My Dearest Nemesis first impression: It's Moon Ga-young and Choi Hyun-wook's K-Drama, not director Lee Soo-hyun's

My Dearest Nemesis Story:

Baek Su-jeong enters the gaming world to avenge her brother. There, she meets a mysterious personality that is Black Dragon. Little do they know that after a heart-breaking rejection, they would end up working together as adults.

My Dearest Nemesis Review:

My Dearest Nemesis, like most K-Dramas in today's times, has a cliched start. It begins with a school setup. Our lead Baek Su-jeong (Moon Ga-young) is a nerd who is bullied in school. She looks to music when all goes wrong, which is again cliched but relatable.

The brother-sister quarrel becomes the highlight of the episode. Ko Chang-seok, who plays the father Baek Won-seop, has the most epic reaction to it. It is after this brief introduction that the real story begins - one of Su-jeong becoming a gamer. With it, the lines between gaming and fiction blur soon enough. This is not the most appealing, but Black Dragon (Choi Hyun-wook)'s entry sure is.

Together, the duo is unmatched in the gaming world, to the extent that they become gaming partners. The twist? There's a whole gang who get introduced to each other.

Oh Eui-shik sets the standard in the real world, and Black Dragon follows suit, thus making it a comic relief in the middle of what could have been an ultimate romance. Of course, Black Dragon being himself, he is trying to keep his identity hidden, and that backfires. The whole scene is cringe beyond belief.

Switch to 2024, where things promise to get better as Su-jeong turns from a healer to killer. Hyun-wook's real-world entry is just as cliched but works since it is power itself. Ga-young is mighty impressive in the current world with her tactics, as compared to what most of the episode is.

Hyun-wook has too many shades to keep up, and too soon. This can get a little too confusing to grasp, given he's a director one minute, a rockstar the next and a pro-gamer the third. He tries to nail each character but for any character to get so many twists so early on, it would be difficult to adapt. That is the exact syndrome this actor suffers from.

The confrontation scene is the peak moment in the episode. Everything gets better thereon - right from her acting crazy to his dramatic-emotional moments with her. Just like Black Dragon, Ban Ju-yeon holds a secret deep in his heart. For his character, Hyun-wook does a fair job at acting already. And just like that, we get the first intimate scene between Su-jeong and her first love, Black Dragon.

My Dearest Nemesis Verdict:

Given the poor start, but Moon Ga-young and Choi Hyun-wook being consistently good in their roles, one can easily call it their drama. Director Lee Soo-hyun's vision of converting the webtoon to drama is fuzzy but the actors keep pace and even get your heart pumping since their confrontation scene, which comes after more than half the episode. So, it is only a fairly good start to My Dearest Nemesis.