Família por Escolha (2024)

So good! Compared to it's Chinese counterpart - I'd say better quality, but not more enjoyable

Loved it! It was better than the Chinese version in many ways, but I think I enjoyed them just about equally. Equal enjoyment doesn't equate equal quality. I think the overall story was better here. The found family was the best I've seen in a drama (besides Love is Science? but that is a different type of found family). In this version THERE WAS NO LOVE TRIANGLE. God that was so much of a blerg in the Chinese version especially when you compare it to the lack of one in the Korean version. The lack of the love triangle meant that they could do Hae Jun's character SO MUCH JUSTICE. I loved his character. I loved his acting. I never felt bad because he didn't get the girl and you could tell that he played an equally important role in the sister's and the family's life.
(We of course felt bad for him because of his "family situation" but not because he earned second place in his sister's affections - which became the case in the Chinese one. Then that made the relationship between San Ha's equivalent and the sister more central, overshadowing parts of the story that were better fleshed out in the Korean version.
Also, Hwang In Youp's acting was FAR superior to his counterpart. That, of course, is no surprise, because Hwang In Youp is a genius and we're all so so so so so so happy that he finally has his lead role that he deserves.
On the other hand. I will say that I didn't feel the chemistry as much. I felt his longing and love for Ju Won, but I never felt here's for him. It was almost like *snap* she's in love with him and it happened so fast and with nothing to support it and her character kind of felt flaky ever after. NOTE, I saw someone say they didn't like her character/the actress didn't do a great job. (This was before I watched it and why I held back from watching it for so long). I 100% disagree. I thought she did an excellent job. She was the glue that held the family together and she did a perfect job at it. It isn't her fault that they didn't do her justice in giving her the opportunity/reasons to fall in love with San Ha (besides the fact that his love is so apparent and genuine and all-encompassing, but having someone love you that much doesn't equate you loving them, and I just was never convinced. They fit together well and were a cute couple, there was just never the spark that got Ju Won there.)
On that note, while San Ha's counterpart's acting wasn't that good, I did think the couple from the original Chinese version had chemistry that their Korean counterpart lacked. Which is confusing. How can a poorer actor be in a couple that has better chemistry? I think it was directing/how the story played out. I still remember the scene where San Ha's counterpart says he's going to marry her early on... you just have to watch the whole thing.

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Relation père et fils

C'est Kang Haen Jun qui m’a le plus touché dans ce drama. Sans son personnage, je n’aurais peut-être pas autant aimé. Plus que l’histoire d’amour des personnages principaux, c’est la relation entre le père et le fils qui m’a captivée. J’ai particulièrement pleuré lors des départs pour l’université, des moments très émouvants symbolisant une ktransition majeure.
J'ai pleuré tout au long de l'épisode 9. 😭 J'étais très touchée. Aprés je ne comprennais pas pourquoi ils ne reviennent pas vivre avec leur pére aprés leur retour. 😏


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Kang Haen Jun was the character that touched me the most in this drama. Without his character, I might not have enjoyed it as much. More than the love story of the main characters, it was the relationship between the father and son that captivated me. I especially cried during the moments when they left for university, such emotional scenes symbolizing a major transition.
I cried throughout episode 9. 😭 I was very moved. After that, I didn’t understand why they didn’t come back to live with their father after their return. 😏

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Worth a watch with better and worse things.

Personally I am a fan of Go Ahead. The bonds, the friends and family connections and yes even the romance because from my pov, Ling Xiao loved JianJian all his life and never considered her as a sibling. Now to make more sense, about why this worth your time and what I personally thought was did wrong lets list it out..

The Good:
1. Actors did an incredible job. Absolutely made me cry a million tears just like original did. The dads were perfect and so were other, well mostly.
2. The romantic angle of Sanha and Juwon, romance was done better in this one somehow, more mature, more stable and more heart fluttering.
3. The second pairing, thank the lords for that. I wanted the best friend to fulfill her first love and I am glad they got their chance here.
4. Better ML. While Ling Xiao was good but Sanha is incredible, he is more vocal about his feelings, he lashes out when he should and also InYoup for this role was perfect. He did it more justice than the OG. For me he carried the show with the two dads. And his character was the one that made this adaption more on a good side that OG.
5. FL's career choice. I loved how she ended up as baker because she loved cakes and also how they put the sports injury line because that broke my heart.
6. Bromance, in this one brothers were better connected and more comfortable with each other. Well done!

The Bad:
1. FL. I love the actress but Juwon's character was a downgrade for me from Jian Jian. The school Juwon is not as bubbly and quirky, and the adult one is also not as good but still better. She was not as charming at the OG FL for me.
2. The living in Seoul and not meeting for 10 years with a girl you love so dearly, umm...should have send him abroad tbh to make this more believable.
3. Leaving out the adult friendships of females from the OG. I wanted to see that because I absolutely adored it.
4. The SL, he was good but compared to OG, wasn't as mature which I kinda missed.
5. Reunion and FLs reaction. It feels like FL didn't grew up all those 10 years and still whines like that. Any aspect connected to FL was better in OG.

And since Good is a bit more than Bad, I would recommend it. I binged it and it made me cry. Loved bits of it, just didn't end up loving it as much as the Go Ahead.

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funsies kdrama def recommend

family by choice is a fun drama centered around the relationships of haejun, juwon, and sanha who have a sibling-like bond but have no blood relation to one another.

what this drama does great:
- gives us a multifaceted view of all the main characters. we're able to see life/the timeline of the drama from all 3 of them which i thought was great! getting to know each character felt so personal.
- haejun and juwon's dad had some of the most sob-worthy scenes ever. their relationship was so heartwarming. haejun's healing journey was so great to watch and also to see dal and him help each other through hardships throughout their lives.
- their take on familial troubles wasn't shallow and actually felt very realistic.
- every episode while all having pretty sad moments at times always felt really giddy it's just a really fun watch overall it makes you wish you could be there too
- NO love triangle thank the lords

what could've been done better:
- while sanha's 14 year long or however many year long crush on sanha was well drawn out, we never got that from juwon. it was just her being flustered by sanha's confession(s) and then dating him. i wish they could've either added scenes where maybe in their younger years she thought of him that way too or have done like flashback scenes idk it just. for a childhood friends to lovers trope was not a very deep romantic relationship
- haejun's america storyline was idk all over the place and needed better integration to the plot. also similar to my issue w juwon he should've had a gradual liking to dal while im happy they got together at the end he literally said in that ep that they aren't good together and then later asked her out

overall lovedddd this show chaeyeon is such an amazing actress

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Heartwarming family drama with touches of romance, and a lot of tears

*** SPOILERS ALERT ***

I started to watch the cdrama Go ahead before Family by choice because I wanted to compare the remake with the original story and to be perfectly honest, I dropped it after ep 6 /7 and skipped to later episodes to see how the story will develop and what I saw didn’t convince me enough to continue watching… It’s not because it was bad, but I feel like the pacing was so slow and I simply don’t have the patience to watch 40 episodes of the same series. Furthermore, I had a hard time connecting with the Fl characterization, too childlike in comparison with her “brothers”. Certainly, the cdrama had more time to explore in depth the relationships between all the characters and felt more “raw” in its characters and emotions whereas the kdrama felt like it was a prettier and “polished” version of the story. (Please don’t attack me because I like the remake better, it is my opinion, and I still respect the original story and those who love it.)

So, here’s a quick review of what I liked/disliked in this remake:

Pros:
- The acting is phenomenal! Especially the main trio, they were absolutely perfect! Big kudos to the Fl’s actress, I’m not very familiar with her but she was convincing and her acting kinda reminded me of the actress in Lovely runner, who I like very much. Her character was overall very loveable and caring, a little childish sometimes but it wasn't too extreme. Of course HIY was a safe bet, I adored him in True beauty and his acting here is so touching, especially when his character showed despair in difficult moments. Then we have Kang Hae Jun’s actor who was a total revelation for me! His duality convinced me entirely and I will keep an eye on his future projects for sure.
- Great chemistry between all the cast, be it platonic or romantic relationship, it all felt very natural and mature.
- Speaking of romance, I actually really liked the romance between the main couple, I knew it was gonna happen since I read some spoilers in the Go ahead MDL page. Personally, I don’t think their relationship was weird, because I considered them more as very close childhood friends than the brother/sister type of thing. Also! The Fl wasn’t just a wooden plank when it came to intimate scenes and it was very refreshing to see. The second couple, Hea Jun / Dal, truly developed their relationship in the very end of the series, so we didn’t get to see much of them together but they were still cute nevertheless!
- The friendship between Ju Won and Dal was so cute!! I was afraid of a possible love triangle between Ju Won / Dal / San Ha but fortunately they chose to keep it simple and that was a very smart decision coming from the writing team.
- The OST and cinematography are also great, and I also really liked the fact that we could hear them speak a dialect different from what we are used to hear in kdramas.
- Of course, the other star of the show, Ju won’s dad! Such a generous and selfless individual! I’m sure such a person can exist in real life and I wish them the very best.
- Great balance of humorous and sad scenes. The sad scenes were STRONG that’s for sure but the humor was there to lighten up the mood without being forced or out of place.

Cons:
- Some scenes/events were a little repetitive in the end, especially with Hae Jun’s storyline, but I’m still glad they didn’t add 36 subplots to the main story.
- For the romantic relationship between Ju Won and San Ha, I agree with some comments that Ju Won accepted San Ha’s feelings a little too quickly, we saw that he had a crush on her since high school but for her it wasn’t shown at all. They should have added some little scenes in which she questioned her feelings for him way before his sudden confession. Of course, they had to concentrate all the story and character development in only 16 episodes so the pacing was understandably very fast, but I still liked it very much because their chemistry was still great in my opinion.
- I didn’t understand the final development between San Ha and his mom… She threatened Ju Won and asked her to put an end to their relationship (fortunately she didn’t listen but still) and we saw San Ha begging her to…. what? Love him finally? After all she put him through? And then she flew to the UK with his sister, leaving him alone (at last!!) on a whim? The last episode was a little disappointing in this aspect, and I sincerely hoped she would seek psychological help in the end to become less of a burden to her son and make amends… But alas it didn’t happen. I guess they wanted to show that some people don’t want to heal themselves and prefer to continue their toxic relationship with their family. IDK but the pacing here was way too fast for my taste.
- Finally, the 10 years or so of no-contact between the main trio was a little hard to believe, especially for San Ha because he was only in Seoul whereas Hae Jun stayed in the US for a few years so it was a tiny bit more understandable but still… They tried to give explanations later as to why they wouldn’t/couldn’t maintain any contact with Ju Won and her dad but yeah, I understand it was necessary for the story to properly develop but it was still weird.

So that’s all for me! Give it a try because it was still a great and entertaining watch, despite some negative aspects. Especially if you didn’t watch the original series already, or if you like a more fast paced family story with great acting.

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a great ride

this is for the cliche loving gals. but its a good one.
predictable, dramatic, cliche, but someimes that what you want k?
is it amazing??? no. but its goodddd.
its just a kdrama that is a good watch. reminds me of those 2017 kdramas (makes sense considering all).
its not pretending to be something its not- which is great.
its full of heartwarming moments of parenthood and brothership and family.
it also has many horrible parents sprinkled around so just take note i guess.
the cast is just perfect, i think it really does a lot, they really feel like a family and its adorable

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Interesting premise

I am not going to wade into the "which is better, the original Chinese drama or this" controversy. I have never watched the Chinese original (and don't intend to) so I can't comment.

The only thing I want to touch on is the mental and social commentary stemming from this drama. First, I find it interesting that this 'alternative' family arrangement has been highlighted, perhaps as the writer's hope that single-parent families and alternative family arrangements will one day become normalised in Korea. It is often not their fault that such families end up the way they are, and they shouldn't face discrimination because of it. Not everyone is fortunate enough to have a happy 'standard' family and as society, we shouldn't comment on what makes another family happy.

Second, what really bugs me is the lack of acknowledgement of mental health. San Ha's mom clearly has narcissistic personality disorder in the way that she manipulates everyone around her and never admits her responsibility for her own situation. Threatening suicide is one such example of manipulation. She needs psychiatric care. This in turn has caused San Ha untold mental anguish as manifested through his constant anxiety and insomnia. Just 'talking it out' won't make either sets of symptoms go away. This is unrealistic and I wished the drama could have handled it better.

Especially in a high pressure society like SK where there is already such a high incidence of suicide and other undiagnosed mental health ailments, this is the best opportunity to normalise help-seeking. As a doctor, Sanha really should have known better than to play to manipulation. There isn't even a need to make a big deal out of it - him putting his mom in a psychiatric ward would have made me feel so much better about her ending rather than letting her run away again!

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3 no-sibling

Beautiful relationship of these 3 "no-sibling", so different but so close and protective each other.
The meaning of family in this case is a choice of a "protective community" and not blood relationship.
A truly touching drama that made me cry for the difficult situations these abandoned kids found themselves in.
I appreciated how they gave continuity to the daughter's character, who was strong and determined when she was little with a predilection for one brother (the little girl was so cute) and she also had this character trait when she grew up.
I like hear dialect slang with different inflections.
I loved seeing the father who raised 3 children as his own.
I love the cast in generally.

On the contrary, it was a bit fantasy that after 10 years in contemporany come back the mother with a new child (a little sister), the other mother to pay the debt and also an unknown father.
Then the two boys left on the same day but even after 10 years they return on the same day?!
I hated the mother who pointed the finger at her poor son, again and again, even 10 years after abandoning him. Crazy! A toxic person.

PS: Bae Hyeon Seong looks a lot like Park Bo Gum.

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Light hearted and easy to binge watch

As a huge fan of the original C-Drama, I was really looking forward to the Korean remake. Knowing that the kdrama would have to fit in the entire story into 16 episodes, I was quite intrigued as to how the producers and writers would do so whilst still keeping the main themes of the story.

This was in general a good watch and I would recommend to anyone who wants a light drama. I won't go too much into the differences between the two dramas, but if you want to watch the one with more emotional scenes, then watch the CDrama. FBC was lighthearted and easy, every episode had a pivotal moment and there wasn't anything that I felt I had to skip.

I sympathised slightly more with the "bad guys" in this adaptation than the other which shows that the writers did a great job in making the characters human with flaws. The acting of the main 5 characters was good, nothing felt too awkward. The second lead couple were very cute and I personally would have liked to see more of them.

Overall, FBC was a nice watch, it wasn't heavy and I didn't cry while watching this in compared to the other adaptation. I liked how the big theme of family was the central point in this and that it was evident throughout the show. I also like the chemistry between the ML and FL way better in this drama than the other so in the romance side of things, FBC wins. But this was definitely a "watered down" version of the original. If you want a drama that has emotional impact, this one doesnt have it. Like stated before, this was an easy watch.

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