12 thoughts I had while watching Kim Seon-Ho and Go Youn-Jung’s ‘Can This Love Be Translated?’

The K-drama fandom has a new story to swoon over and it’s just January. Here’s why Can This Love Be Translated is worth all the love!

Some dramas are easy to watch and forget once the credits roll. And then there are the ones that sit with you long after! The kind that makes you pause mid-episode, rewind scenes, smile at your screen for no reason, and think, ‘Why am I feeling so much right now?’ Can This Love Be Translated turned out to be exactly that kind of a drama for me. What began as a seemingly simple rom-com about an interpreter and a popular actress slowly unraveled into a story filled with longing, emotional depth, and moments that caught me completely off guard. Between Kim Seon-Ho’s effortlessly charming presence, Go Youn-Jung’s layered performance, the slow-burn romance, and the unexpected themes the drama explored, my mind was constantly running with thoughts while watching each episode.

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So without further ado let’s get into it!

I could never get tired of watching Kim Seon-Ho and his dimples on-screen

After several hit K-dramas,Kim Seon-Ho has now added yet another interesting rom-com to his filmography. At this point it feels like every script he touches turns into K-drama of the year and watching him on-screen is a sight to my sore eyes after a hectic work day! I’d never get tired of his dimples making me weak in the knees and maybe we should make it mandatory for him to star in a K-drama every year!

Go Youn-Jung's performance as Cha Mu-Hee is going to linger on my mind for a while!

Go Youn Jung’s performance as Cha Mu-Hee is truly one for the books. Her switch between Cha Mu-Hee and Do Ra-Mi almost convinces you that she is two different people altogether. The sudden shift in the eyes and the craziness as Do Ra-Mi to Cha Mu-Hee’s timidness, she is playing two people with polar opposite personalities at the same time and it might just be one of her best performances so far!

Their chemistry is off the charts; whoever decided to put these two together deserves a raise

Love seeing a fresh new K-drama pair melting us one romantic gesture at a time. Not only doKim Seon-Ho and Go Youn-Jung look good together on-screen, the sexual tension, the banter and the slow-burner that they build over 12 episodes is worth every minute of our time!

The drama highlights finding someone who’d understand your love language 

Can This Love Be Translated on the surface feels like a drama about an interpreter and an actress falling in love. But it’s not just about the languages we know about, it’s about studying your partner and understanding their language in a way that no one else would! Isn’t that what we all want at the end of the day? 

Speaking of languages, Kim Seon-Ho being able to speak 5 languages in this show was impressive on another level

Not once did it feel like he is an actor who learnt Japanese, Italian, English and French for a show. He committed to making it look like he was an interpreter who knows these languages at the back of his hand and I was convinced from start to finish!

Cha Mu-Hee’s subtle Chanel collab is missing nobody’s eye

K-drama brand placements are always in the face and sometimes even cringey. But Cha Mu-Hee’s subtle Chanel plug in the show with new bags every episode is something I started looking forward to as the story progressed further!

Finally found some good OSTs in a K-drama after a long time!

It’s been a while since my K-drama playlist was updated with songs that I liked simply because quite a lot of recent dramas haven’t been up to the mark with their songs. But Can This Love Be Translated has given me enough and more to play on loop with its OST!

This drama was meant to be binged!

While I was initially bummed about the fact that all episodes were out together, as I started watching the show, I feel like it totally made sense for why the show came out all at once. This isn't a story you let simmer over months, their will-they-won’t-they situation wants to keep you hooked in one go!

Shin Ji-Sun and Kim Young-Woo’s arc is a sweet reminder of how love finds you when you’re least expecting it

Shin Ji-Sun and Kim Young-Woo getting together was not something that we saw coming our way in the first half of the show. But when they did, my heart fluttered for them and he loved her in a way that made her feel seen as compared to her ex-fiance who couldn’t love her for who she was. Also, I think a part of me was just happy that she would no longer come in between Cha Mu-Hee and Joo Ho-Jin

Hiro, you made my heart waver for a minute!

While Kim Seon-Ho and his dimples were the sole focus of this drama for me, there were moments where I almost caught the second lead syndrome for Hiro. As an uptight actor who had a lot of boundaries, Hiro let Cha Mu-Hee ruffle his feathers and make him be a lot more open minded towards newer experiences. And of course, him learning Korean for her and secretly loving her from afar will never not go unnoticed as an audience even if it did on the show!

It brought mental health issues like schizophrenia to light, something we’ve not seen in a mainstream K-drama before!

Can This Love Be Translated on the surface felt like any other cheesy romantic drama we look forward to. But as the plot unfolded, it turned out to be a lot more than that. It did not restrict itself to one genre but also brought in darker themes and a little bit of thriller with Cha Mu-Hee past and her struggle with mental health post her accident on set.

Parts of it reminded me of Karthik calling Karthik and the OG Bhool Bhulaiyaa

Before you come at me for this, hear me out! As someone who has grown up watching Bollywood movies, the only two representations I have ever seen in films for Schizophrenia has been Karthik Calling Karthik and Bhool Bhulaiyaa and hence my mind couldn’t help but take me there when I saw Cha Mu-Hee lose herself and become Do Ra-Mi overnight. The parts where she had no recollection of anything and everything she had done as her alter personality had me diagnose her even before the show did because it felt a little too familiar from what I had watched in both the movies!

Have you watched the show yet? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below!

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