Daily Dose of Sunshine

Recently released on Netflix, Daily Dose of Sunshine revolves around the story of Jung Da-Eun, a nurse who recently transferred from the internal medicine to neuropsychiatry department. While working at internal medicine, Da-Eun was considered quite a nuisance and slow to her co-workers. As a nurse in internal medicine, she was also seen as “too kind”. While transferring to neuropsychiatry, her kindness could be a double-edged sword as she navigates the fascinating world of people who deal with mental challenges. There are 12 episodes in this series and it is based on a webtoon titled 정신병동에도 아침이 와요. This series is also directed by the same All Of Us Are Dead director, Lee Jae Kyu. Since its release, this series has been on the top 5 list in Netflix Indonesia which indicates that a lot of people in the country are taking an interest in this series. Now, as the title suggests, I have been wanting to discuss 12 episodes vs 6 episodes series especially in South Korean production. Should Daily Dose of Sunshine be shorter than 12 episodes or was 12 episodes justified for the story and pacing? Let’s dive into that!

In the first episode, we’ll be taken into an introduction of the characters. Jung Da-Eun (Park Bo-Young) was seen getting into a mental ward and was about to start her first day at the new department. Inside the department, there are some nurse staff as well as the potential love interest of the main character, Dong Go-Yun, a proctology doctor who went to the psychiatry ward to get an assessment of his alleged OCD. In the first episode, we will also be introduced to the first case: Bipolar disorder.

In the second and all the following episodes, while still tying the story to bipolar disorder, we are also introduced to the many facets of mental challenges. It attempts to portray that people from all-walksof- life are also susceptible to it. At the same time, we are also shown that the caregiver/nurse such as Dae-Eun is also not an exception. While navigating her depression, we are shown how important it is to have a strong support system as well as the willingness to recover. The story is quite slow paced in that each episode contains two stories that intertwine and attempt to find its resolution. While it’s good that we’re given different examples of mental illnesses, I personally think 12 episodes was quite too much as some story could have been cramped into one episode along with its resolution. While the pros of 12 episodes, the character development is a lot better, it could feel quite boring to watch similar events unfold and the pacing was rather slow.

The story could have been a 6 episodes series from the start when Dae-Eun moves to the department, introducing a few mental health challenges, to perhaps episode 4 where Dae-Eun struggles with depression and eventually recovers from it. But I suppose, they want to cover as many cases as possible, which is why they’re doing 12 episodes instead of 6.

The cons of longer episodes is that introducing more characters is often not necessary causing the focus to stray from the main character if it's not done well. In this series case, I think the dash of triangle love as well as too many cases sort of stray from its main protagonist which is Dae-Eun. A lot of South Korean series that are longer tend to fall flat in the middle while those with shorter series possess more anticipation and have a room for expanding it to season 2 which to be fair, in terms of business, it could be good.

The shorter series such as D.P, Home Sweet Home, The Nurse Files, all have a few protagonists and storyline that are quite solid. Despite only having shorter episodes, it was packed enough to fit in a whole frame of plot, character development and resolution of the conflict to the audience. Although one of the shorter series is that more often than not, the second episode quality tends to be lower than the first one. It sort of ruins the experience as often we have to wait a few years before the next season comes.

In the case of Daily Dose of Sunshine, I would suggest watching it if you’re interested in a series that talks about mental health challenges. It asks us to be more empathetic and learn from people who are suffering that a lot of us can be in the same situation all of sudden. While there is a mix of balance between veteran actors and rookie actors, the overall acting was quite okay. The character development, storyline as well as the resolution of the conflict are still worth following. I definitely suggest checking out this one among the recent release on Netflix.