Good witch

•  Korean title :  착한마녀전
• Other title : Nice Witch
  
• 40 episodes (but same length overall as 20 episodes)
• 
  Aired on SBS
  
• From 2018 March to May

Main cast :

• Lee Da Hae as Cha Sun Hee / Cha Do Hee
• Ryu Soo Young as Song Woo Jin
• Ahn Woo Yeon as Oh Tae Yang
• Shin Hye Jung as Joo Ye Bin
• Bae Soo Bin as Bong Chun Da
• Ahn Sol Bin as Bong Chun Ji
• Yoon Se Ah as Oh Tae Ri
• Shim Hyung Tak as Chae Kang Min
• Lee Han Seo as Bong Cho Rong
• Lee Duk Hwa as Oh Pyung Pan
• Geum Bo Ra as Byun Ok Jong
• Yang Geum Suk as Lee Moon Sook 

Production credits :

• Director : Oh Se Kang
• Screenwriter : Yoon Young Mi

 

Review : -/+

Title : It's actually referenced several times in the drama. Sun Hee and Do Hee are twins with different personalities and lives. Do Hee has become a flight attendant and the face of the company, but she's known as the cold-blood witch. Sun Hee has to take her place and, as she can't help being kind, changes her image. She's now the good witch.

Girl : I thought she was interesting. She's the super kind girl character but the drama showed how being too nice can also be a flaw she has to overcome while still being true to herself.

Boy : He's good looking, smart, kind, courageous, honest, understanding, loyal, funny. I could go on and on. He basically has every quality there is and no discernable failing (apart from a quirk in the beginning which was his only original trait). The problem is that his character didn't change at all. Now that I think about it, he's like the one-dimensional love interest in action movies, except that he is a main character.

Relationship : I wasn't invested at all in Girl and Boy's relationship since Boy was such a non-entity.

Plot : So I kept watching because of the plot. I was curious to see where it was going and how everything would fall down. Also because of the antagonists. Basically, they were 50% of the reason why I didn't DNF this drama. I was really intrigued by their dynamic.

What the... ? There are some stuff that didn't make sense and instantly took me out of the drama. The first is the whole housemates situation. The second is Girl's daughter. There are precocious child character and then there is this perfect life coach confidente child character. It's like they didn't want to add another character and thought "why not give the role to the 5 year-old kid ?" (I have no idea of her age but the point is that she's way too young to be giving life advice to her mother, expecially about her relationship to her father... yikes).

Funny : Yes, some moments are funny but this drama goes to dark places. There are some heavy betrayals.

Music : Not memorable.

Cliché : See the premise of the drama in title.

Bottom line : If I don't care about the romance and the Boy in a romantic drama, I can't rate it more than a -/+. Besides, the mix of stupid and of well-done stuff was confusing. Still, it wasn't a minus because the plot and most of the characters were interesting. In the end, I don't think I can recommend it : -/+

 

2020 October 24th update : From commentary about Red Velvet Irene's scandal, I've just learnt about the "nut rage incident", which I think inspired this drama. More after the jump (spoilers, though it's about something that happens in the first episodes). 

 

What is the "nut rage incident" ? You can search for it to get more sourced informations but basically here's what happened. In 2014, the vice president (and also heiress) of Korean Air, while on a flight from New York to Korea, verbally abused and assaulted a flight attendant and a cabin crew chief because of the way macadamia nuts were served. It was before takeoff and she ordered the plane to go back to the gate to get the chief off the plane, delaying the flight.

Sounds familiar ? That is almost exactly what happens in the drama : the vice-president (and heiress) of an airline company abused a flight attendant for petty motives. Not sure ? Well, the real flight attendant in the "nut rage incident" is named Kim Do Hee. The main character of the drama is named Do Hee (though she's not the one abused in the fictional incident).

When I watched the drama, I thought the heiress character was a bit too much, especially with this incident, like how could you be so stupid to act in that way in public ? So reading that it actually happens in real life horrified me and made me appreciate it more in the context of the drama.

By the way, it seems that there is also a real life rivalry with a brother to control the company (https://www.straitstimes.com/asia/east-asia/nut-rage-heiress-leads-coup-to-overthrow-younger-ceo-brother) and that the real marriage was also abusive, way more than in the drama (https://nextshark.com/korean-air-heiress-nut-rage-video/). By the way, these news are from 2020 and 2018 so after the drama.