Review: Flower Boy Next Door (2013)

Official drama poster. Image via Tving.

Loosely based from a webtoon entitled I Steal Peaks From Him Everyday (Yoo Hyun-sook), Flower Boy Next Door is something of simple plot made complicated by a roller coaster of varying emotions, and is on another level character wise. And dialogue wise. It revolves around people and change, which is the drama's strongest point. It really wasn't about what's happening but how the characters behave and react to that which was happening. That accuracy with emotional interactions... I love how the writers were able to lay this out with so much depth. 

Image via Newsen.

Plus, I've never been amused and interested with a secondary couple as I have been with these two below. Oh, I have. That robot couple Manager Kim and Dong Ah in Wild Romance. But seriously, isn't it ironic that the secondary characters get a story better written than the main leads? I'd swear I don't see these two NOT sell if their characters were cast in a drama of their own.

Yet candid as it is, nothing in this world stays perfect, as the old saying goes. As the story progressed several characters got dropped midstream, there are some whose characters didn't really go anywhere, and plot holes became more evident as the show neared its end. That, plus the succeeding episodes after the third quarter of the show went more like meh. Somehow, Flower Boy Next Door lost its momentum, what with going around in circles for three episodes for a conflict that could've been easily resolved by both of the main leads talking, instead of one throwing idiotic decisions out in the open. Had the writers been able to save the show from all those draggy circles, I would have loved it even mooooore. 

On a lighter note, if there's a circle that I hate, there's also one that I love. Clever narrative circles! Not only does it show wit on the writer's part, it also shows keen attention to detail.

Scenes from episode one and sixteen respectively, where Enrique gestures that 'I've got my eye on you' bit that led them to finding each other.

These, too.

I love the role reversals. The realization on what both sides felt given the situation. The 'putting myself in someone else's shoe' bit. The understanding. Show, why are you so clever at these sort of things? 

And the metaphors... I must mention the metaphors!

I love this scene as to how it was able to symbolize Dok Mi's pain.

After Tae Joon left, Dok Mi shuts the curtains in her room close—the same time Enrique enters his apartment. Not contented with just closing the curtains (and probably not trusting herself that she would no longer peek), she pins them too, pricking herself in the process. Blood draws out, then she huddles in a corner and cries. Aw, that pain!  How brilliant of the writer to use this symbolism in Dok Mi's stead of pain from veering herself away to the sight of our bubbly burst of sunshine.

And this scene at the art gallery.

As Dok Mi grabbed a pamphlet from that Van Gogh exhibit, she gets a paper cut, the same time Enrique gets hit by a car. I love how it implies the entwined fate our two leads have, and I love more that this is also a clever narrative circle in a sense that the paper cut drew blood on the same spot where Dok Mi had pricked her finger. If it pains her to shut Enrique out, it must pain her to have him meet an accident too, since they are tied together by fate like that. Clever bit.

Bottomline: Despite the downhills, Flower Boy Next Door is such a feel good romcom drama. It provides for a compelling material where emotions are explored, where growth is rich, and where love and life is a simple work in progress.

Here's to learning to open the doors of our lives and venturing out, just like Go Dok Mi. 

Image via Pinterest.

The hat mark is gone. Instead of it, there’s a picture of them together.
As time passes, the picture’s mark will be left, right?
A mark of not one, but the two of them.

TAGS: Flower Boy Next Door, K-Drama Reviews, Park Shin Hye, Yoon Shi Yoon   Edit