One procrastinatory afternoon may not have been helpful in terms of productivity but it did allow me to finish Mermaid Tail Tales.
From my first impressions review, you could see that I was completely on board for this show’s particular brand of weird. After the first 4ish episodes I recall the drama going from pure humor and sight gags, to focusing on the household and relationships. Once they got in this zone I recall thinking this show could have gone on for 50 more episodes, so of course it was soon cut from 16 to 10.
From the show’s downright sad rating, to its high overhead costs, I can’t say I’m too surprised. Luckily for me (I guess), I was waning on this drama do to lack of parodies, laughs, and plot.
Which isn’t to say I didn’t lurve virtually all its characters, but from going to 47 minutes of pure funny with 5 minutes of sincerity, to basically reversed ratios for the ladder half of the drama.
That said I feel its totally worth watching even with a cut-off ending. It’s a nice change of pace drama from all the melo, Joseon, and rom-coms that find themselves lacking in com. I feel most sad when innovative, go for broke shows such as these actually end up in the red thus causes producers and writers less likely to attempt something like this in the future.
For my fervent love affair with all these references (my favorite by the way it’s SNL redux of their popular GTA sketches), the coalition of characters they creative were quite amusing and went beyond surface level caricatures. My favorite pairing was the sisterly bond between Ha-Ni and Hye-young being my favorite (Note: I love me some bromances but the pure rarity of a well done female friendship in dramaland is equivalent to a mermaid who doesn’t like to sing)
Dat Ending Tho…
I totally can understand why people were bummed and confused because let’s face it, it was a confusing scatter shot ending. Guess what though they had one episode to wrap things up when they thought they had 40% more show to go, allowing me to cut several pounds of slack.
Now if you went into this episode not knowing all the cuts and ratings info, one should be rightly pissed at how the last hour unfolded. IMO I went into episode 10 knowing it would be slap dash and have to jump through hoops/flash forwards into to reach some sort of conclusion.
As for the last 2 minutes, more specifically the “I’ll be back” final frame, I LOVED IT.
Well okay, more appreciated it’s probable meta hit on the higher ups who caused this ending to happen. Also I really just liked the symmetry of going back to its parody origins. Restating it’s Terminator references from the 1st episode, what a better way to finish a show then do what it did best while also sticking it’s middle finger up in a creative fashion.
Quick Hits
– Kim Seul-Gie has now managed me to be more compelled with her characters and love-lines in 2.5 dramas (thats Surplus Princess, Flower Boy Next Door, and the part of Discovery of Love I watched for those counting at home) Me thinks it’s time for her to get a starring role of her own. Preferably with comedic singing.
I like Song Jae-Rims character in this drama. I LOVE his real(er) life persona on We Got Married. This guy also needs his own show. It will be called Song Jae BRimming with delightful flirtatious antics.
-Better yet, let’s just have both of those crazy kids together being adorable for 20 or 50 episodes, whose with me?
Ratings: 8 let’s eat references/ 8 apple bottomed bootays.
My List of weird commonalities
| motherfadder hilarity | gen dyn twi | Parody Laden | trifecta perfecta |
| the House! | now that’s what I call 2nd couple syndrome | roomiz fo life | wtf ending |
| english done right | nicknames – carp | friends:endangered species | good pilot |
The East West Dramality 