It's Okay To Not Be Okay

      I love the title of this drama... It's about as honest as it gets... It really is okay to not be okay... And I love how the characters in the drama are all pretty messed up mentally and emotionally... Finally a drama where I can actually relate to the characters... I supposed that's why this drama was top 10 on Netflix... most of us can relate to at least one of the character in the drama... 

     The drama revolved around Moon Gang Tae and his autistic elder brother Moon Sang Tae who have been on the run from the 'butterflies' since the murder of their mother... Enter Ko Moon Yeong, a children's book author with an antisocial personality trait who happened to be Moon Sang Tae's favourite author... Gang Tae and Moon Yeong seemed to have got off on the wrong foot right from the start... But she somehow developed an obsession on Gang Tae and kept hunting him down...

     So as with all K-drama, the male and female lead would always have had a childhood encounter... Although in this case, it wasn't a pleasant encounter and as fate would have it, their past intertwined in a web of ugly mess which might have eventually destroyed their chance of finding healing and happiness...

     I like how Moon Yeong described Gang Tae as the 'safety pin' to her 'bomb'...  She's volatile and impulsive... He's patient and rational... Although that's not really how Gang Tae is... He just had to be that way for his brother's sake... I cried so much for Gang Tae... as I can relate to him much more than Moon Yeong... Gang Tae's mother told him that she had him so that he would take care of his elder brother... It's like that's the only use of Gang Tae in this world... Imagine growing up believing that... His life was so suppressed and repressed because of the burden he had to carry...

     Gang Tae never felt he could have a life of his own because he was 'stuck' to his brother... But then he fell in love with Moon Yeong and finally dared to dream of having his own life... Just as things seem to be going well, he discovered that his mother was actually murdered by Moon Yeong's psychopathic mother... I cried so hard when Gang Tae showed up for the family portrait shoot which Moon Yeong and Sang Tae wanted to have to make them a 'family'... The pain that Gang Tae was going through knowing the truth and yet wanting to protect them from knowing the truth... totally bawled my eyeballs out...

      I'm glad that Moon Yeong actually found love in Gang Tae... that poor girl had such a traumatic childhood it was amazing she actually grew up being functional physically... I think there's something hopeful about 2 emotionally and mentally dysfunctional souls finding healing and happiness in each other... It gives hope to emotionally and mentally dysfunctional souls like me that maybe we too can eventually find healing and happiness...

     I love the illustrations in Moon Yeong's books... It's very Tim Burton-esque... And I like how each episode is correlated to one of her books... I especially like The Cheerful Dog story... And how Gang Tae helped cut Moon Yeong's hair (symbolizing cutting off her leash)... Also the scene where Gang Tae punched the guy who slapped Moon Yeong and then he got suspended and he was so happy coz he finally could go on a trip with Moon Yeong... Yeah, ok, I love all the scenes where Gang Tae was smiling happily...

     So what I didn't understand was how did Moon Yeong's mother didn't die although her father killed her... Just goes to show it's so difficult for a bad person to die... And to think after all these years she still came back to haunt their lives and even tried to kill Gang Tae... Thank God for Sang Tae who saved the day...

     Anyway, I had a revelation on why and how girls ended up going crazy for Korean oppas from watching this drama... Took me so long to realize the power of positive reinforcement... So if anyone realized this, the male lead always have a few scenes where he gets oogled at by women... the girls would be all looking at the male lead and saying how good looking he is... Even if the person who was watching the drama probably didn't find the male lead good looking initially, after 16 episodes of such positive reinforcement, anyone would think Gong Yoo, Lee Jong Suk and Kim Soo Hyun good looking... Oh, this works vice versa too... That's why people think Jun Ji Hyun and Park So Dam are gorgeous...

     I guess if I tell myself that I'm gorgeous while looking in the mirror a few times a day I would eventually start believing that too... Well, it worked like magic for Lee Young Jun in What's Wrong With Secretary Kim? Might be worth a try...