Korean Drama

Review – Who Are You (2013)

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Review – Who Are You (2013)

So simple.  So small.  So satisfying.  This drama knows its place in the middle, making itself the “just right” cozy bed for Goldie Locks.  It’s a compact little cupcake of a mystery-romance with a low-calorie supernatural sugar coating.  It’s not enough to make a meal of.  It’s just a tasty little treat.

Like a paper back romance you take to the beach with the full intention of leaving it behind in the hotel – you’ll enjoy this drama if you don’t have high expectations.

Overall Rating – 7.5/10

SPOILERS FOLLOW

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Review – What Happened in Bali

/ Lady Divine / 10 Comments

Review – What Happened in Bali

Overall Rating – 10/10.

Currently still in a trance from having just finished this perfect character study on love, obsession, ambition, greed, betrayal… and all those other adjectives you find in Bronte novels.  What an awesome show.  Definitely going into my top ten favs… will have to do some shuffling.

The plot in a nutshell:  Rich lady about to marry rich guy still has her old flame in her side pocket.  She runs off to Bali for one last fling, only her future-hubby follows after ruining everything.  While there, the three of them end up with a cheery tour guide.  They all end up back in Korea.  Tour guide girl asks rich guy for a loan… and a job.  Next thing you know, both the rich guy and the rich lady’s old flame start falling for the tour guide.

SPOILERS FOLLOW

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Review – The Greatest Love

/ Lady Divine / 3 Comments

Review – The Greatest Love

The Greatest Love is by far one of the greatest romantic comedies ever produced in South Korea.  It is side-splitting funny, incredibly romantic, littered with memorable characters, maintains a fast-paced plot that never waivers and even manages to produce genuinely touching scenes that break your heart.  It is both a satire and homage to the celebrity culture that both punishes and produces its inhabitants.

The story revolves around a woman who was once Korea’s sweetheart, the most popular member of an all girl singing band that lost her status and pride after a series of scandals.  She struggles to maintain her career over the next decade by participating in whatever demeaning or ridiculous job she can get – from common promotional gigs to reality television.  On the other end of the spectrum, our lead male is at the top of his game – a box office hit whose career is exploding.  He finds himself inexplicably drawn to our fallen starlet and proceeds to pursue her.  Laugh riot follows.

Overall Rating:  10/10.  This is one of my solid Top Ten dramas… and here’s why…

SPOILERS FOLLOW

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Review – The Snow Queen

/ Lady Divine / Leave a comment

Review – The Snow Queen

Let’s start with the basics.

Our main protagonist male is a math genius.  Immediate nerd points.  Super smart  characters are some of my favorites.  Super smart in math, extra bonus points.  Oh Math, you wicked beast of probabilities and undecipherable abbreviations.  In fourth grade I was caught cheating on my multiplication tables.  Did this shame me into a begrudging acceptance of math?  Nope.  Cheated on the next test too.  Instinctively I must have known the Great and Powerful Internet was on its way and all mathematical concerns could immediately be solved via search engine.  What’s 7% of $34,021?  Who cares!  The web is littered with nifty programs that solve all my number problems.  Pi?  Pie is delicious.

MINOR SPOILERS FOLLOW (or major if you were drunk during the first episode and missed the billboard sized spoilers embedded in the first scene)

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Review – Shining Inheritance

/ Lady Divine / 2 Comments

Review – Shining Inheritance

Overall Rating – 8/10

Shining Inheritance is one of those “classic” k-dramas that sticks firmly to its tropes, indulges in its stereotypes, and ultimately resembles lessons taught in Vacation Bible School.  At the end of every episode, I half expected G.I. Joe to pop up with their moral tag line “Now you know.  And knowing is half the battle!”  Good people persevere despite obstacles.  Bad people will eventually get their due comeuppance.  You will fall in love G-Rated style and if your love life didn’t work out, you will bow out gracefully, without hard feelings or regret.  Welcome to 28 hours of a feel-good romantic drama.

SPOILERS FOLLOW

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Review – Shark / Don’t Look Back: The Legend of Orpheus

/ Lady Divine / 1 Comment

Review – Shark

Shark is the third (and final) installment in the Revenge Trilogy by director Park Chan-hong and writer Kim Ji-woo.  This drama varies greatly from its predecessors,  Resurrection and The Devil.  Shark is a moody, elegant revenge drama that indulges in gorgeous scenery and slow plot progression.  It’s like watching a Sofia Coppola film.  Everything is filtered down – the action, the romance, the mystery and the suspense – and yet its easy to bask comfortably in this dark emotional pool and allow yourself to sink to the bottom.

Kim Gam Nil is well suited to the careful, calculating man robbed of his father and young adulthood who returns for revenge.  Son Ye Jin does an excellent job portraying a woman who lost her first love – and in order to find him again must face the terrible secrets of her own trusted family.  Though it’s not as sexy and brooding as Bad Guy or as twisted and compelling as The Devil – Shark is an excellent series for a rainy weekend when you’d rather get lost in beautiful visuals, a slow simmer romance and a interesting mystery.

It’s a beautifully crafted drama.  Meticulously crafted, in fact.  Every shot, every detail, every lingering camera angle and detail hint at extra meaning.  Like a Hitchcock film.   Though a lot longer.  It’s long.  It’s 20 episodes.  And there’s a great deal of “sins of the father” theme going on in this show… and more than once you will find yourself thinking, “Wait… doesn’t he/she already know this/that?” and you probably won’t be able to answer your own question and it probably won’t matter cause everyone has secrets and secret identities and everyone is lying to everyone and they can’t keep their stories straight so why should we, as viewers, have to?  I absolutely LOVED this drama – and have rewatched it several times over the years (okay, okay, maybe not all of it… but probably 70%)- loving it more each time.  But of course, long convoluted crazy  romantic revenge melodramas are generally my favorites.

It also has one of the best love theme songs I’ve ever heard in drama.  Lovely, haunting and passionate – I never got tired of hearing this song. This drama also made it to my Best Kisses of All Time list.

Overall Rating:  10/10

EXTREMELY MILD SPOILERS AND MORE

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Review – Ruler of Your Own World

/ Lady Divine / 3 Comments

Review – Ruler of Your Own World

His expression sums up my feelings about this show.

This drama has an “indie” vibe to it.  The characters are street-smart, there’s a considerable amount of informal and bad language, and the whole plot feels very realistic, brain tumor and all.  Like many indie features, you either get it or you don’t.  I didn’t get this drama.  It was like watching Holy Smoke with Harvey Keitel and Kate Winslet, or Your Friends and Neighbors.  There were so many elements that confused me or infuriated me or just didn’t make sense to me.  My biggest qualm being the romance and the most awkward love-triangle of all time.

To be fair – there were some aspects to this drama that I truly enjoyed.  Sweet moments, tender moments, beautifully complicated moments.  Did they balance out my frustration?  Not really.  People loved this drama – it has a cult following – but it just didn’t cut it for me.  I had to force myself to finish it.

Overall Rating – 6.5/10.

SPOILERS & RANTING & HEAD SCRATCHING FOLLOW

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Review – Resurrection

/ Lady Divine / 2 Comments

Review – Resurrection

Resurrection.  Also known as Rebirth.  Also known as Revenge.

The series is the first installment of the “Revenge Trilogy” by director Park Chan-Hong and writer Kim Ji-Woo.  Lucifer (or The Devil) followed in 2007, one of my personal favorites.  The series ended with Shark in 2013, which I have not yet seen.

  

 

Did you ever see the movie Open Water?  For some reason, I kept thinking of that film while watching Lucifer a few months ago.  You knew something horrible was going to happen… you knew it in your bones… you were just waiting for the sun to go down and then God help us all.  Lucifer did not disappoint.  It will drown you.  Rebirth isn’t nearly as dark as Lucifer.  Instead it reminds me more of a Kubrick film, in both plot and cinematography.  More intrigue based than the dark soul-stealing  revenge and redemption epic of Lucifer.  Though Rebirth isn’t as fulfilling, it’s a definite standout in the k-drama universe.

—— SPOILERS FOLLOW ——

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Review – Queen Seon Duk

/ Lady Divine / 5 Comments

Review – Queen Seon Duk

THE GREAT QUEEN SEON DUK

If this show wasn’t so long, it might be the greatest thing to ever come out of South Korea.  Of course, if it wasn’t so long it might not be so darned epic and unforgettable.  Curse you, conundrums!  This show can be effectively divided into two sections:  Pre-Queen and Post-Queen.  Half of the show depicts the young life of Deokman and her struggle to raise herself to royal status.  The second half is what happens when she gets it.

In my opinion, everyone should watch this show.  Wait til you have the flu and a few days off work, if you must.  But watch it.  The “Mishil” music is still played in current dramas as a gag reference all the time.  It’s a staple of K-World.

Overall Rating:  10/10 – near perfection period-piece epic with romance, action, betrayal, friendship, rivalry, political intrigue, and unforgettable characters – it’s a massive commitment of time that will ultimately leave you deeply satisfied and possibly traumatized for life.

Now come cozy up beside me and let’s talk about why this show completely rocks my socks, shall we?

———————— MASSIVE SPOILERS & RATINGS FOLLOW ————————–

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Review – My Love From Another Star

/ Lady Divine / 1 Comment

Review – My Love From Another Star

I absolutely loved this show! The premise was cool:  a hip, uptight alien gets distracted by human business and looses his ride back to his home planet.  And for the record… what’s up with that?  They’re advanced enough for space travel but don’t bother with communication devices?  Did anyone ask him if he wanted to stay?  Nope.  Did any of his fellow aliens even bother to see what was going on with M.I.A. Alien?  Nope.  He was like the kid in Home Alone… maybe they realized he wasn’t there after the ship had already taken off.  Anyways, I digress.  Alien boy is stranded on earth in the Joseon Era and hangs around for 400 years, until present day.  He meets a wacky actress and romance and silliness follow.  Adorable rom-com.

And yet… somewhere around episode 17 or 18, I lost all interest in what was happening.

————— SPOILERS FOLLOW ——————-

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