Doctor Cha

First of all, I have to specify that this drama targets a slightly older demographic: women in their 50s, 60s- however, it can very comfortably be watched by everyone. Still it speaks the most to women, especially married women in more patriarchal societies.

It's a story of a mother of two who, after a near-death experience, turns her life around. A housewife of 20 years, she decides to go back to medical profession and soon realizes her husband is a narcissistic liar and a good-for-nothing ****bag.

There is many frustrating moments in the drama, as Dr Cha navigates the new circumstances. I got annoyed so many times that she doesn't simply cut the cord with everything that's dragging her down- but I'm soon lead to realize that people are much more difficult to deal with. Even when her kids decide to hide big secrets from her, at first I'm annoyed, but soon I understand them. In the last two episodes you even feel some sympathy to the husband and the mother in law.

People are colorful and not pure evil or pure good, and many times they make bad decisions- this drama relies very much on that. The entire sequence of events is so very realistic. Most heart-warming interactions in the drama are non-romantic, human instincts of giving a hand or a word of comfort to those who need it. The entire drama reminded me of a saying "Homo homini lupus est", but turned into "Homo homini homo est".

Overall- this is a great drama, slice-of-life, human in all the mistakes, selfish and selfless acts characters make. It's a comforting weekend motivational type of a drama I'd especially suggest to women.

Doctor Cha returns as a first year resident twenty years after leaving the medical profession to raise children after getting married. Her husband has been cheating and has a child from before they were married and this is the story of how she comes to terms with her changing life and the fact she has serious health problems. The Dr played well by Uhm Jung-hwa is a great character but the writers touched on lots of subjects and characters but gave little depth to any of them, it felt like they had a tick list to cover a scenario and then move on. I was particularly annoyed at how they all treated the illegitimate daughter and then tried to make it right with a few scenes in the final episode. Kim Mi Kyung plays the mother as she always does and I mention her as even though her roles are usually minor she always makes the character believable. So great characters, well acted but let down by poor script.

No Spoilers, just some pros and cons.

Pros

The acting was very good. I would call out Kim Kyung-Chul for his portrayal of Sea In-Ho, the jerk husband. Of course we don't like his character, but he did a truly superb job of navigating jerkiness and having regret. I would also call out Jo Adam for her role as Jeon So-Ra. It looks like she does not have a lot of acting experience, but the way she portrayed a cranky, domineering personality was quite subtle and skillful.

I liked the storyline and the message they were trying to communicate.

Everything that happened in the story was believable, even if unlikely.

Cons Somehow the series did not draw my wife and I in as much as our favorite KDramas. Despite some touching scenes, we were not too emotionally invested in the characters.

The ending was O. K., and I think sent a nice message, but again we were sort of just, "Oh, it's over. What will we watch next?" Rather than feeling like we would miss the story and characters. The story just sputtered to a halt. There a number of things they could have done to tie everything up to a greater extent.

So overall, not bad, but not great. So a 7 ranking.

Although I have only seen 5 episodes, I was hooked after the first 15 minutes of the 1st episode.. I adore the cast which is truly amazing and believable. I was first introduced to kdramas on Netflix and my playlist is mostly filled with them! I wish the USA would learn from kdramas on showing the respect between the cast and giving the audience a chance to use their imaginations instead of showing every sexual detail. Everybody should give Dr Cha a chance before forming an opinion that you will ultimately regret. The only problem I have with this show is that it's only shown on the weekends!!

Great start and great idea.

The beginning is strong and extremely funny! I laughed so hard at so many of the scenes.

Acting is extremely good too, their skills are superb.

Tells you the story of a family and specifically a mum/wife who is basically mistreated, slaved and disrespected by her whole family and of course cheated on big time by her husband.

And that's basically the main and key plot (or should i say only plot) of the whole series.

One day our female lead has enough and decides to start being selfish and for once live the life she wants and get back her career as a doctor.

All of those ingredients could have made a fantastic story of empowerment and liberation but it fails tremendously.

The female lead is so weak throughout the whole drama it's sad to watch. She never stands up for herself and she keeps swallowing offense after offense and not once the has the right comeback against the ones hurting her.

Maybe this is a societal thing in Korea but where I come from, the whole idea of 2 grown women chasing after a weak, narcissistic, indecent and pathetic man and forgiving everything he does to them is just ridiculous.

Then, perpetrates constantly patriarchal gender roles like single mothers cant raise their children without a father figure and that a stay home mum doesn't contribute to the household and owes herself to the husband for providing for her and the kids, when the reality is a stay home mother is the only reason ( and invaluable asset) why the man can actually have a career and a family at the same time...

The series starts dragging the plot all the way until the end and it becomes VERY frustrating, nothing ever really evolves or changes, everyone is just trying to keep a secret from someone and that's it.

The characters are literally one dimensional and they have little development. All of them are bad, hateful and selfish at the beginning and in the last few episodes everyone is good and all is forgiven.... They literally change personalities from day to night.

I also need to add that the second male lead could have been written way better, at least the story and relationships between him and the female lead, he is completely irrelevant when the show finished.

This had a lot of potential, and is not that's bad, is just a pity, they could have done better.