Amor aos Dezessete (2016)

I'm not sure what to say about this drama... I hate giving bad reviews and I don't want to put you off because of this review. But it was, in my opinion, so tedious that I couldn't not write this review. I suppose I should firstly confess that I did start skipping large sections of this drama, it just got predictable, tedious and a little bit dull. I managed to condense the last hour and a half long episode into a 25 minute sitting.

Initially this drama started off at a pretty watchable standard. The young versions of the characters are played by the same people who play the adults, just in school uniforms. I liked the story behind the lead guys past, how he's looking for his sister, hiding out in book shops, living off of ramen. The introduction between the characters was great. The oddball friend falls in love with her best friends brother, the popular friend and the two guys crushing on her. I like the way that the oddball friend befriends 'Peter' and stays loyal to her promises.. however. I don't like the fact that this entire drama is based on the fact Ai Li Si refused to tell anyone who Peter was, and that her so called best friend didn't believe her. That was kind of the area things started to wobble.
Fast forward to the future and Ai Li Si has turned into this cold and distant woman who works as a science researcher. Now as a science researcher I would expect her to be fairly bright, despite her obvious emotional trauma. No. No she is not. The main female lead is probably one of the most naive, air heads I've seen in a drama. Now female empowerment in general is not something I talk about, I'm all for it but it's not something I ever talk about because I don't really argue my opinions. But this... THIS took the biscuit, the plate and the tiny little napkin it came with. I can't put into words how annoyed I felt at this female lead. I know a lot of female Asian leads are meant to be delicate flowers who need to be protected by the strapping young man with a six pack and a flaming axe made out of manly things, but this.. this.. I just can't. I don't see why or how the writers thought making the female lead so urghhhhh. I KNOW she's emotionally unstable but ughhh. Okay I'll stop talking about how peeved the female lead made me I think you get the idea, but it was like.. 73% of why I started skipping.
The actors themselves weren't awful, it was mainly just the way the characters had been written. I think with the scripts they were given, the actors did a great job. Not enough to win an Oscars (or Asian equivalent) but pretty good, especially in the first episodes when they're pretending to be high school students.

I like the way that bullying can be seen in this drama, as in... it shows that bullying can affect people whether that's the intention or not. There's one scene where Ai Li Si meets one of her past tormentors to try and only her memories, but he doesn't really remember bullying him. I think the way it shows that although it doesn't effect you, or doesn't seem like a big deal, bullying can be a big deal in some people's lives. It's kind of like how in Who Are You: School 2015 she tries to commit suicide, although not as extreme in this drama, showing the side effects bullying can have on the victims. Especially in Asia where you can hear a lot of extreme cases of bullying, but no one sees what's wrong with it (I don't know how accurate this is I'm just basing it off of blogs written by people who have taught in Asia).
That's second (and last) item I liked about this drama.

The music was okay, I don't really remember a lot of it... I know it wasn't bad, but I'm not about to go and download the OST.

So to summarise:
Good things - The first episodes where they're students, the portrayal of bullying in younger generations and the affect it can have on the victim.
Bad things - Weak female lead, predictable script writing and a little repetitive. Weak female lead and even seeping into weak second female lead is a large reason I disliked this.

But please keep in mind that this is my opinion and that I did start skipping because it bored me. It is possible that the parts I skipped had information to make this drama better, but in my personal opinion I highly doubt it. I was going to drop this drama, but finished it due to sheer will power. I wanted to give the drama a chance but it just didn't do it for me. I know a lot of people are fans of the innocent romance style, and if you like that kind of thing it might be worth giving this drama a try. But if you came up to me and asked me if you should watch this.. I'd say no. Or at least watch the scenes as kids and then just read up on the rest of the drama. There were a couple of good parts but I don't think that they were quite worth the other 10(ish) hours of not... very.. exciting script writing.

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I ultimately decided on a 3.5/5 star rating for this show because this show made me feel a lot of things. I HATED Lei Lei and Liu Xiao Fen at 17 and 30, even when they realized that they were wrong and were at fault, I still didn't care for them. I loved Peter because he wanted to protect Ai Li Si from everything in her past that gave her pain, even if it meant getting revenge on Lei Lei. I loved Ho Hao Yi and his dedication. Once reunited with her, he wouldn't let go of her. He promised that he wouldn't run away again and put 100% of his trust in her. That 13 years away from her was karma for him not showing up at 17. A little extreme, but homeboy was dedicated and knew that she was his only true love and he always known about it, but realized it a few hours too late at 17.I loved Ai Li Si, even though she tested me throughout the series, but I loved her character development and it made her pain feel that much more real. She was in a 13 year debate with herself, not knowing who she should be and if she should trust anyone. I felt her pain and let me tell you, it made this drama super emotional and hard to watch. Plus, that ending had me and my roommate ugly crying in our new apartment. I couldn't give this drama a 5 simply because each episode felt like 3 hours, and I am not sure if I was ever supposed to "feel" for Lei Lei and her struggles, but I didn't. I felt like it glorified Lei Lei and Liu Xiao Fen after they learned about Ai Li Si's past, and honestly, they were just horrible people. If they had a little bit of respect and faith in their friendship with Ai Li Si, none of this would have happened.

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