PrettyCarEye

Ok, thank you, dear. Enjoy your trip!

Yeah, but how soon did she realize her feelings? Early in the drama or late in the drama? And tell me about the end too! :)

Chrissy, chingu, tell me about this drama. Is this one of those ambiguous love triangles in which we don't know who will get the girl until the end? Your review got me interested in this drama, but I don't want to watch it if it's all about the love triangle.

I think his name is Wang Xiao.

If you can read Chinese characters, look here:
afspot.net/forum/topic/782730-a-clear-midsummer-night-盛夏晚晴天-2013/

I believe the actors' names are listed on the middle poster.

Keep telling yourself 'nobody really knows what happen ...' if it feeds your delusion.

No one is going to know every minute detail of the case, however the fact remains that there was enough evidence to charge and fine him, and for Kim himself to ADMIT he abused his girlfriend. You need to grow up and stop making excuses for an abuser.

I dunno, dongsængah, there was just something about his face ... and that hair! that turned me off. haha
I actually liked the husband a lot better. Much more attractive and manly, my type of man! :)

This is perhaps the 2nd time in the history of my drama watching that I preferred the 2nd lead ... although for much of the drama I thought Chris Lee was the lead.

I seriously felt bad for everyone in this drama. They all kind of were victims of circumstance. Everyone's stuck in a miserable situation with seemingly no way out. No matter which choice you make, stay or leave ... your goose is cooked. I'd surely go mad living under such oppressive conditions.

By the way, I didn't really like the bookstore guy. Probably because I don't find him all that attractive. haha I know, I'm one shallow ass mitchenyeoja! lol

In that case you do realize that most Asian men are mama's boys?

But it's not just about being a mama's boy for the sake of being a mama's boy. It's about the Confucius value of filial piety. In order to maintain some sort of social order everyone has a role to play. The old lead the young, men lead women, parents lead children, rich lead poor and so on. That's the order on which most Asian societies are built. Those who rebel against it are looked upon as deviants and outcasts.

I often become frustrated with how compliant these grown ass children are too, but you have to recognize the culture they live in, even if we can't understand it.

He makes some mistakes, but he's not a bad guy at heart. He doesn't behave the way he does because he doesn't care about his wife or wants to deliberately hurt his wife. It's nature and nurture ... the culture he was brought up in and the family he came from. He kind of doesn't know any better. I actually had a lot of sympathy for him despite everything. Maybe as you keep watching you will too, let me know!

About what?

Very well said, Orion. I couldn't have put it better!

With all due respect to you, AnnaFriesz, there is nothing professional about your article. It is clearly not an unbiased, informative reportage about his career, but rather an opinion piece written in the same admiring, fangirl tone as other Stalker's Guides. So please, don't insult our collective intelligence by suggesting otherwise. People are neither dumb nor blind. Your article is in poor taste. You're not wrong to have written it; MDL exercised poor judgment in publishing it. I'm sorry you've had to go through a lot of us speaking out against your efforts, but I hope you will learn something from this experience. Glorifying abusers, especially in a community of women, is not cool. Please think before you write next time. Wishing you all the very best of luck in writing your next article. Let's hope you choose something more appropriate to share with us!

We know enough. We know that he physically assaulted her, a charge which he himself admitted to and paid a fine for. Whether his girlfriend is an angel or not ... or whether someone is out to get him because he's a Hallyu star (like we haven't heard that before!) is really besides the point! The point is that men should not put violent hands on women. Period! Why is this so hard for people to comprehend?

And if you think sophistry and deflection from the indisputable fact that he admitted to beating her is fooling anyone then you're just as delusional as the person who runs that site you linked to.

What a lot of you abuse oppalogists (genius word, emasika!) fail to realize is that domestic violence is a serious social problem in South Korea, and indeed much of Asia. Not to say other regions are any better, but due to deep-rooted & unrelenting sexist values in these societies as a whole & in the South Korean judiciary domestic abuse cases are often not properly investigated by police or prosecutors and perpetrators often get away with a slap on the wrist, if any punishment at all. There have been cases where children have reported their fathers for beating their mothers and the police chased them away saying no filial child would ever snitch on their own father. See the UN health reports on DV in South Korea, as recent as 2012 and as far back as 2007. Very little has changed in that period of time.

This emboldens abusers to abuse again and again with impunity. Moreover, many women internalize these sexist values and subconsciously begin to resign themselves to the violent nature of their boyfriends and husbands, thinking they somehow deserve to be abused. That is why opinions that blatantly or seemingly condone, glorify or glamorise celebrities with abusive tendencies should be kept off the community's public platform. The piece should have never been published and I think it should be taken down. I'm not angry at the writer for her opinions or the fact that she wrote the article because that is her right, but she seems to be very naive and delusional in her assessment of the facts surrounding this case (as are you and a lot of people who blindly defend and make excuses for Kim's behaviour). That is why we're supposed to have editors, hopefully ones with good judgment, to filter out potentially harmful and offensive rhetoric such as this from the public sphere.

What plain & utter sophistry!

Not publishing drivel that glorify abusers and other criminal or offensive behaviour is a social responsibility of those who manage this site & the publishing of articles. This article is not an opinion piece that invites reflection and or discussion. This is an opinion piece that blatantly dismisses the severity of this man's crime by labeling it 'disputable' when it is not, and which pompously points a finger at likely critics as 'hateful'. This man is glorified as 'hubby', a 'great man and an adorable person'. Are you freakin' kidding me?

It was the height of irresponsibility to have published this article. It's a very bad idea for MDL to become a platform for normalizing abuse through articles like these when the site is populated by so many teenagers, possibly without parental supervision. Not everyone here are grown women who may or may not be able to filter acceptable behaviour vs unacceptable behaviour.

So please don't act like the outrage the article has rightfully spurred is out of order or an infringement on anyone's right to freedom of expression. The internet is a very vast place where anyone at any time can start a blog to write whatever s/he wants. Right here on MDL we have our personal news feeds upon which we can post any amount of polarizing opinions. However, MDL should at least respect its core audience, women, enough to not publish nonsense like this publicly.

All good points, Orion. I agree that how recently the incident took place shouldn't matter. This type of behaviour is NEVER okay. My point is that it's still so fresh in everyone's minds that it's hard for people to come to the conclusion that it's time to forgive him. It's too early for me, and it would seem many others, to say that and understandably so. As far as I know Kim hasn't done anything publicly (or privately) to rehabilitate his image in the eyes of the public. He issued an apology that conveyed more his regrets of getting caught than an actual understanding of the atrocity of his actions.

Also is MDL a 'news site' like soompi and the others? I've never really seen it that way, though my perception may be wrong. I see MDL as more of a social network for drama lovers. Article sourcing is not its main business, the dramas themselves are. They are why we're all here. Moreover, the vast majority of articles are opinion pieces, not factual journalism (aka news). But like any community I think there should be guidelines in place as to what's acceptable to publish. Articles that promote and or glorify certain activities or the questionable acts of celebrities that may offend the site's core group of supporters shouldn't be published, but regulated to personal blogs where writers are free to express whatever s/he likes.

MDL as a public domain shouldn't become a platform for idolizing those who act out in violence against women (or anyone really). I would really hope this is not the kind of site MDL is or will become.

Kim Hyun Joong was charged by police and fined for domestic abuse against his girlfriend. Kim himself publicly acknowledged that the incident took place and apologized for it. There is absolutely nothing 'disputable' about these facts.

Do we really want our beloved MDL to become complicit in normalizing violence against women? Do we really want to encourage young women & girls to look up to and idolize violent men who at best are very troubled people in need of serious anger management & other counselling or at worst men who simply don't respect women and see them as their personal beating sticks? Do we really want to be sending the message that it's okay to love oppa even though he beats women as long as he's handsome & can dance/sing/act (famous)? At this present point in time Kim is very clearly not 'hubby' material, as the article writer refers to him, for anyone. He's clearly not 'a great man and an adorable person'.

Women make up a large portion of the MDL community, some of whom might be victims of domestic abuse themselves. We have a social responsibility to this community of drama lovers to promote positive role models, images and messages. NOT those who violate a woman's human right to live without fear of violence against their person, esp from their intimate partners. And I don't freakin' care how crazy the girlfriend is alleged to be. She does not deserve to be beaten!

I fully respect the rights of the writer & other Kim fans to support him as much as they like, but this article is offensive and should have never been published. I hope better judgment will be exercised when assessing the newsworthiness of future articles.

The point is, Skye, this was a very serious error in judgment on the part of your editors in allowing this article to be published so soon after the incident. It's only been what ... two three months since this scandal took the drama world by storm? The entire fiasco is still too fresh in everyone's mind for this to just fly over our heads.

It shows such a lack of respect and a slap in the face of the vast majority of people who support MDL, women (and esp young impressionable girls). You have a social responsibility to your audience not to promote activities and or people who act in violence against women, whether you, the admins, are on board with the writer's views or not.

As the owners of the site you guys need to take more responsibility in training your editors as to what's acceptable to publish and what's not.

I'm not disappointed that you refuse to delete the article, I'm disappointed that you guys didn't see something wrong with publishing it in the first place!

Thanks for the head's up on PTB, I'll be sure to remove it from my list. I didn't always plan to watch it originally, but I saw some gifs from the drama on someone's profile and there was a particularly hot kiss scene that drew my attention. haha
Given how rarely we see such passionate kissing in Asian dramas I decided that I had to watch it even though the kiss turned out to be between the second leads, not the leads. For me, even though natural kissing is important, a good story is also just as important so I won't waste my time watching a drama if there's good kissing but the story sucks. I'd rather head over to Youtube and watch the kiss scenes from the drama there. I did that for Marriage Not Dating and that was good enough for me! lol

Aww, I had to smile when you mentioned you're watching ADG and like how the story is being handled. I agree with you! You know why? Because the writer of ADG is the SAME writer of Lovers! haha

Generally, this writer writes her dramas with a very mature vibe that I really like. You know how sometimes the characters in many dramas can feel like they're overgrown children even though they're adults in their 20s and 30s, sometimes even 40s? Well, Kim Eun Sook tends to avoid this childishness in her shows, which is exactly why I continue to be a fan of her work even though there's a 50% chance I won't like what she writes (way better than the Hong Sisters where there's a 90% chance I'll hate their show, though. For this reason Master's Son didn't even make a blip on my radar).

I've seen exactly 6 of KES's dramas and I liked 3 of them (Lovers, City Hall, ADG) and disliked the other 3 (Lovers in Prague, Secret Garden, Heirs) so she's definitely hit or miss. Of the 3 I liked ADG is my least favourite because 1) I'm not a fan of the actress who plays the female lead and 2) I didn't like the one-sided love angle, but even if I didn't like it ... I didn't dislike it as much as I've disliked it in other dramas that had it. Which goes to show it really depends on the writer. If you have someone decent enough it can work really well. I watched ADG very early on in my drama watching days, think it was my 4th or 5th drama. I gave it a 9 back then, but today I'd probably give it an 8.

Anyway, now that I know you're watching & liking the drama, I definitely think you should add Lovers to your list. I can't be sure, of course, but I have a strong feeling you might like it! :)

I agree with you that some actors just don't like french kissing their co-stars. Off the top of my head, Park Shin Hye and Ha Ji Won are good examples, esp PSH. But I don't think this is the case in KMHM. If you've watched Ji Sung's other dramas and movies, he's a very passionate kisser (one of the reasons I love him, haha! :). The most passionate kiss I've seen HJE participated was in Secret ... with Ji Sung. That ending kiss ... yum! (So, if anyone is indeed holding back, I don't think its Ji Sung. It's more likely to be HJE, imo).
For me physical intimacy in a romantic story is very important. If it's not there I just feel like something is missing. My brain starts going 'do not compute, do not compute'. I need the kiss. A good kiss. I'm always disappointed when all we get are hugs and hand holding and long stares and lip brushes and pursed lip kissing. It just seems unnatural that two people are soooooo in love, yet they don't kiss each other or kiss like they really mean it. I don't need to see them in bed or anything like that (although you won't hear me complaining if they do), but real and natural intimacy is a must for me.
I also know for sure that TV creatives in much of Asia have limited creative freedom (they have a lot more freedom in film than TV). The amount and severity of censorship vary from country to country, but if we're talking about South Korea alone, there are very strict censorship laws that government what appears on national TV, not only intimacy levels, but even certain storylines are discouraged or downright banned. For eg, teenage pregnancy and single motherhood. Usually if these issues are portrayed in a drama there are very specific ways the storyline must be resolved: either the woman/girl gets an abortion/miscarries or she marries the baby's father or she gives up the baby for adoption/send the baby away to live in the US. Her choosing to raise the baby on her own as a single (teenage) parent is absolutely frowned upon and a big no, no. It will probably only get shown on late night TV, if it is shown at all.
When it comes to intimacy (kissing, cuddling, sex) on TV, younger actors, esp those 25 and under, are banned from french kissing and doing bed scenes because the agents want to promote them as pure & innocent in order to keep their audience as wide as possible. Children/teenagers & housewives are the two biggest TV demographics in SK. Of course there's an exception to every rule, but this is generally how things go down in South Korean showbiz. Even some actors in their late 20s and early 30s still want to promote this image, but in cases where the actors are grown adults and may want to do a proper kiss or bed scene they are restricted in what they can do because the scene must cater not only to the censors but also the target audience. If there's any possibility that younger viewers will watch the drama, then we end up getting this 'simple' type of kissing (most dramas have 15 yrs as an appropriate age rating). This is not always the case, sometimes the censors will overlook an extra dose of passion in certain dramas, but most of the time, no.

My turn to apologise. They really need to start notifying us about comments on reviews! Hopefully, it's on J-in's massive to do list. Anyway ...

I see, well I haven't watched Protect the Boss yet and I must say your comment doesn't encourage me to prioritize it on my watchlist. I don't like 'who is she going to choose' type dramas. I really hate triangles, esp ambiguous ones where it's anybody's guess who the lead ends up with. I like a well defined OTP from beginning to end.

I also prefer when the OTP are already in love or have warm feelings for each other, rather than the love being one-sided for most of the drama. Which is the problem I had with Greatest Love, not the fact that Dok Go Jin fell in love too quickly. I actually got really annoyed with that drama around ep 11 because the female lead continued to be so hot & cold. One minute she was into him, another minute she was pushing him away. I found it exceedingly frustrating and one of the reasons why I can't stand Hong Sister dramas. This is a staple of their writing, I really hate it. Another thing is that their dramas tend to have really horrible kissing. They're good at coming up with some very comedic situations to put their characters in, but their romances seem more appropriate for teenagers than grown adults.

So while I agree that it can be very satisfying to watch the build-up of a relationship rather than one that takes off running right away, I really hate when the characters take forever to become an official couple. I think good 'love at first sight' stories depend on the writer & the story itself. They can work if the writer is able to create a balance between the love and the challenges that love faces underway. One shouldn't outweigh the other or we end up with the situation you dislike, where we don't really get to enjoy the build up of emotions between the couple.

A drama that does the 'feelings at first sight' really well is Lovers, one of my all time favourite dramas. It has one of THE most amazing build up of chemistry I've ever seen in a drama. The characters had warm feelings for each other from the beginning, which eventually developed into a deep love, but they didn't get together until late in the show. Unlike most dramas that come up with the most preposterous reasons to keep the couple apart, there was a very logical and plausible reason why this couple couldn't be together. While they're apart their love blossomed from a slow burning ember into a blazing fire. If you haven't seen it yet, have a look at it. I dare say you may enjoy it, if you enjoy the chase more than the catch.