The premise of [My Farm By the Palace] is wonderfully simple: Hazel, the MC, wants to open a farm. But as the title indicates, this farm is located deep inside the palace. With a bright smile and delectable cooking, hijinks and friendship ensues. First and foremost, there's a Saturday Morning Cartoon feel coming from this manhwa. By that I mean, this story has a quite distinctive sense of simplicity and idyliic peace that reminds me of a much simpler time. A time where friendship is lovely and warm, good always triumphs over evil, and the future looks bright and promising. And it works, for me. This storyhas a more strongly pronounced episodic feel compared to any other manhwas I've read, with each story arc feeling a lot like new episodes of an anime. The writing is simple and straightforward, yet still bearing enough nuance and layers to keep me pulled in the narrative. And the plot structure reminds me more of a slice of life mangas than anything else-- something that I've rarely seen replicated in OI manhwas in particular.

More importantly though, it's a warm spring day of a story.

Everything about this story is warm and sweet and welcoming. The art has that classical shoujo feel, with pastel colors and very bright lighting that reminds you of a stereotypical children's book. And the story is all about building friendship and bridging differences. It feels wonderfully refreshing especially after reading one too many BLs that mistakes conflict with growth, banter with communication, smut with love, and passion with intimacy.

The MC, Hazel, is easily the main draw of the story, and much of the plot centers around her. She's an absolute rarity in manhwa in that she is very much all fluff, no edge. Her painful past is one about loss and separation, a dream taken away much too soon, but that's about it. That doesn't mean she's a doormat; she has repeatedly shown that she won't stand for being disrespected or exploited, but that does mean she lacks any deep-seated grudge or a teeth-gritting sense of self-preservation that is so very common in OI manhwa protagonists. For the most part, she is warm and friendly and inviting. This is a protagonist archetype that I usually see more in OI manga, and it's pretty fun to watch her exist within manhwa plot structure and values.

And this does add to the plot. It just feels so nice to watch Hazel build close relationships with so many people in the titular palace. Everything is so fuwafuwa and with the perpetual chick Hazel is carrying, it does get mofumofu at times.

The rest of the cast is kiiiinda generic for a RoFan story, and they aren't that fleshed out either, but the art and writing are working their best to hide the flimsiest parts. Hazel's cheerful and friendliness does wonders in drawing the rest of the cast out of their comfort zone. Lively banter, adorable chibis, and good chemistry between the characters combine to inject color and life to the narrative.

Her cooking is the second biggest appeal in the entire story. Granted, it's more about being delectable food porn more than a tutorial, but they are pretty well-drawn as far as manhwa is concerned, with a tactical use of 3d assets and stickers and a decent coloring that gives them depth and complexity.

Now that I have described the story's main draw, hopefully there's a clearer sense of what this story is and isn't. Because when I look around, I see that a decent lot of people calls this story 'boring', 'nothing happens', 'repetitive', and so on and so forth.

Don't get me wrong, I can see what they mean. This story IS repetitive and formulaic, and it DOES affect the narrative negatively. In adopting the episodic format of a Saturday Morning Cartoon, the narrative also stumbles into the same pitfalls as your typical 'hijinks-of-the-week' stories. Much of the stories here can be described as "Hazel stumbles upon an issue >> She cooks a delectable and welcoming dish for the person associated with the issue >> a heartfelt conversation shows that Hazel has a good heart >> another friend get". Some story arcs are longer, and some story arcs have more stakes in it, but in the general the structure never changes much.

I can also make a similar complaint with the romance. The relationship between Hazel and the ML is anchored in a generic 'secret identity' plot, and so far it seems like the story is hellbent in keeping it going for long-term. The end result is a slow burn that ACTIVELY sabotages any significant progress, using all sorts of reasons to stall and delay the moment of truth just for the sake of keeping the gag alive. This also affects the narrative negatively, because the romance cannot grow as much as it should. The moment it enters a certain depth, the secret identity will inevitably rear its ugly head to drag itself back to the status quo.

It does not help that the ML is pretty generic as far as love interests are concerned. He's decently fleshed out, but there's nothing special to set him apart, especially when compared to OI manga love interests who are generally more pleasant than OI manhwas. The narrative's best efforts to add some darkness to his personality are viciously neutered by its own sunny vibes. At this point, the ML's buddies have much more interesting personalities, and the only reason why this is not as annoying as it should be is because the romance is like, the third most important aspect of this story after Friendship and Cooking.

In general, I'd say it'd be much better to treat this story as a friendship building story first, an iyashikei story second, and a RoFan last.

But at the same time, this is also a feature, not a bug.

With iyashikei stories and its derivatives, the predictability is half the point of the story, and the repetitive structure is one of the ways to achieve that. We are meant to know what the story is about and where it's going to be. We are meant to turn off our brain and just enjoy the sweet fluffy ride.

The main draw of this story is how Hazel gets everyone to be her friend. That's basically it.

And so far that was exactly what I'm looking for. This is filling my heart.