I really enjoyed this show. It is not groundbreaking by any stretch of the imagination, and I think the plotting suffered from early negative reactions. The writers kept picking up plot lines and then dropping them and then picking them up again in a way that felt rather indecisive. But the love-lines in this show were really sweet (and it was a nice bit of payoff to see Hwang Jung Eum and Namgoong Min getting to have a good couple together since I recently struggled my way through the ending of Can You Hear My Heart). I understand some people's criticisms of Jung Eum's acting choices, but I still love her so much I don't care. I find the "over the top" stuff really endearing when it's her. And Namgoong Min's adorable pleased-with-myself smile, Heart melting. :) Is this my favorite drama of all time? No, but I enjoyed it entirely and will probably watch it again.

Read More

I love this show. Love it. Wholeheartedly love it. This is a family drama centering on the Byeon family. The titular father in this case is Byeon Han Soo, father of four children: ne'er do well oldest child, Byeon Joon Yeong (who is on his third attempt at passing the civil servants exam), oldest daughter Byeon Hye Yeong (a hyper competent, over achieving, tough as nails lawyer), middle girl child Byeon Mi Yeong (an insecure job seeker who was a former judo athlete and then also a former fat girl in high school), and youngest daughter Byeon Ra Yeong (a yoga instructor and Pretty Girl (tm)). Coming into this mix is actor Ahn Jung Hee - who is notorious for being a bad actor and whose father is Byeon Han Soo - but the Byeon Han Soo we know has a secret he's been hiding for 35 years. Jung Hee comes looking for his father, as he takes to heart criticism of his acting and he wants to find out for himself the feelings that he's struggling so hard to portray in his acting. Partnered with Byeon Han Soo is his wife Na Yeong Shil, who is a party to his secrets, and has stood by him faithfully for more than 35 years.

Being a family drama, this story also centers around the love interests of the main family members, and the trials and tribulations of the extended family as well (such as the brother, sister-in-law, nephew, and mother of Na Yeong Shil). The story lines in this one definitely have twists and turns, but lack the absolutely soul crushing series of bad events that some family dramas seem to get bogged down in. All of the various romances are delightful to watch, and each episode (even ones that end in sad or suspenseful cliff-hangers) left me with warm fuzzy feelings that made me eager to go to the next episode. I highly recommend this one. And man am I in love with Lee Joon as Ahn Jung Hee in this show.

Read More

Moonlight Drawn By Clouds. This lovely little gem stars Park Bo Gum as Crown Prince Hyo Myeong and Kim Yoo Jung as Hong Ra On, a young woman who has spent most of her life passing as a boy and ends up, through various bits of misfortune, serving in the palace as a eunuch. Of course, they fall in love. There's also Jung Jin Young as Kim Yoon Sung, former childhood friend of the Crown Prince and hapless second lead who knows the girl's secret before everyone else, and Kwak Dong Yeon as Kim Byung Yeon, also a childhood friend and now the Prince's bodyguard and right hand. It's a historical drama, so politics are everywhere, convoluted, and deadly. Birth secrets sprout like mushrooms after a rain storm. Through it all, Park Bo Gum and Kim Yoo Jung are adorable. It's nice to see Park Bo Gum in something where he's not a sociopath or locked into a limited range of emotion. The story is not ground breaking, covering a lot of common sageuk tropes, but the actors are so delightful it doesn't matter.

Read More

Healer. Wow. This drama has been on my "To be watched" list for a long time, and it kept just being something I didn't want to start. Then I started watching The K2, which also stars the ridiculously charming (no, seriously, it's criminal how charming this man is) Ji Chang Wook. Unfortunately, just about every single character I encountered in six episodes I've seen so far of The K2 has been despicable. Which is not to say that it isn't a fine show, just that I can only take so many doses before I have to walk away for a while. Contrary to that, Healer is filled with delightful characters that really inspired me to care about what was happening to them. Did I mention that Ji Chang Wook is inhumanly charming? He embodies the character of Healer, a "night courier" who does shady work for high pay. It also has Park Min Young as the spunky girl reporter with a mysterious past (well, to be fair, most everyone in this show has a mysterious past) with whom he falls in love. This one is a lot of action, a lot of political drama, some family drama, and a bit of lovely romance thrown in to season it all with hope. Ji Chang Wook is a joy to watch in action scenes. And non actions scenes. And gratuitous shirt-less scenes. And cute falling in love scenes. And hot kissing scenes. And outraged black-hat-turns-white-hat (though really he was always more of a grey hat than a black hat) scenes. And devastating emotional loss scenes. He'd probably be a joy to watch in reading the phone book out loud scenes, truthfully. Throw into the mix Yoo Ji Tae as the intrepid, famous, successful investigative reporter and add some truly outstanding supporting cast members, such as the ever versatile Kim Mi Kyung as Healer's hacker ahjumma, and the outcome is a very engaging race to the finish line.

Read More

What can I say? Choi Si Won and his adorable dimples are back! Choi Si Won plays Byun Hyuk, a carefree third generation chaebol whose family is super awful, who falls in love basically at first sight with Kang So Ra's Baek Jun, the plucky, multi-parttime-job-holding, no-nonsense girl of modest means. There's a second male lead, Kwon Je Hoon, who grew up with Byun Hyuk (played by the adorable Gong Myung). Some of the writes up I've seen describe the plot as 'rich boy learns to be a good human', but my read of it is more that the rich boy in question has always been a good human - he's just been living his life oblivious to consequences. So really, the story line is him learning that there are consequences to actions and how it awakens his desire to try to reform "Hell Joseon", or at least his little slice of it, for a new era.

I'm not going to lie, it's an uneven story. Choi Si Won is game as always to be an over the top goober - which is really why we loved him so much in She Was Pretty - but sometimes it's too much in this drama and he's not as good at anchoring the drama as he should be. A lot of the trend lately seems to be that shows are heavier, with highlights of humor, so what starts out funny, often ends up going pretty serious and dark for some portion of the middle and/or end.  This show embraces the humor throughout and keeps it going. Even with that, I still greatly enjoyed the show.

Read More

Go Kyung Pyo, oh how I adore this man. I'm so pleased that he's finally gotten to be the lead. He plays Choi Kang Soo, a young man who has been moving from neighborhood to neighborhood in the city trying to find his birth mother. He spends two months in each neighborhood then moves on to the next. He makes friends everywhere he goes and generally works as a deliveryman. He moves into the neighborhood where Lee Dan Ah, played by Chae Soo Bin, lives. She's a young woman completely disenchanted by life in "Hell Joseon," where young people struggle and can't find jobs and competition for everything is fierce. Throw into the mix a spoiled party boy rich kid, Oh Jin Gyu, played by Kim Sun Ho and a handful of engaging secondary and tertiary characters and you end up with a delightful rag-tag bunch of young adults facing off against a corrupt corporation.

I was worried that this show would be the usual love triangle (rich boy versus boy boy for the plucky poor girl's favor), but was happily surprised when they veered sharply away from that dynamic after the first few episodes. What played out was a good balance of light cheer and sad drama for a show that ended up being really comforting to watch. I was a little disappointed in the chemistry between the two main leads - but I put a lot of that on the writing and less on the actors. Dan Ah spends so much time being bitter and angry that it can be off-putting at times. There were a couple of places where I felt like plot threads were brought in and then abruptly dropped. I would definitely watch this one again.

Did I mention that I love Go Kyung Pyo? I just want to carry him around in my pocket all the time.

Read More

This seems like a kind of hybrid between rom-com and family drama. It's refreshing that the main romance/story line is about a couple in their forties, which is a nice break from all the 20-something and 30-something romance dramas. Kim Hee Ae plays Kang Min Joo, a successful television producer, and Ji Jin Hee plays Ko Sang Shik, a safety minded civil servant. Sparks fly when the two of them clash. The extended cast in this drama is delightful and really flesh it out. Unfortunately, the pacing is tedious. I really did like the story, but there were far too many 'if you people would just take five minutes to /talk/ to each other' frustrating moments. It took me almost a full year to watch the show, because the pacing was just so off. Which is really unfortunate, because like I said, the cast was superb.

Read More

There was so much more crying while watching this movie than I expected from the trailers. Jo Jung Suk plays Ko Doo Shik, a conman in prison who gets parole to take care of his younger half-brother, Ko Doo Yeong (played by Do Kyung Soo AKA EXO's D.O.), an Olympic caliber Judo athlete who is suddenly blinded from an injury during a match. Park Shin Hye (You're Beautiful and The Heirs) plays Lee Soo Hyeon, Doo Yeong's coach. I definitely did not expect the depth of emotion in this movie based off the trailers that I'd seen. I expected odd couple like sparks between the brothers and comedy surrounding that, but this movie was really much more melodrama than comedy (which, given D.O.'s track record, I probably should've expected). It was definitely a good crying movie.

Read More

I really enjoyed this drama.  Lee Jong Suk is wonderful as Jung Jae Chan.  Suzy does an admirable job as Nam Hong Ju - a lot of people like to bag on Suzy, which is unfortunate.  She's not the strongest actress out there, but I think she shows steady improvement and this show was no exception.  I especially loved hers quip with Jung Hae In's Han Woo Tak - their chemistry was delightful and that it was much more a "friendship" chemistry really keeps it from being Another Second Lead Syndrome kind of show.  And Jung Hae In... man, I just want to shrink him down and carry him in my pocket for sad, rainy days. He stole every scene he was in. There were a host of actors in this show who often play supporting characters or guest characters and whom I always enjoy.  The strength of the supporting and guesting players really rounded out this show for me.  I freely admit that when I first heard the title, I was sort of expecting a remake of the Sandra Bullock movie (which, hey, is one of my favorite rom-coms, so that wouldn't have sucked), but I'm actually really glad that it was not.  This premise could easily have gotten bogged down in what-ifs and paralyzed inability to act because of "destined outcomes," but the script deftly avoids those pitfalls.  I loved how intricate all the connections were.  The last episode was all the feels all the time. All in all, this was a really sweet show.  It had just enough suspense and set-backs to keep me guessing sometimes, but was never so bogged down in complications that it felt oppressive.

Read More

This is the latest entry in the long running School series. (Each "season" is a stand alone season, new casts, new storylines, so not quite one would expect if one is mostly familiar with how American television series' work.) It carries all the hallmarks I've come to expect of school dramas - young adult romance, poor vs. rich struggles, bullying, corrupt administration, strained bromance, friendship struggles, etc. School 2017 does them all admirably well. The corruption in the school administration is over the top and horrifying disheartening. The young cast is enthusiastic and enjoyable to watch. Kim Jung Hyun (who I liked very much in Jealousy Incarnate) plays Hyun Tae Woon, the angry son of the school's chairman. Kim Se Jung plays Ra Eun Ho, the poor but plucky (aren't they always plucky?) aspiring webtoon artist who ends up being the target of the corrupt administration as the scapegoat for various things going on around the school. The extended cast does a good job selling the trials, tribulations, and triumphs of young friendship. You'll hate the rich, privileged parents who are all too happy to game the system for the advantage of their children only. You'll love the friendship and trust many of the students find which changes them for the better. I loved that there really wasn't a love triangle in this one, and the relationship between the two main characters is adorable.

Read More

Noble, My Love

I just re-watched this little web-drama. There's a fair amount of Problematic Patriarchy inherent in some of the common tropes in k-dramas and this web-drama is chock full of it. I remember being much more enamored of the drama the first time I watched it, but this time around, I was much more aware of how off-putting (and even alarming) the controlling behavior of the main lead would be if this was "real life" and not a drama. That said, I still enjoyed watching this show. It has Sung Hoon as Lee Kang Hoon, an arrogant and closed off CEO type who falls for Kim Jae Kyung's character, Cha Yoon Seo, a poor but stubborn and plucky Veterinarian who saves his life. There's a contract relationship - I'm a sucker for a contract relationship story-line - and sparks fly. Because of the web-drama format (episodes are short, typically between 12 and 20 minutes in a web-drama), this show is almost like what would happen if you stripped out only the main love-line story from a full length drama and tacked it all together without any of the side plots or secondary character lines. Because of that format, character development suffers a bit here. When I first watched this show, I rated it as 8 out of 10. On re-watching, I would rate it 7.5 out of 10, because the controlling behavior and jealousy of the main lead was more off-putting this time around. (There's a hint of a back story as to why he is that way, but since it is never fleshed out or really explored, he doesn't get to hit that satisfying "humanizing" arc that full length k-dramas with this type of lead get to have.)

Still, I'd recommend this if you're looking for something light and quick (assuming you can get over the Problematic Patriarchy). (Not to fear! The presence of Problematic Patriarchy does not, in fact, cheat you out of your moments of Feminine Gaze and Sung Hoon shirtless for Very Important Plot Reasons and not just gratuitously - okay, sometimes gratuitously.)

Read More

This drama did not have the strongest, or most coherent of story lines, but was generally pleasant and entertaining to watch. The second half arc is a hot mess. Characters who were thoroughly evil are suddenly accepted as "only evil because they had to be" and their past atrocities glossed right over. The pacing borders on torturous at this point and the ending is so awful that it actually wiped out any previous enjoyment I'd had in this show. Up until the last episode and a half, I'd probably have rated it around a 7. But the ending just ruined the whole experience for me. The actors did what they could with what they had, but all around it was a hot mess.

Read More

Chief Kim AKA Good Manager

Oh Namgoong Min. What can I say? I love this man. He's a delightful actor. In Chief Kim, he plays Kim Sung Ryong, a former accountant for mobster types sort of turning over a new leaf. His character is smarmy and over the top and utterly lovable. This show is very much about corporate politics and corruption and the redemption of two men. I was a little bit worried that they were going to make it into a basic love triangle, but was actually really satisfied when that ended up not becoming the case. The second lead in this show is really Lee Jun Ho as Seo Yool, who starts out pretty darn despicable and rotten and is the foil for Namgoong Min's Chief Kim. Nam Sang Mi plays Yoon Ha Kyung, who thankfully ends up not being paired off with anyone. The plot lines and evil corporate shenanigans in this show are very often over the top in an almost makjang way, but just when it seems like this show is going to jump the shark, they reel it back in to the final, satisfying, rush to the finish line where the evil are punished, the good are rewarded, and the somewhat grey move forward with turning their lives around. It wraps up very satisfyingly and I was actually really pleased that it pretty much lacked a romance plot line. It didn't need one.

Even smarmy and over the top, Namgoong Min is pure joy to watch. I'm pretty sure he'd be on my list of actors that I'd pay to watch read the phone book.

Read More

I just finished watching Let's Fight, Ghost, which features 2PM's Ok Taec Yeon as a college student who can see ghosts and Kim So Hyun (who I liked a lot in Who Are You?: School 2015) as the ghost of a high school student (but think 17 or 18, not 15). South Korea does good ghosts. :) It's a cute show, with a fair amount of humor, creepy ghost makeup and visuals, and a satisfyingly creepy bad guy. It's a show from tvN, which is a cable station in Korea, as opposed to a regular broadcast station. A lot of the recent dramas that I've very much enjoyed have been from tvN. The pacing in Let's Fight, Ghost is fairly uneven, though, so I give it 4 out of 5 stars on DramaFever (where I watched it) and 8 out of 10 on MyDramaList (where I track what I've watched.)

Read More