Review of Queen of Tears / 눈물의 여왕

There are some Korean dramas that I end up watching because everyone around me is raving about them, then I go onto my social media accounts and I see complete strangers also raving about them. This is how I ended up watching Twinkling Watermelon recently, although I majorly procrastinated on watching that for the hottest minute.

Queen of Tears is one of these dramas. There were so many people talking about it, and it’s probably because I know a ton of Kim Soo-hyun fans. Every time a drama or movie comes out with him, all of the girlies go on and on about how it’s the next best thing, even when it’s vaguely mediocre in my mind after watching. Power to them though.

I didn’t procrastinate on this show though—which is power to me, as I typically procrastinate on shows for the longest while before actually going to watch them. I got right on this as each episode was dropping, dutifully getting through those hour and a half episodes even when I wanted to quit.

And let’s be upfront: I really wanted to quit this drama so many times. I thought about it almost every episode after the ninth one, as I was not the biggest fan of the show.

Let’s get into it!

A chaebol heiress and her lawyer husband find their marriage on the rocks and on the brink of collapsing.

We begin this drama at what seems to be the end of a marriage. We meet Baek Hyun-woo, who’s the lawyer, and see how he’s basically delegated to lower status by the member of his wife’s family. His wife, Hong Hae-in, is the owner of a Department Store, and is the third generation in a chaebol family.

Hyun-woo, however, comes from a modest family from the countryside, and his family are surrounded by farms and whatnot. Later on in the drama Hae-in’s family comes to stay with them after an incident, and we really begin to see the clash between both of these two’s worlds.

But in the beginning, Hae-in and Hyun-woo really are not getting along. Things become even more complicated when Hae-in discovers that she has a tumor in her brain, and she’e estimated to only have up to two months to live. Right after that, the rocky marriage hits a boiling point.

Unable to trust each other and the situation they have been forced into, the talks of divorce begin. Hyun-woo tries to move to a different practice, and Hae-in hires Vincenzo to be her ruthless lawyer to negotiate everything out.

Even through all of this, there are pockets when the two of them have romantic moments, and it becomes even more obvious they still care for each other. By the time the drama gets to the tenth episode, we kind of lose this subplot completely and other ones take over.

There’s also major drama involving the family’s patriarch and his lover slash girlfriend who’s pretty conniving. There’s also someone that Hae-in knows who is trying to gain more power, although in a complete girl boss moment she subverts his expectations and does something absolutely spectacular before collapsing.

And let’s not forget the whole two months to live plot going on here too—this gets reminded to us every so often.

Overall Thoughts

Like the aesthetics and whatnot are good in this drama, but it was way too long for me. These hour and a half long episodes were overkill, and by the time we got to the little epilogues, I was completely burned out.

I was starting to feel it around episode 9, as I mentioned before, but getting to the final episode of the series was really difficult. I really really wanted to quit this show at episode 13 especially, as the plot was beginning to drag in a way that I didn’t care for.

Like if this show were more of a limited series, I would not mind. It would’ve been perfect for me if it had stopped at episode 8, but it just kept going.

As I mentioned before though, to each their own. There are people who love this out in the world, and good for them. Glad they loved it!

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