The ending of this drama left me speechless, sad, angry and frustrated. I guess it was my fault for having big expectations. When I read that it was the 12 year love story between Joon-young and YoungJae I was expecting a happy ending.
It has been months since I’ve finished watching this drama but I think now I have come to peace with the ending. I have to make it clear that this was a great drama, the acting was great, the music was pretty, however it is not your typical romance drama. We follow this couple through many cute moments but also many hardships, misery, and misunderstandings. At times I was very frustrated when they were dating because of their jealously, insecurities, and the way they handled things. In the first episode there’s a quote Joon-young says, “There are two types of women. The ones you must meet and those whom you don’t necessarily have to meet. And today I’ve meet the third. The woman I’ve should’ve never cross paths with again” I think at the end of this drama I felt that, I’ve wished that Young Jae and Joon-young would’ve never meet that second time or even at all. I wonder how different their lives would’ve been if they never meet each other. I wonder how different their lives would be if they would have never broken up in the first place. I felt that Young Jae was a tragedy in Joon-youngs live and viceversa.
I understood that this drama was never about a happy ending. I understood that I shouldn’t blame the writer because this was her drama and it was about life. I think the purpose of this drama wasn’t the romance but the grief and pain the characters went through and how they learned to rebuilt theirs lives at the end. Young-jae was already broken to begin with as she had lost her parents and her brother had that accident. She found happiness with Joon-young only to break up with him again and again. She finally moves on gets married, has a daughter but tragically loses her daughter in an accident and after that her marriage and life crumbles. Joon-young lost himself after that first break up, even following a career path that wasn’t for him. After the second breakup he leaves Korea and is finally doing what he loves and also fall in love with someone new. Soojae story was also very heartbreaking. He had someone he loved, he was almost done with this studies and has that accident where as a result he can’t walk anymore and loses the girl that he loved. He also have Jooran who is Young-Jae’s friend. She might have a successful career and business but she is lonely. She wants to fall in love and have a family but then she gets cancer and she’s afraid.
I don’t precisely get the title of “The Third Charm” because their third time meeting is not better than any of the first two. If there is one thing I am upset about is that Joon-young was happy at least he look happy and was about to get married. He was back in Korea and back with his family. Instead we had Young-jae back in his life only to break up his engagement. I guess the third Charm was them being there for each other as friends as they both rebuilt their lives. I usually give up on sad dramas like this one but I was very engaged with the story and the characters. If you ask me if I recommend this drama I say yes because I feel like everyone should watch a drama that is very real. If you ask me if I would watch this drama again, the answer is HELL NO! I don’t think I can go through that rollercoster of emotions again but I am glad I watched it.
