Review of The Revenge Lover / 復讐カレシ～溺愛社長の顔にはウラがある～

If you’re new here, and stumbled upon this blog through the mythical powers of the Internet, welcome! I know a lot of visitors to my website are people who randomly come upon this website through search engines like Google, but I also do have a lot of visitors who come back. Regardless: my name is Ashley, and I started this blog in order to keep track of everything I’m coming across in the world.

I’ve always been a bit of an Asian drama junkie since I was in middle school and taking Chinese classes in order to prove that I was smart (long story short: I signed up for Chinese instead of French because I heard a kid say the smart kids learn Chinese, and I had an ego to stroke. That ended up changing my life completely for the better), but I never really got into Japanese drama until the past year.

It’s interesting to me that I never delved deeper into this until now, but I’ve really been interested in Japanese shows lately. Maybe it’s because I started an 8-5 job and I don’t have time like I used to when I was unemployed and doing contract/freelance work. I’ve been squeezing my drama time into my at-home binge sessions, and Japanese shows tend ot be shorter.

I tend to watch them on Viki, and that’s where I found The Revenge Lover. I was interested in the premise, despite it being similar to other shows I’ve watched recently, and because I kept seeing multiple shows with the female lead on the poster. Call me influenced by the marketing, but it worked.

I ended up watching this show over the course of two days, which is all I needed. I could see someone watching this in a single day though! Let’s get into the review before I start rambling too much.

After discovering her partner cheating, one woman finds love with someone she’s in a fake relationship with.

Our main character in this series is Hattori Maika, who works during the day at a hotel. She’s good at her job and dutiful, but her boyfriend, Matobe Narimitsu, also works at the company with her. Their relationship seems really ideal and perfect, until suddenly, one day, it isn’t.

Maike realizes that Narimitsu is actually having an affair with someone else in the company. Worst of all, when confronted with the fact he’s cheated on her, he decides to leave Maika behind for the new girl. This leaves her devastated and forced to grieve a relationship that had seemed so good—until it wasn’t.

This also makes her life at work a lot harder, as she works with both her former boyfriend and the woman he cheated on her with. But when Satori Shun, the new CEO of the company, spots Maika and how she’s being tormented over the relationship that turned its back on her, he takes matters into his own hands.

Shun is being forced into an arranged marriage with his parents and he wants no part in it. He asks Maika if she wants to pretend to be his girlfriend, as that can get his parents off his back and out of his marriage, and Maika ultimately agrees to his conditions because it will also help her get over her boyfriend (while also making her look better, as she snagged the CEO).

So they pretend to be in a relationship together to get what they want, and, over the course of the series, they actually fall in love. In true Asian drama fashion though, this doesn’t come without its own set of problems. Over the course of eight episodes you’re going to feel the full spectrum of emotions, even though the acting isn’t exactly the greatest in this series and some scenes are going to have you face palming.

Overall Thoughts

For me, this was a pretty entertaining show overall, especially when I didn’t think too hard about it. This was a show I’d classify a bit as a brain rot show, because if I actually wanted to dissect it and break it down, I’d be dissatisfied with it overall. It moves quickly, as most Japanese dramas that are only eight episodes, which is good for if you want something bite-sized.

I would say that if you want a little bit of everything as well this show has it. There’s the family drama going on in the background, the cheating that propels the whole “revenge lover” concept, and then some classic falling in love moments. It’s an eclectic mix at the end of the day, but it works.

I say watch this if you want something short and sweet. It’s not too deep, and it’s kind of fun to watch! I enjoyed the process of watching this, but it’s not something I would probably return to in the future.

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