I have to admit that I thought the first season was perfect in every way. The protagonists’ insta-love, the sexual tension, the way you can perfectly understand each character—every episode had me nodding in agreement because everything that happened felt logical and incredible for introducing these characters to us. How Yoonho knows that starting this relationship will be painful, but does it anyway, because his heart is pure. Meanwhile, Suyeon is one of the most pitiable characters I’ve seen in a manhwa... truly sad, wounded, and unable to understand innocent love without hurting himself. With the introduction of Gyeol and the traumatic past he shares with Suyeon, it became clear to me that the journey of this story would be about Suyeon’s emotional recovery and accepting that he was worthy of love without pain. The second and third seasons, however, saw a slight drop in quality and focused heavily on the sexual relationships between the characters. I would have liked them to explore each character’s past more deeply, such as how Yoonho was raised by a father who asked him to forgive all wrongs and who justified injustices with an overly soft form of love, and how he really differed from Suyeon’s father, who completely shattered his son’s confidence from a young age by forcing him to take the “blame” for his mother’s actions, or Gyeol’s childhood, above all, which explains very well how his fear of rejection turned him into a sadist who enjoys ruining people’s lives. I was a little disappointed, and also by how little Gyeol is “punished” for his actions, but after reading the authors’ notes, I better understood what they meant with their story: Yoonho and Suyeon hurt themselves by seeking that love that heals them without first doing something for themselves. Suyeon, feeling inferior and weak, lets himself be swept away by masochistic sexual pleasure and accepts the relationship with Gyeol—one he could have easily walked away from at any time. At the same time, Yoonho, hoping that Suyeon would always choose him, allowed himself to be hurt by entering into that unpredictable BDSM dynamic. Finally, Gyeol, who was also incapable of loving properly, ended up irreversibly hurting the only person who truly understood him. They are damaged people who hurt themselves even more by searching for a magical solution that would make them whole! In the end, I liked that Yoonho went to therapy and worked through his trauma, and that Suyeon chose his art and his relationship with Yoonho. That’s something you don’t usually see in a manhwa. Overall, I really liked the story and the character designs (Suyeon’s eyes are beautiful), and the final message (the scene where Yoonho and Suyeon repair the vase with kintsugi… I cried) was very good, so I wholeheartedly recommend this manhwa.
I have to admit that I thought the first season was perfect in every way. The protagonists’ insta-love, the sexual tension, the way you can perfectly understand each character—every episode had me nodding in agreement because everything that happened felt logical and incredible for introducing these characters to us. How Yoonho knows that starting this relationship will be painful, but does it anyway, because his heart is pure. Meanwhile, Suyeon is one of the most pitiable characters I’ve seen in a manhwa... truly sad, wounded, and unable to understand innocent love without hurting himself. With the introduction of Gyeol and the traumatic past he shares with Suyeon, it became clear to me that the journey of this story would be about Suyeon’s emotional recovery and accepting that he was worthy of love without pain.
The second and third seasons, however, saw a slight drop in quality and focused heavily on the sexual relationships between the characters. I would have liked them to explore each character’s past more deeply, such as how Yoonho was raised by a father who asked him to forgive all wrongs and who justified injustices with an overly soft form of love, and how he really differed from Suyeon’s father, who completely shattered his son’s confidence from a young age by forcing him to take the “blame” for his mother’s actions, or Gyeol’s childhood, above all, which explains very well how his fear of rejection turned him into a sadist who enjoys ruining people’s lives.
I was a little disappointed, and also by how little Gyeol is “punished” for his actions, but after reading the authors’ notes, I better understood what they meant with their story: Yoonho and Suyeon hurt themselves by seeking that love that heals them without first doing something for themselves. Suyeon, feeling inferior and weak, lets himself be swept away by masochistic sexual pleasure and accepts the relationship with Gyeol—one he could have easily walked away from at any time. At the same time, Yoonho, hoping that Suyeon would always choose him, allowed himself to be hurt by entering into that unpredictable BDSM dynamic. Finally, Gyeol, who was also incapable of loving properly, ended up irreversibly hurting the only person who truly understood him.
They are damaged people who hurt themselves even more by searching for a magical solution that would make them whole!
In the end, I liked that Yoonho went to therapy and worked through his trauma, and that Suyeon chose his art and his relationship with Yoonho. That’s something you don’t usually see in a manhwa.
Overall, I really liked the story and the character designs (Suyeon’s eyes are beautiful), and the final message (the scene where Yoonho and Suyeon repair the vase with kintsugi… I cried) was very good, so I wholeheartedly recommend this manhwa.