My Youth episodes 1 and 2 review — A broken bracelet, a love that lingers, and the second take of a lifetime

My Youth begins with a question that feels both playful and devastating:

“How come there are no previews in real life?”

The first episode introduces us to a world where past and present bleed into each other, asking what becomes of love when time refuses to give second chances.

The drama draws us back to their school days, where Sun Woo-hae was a boy carrying abandonment like a second skin, raising his little sister alone. Sung Je-yeon was the one who believed he could chase something brighter, urging him toward stages he never thought belonged to him.

Their connection carried warmth, but My Youth shows how the cruelty of circumstance silenced that possibility, leaving their story cut off before it could bloom.

Years later, the drama reframes their encounter as a fragile “second take.” The present is steeped in melancholy yet always feels alive, weaving nostalgia into the fabric of their daily lives. Each glance, each hesitation, carries the ache of what might have been, yet it never collapses into despair.

By the time he accepts the television job she begged him to try, the moment lands like a wound and a promise. Will their unfinished story finally be rewritten?

The fragile brilliance of their youth

My Youth paints adolescence as both a burden and a spark, and things in their case are hard because of parental and societal expectations besides personal struggling. Through the flashbacks we get to see a boy forced into adulthood far too soon, left behind by his father and struggling to raise his little sister.

Each scene of Sun Woo-hae balancing school, work, and caretaking builds a portrait of exhaustion, but also of resilience. That moment at the park with his sister? Heartbreaking to the core! The little girl thought she was a burden to him. It's absurd to see children raising children.

Yet, it actually happens a lot in real life. And it's sad, oh, so sad. Children should never be forced into adulthood so soon... and certainly not by the ones who should be responsible for them: their parents.

Beside him, the girl becomes more than a classmate, an anchor of belief. She perceives both the struggles marked in his existence and the potential he attempts to conceal. Their bond deepens in subtle resistance to societal expectations, nourished by mutual confidences, late-night talks, and simple gestures of goodwill. In my younger years, these moments of closeness seem bright despite being enveloped by the darkness of debt, neglect, and solitude.

When the past collides with the present

In the present timeline, My Youth places the two protagonists face to face after years of distance, with him carving out a modest life at a restaurant while tending to his flower shop, and her rising in the entertainment industry with the confidence of someone who never stopped moving forward. Their reunion is charged with layers of hesitation, recognition, and the sting of memory.

What stands out is how My Youth refuses to frame their meeting as a sudden miracle. Instead, it lets the weight of the past seep into every gesture. The years apart are felt in the way they speak, in the pauses that hang too long, and in the small kindnesses that feel both familiar and foreign. The series captures this encounter as a fragile possibility, asking whether the second take will allow them to rewrite what youth once denied.

The burden and the gift of family ties

Family is where the drama sharpens its emotional edge. The flashbacks linger on the image of a boy becoming both brother and parent, carrying the responsibility of raising his sister after being left behind. Every sacrifice he makes, from skipped meals to late nights of work, adds layers to the sorrow already etched into his youth, yet this same burden also becomes a source of strength, shaping him into someone who understands loyalty more deeply than most.

The drama complicates these ties further by revealing that he and Seok-ju are connected as half-brothers, a twist that does not come with the comfort of newfound kinship but with the heaviness of old wounds, debts, and pride.

Refusing financial help, he clings to dignity even when it keeps him on the edge of survival, and My Youth uses these fractured bonds to show how family can both fracture and fortify, turning each relationship into a test of endurance and care.

Melancholy and hope

What makes My Youth compelling is its refusal to settle into despair. The sadness is constant, but it carries a pulse that keeps the story alive. The melancholy of lost time is balanced by small and luminous moments that insist on the possibility of healing. Even in silence, the drama communicates that the characters are still moving, still trying, still reaching for something better.

The dual timeline reinforces this rhythm. Every flashback of pain is mirrored by a present-day gesture of tenderness, as if the series is stitching together a fabric from pieces that were once torn apart.

My Youth understands that hope does not erase sorrow; it grows beside it, reshaping what once seemed final into something unfinished, waiting for its second chance.

What will become of them in My Youth?

The closing moments of the second episode give My Youth its first unforgettable echo. After years of distance and a reunion steeped in hesitation, he finally accepts the job she practically begged him to take. The gesture feels less like ambition and more like a fragile offering, a step toward the life they were denied as teenagers.

When he turns to her in the preview and asks,

“What will become of us?”,

the question lands with the weight of everything unsaid. It's not only about love, but about time, loss, and whether a second take can repair what youth left broken.

My Youth leaves the line hanging, suspended between wound and promise, urging us to wonder if this story can find its way to the happiness that once slipped through their hands.

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Rating with a touch of flair: 5 out of 5 broken bracelets glimmering with the promise of a second take.