K-Drama Reviews

Review – Tomorrow With You

/ Lady Divine / 1 Comment

Review – Tomorrow With You

This is a show about a guy who can jump back and forth between his current time line and the future (until his own death, which isn’t too long in the future so he’s got a limited jump frame).  Anyways, using his ability to pop forward and backward in time via the subway, he’s able to make some great investment decisions and manages a successful real estate company… doing little to no work, showing up in ripped jeans, treating the majority of his employees like douchebags, and being generally an ass to everyone.  Normal CEO behavior, I guess, according to K-World.  It isn’t until he decides to use his amazing time traveling ability to actually prevent a death that his own life changes – and his life gets further tangled with a beautiful photographer’s whom he decides to marry in an attempt to prevent his own future demise.

Since this drama was so insular – so focused on just two characters – it would have been a LOT BETTER if the two characters had been more interesting and/or more likable.  They were just… eh.  Both of them.  They recently played very cool characters in other shows I loved (Shin Min-A in Oh My Venus… adorable! and Lee Je-Hoon was cool as cucumbers as the newbie cop in Signal), which only made it worse.

For a show about time travel, I felt like I was stuck in a time hole watching this.  My God, it just dragged on and on for hours… and for what?

Overall Rating – Final Verdict… abandoned to the K-Drama Graveyard.  Didn’t finish it… don’t care to.

More Musings with Spoilers…

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Review – Spy Myung Wol

/ Lady Divine / Leave a comment

Review – Spy Myung Wol

Spy Myung Wol is one of those adorable, zany romantic comedies that came out a while back – with heavy handed shenanigans, lots of side characters, tons of extras, and these stellar cliches for leads that are so out there you can’t help but love them.  Think… The Greatest Love or You Are Beautiful or Fated To Love You or Secret Garden.  Zany.  With handguns!  This drama is about a North Korean spy who ends up getting entangled with a South Korean actor/rockstar.  National politics, international intrigue, paparazzi, and a hosts of fans are thrown into the mix for a good-hearted romp of a show.  Not only are the two leads highly amusing, but there’s a whole gift basket full of side characters that are witty and entertaining.  It’s so much fun!

Overall Rating – 9/10.  The Drama Between North & South Korea Is Nothing Compared To The Drama Between Men & Women.

Mild Spoilers & Fan Gushing Follow

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Review – Descendants of the Sun

/ Lady Divine / 6 Comments

Review – Descendants of the Sun

In a way, this show was a big tease.  It promised to be epic and exciting and exquisitely romantic… and it took us out on a first date and flirted with us and opened the door for us and laughed at all our jokes, it sent us flowers, it held our hand and told us about all the wonderful places it wanted to take us, the things it wanted us to see and share together.  And then it ghosted us.  Just left us on the side of the road.  What happened?  I may be able to live on my fantasies alone for a few weeks and think back fondly on this drama, but after a while all I will remember is the odd case of misdirection and mixed feelings.  Like the movie version of Les Miserables when I thought we were going to see the Broadway Play.

It was a good show.  Beautiful, even.  Visually, at least.  And interesting too.  Exotic locations, a host of random foreigners speaking broken English, attractive actors playing unique characters with fascinating jobs.  And  yet… meh.  I was entertained and simultaneously underwhelmed.

Overall Rating – 7.5/10.  The Picture On The Menu Is Better Than The Meal.

More musing and spoilers and opinions….

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Review – Painter of the Wind

/ Lady Divine / 9 Comments

Review – Painter of the Wind

This is less of a review and more of me expressing my frustration over this drama. The costuming, the cinematography, the sets, the actors – all fantastic. The music was wonderful. It offered a nice twist on the cross-dressing girl trope. You had a lady  disguised as a dude so she could perfect her artistic skills and study the craft under the masters. There’s some royal conspiracies and a lot of fuss about a portrait of the prince, all of which was rather underwhelming and generic “historical political” hoopla.

My problem is this: Our female lead didn’t come across as a girl pretending to be a guy, in the style of this tried and true K-Drama trope. She came off as a cute, artistic lesbian. Thus my exasperation with this show. Painter of the Wind should have embraced its obvious natural direction and  gone gay. The entire show felt like an indie coming-of-age lesbian drama, but failed to fully embrace its already deliciously implied girl-girl romance and instead meandered around with an old man artist and attempted to go straight. Don’t they remember the lesson from art class… that if the straight line is long enough eventually it will curve? Come on!

 

Overall Rating – 2/10 For Not Coming Out of the Closet.

or…

Overall Rating – 8/10 If You Ignore The Lesbians And Watch It Straight. This is probably the more fair rating – cause it really is a lovely drama and the subject of old school painters is very interesting and beautiful to explore. But… I just can’t. Cause this is my blog and my review and fair is for love and war.  And this is war!

More bitching and moaning and some sexy photo stills and SPOILERS follow.

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Review – Bride of the Century

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Review – Bride of the Century

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Two things were made abundantly clear by this cute, odd, quirky, melodramatic, supernaturally-tinted show.  One, Yang Jin Sung is a adorable!  Two, Lee Hong Ki… maybe not so much.  Don’t get me wrong, I love this little guy… but he just doesn’t have the chutzpah for leading male status, in my humble opinion.  Yang Jin Sung, however, blew me away.  I actually didn’t realize it was the same actress playing two characters until the end of episode one, she was that good.  Her face is so expressive and she can go from sticky sweet to hardened bitch face in two point five seconds and both are perfectly believable.  My favorite is her little lip curl – which makes me think of the famous lip curl of Jang Keun-Suk.  I’ll be bookmarking her other dramas and watching them soon.

Bride of the Century is mainly a story about women.  It’s about a rich, rich family with a sexy ghost watching over it for generations… but she demands payment for her services, in the form of the first wife of the first son of each new generation.  This is a conundrum for the mom of the current first son, as she wants him to marry the gal of her choice but needs to get that sacrificial first marriage out of the way before her plans can be realized.  So it’s scheming demon, and momma is willing to go to great devious lengths to get what she wants… but soon finds herself at war with another momma who doesn’t plan to lay down her daughter’s life without a fight.  It’s the behind the scenes battlefield that so many women wage wars on and claim victories over.  The battlefield of other women (dead and alive).  It may the be the worst thing patriarchy has done to humanity – setting women against women.  But it’s a great thing for dramas and novels.

Overall Rating – 8/10 – You Can’t Trick A Ghost With A Doppelganger, But You Can Trick A Man.

Discussion and Spoilers Follow

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Review – Incomplete Life (Misaeng)

/ Lady Divine / 2 Comments

Review – Incomplete Life (Misaeng)

incomplete-lif

Work.  It’s something most of us have to deal with about 50% of our waking lives, if not more.  So much of your identity is tied to what your job is.  What kind of life you lead is largely determined by your career, let’s face it.  Whether you are a cop, a priest, a lawyer, a chemist, a construction worker, a teacher or a salaryman – your job wraps around you like an extra skin.  It shapes your view of the world, the environment you grow accustomed to, the people you are in contact with, and the paycheck you learn to live on.

This is a show about work.  It’s a character study, focusing on a few key players and exploring the nature of their personalities, their backgrounds, their current lives, and their struggles and successes as they navigate their careers.  It’s fascinating, well written, engaging and just really good.  It’s a show that makes you think.  It doesn’t hand you all the answers.  You’re expected to be smart enough to figure it out or patient enough to wait it out.  And the pay off is worth it.  It’s an odd mix of realism and subtle optimism, which makes you reflect deeply but offers you hope.  I highly recommend it.

Overall Rating – 10/10.  You Are What You Do, Not What You Think.

More Musings About Work and the Characters and SPOILERS…

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Review – Another Oh Hae Young

/ Lady Divine / 6 Comments

Review – Another Oh Hae Young

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Okay, so here’s the cool plot of this show.  A man gets stood up on his wedding day and his bride-to-be, Oh Hae Young, disappears without a trace and no explanation.  Embittered, a year or so later he hears Oh Hae Young is going to marry again and, encouraged by his best friend, he sets out on a scheme of revenge.  He sabotages the future husbands business, which results in the future husband landing in jail.  Embarrassed by his sudden turn of fortune, the future husband breaks off his wedding by dumping Oh Hae Young.  Revenge complete!  Except… it wasn’t the same Oh Hae Young who had stood up the other guy a year before.  It was a woman who had the same name… so, basically, the guy had just ruined the life of two complete strangers with his vendetta!  Oh, the cruel twists of fate!  Then, even crazier, he starts to fall in love with this new Oh Hae Young… right when the other Oh Hae Young shows back up and wants back in his life!  Whooohoo!  It’s a wild ride.  Apart from when it wasn’t… which was, unfortunately, quite a bit of the time.

There was so much I liked about this show, yet it often left me wanting… and, truth be told, quite bored.

Overall Rating – 6.5/10.  Hit Men Should Be Sure They Don’t Ring The Wrong Doorbell.

Spoilers & Discussion Follow Continue reading →

Review – Weightlifting Fairy Kim Bok Joo

/ Lady Divine / 1 Comment

Review – Weightlifting Fairy Kim Bok Joo

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One of most feel-good of feel-good dramas out there.  I’d like to give a standing ovation to this show for presenting one of the healthiest relationships I have ever seen in a K-Drama.  Could there be two more likable leads?  I’m struggling to think of anyone I’ve liked together more than this adorable pair.  Watching them together was magical.  It was such a fun, feisty, genuine romance.  It was like eating sunshine.

Plot, Short Version:  While two college athletes slowly fall in love, this show will wrap you up like a warm blanket and snuggle you.

Overall Rating – 10/10.  This Drama Takes Home All The Gold Medals.

Spoilers follow!

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Review – Uncontrollably Fond (of Melodramas!)

/ Lady Divine / 6 Comments

Review – Uncontrollably Fond (of Melodramas!)

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In which a romantic melodrama causes me to become very philosophical about life and spend too much analyzing a show as a microcosm of the problems of the world.  But before we jump into that mess, let’s just say this was a cool melodrama with a bizarre plot line about justice and personal responsibility that I quite enjoyed.  We had the battle between the economic classes, the battle between lovers, the battle between exlovers, the battle between spouses and extended families, and the battle for your life.  Lots of little wars going on in this show with lots of little twists and turns to keep you entertained.

Do not be fooled by all the happy smiling faces in the promos and title images.  It’s a melodrama, not a romantic comedy. I get very frustrated with viewers who want to criticize a melodrama for being a melodrama, with comments like “it’s not realistic!” and “why does she keep apologizing!”  and “oh my god, I hate his hot and cold treatment of her!”  I mean… what?  What do you think a melodrama is?  They’re sensationalist madness.  They’re emotional rollercoasters.  They’re a giant trainwreck and when you bought the ticket to ride it said, “WARNING:  THIS TRAIN IS GOING TO EXPLODE, THEN IMPLODE, THEN PROBABLY RECONSIDER, HOLD ITSELF HOSTAGE WITH DYNAMITE STRAPPED TO ITS CHEST, CHICKEN OUT, START CRYING, AND FINALLY SETTLE FOR TURNING INTO A BLACK HOLE AND PULLING THE ENTIRE WORLD INTO ITS VOID.  We hope you enjoy the ride.”  Your ticket was very clear, my pretties.  Melodramas don’t mess around with your reasonable business, go elsewhere if you want a fair shake down and rational decisions.

I am a huge fan of melodramas; it’s exciting, perversely, to watch everyone’s lives crumble to pieces despite their best efforts to keep it together with lies and manipulations.  Oh, the drama!  The drama, the drama.  You will gasp and shake your head and bite your pillow and cry.  Even the most stoic of viewers will probably melt down in ep 19 about 38 minutes in… if you have dry cheeks after that scene then I fear for the state of your soul.  It would be stripped away of its melodrama title if it didn’t make you ugly cry at least once, though, so embrace the hard earned tears.

Overall Rating:  8/10.  Broken Hearts Are Easier To Mend Than Broken Families.

Now for lengthy philosophizing and ranting and raving….

spoilers ahead!

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