Our Very First Newsletter: Love Next Door, New Netflix Films, and More!

Hello, my dear human!

How are you today?

I hope you had a lovely weekend and that your Monday wasn’t that awful (like most Mondays are, am I right?)!

My Monday was alright: I spent most of it writing and editing our (super) long review of tvN’s Love Next Door. Here’s a quick snippet of our review, coming out on The Blossom Review tomorrow at 1 pm GMT (or 2 pm GMT+1):

The show does have random moments of tenderness throughout, though, but they don't happen often enough or are placed efficiently enough to add anything to the overall narrative. Initially, I thought that Love Next Door wanted to explore Tolstoy's famous introduction to Anna Karenina: "All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way." But I don't think that's what happened. I'm afraid that the show didn't know exactly what themes to explore, leading to a hodgepodge of ideas, plotlines, and one-dimensional characters.

Doesn’t sound that cheerful, does it?

After 16 dragging episodes, Seok-ryu and Seung-hyo’s tale came to an anticlimactic end last Sunday. And yesterday, the first thing I did was break the whole show down, trying to understand how a show that I’d earnestly looked forward to disappointed me so much.

I wonder if my expectations were too high or if I was just in the mood for something else. Either way, it was difficult for me to finish the series and I felt bad for feeling so relieved on Sunday.

You might wonder why I continued watching it if I didn’t enjoy it.

Good question, my fellow fan.

Back in the day, when I was a young and innocent drama fan, I would watch whatever popped up in front of me — regardless of quality, duration, and enjoyment level. Experience made me set up a single rule: try the first third of a show. If you like it, continue. If not, drop it.

Life is too short to watch something you don’t enjoy. And there’s so much content out there, so many shows that I still want and need to watch, that there’s no time to be wasted!

Right? What are your rules when watching dramas?

Anyway, after the first third of Love Next Door, I held on to the hope that things would improve. After all, this is Jung Hae-in and Jung So-min we’re talking about, for goodness’ sake!

(And I lowkey fell in love with Mo-eun and Dan-ho, honestly).

But I guess it couldn’t be saved. And I don’t remember the last time I felt this disappointed with a K-drama.

Have you had that kind of experience before? How do you feel about Love Next Door? Shoot me a message or leave a comment on Substack or The Blossom Review tomorrow! Let’s cry on each other’s shoulders! T-T

Moving on to some more exciting news:

• During the BIFF (Busan International Film Festival) last Friday, Netflix announced their 2025 Korean film slate. According to The Korea Times:

"For 2025, we have prepared a diverse lineup, ranging from action and thriller to romantic comedy and animation," Kim [Tae-won, director of the Content & Business team at Netflix Korea] said, highlighting that the films were chosen in line with the company's philosophy of offering "universal fun" and "unique storytelling."

The seven films announced during the event were:

First look at the Kill Boksoon’s spin-off, Mantis, with Yim Si-wan leading the cast. (Credit: Netflix)

1. Revelations, a thriller directed by Yeon Sang-ho (Train to Busan) and starring Ryu Jun-yeol (The 8 Show) and Shin Hyun-bin (Cinderella at 2 AM).

2. The Great Flood, a sci-fi action film directed by Kim Byung-woo (The Terror Live) and starring Kim Da-mi (Our Beloved Summer) and Park Hae-soo (Money Heist: Korea).

3. Lost in Starlight, an animated romance film directed by Han Ji-won. This is the first Korean animated film on the platform.

4. Wall to Wall, a thriller directed by Kim Tae-joon starring Kang Ha-neul (When the Camellia Blooms) and Yeom Hye-ran (The Glory).

5. Good News, a thriller directed by Byun Sung-hyun and starring Sul Kyung-gu (The Whirlwind), Hong Kyung (Revenant) and Ryoo Seung-beom (Moving). This is the working title and details haven’t been released yet.

6. Love Untangled, a rom-com directed by Namkoong Sun and starring Shin Eun-soo (Twinkling Watermelon) and Gong Myung (Lovers of the Red Sky).

7. Mantis, the Kill Boksoon spin-off directed by Lee Tae-sung and starring Yim Si-wan (Boyhood), Park Gyu-young (A Good Day to Be a Dog), and Jo Woo-jin (Narco-Saints).

• A fan of KBS2’s Winter Sonata? Then, rejoice! Director Yoon Seok-ho is leading a re-editing and remastering process — because the show will be re-released in Japan as a 4K feature next winter. Hopefully, they’ll release it internationally too. For now, you can watch the show on Viki or Kocowa.

• Exciting updates for Ryo Yoshizawa’s latest feature, Living in Two Worlds. Besides competing at the BFI London Film Festival (this October) and at the Shanghai International Film Festival (last June), distribution rights have been sold to Hong Kong, Taiwan, China, Korea, Indonesia, and Israel. Encore has secured the rights for in-flight distribution too. Here’s the trailer with English subtitles:

• Healing fiction continues to grab attention worldwide. The Korea Times released a lovely article on two books that we’re all looking forward to reading, Yun Jung-eun’s Marigold Mind Laundry (which was released in the UK last week) and Yeon So-min’s The Healing Season of Pottery (which should come out in January 2025). I had already added these two titles to our “8 Unmissable Korean Books Out in the Next 6 Months!” article. Why don’t you check it out?

Last week, on The Blossom Review:

You often hear that Japanese television is a “niche” but I find that hard to believe. Japanese TV can offer as many marvellous stories as any other market. The country has talented directors, writers, and actors like any other place. It’s just that J-dramas aren’t marketed, and even worse, available enough to be labelled anything other than “niche”.

Last week, I opened my little heart and shared some of my thoughts on the international distribution of Japanese content. I also made a long list of 30+ J-dramas coming out in October. You can check it all out here.

Last Friday was book day for The Blossom Review and we published our review on Lee Mi-ye’s magical Dallergut Dream Department Store. I also made a video about it, which you can watch here.

This was our update for this week! I hope you have a wonderful week ahead (: I’ll stop by your email inbox next Tuesday again but, meanwhile, you can find me on The Blossom Review tomorrow with a new review and on our YouTube channel on Thursday with a new video!