Kuma ^.^

Poorly-constructed narrative with no tension or conflicts that I care about as a viewer. Probably because the show doesn't adhere to its description.

Warning: Spoilers. Also I dropped this series halfway through watching it. There are seemingly-unrelated plot lines that perhaps converge later on in the seasons, but five episodes in and they are just that: seemingly unrelated.

The description describes the protagonist as "trapped in a false paradise" but there is nothing "trapped" about her situation at all. I thought perhaps the story would be something like she meets a charming guy and he turns out to be a kidnapper/serial killer/criminal etc. Very early on (I think episode 2?) we find out the guy is just having an affair. Literally everything after this point (with regard to this plot line) is entirely self-inflicted by the protagonist. There is nothing "trapped" about it. After finding out he lives in a rich community with his family, she decides to move in next door. Why? To ruin the marriage? Because she likes the sex that much? No idea, but these are all her own choices, so once the show devolves into these derivative conflicts, it's hard to care at all. A normal person would have ended the relationship after finding out it was an affair, so everything after that feels forced and irrational.

There are other plot lines but they seem to serve very little or no purpose. The protagonist has a stalker ex who shows up out of the blue sometimes or makes phone calls with vague threats and begs her to be in a relationship with him. It's all very petty and leads to no material consequences for the story, so it's unclear what the point is or why the writers waste time with it. There are also questions re: how a dancer from Vegas affords to live in a rich community, hire a fake husband, and buy a Mercedes which don't get answered satisfactorily (intentionally), but I also don't care that much. Nothing else makes much sense anyway so I just assume the writers fabricated the money for plot purposes. Lastly, the family that owns the community knows the husband is having an affair and want to "get rid of him" and apparently intend to use the protagonist to do this. This seems to hinge entirely on the protagonist making the absurd decision to uproot her entire life and live in this community. What if this had never happened? Well it had to happen for plot purposes.

Maybe these plot lines are related. Maybe the family hired the ex to intimidate the protagonist, but if so it's not evident when, how, or why. So halfway through the season, these all seem to be discrete plot lines with no relation to one another and very poor pacing if they are indeed related to one another. For example, if the family needs the protagonist to move into the community for their goals, spend some time exploring ways to get that to happen instead of the protagonist having poor decision-making. e.g. the family could hire the ex to intimidate her and make her afraid of Vegas in order to give her a reason to go overseas or feed her information about who the man having an affair really is (before she knew) to make her curious. Once overseas, they could have had the protagonist act like a sane human being who initially wanted to leave and end the relationship, but the family gets her to stay. They could have given her a role in ruining the man's life instead of just being the girl who decides to move in because she likes having sex with the neighbor's husband.

Overall, the story is "woman finds out guy she's dating is having an affair and makes the questionable decision to live next door to him" + "family owning the residential property wants the man having an affair to be out of their lives" + "also there's a stalker who shows up once every few episodes for a few seconds because the writers forgot there was supposed to be tension in this series" and none of these appear to be related.

People need to stop being so obnoxiously negative. This show is extremely entertaining. Maybe not always funny, in a sense, but certainly always entertaining. Entertaining isn't as subjective as funny. And if you don't find it to be entertaining, at the very least, you're doing something wrong. Lower your negativity, lingering expectations, and I bet you'll begin to find it entertaining, a little bit, at first.

Anyway, all that aside, I enjoyed watching this show very, very much. The fictional history of the in-show world and the subtle references to little bits and pieces of it came out of nowhere and was probably one of the most shocking aspects of it if not the most. But it was super interesting from the start, and then began to be entertaining and a very wonderful running gag, so to speak. The gradual descent into anguish and madness made for a compelling theme and didn't disappoint.

The VFX (or CGI?) of outer space, and maybe the space ship itself as well, something that I think I've seen a person or two complain about and call bad, or at least comparing it to a much older show that had "bad" VFX/CGI that also didn't age very well, didn't look remotely bad to me. In actuality, it looked quite good and...crisp or whatever, I don't know. Each significant character was entertaining. Yes, even Karen. Sure, if you're more passionate and generally immersive in what you watch than I am, you probably hate her and don't particularly like any of the other characters. That's fine.

Moving on, the main issue which a lot of people have with the show that I've seen is that it isn't funny, and I think that's a load of bollocks. While the show is advertised as a comedy or considered to be a comedy, first and foremost, you're supposed to be entertained. Not to mention, this is, without a doubt, and very obviously, a much different version of the comedy genre than usual. That alone should've been obvious before going off and complaining about how much the show sucks, and how remarkably unfunny it is. That being said, feel free to freely act negatively towards the show, most of you probably already have. I liked it and I'm looking forward to the second season, and it's a good thing for the show that those of you who I've mentioned, you know who you are, have been weeded out and won't be returning. Goodbye.