i love chinese/korean dramas. to start with, i'll admit that i wanted to see this because of ji sung, whom i admire and love as an outstandingly talented actor, with a very high EQ, which he relies on very skillfully while getting into his characters. the first one i saw with him was "kill me, heal me" - and it was "love at first site", i wanted to see more and more of ji sung. so i did quite a few, including his last drama "devil judge", which became one of the best dramas in my book of excellency.
but.. this "secret love" was the first time that i wanted to let it go from the first 4 episodes, sooooooo boring, repetitious. then i must admit, i sort of got sucked in, wanting to know how the writer resolves this or that, where it will go and how the characters will develop and adjust. disappointment is not even a word i would use , by the end i felt a waste of my time, emotions and investment. first of all, it felt more like it had characteristics of a cheap american soap opera rather than one of the korean or chinese dramas that i got to love so much. the amount of tears shed by the main female character and then many others in this drama can easily put an end to any drought anywhere on earth - when it's that much it becomes almost irrelevant. yes, some instances were called for such expression of desperation and sadness, but not ALL the time, non stop. it made this drama very lopsided, if you will. the topic itself had a potential but it was wasted, scattered and definitely underdeveloped (the story itself). after the first 4 episodes it kind of started building steam, but the last 5 episodes it started rapidly deteriorating, really getting NOT SAD, but on my nerves. it almost got us to a conclusion of the worst outcome - greed, money and power win the day, love is in the dust and that is the fate of humanity. thanks god, in the literally last few minutes of the very last episode, the writer got himself/herself up, dusted up, and provided a semi-happy ending, but was this enough payback to the viewer? i think not.
a few words about the acting. top performance from ji sung as expected, and bae soo-bin surprisingly good, but i did not see him in any other production. hwang jung-eum is not consistently good - she is overdramatic in many instances and screeching to the degree that it feels like it's piercing your ear drums (but that's the complaint i had in "kill me heal me" as well.) so i gave an 8 for the acting because of these actors.
in conclusion, i could live without this drama. sorry to all the other reviewers who actually liked it a lot, i am in the minority.