8/10 is my rating. This is a 2023 South Korean paranormal romance drama with 12, 70 minute episodes. It is based on a very popular webtoon of the same name.

First I provide a synopsis then review.

Synopsis

If you not only reincarnated but were able to remember all your past lives you would excel at many things but feel isolated and lonely. Ban Ji-eum (Shin Hye-sun) considers her "ability" a curse until something haopens in one of her lives that changes her mind. After reincarnating for nearly 1000 years Ji-eum meets someone in her eighteenth life that makes her happy she can remember. When her life is cut short by an accident, she vows to find him, Moon Seo-ha (Ahn Bo-hyun) and make him fall for her again. It is not easy though because Seo-ha experienced a lot of trauma from losing his mother at a young age, the accident and feeling guilty and responsible for Ji-eum's death. So when the ever persistent Ji-eum shows up he is now t sure he wants to entangle himself with this odd woman. But fate and familiarity will have their say and the 19th life may be the one that counts.

Review

When I read some reviews I noticed a trend where those that read the webtoon were, in general, less satisfied with tge direction things took in the last part if the series. This started really well. I loved her confident, spunky, knew how to do about everything personality. Her relentless pursuit of Seo-ha was entertaining. The 2nd couple was also cute. I did not read the webtoon but even for me it felt like they destroyed the story toward the end. Watch it for the interesting story and slow build romance for both couples. It is heavy in the 1st love aspect. It is a deep thinking topic for anyone interested in reincarnation. It also visits several historical points in her flash backs to previous lives. It is a happy ending if you can accept the strange twist it takes.

Spoilers*
My daughter read the webtoon and said that female lead character did not reincarnate due to a revenge arc like was portrayed in the drama but rather she lost her twin sister through murder and was reincarnating to be reunited. So that was very different. In the drama anyone who found out she was reincarnated suffered bad consequences such as strange ailments. It was weird within the drama as there was no sensible reason that would be the case. And apparently that was never a thing in the webtoon., there were no ill consequences of finding out she reincarnated. In the webtoon Ha Do-yoon (Ahn Dong goo) was her reincarnated sister and that was a surprising twist. In the drama. He was not her reincarnated sister he was a man in her 1st life, a side character, and he looked exactly as he did in her 19th life. In her 19th life her sister had reincarnated as Yoon Cho won (Ha Yoon kyung) and she also looked exactly as she did in her 1st life. There is also a character in the drama who murdered Ji-eum in her 1st life, who also was continually reincarnated and remembered his past lives. He got close to Ji Eum and wanted her to remember so they could break the cycle because, in the drama, Ji Eum created the situation where they reincarnated and remembered as she vowed to not forget and get revenge. In the drama Seo ha's mom had reincarnated and was watching over him to remedy an injustice around his attempted murder. So it makes it seem like remembering past lives is common. In the webtoon there was just her and another character. Then, the reincarnated mom, makes a decision to do some ritual somehow the murdery guy knew about where she stops remembering past lives. Main female lead sees her after and it was like, not only did she no longer recall, but her personality was different. Somehow that makes lead girl decide to do the same. Supposedly it fixes all those suffering harm from knowing about reincarnations if you are just willing to do some weird ritual that makes you selectively forget. And lead girl is like yes I struggled to get everyone to like me and accept that I reincarnated but now I just want to forget all about all of that. It was cool she knew so many languages, had so many skills and had historical knowledge, it added a lot of depth to her character but then that is all wiped clean. So then this now different person who somehow remembers how to be an engineer from her 19th life but not where the ring on her finger came from. But all the people she met in her 19th life remember her and all that but now it doesn't make them sick somehow. So then he relentlessly pursues her. But there was this slow build romance to that point with him and the super cool her who could do all these things but niw there is this renewed her that he is determined to make love him. If you can completely suspend your belief that things you experience shape who you are I guess you could buy off on that. Realizing some changes need to be made to adapt it to drama but many just seemed unnecessary.

#ShinHyeSun
#AhnBohyun
#SeeYouInMy19thLife.