DanaL

First of all, try to use some punctuation marks, especially the point and the comma. It's difficult to read a long text like yours, everything is just going on and on and never ends.

I can see that you misunderstood a lot of things in what I've said. Don't know if that comes from ignorance or intentionally. I didn't want to hurt anybody and from your tone I see you took everything personally. I used there some smileys with intention to make you understand that it's a joke.

Nobody here kicks out their kids when they're 18. Nobody leaves their kids, even after they get married and having their own kids. Parents' role is to guide, to give advise and to love and cherish their own kids until the end. But make the difference between "advise" and "give approval" (in other words is "force", if you don't approve). We respect our children from the day they are born.

In our mentality a child is a little person, has rights and deserves respect. If parents beat/neglect/starve/exploit their children here, they go to jail or the kids are removed from home. Children are on the 1st place everywhere: emergency rooms, transportation, investigations, etc. But from nursery they are taught to be independent, kindergarten teaches them how to eat alone, to get dressed alone, to clean their own mess - all with the gentle guidance and help of the parents and educators, together.

I use to say "Give wings to your kid to be able to fly alone", watching, explaining and guiding. That means you have to let the kid to make alone a lot of things, you as a parent watching like a shadow, without force and punishment. Valid also later, when kids are teens, young persons and even adults.
Believe me, an 18 years old here wants to move out, they have already their own will, friends and maybe lovers - they wouldn't want to party with friends disturbing the parents or come with the lover in their parents' home. They need their own space and privacy. At 18, they are already adults, are respected as adults and have the responsibility of own actions. And they earn their own money - they are financially independent from their parents. If they don't earn enough they ask for help and the parents offer their help. Anytime, even when the kids are 50 :)

About money: as long as you are under your parents' responsibility, you get all you need and ask for - if their economy allows. After you start earning own money, if you ask for money from your parents, they ask you "When do you think you can give them back?" Parents don't give money just like that to their adult child, but borrow without interest. They expect to get their money back, if they don't say it's a gift. Parents also work, have needs and most of all have a life. If their adult kids are some loosers, it's not their duty to feed them till they die. Or to bust in their kids life and dictate about how to live their own life, to "give approval".
A little fact: if you live with your parents after you are 18, you start paying your contribution to the house's expenses. You pay your share of the rent and some to the bills (food, electricity, warming, etc.) You don't live for free, like a parasite:)

When thinking about my life, my husband's or all those people around us (friends, relatives, acquaintances, etc), I simply laugh thinking about our parents giving approval ... We had some special times here in the 1970's and 1980's... Those decades changed the world we live in. A child growing up in a house where the mother or the father or both are unhappy, will not learn what means a good marriage. A mother that stays in a hell of a marriage only for the sake of her children is not a hero. When children grow up a little and understand, they will feel guilty. It's more toxic for a child to grow up into a bad marriage than to be into a poorer house but where is a good ambience. I would go nuts to have a hell of a father/mother which I don't respect and being forced to wait for their approval to make my own life.

The last thing: gossips will never change a criminal into an honest person. It's the police job. In vain people talk and talk and condemn the bad doings of a person if police and justice don't put them away, because of corruption or unfit laws.

To be honest, I don't get why she had to hide her career change. It's her wish and her decision, why should parents meddle in this? Parents' wish is that their children are happy, right? If she would choose a job only for making her parents happy and proud but she would hate it every day of her life, would be better?
It's so shameful to become an actress?
There are things that I really don't get. It's not logic :)

It's very relaxed. I think sometimes that is TOO relaxed :)

The most important here is the social skills, bullying is 99.9% eradicated and the system uses "team work" a lot. In the small grades/ kindergarten kids must play with both girls and boys, boys playing with dolls and allowed to dress in pink and skirts and girls playing with pistols and cars :)
Nobody is let outside, no matter of handicap, origin, race, religion, etc. Individualism is not seen with good eyes, but at the same time you get a personal space where you can be yourself. They avoid as much as possible to make rankings ("the best", "the worst" and "in between"), all kids are considered special and each one good at something. And the school's job is to find that "something" and tell what it is.

Learning must be funny, kids learn from playing. They have, for example, days when they come to school with blankets, lanterns, pillows, etc and books to read. They move the furniture in the classroom, they lay on the blankets on the floor and read the books they choose. They are allowed to build some hiding places from blakets and read by flashlight. All this to make them love reading books. Not out of obligation.
My son is fascinated with psysics/chemistry, they make a lot of funny experiments in the lab, exploding things or making a lot of smoke, small rockets mounted on toy cars, etc. He's a nerd :)

There is SO important what people may think about you and the family name is such a big thing. While here nobody gives a shi* on what the neighbour is doing, we're educated to mind our own business, it's not good under any circumstances to gossip and start rumors and everybody is free to do what they think is best for them.

It was here like that 200 years ago, when women were depending financially on their husbands and parents and was a hell to divorce especially if there were children in the middle, a woman could not afford to raise them alone. "The people" were thinking badly about a divorcee, her kids were having a tough life too and a stigma. And the parents dictated who to marry and how much it costs.

To come with the argument "drug dealer" is ridiculous. How many drug dealers you know? :))
And in the end, if she is in love with a drug dealer is her own mistake, not her parents'. In life, if something goes wrong because you made a wrong judgement at one point, it's your own mistake and you pay for it. But if your parents make the wrong choice for you - it's still you that pay for it. If you take their advice and marry the wrong partner, it's your life and not theirs, you live with him/her and not they.

What if the father is a drug dealer? Has he still the right to decide who and how? :))

I don't think the Japanese one is better. In my opinion, compared to the Korean is superficial. It goes on the fact that ML is deaf and the FL is not developed enough to manage a relationship with a man older and having that issue. She's in her 20's but acts like a kid. No way she could say something like "It feels like we're having a silent conversation that never ends in a quiet world of our own".
The Korean version is on a completely different level, much higher and deeper at the same time :)) I would give a huge hug to that writer who could create this beautiful piece of art. And even a bigger one to that person who cast Jung Woo Sung in this role. I imagine that directing him in this series is a kind of "peak of happiness" :)

Here you must be around 18 to start the uni. There are some obligatory steps before you can enroll in university, to build a background of knowledge absolutely necessary to understand what is taught at the uni.
And you have 1 year, the 10th (after the obligatory 9th to graduate the public school), where you can deepen your knowledge if you are not sure you assimilated all it's required to know at high school, the next step before university. You can choose in that 10th to learn only those subjects you feel you lack some parts. Or simply you don't feel yourself ready to go on one path or you don't know yet which path to take for a future career. So you are given an extra year to do what you think is best for you.
I think we have different kinds of systems.
Anyway, at 16 I think it's too early for the university life. Here we think that young people should enjoy their teen years and start slowly and step by step towards an adult stage: small jobs, more and more responsibility, bigger and bigger projects, etc. In school, pupils don't get grades until they are in the 8th grade (my son is almost 15 and in 8th grade).The 9th is the final and they start a year before to get ready for the final graduate exam.

They don't get homeworks until the 4th grade, starting from kindergarten class (named 0 class, at 5-6 years old) they leave their books and notebooks in school. They go home and play, because they are kids and have to be happy. Almost all kids have free time activities (a form of sport or a club for kids or somewhere where they can practice their hobbies).
Even if they are over the 4th, if they are clever and fast enough, they have some time to make their homeworks in school and are free at home to do something they like.

It's much to tell :)

She's an adult not hanging up economically on her parents. She has the right to hide whatever she wants from her family, if she thinks that is right for her.
And introduce him to them when she feels it's the time for that.
I feel like parents in that area of the world are like detectives :) They MUST know everything. :)

Here if you study full time you get stipendium and lodging.
If you start a vocational school, you get paid for the hours you spend on a practice place (where you practically learn the trade and produce value) which place use to be a firm/enterprise/business/etc.

The system is built in that way that young people can earn their own money, they are interested to be as good as possible, their earnings increase with the quality and quantity of their contribution. They get confidence in their own skills, learn something for their future and firms/ enterprises/etc make money from their contribution.

Parents are not pressured to sustain their children. If you are in university, that means your parents should pay for you until 25 or something, if you want a master or a doctor degree that means over 30.
All educational system is free, from primary school to university (and postgraduate).
Of course, I speak about the public education not private.

Watching so many Asian movies and series in the past years, I have learnt some things: parents have too many rights over their children, busting in their lives no matter if the children are married, adults, with own kids. They decide who to marry and this is done in their own interest, giving a shi* if the children are unhappy for life.
They decide which path the children should take, no actress, no artist and it's imperative they have to graduate a college. If not, they are very dissapointed. There is most important also to have a college degree if you want to marry well. Nobody cares if you are a good person, with other qualities.

Children have to obey their parents and in-laws, daughters especially have a hell of a life, being bullied until the old ones die.
At least this is in the movies, but I am sure that there is a seed of truth.

Being born and raised in Europe, you can imagine my view about this issues. I live in Scandinavia where in raising children is most important to give them personal space. A 100% contrast to the above. Parents use to think "We've made a huge mistake in our child upraising" if the child is not moving out at 18 and not being independent. Parents never show unannounced, only by invitation or giving a call asking if their kid is home and having time for a visit (if not today, then when?).

It's in human nature to react like that when we don't understand something. We tend to be afraid of things beyond our comprehension. If her parents have never been in connection with a deaf person, they didn't know how to communicate or react. But they were ok, they were quite polite and decent in their behaviour. Compared to his neighbour, grandmother to that little boy.

Another story with the brother, he was really rude to ML, his own sister and even his own girlfriend. Maybe because he is moving in training area, where all people look or trying to look perfect psysically, he has no understanding for any psysical "defect", he's looking down to people who are not "perfect". He's thinking about himself being beautiful and perfect psysically and cannot accept some "permanent damages". His best friend is in the music industry - it's unacceptable near him a person who cannot and will never be able to hear music.
And I think he knows his friend's feelings for his sister, he would like to see them together.

About her concerns, I find them normal. Sign language is not enough to have a good relationship with a deaf person. There are many levels to go through, he was the one rejecting a relationship, she had to insist and persist - but in that way he wouldn't feel "attacked" or forced. And she has also her pride, like any person. It's really hard for her making him open himself and explain how his world works, so she could understand him from all angles. And even after she understands him, there must be a lot of patience, insight and a perfect fit between them, her life with him wouldn't be so easy - both internal and external reasons.

The advantage to sing for a deaf person is that he will never know how out of tune you are :) Joking.
I am watching that moment again and again and can't believe what a great actor he is.
They say our verbal communication is only 7% and the rest of 93% is non verbal. This guy speaks with his eyes, no doubt in what he's telling.

And I can't really see the ML of the Korean version falling in love with a jumping around woman like the Japanese FL. That FL from the Japanese version was maybe in her 20's but was behaving like a toddler, jumping around and falling on her butt. It's ok to act like that, I have nothing against it, each with their own way, but would never make the Korean ML to think romantically and sexually about her. He's a teacher, maybe would approach her as a pupil-teacher and nothing more.
Anyway, to make the Korean FL behave in the way of the Japanese FL would give a caricature. People would think she's nuts.

You'd miss a lot of great movies and watch a lot of crap for the sake of a happy end.
But, as you say, you can choose.

Why do people think that movies must be all happy stories and have happy ends? Movies are stories on screen and not all stories are happy or have a happy end. To say "Don't watch because there is no happy ending" is absurd.
If everybody thought this way, movies like "Titanic", "Million dollar baby", "Forrest Gump", "Love story", "Philadelphia", "The green mile" and so many thousands other would have never been awarded and loved by billions of people.

Missunderstanding or her parents don't accept him for his deafness. I look with some suspicion also at her brother.
Parents in some cultures have too many rights to mix in their adult children lives. I really hate when I see this. Because I've never seen any good outcome from doing that. Only deep unhappiness for their kids.

Agree :)

I live in Scandinavia, the vikings' teritory :)
Men crying it became acceptable here (even paternity leave up to 20 weeks:)), we started to change our views, it's about learning expressing feelings and mental health. No shame, just be yourself.
But there was a huge river of tears :) It's true that alcohol had also it's part in this.

Too much crying for my taste. It was like a highly contagious thing, spreading from one to the next :)

Yesterday I wanted to sent a comment to that person who is obsessed with cheating and sends here a lot of crappy messages about the Japanese version. But I am 100% sure that my message wouldn't change anything, would be only waisting of time, energy and electric power from my side :)
The Japanese FL is just a girl, I think a teenager not even 20 and slightly stupid - in my opinion. In the half of the 1st episode FL and ML have already met few times and she didn't get the fact that the man is deaf, asking him to reherse with her on the scene to be "the other character", helping to learn her own lines. So dense is she. It was necessary that a kid told her about his condition.
She's running around and jumping up and down like a toddler in the kindergarten, they've met after she tried many times to pick an apple from a tree and fell on her butt. He picked that apple for her.

I don't see any resemblance with her in the Korean version. But even if the Korean plot developes in the same way, I think some people should realize that it's only a movie :))

We are speaking here about movies, right?