Series Review : Start-Up. The fine example of how a loose script…
By: Devina Aprilia
Tags: Startup, Drama, Korea, Series, Review

The plot itself looks promising in the beginning. The way the first few episodes slowly build the background story, make us beginning to wonder how the relationship between them will turn out, while give us a glimpse about how startup companies work from the beginning. The character build-up itself was amazing at first. Between 4 key characters in the story, everyone got their own spotlight and background. Sadly, the more the story unfold. In-jae start to feel like some supporting character, because the story was getting dragged to some kind of loose love triangle between Do-san, Dal-mi, and Ji-pyeong, which could be made clear from a long time.

The last few episodes just make it even clearer that no matter the situation, it was designed from the beginning for the convenience of one character to get together with Dal-mi (I’m trying not to spoil the ending for those who is save from all the spoiler in the media). Not to mention, there are some kind of contradictory in the way the lead couple think, just for the sake of throwing some romantic lines and act. The forced ‘convenience’ from the story make me lose interest in the love line between the character, and I just wondering, why bother making a strong background story and character if it was only to be discarded in such way? Because the way the story unfold defies the key things about precious memory from the letter it was trying to highlight the most at the beginning.

The startup environment is also getting over-simplified over the course of the story, and serve mostly as a supporting element for the love line. It was unfortunate though, because I was hoping we could explore and learn more from the subject which was obviously became the title of the series.

Art, Act & Audio

I love the colorful and lovely tone from the set to the fashion style of each character. The original soundtrack combined with the cinematography was managed to amazingly level up the emotional scene as well. I especially love the song “One day” by Kim Feel (it left such an impact on me on the first episode), and “To Me” by Jeong Eun Ji.

I have only praise for the acting from all the actor and actress, since they all have showed an admirable performance, but I especially want to give a highlight on Kim Seon-ho’s performance as Han Ji-pyeong. He was able to perfectly executed the tough and harsh yet kind and lonely with a bit comedic side from Ji-pyeong’s character. The way he perform makes me able to understand the pain felt by Ji-pyeong just from the look at his eyes. His acting not only makes me feel sad for him, it makes me cry with him. I personally thought all of his scene with Choi Won-deok (Dal-mi’s grandmother — performed by veteran actress Kim Hae-sook), was the best and the most emotional scenes throughout the series.

I also highly appreciate Nam Joo-hyuk’s performance as Nam Do-san. From the way he looks at things with determination, and excitement like a child, the small gesture, the way he talks or stutter, it was perfectly portray the naive yet passionate Do-san who is trying his best to learning new thing and yearning to be a better person for the one he loves.

What Do I Get?

Watching the journey of the quartet give me some insights;