Because This Is My First Life

This is the best series I have ever seen. I am over 40 years old, have my own family and can relate to many situations displayed. Growing love, miscommunications and misunderstandings, expectations and pressure from the outside (family, friends, traditions...), looking for and fighting for happiness, women trying to make their lives better in a strongly patriarchal society. That said, this series is probably more suitable for more matured audience. Although it's often funny, it is not light. The pace is slow and natural, which is good - life does not happen fast, dialogues are not a race (I hate west and especially US cinematography for making people spit out sentences like machine guns). In many situations each single word, each facial expression or change in eyes, each touch matters. Yes, many dialogues and interactions in this series are very meaningful, beautifully written and superbly executed by the actors. The main cast, Jung So Min and Lee Min Ki are simply phenomenal. Every time these two interact with each other, magic happens. They seem to be very comfortable with each other and incredibly match together. Even when they are silently looking at each other, I can absolutely feel the emotions - a spark of happiness, attraction and love, as well as confusion, tension and disappointment. The atmosphere between these two is often so real and electrifying that I get the feeling I should not be watching, as I am violating their privacy. I have never had this experience in my life with any series or movie before this one, that acting would feel so real and so natural. Pay especially close attention to Lee Min Ki's eyes and his face. Due to the nature of the character he portrays, his palette of emotion expressions is very limited. What other express by using their entire body and voice, he manages literally just by changing the shade in his eyes. Have you ever seen an actor expressing expectation, then confusion, then worry and disappointment only with his eyes, within few seconds, without moving a single muscle or saying a word? Just the way he looks as his partner (Jung So Min)? Not me, not before I have seen this series. Jung So Min has more room to portrait her character and she delivers perfectly - she is absolutely fantastic. Love. Care. Broken-heartedness. Happiness. They all feel so real. There are few extremely intense situations too (not giving out spoilers) which would have been very difficult for any woman to act through. And she channels the pain, the heaviness and tragedy of the situation so genuinely that it punches you in your gut. I cannot even describe all the details of how good she is as I would have to write a novel. The rest of the cast follows the suit, they are all very very good. The directing is top-notch, the lighting is spot on, the soundtrack is incredible, silence is used generously and at the right times (all together making especially intimate or tense situations feel even more real). My only complaint would be about, in my opinion, rather rushed last episode. Being used to the slow and thorough pace of the series, things suddenly wrap up too quickly to my taste. I would definitely appreciate more of the happy, post-climactic interactions of the lead couple, some recapitulation of what happened while separated. I could personally handle one more 16-ep series of those two just living their ordinary happy life together, because the "chemistry" between the lead actors Lee Min Ki and Jung So Min is no joke.