"More than Friends" was a journey not for everyone.

Before MTF began, I was excited because of the friends to lovers trope. One of my favorites. Seeing the promos for it, it seemed to be a cute romcom. Well forget all that. It definitely wasn't romcom. I would call it melo-rom. And while it was friends to lovers, the friends part was a bit exaggerated.

Overall, I didn't hate it, in fact for the most part I enjoyed it even if it infuriated me a few times. If I did I would have stopped watching it a long time ago. Early on there was such a reaction to this drama that I just didn't understand. The word "toxic" seemed to be used a lot and while I didn't agree with some of the things said, it was far from what I deem "toxic". Toxic is a word I don't like to throw around lightly. In fact, I think it's a word used too much to describe things on the internet/dramas. Sometimes things are mean, doesn't mean they reach what I deem toxic. Granted everyone's personal experiences will define that word for themselves, but as one who deals with children and families who quite frequently come from a background too horrific to mention, my perspective is different.

But let's get back to this drama...it had a lot of good things. The cast was great and save one small supporting character all new to me. The way it was filmed was beautiful. There were many scenes of forgotten Seoul that made me fall in love even more with this city. Jeju Island scenes also never disappoint. It also had some of the best male character growth I've seen in a drama.

Let's talk about our leads. They were somewhat friends in HS but it was more of a one sided crush and then they just didn't interact much after that for me to really consider them friends. I often wanted to shake the female character especially towards the end. I didn't understand her reasoning and fault the writer completely for that. I felt the leads suffered due to focus on the second story of the dying mom of the friend. Why they broke up? Why they felt the way the did all along? Especially Woo Yeon. The writer redeemed themselves a bit in episode 16 and had both lead character say exactly why they felt the way they did and did the things they did. It actually took away some of my animosity towards the lead female character. I just wish that open communication had been present more throughout the drama. They did have a lovely confession scene and some nice kissing. And I appreciated them realizing they didn't really know each other well and set out to fix that. While they ended the show happy, it was with the knowledge that it's a day to day thing to work on.

Lee Su though was my favorite character because I saw this character change. His heart. His mindset. How he approached life. He started as a jerk. I don't think anyone doubts that. I certainly saw it loud and clear on the internet. I kept saying..."he's so jerkish, there is only one way for him to go and that's up". I think I was right. Each episode he started seeing more and more his flaws...acknowledging them right up until the end. His relationship with his parents was fixed and through seeing their son change, their relationship changed as well. So kudos to the writer for Lee Su's transformation.

The CEO. Probably my least favorite character and not because of the triangle. It was because he was too perfect. Everything he did was almost over the top and the showing up and following Woo Yeon around and popping up everywhere was a bit creepy to me. Even in the end, he was still hanging around hoping to take her leftover crumbs if it didn't work out with Lee Su. I thought he had acknowledged that he saw himself in her and was trying to "fix him" through her and he wasn't interested in her anymore but episode 16 dispelled that. I felt he needed more character growth and he didn't get it.

The friends. I did like the girl's friendships but most of the time I was thinking if this was my best girl friend I would slap the crap out of them and tell them to wake up! They were supportive but also in my mind enablers as well. Most of the time they were just sobby and maudlin. Most of the time I didn't understand the refusal to marry her boyfriend because she was miserable and poor. For most of the drama, I didn't want him to marry her for those reasons either though. Jin Ju and PO's character were perhaps the most normal but even then she couldn't see him because he wasn't good looking enough. They both got their happy endings and I was happy to see that even though most of the time especially with the first pair I just wanted to say "just stapppp".

I would recommend this drama for someone who loves a good character growth in a male character but doesn't expect everyone to get that same kind of character growth. For someone who doesn't mind the ML being a jerk before his transformation. For someone who does like girl friendships. For someone who doesn't want a romcom but wants a melorom.

Overall, I rate it a 3/5. Enjoyable entertainment but not groundbreaking. The 3 mainly going to the character growth of the male lead character. Otherwise it likely would have been a 2/5 (It's was okay but had a lot of issues but not enough to fast forward. Likely to not remember it too much.).