"My Perfect Stranger" has its flaws, but I love it nonetheless.
006: I'm a sucker for dramas that make me overthink.😂
The thing with time-travel + murder mystery shows is that you have to be very observant with clues they're spreading throughout the episodes until the big reveal.
When I started watching My Perfect Stranger, I was intrigued on how they'll manage to figure out the culprit without significantly affecting what happens in the future. To briefly summarize the plot, Yoon Hae Jun (Kim Dong Wook) and Baek Yoon Young (Jin Ki Joo) are two strangers from 2021 who somehow end up in 1987 - he to find the serial killer who is connected to his death in the future (he dies in 2022), and she as collateral damage (after being ran over by his car)... or so she thinks.
They end up in Woojung-ri, a village that happens to be the hometown of Yoon Young's parents. And since nothing in KDrama is a mere coincidence, they realize along the way that their family history is a lot more intertwined than expected.😲
Spoiler Alert:
The creator of the car is their son from a distant future. Hae Jun survived the attack on that lake (it was mentioned in an earlier episode that his body was only "missing") and fathered a child who saw that he was still haunted by the events of his past. The time machine was a way for him to help his father make the right choices if given the chance.
So many things didn't add up for me especially in the killer's big reveal, but I'll take the happy ending that was given after everything the characters had been through.
And I may be in the minority, but I liked how Hae Jun and Yoon Young's relationship progressed from being mere strangers to people who found a deeper connection with each other. Proximity breeds the strangest feelings indeed.😏
Nitpicks:
I had expected this to develop like Tunnel, one of my favorite KDramas ever, where the element of time travel also figures prominently in the hunt for a serial killer. But this one took a slow burn approach with several red herrings thrown in to confuse viewers before revealing the killer in the last three episodes.
They never really told us what happened to Yeon Woo's mom. Sure she abandoned him when he was seven and he acted like he was okay with it until he casually brought it up to Chung Ah about going to meet her. The next shot had him crying while she comforted him... and then the murders started. Anyone who's a fan of procedurals would know that "mommy issues" was the stressor and the trigger was either she's already dead, or that she rejected Yeon Woo... again.💔 He never got the closure he needed.
Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Watch this on: VIU (all 16 episodes done)