Netflix has established itself as a home for popular K-Dramas, even branching out to create original series. Cafe Minamdang is based on a popular web novel by writer Jung Jae-ha. Let’s see how does the adaptation fare as a television series. Nam Han-joon (Seo In-guk) is a former criminal profiler who pretends to be a shaman to swindle people out of money and uses Cafe Minamdang as his headquarters of operation. He has a gift for reading people’s facial expressions and body language to appear like the spirit is speaking to him, and leans on his little sister Nam Hye-joon (Kang Mi-na), an expert hacker, to solidify his claims. As he’s investigating a hit-and-run case involving one of his client’s husbands, he is introduced to Detective Han Jae-hee (Oh Yeon-seo), forming a slight crush on her while she investigates him, setting up a cat-and-mouse game for the series. While the premise of the show seems fun and entertaining, it is unfortunately a little bit undercooked. The main issue is that Nam Han-joon feels like an extremely self-obsessed person, and the characterisation comes off more like a caricature than anything else. He’s a bit goofy but not in an endearing way, and his shaman character is played for more laughs than actually realistic, making all of the people who fall for his tricks also seem equally silly.

– Compilation