Ha Na is finally done with Seo Hoo.
Episodes 13-16 Review
The writing of The Time We Were Not in Love is truly lame and filled with plot holes until the very end. Ha Na’s feelings for Seo Hoo takes a sudden turn and she tries to break up with him. Yet Seo Hoo magically disappears for a few days with no explanations of where he was and what he was doing offered to either Ha Na or the viewers. So Ha Na gets the perfect excuse to end things with him.
Once Seo Hoo is out of the picture, there’s little stopping Ha Na from finally getting together with Won for a happily ever after. The drama is still just as slow and unproductive as usual, but at least the chemistry between Ha Na and Won is a lot easier on the eyes.
Sadly for The Time We Were Not in Love, even the combined powers of megastars Ha Ji Won and Lee Jin Wook could not save its cliche storyline and poor execution. I leave the drama feeling like I’ve aged 17 years waiting for this tedious love to finally come to fruition.
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