Devilish Joy (or Devilish Charm) is a romantic comedy about a doctor (Choi Jin Hyuk) suffering from “Cinderella Amnesia” where his memory only lasts one day and then resets who falls in love with a washed up actress (Song Ha Yoon).
Devilish Joy is one of those dramas that has about every cliché in the book: white truck of doom, amnesia, evil mother figures, childhood trauma, and a host of others. But it throws them all together in a pretty entertaining story with an adorable romance, humor, and a decent plot.
Choi Jin Hyuk plays Gong Ma Sung. He’s a successful doctor who is working on developing a big project to help sick poor people. After an accident, he ends up with amnesia effecting his short term memory. But a woman from his past changes things as he finds he is able to remember her day to day.
Song Ha Yoon is Joo Gi Beum. Gi Beum is the woman he fell for several years ago. She used to be a top actress, but a murder scandal caused her to fall out of favor, and now she struggles to get by. When she reunites with Ma Sung, her unresolved feelings for him come to the surface as she tries to understand what is going on with him. And Song Ha Yoon is all kinds of adorable in this drama! Loved her so much.
Then there is Hoya as Sung Ki Joon. He’s Ma Sung’s cousin who is an actor looking to make it big. He has quite the lively and outgoing personality. He is also a very passionate fan of Gi Beum as well as having a crush on her.
Lee Joo Yeon is Lee Ha Im. She’s a top actress who is very high maintenance and demanding. She has some issues with a lot of the people around her. She also develops an interesting relationship with Ki Joon.
I wanted something a bit lighter to watch so I decided to go for Devilish Joy. I loved the first episode of the drama where Ma Sung and Gi Beum first meet. It’s all kinds of sweet as their romance begins to bloom after spending the day together abroad. Very dreamy and romantic.
But then tragedy strikes as Ma Sung gets amnesia and Song Ha Yoon’s life soon falls apart. The drama then takes us back to South Korea where we see their current lives. They are reunited, but he doesn’t remember her. Too sad!
The premise of Devilish Joy reminded me a lot of the movie 50 First Dates which I really enjoyed back in the day. It has the same concept with the lead having his memory reset each day.
Unlike that movie though, Ma Sung is way more on top of his condition. He keeps extensive notes about his days to read each morning so that he can function fairly normally. I was kind of hoping he would struggle a bit more with the memory issue initially, but overall he does fairly well. The struggles do come later though!
It’s fun watching him meet Gi Beum again. She triggers some memories for him but not everything. It takes a lot of navigation on his part to maintain the relationship. Because of course in true kdrama fashion, he doesn’t tell her about his memory problem and keeps it hidden.
But it’s nice watching them reconnect and move forward. These two are super cute together. I particularly liked that they had a good amount of screen time with each other as well as had some really nice conversations. And I loved the height difference between Choi Jin Hyuk and Song Ha Yoon. He’s so tall while she is pretty short. They just looked adorable!
The show has plenty of humor too. I really enjoyed a more lively performance from Hoya in this drama. He was hilarious and made for such a fun second lead. I also liked his relationship with Ma Sung a lot. They bickered a fair amount, but it was clear how much they cared for each other.
We do have another story line going on surrounding the hospital Ma Sung works at. It turns out there are quite a few people using his memory condition against him and plotting his downfall. Lots of scheming bad guys and gals running around in this drama!
The first half of the drama was fairly simple and cute, but the plot really thickens up in the second half. There are a few mysteries to solve, and then also we have to deal with Ma Sung’s worsening memory condition. It made things more dramatic. I was surprised how nicely the story developed.
Overall, Devilish Joy is a pretty cute and easy watch. There are plenty of cliches and kdrama tropes present, but they are put together well. The romance is sweet and there’s some meat in the story to beef up the drama. It was pretty entertaining all in all.
My Rating: 7/10
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