The Little Lady Behind the Scenes

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First two seasons are great, they depict lili's childhood and sister suitor dilemma, while also depicting various psychological traumas and mental anguish very well. Art is amazing, and the relationship dynamics between all the main cast is greatly fleshed out.

So the issue, as others point out, is 3rd season. While not as bad as others make it to be, effectively the season has no driving purpose moving the story forward. What I mean by that is that the main problem(Julianne's love candidate) has already been solved, and the story is now focusing on Lili's love life, but it doesn't move forward in any way ... due to Lili's psychological state (which I don't have issues with, but the events that happen could try to develop better). The issue is that you could give a 2-3 chapter summary of s3 for notable developments as part of the time skip introduction. I also thought the physical fighting parts were a bit out of place, seeing as that is not the tone of the manhwa. Still, I did enjoy s3, even if it mostly just serves as an intro to a now grown(physically, not mentally) Lili. Art is still amazing as well.

Hopefully s4 is better with character and story development, 9/10 for first two seasons, 6-7/10 for the third.

The first two seasons were absolutely perfect! The art style was stunning, with beautiful and detailed illustrations, featuring some of the best portraits since WMMAP. The story was both engaging and interesting. The dialogue struck a great balance between comedy and serious undertones that really drew me in. The characters were well-developed and multifaceted, each with their own unique personalities.

However, I recently started reading the third season, and that's where things began to go downhill for me. While I'm on board with the overall direction, there's this one plot device that gets really old and annoying: the FL (Lili) keeps flip-flopping. She's the most wishy-washy ... character I've ever encountered. She'll say one thing and then, just a few panels later, do something completely different. Sure, the author established her as indecisive, with no solid plans for her future and difficulty revealing her ultimate secret as a transmigrator. But even when she does make a decision, she immediately backpedals. I feel so sorry for Josh this entire season because he keeps holding on to a girl who can't make up her dang mind.

There's a limit to this kind of plot device, and I think this series has reached it for me. I won't be finishing this season because, even if it does eventually pay off and Josh gets the girl, the author would need to deliver the most epic, romantic reveal ever to draw me back in. Given the current direction and its faithfulness to the novel, I highly doubt that's gonna happen.

Also, the third season just doesn't vibe with its own title. It made sense for the first two seasons when she was "the little lady behind the scenes" of her older sister's love life, but now she's become "a girl with four guys in her pocket." Everything after the second season should've been a sequel title, a spin-off, or a side story.

It was super cute and enjoyable. I didn't appreciate the random moments of korean nationalism. They were forced and arbitrary. They felt like strange deviations that were inauthentic. The character felt less authentic in those moments. The main girl was the only character that felt as if they had any emotions. The other characters were just there as if they are filling a space defined by predefined traits.

There is a servant that is colored like he's doing blackface. What is going on????? It is so strange and unacceptable. He reappeared in chapter 30. I gave up on reading. It is the kind of thing that ... poisions any good faith for the author.