‘Devilish Joy’ boasts of familiar faces, great acting, beautiful cinematography, a mix of romcom plus melodrama despite being a bag of cliches.

This recently completed series from MBN has captured my heart by its heartwarming story that started from love at first meet and miraculously ended happily without much complications in the story line. Though it’s filled with bordering cringey sweet romance that will definitely result to a toothache, you won’t be able to get enough of each episode.

The Story

This drama is about a genius doctor who has “Cinderella Memory Syndrome” and falls in love with a has-been actress.

Gong Ma Sung (Choi Jin Hyuk) is the successor to the Sunwoo company and is a genius doctor that excels in his field that involves the human mind. He is well respected by many and is known widely in the world.

However, on his trip to Hainan he meets a woman whom he falls in love with. He spends the entire day with her until she has to leave. They promised to meet again an hour after they parted, but Ma Sung isn’t able to keep his promise after getting involved in an accident that changes his life completely.

He loses the ability to remember what has happened to him in a day after he’s gone to sleep at night and the next day it’s as if yesterday didn’t happen. To cope with his daily living as Gong Ma Sung and memorize what happened the day before, he makes sure to note every important event from that one day into his journal and reads his notes the day after.

One day, however, he meets Joo Gi Bbeum, a has-been actress and singer that was loved by all three years ago. Her career fell apart because of a false accusation of murder that turned her into the most hated person in just one day. Since then, Gi Bbeum has been living a hard life trying to bring bread and butter to her family’s table despite her life still continuously crumbling because of her unfortunate fate.

Once their worlds collide, Ma Sung realizes that even if a day or two or three days has passed, he remembers this one face that won’t seem to go away. Her. And as he tries to remember her and figure out who Gi Bbeum really is, Ma Sung falls in love with her.

But how do you love someone when you will end up forgetting this person? And how do you love a person who keeps forgetting you? Heartbreaks are bound to happen, but is it worth taking the risk?

Review:

The Good

Despite a mix of cliche themes in the story, it pleasantly managed to surpass my expectations. They used the poor girl and rich chaebol trope really well and it has effectively managed to create conflicts that people can sympathize with. It gave the female protagonist, Joo Gi Bbeum, a really good lesson about life, that despite her A-level status before, she didn’t turn out to be one of those annoying has-been actresses that still has their noses up despite their unlikely style of living. It gave her more dimension and it showed us a vulnerable side of her despite her toughened exterior.

On the other hand, Gong Ma Sung was a really perfect man when Gi Bbeum met him in Hainan, but because of his mental condition, he felt more human to me. Despite his prickly personality that keeps him alive while being surrounded by vipers, it made Ma Sung more vulnerable when he’s by himself. All throughout the drama, I felt all his emotions while going through the hardship of facing his illness alone as his world has it forced on him.

The build up of their story wasn’t abrupt. It has gone through a really hard process that will make you believe they are so in love with each other because of what they went through together despite disappointments in the relationship–being stood up in dates, secrets, and when you know soon enough your boyfriend is not going to remember you–and struggles because of their personal troubles–villains trying to bring your life to bedrock bottom, an aunt who’s just waiting for you to be dead, and a million anti-fans.

It has gone from really romantic, to comedy and then full throttle drama that will wear out your tear ducts and will really make you think whether their love is really hopeless or by some miracle it’s still gonna be a happy ending. I’m just glad that despite the unrealistic turn of events, the drama opted for the ‘happy ever after’ the character deserves, wherein Gi Bbeum pursues her dreams of getting herself out there in front of the camera and gaining back her popularity despite her longing for Ma Sung, instead of wallowing in her misery after a lost love and not doing anything to uplift her family’s living condition. It’s also good that Ma Sung is recovering from his illness, but that they didn’t completely make him fully recover from it, but at least that there is hope he would and he’ll be healthier.

Let’s not forget the interesting plot as a whole. You get a whole package that’s gripping until the end, and that you won’t easily get tired of. Plus, it has done really beautiful cinematography that all throughout the scenes are food to the eyes. Each of them situated at really good spots thoughtfully decided on to give more highlight to important events especially for a sweet kiss, a reconciliation or meeting after so long. The songs are really cute and catchy too.

And let me tell you, you will definitely get enough of the kisses you don’t see in other dramas. It’s to the point you’d wonder whether they are truly dating because it’s as natural as real couples would do. With raw emotions displayed by the actors, you’d be touched by what unconditional and timeless love really is.

As a bonus from the drama, though Gi BBeum’s drunk father’s poetry seemed misplaced in the beginning of the drama, he managed to create poems that are befitting to the mood of some scenes and made them even more touching or poignant to a point it would make your heart cry. It was as if I am somehow watching ‘A Poem A Day’ all over again.

The Bad

I have a lot of praises for this drama. However, talking about shortcomings of course this one has it’s own share:

The villains are portrayed as one dimensional characters: as examples, Kim Beom Soo and Ma Sung’s aunt are shown as really bad people that only wishes bad things to both protagonist. They don’t show any other kind of emotions like guilt or sorrow and doesn’t have a rich backstory as to why they hate Ma Sung or Gi Bbeum with a passion

Though it’s nice the conflicts with the bad guys are resolved without complications, I felt like it is so good to be true that it is done fast and without struggle, that there are times when I wondered whether they will somehow appear somewhere at the ending, but of course they didn’t. Plus, it’s as if they aren’t punished enough after all the bad things they’ve done. They easily got away from killing someone by getting locked up and the story being vague as to what happened to them after that.

I’ve also expressed disbelief with some takes of the story to sort out matters: (1) Sung Ki Joon is like a ball of sunshine that’s ultimately the definition of immature, that’s why I still question how he’s able to run Sunwoo group in a year without plummeting; (2) How Dr. Yoon is able to treat Ma Sung despite of his deteriorating health that made us all think he was gonna die, when he isn’t able to do anything like that as a doctor in the beginning of the story; (3) How Ma Sung is able to recover when they’ve described his condition as something degenerative like ‘dementia’

I think that a relationship should always be a trusting one, so I didn’t like it that Ma Sung kept things from Gi Bbeum even when she knew already of his condition. He should have at least been honest when he’s in pain so that she could care for him when nobody’s there for him, because that’s what a relationship is. It is a two way road where two people share all their happiness and pains. If a relationship isn’t a give or take thin and only flourishes in joy, then how will it withstand extreme hardship in the future, right? I mean, I get it that Ma Sung grew up doing everything on his own that’s why he must have acted as if he should carry his own burden, but what does that make the other party feel? Insignificant because she didn’t even know he’s about to die? Well, anyway that’s just my take on this part of their relationship.

Characters

All of the good characters has portrayed a flawed side that really made them more relatable and three dimensional unlike the villains who were rather one dimensional. This is nice to know even though you can tell the writer’s biased opinion about their characters. Protagonists are given more importance while the villains are left unpolished. Not saying it’s super bad to the point it sucked, but I think even villains deserve a back story and a real reason why they are doing things.

Nonetheless, besides Gi Bbeum and Ma Sung, I came to love Gi Bbeum’s family, Nan Joo, Woo Jin, Ki Joon and Ha Im, especially as their personalities evolved as the story progressed and as I came to understand the magnitude of their care for both protagonists and warmth they showed outside their more unlikable traits displayed during the first few episodes.

Acting

I believe that the drama is able to shine because of Choi Jin Hyuk’s superb portrayal of Gong Ma Sung’s character and how he’s able to show layers of his personality throughout and also Song Ha Yoon’s acting that made Joo Gi Bbeum as relatable and touching as she can be. The raw emotions she displayed felt all real that not a single moment with her went dull. She’s a really good actress and hopefully she gets more lead roles like this that will show her different colors.

Ending

The ending is really good for people like me who loves happy endings. It has given justice to the frustration I felt while watching their romance unfold and fall apart continuously. Plus, I really like how Ma Sung didn’t fully recover from his illness, it keeps things more at bay and not overly done when everything else is already ‘overly’ made, yet they also give us hope that he will recover soon and that to keep it that way, Ma Sung and Gi Bbeum marries each other week after week (since Ma Sung allegedly always forgets he’s already married to her). It gives a dreamy feel to their relationship, which is perhaps still in the honeymoon phase. But admittedly, it feels unrealistic to hold a wedding of their caliber each week, not unless your chaebol like Ma Sung. If that happened to ordinary people I think one could only dream. Yet, the concept is refreshing just like their enduring relationship that goes beyond borders.

Someone more realistic, however, will take this ending wrongly. I mean, it’s too good to be true. It takes away the rawness of Ma Sung’s situation wherein we’re already shown the fact he has a degenerative mental disease showing signs like dementia and that in reality a person cannot recover from that. Pallative treatment is perhaps the best solution to these kind of people and yet by some miracle Ma Sung is going to recover from it? Wow. That’s the power of fiction. Really. Anything can happen, but it’s as unrealistic as it can get. It would be more believable if he just went senile and Gi Bbeum still loves him and cares for him, but I know either way, people won’t be happy as well with this kind of ending. So, better yet just stick to the happy ending, right?

And well, that surprise at the ending is a real icebreaker. lol. Watch it to find out what I’m talking about!

Rating:

Cliche, but raw and beautiful unconditional love story to the finest. So, I’m giving it 4.3 out of 5.