Kdrama-lover-4ever

sending live links is evidently verboten. ommitted them and things sent.

Reply to @Eleison "invalid linking permission" so I took out the link

I shared this "with another user, also fairly new to Kdramas, and thought it might be helpful. It will be LONG, just to warn you:
Woah, it really is long, I love long. Thank you!!!!


What streaming site(s) do you have access to/use?
almost everything, my son is a video buff to say the least. I don’t want pirated sites stuff, I like being able to recommend stuff and pirating precludes that.

That also determines what you can see unless you use pirated sites.

I use Rakuten Viki and Netflix (in the U.S.).
me too but I quit Rakuten until they let me log on with ease. Haven’t watched it as much as I thought I would but like with the nyt and wapo, it’s nice to be able to access it, Rakuten is worth the price, but may be awhile before fixing the login mess trumps watching Kdramas!

Here are some genres/types and super famous ones that you can try and look into to help you decide what you like (those marked "a favorite" are some of my personal favorites (I also loved CLOY and Stranger! In my top 10!)):
Yes I hope your top 10 is somewhere in here! (found it!)


The Replys (these have a family drama feel, with a main focus on romance and friendship):
-Reply 1988 (the best of the three; the Replys are a but edgier content/humor-wise than most dramas, but the end of this one wallops a massive gut-punch that left me a weepy mess; Kdramas rarely do that, though the beginning was a slog for me)
-Reply 1994
-Reply 1997
Switching to bullet points bc you are using the hyphen. Haven’t seen any of the Replys

The Schools (set in high school and themed around attending school):
-School 2013 (the best of the schools, in my opinion--quite good!)
-Who Are You: School 2015
-School 2017
-School 2021 (not great, in my opinion; very weak compared to the rest)
NOTE: may not enjoy these if you're far removed from high school and don't work in education.
Not crazy about boys over flowers but am giving it time. I’m a substitute teacher who does tk thru 4th, and 5th if I know them, otherwise I’m too easily played so probably the high school dramas will not be a draw. Note, bullet points have turned back into asterisks and I am too tired to figure it out.

Ghost/Afterlife/Reincarnation Dramas (I will exclude the slough
slough is often used when one wants to say slew meaning bunch. I looked it up so you don’t have to lol. Proofreading is a genetic “gift” from my grandfather, a WW1 veteran who worked on the stars & stripes with the French. Love the French. Dating myself: born 5/3/52.

of many recent dramas with the reincarnation trope since I'm not familiar with them yet (some of these below have some romance but are not always "happy" endings; many dramas of this genre have ambiguous endings)):
Good to know. I found out how to get the bullet points back. They need a space after the asterisk.


-Hotel De Luna (very famous)
-Mystic Pop-Up Bar
-Missing: The Other Side (2 seasons)
-Tomorrow
-Bring It On, Ghost
-Ghost Doctor (also a Medical Drama, enjoyable; Kim Bum is adorable)
-The Master's Sun (a classic)
-Uncanny Counter (has a lot of action (with evil spirits and is also dark despite also being quite comedic))
supernatural is not my thing, likewise modern gumino/goblin fantasy dramas, but may gie the best of them a chance sometime in the future.

Modern Gumiho/Goblin Fantasy Dramas:
-Goblin: The Lonely And Great God (a classic; super famous, with a beautiful but kind of sad ending; be warned!)
-Tales of the Nine-Tailed (2 seasons)
-My Girlfriend Is a Gumiho
-My Roommate Is A Gumiho
-Kiss Goblin

Office Dramas (not usually my thing, I've decided):
-Hot Stove League (also a teeny bit of sports)
-The Good Manager
-Suits
-My Mister
-Search: WWW
-Unlock My Boss (sort of) (cute, with an unecessary sad part 1/3 of the way through)
-Shooting Stars (sort of) (cute)
-Misaeng: The Complete Life
-Start-Up (but also a Healing drama; beautifully written, hard to get through; may want to avoid if you get second male lead (SML) syndrome)

just came across the term sml TODAY. Will be interesting to see it explained organically in the films I watch. Don’t explain it to me pls. It might be like in business proposal in which both couples get happy endings. *oops spoiler but no real surprise there lol. So Korea seems desperate to get the message out: pair up! Build families!

probably will watch all of the office dramas since business proposal and others all took place with offices. Is there a chaebol category? I’d probably like them all. Loved Rich Crazy Asians, have you seen it? And Memories of the Alhambra?? So different.


Slice-Of-Life/Romance/Healing Dramas:
-Oh My Venus (a classic)
-True Beauty
-My ID Is Gangnam Beauty
-Castaway Diva (also a found family drama with a light suspenseful component) (a favorite; a Park Hye Ryun drama. I have LOVED anything written by her)
Have you seen all 8 of her tv shows? (censored)
And here’s a link I came across to the winners and nominees in all categories of the last 14 years of drama awards: censored.
The entire category of Slice-Of-Life/Romance/Healing Dramas:holds great appeal.
-Live On
-Another Miss Oh
-Our Beloved Summer
-At A Distance, Spring Is Green
-Hometown Cha Cha Cha
-Move To Heaven (no romance)
-It's Okay To Not Be Okay (very... unique (?) female lead)
-Beauty Inside
-Hogu's Love
-Angel's Last Mission
-When The Camellia Blooms
-Fight For My Way
-Once Upon A Small Town
-Romance Is A Bonus Book
-Itaewon Class (could also solidly go in the Revenge Drama category)
-Go Back Couple
-Thirty But Seventeen (or Still 17)
-What Happened to Secretary Kim? (a classic)
-Do You Like Brahms?

Sports/Slice-of-Life (some have romance below) Dramas:
-Weightlifting Fairy Kim Bok Joo (a favorite)
-Run-On
-Racket Boys (a favorite; very light romance)
-My Lovely Boxer

Melancholy Slice-Of-Life/Healing (some with romance) Dramas:
-The Good Bad Mother (has some suspense also)
-My Mister
-Just Between Lovers
-Moment At Eighteen
-Prison Playbook (has a teeny bit of sports, too)

Romance/Action, and a Thriller element (but light compared to the Crime dramas farther down) (love all of these, and all classics):
-The K2
-Crash Landing On You
-Vagabond
-Descendents Of The Sun
-Strong Woman Do Bong Soon
-Healer
-W: Two Worlds
-The King2Hearts (is alternative reality that pretends Korea still has a monarchy, but is also quite dated; I skipped all the ridiculous villain scenes until the end when he became important; something cozy about the classic old dramas despite all their flaws)

Historical (called "sageuk," and can be quite long) Dramas:
-Mr. Sunshine (be warned; sad ending)
-Six Flying Dragons (a classic)
-Moon Embracing The Sun (a classic)
-Tree With Deep Roots
-Under The Queen's Umbrella (a favorite, cool female lead)
-Rebel: Thief Who Stole The People (another favorite)
-Warrior Baek Dong Soo
-Sungkyunkwan Scandal (cross-dressing) (cool female lead)
-Tale of Nokdu (cross-dressing)
-100 Days My Prince
-The Crowned Clown
-The Bridal Mask (also quite dated; prepare yourself for over acting and bad sets 😅, and torture; but there's something special about it still)
-The King's Affection (cross-dressing)

Fusion Sageuk (have anachronistic and/or fantasy elements) Dramas:
-Alchemy Of Souls (2 Parts) (a favorite)
-Gu Family Book
-Hwarang (some great bromance that could have been even better)
-Forbidden Marriage
-Queen In Hyun's Man
-Live Up To Your Name (also a Medical Drama)
-Splash, Splash Love (only 3 episodes)
-Arthdal Chronicles
-The Secret Romantic Guest House
-Love In The Moonlight (cross-dressing; could be in the sageuk section, but it shamelessly rewrote history so I put it here; a classic)
-Mr. Queen (comedy, body-switching (couldn't get past the body-switching))
I thought it was a hilarious premise and didn’t even recognize the actress, who I first saw in Welcome to my 19th Life or something like that, excellent emotive actress(also star of Welcome to Samdal-ri!) but I think the last few episodes are going to be really dark.

Medical Dramas:
-Dr. Romantic (3 seasons) (2nd season is a favorite; haven't seen Season 3, but Season 1 is also good)
-The Good Doctor (American show of the same name based on this)
-Hospital Playlist (2 seasons) (quite famous)
-Doctor Stranger (end is kind of a train wreck, but Lee Jong Suk is great. :))
-Beautiful Mind

Modern or Urban Fairytale/Fantasy Dramas:
-I Can Hear Your Voice (also a Law Drama) (one of my all-time favorites (a Park Hye Ryun drama))
-Pinocchio
-While You Were Sleeping (also a Law Drama) (one of my all-time favorites, a classic (a Park Hye Ryun drama))
-I'm Not A Robot (a favorite)
-Legend Of The Blue Sea (a classic) (this drama and the next are by Park Ji Eun, who wrote CLOY)
-My Love From The Star (a classic)
Ooh thank you. Also I really enjoyed My Lovely Liar
-My Lovely Liar
-Are You Human Too?

Law Dramas:
-Law School (a favorite)
-Miss Hammurabi
-Extraordinary Attorney Woo (a new classic)
-The Devil Judge (also Revenge and Action/Thriller)
-The Lawless Lawyer (also Action/Thriller)
-Suspicious Partner (but also heavy on romance; famous but not my favorite)

Action/Thriller/Detective/Crime (serial killer plot) Dramas:
-Beyond Evil
-Flower Of Evil (a classic)
-Stranger (2 seasons, also Law Drama) (a favorite, a classic)
-The Good Detective (2 seasons)
-Signal (a favorite, a classic)
-My Perfect Stranger
-Tunnel (a favorite, a classic)
-Bad and Crazy
-He Is Psychometric
-The Memorist
-Hello, Monster/I Remember You
-Mouse (famous for a major plot twist)
Oh now I see. I thought Mouse was one of the characters in Boys before Flowers lol

Monsters/Zombies/Paranormal:
-Sweet Home (famous, the 1st Season in particular; the monsters have kind of a stop motion kind of movement to them; unique! Very gory)
One more episode of Blue Eye Samurai left to watch. Altho I don’t like gore, this particular anime makes it beautiful. Beautifully told, as well. Rated at least R.
-Zombie Detective
-All Of Us Are Dead
-Happiness
-Search
-Duty After School (Part 1 was good (a bit gory for me), but I never watched Part 2 because I heard it was terrible)

Revenge Dramas:
-Vincenzo
-The Glory

Older Classics:
-The Heirs (has a makjang feel, like My Perfect Marriage Revenge)
Can’t find the word makjang anywhere, so I see you defined it 2 paragraphs below!

-Dream High
-Boys Over Flowers (I like the new Thai version the best, but there's a Korean, Taiwanese, Chinese, Japanese and Thai version; probably THE biggest drama of all time across all the Asian countries, and a must watch, just to say you have; has the famous hard-working poor girl meets chaebol heir that is the most famous romance trope in Kdramas, so, definitely a Kdrama Rite Of Passage)
-Coffee Prince
-Secret Garden (body-switching; the ML is a jerk for a VERY long time)

There's a bunch of famous makjang ones (these are the soapy dramas), like Penthouse, and there are a bunch like it (you can tell just from the posters, haha). My Father Is Strange and My Perfect Marriage were all I could do.

And by the way, these are all Korean dramas. JDramas are not my thing (neither are Thai dramas, usually, since most are BLs (Boys Love)

So that would be males loving males, I saw a little of one and it surprised me that there is a whole genre.

, and I don't watch those), and I've only watched a few Chinese Dramas that were super highly rated (Hidden Love (modern romance drama), When I Fly Towards You, (modern romance drama with high schoolers growing up together) and Love Like The Galaxy (historical drama)), and they were very good. Chinese Dramas just have a different feel than Kdramas and I'm not sure I'm into it, and

Me, too: I kind of started with the best so I'm scared to venture into lower rating territory
as I tried one and quickly dropped it. Cdramas are even more unrealistic and fluffy than Kdramas, which is saying something. 😏

This is probably WAY more than you wanted, haha, but I had fun compiling this and trying to decide what categories to use to group them. I'd also recommend you track the screenwriters you like as you watch, because they tend to write similar types of things and have consistent quality; tracking them can help you know what you'll like and what to look for (for instance, Castaway Diva, I Can Hear Your Voice and While You Were Sleeping are dramas I dearly love, and all have the same screenwriter; I know now she's always going to be one of my favorites)

I wonder if the latest of her screenwriting projects has production paused bc the female lead is Bae Suzy (wikipedia just said Suzy but the only one I’ve heard of is Bae Suzy) was the girlfriend of the actor who recently took his life.


. :) Enjoy!!

Aww, it’s over too soon! Why don’t you send it off to Netflix so they will know what to buy next?! Since I am the Queen of Excellent Ideas, pls give it some thought!!


I think I mentioned, it's fun to listen in Spanish w English subtitles. Viki has that option pretty frequently.


It was really fun getting this. I’m a fast typist thru training so it was fun responding as well. These are the last 4 days of a 24 day vacation and we’ve had on and off showers with more to come, huge waves from San Francisco to San Diego, the footage is available on youtube. No damage here near Eureka CA but with the king tides happening as they normally do at this time of year coupled with the rare long train of Atmospheric River storms coming all the way from Japan, I’ve never seen swells as big as we got here. Ours were nothing like Mavericks Beach at Half Moon Bay where surfing contests are held but still ours were beautiful to see and there are more tomorrow.


It’s very interesting–or was to me–to explore Viki/Rakuten’s system for subtitling positions, they use a video game model. Kind of brilliant tho needs improvement and ironically those volunteer subtitlers could be watching these great Kdramas!


Thank you, thank you, thank you!!

I might have done something wrong. I got an ominous message after I tried to post that they will review me! sharon myers aka Kdrama...will try to send it again. Not sure why they reviewed, maybe bc i included my gmail address which is my name. I only did bc without the bullet points of my annotation, it's a lot to wade thru. Weirdest feeling.

I might have done something wrong. I got an ominous message after I tried to post that they will review me! sharon myers aka Kdrama...will try to send it again. Not sure why they reviewed, maybe bc i included my gmail address which is my name. I only did bc without the bullet points of my annotation, it's a lot to wade thru. Weirdest feeling.

That's funny bc my sister, whom I'd not seen in years, found me "garrulous". Maybe many are just putting up with me. Using the spoiler alert is a great idea if one's post is long, more privacy that way. Also one could make one's own spoiler alert as like a title to the post and be quite specific about what one was spoiling without spoiling it. Now that could be fun.

It's rough when you like something just barely enough to keep following it. Maybe you should set it aside until it is finished and find something more gripping to watch in the meantime? What did you really enjoy? What genres capture you?

I've found it helps to watch several at once, there are a lot of great "oldies" you can find and binge watch while waiting a few weeks so you can not be at the mercy of waiting for the next episode to drop. @Eleison had a great tip for finding the ones you will like, follow the work of scriptwriters of the works you love best!!

thanks for the tip of Nevertheless

@Armadillo1mil. I'm trying to understand you. I don't pick up on sarcasm easily, I like to assume good intentions and sarcasm tends to be passively aggressive. What would be the advantage of a 5 letter username? I see yours is long. And how would one rename their name? And then how would people seek out their comments when they are really good like those of @Clinically-Insane? I guess maybe watching all of these K-Dramas have increased my liking for. the values of courtesy and politeness as a basis for having better interactions. Again, I ask you: What are YOUR favorite KDramas if you care to say.

Having watched it and waiting for the next episode to drop, I think the 8 years thing is a plot device to let her career blossom so she can become famous enough that she is newsworthy and eligible for cancellation if someone tries. Spoiler alert: If it were unrequited love, that would be one thing, but when it is true love but society eg the father's withholding of his blessing in the culture they are in--well true love doesn't just stop because of great obstacles. Neither of the couple are at fault. And he is growing as a meteorologist,pujtting in his 10K hours (an Outliers reference) it seems to me he has been raised in nature and prefers it to the urban experience. A city mouse-country mouse analogy, perhaps? And the other member of the group in the fancy car that is the one REALLY pursuing unrequited love went ahead and did his rise to wealth thing, he wasn't wasting his time pursuing people he wasn't drawn to, or choosing bad love interests to drown his (her sorrow which I think is really what over consumption is really all about, drowning jpainful feelings? @Eleison, @Clinically-Insane

I don't know why you would say that. They're having a great discussion, actually!

@Clinically-Insane, why won't you be able to reply again> Can you make a new post and tag me in it to answer?

I hope that wasn't sarcasm; I'm pretty dense. What are YOUR favorites? Please, do tell!

@Eleison, knowing my favorites, and probably Stranger and Crash Landing on You, what would you recommend for me? And have you seen Memories of the Alhambra? What a surprise! I wonder if someone like Hyun Bin gets enough fame from CLoY to then have first crack at best scripts? Your pro tip about following screenwriters is gold & I hope you find a wide audience! Happy New Year!

@Eleison, first of all thank you for the detailed, enriching reply including an exquisite piece of music at the close of your remarks! It is interesting replying to someone in these comments bc it is so public; sending a hateful remark is like adding hatred to everyone's feeds and this is the exact opposite of that. I can only hope that everyone finds your remarks as thought provoking as I do bc then your posts will be longer and even more detailed as you relax into being appreciated. (btw, MDL needs to improve their spoiler alert bc it hides your WHOLE POST if you check the spoiler box and your spoiler wasn't even about Welcome to Samdal-ri! but about a plot twist in Boys over Flowers which I will watch next) You make such interesting points, I could go on and on about them but then people who read this will start telling me to get a room lol.

Thanks for the pro tip about following screenwriters, hadn't thought of that. I do check out actors and explore other things they've done (just getting started with that) and my thinking is that as they get more acclaim they have access to lead roles and better quality scripts so it works in a "follow the money" kind of way, tho the analogy isn't perfect. I was surprised to find that the star of Stranger was the SAME STAR as Divorce Attorney Shin. It was shocking because he was so immersed in his very different roles that I didn't recognize him! Also Korean names drive me crazy! But that is offset by getting to see into another culture. (Also, when possible, I set the audio to Spanish to get a better idea of intonation.)

I first became enamored with foreign films from Cinema Paradiso (spoiler alert--the trailer is a bunch of spoilers) but I had seen the best first. That let me be open to Say it Again which is a Bollywood flick. I hadn't know Bollywood exists, or that all over the world, people watch for the excitement, the endless plot twists, the woven-in elaborate dance numbers, the incredible music, the screen idols. There is no sequel or parts 2, 3, and 4. They put it all in the initial film! (or at least they did.) But nothing has been able to suck me in like K-Dramas. The moral of the story is that like other good products, you can research them and find exactly what suits you.

A little too much rambling, sorry! Thanks for the virtual gifts of Mozart's exquisite piece of music and your sharing of your insights and knowledge! Have a fabulous day!

after episode 10, it is much clearer why he made the choices he did. the answers are often in the epilogues at the end of each episode.

@Clinically-Insane and @Eleison, love your thought-provoking comments! thank you. Having recently discovered KDramas, at this point I am down the rabbit hole and can't help but wonder if they are government-sponsored to improve the birthrate of Korea by portraying true love and rekindling the ideals of love, loyalty, family, etc in the face of adversity. I agree it is important to explore the different subgenres of Kdramas in order to find the ones that are a perfect fit for YOU. I especially love when commenters list a few of their favorite movies so I can widen what I am open to. And for me it is fun to have English subtitles with Spanish audio so I can improve my Spanish painlessly. So far, I have watched Crash Landing on You and Stranger twice, loved Extraordinary Attorney Woo which was the gateway drug for me, and loved King the Land, Business Proposal, What's Wrong with Secretary Kim, Red Sleeve (on Viki.com) See you in my 19th Life, Divorce Attorney Shinn, and now, Welcome to Samdal-ri. I find admiration and love for the Korean people increasing. I find Viki's subtitling system of harnessing fans' free time to create subtitles in many languages both comical and brilliant.