Memories of Alhambra Drama Review

Memories of Alhambra tells a story about a groundbreaking AR game about medieval battles in the Alhambra (a real place in Spain). Yoo Jin Woo (played by Hyun Bin), CEO of an investment company that specializes in optical devices, travels to Granada, Spain to meet the creator of the game, Jung Se Joo (played by Park Chan Yeol). However, Se Joo has gone missing and there, he meets his older sister, Jung Hee Joo (played by Park Shin Hye), who is the owner of the hostel he stays in and a former guitarist. Both get entangled in mysterious incidents, as the border between the real world and the AR world built by Se Joo begins to blur.

This drama deserves a real appreciation for its plot and fresh new story ideas. We haven't encountered an augmented-reality games drama like this for years and I give a standing applause for Hyun Bin. He rocks the role of Yeo Jin Woo so much *applaud* that I have no idea who's gonna fit Yeo Jin Woo other than him. 

It was really exciting to play a game which happens in our reality, Zinu (Yeo Jin Woo's username in the games) gets so excited to explore the game and got level up, but then it's a new game and it is not completed yet. The problem appears when Jin Woo had a fight within the game with Cha Hyeong Seok (Jin Woo's ex-best friend who had an affair with Jin Woo's ex wife - Soo Jin). Jin Woo proceeds to defeat him in the game after leveling up to level 5, where Cha Hyung Seok was. Before their last battle, Jin Woo made a deal with Hee Joo to buy Hostel Bonita, which is under Hee Joo's name. The deal was made because Se Joo put the license for the game under Hostel Bonita, which means if Jin Woo got the ownership of the Hostel, he got the license for the game. 

Hee Joo got 10 billion won from Jin Woo, which was like a magic for her. After the deal was successful, Jin Woo invited Hyung Seok to meet with him in the middle of the night before Jin Woo's flight to Barcelona and go back to Seoul.

Jin Woo says that he’s headed back to Seoul the next morning, which indicates that he’s been successful with the business deal that they were both after. Hyung Seok’s face hardens at this news, and Jin Woo goads that he’s giving Hyung Seok a chance to beat him in the game, even though he lost in real life. He prods, “That’s the charm of games, right? Escapism and denying reality — a world where losers can become heroes.”

Jin Woo continues to jab at him by saying that Hyung Seok should have just taken his advice and spent time with his wife. That’s the last straw, and Hyung Seok attacks. The two rivals engage in an intense sword fight, and they both manage to slice each other’s arms. Hyung Seok paces as he catches his breath and says that he always wanted to tell Jin Woo something when they met one-on-one. 

He clarifies that he didn’t steal Soo Jin from Jin Woo and claims that he saved her from him because she seemed so miserable. He says that he was worried that Soo Jin would deteriorate next to Jin Woo.
Hyung Seok warns Jin Woo not to reject reality and points to him as the problem, since he’s failed in his second marriage. He advises Jin Woo to reflect on his failures unless he wants to continue to fail in his future marriages. Jin Woo smirks and calls Hyung Seok a bastard. He notes that all traitors justify their deeds with the same excuse — that it was for the people. Jin Woo points out that Hyung Seok’s justification is evidence that he’s a true traitor.

Hyung Seok punches Jin Woo, and they grab each other by the collar. The game notifies them that physical contact is prohibited and warns them that they will level down. At the warning, the two enemies release each other and both drop to level 3 in punishment. There’s nobody to stop this fight. The two rivals continue their sword fight, and Hyung Seok manages to fling the sword out of Jin Woo’s hands. Jin Woo just barely avoids Hyung Seok’s swings and runs to grab his sword stuck in the ground. He sees the shadow of Hyung Seok approaching behind him and times his attack to stick his sword right into Hyung Seok’s abdomen.

Hyung Seok freezes in shock as the sword pierces him, and he seems convincingly in pain. Jin Woo pulls out the sword and slices at Hyung Seok a few more times before the final blow that sends bloody Hyung Seok limp onto the bench. He looks at Hyung Seok, and the game congratulates him on winning and earning his enemy’s experience.

The next morning, Jin Woo wakes up to his phone ringing and sees that he’s missed 16 calls from Secretary Seo. Secretary Seo urgently explains that it’s an issue with Cha Hyung Seok. He was found dead on a park bench in the morning — dead with his eyes wide open. Jin Woo freezes at this news, and notice that Hyeong Seok died on the battle ground last night. Jin Woo looks shocked as he finally realizes there may be a defect in this genius game.

The game is magic to Jin Woo because it’s a technological breakthrough that will bring him and his company fame and fortune. And the game (if it functioned safely) would be magic to the world, because the kind of things that can be done with augmented reality, including but also in addition to gaming, could change the world in ways we can only imagine. But this defect is real, even though Jin Woo puts away the game contacts, he is still log in into the game. The border between AR and real world becomes blur. 

As Jin Woo looks through his phone, he hears the thunder outside followed by a guitar playing “Memories of Alhambra.” He looks around nervously and finds that his vision has changed into game mode. He checks his eyes, and once again, he has entered the game without his contacts.
The game notifies him that his enemy has arrived, and Jin Woo fearfully tightens his grip. He hears a knock on the door and asks who’s there. The door opens, and when he sees that it’s just Hee Joo, he sighs in relief. But then, he hears other footsteps approaching. It’s glitchy Hyung Seok with his sword, and Jin Woo looks petrified. The battle continues. Crazy. No one can see Hyung Seok, other than Jin Woo. He finally understands that why Se Joo hasn’t returned and what he’s afraid of. Jin Woo presumes that Se Joo was also under pursuit by someone that only he could see.

Everyone starts to think that Jin Woo had some mental problems, even though Hee Joo seems to believe him. Thus, to end this life-threatening game, is to finish the game with some clues given to him from Game Master (Se Joo) through the game. 

During the adventure, Jin Woo was able to find Emma, the game character of Hee Joo, which functions as healer. There was this quotes is when the golden key meets with the bracelet, the gate will open. The bracelet itself was worn by Emma. Se Joo was then released from predicament and Jin Woo as the game master was given the ability to have instance dungeon in which he can escape and save himself there in case anything happen.

The game was reset and Jin Woo's character was deleted from the game. But after one year, Jin Woo come back to the real world after the AR game was reconstructed and the border between AR and real life has been checked properly. The game was released to the world and it ends like that. 

My Thoughts:

I am seriously mind blown with the idea of this story. This show is so dynamic and actually feels like a reflection of the AR game itself. The plot is unpredictable and unsteady in a way that makes this show gripping. 

The blending of multiple dimensions is blowing my mind. But we never quite know because the rules of the overlap between virtual and reality are still a bit unclear. As this is a story that only the writers know why certain things happen, and despite this ambiguity, I’m actually enjoying this lawless game going rogue because it infuses the drama with an element of mystery that makes everything so unpredictable. 

I’m loving the unexpected surprises, even though they’re mostly terrifying. The way that Hyung Seok just appeared behind the door and ruthlessly attacked Jin Woo made me squeak in fear and pain for all the broken bones that Jin Woo probably just broke again. 

The twists and cliffhangers slap me in the face because they come out of nowhere, and the solid creative writing ensures that the cliffhangers keep me engaged and not infuriated. The cliffhanger endings leave us with a taste of what’s to come, making me intrigued by the unknown elements of this AR. Just when I think that the show is slowing down, it speeds up and then comes to an abrupt halt. There are so many interesting elements and plot points to work. 

Even though it's all mystery, I still don't really like that the writer is not a good storyteller because everything is a surprise. We all need the background why it happens, how could it happens and any solutions to end it need to be tell into a good story telling - which doesn't happen here. The more it gets into the ending, the weirder it gets for me. 

Anyway, Hyun Bin portrays Jin Woo very nicely. He did super super good, I think one of the reason why I continue this drama is to see how much Hyun Bin has grown since Secret Garden and hope that this drama goes well, even though sadly the storyline needs a bit of soft touch. 

I'm sorry to say but the romantic part didn't get me well. The connection was a bit off and no chemistry so far between Binnie & Pak Shin Hye LOL, or maybe I just didn't ship them together haha!

Overall is good, if you want something nice like an AR game drama, this one is worth to try ~ Enjoy!!

Search: WWW Korean Drama Review

Search: WWW is all about the story of three women in their late thirties — Bae Ta Mi, Cha Hyeon and Song Ga Kyeong — who work in the top two competitive web portal companies: Unicon and Barro. I am not an expert in such webtech thing, but Unicon & Barro might be like Yahoo or Google - which is very inetersting enough to see what kind of workplace there and how the three woman manages to survive the working life battle. 

This k-drama is actually 2019 television series, and I already watch it when it was aired on tvn during June 5 till July 25, 2019, which in fact the time when I turned 27 that year and watching those woman series give me such a heartful of passion and faith. I did not expect that this drama will have a huge popularity that year. It all about love life, work life, life as a whole. 

It was all started when Bae Ta Mi (played by Im Soo Jung) got fired from Unicon and she then decided to move to Barro to challenge and make Barro a bigger web portal than Unicon. 

Unicon grew because of Bae Ta Mi and her senior, Song Ga Kyeong (played by Jeon Hye Jin) until it was acquired by KU Group, in which Song Ga Kyeong got married to Jin Woo, the last child of Chairwoman Jang of KU Group. Their marriage was a marriage of convenience - to save Ga Kyeong's collapsed parent business. As a “sacrifice”, many of Unicon's decisions were made for the benefit of the KU Group. One of them is removing real time keywords. A kind of hot trending topic discussed.

One big incident was when the KU Group sided with one of the presidential candidates. That's why when candidate A got caught in a scandal and became a public conversation, Unicon deliberately deleted the keyword about candidate A so that the related article didn't come out. The reason is that they protect candidate A's human rights.

But this did not make sense, as a result the government made it a concrete one. Unicon's party was summoned to attend the trial, on charges of fabricated alias manipulation. Bae Ta Mi as a Unicon employee was asked to be a witness. Even though the one responsible was actually Song Ga Gyeong. But Ta Mi doesn't want to be a scapegoat either. At the trial, he attacked back. His name has become a trending topic and entered the real time keyword ranks.

Because of his behavior, Ta Mi was fired from Unicon. From here he got an offer from Barro, the competitor's web portal for Unicon. Barro and Unicon always compete to be in the top 1. To be precise, it's Barro who tries to tackle Unicon. So far, Unicon has always been number 1 and Barro only second. When Ta Mi entered Barro, Cha Hyeon / Scarlett (played by Lee Da Hee) refused - which is my favorite in this drama!!! 

Finally, Ta Mi promised that if Barro didn't win the top 1 title within 6 months, she would get out from Barro. From there Scarlett accepted. Ta Mi was appointed by Brian, the CEO Barro to form a TF (Task Force) team. This team is aimed at making Barro number 1. Ta Mi invites A Ra (Oh Ah Yeon) and Choi Bong Gi (Woo Ji Hyun) from Unicon to join. Meanwhile, from Barro there are Scarlett, Jennie (Ha Seung Ri), and Alex (Song Ji Ho).

Although others are engaged in IT, the culture of the Unicon and Barro companies is different. If at Unicon it seems stiff and formal, at Barro it is the opposite. Every room is nicely designed, far from "office" impression. Every employee is free to wear any fashion style. Plus, they are called by English names. Like Cha Hyeon who was called Scarlett. Min Ho Jung CEO Barro is called Brian. It sounds fuuun - like that kind of Western company ~!

The concept of Barro and Unicon is similar to Google. The web search portal also provides many features. Barro, for example, has a game feature, books, etc. So it turns out that designing a homepage for a web portal page is not easy, you know. Companies must place themselves in the user. What is the need. His search trends. His interests. How difficult is it to persuade a field that is considered less profitable.

The humanist side of a CEO is depicted when CEO Brian decides to resign because of a scandal. Even though Ta Mi and Scarlett convinced Brian that he didn't need to resign, he was adamant. He said, perhaps a public apology was sufficient for the business area. But when it comes to company image, he has to resign. Why? To convince the public that Barro's image is good. 

On the love life, Cha Hyeon - she is dating a friend at work. But sadly, her boyfriend cheated behind her. The funny thing is that Cha Hyeon's boyfriend was Ta Mi's ex from college. Cha Hyeon describes as a woman who is strong and doesn't want to appear weak. Once she found out that his boyfriend was cheating, she beat him up. 

Cha Hyeon is a woman who can't stay quiet when there is injustice. So the funny part is, Scarlett likes watching soap opera dramas, aka soap operas! She would just laugh, cry, got angry with the dramas go on. SO funny, love her personality here!

In the story, he got stuck with the actor because of some misunderstanding of an action drama and made the actor hurt. Seol Ji Hwan, a rookie actor whose name I never heard of. Finally Scarlett somehow admitted to being Seol Ji Hwan's manager. All for Seol Ji Hwan to be more acknowledged of his abilities. Both by the public and colleagues like directors, directors, et al. Finally they both fell in love.

It's really a drama, from fan-idol to couple. IS A REAL DAT EVENT? 

Meanwhile, Song Ga Gyeong. As mentioned above, she didn't get married because of love. Finally she had an affair, her husband too. They are not a normal couple. Everything changed when Ga Gyeong asked for a divorce. The reason is so that she can get out of Chairwoman Jang's confinement. Jin Woo agreed. Say at least this is the last thing he can do for 10 years of marriage.

Try to imagine 10 years of marriage without love, what will you do? You don't even live at home. Really got married because of formality and business alone. I am sorry for what happened to Ga Gyeong :(

Not knowing that before the divorce, Jin Woo fell in love with Ga Gyeong. 

The last and most complicated is Bae Ta Mi. The biggest part in this drama is Bae Ta Mi's relationship with Park Morgan (played by Jang Ki Yong). In the midst of stress at work, Ta Mi plays games at some kind of play place. She then met Park Morgan. It's funny. Starting from the chatter, it ended with a one night stand ..... thought Ta Mi. not for Morgan. He likes Ta Mi from the first sight. In the end, Ta Mi was chased. A 38-year-old woman, being chased by a 28-year-old man. 

Ta Mi doesn't want to just play around with dating. Uniquely, Ta Mi has no desire to get married. The concept of "love" for Ta Mi: living together is yes, but marriage is no. In contrast to Morgan, who hopes to get married and have a happy family. Naturally he has that kind of desire. From a young age, Morgan was "dumped" into an orphanage by his mother and was raised her adoptive parents. From the start of Ta Mi and Morgan's relationship, it was this difference in principle that was the source of the problem. It's also complicated, I already understand that both of them have different goals in dating. But still continued. Morgan said, "we can still be in love".

Ta Mi said, how can this relationship work? In the end, one of us will be hurt. Either Morgan who can't fulfill his dream of getting married, or Ta Mi who is forced to get married in order to continue the relationship with Morgan.

It's waaay toooo complicated. But what matters most is how to stay true to yourself and always try to find happiness in small things. Maybe it doesn't work at this time, but who knows it will later on? 

If you need a drama that feels right, challenging, complicated and more real, this one is recommended to watch!

Cheers~