You're Beautiful: finally finished and the verdict is in
Ta-da!
I have finally finished You're Beautiful. I got through 14 eps earlier and watched the ending but I am a completist (sort of) and now finished the two eps in-between.
Verdict: Still rather meh, but shockingly with distance from its crazy fandom I realized that I didn't hate it.
Pros:
* funny, fast-paced script with some hilarious parodies (IRIS, fanfics, music vids) and riffs.
* some delicious acting by its young cast - especially Jang Geun Seok as Tae Kyung the emo diva. There is no hormonal interest here for me - not only is he way too young, he's entirely not my type, but despite that he made TK an absolute delight to watch and made me want to watch his future dramas. Park Shin Hye made Minam adorable a lot longer than she should have been by rights, Uee was hilarious as a futile schemer. Jung Yong Hwa was suitably pretty and a better actor than his counterpart Kim Hyun Joong in BOF, Lee Hongki was hilarious. etc.
* I actually liked the soundtrack a lot. I like sugary sweet pop so this was up my alley.
* A fangirl fantasy of what it's like to be in a boyband :P
Cons:
* I think my loss of interest in the second half was correlated directly to its biggest con - there was not much conflict or plot and the second half was when I realized it. Nothing really much happened. Any potential conflict was speedily resolved, every potential for a dramatic moment or situation undercut. There wasn't a strong character development or conflict - it was 16 eps of basically unchanged people having fun, like a long charming skit. This would have been fine for a mini-drama - say 5 eps long - but for a 16 ep drama it felt very draggy - there was not enough there for 16 hours' worth of eps. Especially since if there is no strong plot, there have to be either strong character development or really complex characters and this had neither - how could it when by its genre it was a fluffy fun trifle? But even a fluffy fun trifle as written by the usually-awesome Hong Sisters is too long when it's 16 eps.
* Minam the Heroine - I don't mind silly heroines, nor do I mind helpless ones, or long-suffering saintly selfless ones. But a combination of all those is deadly. She was simply a heroine type I did not enjoy in the slightest. When I had hope she'd grow up and change I was OK, but once I realized it was not happening, the drama really started to bug me. Once again, this heroine lack wouldn't have been so bad if this had a strong plot - because then there would have been other things to concentrate on rather than Minam all the time. Or a shorter length would have helped - I only went into Minam overdose in the second half.
* Love story - I could buy Minam and Tae Kyung liking each other, I just couldn't buy it in the long-term - that they would truly last or that there wasn't someone more compatible for them out there. I never really bought into the romance and that's a huge hurdle for a romcom.
* Taking their climax directly from "A Star In My Heart." That's just not on.
Extraneous factors that probably affected my reaction negatively:
To be fair, these factors had nothing to do with YAB, but they are responsible for contributing to me being perhaps harsher to it than I should have been:
* I am simply too old for this type of drama. I am possibly closer in age (though barely :P) to the characters' parents than the characters. Certainly closer in my place in life. So I am very much not the target audience. I have learned my lesson and now avoid teen dramas.
* The rabid teenybopper YAB fanbase. I probably wouldn't have become a rabid YAB worshipper in any event (due to the above-mentioned reasons) but I confess I would have liked it much better if it wasn't for the fanbase which repeatedly proclaimed it the best drama ever made, most complex characters ever made, bashed any dramas which either competed with it in the ratings (IRIS), had the temerity to follow in in the time slot (Will it snow on Christmas), or had the audacity not to be YAB (too many dramas to name). They also demonstrated a cult-like defensiveness which did not endear them either. I am sorry, YAB! I shouldn't have let some crazy fans influence me! Mea culpa.
Conclusion: A fun if not too-memorable trifle which would have worked better with shorter length (or possibly a quick marathon without too much time to think between eps) but had some delicious scenes and moments.