Perfect Marriage Revenge – Ep 1 & 2 RANT

So, brace yourself… I have accepted the PMR challenge.

Secondary Voice
I’d love to say that I accepted it against my better judgement, but there was no judgement involved at all.

Third Voice
This is nothing to be proud of, Cecee…

However, one brief word of warning. Actually several words of warning.

  • I leave the recap to more talented Beanies
  • I get so much rantworthy material I don’t know where to start
  • I shall tag my fellow PMR sufferers

So, last time I check, we had a bunch of innocent Beanies who had been volunteered for the torture, so please correct me if I’m wrong:

@attiton @hopefulromantic @emsel @darkcc @kafiyah-bello @mindy @elinor @ceciliedk@dncingemma

@fancypants @seeker, if I understood it right, you’d rather keep your weapons by yourself for this makjang, rather than throwing them at the screen like I do?

If I’m missing someone/ If someone would rather have peace from the long long LONG rant that will ensue, please let me know, I’ll tag or untag you accordingly in the next post (because there’s no way I’m reposting that one)

On another note as well, for those interested in finding out what the actual story was supposed to be, here is the link to the EN-translated webtoon: https://www.webtoons.com/en/romance/perfect-marriage-revenge/episode-1/viewer?title_no=3484&episode_no=1

If you have already endured the first 2 episodes of that monstrous melo, you’ll soon notice that the writer took some vague inspiration from the webtoon and decided to run with a completely different plot…

Writer-nim’s script felt in the melo cauldron, like Obelix in the cauldron of Magic Potion.
But worse.
Much, much worse.

I’ll give you my rant in very messy and disorganised chapters. Let’s pretend, for the sake of the game, that you are satisfied with the format.

Secondary Voice
Not that I’d change the format if you didn’t like it, tough. I’m too lazy for that.

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The Blandest Trauma Magnet on the Menu
So, let me introduce Han Yi-joo whose entire existence is pure blandness. This reminds me of Goodness Gracious Me Going for an English: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-uEx_hEXAM&t=27s

Yi-joo is the blandest thing on the melo menu.
You could not find anyone who has less personality. I wouldn’t recommend searching in case you do, in fact, manage to find someone that fits the description.
We spend far too long following Yi-joo-I-have-no-life’s existence in a major chunk of episode 1.

This is a long series of passive aggressive abuse that she completely misses. She’s not just bland. She’s utterly unaware of literally everything going on around her. We’ll discover later that, apparently, it is a conscious choice because she believes that if she’s good, good things will happen to her.

Secondary Voice
She probably means good things like having her husband wanting to divorce her for her adoptive sister

Third Voice
Nothing beats the goodness of mom throwing her under the bus and then proceeding to murder her. Ah, those were the good days, Yi-soo.

If you thought it couldn’t have been worse, episode 2 has some more fun surprises for us, like for example, she used to be held hostage in her room (apparently without food) for days on end whenever mom felt like her. And at some point during her childhood, someone poisoned her food.

Secondary Voice
Yi-joo, my girl, at which point were you going to call the police?

Third Voice
I’m still waiting for some more traumas to pile on her. We didn’t get any life-threatening and debilitating illness, which frankly would be a child’s play compared to being murdered in a hospital room.

Anyway, we can trust Writer-nim to throw some more traumas at her. I don’t know, see what sticks and run from there. The problem is everything sticks. She’s a walking trauma magnet with no personality.

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Fashion Hell Is Upon Us

In the first episode, I wrongly mentally labelled mom Morticia Addams. She’s that lengthy figure wearing an impossible long black dress. There was a Family Addams vibe to her… But I have to correct myself. I am confident that Morticia would have been a wonderful mother to both her daughters, including the adoptive bunch of blandness.

There was this wonderful image of Morticia, Barbie girl and her vibrantly pink suit (Yoo-ra), and Laura Ashley 1980s model/Golden Girls fashion enthusiast (Yi-joo).

I can’t help but think those three probably don’t go shopping together.

Anyway, I changed my mind about mom and decided, having watched her appear in some vibrant gochugaru red ensemble in episode 2, that she was probably posting as burnt gochugaru in ep 1. You don’t get to be Morticia, you bitch.

Secondary Voice
But she gets a bonus point for making that murder scene in the bed almost look sensual. You’re a bad bitch, mom, but you’re so good at it.

We get another fashion accident from which I am still recovering in Seo Do-guk’s mother who dresses up like a giant scallion and then tries to argue the respectability of her son’s love life. Sorry mom number 2, we don’t talk to green onions. We cook them.

Secondary Voice
This was one angry Allium.

Third Voice
Was the stylist team on strike? Did they lose a bet?

There’s another fashion question that’s been at the back of my mind since. Have you seen Yi-joo’s heels? Those are tall, sharp, narrow heels. She could probably use them as chopsticks for the usual convenience store ramyeon meal.

More importantly, there’s an interesting scene in the first episode where Do-guk jumps Yi-joo as she gets out of the toilet, berates her for pretending she doesn’t know anything about her husband and Yoo-ra, and then, realising that Yi-joo is, indeed, not as clueless as she appears, but A LOT MORE, grabs her by the wrist like any true K drama male establishing dominance. I, for sure, am glad they’re not resorting to urine marking to show dominance. This would be messy. Yi-joo, in the heat of the moment, does nothing.

Secondary Voice
But then, Yi-joo never does anything, so this would be her usual defence mechanism. Nada.

Third Voice
Yi-joo, you are armed. You have sharp and pointy heels. Pierce a hole in his leg!

Anyway, she seems able to drive with those heels, so, as far as I’m concerned, she’s mastered the art of heeled shoes enough to use them to cause harm. But, ô surprise, she does nothing. Were you surprised?

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Running After So Many Emotions & Not Reaching A Single One
I’m not used to melo dramas, but I am going to take a wild guess. Those little shits are supposed to be giving you the emotional engagement of a mild indigestion after a heavy meal.

So, I assume that is probably why the budget that was not allocated to questionable fashion statements went directly into impactful melodies. Is music enough to carry a scene void of any emotion? I’m pretty sure the answer is a big fat nope. But, for some reason, the director seems to disagree with me. So, we frequently end up with emotionally charged music trying to patch up bad scenes, with the same success as sticking a plaster band aid on a crumbling wall. Does wonders if you’re going for failure.

Naturally, we are blessed with characters expressing different levels of neutrality, so it’s getting tricky to feel an ounce of anything except for boredom. Not mild boredom. Raging boredom, in my case.

I give you Se-hyeok’s forever blank face with some level of teeth grinding for sharp jaw definition. He questions what he’s doing here, and frankly, I agree. We’re all unsure what you’re doing here, bae.

But, nevertheless, he’s blessed us with some high emotional awareness when he offers to make up for hurting Yi-joo by doing the laundry.

Secondary Voice
Are you feeling depressed, bae? Wait here, I’ll go and wash my socks for you.

Third Voice
Should therapists have a bucket of soapy water in their office for vulnerable clients?
“You’re not having suicidal thoughts. You just need to wash socks.” Problem sorted. Everyone will have clean socks. Everyone’s happy.

But, Se-hyeok’s unexpected emotional awareness is brushed aside by Yi-joo’s new “I’m-a-bad-bitch-who-kicks-asses” persona when she turns him down and explains that she’s done being pathetic… and immediately proceeds back to the house of the very woman who killed her the day before. I’m not sure this is what you mean, Yi-joo.

But, anyway, in case we didn’t get enough emotions, we’re going to spend the second half of ep 2 watching Yi-joo tear up. She’s not set on revenge yet. She’s just using Do-guk for therapy purposes. And apparently, our least useless CEO felt his inner therapist’s heart beat with excitement because he’s totally onboard with anything that happens.

“I’m broken”, says Yi-joo. (No shit, you think?)
And Do-guk watches her vomit lovingly before he kisses her. Weird fetish, my good man.

Secondary Voice
The new kiss and tell… Puke and kiss.

Third Voice
If you think this is disgusting, imagine just how I felt.

That’s all from me for now. I’ve run out of ranting juice.

All typos and mistakes are bred in a free-range environment.

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    for some reason @ceciliedk and @dncingemma tags did not work. I apologise profusely with finger hearts and cyber flowers 🌷🌷

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    Okay, that’s it. SOMEONE give CeCee her own column within Dramabeans. Who do I need to tag for this?
    I’m falling out of my seat laughing here. People at work might catch on that I’m laughing too hard to be working. The sole purpose of PMR existing is for CeCee’s rant recap.
    Pure Genius here:
    “You don’t get to be Morticia, you bitch”
    “You have sharp and pointy heels. Pierce a hole in his leg!”
    “You’re not having suicidal thoughts. You just need to wash socks.” Problem sorted. Everyone will have clean socks. Everyone’s happy
    Do-guk watches her vomit lovingly before he kisses her. Weird fetish, my good man.

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    I’m not watching this (yet) but various beanies are selling it so hard I may break down and try it, with all my abundant spare time since I only have [counts on fingers] 4 current shows, possibly 2 more starting this week, and 1 thoroughly absorbing rewatch going. Everything about this screams the kind of show I hate and yet I have terrible FOMO. Please leave me on the tag list for now, but I may revisit that. Thanks!

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      I feel you! I’ve got a few show I’m following at the moment too.
      I am not sure what you enjoy when it comes to K dramas. I can safely say that I absolutely loathe melos. I do not hate that one as much as the others, so I do get what @kafiyah-bello means: There is an element of charm. Admittedly, in my case, charm is the hope that the plot will address Yi-joo’s mysterious expiration date she finds on her wrist once she wakes up one year in the past after having been dutifully murdered by mom (thanks you mom for your hard work). I like this as a plotting device, and it asks a lot of currently unanswered questions that I really hope the show will address at some point.

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    So you don’t like it, lmao. I enjoyed this almost as much as the episodes. You my good chingu are putting far and away too much effort into this drama. It is BEYOND shallow, badly written, and almost as badly acted, but that is the CHARM. I knew going into a Sung Hoon drama, that it wouldn’t be good. He doesn’t do good dramas, he does bad or very bad dramas that bring you in and evoke happiness and joy.

    Also, totally forgot she vomited right before the kiss, hilarious.

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      Lol, melo isn’t my thing 🤷🏻‍♀️

      And it frustrates me because the bits I am interested in (her expiration date on the wrist) are unlikely to get the main focus. Instead, one might throw another trauma at Yi-joo for lols!

      That kiss will haunt me 🤣🤣

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        After this advance warning I watched the lead-up to the kiss VERY closely. I have concluded, for the sake of my sanity, that she only retched and coughed but did not actually puke. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it, because there WILL BE more kisses and I don’t want to consider the state of her delicate digestive system or breath during every one of them. (Yeah, good luck to me with that now.)

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    I still adore this show…and yet will read this column weekly to hear why I’m absolutely wrong to do so, here on Cecee’s Corner.

    I will admit that I didn’t even THINK about the puke kiss until you mentioned it, Cecee, and now I find that scene even more hilarious than I did before…even after noticing that dude said,

    What’s that I hear? You only want to marry me for petty revenge, and it remains the case I don’t even know you and you don’t even know me? RAWR THAT’S MY TYPE OF WO-MAN!!! Gimmie dat puke kiss.” 🤮💋

    This show is gonna be spectacular.

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    Wow, after viewing/reading all this, I feel left out. But, alas, this show isn’t playing on the streaming services I have. Enjoy the train wreck without me!

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    I’m sorry the VEGGIE TALES GIF IS ABSOLUTELY SENDING ME LMAOOOOOOOOO thanks now I have that song stuck in my head

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    I will just say: this is all entirely the point of the drama lol.

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    I really miss an ff button. It’s nice to know what’s going on without having to sit there forever, and when you jump all the time you miss things. Like, I missed the puking. 😢
    If it all went a little lot faster, I would enjoy the part with the mean family. But whatever you could say about J.K. (and there’s a lot) Harry Potter being mistreated by his family was a lot more fun.

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      I did not ff but i was browsing other tabs while watching.

      Oooh yes the meanies were dragging a bit. Each family scene was just an excuse for some more traumatic back story, as if Yi-joo really needed some more 🤦🏻‍♀️

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        Mean family is fun in fiction, if they are mean enough. Think “The Four Yorkshire Men” degree of calamity. Struwwelpeter. “We were happy if we only had one thumb cut of! Grateful! Never moping!” Or the softer version: Getting your uncle’s sweaty sock (one sock) for a Birthday present.
        This girl is spoiled, how about that broom closet under the stairs? Tsk tsk tsk.
        But it needs to be shown quickly. And I cannot be meant to be actually sorry for that person, just on their team. Looking forward to revenge.

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    The vege-tales gif sends, I keep dissolving into full laughter fits every time I see it or think about it and I’ll never be able to get that out of my mind now when I watch this show – I’m not complaining though 😂

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    Cecee, thank you for a “picture perfect” rant and the webtoon link yay!

    Did you find out the significance of the date on the wrist yet?
    Is the webtoon finished or still ongoing. 😊

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    The Lady in Green
    Seems to me that mother in PMR is inspired by the traditional wardrobe of The Queen of the Night including that production where Diana Damrau is in all green.

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