Estar com Você (2020)

After ep 14, it stopped making sense... and started making me uncomfortable.

After ep 14, it stopped making sense. The beginning half was funny and had a refreshing, lovable-without-being-cringe-y, clumsy, and amazingly BLUNT female lead, who was brave enough to do things that would only happen in a drama. It also had a no-nonsense, rational, and caring male lead, who reacted realistically! The female lead knew when she should cut her losses and own up to her schemes quickly. It was lovely to see certain conflicts resolved with such speed without repeat, but still have the male lead give her more opportunity to be around him the more he fell for her. They were a lovely combo that caused me to binge straight through to ep 14 (amazing tension) and made me anxiously wait for the next episodes. The ML wasn't your typical overbearing, unreasonable, cold ML...I loved his interactions with Ji Qiu. Around ep 14, I could even justify some of the ML's antics to provoke the FL, hoping that he would have a frank discussion with the FL in ep 15, but.... that never happened.

I binged all the way from ep 15 to ep 24 with growing disappointment. After ep 15, a lot of the vehicles that drove the main romance were ignored, while a monster pile of other conflicts with new characters that were thrown in and resolved within minutes. There were a lot of unrealistic scenarios! While I'm glad for some quick conflict resolution, these new conflicts were unnecessary! The first half had plenty of other conflict that could be flushed out and resolved! While the two other pairings were cute and acceptable, how the drama went about creating one relationship (Si Qi's) and creating conflict in another (Ji Qiu's) was out of nowhere and hard to buy in. I would have loved to see more of a sisterhood between all of the ladies - sooo much potential there that the drama barely cracked the surface. FL's love rival had so much potential to be a supportive rival/sister and that was annoyingly destroyed. She barely had any screen time. I would loved to see the girls gang up on the ML for being a dork and putting the FL through (albeit brief) anguish. Qing Wu and Qi Nian's conflict should've been resolved earlier! That would have made Qing Wu's relationship more palatable, but also her commentary about her partner being legal to marry was so worrisome (smh!).

I love a fluffy cheesy romance and have seen my fair share, but in the latter half, moments got so trope-y (ML went into full overbearing CEO mode with some scenes) that my eyes rolled to the back of my head too many times to count (still squealed my fair share though for some scenes). First half, he was a solid balance of a hidden romantic, then went into full blown romantic, before going back into a repressed, controlling romantic for the last few episodes haha. He didn't ask her opinion for any major decisions involving the two of them, didn't express his feelings toward her properly, and admitted that he was a control freak. He wasn't before! He was a bit harsh to others, no-nonsense, warm to people close to him, and a workaholic before. He had this great storyline with his brother (Si Qi) that was resolved soooo beautifully, but then did a 180 with the female lead and said, "I'm going to be as controlling with you as I was with my brother even though that blew up in my face and I painfully and actively spent the last few years trying to make reparations (like wtf!). Female lead was basically a cheerful, straight-talking bunny, who somehow slinked into a submissive shadow in the latter half. When some of the "romantic" clips in the latter half were released, I actually couldn't watch them because they were that cringey/not romantic.

I was uncomfortable with some scenes with some side characters that skirted consent and harassment... but it's dramaland where these things are unfortunately normalized and utilized to brew conflict. I thought the drama had so much potential, so I'm left very disappointed. It started out being fresh and new and fell back to old C-drama antics and dramatics. The ending is pretty satisfying and cute though.

I loved the quality of the ML's acting until ep 14 (idk, his script was hard to deliver, so props to him) and loved the FL overall (she had plenty of cringe-y moments but was not annoying!) Xin xin (from Le Coup de Foudre <33) and Ji Qiu were played to perfection. I was impressed/moved by FL and Ji Qiu's crying scenes. Love the brothers' conflict and how it was resolved. Loved the grandpa. The FL's friends barely had screentime, but I liked their dynamic with her.

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