Wednesday 3:30 PM

I had a bit of time while cleaning up my office and one of the Kdramas on my follow list had randomly short episodes (anywhere from 15 to 25 minutes long). It also had older characters (30's...though, yeah, barely and I'm pretty sure the dude was very early 20's when this was filmed--it aired in 2017), which I'm always looking for, though the story is that whole "let's pretend to date to make my ex jealous" thing.

Anyway, it's called Wednesday 3:30 PM (referring to the time of the week/day when women are apparently at their most tired and "ugly").

Seon Eun Woo (Jin Ki Joo) was unceremoniously and quite callously dumped by her longtime boyfriend, Baek Seung Gyu (Ahn Bo Hyun). It happens on the same day as her childhood friend, Yoon Jae Won (Hongbin), moves back to town and takes over the cafe (that she was dumped in). He winds up moving in with her (the cafe coincidentally burns down that same day and he has to use the money he was going to use on a house to fix it) and they concoct a plan to get Baek back. Jae Won takes Eun Woo out on these lovely little dates every Wednesday at 3:30 PM and they post pictures of her on Instagram (or something similar) showing how happy she is--making her pretty/happy during a time when all the other women are looking their ugliest. You know, make the asshole jealous.

Watching a movie...

Meanwhile, they are reconnecting. They've known each other since they were little kids. Took baths together. Grew up together. They bicker affectionately. She threatens him with bodily harm periodically. He teases her but from the "now" and the flashbacks, you can see he's always looked out for her too.

Of course, you can see them starting to have feelings beyond friendship, though Eun Woo is still grieving over her relationship as old beau dates a pretty new girl in the office (she works there too; seriously, people, office romance is generally a bad idea, y'know). The complication that will probably cap this off is that Jae Won had a crush on the lady he took over the cafe from and she'll, I'm sure, come back soon. And their plan succeeded -- as of episode 6, ex-douchebag does want her back and has dumped his new girl for his old girl.

It's working surprisingly well considering that the episode lengths don't allow for a lot of fleshing out and the actors are relatively newish to acting. Hongbin is only 25 now (just looked it up) and got his start as a Kpop Idol in 2012. A baby. They are both sometimes a bit stilted with their delivery, but they also have some nice moments; particularly the ones in which Eun Woo and Jae Won are happy together and not angsting over something. It's fairly sweet. The supporting characters are decent enough too. Though the character of the boyfriend is really a total dick. No idea about the actor, though I'm sure he's fine. ;)

With added dog belly!

Might even finish it tonight, since there are only 10 episodes total. Will update this post when done. It's soft, which is, I guess, what I needed today.

Edit: Finished it. It was good. It wasn't AH-mazing or anything, but it was solid. As I suspected, the other lady came back and to further complicate it, she'd been gone because she had a brain tumour. So, yeah, added guilt. Because Jae Won was all ready to go confess. Instead, he winds up running away (to California? Though he winds up in Jinju?), not realising that Eun Woo had already broken it off with jerkface boyfriend.

Actually, that was one of the better moments in the show. Because she left the dude (not even knowing that he'd been out clubbing with babes all the time) for herself. Yes, it was partly because she was in love with Jae Won, but she did it for herself, not for him. Good move, show writer.

There was an unnecessary 1 year separation at the end, but at least it was just a year, I guess. Not sure why this is such a big thing in Kdramas either? Why not a month? A week, even? In a show like this in this situation, it would have been enough.

I did enjoy this one. It's got a very stereotypical plot, but it was fine. It did what it set out to do and had a surprising amount of development considering how short it was. The actors were okay, but, to be honest, there weren't any HUGELY emotional scenes for them to show off in anyway. It's a low key show. In some ways, that's refreshing. They can't ALL be tearjerkers with huge emotional highs and lows, right? That said, the chemistry between the leads was good, though I also can't (at the moment) imagine watching it again. Does that make sense? I almost wish it had been longer and more developed though maybe if it had been I'd be sitting here complaining about how long it was. Ha. Anyway, a solid, sweet little Kdrama. Nothing outstanding, but nothing bad either.