K-Drama 
A lot of people slept on this drama because the writer is a complete nut that is infamously known for wack plots and nepotism. But, this easily in my top 20 and one of the 10 I recommend for anyone dipping their toe in the kdrama world for the first time.
Bad stuff first:
Slow start. Give it the necessary 8-10 for the real fun to start.
There's a F-ing ghost and not a good one, like why?.... The writer, that's why.
Dumb af birth secret you realize you don't care about and then they give you another one.
Sung Hoon's acting, most are more than a little green be he stands out as the worst in the beginning.
Eeyore gets a hairdo and it ain't pretty.
Her other choice of ...~cough~ partner...~gross~.
The good stuff:
Sung Hoon takes a shower.
Chock full of madness to make you yell at the screen and tell off the jerk of a male lead who really gets pulled through the wringer, deservedly so.
Sung Hoon takes his shirt off and starts yelling about how much he loves you and wrong for everything.
The male lead actually shows growth as a character without just waking up one day with a change of heart.
Sung Hoon crashes your Skank-wedding, sorry "Courtesan-Wedding"
The lead female isn't a doormat either.
Sung Hoon is all Boo-hoo at your feet begging you to take him back.
Rewatch factor: High.
I have found myself rewatching this one when I'm in a drama slump or I need to wash the sting of a disappointing drama from my mind. So at least 5 times that I've watched this one.
Was this review helpful to you?
This review may contain spoilers
Show full of cliches
The male lead looked like he was really attracted to the actress but she looked disgusted by him 😂 she was cringing half of the show.I watched all the episodes and hated how they gave this cliché of "the woman should only be pretty, serve her husband and shut up"
I hated how they made being pretty the whole personality of the female lead
It was also way too long. The only positive note is the life of the giseang and their colorful costumes and cute Andre
Don't waste your time on this please!
Was this review helpful to you?
"I think dying by your hands would be better than losing you and dying of heartache" - Ah Da Mo
I smiled, laughed,swooned,screamed and cried while watching "New Tales of Gisaeng". Wow, what a journey this has been. What a absolutely marvelous story of fate, family, sisterhood, pain, trauma and the teachings of life this brought to every character. But most of all, the central and epic love-story of our main-leads, they are star-crossed lovers Ah Da Mo & Dan Sa Ran portrayed by Soo-Hyang and Sung-Hoon. These two on-screen created fireworks, just gosh what a beautiful pair they are! It was long time coming for me to watch "New Tales of Gisaeng" since it has been recommended to me for some time now but i never came around to actually watching past 20 min of first ep in the past. I think the time was not right for me, i gave it another shot last week and decided that i firmly would finish 3 episodes and when i did i was stuck. I knew this was a drama i had to and would finish watching. It is a wonderful story that depicts the magic of fate and how it entangles characters in their lives. This drama has characters that makes you root for them and i grew so fond of everyone, even the elders. Then we have the romance that feeded my romantic heart, ah what a magical and electrfying chemistry our main-leads have!! The dialuge, the glances and the touches between them, just stop it!!!KYAAAA!!!Sa Ran is unlike many of the heroines i have seen in other dramas. She is cold in the sense that you would outwardly think she is arrogant, but she uses it as a mechanism to not open herself up to anyone. She does not speak of whats in her heart and mind, and the awful loneliness that consumes her. She has this firm dignity and great love for dancing. She is beautiful and has such a beauty in her heart.No wonder our leading hero Ah Da Mo fell madly in love with her! Ah, i love the way they hated to love each other. Hardcore hate-love story this one, and i loved every damn bit of it!!
Ah Da Mo has such a compelling character developement throughout the drama. He is very arrogant, bitter and cynical at the start. He lives his life with the following flow, knowing his place and situation in following his fathers footsteps as an heir to their family company and knows what is expected of him. He is not a rebel, but he is angry at his father for neglecting him emotionally throughout his child-hood, and that he even regards the dog Andre more of a son than Da Mo is, which is a humiliation to Da Mo`s ego. He slowly changes when he gets to know the dancer his grandmother invites to his house, the beautiful Sa Ran who is incredibly attracted to at first sight. But due to a awful misunderstanding caused by Da Mo`s cynical views she insults and hurt his pride, which makes him in return pursue her for his selfish reasons in making her fall for him so hard she would throw herself at him. (sigh, these arrogant male heroes always dig their own graves) but he senses how incredibly he is softening towards her and gets frightened out of his wits when he suspects that he is growing feelings for her. And that my friends was his gravest mistake. He run away from his own heart and bitterly regretted the awful consequences because of it. Thank god he comes to his senses and does everything there on to make her forgive him...i love how he declared that he lost to her. That he would rather she kill him with her own hands, than him dying of heartache living apart from her.
I also need to mention how fond i became of second female lead Ra Ra who also was given such a wonderful developement in character from a spoiled and entitled princess into a strong, loving and caring young woman who tackled the harsh surprises life gave her. The actress protraying her Hye-rin gave such depth to her performance that you could not help but root for her happiness as well. I love that she found true love in her new friend and protecter, Kyle that teached english at the Gisaeng House. They are absolutely wonderful together, love the deep sense of trust and friendship and admiration both have for each other.
Was this review helpful to you?
This review may contain spoilers
There's romance here, but it's mostly a slice of life family drama with some makjang (melodrama) thrown in- secret identities, poor woman/rich man, evil stepmother, not knowing your friend is actually your brother, or that you are related to so and so, etc. It might be a little slow for others (it takes a few episodes, maybe until episode 15 and over to get into its groove) but I really enjoyed watching the family dynamics the most. It gave me the same sense of comfort as watching something like Reply 1998, which also had an ensemble cast.The story is split into 3 arcs. The first arc focuses on the Geum family, then the house of the Gisaeng (Buyyeongak) and then the Ah family. I like how most of the characters here are essentially good, but flawed. At first, I thought Ra Ra would be nothing more than the spoiled female antagonist who got in between the male and female lead, but it turned out that while she was spoiled, she was essentially good and became an ally of theirs. Her birth mother Shin Hyo Ri started out as shallow and absorbed, only thinking about inheriting a building when the grandfather died, but she turned out to be caring and even accepted Son Ja, who was her husband's son with another woman.
Dan Sa Ran is basically a Yamato Nadeshiko, a very ladylike and gentle character. I didn't always agree with her way of thinking, but found her likeable overall in her interactions with others and how she found ways to mend fences. I didn't understand the weight the drama was putting on her background and thought she was making too much a big deal out of it (literally losing her self worth when she found out she was adopted) but then I realized that her behavior was actually shaped by the people around her, especially key characters like the male lead's mother- who was actually a good person, but would not accept her at first only because she was poor... and it got even worse when they found out that she was adopted. The drama isn't necessarily justifying this way of thinking, it only shows that even people who are essentially good have prejudices and can behave badly, which leads to negative things for others. The male lead's father, Ah Sura, was technically the main antagonist in the last third of the drama and the actor playing him did a great* job. His obsession with his dog Andre, was also hilarious.
The male lead Ah Da Mo wasn't always good to Sa Ran, but like the rest, was still essentially good. This has one of those tropes where it takes awhile for the male lead to realize he loves the female lead and it causes her to suffer for a bit...but when he finally realizes it, he makes it up to her and also suffers a lot trying to win her back. The way he broke up with her was pretty callous, but it turns out that it was because he knew his father would never accept her (he is technically right about this, because chairman Ah Sura made life a living hell for both* of them later on); this probably has the best grovel scene from a male lead for a female lead that I've seen; I mean literal groveling. The scene (along with the events that lead to it) was very dramatic.
Things I feel neutral about: Some anti-Japanese themes...Japanese guys harassing Korean women in the subway...the male lead goes to Japan and after reflecting in an onsen, decides to break up with the female lead...
There's a supernatural event here that feels out of place. As punishment for the way he treated Sa Ran, chairman Ah Sura gets possessed by different ghosts...this feels out of place in a drama with no supernatural themes, but I think the actor did a great* job acting like an old ahjumma, a warrior from the past and even a little kid.
Things I didn't like: I feel bad about disliking Sa Ran's birth mother, because she was poor and disabled, but it really annoyed me how she didn't do anything throughout the story but cry about the child she gave away and stare off into space and be miserable. I honestly hate how she left a defenseless baby on the doorstep, vulnerable and exposed to all kinds of harm and didn't even bother to leave a letter to explain who this baby was (she was actually the cause of all the female lead's problems)...but even this I excused because other shows also have this scene where they sacrifice a character's common sense for dramatic purposes...even Doctor Who had a scene where a baby was left on a doorstep.
The female lead's birth parents were the flattest characters in the entire story...they had no personality and they didn't do anything but talk about their missing child. At least the birth father (Dr. Geum) developed some personality later when he had a rivalry with chairman Ah Sura.
I feel confused about the representation of the Gisaeng in this drama and whether it was trying to present them in a positive or negative light. Madame Oh was very gracious and majestic as the head of Buyeongak...she also made a good point that if Japan could keep its geisha culture, then Korea should also be able to preserve the Gisaeng. I just don't understand why all the other characters looked down on the Gisaeng so much. They weren't doing anything wrong and the scenes in the Gisaeng house were pretty wholesome...then the show introduced this archaic practice (raising one's hair) which struck me as very demeaning and outdated...I can see this practice being done in a historical drama, but in 2011?? The problem is that the show wasn't trying to depict the prejudices that people had towards the Gisaeng...it was showing how most of the characters (even the morally upright ones) viewed being a gisaeng as something very negative and something to be ashamed of.
When Madame Oh finds out that Sa Ran's step parents are literally thrown off a cliff in the last episode, she thinks it's karma for how they forced her (Sa Ran) to become a gisaeng to answer for their money problems. If being a gisaeng is such a bad thing, then why did Madame Oh decide to become one and want to preserve the tradition in the first place? It felt anti-thematic.
Was this review helpful to you?
This review may contain spoilers
Long but enjoying
I might drop even those dramas that are of 16 episodes but I can't believe that I watched the whole of 52 episodes!!This drama depicts the difficulties and the prejudices that Gisaengs face in today's world. It was very touching. I really liked how any of the characters were not so negative that our blood starts boiling. I won't give a major spoiler but Ra Ra was a really good best friend. She did not become a b!tch like most of the Chinese dramas and made up with Sa Ran so quickly. She didn't break her friendship for a man. This whole drama was completely logical (except that ghost part). Never did I get those thoughts like ''seriously?'', ''what's going on?" or "this is too much" etc. while watching this drama.
Overall it's a good watch.
Was this review helpful to you?
The acting was really good for the most part. Baek Oh Dam (Gong Joo) had me balling every time she cried. I loved the OST.
Was this review helpful to you?
Was this review helpful to you?
Many haven't watched this but i really really love this drama. I Really recommend this drama for everybody who likes family dramas with romance and a nice storyline.
When they made this drama most of the cast was unknown and it were their first time acting in a drama but their acting is really good! So i really loved the cast and their characters!!! The drama is a little 52 episodes for some people but for me it was perfect.
But in the beginning some parts were to slow but is normal, and if you hang on you will realise that this is a really good drama.
Was this review helpful to you?
