by liquid_hell on May 19th, 2007, 2:00am

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User rating of this review - 4.75 out of 5
Story/Plot - 3 out of 5
Characters - 3.5 out of 5
Drawing Style - 3 out of 5
Enjoyment - 4 out of 5
Overall - 3.5 out of 5

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Plot/Story
As a child, Ha Ji was frequently used by her brothers as target practice. After getting beaten up one day, she runs to childhood friend Te Hu who instead of comforting her, tells her to stand up for herself. Fast forward a few years and we are presented with a new Ha Ji, the leader of a gang in her high school who uses her fists to solve problems. We are then shown a scene where Ha Ji decides to challenge a gang which Te Hu is the leader of. On her way there however, she gets involved in an accident and falls into a comatose state. Her spirit through some twist of fate, lands into the body of Aram who hasn't been awake for a month. And this is where the fun begins.

Characters
Ha Ji: I quite like her because she has a certain naivete but is rather strong, which is pretty rare in most shoujo manga/manhwa. Rather un-ladylike, she loves to eat like a pig, burps satisfactorily, and doesn't think much about beauty as she only cares about building up her muscles.

Han Seo: Ha Ji's subordinate in the gang, he is a violent character who is very possessive and appears to have a crazed side to him. He is amused by Ha Ji and therefore follows her, letting himself lose to her in the fight to become gang leader. We often see him as a serious person but whenever he is shown together with Ha Ji, there is a certain light-heartedness to his character, making him endearing in some ways.

Sin Uoo: Son of a chairman, he is the love interest of Ha Ji. Constantly with a poker face that reveals little emotion, it seems that the more he likes a person, the meaner he gets. Outwardly he is shown as a very cold person, and is a very typically shoujo-drawn guy (think Yuki of Fruits Basket). One cannot help but like him even though he seems so generic, because the author would show different sides of him which are uncool, and his blunders are rather amusing.

Aram: We are not shown much of this character during the first few volumes, except through the words of other characters. She appears to be someone dark and overall, very negative. A great beauty, she goes to school ironically as a nerd with thick glasses and two braids. When Aram finally appears, it is when her spirit invades Ha Ji's body. Not likable from the start till the end (at least on my part), she is cruel although the author tries to redeem this character by presenting a dark tormented past.

I would say that the author presented the characters nicely, though not extremely well. Perhaps it was because she intended there to be twists in them, as some traits are not fully shown till the later volumes. Take for example, Ha Ji. We are shown a girl who is honest and has more than a little naivete in her throughout the first half of the manhwa. Later on, it is revealed that she is not always as she is shown. Not that it's a flaw, because it shows different sides to her, but one cannot help but feel that the neglect in character development during the earlier parts was simply to lure in more fans before dropping a bomb.

Drawing Style
I would say it's very typically shoujo style although I'm not much exposed to Hwang Mi Ri's style. The art itself is mediocre at best, and characters do not have many faces to them, the emotions sometimes failing to be conveyed through facial expressions. I'm not surprised, because it is quite rare to see a shoujo manga being able to display more than the extreme emotions of happiness, sadness, anger. Generally though, the feelings and thoughts are expressed through words so at least we are shown different sides to the character.

Enjoyment
It is I would say a very enjoyable read. The story starts at a very fast pace, and we are drawn into the world of Aram/Ha Ji. I found myself laughing out loud quite often with the silly antics of Ha Ji and the interactions between her and Sin Uoo. It did however, go downhill which is a disappointment because when reading it, one feels that it's more of a comedy than a drama. Unfortunately, I find that there wasn't a perfect blend of both, and towards the later volumes of the manhwa, it felt like a repetition of events simply to prolong the length of it.

Overall
I would say read it, because it really is better than some (or most) shoujo stuff. Maybe it's because I'm just plain tired of typical heroines who are so weak while presented as having "strong" personalities in them. While I was reading the first 10 volumes, it truly, truly was very good and I just couldn't wait to get my hands on the next volume. But as I mentioned, it went downhill from thereon and feel that it should have been shorter because it just went around in circles. Of course, that may be due to me starting to not like the protagonists very much (and the fact that I'm very much into angsty characters)

The loose ends are tied up, but there is a hollowness in the ending. As a cynic, the revelation of characters is somewhat realistic and should put a satisfying end to some of them in that "Ha! She's not so perfect after all" kind of way. If you like happy endings, then this one is really for you, although the oh-so-human qualities injected into the characters just takes out some of the "happy ever after" feeling. I leave the manhwa feeling happy, albeit wishing I had a silly grin on my face because I love of happy endings, and finding it disappointing that I don't.

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