Synopsis: Eun Dan Oh, a high school girl who is the only child from a rich family, has congenital heart disease. One day, she wonders why her memory keeps disappearing. She finally realizes that she is a character in the cartoon, and decides to find her real life and love. Meanwhile, a character that doesn’t even have its name, Seuli High Shool’s Student Number 13, lives like a background of the other characters, but his life slowly changes after meeting Dan Oh. They begin their mysterious adventure to find out the secret of the romance cartoon world, and they try to get their independent lives back.
Extra-Ordinary You has a very clever and interesting setup, although the follow through and conclusion are less than I was hoping for. However, the show overall is very enjoyable, with lots of interesting twists, plenty of sugary sweet moments, and lots of fun easter egg type jokes for fans of k-dramas.
As stated in the synopsis above, the setting here is that these people are actually characters in a romance comic. The world they live in is in a comic book. Eun Dan Oh starts realizing things are strange when she starts noticing gaps in her memory, and she appears to be teleporting around. We later find out that she is jumping from scene to scene in the romance comic, and characters only remember what happens in between the scenes once they are self aware. They have no power or ability to do their own will in the scenes, but they can do whatever they want in between. Once Dan Oh meets High School Student #13 (an extra without a name or character setup), she finds that he somehow has the power to change things in the comic book. The two work together to try to change their respective fates, but this just causes more trouble along the way.
This was a really fun one. I loved the setup of the comic book world. I feel like the author who wrote the webtoon this show is based on was like “What would happen if the characters in Boys Over Flowers realized they were in a comic book?”
There’s a lot of rom-com cliches, but they’re fun because the self-aware characters witness them and react in funny ways. You’ve got your classic male lead making countless romantic proclamations in front of the whole school about his “Cinderella” (oh you best believe there’s a shoe scene involved).
You’ve got the poor second lead who just can’t catch a break with the female lead, and is forced to play sad violin songs against his will when he’s supposed to be feeling especially melancholy (he’s a self aware character, which makes this even more delightful).
And, of course, you’ve got the absolute jerk who thinks that Eun Dan Oh is essentially his property, since they are engaged. Although he does have quite the character arc, and what makes it good is his character arc occurs in the in between times, so not in the actual comic book. That made it a lot more interesting.
And this is a high school drama, so of course we’ve got bullies galore who insist on ruining the “female lead” Cinderella’s life.
But, lets be REALLY honest, we’re all here for Rowoon, right?
The romance between Eun Dan Oh and Haru is the heartbeat of this show. They are absolutely adorable, fun, and sweet enough to give you cavities.
Also, not to confuse anyone, but doesn’t it look like they’re wearing historical costumes here? Huh. Guess you’ll have to watch to find out what that’s about (and no, it’s not some school festival or play 🙂
Now, don’t forget, this is a K-drama, which means no matter how funny it starts out, there’s gonna be tears somewhere in there. Eun Dan Oh has a heart disease from the start so she’s got that hanging over her head the entire time. Then as the characters fight against the author, bad things start happening. While it generally keeps a fairly light tone most of the way through, the last quarter or so gets fairly serious.
I was a bit disappointed in the ending. Not because it was sad, it was actually pretty much very happy for everyone involved, but it was very ambiguous, and didn’t really answer our questions. I wonder if it’s explained better in the source material, or if they wrote themselves a complicated setting and couldn’t dig their way out with a clever ending.
I really like that this show didn’t take itself too seriously. It laughed at cliches, had a rather clever setting, and overall was very enjoyable, with good acting, a great soundtrack, fun characters, and adorable romance. Highly recommended for fans of rom-coms!