She Was Pretty – Keep the First Love a Nice Memory

“She Was Pretty” is a 2015 Korean drama series, with 16 episodes, based on a true story, and categorized as Office, Workplace, Romance, and Comedy (Rom-Com). It is available on KOCOWA+ and Viki.

SUMMARY: When they were kids, she was pretty. Now she looks like a train wreck and her first love who left to go to the USA is now back in Korea. He wants to meet her again. WHAT?? She can’t let him see her now! It would destroy their beautiful memory of their first love.

♦ She Was Pretty But Changed Over Time

“She Was Pretty” is kind of a Korean version of Cyrano de Bergerac, a play written by Edmond Rostand and published in 1897. An ugly man is in love with a beautiful woman, but does not dare face her. His friend is dashing and handsome so he gets his friend to serve as a substitute and romance her.

When Ji Sung-Joon was a young kid, he was chubby and dorky-looking. The only person in school who was kind to him was a pretty girl named Kim Hye-Jin. They became very close. You could say it was a case of first love. But then Ji Sung-Joon had to move to the United States because of his father’s job. Time passed and they lost touch with each other.

Ji Sung-Joon now works for a fashion magazine company and has been transferred from the office in New York to Seoul, South Korea. He didn’t tell his staff but he was given 3 months to make the magazine rank at the top or the company would close down the office. That’s his primary mission. But now that he’s back in Seoul, he hopes to reconnect with Kim Hye-Jin. YIKES! She can’t let him see her the way she is now!

When Kim Hye-Jin was young everybody said she took her good looks from her mother. But something happened on her way to adulthood. There was some sort of DNA hiccup or burp and she lost her mother’s genes and ended up looking more like her not-so-good-looking father. That’s the best way she could explain her transformation. She has freckles and “malicious” unmanageable curly hair, and if that isn’t bad enough, she’s jobless! Ho can he re-connect with Ji Sung-Joon? No doubt he would be expecting to see a beautiful young woman. Not a train wreck!

Kim Hye-Jin agreed to meet up with Ji Sung-Joon but the young man she saw was no longer the chubby unattractive boy with low self-esteem. He was now a handsome young man. In desperation, she asked her pretty friend to act like she was Kim Hye-Jin. After the meeting, the friend would make up an excuse so that they would never see each other again. In that way, the nice memory of the first love would be preserved.

It worked perfectly. Not only that but she finally got a job. She thought she would be working in one department. But as soon as she arrived they transferred her to a different department. Kim Hye-Jin was a brand new employee; which meant she had 3 months to prove he could do the job. But this wasn’t the job she signed up for! Her boss told her all she had to do was last in the other department for 3 months and then she could transfer back.

Could things get any worse? Yes. Yes, they could. Guess who her new boss is? Ji Sung-Joon is the head of the department she was transferred into and he’s MEAN! He still doesn’t recognize her as his first love from childhood. But Ji Sung-Joon thinks she’s terrible at her job and threatened that he could fire her at any time! After all of those unsuccessful interviews, Kim Hye-Jin finally gets a job and it’s a nightmare! But she’s got to keep this job!

Main Characters:

• Ji Sung-Joon (played by Park Seo-Jun, “Park Seo Joon: Best Korean Dramas Released 2012-2023”)
• Kim Hye-Jin (played by Hwang Jung-Eum, “The Escape of the Seven 1 and 2”, “Incarnation of Money”)
• Min Ha-Ri (played by Koh Joon-Hee)
• Kim Shin-Hyuk (played by Choi Si-Won, “DNA Lover”)

Where to Watch

Viewership and Rating:

• IMDb: 7.6 out of 10 stars
• My Drama List: 8 out of 10 stars
• Viki viewers rated this series 9.5 out of 10 stars
• Google users shared a public rating: 4.6 out of 5 stars

My personal rating is the same as the My Drama List.

I had not watched a K-drama starring Park Seo Jun and found this one. It was delightful! But it wouldn’t go on my list for best Park Seo Jun K-dramas.

LINKS OF INTEREST:

[Drama Review] She Was Pretty | Mean in the Middle

[K-Drama Review] She was Pretty | OtogeMeow

She Was Pretty Korean Drama Review | Funcurve

Park Seo Joon Confirmed For New Rom-Com Drama, “Waiting for Gyeongdo” | Soompi

We Ranked Park Seo-joon’s 5 Best TV Shows | ViuScene (“She Was Pretty” I No.3 on this list.)

TRAILER/TEASER:

KOCOWA TV. “[One-Minute Drama] Park Seo Jun & Hwang Jung Eum ‘She Was Pretty.’” YouTube, Video, 26 Apr. 2018, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YXxxQRwumSQ.

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