겨울새

Young Eun lived with a family ever since she was an orphan and then fell in love with Do Hyun who is 5 years older than her. However, Do Hyun's family did not approve of Do Hyun dating Young Eun. As a result, Young Eun eventually left Do Hyun and marries a doctor, Joo Kyung Woo. Although Kyung Woo acts like a gentleman, he is actually a mama's boy with multiple and complicated personalities. Though he treats Young Eun well, he believes everything his mother tells him and will turn on Young Eun at any moment. Jin Ah is a pediatric medical resident and falls for Do Hyun. But she is unsure of his relationship with Young Eun. Do Hyun decides to marry Jin Ah and after the wedding, Young Eun has had enough of Kyung Woo's mother. She decides to leave Kyung Woo. What will happen between Do Hyun and Young Eun? Will they realize they can't leave without the other?

Unfortunately, the drama took the least favorable route for a makjang drama. What makes a good makjang is having a reasonable push and pull balance for its conflicts, however, this drama tipped the scale all the way to the other side. The result is having an utterly doormat female lead which led to a miserable experience for the viewers. Throughout its runtime, everyone was pushing her around with all kinds of abuse, but there was never a real push back. Waiting in desperation to see her bite back but the drama didn't allow it. The attempt to show her standing up for herself resulted in a successful failure, as expected. There were other problems relating to balance all over the drama. The ending as well followed the same pattern, denying the viewers a reasonable amount of satisfaction after all the preceding events. God bless the ML's aunt, Jung Eun suk, for keeping the drama tolerable and watchable. One more thing, the drama definitely feels like it was cut short, hence, why the last 3-4 episodes were scrambled together really quick. There were even some obvious signs like attempting to introduce a new character/side plot at episode 41.