Way Back Into Love & Queen of No Marriage

Sigh. So. I tried two more non-Korean dramas and one I couldn't even finish the first episode of. Er, actually, just checked and I didn't finish the first episode of either of them. Which is why I'm just doing one post for both. 

First was Way Back Into Love. It's a Taiwanese show, actually, from 2011. Not to be confused with (apparently) a new 2020 Chinese Drama titled the same thing with an entirely different plot. 

It's the story of a woman who returns home after a long absence living in the US. Since she's been gone, her mother has died and now it's just her father running a run-down B&B along with some friends (?) that the mother had taken in that are closer to the daughter's age. The father and daughter argue a lot. He's getting older. She'd left all those years ago with a boyfriend, which immediately made me wonder if there were a kid somewhere in the picture...though I didn't get to the point in the show where said kid was introduced...but I see now from a summary I just found that, yes, indeed, there is a kid. There's also an old love interest (now a local doctor). 

I was just...underwhelmed with the acting, the pace, and the story. I felt like I could guess the entire plot from the 38 minutes of the episode that I saw. It also had a couple of dudes that were obviously there mostly for comic relief. I didn't like any of the characters enough to invest my time in watching it, much like the 2 Fathers show I tried before this one. Especially at 22 episodes running about 65 minutes each (or more). 

I mean, there wasn't anything horrible about it. I've definitely seen worse. But life is too short. This just didn't grab me. It might also have been partly a production quality thing -- it's older and it shows.

The second one, Queen of No Marriage, has actually been on my list a long time. But I only made it 22 minutes into that one. And, honestly, wanted to turn it off about 5 minutes in. It's also Taiwanese and circa 2009. It opens with a mother (who doesn't look old enough to have a 33 year old daughter, but hey) at a temple trying to work up some good karma for her daughter to get married...by having the priest whip her with a stick. Yeah. It's played for laughs but...yeah. Then we get a glimpse of the daughter, who is a reporter after a scandalous story. We also meet who will obviously be the potential love interest -- a handsome younger guy doing whatever part time jobs he can find and his sidekick (who wishes he were as handsome). 

Again, totally underwhelmed by the acting. And the comedic stuff that I just...didn't find all that funny. It's cheap jokes, people. I'd liked the idea of a noona romance (which was why it was on my list to begin with) but since she seemed to have the mentality of a 14 year old...er...just a big NOPE from me. While the main characters acting was okay (not amazing, but okay), the minor characters were...very, very stiff. I've seen high school plays with better acting. And more clever jokes.

So both of these are moving immediately to the Ditch List.