Rooftop Prince is one of those dramas that I like not because the story was good or anything (at least not in my opinion) but because of the sheer entertainment of it all. This drama made my day, it got me emotionally invested and I loved it. I was super impressed with Yoochun after Sungkyunkwan Scandal and then this drama.

I was watching King 2 Hearts and Rooftop Prince at the same time and I wad debating on which show I should do a review for and I ended up choosing Rooftop Prince since I just felt more things while watching it, though story wise and all of that King 2 Hearts is a bit better.

King 2 Hearts wasn't originally on my watch-list, because I thought it would be way too political for me but the cast won me over and I actually found the story intriguing. This drama on the other hand was on my to-watch-list ever since I saw the trailer and the poster for it, because it looked like it was going to be a hoot and it was.

I just knew this show would make me laugh and the trailer just gave of this really nice feeling and I just sort of knew that I would end up liking it. One of the best things about this drama is the humour of the show and the setting of it, since you can make so many jokes and funny scenes with people who come into the 21st century from the past. That really is the charm of the show, as well as the cute characters.

There were a lot of things that you just knew Rooftop Prince would make a joke out of, like the toilet and the spotlights and all of that, but they also just used so many other jokes that you sort of only notice if you have watched some period dramas (I think) or know even just a bit about it, like how the talked, and so on,and I just found that so well done. It had be rolling on the floor with laughter.

Rooftop Prince really made my weeks a bit brighter and I just want to thank it for that, in a way. The main couple was also very cute and shippable. The main story could have been a bit better though. The Joseon mystery was such an interesting set-up but I feel like it sort of fell flat and it got a bit dragged out or something.

The story about the family and the company and Tae Moo and Se Na and their whole revenge thing or whatever that was about was so badly done and some of it was such a filler and it got a bit annoying from time to time. I didn’t really care and it was quite dull and not that original imho so that makes me lower my praises for this drama a lot, even if I enjoyed it for the most part or pieces of it.

In King 2 Hearts for example I liked the politics a lot, probably because a lot it was about that and also because it was written well into the story and it sort of made sense (at least to me) but this company, family stuff just bored me to death, because a lot of it was just a filler and to make a bit more conflict in the story. It was sometimes cute but that was about it.

I did however like how the story dealt with the reincarnation and all of that stuff and I found that to be quite interesting, like you become thing type of person because you did this and that in your past life and all of that. And I felt like it was used quite well with tying up the story.

So yeah, like I said, the main charm of the drama was the comedy and the rom-com elements of it, since I enjoyed the main couple a lot. The OT5 was super cute together and I sort of could just watch a drama about them all learning how to fit into the 21st century and all of that. I could take 20 episode of that kind of cuteness, even if it would have been a total fluff or even more of a fluff than it already is.

So the entertainment factor of the drama was totally there for me, as I sort of expected but I did not think I would get as emotionally connected to the story and the characters as I ended up doing. I didn’t just find it funny and cute and I didn’t just laugh over it. I also cried so much towards the end of it and that is what I look for in anything. Make me care show and preferably, make me care so much that I will cry. I am a sucker for those kinds of things.

Leia Mais

I mostly watch rom-coms and period dramas so Misaeng was at first not a drama that I had too high expectations of and I was just going to check it out because I liked some of the younger actors there and I read that the person who wrote Arang and the Magistrate was writing it or adapting it to the small screen and I liked Arang so I thought I could at least check it out.

Misaeng really surprised me. The story itself doesn’t sound like my cup of tea or that exciting and rather “ordinary” and ordinary isn’t always what I am looking for in the tv programs that I am watching but it pretty much just won me over at the first episode. It was fresh, it was sort of fun and sort of heart-warming and I think one of the charms of Misaeng is how ordinary it feels. This is just a drama about everyday life almost.

There is no over-dramatic plot, there is no romance in it or anything like that. It is sort of just very heartfelt, heart-warming story about this ordinary dude that is just trying his best to get his feet on the ground in this new environment that he is in. It is done very well, it is written and acted very well as well as directed and it manages to speak to people and connect to them since it is so easy to see yourself in these characters, even if you haven’t experienced what they have or are experiencing.

I really feel like applauding the writers and the director and everyone involved with this drama, as well as the manhwa author for thinking up this story since it really was just wonderfully done from the beginning and until the end. It really is the best drama that came out in 2014 and it is one of the dramas that I have enjoyed the most while watching it and I was never expecting that when I first started to watch it tbh.

I have mentioned that I thought Misaeng was fun to watch but it also sort of wasn’t, since it was quite heavy and I don’t think many people are just watching it for some entertainment because some of the scenes and themes in this drama are so heavy and make you feel quite sad while watching it but in a good way. There weren’t that big dramatic scenes but it is quite intense at times and so heartfelt in its delivery and the characters are amazing that is becomes sort of amazing and you are willing to watch these heavy scenes.

The main plot is almost just seeing these people interact and seeing the newbies trying to find their place in the workspace and seeing them fail and succeed at it. It has bosses that aren’t so good and bosses that are so nice and it talks about stress and tension in the workplace as well as misogyny and the question whatever you will become a permanent worker there or not and that maybe doesn’t sound that dramatic for a drama but it is very interesting, intense and realistic and we really didn’t need to have a bigger plot than that.

Like I said, that can be a bit heavy but there are some lighter scenes in between these heavy scenes and while they don’t really hurt as much in a good way but they make you feel a bit better and make the tension go away fro a little while. Some of my favorite scenes in this drama are these more lighter scenes, where we see the characters growing closer and working together.

The friendship that bosomed between the newbies and the sales team nr. 3 was one of the best things about this drama and it both broke my heart and glued it back together at one point or another in this drama. I just want these people to be friends forever and the thought of that not happening was sometimes unbearable.

Mr. Oh and Geu Rae are the most popular ship or relationship in this drama, which is completely understandable and they are so sweet together, as well as the friendship that slowly grows between the newbies at the workplace. I also really really liked how there were no love-lines and there is no second lead or anything like that. There don’t need to be a love-line in every single drama and this story just isn’t about that so it wouldn’t really fit.

Shows like Misaeng don’t tend to get me in the heart like I wanted but man this show owned my heart. I also sort of knew that I could be very good but that did not mean that I would have to like it since you don’t always end up liking shows or movies that are really good simply because they didn’t get you in the heart. You didn’t feel anything while watching it. That is not the case with Misaeng and that makes me super happy.

Sometimes it was hard to watch and some of the character arcs didn’t really do it for me but I liked how every character got their own time to be explored and we got some time to know them, at least the major characters. I almost have nothing but praises for this show except my somewhat usual complaint with TvN dramas and that is that sometimes their episodes can be rather long but other than that they are doing a great job.

I may have gotten more entertainment out of other dramas this year but Misaeng is one of those dramas that I really cherish and I am pretty sure that I am going to remember it after few years while I might not do that with some of the more entertaining dramas that aired this year. It is also so original and well done that it is almost impossible to just forget it. It just really spoke to me, even if I have never been in most of these situations before and it is very well done and I am not surprised over how popular it got. I just hope this review is doing it justice.

Leia Mais

It's not often you get a great adaptation of a great novel that has so much scope and a rich story to tell, but I think Pachinko is a rather successful adaptation and handles the subject matter well. It's a big novel that leaves a lot behind once the reading is over and is a true family story that spans generations through Japanese colonial rule over Korea and then as uprooted and anxious immigration to Japan and what follows that second-class citizenship.

The cast, sets, cinematography, and costumes are all excellent, and each episode feels like a short film in a sense. However, we only got to see part of this big story in this first season. The pace of the story is slow, but the story never seems to drag its feet or lose too much focus on the story it wants to tell us.

How the story moves between periods isn't always too clear, but the show often gives viewers notice of where they are in the story. Even though past and present events certainly mirror each other in certain places and explain the characters and their hidden backstories it does feel a bit choppy at times. But because of this time jumps that the story leaves some of these storylines a bit short or they feel rougher around the edges than one would have liked.

There are also certain characters, moments, or backstories that the story focuses on that are less interesting than others – but there was also a thing I noticed from the book. The story certainly shines brightest when focusing on the perspectives of the women in the story and Sunja, the matriarch, truly has all my heart. How much these women fought for their family's survival even though their lives suffered is breathtaking and it makes sense for the show to not beautify those things too much since they're based on real events.

Both the book and the episodes tell a story that is rather realistically depressing, but not necessarily in a totally crude or bleak way. It's a story about endurance and finding a way to thrive despite everything, and it certainly works for every tear the show squeezes out of you – and oh boy, where there are lots of tears. There really is not a big happy ending for any of the characters, they just have to keep fighting for their lives and hope that's enough until the end.

This is a great exploration of culture and life, but also the loss of it. The story is quite thought-provoking and poignant, pulling at your heartstrings with its realism and resilience of the characters, allowing the audience to confront the reality these characters live in. The scope of the story is epic, although the story manages to feel intimate and personal. This season successfully gives the viewer a pretty open ending to the story just in case there is no follow-up and the story doesn't get another season, despite having so much more to say.

Leia Mais

Yumi’s Cell is the first Korean drama to blend in animation into the drama in such a intrinsic way. You can seen that there is a lot of work behind it and these little animated figures do a lot for the story and make it stand out from other dramas. The story really come to life because of them.

The drama manages to bridge the gap between rom-com and more slice-of-life drama in my opinion. To me it has this calm and gentle focus the characters’ everyday lives that never feels too dramatic or unnatural, aside from the animated characters that bring out the more cute and comedic side of the story.

the cells that bring the humor (and are often my favorite parts of each episode) while the other characters get to be much more down-to-earth. It still has some those characters that you often find in traditional rom-coms but it manages to undermine some of these tropes and make it refreshing to watch. You can really just sit back and relax while watching the episodes.

Some of the side characters do not feel as complex, which may because we do not get to see the cells of all of them work like Yumi or Gu Woong who are in the leads and perhaps the drama relays a little too much on those cell characters to understand the nuances of the characters. But when it does the drama does a good job of showing all the little twists and turns of communication that Yumi or Gu Woong encounter, whether you agree with them or not, because you see the thoughts behind them.

The cells are a key factor in this and often make you look at things from a different perspective. The story really seems to stand by it’s characters though and allows them to be unlikeable when needs be, and also gives us a good lgbt representative (although he does not appear as often as I would like him to do) as kdrams do not do that often.

The pacing a bit unconventional and the story focuses a lot on communication and misunderstanding when Yumi steps back into the dating world after many years of closing her heart and the mistakes that come with that as a result. And I thought it managed to bring that theme it pretty well to the forefront without dragging the plot or making it too dramatic. The story always seems rather mild and light in my opinion. There was a certain calm over the story no matter what happened.

I found Yumi’s Cell to be quite sweet, warm and funny drama to watch. It is missing a key element that I like in kdramas, which is that the story hasn’t ended yet because we are only at the end of season one. I personally really enjoy kdramas because we get a beginning, middle and a end in about 16 episode. It’s one of their charms. There is so many shows that drag the plot and the tension until most of everything you enjoyed about the series is no longer there. But I’m excited to see how Yumi’s Cells handle this multiple season format. The drama is sweet and stands out from other dramas and just hope the next series manages to keep them charming and not drag the story out.

Leia Mais

Despite the main character being a man trapped in a female body, there is a certain focus on women within this drama; their lives, roles and work within the palace, which I enjoyed. Shin Hye Sun is absolutely amazing in this role and can switch from comedy to drama with great easy. It never feels forced to too harsh of a transition. I enjoy her so much in this role. And considering that this is a comedy about gender-swap, I never really found the humor that demeaning or like it talked down to women, or even homosexuality for that matter, as the romance became more prevalent. It wasn’t perfect, but I had expected worse, and it never really got on my nerves personally.

Whether we need this gender-swap to tell the story I am on the fence about. I think but that the story could have worked well enough if the main character was just a woman from the 21st century. Sometimes it seemed to me that they were brushing over things that should have underlined the struggle that a person who is not in that time, not in their body, would deal with. And I don’t think this is the radical or feminist take that some might have wanted about of women or the gender. But I also don’t think the drama ever intended to be a big commentary on society or gender roles. It just wanted to be a comedy sageuk with a twist.

I liked pretty much all the female characters in the drama for different reason. There was a range of characters and even the more comic relief ones had more to their roles than just that. Most of my favorite moments in the show had something to do with the main character’s friendship with their maids as well as the mutual respect that existed between them.

The sort of regular, everyday life of the court, especially for the women in the highest positions, was something I enjoyed too. Those moments are usually more in the background in these dramas. And I found the humor mostly revolved around that; life in the palace, the people who worked there, a little bit about politics and power struggle, but also the fact that the main characters was from another time period and how that person did things differently from the others and the conflicts that created. Much more than the actual gender-swap. Which is why I think we didn’t need it.

It took a while for the drama to mix the humor with the more serious tones of the drama that boosted the suspense in the story. The humor that led the drama in the beginning, but the more political bits never felt too jarring to me. And after a few episodes I felt like they managed to mix those two elements well enough so they worked together.

Despite some complaints about the politics taking up too much time, Mr. Queen was always a comedy and manages to keep the humor up throughout the drama, despite the politics and all the power struggles taking place. But even in the darkest, most tensest moments the show always manages to mix in lighter and funnier moments in. I never felt like the overall tone of the show dropped, or that it become too heavy. The humor never dried up and the story never became too dreary.

Many people do not like the high stakes, which never feel that high compared to other such period dramas, or the politics and just want the romance and the comedy. But personally I think dramas like these could not keep the story going with just funny moments and no politics. There have to be stakes and in the palace stakes comes with political maneuvering. Most stories are based on some kind of tension, risk and conflict.

The conflict here comes out in subtle fights for power, very under the table political tactics to, shifting of allies and clashes between several powerful clans within the Joseon era. But those conflicts never took over the whole story. It is the usual shenanigans that you usually see in these period dramas, but just a bit more woman focused, which I enjoyed a lot. How the women used their power and manipulated the court and people around them. The king has his focus as well, but the is surrounded by really smart, calculating women.

Overall I felt like Mr. Queen was a pretty standard period drama that tried to have a little bit of a different angle on things, that just aimed to be very fun and entertaining. It never took itself that seriously, but I also didn’t think it was saying that much either, although criticizing society through comedy is what the genre is sort of made for. Yet the light-hearted spirit that was always persistent through the drama, the character and just the amazing performance of Shin Hye Sun, made Mr. Queen overall a really easy and entertaining show to watch.

Leia Mais

I kinda knew that I would be making a review of this drama around episode 10, because it was just one of those shows that I couldn’t stop talking about. I liked it that much and I was sure it would keep up the good work and I was right.

The things that I like the most about the dramas that Park Hye Ryun writer is how easy and fun they are to watch and how great I feel when I watch them. They are all a feel-good shows for me. They all manage to be both funny, entertaining and dramatic and emotional at the same time and there is a great balance between all of these things in this drama, as well as in Dream High or I Heart Your Voice.

I was just so pleased with this drama, it is well written and for me it hit all the rights spots, since I got emotional and I smiled etc. so I was very much in love with it. It is also very easy to watch and I tend to not get bored over her dramas or at least those who I have seen.

The story isn’t necessarily not that new but I feel like I haven’t seen that many dramas like Pinocchio and Park Hye Ryun does tell a good character story well in my opinion. The story is very well paces and I didn’t feel like it ever dragged along ether and I liked how she wrote it. It was like she had a plan and she didn’t just write something in for no reason and I like that. I also liked how the new reporter theme was used in this drama.

The character have always been quite good in those Park Hye Ryun dramas that I have seen and for the most part they are quite well rounded in this drama as well. I especially like how she writes female characters and they get to do more than just be the love interest or the mean bitch.

The secondary characters could have been a bit more developed in my opinion and I felt like she has done a better job with the second female lead in the past, which was a shame. Yoon Yoo Rae could have been a much more interesting character but she was just the cute comic relief to me. The second male lead Seo Bum Jo got so much more to do in this drama, as well as In Ha’s mom.

Maybe it helps the plot to go along smoothly and swiftly that the main character can’t lie and she has to tell the truth and can’t hide her feelings or anything. I did have my concerns around the middle of the series that it was going too fast and there wasn’t enough story left to tell, but I was gladly proved wrong on that.

I also liked the main couple a lot and it could have ended up being super creepy since they were raised as niece and uncle but it totally wasn’t creepy at all and very well done and felt realistic.

This is one of the better dramas that I have seen Park Shin Hye act in and I think this drama has helped some people realize that she doesn’t totally suck and maybe they will stop hating on her now because of Heirs or for other things. I liked PSH and I find it very comfortable watching her act and I am a fan so I am super happy that she got a role that I like.

In my humble opinion Pinocchio is one of the better dramas that came out in 2014 (most of the drama aired last year) and it was, like I said before, a very nice and sort of feel-good watch that I enjoyed a lot and therefore I have not many bad things to say about it. I am a huge fan of Park Hye Ryun now and I liked how she crafts her stories. They are meaningful and entertaining, both light and dramatic and I liked very twist and turn along the way.

Overall I liked this drama more than I liked I Hear Your Voice but not as much as Dream High. But like I did with Dream High I felt so nice and comfortable watching this drama, but I was maybe just a bit more emotionally invested in Dream High. I will miss watching Pinocchio every week and I can’t wait for Park Hye Ryun’s next drama.

Leia Mais

A review of both part 1 and 2

What both stunned and impressed me the most about the kdrama My Dearest, right at the very start, was how focused it was on the ordinary people and how they deal with war. And what the war does to them. It makes it less of a war epic and more of a human tale of self-preservation and hope at a trying time. which I found to be quite a fresh approach to this kind of historical drama, although many will no doubt find it rather slow and dry in its execution and style.

The story is ruthless in its realism and harshness with how it seems to paint the world. The narrative is very willing to comment on several aspects within society that it tells it’s tale, the nobility and their uselessness, the lack of care that a certain position within society seems to push into you for the people that live around them, as well as society’s attitude towards women in wartimes and just their position in society both outside of that as well. The way it uses these elements to shape itself, the details it shares throughout the story is very tangible, interesting but also poignant. It is incredibly well thought out and effective within the narrative to stir up further emotions both with the characters and the viewers.

These are not the heroes that poems are sung about, but seem to be more everyday heroes of the common folk. Most of their influence is not great within the grand scheme of things, but it is the people who knew them who will always remember them with kindness and love. They are the ones who will tell the stories about them until they disappear from human memory and are forgotten.

At some point, despite their intelligence and strength, as the war and the hardships seem to tighten more and more around them, the characters seem to wear down a bit. But they never lose who they are, their will to fight but how they go about fighting, how they deal with situations changes a little. All that happens very slowly and works very realistically within the story. It’s a really well-handled look at character, as well as how normal people deal with such situations.

The characters do feel sharp and manage to be both a fresh take on the traditional characters that we get in a Korean historical dramas, but at the same time they have quite a bit of the characteristics that we are used to seeing; Jang-hyun may come across as smug and aloof, and Gil-chae may come across as snobbish and somewhat self-interested. But there’s a lot more to them and their flaws are very presant within the story. Overall there are plenty of multi-layered characters that make My Dearest a rather worthwhile and heart-wrenching watch. Everyone has something to say in their own way and all have some point to emphasize within the story. The story touches your heart from beginning to end if people just allow themselves to enter this cruel, realistic world with these characters as a guiding light.

The plot itself goes through its ups and downs, and it does hit a bit of a lull within the second half where the story tends to repeat itself quite often. Characters almost miss each other a few times over the course of few episodes in order to create tension and longing within the viewers, and since the story is already slow by nature it might make some people really struggle. It makes it seem like the story has lost steam and doesn’t really pick up fully until right near the end. But if the characters manage to grab you and make you completely fall for them in the first half of the story, it’s perfectly tolerable.

The story never seems to fall into being too epic or too grandiose in its approach to the narrative, as some costume dramas tend to do to make their heroes seem bigger. Much rather My Dearest seems so focused on being realistic and grounded in reality like it has a bit of an obsession with the human spirit and the lengths to which people will go to survive. It run through the very heart of the series. And the love story, which is really successful on its own, reflects that. It’s very slow and down to earth and it’s quite unusual for a kdrama in lots of ways.

The story takes its time, sometimes excessively so, and repeats itself a bit too often, but even if it takes the story a good while it manages to underline every point that the drama set out to make really well. The story always seemed to know what it wanted to say. And the humanity that this series carries with it and manages to reflect within the narrative does make you cry many times. It’s gorgeous, it’s heartwarming and filled with hope for brighter days that is always enveloped by a little bit of sadness.

Leia Mais

From Why Secretary Kim to My Stranger Hero and now Her Private Life it seems like my kdrama rom-com slump is finally over. I say slump since for few years I didn’t really enjoy those rom-coms like I used to, and I didn’t really write any reviews for those dramas.

Her Private Life went in a bit of a circle for me. I wasn’t too keen on it at first. I wasn’t a fan of the humor and the whole fangirl aspect of it wasn’t really doing it for me, even if I consider myself a fangirl myself (just not that much like Deok Mi).

It wasn’t until the romance really kicked in, with all the fake dating shenanigans - one of my fav rom-com tropes ever - that I almost sold my soul to this drama for a few weeks.

The drama toned down the humor and sort of became sweeter and light, which I enjoyed. I really liked all the pining in the beginng and the start of the relationship. It was very predictable at times, but I could not get enough.

I would personally have wanted more depth into the whole fangirl business and the whole culture of that. More focus on Deok Mi and Cindy - which was one of the more interesting side characters in the drama - and them finding a balance in their fangirl activities. Not just the worry about how Ryan would react to Deok Mi being a fangirl.

For a drama about the private life of a fansite manager and all of that, I expected more of the plot to revolve around that and not about the family drama of Ryan Gold.

The success with this drama, with me and other, is kinda thanks to the actors and how well they played these characters. They had very nice chemistry together. Deok Mi and Ryan was the sweetest couple and treated each other with such a respect and tenderness. It was wonderful.

There was not a whole lot of conflict in this drama, even if it used some very well known tropes in it story lines that usually really amps up the conflict. The characters sat down and talk things through, which I really liked. I thought that was sweet and I like how things didn’t drag too much.

But that also left the story kinda conflict-less and therefore not a whole lot happened toward the end. It slowly ran out of story to tell. If you are going to have such a non-conflict like story then you kinda have to fill it with side characters and plots that make the story a bit more exciting.

The romance, as sweet as it was, wasn’t always enough. Especially when some of the side characters and their stories were really not fun at all. The ending suffered a bit from this, in my opinion. The story was over before the drama was over and I was starting to fast-forward through certain scenes.

Leia Mais

This is a drama that sounds like a hallmark rom-com; a city girl who focuses a lot on frames and her career moves to a beautiful small town and meets a scruffy local men that she falls in love with. But this is actually a slice-of-life story. It’s overflowing with warm feelings and wonderful, deep and imperfect characters that you will fall in love with along the way. It’s almost like a warm drink on a rainy day in kdrama form. Hometown Cha Cha Cha is one of those dramas that really moved me from the very first episode as there was something so cozy and homely about them that just gripped me by the heartstrings and would not let me go.

The story may not be big but it seems to be enough there that the story never drags it’s legs or or goes into endless circles with the plot. It spends a good time with all the characters and the introspection of those characters that takes place within the drama.

Hometown Cha Cha Cha strikes a pretty good balance between having a story that is constantly moving forward while also capturing this mundane life and the quiet moments as we follow all of these different characters and their lives in this small community where everyone knows everyone.

All the characters we meet on our way through the story are interesting and it’s fun to watch them and their impact on each other’s lives. Everyone has their own burdens and baggage’s in life that the drama manages to explore quite well. Watching people’s walls break down over time and people face their demons without it ever dragging too long or being too dramatic.

We get to see the different sides of most of all the characters and how complex and human they are. Each episode of the drama is more than an hour long, which I usually do moan about, but here I hardly felt it. Because I enjoyed the time with the characters so much.

There is almost this subdued suspense that is there all the way through the story. It never get’s too big, too dramatic or too ahead of itself. It captures this feeling that life can be messy but it’s also just a series of moments that pass and fade over time really well. Some moments are wonderful, warm and calm but some cruel and sad. But life still goes on somehow. The message of the story and the story itself is not much bigger than that, but it works really well.

So much of the romance, but also just the friendship that is going on, is just about the individual’s personal boundaries and the communication between them. Everything about how the romance was built radiated comfort and warmth in my opinion, which I found really sweet and just pleasant to watch. Like everything about the drama was. Shin Min Ah and Kim Seon Ho, as well as all the other actors, fill their characters with life and emotions.

There is also a really good balance between the love stories within the drama and the other stories that deal more with people’s personal lives and their position in life. The love story will never be too sappy, which would not suit this type of story, but rather it seem more human and sensible. Even if misunderstandings occur it is quickly worked out and one can understands the reason why the character act a certain way because they story has worked for it. These people are complex and you get to see them from many angles.

The love story is still a very big part of the story; both when it comes to the main characters and the supporting characters. But even though the story is about them falling in love, it is also so much about these characters learning to love themselves as well as the other characters around them. But the drama also deals with loads of different themes such as loneliness in old age, divorce, there is a lgbt character, and many other things that crop up as we go through the lives of the characters of this small town as this is ultimately a story about the community.

Leia Mais

Answer me 1997 is probably one of the most down to earth kdramas that I have watched, if you can call it that. It isn’t that every other kdrama is completely unrealistic but they (or at least those that I watch) tend to be a bit of a fairy tale like dramas, total escapisms, in some way while I didn’t feel like this drama is. It’s very down to earth, coming of age type of story.

This is not some Cinderella tale, where the rich guy falls or the poor girl or anything like that, and while I often like those dramas a lot, it was also so refreshing to get something like this one, where the characters were just normal people and we just follow them through their young adult life. After the drama I truly felt honored to have been able to see them grow as humans.

I was truly amazed by the fact how nostalgic it felt, and how it evoked that nostalgia within me, despite the cultural and the time differences, that I had from this drama. I was feeling not only nostalgia for those universal things like; your first crush, your first day at school after the summer, first idol band you liked (granted, I was never that kind of kpop fan, like Shi Won, but then again I never lived in Korea, where these kpop idols where, with that type of idol culture), while also nostalgic over time that I had never experienced. And that connection, that nostalgia and that coming of age aspects of the story made me weep like I have never weeped before.

The drama may have been set in ‘97, but the story feels sort sort of timeless, even if we didn’t grow up or were around Sung Shi Won or Yoon Yoon Jea’s age in '97. Throughout the drama I found myself saying this to myself; god this drama speaks to me. It perfectly describes emotions that I had felt when I was a teenager and even beyound that. That age where you feel like you could where you put everything on the line for the smallest of things like a boy band or something. A more naïve and innocent times.

It’s a story about you first love, about your first heartbreak and just about growing up, but so much of it is just about friendship. There is so much heart and soul in this drama and it hits such a sweet spot, at least for me, which makes Answer me '97 is quite a unique drama. It was just so original and wonderful. And it has had such an impact of this more slice-of-life, coming of age type stories in kdramas.

It was just this little show produced by the cable network TvN that just became so big and so successful. It just fills us with empathy (or sympathy) and nostalgia. I felt like the writer(s) of the drama understood what it had been like, being a teenager, just like I feel like a lot of adults forget what it is like to be with all those hormones and emotions and can’t therefor quite catch those feelings when they try to talk to you or write about it.

The later half was much more about the supposed lover-triangle. I did feel like they did a good job on it and I felt like they did keep us guessing for the most part throughout the drama. It was wearing a little tiresome by the end, but I didn’t feel like it ruined the story or anything. But I always got the sense that the people involved knew what kind of story they wanted to tell so they didn’t go overboard with the story, so it become too crazy or just fell flat. It just hit that sweet spot.

Leia Mais

I went into this one not expecting much, it was an idol drama after all, and yet it just turned out so much better than I thought it would and it improved steadily with each and every episode. There was just a really solid underdog elements, a great coming-of-age story, wrapped up in some kpop, with a whole lot of heart underneath it all. It was so cute, it had some funny bits, some fluff and a whole lot of heart and soul in it. It was probably my favorite drama of 2011.

It was also just the drama that I needed at the time. It was such an escape, since I wasn’t feeling that great mentally and then Dream High gave me something fun and cute to watch every week and something to look forward to. It became my feel-good drama and I have watched it a few times through since then and it just makes me smile.

Despite the acting not being top tier in every aspect of this show, Kim Soo Hyun may have carried it a bit on his shoulders and his characters is in a lot of ways the very heart of the story, or the biggest heart, and it does have some great actors in the supporting roles as teachers and other adults (and then JYP is just JYP). And I feel like each and every character fit the idol that was playing it, and they found some really creative ways with getting around those more stiff acting moments from the cast (many who were acting for the first time here) so it never truly bothered me too much. I was too busy having fun with it.

It’s that standard underdog story that you know and love, but it just did it so well and it hit all the right spots (at least for me). There were some great character moments, there was actual character developments and plot developments going on there, it was not just for fluff or just to promote some kpop groups, It manages all of that while also being a completely great, fun and easy to watch, coming of age story. It was a great fun.

Some actual thought went into this story, which made me really fun to watch. it didn’t drag a lot or at all and it didn’t suddenly become bad or anything. It was quite consistent though it did become a bit more dramatic toward the end but it was still cute.

I cared so much about the characters; both the teachers and the students and I just wanted them to do well and fall in love (there were some great couples there, my favorite being the Milky Couple) and just be happy. And unlike a whole lot of kdramas, this one kinda made me guess which lead the main heroine would end up with. Like, I was worried there for a second. I usually always figure it out quite early.

This is a kdrama for kpop fans. I feel like this is a kdrama that you make someone watch to get them into kpop, or vise versa. The way they incorporated the dancing, the singing and the music into the story, without shoehorning it in and making it just be there as filler, was excellent. There was a real emotion there when these people sang their songs, and actual stakes to the performances. And then also some really funny inside jokes if you follow kpop. It just had a really good mix of kpop and kdrama elements.

Leia Mais

With movies such as Train to Busan (but also another very underrated comedy called Zombie on Sale) and the Kingdom series, South Korea is proving that no one is really doing the zombies as well and them right this moment. Ashin of the North is not the much anticipated third series of this hugely popular kdrama Kingdom, but a kind of prequel to a character we will get to know better in the third series. When we get to do that we will have to wait a bit more to find out.

Ashin is dark, not only in terms of it’s story and the subject matter of the story, but also in how it was shot. There were scenes, that were supposed to take place at night, where I did not see properly. That got on my nerves, but nothing that completely ruined the story for me or anything.

Personally, I would have liked to get a good three episode arc from Ashin and not this one and a half hour movie that we got. I thought the story was a bit hasty in parts and maybe a bit rushed in the first half and I really would have wanted a whole episode just to set things up and spend more time with the characters. Really explore the people’s actions and the consequences that came with that later in the story. And I would have liked more screen-time with the adult Ashin and her thirst and drive for revenge.

Getting a good two episodes where more character focus and a nicer buildup to the escalating tension would have been nice. Because I felt it was a little lacking. And I was expecting more of a connection to the previous season of Kingdom and perhaps more answers regarding the plant that is the root of this all. There was not much information we were getting from this story in my opinion.

Except for Ashin’s revenge of course, which will come to play later on. The revenge and how it all comes about is still a really cool and interesting, dark plot twists and what I enjoyed the most within the story. It wasn’t until that section came about where the story caught my attention.

Ashin is dark and thrilling in parts so if you’re just going into this to experience some excitement and a bit of zombie horror then Ashin manages to be completely satisfying. Maybe Ashin falls into the trap, like the first series Kingdom did for me, of being just an introduction or the beginning of something and not telling a whole story. Perhaps I will not really manage appreciate its genius until I finally see the third series and where the story will take the character of Ashin and the conclusion it might give to that story.

If Ashin was supposed to be something to quench my thirst for the third series, then I did not think it managed that as well as it hoped, although it is very good entertainment and a thrilling ride with some good twists. I just wanted a better buildup to things and character work. Had fun watching it though. Just didn’t leave as much as I wanted behind.

Leia Mais

You could say that I’ve been waiting for this drama to come along and sweep me of my feet for some time. A gloomy fantasy with a hint of horror and humor that doesn’t take itself too seriously is something I really enjoy. And then it was kind of a bonus to get a story that gave Park Shin Hye a role that made her shine as brightly as I know she can.

The plot, or the setting around it, was a bit rough around the edges at times. It can certainly be argued that her role as a judge was not particularly necessary for the story itself – she could just as well have worked in a morgue. And as a result, the plot allows itself to play as loosely as it wants with that setting. This is not a serious legal drama, this is a fantasy about demons, and as long as it has its own internal logic that it follows to a point, and it works decently. The court was a decent plot device that moves the story along, but it did feel a tad repetitive and almost too much of a crutch to the story at times.

That internal logic doesn’t drag the story down unless you really focus on how the legal system or anything like that works and perhaps some of the logic of how the underworld functions to be a but flawed, but I don’t find myself wondering too much about it as I watch the show. The fantasy-elements don’t feel too hesitant to play around but it’s not as if things are happening for no reason. It gets a little confusing as we get further into the story, and the cop-part of the story may be a little basic, but the fantasy adds something new and fresh to that tried-and-true story.

The drama focuses a bit on the morality of humans, along with the laws they have made to uphold the justice and the people who break them. There is a certain thrill in watching our main character take revenge on the criminals with the same amount of blood and violence that they inflicted on others. But that part got a bit repetitive until the serial killer storyline really got going. And while I thought the drama did a good job of showing human corruption and how weak the justice system is at times, and getting to see Park Shin Hye in all those action scenes was fun, I wanted a little more out of that theme than we got.

The series was exciting with a lot of action and some violence - without being too gory or too cruel. They managed to balance those things with a decent amount of humor and a gentle character moment. Towards the middle, when everything truly was set in motion, there was not a dull moment to be found, and the drama managed to keep the momentum going until the very end.

One of my favorite things about The Judge from Hell manages to deliver one trope, or the role reversal, which I really enjoy; I adore evil female characters or a cold-hearted immortal female character who bring softer human male characters along with them and little by little she allows herself to open a little. Or the male character allows her feel things for the first time in a long time without her becoming too soft. Seeing female and male characters swapping traditional gender roles is always fun, especially if it’s done well.

The romance was slow, which suits the story well, but it was still full of suspense, tenderness and passion. But the story worked for every smile and every tear the characters produced as the narrative slowly moves from enemies to companions and then to lovers.

The drama seemed to have wholeheartedly embraced its wacky setting and just gone full steam ahead. The thrilling action, the exciting build-up, the internal logic as well as the character moments were something that the drama managed so well, and the acting was good across the board, which made the entertainment value of the drama truly addictive. Although for sure, the drama had its weaker moments when history repeated itself slightly and the special effects were perhaps a little lame at times but that can also be part of the charm.

But what I think makes this drama as good as it was were the characters; the spark between them and the humor. The combination of the motives of the main characters and the way they change places, one becomes warmer and the colder was well deserved within the narrative and even the secondary character was well executed, getting their moments shine and develop within the story.

Leia Mais

It’s not every day that the Kdrama gets a season two - which is actually one of the things I like most about kdramas - so I was so I was thrilled, yet cautious about how the Age of Youth 2 would turn out. It’s hard to meet all those expectations, if the previous series was really good, as Age of Youth was.

And while Age of Youth 2 certainly didn’t beat Age of Youth in terms of quality, or how good it was, I can’t say that this was a bad drama. This was still the story of five girls and all the ups and downs in their lives. Even if it did not feel as fresh or new, but then again, to me, it was never going to since it was coming after the first season. It was a lovely continuation in my opinion, was what it was supposed to be.  A continuation. And I think I have to judge it based on that.

At first people were concerned about how many changes were made (and some people it was just too much) but these changed didn’t affect the story itself too much, though it did a little. Even if they added more male roles, they did not take any (or not much) time from the girls and their story. It was still all about the girls.
When it comes to both seasons of Age of Youth, they are mainly about the girls in Belle Epoque, their lives and their friendships.

The boys are just on the sidelines, featuring in the stories of the girls and it wasn’t super heavy on the romance. And while there are some people who find the focus of the series have shifted a little more from the story of the girls, and into the story of the girls and all these ships, I personally never saw it that way.

A good part of the first series was dedicated to these ‘ships’. Ether those who were there from day one (Yeun and her boyfriend) or the ones that slowly formed during course of the drama. (Jinmyung and Eun Jae and their men). The fandom might have shifted its focus more on these ‘ships’ in a second series, but the story itself didn’t.

I think this focus on these couples within the fandoms has more to do with the fact that the underlying story of Age of Youth 2 was not as captivating or compelling as in the previous season. Or it didn’t feel as tight. I like the stories that were featured in this season, but at the same time I did not feel like these stories had too much to do with each other, as they did in season two. This season didn’t have any ghosts in the shoe-closet to connect all these story-lines and make it all more symbolic.

There were many interesting stories going in this series, but they didn’t have too much to do with each other, and we did not quite get these individual episodes that we got into the previous series, which added so much to these characters. The connection that these stories had with each other was mainly that the girls all lived in the same house. 

To me, Song Ji Won, one of my favorite last season, got the biggest, heaviest and probably the best storyline, compared to the previous season where she was mostly on the side-lines. Which is great since Park Eun Bin is a great actress, one of the strongest in this drama and Song Ji Won deserved her own spotlight.
Her story had the greatest weight and depth in this season, and we got to see more of her and Im Sung Min, which I appreciated (cuz I ship them). I was over the moon over it and though that story took us to some rather dark place at times, it was handled quite well.

It took her character to another level and made her into such a complex characters. To me she is the star of Age of Youth 2. To me she was the main character of this season.

Drama was still only in trying to make the story darker, or more dangerous, than she had to be (in order to be edgy) in my opinion. But those items did not appear to be dry, or out of nothing, and just being there to make us feel uncomfortable.

Yeun and Jinmyung both got to continue on with their stories from the first season, as Jinmyung lays his first step into the adult, working-world, and Yeun is struggling with the follow-up of the violent relationship she had with her former boyfriend. And I thought that was very done, how Yeun and the drama managed to handle that problem and how she slowly began to become more confident. I was very happy with that progress.

Jo Eun, the new girl, who moves (after Yi Na moves away in episode 1) and although I found her friendship with the girls, how she opened herself up bit by bit, and her relationship and Jang Hoon was very sweet. But I didn’t feel like story stood out a lot.

But Eun Jun, my favorite character in the first series (with Song Ji Won), got another actress who did very little for that character - though I blame it mostly on how she was written. Eun Jun really pulled the shortest straw when it came to plot in AOY2. All she did was break up with her boyfriend, for god knows what reason, and then she moaned over that the whole season. I never really understood what the scriptwriter was trying to go fir. All her parts just seemed to act as a filler, and she didn’t really act like herself. For me it was by far the biggest minus about Age of Youth 2.

If Age of Youth was four and a half star then Age of Youth 2 was a solid three star drama. It had some really good moments; I was very excited about watching each episode, and overall had a pretty good time watching it. But it did not reach the same height as the Age of Youth did. I did not cry over t.  The story was, in my opinion, a little disjointed  at times and could have been tight. There was something missing in that department. We needed something to keep going back to, and added a bit of depth to the underlining story, like the ghost in the shoe-closet.

I thought t was a good follow-up, I loved visiting Belle Epoque again, as well as the characters. Not all the stores left as much behind as the stories in the first season. But it is hard to re-create that magic. I just wish I could have gotten a bigger closure to some of these stories. Because we have been sitting through 14 episodes of these stories, so I think it is better to not leave things too open ended. It doesn’t leave as much behind.

Leia Mais

When I first started watching Empress Ki, I never expected to actually finish it and I am (sort of) to this day surprised that I finished it. Not because it was bad or I thought it would be bad. It was mainly the size of it because to me 50 episodes are a lot of episodes and I just wasn’t sure if I could make it threw that but I liked the cast so I decided to give it a go and it just turned out so great.

The first 5 episodes of the drama had me hooked and suddenly I was just so far into it that I started to see myself actually finish it and here I am. This is therefore the longest drama that I have watched and funny enough the longest drama that I had watched before EK was the drama that introduced me to Ji Chang Wook (which was one of the main reasons for watching EK).

I know a lot of people were annoyed by the not-so-historically accurate plot and the costumes. I did read a bit up on Empress Ki before the drama and tried to do a bit of research here and there while it was airing but it sort of doesn't bother me that it wasn't historically accurate (I feel the same way about Reign as well) because I am mainly watching it for the historical setting not the historical accuracy.

I am very found of period or costume dramas and while I liked it when they are historicity accurate (if I know th history beforehand or when I read up on it) but I am mainly just there for the costumes and the period setting and all of that and to me Empress Ki delivered on that. The set and the costumes were gorgeous and just really well done.

The drama says in it’s description that it is a “historical” romance drama and while there is romance in the drama (like there is in most tv shows or dramas) I felt like a lot of the romantic stuff was sort of put on the back burner for some parts of the drama, which I didn’t mind that much.

A lot of the drama was just about Empress Ki /Seung Nyang revenge and quest for justice/power and the political aspect of things and while I did enjoy it a lot I think a lot of other people where annoyed by it or by Seung Nyang and her politics. I liked how the women of the drama were powerful and involved in the politics and I really enjoyed that aspect of the show.

I really didn’t expect to like the politics since they sometimes bore me in these dramas. Maybe Game of Thrones is making me like that sort of thing more. It has happened that I am watching a drama and as soon as the plot goes away from the main couple I lose interest but that didn’t happen here.

I feel it was most of all a character driven drama and not necessarily a otp driven drama. The main story is not how they got together but how Seung Nyang became Empress Ki. The story does go on for a long time though, so there are bound to be plotlines that were more fun than others.

Now that I look back my favourites were between episode 1-6 and episodes 24-37. Those were the plot-lines that I enjoyed the most and I felt like were best written. For the most part I felt like the story was fast paced and all in all decently written. It went a little thin in the end but overall I found it very entertaining.

Because it is so long and therefore you have plenty of room for a lot of things happening at once and a lot of different side plots and side characters you really could flesh out some of the characters. Some for the better and some for the worst and I think most of the characters went threw some sort of character journey, except for some of the bad guys which were just evil and bad just for the sake of the plot like El Temur and his lot.

Aside from Tanashiri which I always liked even if she wasn't the best character. I felt like I could sympathize with her but not her action. I understood why she felt why she had to do what she did, because she was the empress and she needed to secure her place in the palace because that was her only job in life but I didn’t really like how she handled everything but I found her amusing and I liked the actress who played her and I will be keeping an eye out for her in the future.

I liked how I could understand most of the time why people did what they did within the palace because you had to be hard and ruthless if you wanted to survive in the palace and I especially liked how the women where written and that they were just as powerful as the men.

Wang Yoo however was one of the good guys and he was suppose to be the main lead until the public (and most of the fandom I think) decided that they liked the emperor more and he was sort of swept aside and he didn’t get that much character development at all. He was just always very consistent and noble but just sort of there in my opinion and I just found it sort of plane.

I couldn't even get behind his love-line with Seung Nyang and I just sort of feel bad for Joo Jin Mo but their love-line felt so much like a duty thing and that she was always just his subject that I never got behind it.

In the beginning I also rabidly shipped Seung Nyang og Ta Hwan / The Emperor but that sort of went away later in the drama and while I liked them together for the most part of the drama my rabid shipping never returned. I mostly saw them as friends later on but I don’t doubt their love for each other. I just really liked their

Ta Hwan did go threw a lot of character development, which is why for the longest time he was my favorite character on the show. Untill he became a bit too possessive for my taste and it almost looked like the writers forgot all about his character development and just decided to toss it out of the window because they needed a bad guy.

I think the best character in the end was Tal Tal but he was amazing and he really started to bloom in the later half of the drama. Empress Ki is just a very character driven drama to me.

In the end the story was getting a little bit thin and a little bit wonky but I still enjoyed it for the most part and I sort of expected it to go a little bit like that just because of how long it was. I never felt like it dragged and I wasn’t really that annoyed by it or anything. It just felt like the writers didn’t know what to do with all these episodes and just started to add in some shock-value.

I don’t think it could have been ay longer than 51 episodes and 45 episodes or something would have served it just fine and made made the story just a bit more stronger and not at thin but I still enjoyed myself a lot while watching it. The last 10-15 episodes were not as good as the rest of the show.

The ending though didn’t bother me at all nor did I find it lame or anything. It was sort of what I had come to expect given how the story was going and how the story actually went (historically) so I was’t really mad about it. Empress Ki was such a roller-coaster ride and some parts were better then others and it did go a bit crazy in the end but I still enjoyed the drama a lot. It was entertaining and for the most part fun and easy to watch and I will miss it.

Leia Mais