Alexandra Leaving

First of all, my sincere apologies and belated birthady wishes to the wonderful:
elspethsheir
calixa
village
endlessdeep.

Thank you so so much to everyone reccing "Gloria" – I am deeply and fully back into Korea drama love! This drama is made by the same folks who produced "Family Honor" and not surprisingly it gives me the same feeling "Family’s honor" did. I love it’s cosy world (the drama is supposed to be about harsh realities of life but I feel so comforted by it’s world I want to live in it), I obsess over it’s delicious romance stories and I adore almost every single character, elderly and children included. I adore both couples, Jin Jin/Kang Suk and Dong Ah/Yoon Seo, but also I like Kang Suk’s irascible mother , the invincible lady manager, the perm-haired club owner and especially Jae Hwan, new re-incarnation of the cute under-cook from "Pasta". The only two characters I hate are Yoon Seo’s possessive mother (your daughter doesn’t belong to you, you crazy person) and Kang Suk’s evil step-mother (but I have a little tiny flick of pity for her). Oh, and I loathe Kang Suk’s pervy alcoholic brother.

But mostly, because I am shallow, and also because I loved and wept for Man Oh in "Conspiracy in the Court", I love Lee Chun Hee and his portrayal of Dong Ah. I have great hopes for the writers of Gloria (so far they only produced happy and life-affirming stories) , so I hope Dong Ah has much happiness coming towards him. Wake up, Dong Ah!

In the meantime, the drama also has it’s priorities straight and in the episode 2 we had Dong Ah shirtless for no apparent reason:

( just in case you want to see another version of this )

And the fact that Kang Suk is regularly prone to angsty shirtless fighting and other forms of shirtless angsting doesn’t hurt as well ( Shirtless and semi-shirtless angst )

PS: I have sailed through 10 episodes really fast and I am so going to enjoy every episode left. The subtitles are coming nice and quick, apparently, so YAY!

My first Kdrama of Autumn! A good, wholesome drama with huge ratings success and very decent robust story, very engaging but at the same time fast-forward button worthy and containing more information about baking than you need to know. In many aspects, it reminded me of “Shining inheritance”.

I tried the drama when it started airing but the pre-story made my stomach churn a little, so I left it for a while. After the dramas’ crazy unprecedented ratings (50%!) I felt compelled to find out what the fuss is all about. The story is still the same: it is build on a simple notion that it is good and fine and even advisable for a husband to have an affair when his wife can’t give him a male child – he needs an heir, but it is no way fine for his wife to have an affair in attempt to procure a male child – this is EVIL. A male hair (the son of the man of the house) is of paramount importance. It is all about Tak Gu, who is one true and light-bringing male hair. And Tak Gu's father is a saint, of course (even though he ignores his daughters and everyone else, really), but the father’s wife is EVIL reincarnate (because she is adulteress).

In short, the set-up is very traditional for a Korean drama. The gender-weirdness of it might bother you some or might not bother you at all. I ended in the second category because really, at the end it was all about Tak Gu (the light-bringing baker prodigy) and his not-so-brother Ma Joon. And they both are lovely, in their own way.

It is interesting to analyse the reasons for “Baker King”’s huge ratings success, and surely, all the usual elements of successful drama are there: fast-paced story with several twists, family orientation, interesting characters, and wonderful new actors. For me, the most squeeful thing about “Baker Kind” is that it shattered the staple (and the stumbling block) of Kdrama, Kdrama love triangle. The cracks in Kdrama love triangle have been visible for some time (Chuno), but “Baker King” is really the first drama where not only the secondary guy gets the girl, but also the secondary girl gets the guy. And no-one is vilified ** gasp **! No-one turns into a psycho! Everyone heals each other and eases each other’s pain! When I have found out what “Baker King”’s ending is, I could not believe it. The Kdrama love triangle is dead, and this makes me so happy!

In short, I loved the drama, fast forwarded quite a bit and felt good when it ended (my ratings - 7/10). If you need any encouragement to watch the drama (only 30 episodes!), here are three “Baker King”’s best scenes :

1. Male bonding (or call it what you want). As it goes w ith all OTPs, all this is happening just before some big revelation and complete break-up.

( Some more male bonding )

2. My favourite OTP’s best scene. Ma Joon /Yoo Kyung: two broken people healing each other. Yoo Kyung has a panic attack after meeting her abusive father after 12 years. Ma Joon comforts her and asks her to marry him. This is a rare moment when both of them have their masks off and stop playing their games with each other. They are so wonderful together, and there is no way Tak Gu/ Yoo Kyung could have worked, she could never allow herself to show all the terrible things inside herself to Tak Gu. This OTP is like "A love to kill" without dying in snowy wilderness. My heart is healed too.

( Ma Joon /Yoo Kyung screencaps )

3. M/M Hurt/comfort: OMPH!!!!!!!!!! Tak Gu is insanely cute and adorable, like 1000 of puppies in one. If I was Ma Joon I would have been seriously worried too.

( Hurt-comfort screencaps )

Ratings : 7/10

I have had a very very lazy day today, mostly watching lots of drama-related things. I have finished "Tsuki no Koibito", and what a strange case of drama this is. It is like two dramas in one! The whole direction changes completely after the episode 5 and it is not as if I am complaining because 5 episodes of doe-like Lin Chi Ling acting cute was definitely a hard to stomach thing, but still - what why and how this has happened? The creators of the drama suddenly heard the voices of all the fans? Anyways, I am not the one to complain too much because I liked the second half much more than the first one and even reconciled with Lin Chi Ling who was perfectly acceptable as her new personality as well: good bye cutsey poor girl, hello aloof model.

I have also caught up on "Bad Guy". I am full of enthusiasm about this drama again! It is great! Psychological entanglements, guys of gorgeousness that is hard to express by words, beautiful settings, wonderful music and kissing galore. This drama definitely has more kissing I have ever seen in a Kdrama. It almost has as many kissing scenes as "Summer's Desire", and this is a lot.

( Some of spoilery bad Guy pictures and video! )

I am terribly behind on everything , from responding to comments to EVERYTHING, really. I have been mostly doing nothing but going out for the last few days and the result is: I am quite exhausted (but in a good, post-birthday way).

And I have missed the fact that Kim Soo Ro is getting subtitles!!! In the soompi thread! I can't wait until I can get home and catch up on the few episodes, but in the meantime, I am enjoying a good dose of pretty pictures:



( Some more, with spoiler (of most delicious variety) )

I am looking forward to the new Hong sisters' drama, "My Girlfriend is a Nine-Tailed Fox" with Shin Min Ah. My faith in Hong sisters , quite shattered after the betrayal of "Hong Gil Dong", was restored by the good dose of funny in the form of "You're beautiful". The new drama seems to be promised as a romantic comedy, and romantic comedies are Hong sisters' strongest suit!

But I am also quite interested in the legend itself : the legend of Fox-spirit is very popular around Asia. A fox that lives a thousand years turns into a gumiho (or nine-tailed fox). Originally gumiho was a benevolent creature, but the legend transformed later on and now gumiho is a creature that lives on human liver or heart. However, it is often told that gumiho can transform into a human, after a thousand years of abstaining from eating human livers (or something like this).

I am also very interested in another gumiho drama that is out this July: Gumiho: Yeowoonuidyun (or Gumiho : Tale of the Fox's Child) . There is much buzz and anticipation surrounding Hong sister's drama, but I wonder if "the underdog" , Gumiho: Yeowoonuidyun, might be also good. I still remember the anticipation everyone had for "Iljimae", which was a decent drama, but nothing really special. However, another drama with the same theme, "The Return of Iljimae", quite obscure and without any big stars, was surprisingly awesome.

I quite like the cast for "Gumiho : Tale of the Fox's Child". Han Eun Jung is graceful and has something slightly fox-like in her features (which appears to be a must for the gumiho from the legend). I have seen her numerous times as an evil secondary lady, but I think she can be good in a leading role. The male lead ( Suh Joon Young) seems to be a tiny bit young (but pretty) . I remember him as the young version of Oh Soo in "Mawang": he was very good. And the two of my favourite young actresses Seo Shin Ae ("Thank You") and Kim Yoo Jung ("Dong Yi" ) are in it too!





( Costume!!! )

I am up to the episode 11 of "Dong Yi". The drama is lovely and the filming locations are wonderful. Even Mr.Alexander noticed this passing by (Kdrama files are great in quality and they look good on my new TV)

Still the drama hasn't clicked with me as good as "Chuno" or "Queen Seon Deok", for three various reasons:

1. Bae Soo Bin aside, there is no male character for me to fall in love with. And so far, there is not enough Bae Soo Bin. As a shallow lady I am, this is usually the maker or the breaker of any drama, TV show, book or any other work of fiction for me. The King is adorable and cute, but he does not make my heart beat faster. Take "Queen Seon Deok" or "Chuno" - there are swarms of crazily attractive male characters everywhere. "Dong Yi"? Bae Soo Bin and this is all (which is kind of not enough for a 50-episode drama IMHO. Thy could have added some good secondary characters).

2. Although I am all for female-oriented fiction and Dong Yi herself is awesome and adorable, I am not that interested in stories that tell me in numerous episodes about a big go-ga in the Palace that has arisen from someone stealthily sneaking in pregnancy tonics. I am more about swords, fighting and all such things. I don't even mind assassinations. But pregnancy tonic shenanigans don't attract my interest whatsoever.

3. This is the result of my communist upbringing:
I understand that the times were different, but this doesn't change the fact that for me, a person who doesn't even think that King is a particular good form of government, it is really hard to accept the fact that there is this person who is allowed to have tens of wives and dozens of concubines and that every young lady in the country will consider it a honour to join the cohort.
So, you see, when I watch the adorabliest of romances developing between Dong Yi and the King all I can think of is "But he already has a wife! And concubines! And she never ever will be able to be his wife anyways! Besides, they all are so obsessed with having babies as if they are some baby-making machines and not people!" and I sigh and my heart just can't warm up to the King/Dong Yi romance, however adorable it is.

I know I did quite a bit of complaining, but on the whole I am loving the drama: Dong Yi is awesome, everything is pretty. And may be (may be!) this won't go all the way Dong Yi/the King but instead will be about Bae Soo Bin a little more.

Ratings mania:

Cinderella's Unni : finished with respectable 23% ratings. No surprises here, the drama is good and family dramas generally make good ratings.

Bad Guy : still 12%. Poor Bad Guy. I think SBS is not treating it fairly: first they try to move the airing date, second they miss Wednesday's episode because of the elections, thirdly, the drama won't have any new episodes on 16-17th of June because of the World Cup. I am personally very obsessed with the World Cup, but still: this sounds like they want to sabotage their own drama! I watched the episode 3 today at the lunchtime and although I liked it ( a lot) , at the end of it I felt as if the story is left half-way. These dramas are meant to be shown 2 episodes a week!

Kim Soo Ro : 9-10% . This is a bit odd for a sageuk. And there are no subtitles to check!

Dong Yi : 26-27%. The ratings are high, but not as high as the ratings of "Chuno" and "Queen Seon Deok".

Tsuki no Koibito : 15-16% (a big nosedive in the ratings since the first episode). This is a bit of an unpleasant surprise, the lowest ratings of Takyua Kimura's drama since .. I don't know when. And just when I was about to start watching it! What is wrong with "Tsuki no Koibito"?????

Edit: Coffee House: 9% . The ratings are low, but they are little better than the ratings of "Worlds Within" (previous drama of this director). I have a whole theory about "Worlds Within": I think it is a drama that closer to Western shows and films than any other drama I have seen. May be this doesn't fare well with Korean public?

Recommendations: A great Chuno write-up by kittyhawk03 , here.

Help!!!!!!!!! Watchers of "Dong Yi": can you let me know in which episode the pre-story ends? So that I can jump straight to the story? I will appreciate this very much.

This is so EEEEEEEE!

( Read more... )

It has happened: after 1 episode of "Bad Guy" with subs and one raw I am insanely loving this drama. This might end in doom and gloom, but there is still hope, I haven't picked up anything that says "definitely everyone will die" yet, it is more likely that Shim Gun Wook will achieve redemption, that "heaven or hell?" phrase at the end of the episode 1 was very telling.

Shim Gun Wook's tragic past is probably one of the most tragic pasts I have ever seen in fiction. The death of the puppy (poor little thing!) was just the icing on the cake of misery.

Moon Jae In is lovely and so very unconvincing as a beginner gold digger. Hong Tae Sung is incredibly cool (he is Kim Jae Wook ! ) and as it seems that nothing is his personal fault, I am feeling for him and for the poor puppy.

Whoever is filming this has a huge crush on Kim Nam Gil:



( Screencaps: obligatory shower scene (with scars) )

This drama is making me happy! ( A couple of gifs from the epsiode 18 )

Wednesday / Thursday ratings :

Cinderella's sister: 23% : well-deserved!

Bad Guy: 12% : not too bad for the first episode?? Or too low? I am in the middle of the episode 1 (with subtitles) and I think I am OBSESSED. It is no secret I like Kim Nam Gil, but I have also fallen instantaneously in love with Han Ga In's character, Moon Jae In.