Exploring Hyper-Real Contemporary Romance in Nevertheless

Exploring Hyper-Real Contemporary Romance in Nevertheless

The latest teaser from Nevertheless reveals a strong spark of chemistry between Song Kang (Navillera) and Han So-hee (A Couple’s World). Based on a popular Naver webtoon by the same name, Nevertheless is a love story between a woman who doesn’t believe in love but wants to date and a man who doesn’t want a relationship but enjoys the feelings caused by romance. According to the poster above, Nevertheless will be a “hyper-real romance.”

Han So-hee plays Yoo Na-bi, a woman who was burnt by her first love so much that she no longer believes in love or destiny. However, when she meets Song Kang’s character, Park Jae-eon, she’s compulsively attracted to him like a butterfly to a desirable flower. He’s a lover to many, but not exclusive to any woman until he starts feeling strange things for Yoo Na-bi.

These two twenty-two-year-old youths fall helplessly into a sometimes recklessly sexy, sometimes passionately sweet relationship, knowing that nothing good may come out of it. Park Jae-eon is an art college student who is polite and warm-seeming, but rather aloof and indifferent about others. He is especially careful about drawing an emotional line with people of the opposite sex. But all his line-drawing comes to naught when he meets Yoo Na-bi.

The teaser begins on a snowy night, with Yoo Na-bi holding a bouquet of roses, wondering what love is. A man whose face is not completely revealed is shown helping Han So-hee write “love” on her art sketch. She smiles, but the next scene hints at a potential betrayal and her face turns dark. In the voiceover, a girl gossips about Yoo Na-bi: “With a pretty face like that and no good judgement when it comes to men, obviously her love life is in disarray.”

Copy appears onscreen: “Separation is one moment… two people who met as if by fate” Yoo Na-bi meets Park Jae-eon at a bar. She asks who he is, as he asks whether he can sit down next to her.” After he writes something on her arm, he bends down to gently kiss it and she flinches in surprise. He tells her that he likes “Na-bi” (in this case, it’s not clear if he’s referring to butterflies or Yoo Na-bi). They enjoy some playful heart-stopping moments at her art studio and on a warm spring night with flower petals floating all around. In Han So-hee’s final voiceover, she says: “I’m probably not imagining this feeling of starting something new.”

Written by Jung Won and directed by Kim Ga-ram, JTBC Saturday romantic drama Nevertheless will air one episode a week (ten episodes total) starting on June 19.