Japanese Drama: 僕はまだ君を愛さないことができる I Don't Love You Yet (In Time With You - Japanese Remake) (2019)
僕はまだ君を愛さないことができる Boku wa Mada Kimi wo Aisanai Koto ga Dekiru
I Don't Love You Yet (In Time With You - Japanese Remake)
Genre: romance
Starring: Adachi Rika, Shirasu Jin, and more
Aired: July - September 2019
Watched: October 2019 on Viki
WATCHED IT BECAUSE...
After watching Thirty But 17 (silly but still melodramatic) and He is Psychometric (cute parts but also intense) and The K2 (just intense), I needed a lighthearted happy romcom. And then I discovered that this existed?! Wei and I watched 我可能不會愛你 In Time WIth You back in NYC.. Sometime between 2014-2016? And we loved it. For me, it was like a breath of fresh air that boosted me more into Taiwanese dramas, since a lot of the older Taiwanese dramas back then were VERY CUTESY and just sort of too much for me (IN GENERAL. But there were still lots of gems, e.g., Autumn’s Concerto, Fated to Love You.) But anyway, I loved how REAL the Taiwanese version was—and so I wanted to try this one.
THE REVIEW
(Note: I watched and wrote the bulk of this review in October 2019!)
I watched this in three days. It was so good. I remember I started it pretty late at night (after 12AM?) just to figure out what I would watch next… but then I had a hard time stopping.
Just to let you know, she repeats the same line like 40x in the beginning of the drama.
Hachi to kyuu wa zenzen chigau.
I am going to remember this forever. (8 and 9 are completely different.) As in twentyEIGHT and twentyNINE. Our main character, Mitarai Yo (played by Adachi Rika) is turning 29 (HAY, I JUST TURNED 29 TOO!). And then her boyfriend breaks up with her. She also has a long time best friend, Ishida Ren (played by Shirasu Jin) who is always there for her. But little does she know that he’s actually in love with her! Yes-it’s one of those stories, but in the best way.
Through the course of the drama, we see how for years and years, Ren has always been there for her that people around her even think they’re together. But given their history of friendship and the events that happened when they were younger, she didn’t end up thinking of him like that. Will Yo’s feelings towards Ren ever be more than just friendship? Watch it to find out!!
SPOILERS
(highlight below to read)
“I cried so much. Like 3x I was just like T___TTTT~~
It’s not Yu (it’s me. JK.) The assistant is really just trying to like work his way up in the chain. He has a girlfriend. She ends up recommending him for a good position later anyway, because she’s a good person. And he was a good worker.
Maki has this marriage book and she’s trying to plan her marriage. Which makes no sense, why are they so set at marrying at a certain age? Just be natural and fall in love regularly and stop trying to rush things, my goodness. She tries to kiss him like twice and he is SOOO unresponsive HAHAHA. Oy. Why doesn’t she get the hint. Can someone be so desperate? She wants him to trial-date her. But. What. I mean… Thinking back to my younger self and people in general… If you like someone so much… you would put yourself in that foolish position, huh. You don’t care if you get hurt later, because you’re just so so desperate. It’s so sad, really. It’s so sad and so stupid. But what can you do? If you have a chance and you can maybe make their feelings change, then you do it. But then the other huge thing is—YO. IF YOU KNOW HE HAS HER (as a BFF) AND YOU ALREADY CAN’T DEAL WITH HER EXISTENCE, DON’T TRY TO LOVE HIM WITHOUT HER. Obviously that’s easier said than done… Sigh.
By the end of episode 2 and 3, I was already like… I don’t even know how to describe the noise that I made—gushing, squealing, wailing? for Ishida Ren, because he IS SUCH A CUTIE and a good person and I want him to be my best friend too please. I don’t know if it’s because I already know, in general, what his role is in this drama, or if I just got that from his character in general. But he is suchhhhhhhhh a sweetheart. And I don’t really use that word to describe people.. !!
Maki’s cousin, HAHA WHAT ON EARTH. “TOO~ HOT!” Oh my dear lord. So speaking of speaking different languages, later when Ren is in Shanghai (yes, he goes), it’s soo funny. For the bits and pieces that Yang-san spoke at first, I thought his Chinese sounded really good (fluency wise) and Taiwanese-ish? WHEREAS Sunmei, what on earth. You can TOTALLY tell she’s Japanese. And she’s trying to sound like a foreigner/Chinese person speaking Japanese (rolls eyes) and her Chinese just sounds like a Japanese person trying to speak Chinese. I say this because I watched this shortly after watching The K2, in which there was an Iraqi(?) woman who “spoke” Korean. I say “spoke” because she was wearing a hijab and she was clearly dubbed (over… uncertain whether she was actually speaking at all)… But there are probably tons of Iraqis or middle eastern women who have learned at least some Korean (AND PROBABLY WOULD HAVE LOVEDDDDDDDDDDD TO PLAY HER ROLE), and they chose someone who… just got dubbed. Sigh. The voice that she was dubbed with was CLEARLY a Korean person (or at least someone with native fluency) AND Korean mannerisms… And then all of a sudden she starts singing Black Pink and her Korean just becomes a mess. What on earth. So this reminded me of a conversation with my friend where we were talking about how native people are always chosen to be non-native, and their impressions are just…
I cried so much when she forgot her wallet and she had ordered all that stuff and the boss guy was like, “your boyfriend left $200 for you because he knew.” I could feel my heart being crumbled to pieces. PIECES. So many. Because HE IS SUCH A GOOD GUY AND HE’S NOT THERE.
Let’s talk about this ending please. I was not completely satisfied. Like, I was, but I wasn’t. TO BE HONEST. I don’t really.. fully understand the ending. I thought he was going to propose with the shoe. And I cried a little when I saw the shoe, but he didn’t. Since the shoe was the moment where he failingly told her that he would never love her… But then they just walk off into the sunset (not actual)… So they’re moving in together, the end? ”
</spoilers>
OST/MUSIC
There isn’t much singing OST… Does Japan still release drama soundtracks? I remember like Hana Yori Dango, Hana Kimi days, they were primarily instrumental OSTs + the OP and ED and an insert track… But I wanted to find a piano instrumental song but I can’t find anything on youtube, other than this.
* indigo la End - Musubizama
This is the ending song and was used throughout the drama, including (check spoilers) and instrumental versions too? I can’t super remember hahaha because it all blends together (especially since I watched it all in three days :X). But anyway. Actually, as I’m writing this post, I’m actually listening to the whole song for the first time.. ! Hahaha, I like it! I’m pretty sure that I’m going to have similar feelings towards this song as 손 닿으면 from Search: WWW because that’s just the type of feelings that these types of songs evoke for me ;_;.
The opening song was cute—I think they always become a staple of Japanese dramas—that I liked to leave it on and do stuff around the house, like get food or clean or whatever. Other times when I was super binging (uh, which was most of the time, given that I watched 16 episodes in 3 days…), I often skipped the intro (show starts at about 2:30 into each clip if you watch on Viki.
OVERALL
- Did I cry? Like this TT___TTTTTTT <— 3 different times.
- Should you watch it? YESSSSSSSS. It’s soooooo gooood. Additionally, if you like cutesy and best friend relationships and slowburn ;_; you will love this even more.
-huay