Korean Dramas

Review – Incomplete Life (Misaeng)

/ Lady Divine / 2 Comments

Review – Incomplete Life (Misaeng)

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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.

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Review – Weightlifting Fairy Kim Bok Joo

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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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Review – Warrior Baek Dong Soo (I can’t quit you!)

/ Lady Divine / 7 Comments

Review – Warrior Baek Dong Soo

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The Plot, Short Version:  Two young warriors choose two different paths and swords clash.

Though I still don’t think this is a perfect drama and stick firmly to my 8/10 rating, I must confess… the rewatch factor on this show is HIGH.  I have rewatched this show several times.  Maybe not all the way through, true, but I’ve cherry picked my favorite episodes and scenes and tend to crave them like a pregnant woman craving pickles.  Nothing else will do.

Let’s Dig In.  (minor spoilers follow)

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Review – Signal

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Review – Signal

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I heard everyone raving about this show but I thought, “Ugh, a cop show.  Ugh, sounds like Frequency.  Ugh, matching up an older woman with a younger man again.  Ugh Ugh.”  I should have slapped myself across the face.  And so should you, if you are entertaining such thoughts.  Snap out of it!  Signal is AWESOME.

Yes, it’s a cops-solving-crimes show that jumps back and forth between the past and present, connecting cops and crimes across decades.  And yet I was riveted.  None of the cases ended like I thought they would.   None of the future’s interventions had the outcome I expected.  None of the usual cliches and tropes applied to this show.  There was no noona romance, for one thing.  Instead, a seasoned female cop works alongside a young cute rookie and NOTHING HAPPENS except for work.  Gasp!  I was sooo happy.  Yes, ladies and gentlemen, men and women can be friends.  They can care about each other and not want to have sex.  It is, in fact, possible to live and work in a nonsexual way with half of humanities population.  Signal was a revelation!

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It was also very dark.  The crimes were horrible and gritty.  The justice system struggled, realistically.  Crimes were unsolved.  People died and their killers were never brought to justice, not in this past, not in the present.  It was hard to know what the right thing to do was.  People are so many shades of gray, after all.  The story lines were complicated and compelling and every single episode was gripping and intense.

I highly recommend not reading too much about it before starting it up.  It’s nothing like Frequency (the movie or the show).  It’s a mystery and all mysteries should remain vague and ponderous until you actually watch it unfold before your eyes.  I don’t like to do lengthy reviews on mysteries for that very reason.  So I leave you with this – just watch it.  When you’re done, you can pick at the little pieces and discuss characters and debate the ending all you want to.  Somewhere else.  This review is just to get you to bite and spend sixteen hours devouring this amazing show.

Overall Rating – 10/10.  Dark Crime and Magical Realism.

Review – High End Crush

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Review – High End Crush

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Another deceptive title image.  This in no way reflects the tone or the plot line of this drama.  But whatever, I’ll save my title image ranting for another day.

The Plot, Short Version:  Eccentric wealthy dude falls for stubborn country girl.

High End Crush.  What to say, what to say.  Thankfully the leading man was entertaining enough to carry this short drama to its obvious conclusion with a few laughs along the way and a few enjoyable romantic moments too.  But…

After finishing this series, I think I can officially state that I don’t like “short” dramas.  It’s like having annoying commercial interruptions ALL THE TIME, right when interesting things start happening.  I think if they had strung up all the episodes together and let them play as one long string, without the constant stop/start of intros and exits, it would have been a quality short drama, if not a bit on the hammy side.  If it ever makes it to Netflix, they will do this for us.  They did it with The Guild and it made the entire viewing experience so much more enjoyable.

What else can I say about this drama?  I finished it a few days ago and have been chewing on what to write for a review.  It’s so problematic.  Here’s why… the things I liked about this show were also the things I hated about this show.

Example 1:  I loved the idea of a young woman from deep in the mountains, disconnected from modern society… and yet I didn’t buy it.  At all.  The entire sequence of events in the mountains felt like theater scenery and unnatural to both characters.  She did not seem like a young woman cut off from modern society at all.  It just felt off.

Example 2:  I loved the love/hate relationships inspired by the main male character.  His shrink, his employees, his personal assistant all hated him with a passion… and yet they loved him too because he was interesting and flamboyant and really good at his job.  And yet I couldn’t really figure out what his job WAS or what he did or if it was, indeed, impressive.  It just seemed like a glossed over subject.

Example 3:  The disloyal yet lovable assistant.  This contrasting nature made the character both deviously hysterical and enjoyable.  Sometimes.  And other times I thought, “there’s no way this guy wouldn’t have been fired three years ago,” or worse, it made the assistant come across as a true asshole, which is not endearing whatsoever.   And this is one of my favorite actors, too, so it hurts to say that…

There’s some really cute romantic comedy moments in this show.  And some pretty spectacular lines and witty banter… like this scene in the car…

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But overall it was just MEH.  I enjoyed all the characters, mostly, and was entertained… but I also felt cheated out of a good drama, which it might have been if given room to stretch its legs.

Overall Rating – 7/10.  Size Matters.

Review – Discovery of Romance

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Review – Discovery of Romance

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This romantic drama featured the reunion of actors Jung Yoo Mi with Eric Moon.  I love these two together.  They were fantastic in Que Sera Sera.  And they were good in this drama as well.  Sung Joon is also in this show, and he’s another of my favorites.  But I’m just gonna stop you now before you get excited by the quality line up of actors…

It just wasn’t that good.

Discovery of Romance is love triangle plotline, but with a bit more weight on each side for once.  Eric Moon’s character is the former lover of Jung Yoo Mi’s character.  They were together five long years before breaking up.  Now she’s with Sung Joon’s character, in a strong, healthy relationship.  That is… until her old lover turns up again and wants to try again.

Despite loving all the actors and the exploration of the complexity of relationships, I didn’t think too much of this drama.  I finished it, though I confess I started to skim towards the end.

Overall Rating – 5/10.  When The Heart Is Involved, Honestly Is Easier In Theory Than In Practice.

SPOILERS FOLLOW

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