The latest holiday offering from Netflix is the eight-episode Korean drama, The Fabulous. Starring SHINee’s Minho, Chae Soo-Bin, Lee Sang-Woon, and Park Hee-Jung in the lead roles, the series is set in the bustling and glitzy world of the fashion industry. The Fabulous follows four best friends as they chase their dreams of making it big in the fashion world while juggling demanding jobs and romantic dilemmas. To know what we thought of the series, read our review of The Fabulous.
An endearing tale of friendship
Friendship is the heart of The Fabulous and you’ll get that in spades. Unfortunately, for a series set in the fashion world, you don’t get the glamour and glitz that you would expect. It’s no Devil Wears Prada, but you won’t be disappointed if you go into the show expecting a story about four friends and their lives.
Pyo Ji-Eun (Soo-Bin), Ji Woo-Min (Minho), Joseph (Sang-Woon), and Ye Seon-Ho (Hee-Jung) are best friends who all work in fashion, though not together. Ji-Eun is the Head of PR at Audrey PR, Woo-Min is a professional retoucher, Joseph is a down-on-his-luck designer, and Seon-ho is a model who is dealing with ageism in her career. Though Ji-Eun and Woo-Min dated previously and broke up, they continue to be friends. The four of them stick together through thick and thin, without judgement. They don’t hesitate to call each other out on their bullshit and they never shy away from hyping each other up or being there in times of need.
It needs a bit of refinement
With only eight episodes that range from 45-65 minutes, The Fabulous is quite a bingeable series and that’s one of the best things about it. Having said that, the characters and the story could have used some fleshing out. The makers have played it very safe with The Fabulous. There was so much scope to do something absolutely gorgeous and mindblowing, but this was a wasted effort. The clothes were pretty, but definitely not something you would expect from a fashion-based show. The actors did a great job, but the script did them dirty at times. Joseph is the caricature gay designer, which is a pity considering how much web series have evolved over the years.
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