Wild Romance is about a star baseball player (Lee Dong Wook) who has an incident with a bodyguard (Lee Shi Young) which results in him hiring her for his own personal bodyguard despite the two hating each other.

Lee Dong Wook plays Park Moo Yeol. He is a popular baseball player for the Red Dreamers. He’s arrogant with a temper and knows how great he is. This puts him at odds with a certain bodyguard.

Lee Shi Young is that bodyguard, Yoo Eun Jae. She is an outgoing and quirky bodyguard who is dedicated to her job. But when she has to work for Moo Yeol, she is less than thrilled and struggles to maintain her dedication.

We then have Dong Soo (Oh Man Suk) who is another baseball player and close friend of Moo Yeol’s as well as Dong Soo’s wife, Soo Young (Hwang Sung Hee). Finally, there is Jong Hee (Jessica Jung) who is Moo Yeol’s first love.

Wild Romance is a romantic comedy with a slice of suspense and a serving of angst. It’s a little bit of everything with a unique structure. The first third leans heavily comedic. The middle leans angsty. Then the final stretch dials up the suspense. An interesting combination indeed.

Wild Romance was released in 2012 which is about right in the middle of my favorite time period for dramas (about 2009-2014). I always love the nostalgic feel in terms of overall and tone, music, and style. This drama definitely had all of that.

VAGUE SPOILERS THROUGHOUT

Now, the drama itself, took some serious warming up to for me. This is one of those interesting cases where the main couple don’t have the typical bicker/attraction thing going on in the beginning. They completely hate each other. And that lasts for about 5 episodes which is a big chunk of the drama.

That first third or so involves a lot of comedy, much of it exaggerated and over-the-top. Lots of fighting between Moo Yeol and Eun Jae takes up a huge chunk of that comedy. In a rare turn of events, I also disliked both of the main characters. Not a great combination. I found this entire section so-so and was soon ready to move on from it.

When we finally do move on, it’s like a switch is flipped. In the middle third of the drama, the comedy is still definitely there, but it tones down. We start getting some slightly sweeter moments with our potential couple, though they are definitely still not a couple.

A more serious side to the drama also emerges involving a stalker and many troubles for Moo Yeol. Things also take an angsty turn as heartache arises for Eun Jae. This is all noticeably felt in terms of tone.

I liked the change of pace with the story settling in and beginning to thicken. Lots of new dynamics between the characters emerge, and some were downright surprising.

Something I found odd though involved our second leading lady, Jong Hee (Jessica Jung), who is Moo Yeol’s first love. SPOILERS: She suddenly shows back up in his life, and her and Moo Yeol begin to rekindle things. It was kind of strange since we were actually getting more romance between them than between Moo Yeol and Eun Jae. An odd dynamic for sure. END OF SPOILERS

As we move into the latter third of the drama, the suspense element picks up as the stalker becomes more problematic. A lot happens story wise during this time with some interesting reveals. The drama did succeed in actually surprising me with a couple of its twists.

It also takes about this far before the potential for romance between Moo Yeol and Eun Jae really starts to emerge. It was good to see, but even then, it wasn’t a lot. Though their romance does play a very important part in some of the final plot developments.

Wild Romance was a nostalgic ride. It has a little bit of everything which is a combination I generally like. While I never really loved our main characters and definitely did not care for the first 5 episodes, the rest of the drama was much better and had lots of interesting story and relationship dynamics at play. Comedy, angst, and suspense come together for a wild romance for sure.

My Rating: 7/10

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