[HanCinema's Drama Review] "Our Beloved Summer" Episode 4

There's a nice bookend here of when that Woong and Yeon-soo started dating back in high school. As Woong tells the story, he was trying to be cool because Yeon-soo was setting the mood. As Yeon-soo tells the story, the whole experience was extremely awkward. Yeon-soo choosing to date Woong implies that regardless of the awkwardness, she found Yeon-soo's attention flattering. We're told how Yeon-soo was so aloof that boys at school considered her unapproachable despite her clear attractiveness.

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This is a running theme with "Our Beloved Summer" and its structure. There's a genuinely excellent idea here- the story of a first love that blossomed in high school into a long-term relationship, as told five years after the breakup by unreliable firsthand witnesses. The documentary framing device is well-used to emphaisze how Woong and Yeon-soo both aren't trustworthy, as the stories they tell are in service of their own personal narratives.

The problem with "Our Beloved Summer" is that the bulk of the runtime is dedicated to surrounding worldbuilding that makes very little sense. Ji-woong's role as documentary producer is in jeopardy because he can't find usable footage. But it's a documentary! They take far more footage than they're planning to air, just so they can edit the few good parts into someting informative! That's how documentary production works!

The baffling part is, I thought the production team already knew this. We were explicitly told in backstory that clips of Woong and Yeon-soo's high school interactions only went viral long after they graduated. But so much of the worldbuilding just makes no sense upon further analysis. Very little is made of the fact that Woong's agreeing to participate in the documentary at all effectively outs his identity. Anonymous artists in South Korea aren't anonymous just for the fun of it. The use of screen names is deliberately designed to protect their privacy.

This entire aspect of Woong's character is simply abandoned for the sake of a plagiarism accusation subplot. Which is good, in the context that Yeon-soo can actually prove that Woong didn't commit plagiarism but isn't knowledgable enough to know the best way to explain it. Yet the subplot is abruptly abandoned for the sake of a thinly contrived excuse to make Choi Wooshik wear fashionable clothes for a party I had assumed was just business casual. Incidentally Lee Jun-hyuk continues to show up as a special appearance, despite his role seeming far more like regular supporting cast.

Review by William Schwartz

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"Our Beloved Summer" is directed by Kim Yoon-jin-I, written by Lee Na-eun-I, and features Choi Wooshik, Kim Da-mi, Kim Sung-cheol, Roh Jeong-eui, Ahn Dong-goo, Park Won-sang. Broadcasting information in Korea: 2021/12/06~Now airing, Mon, Tue 22:00 on SBS.

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