lord_varvara

Hellbound all the way. Better not disappoint.

I'd say Kingdom and Sweet Home have their share of psychological horror. The baby plot in Kingdom is more terrifying than any zombie and that makes the young Queen more monstrous than her scheming father and the hoards of the undead. Also, the cannibalism for the sake of survival has a lot of psychological impact in that those people rendered themselves unhuman by having to stoop to that level. Their infection that followed was really a physical manifestation of what happened psychologically.

Sweet Home had the underlining "what makes one a monster/who is really a monster". There are benevolent "monsters" such as Hyun Soo's struggle to contain his darker impulses, the giant pregnant monster in the bathroom who isn't a monster psychologically, but just a manifestation of that woman's desire to be with her deceased daughter, and the green jelly "monster" who helped the children and the only thing that made him monstrous was his jelly appearance not his actions. And then we have the abusive husband and the pedophile and the highschool bully (who becomes a goo monster that possesses dead bodies later because he gave in to his dark side unlike Hyun Soo).

So I'd say there's pretty equal measure of jumps/gore and internalized horror.

Reads synopsis. Oh, Search has military + mystery. Sound interes___sees that Krystal is shoehorned as a "rookie soldier". NOPE.

Good list. I adore Kingdom (Season 1 and 2, pretending that God-awful Ashin of the North special episode didn't happen) and Sweet Home (very concerned that the boys are not coming back in Season 2). Girl From Nowhere was great too. Haven't seen the rest.

This concept sounds super interesting! Jung Hae In is on the roll! Love him. Haven't seen this other actor in anything but I'm looking forward to bromance.

He killed himself because ML's idea to walk away without money was pure nonsense. They owned money to Yakuza so they and their families would have been doomed if gangers weren't paid off. So offing himself was the only way to make ML win the money and thus take care of his mother. In that, he was more far-sighted than ML who forgot the promise to take care of her as well as NK girl's brother. So in the end, Sang Woo was a hero of sorts. ML was rather useless. A good guy but that goodness stood in the way of being practical.

I fully expected her to play his mom and was about to congratulate her for finally playing characters her age but nope. It sounds like yet another massively convoluted noona romance with WTF revenge complication.

this. sounds beyond stupid. Are we supposed to root for evil noona and naive LDH to take revenge on an elementary school kid just because his parent were bullies at school way before he was born? WTF?

Memorable OST always matters. I wager that use of classical music (Blue Danube, trumpet Concerto, Serenade for Strings) helped Squid Game stand out as well, for example.

I admire dramas for coming up with crazy plots like this (he pretends to be an amnesiac, she pretends to be his terminally ill fiancee) but there's no way I watch this. Sounds insufferable. I did get a good laugh.

This is the type of plot that will never fly in a big way internationally but should be made because there's domestic audience for that and variety is good. it would be bad if everything catered to the same tastes.

Don't like this FL. Ruined Prison Playbook til I started to skip her scenes. her character and romance were unnecessary. The drama was about bromance and that aspect was phenomenal. Also, like all FLs, she's terrible at acting drunk. I know that dramas have mandated drunk FL scenes but absolutely all of them suck at it.

yes Blacky and Kim Bum are epic. The drama needed more of them.

Honorable mention: Magic Horse, Arthdal Chronicles

Pets and kids that I remember:

Inzaghi - this iconic pigeon was both a memorable comic relief and a mighty ally (Vincenzo)

Kim Soo-oh/Blacky - this adorable Spiderman fanboy is the reincarnation of Lee Rang's equally adorable puppy. TOTNT

you're welcome! :)

yep that's what he does. Uncanny business. :)

I think I get it. Urban fantasy is a broader subgenre of fantasy and it has its own subgenres including Uncanny Business. So, in American terms, Twilight is an urban fantasy but Lucifer is an uncanny business while Twilight is not.

FL was terrible. One of reasons why I'm so happy that Squid Game is such success is that overrated drama FLs must be seething that a total unknown hit the jackpot while none of their dramas, including made by Netflix, were even half successful.

he's always so smug but without charm to soften the blow. Just smug. Unlike RDJ who is smug but charming, self-deprecating and charismatic af, so you can't help but love the guy. LDW is just smug and looks like he had work done to look more American.

I'd also add Vincenzo to mega overrated drama list. 20 episodes, over half of them redundant filler. Insufferable FL. Gary Stu lead. Massive disappointment once you realize they are not going back to Italy but are staying in a dilapidated Seoul building. Overcomplicated plot. On the positive side, supporting cast saved the whole thing and they were constantly entertaining to watch. It's leads that slowed the drama down to a screeching halt.

I love SJK but this was one of his least interesting characters.

CLOY is cloying. I really liked NK parts but the drama overall was too long for its own good, had subplots that were unnecessary (chaebol, Captain Ri's brother, mommy issues, fiancée and fiancé - which people liked but it should have been its own drama independent of CLOY), got much less interesting in SK, and the villain was ridiculous - who needs some Terminator-like unstoppable baddie when finding yourself across the border illegally is an organic source of high-tension drama?

Goblin...I refuse to watch it cause I can't stand LDW. My first exposure to him was in TOTNT, which people say tried to be like Goblin, and that drama sucked in big part because he sucks. So while I love Gong Yoo in Train to Busan (also my first exposure), I can get his fix in upcoming drama The Silent Sea.

yep different sites attract different tastes. these happen to attract visuals + romance = awesome crowd...that then can't believe something like Squid Games obliterates some romcrap starring Idol # 4567 or Idol Lookalike #2365789.

MDL ratings, Soompi, Dramabeans, All the Drivel Non of the Drama, etc are sites that attract fans of romance in any form (contemporary, sageuk) which is why those dramas have inflated ratings. Same as Viki where romance viewership reigns supreme. I remember when I reviewed Squid Game, it was at only 8.1 or 8.2 on MDL so I said in my review something along the lines of "WTF? how the heck true Beauty has higher rating? For shame" lol. That got corrected by now but the very start was rough for Squid Game.