Fight For My Way is like a really beautiful fruit but with no actual taste. When you bite into it, you think it’s flavorful at first l but as you chew there’s actually no taste.
Sadly, even though the drama had a promising start as I watched more, I gradually lost interest like I was not interest to know the story further than it was already shown. I have rather conflicting feelings with Fight For My Way, I liked the drama but most of the times it felt like a task watching. I wasn’t feeling any joy or excitement, I liked it but not to the point of actually being interested in the story or the relationship of the characters.
Despite the writer making good characters, she failed to make them shine. Ae Ra will remain as a female character I like but regardless of that, the drama as a whole turned to be a miss for me. Again, the premise was good yet we have good characters with a boring development process which made me be in the mood to do and iron my laundries as I was watching. Maybe I am too picky or dramas with a summery feel aren’t for me, however, this one is good only to the point of being a background sound as you do something else around the house.
While I did like the characters separately, I liked Dong Man and Ae Ra as a couple, which felt like a normal 20 something couple, at the same time I found them boring. There was something missing from the whole relationship (maybe) which made it seem flat as a whole. On the other hand, Joo Man and Sul Hee felt like they were the main couple, as Ae Ra and Dong Man were there just as fill in characters. They gave the comedic relief that’s normally the ‘job’ of side characters, in the mean time, Sul Hee and Joo Man were out there making rounds and having a relationship that triggers the viewer.
Acting wise, although I like Park Seo Joon and followed his career even since the beginning, compared to Ahn Jae Hong, he lacks a lot in delivering emotion. Even if I hated Joo Man as a character, the actor was so good and I have no idea why but I found him to express so much with so little in the scene where Sul Hee finally tells Joo Man that she wants to break up. I like both Kim Ji Won and Park Seo Joon so I’m thinking that probably I was expecting too much from them. As I was watching their scenes I could not feel the characters, I could just see them playing themselves and not Ae Ra respectively Dong Man. With Sul Hee and Joo Man is another story, they were characters in a drama and not the actors.
I liked that after the breakup between Sul Hee and Joo Man she always made it clear that they are not together anymore. It was nice seeing her stand on her grounds by drawing a clear line while they were interacting. What I liked about Ae Ra the most is that she was always true to her principle and never did anything that could trample on them. Dong Man had a temporary personality of a middle scholar but I’m glad that he gradually matured by the end.
Unfortunately, somewhere in the middle the story turned superficial and I did not see a development of the four main characters, in the end it was all about their relationships and not about their road to adulthood. Right now, I consider Fight For My Way not as a product for the viewers but as a project where the actors and the staff had fun working on. Not like the actors and the staff having fun at their workplace is a bad thing, but they were having so much fun that they forgot to deliver the promised product. It’s like when you go to the store in the summer to buy a watermelon but the clerk gives you a squash. That’s a tremendous disappointment, especially in the summer.
Something that I appreciate about this drama is the friendship and the chemistry between the characters. It was an easy to watch drama, perfect for the summer time but also obviously too summery, if that makes sense. To put it simple, it’s the normal drama that air in the summer. It was laid back without major conflicts. In fact, the conflicts were never the main point of the story but rather the characters and their interaction.
Sadly the writer didn’t make use of the promising characters and when the drama ended, we actually got back to the beginning, which means there weren’t many changes or developments apart from the relationships. If we are to take each character, separately, they did not grow however as a group they did.
In the end, the writer lost focus of what the plot was about and went on to focus on something else. The “mistakes from the past” was something more interesting than showing youth and the growth of the main characters. Also, I didn’t like how she played the pity card for Joo Man and Hye Ran. These two characters left a bad taste in my mouth and when I saw the writer trying to make the viewers pity them all I could do is roll my eyes at the stupid turnaround.
Would I recommend this drama?
Yes, it’s light and good to give it a try but it’s not the type of drama that can easily squeeze into someone’s top 10. The OST is lovely, nothing memorable but it blends well with the scenes and I think I can give it listen once in a while.
Four Seasons Dramas! 