Leyla: Hayat... Ask... Adalet...

Writers and directors of turkish series have the habit of making excellent TV shows and twice the bad habit of ruining the story right past the climax, in order to extend the series as per audience clamor or sponsors and advertisers requests.

This is what happened to Leyla series. Everything was good, almost all episodes past 10 have their own climax, slow unraveling of secrets and revelations and vengeance kept us audience on the edge of our seats, until it's almost the end. BUT, hey, they're not ready to pack up just yet, so the writers decided to divert the story into something the viewers, I'm sure, are not happy about, nor interested to see.

Hatice and her infidelity - we are not interested. Then we lost Serap, what happened to her? Then, the appearance of new characters which, for sure, comes along with their own lengthy stories to lengthen further the story and this series.

This series is ruined past episode 30. If you want to start watching it, you've been warned.

I like the story so far, I appreciate it's trying to highlight an important message as well. The pace is okay for a turkish series but it still drags sometimes. Female lead she's pretty strong and doesn't let everyone walk all over her. The male lead on the other hand is insufferable. Little Gino was happy and a fighter but adult Gino is weak and stuck in the past - all his scenes are him talking about a short lived childhood romance, at least the female character is motivated by revenge even though she still has a strong connection to their short lived loved. The chemistry between them is also lacking. I am watching for the revenge plot only at this point - I really love to hate Nur she keeps things interesting but of course i'm waiting for her downfall LOL.

Also personally there's way too many flashback scenes from the past.

I was a huge fan at first, but at this point, I can hardly watch it.

I love the lead actors, especially Cemre Baysel. The story began with an interesting premise of justice and a precious love story which honestly could and should have come to a satisfactory end several episodes ago. Unfortunately, it's going downhill with a meaningless and frankly UPSETTING turn of events that I am forcing myself to watch, just for closure. This was one of my favorite shows but now I can't stand to watch.

I will add that the child who portrayed Little Layla did an excellent job. And though a villain, Nur was often entertaining (at least initially). The show was more about her than Leyla. They could have named it Nur, for that matter.

It was really good at first, but now its a chore to watch. How unfortunate.

From episodes 1 to that episode where Neco is about to unalive Noor wrapped in carpet and chain. This series could've ended there, that's the sweet spot - retribution, justice served!

But NO! Like several other Turkish TV series, they decided to inject ridicul0us subplot to extend the story into several more episodes. They made Civan lose his memory back to the time when Leyla was just a house cook and not his wife and they also decided that Leyla and the rest of the cast were prohibited to remind Civan about the current and real circumstance - that Leyla is his wife - what??? And instead call back the ex-girlfriend as that is the memory that he recalls. What?????

I have loved this series and excited waiting every episode UNTIL the memory loss episode ...... I lost interest now. It became funny, utterly silly, meaningless and ruined what was once an exciting Turkish TV series.

If I've written this review 2 - 3 weeks ago prior to the memory loss episode, I could've given it 10 stars, now it was reduced to 1.

The first and middle parts of the first season of the series are really, really good. Especially the episodes between 10 and 20 are truly excellent. It feels like each episode has the intensity of a "final" episode, and this is wonderfully integrated into the story. However, after episode 28, things really start to go downhill. By the time episode 30 rolls around, it becomes almost unwatchable.

This is what happens when a series doesn't wrap up with a proper ending. It gets filled with unnecessary scenes and irrelevant story elements. As you continue watching, you start to realize how ridiculous everything seems.

The actors are genuinely talented, and the director's ability to convey emotion in the scenes is quite successful. But as I mentioned, if the script isn't well-written, nothing else really matters.

In short, a series that starts off strong and pulls you in ends up completely ruining itself in the last few episodes.

Is it worth watching? Yes, but you might want to be selective.