American shows that I would like to get a K makeover but not one-to-one scene-by-scene remake:
Buffy the Vampire Slayer - don't care what names they will get, as long as Buffy/Spike is the OTP, and nonsense with Angel (the lesser Spike) and Riley Finn is absent from the drama. Plus please no Dawn! Also, drama culd feature mythical beings from Asian folklore which would make it different from the American counterpart
Lost - keep Skate, ditch Jate, explain the mysteries, fix the ending
Battlestar Galactica - Space Sweepers shows that Ks have SFX team to make space look good so why not a take on the best space show ever?
International shows that I would like to get a K makeover:
Dark - German mind-bender with complex time travel and parallel universes is something that would be a natural fit for drama's facination with weird
Vincenzo himself is the most vanilla anti hero ever. He is given the faux anti hero/villain background (raised…
Yo Si Jin wasn't a bad character. It's romance that was boring but he had a great bromance and was fun overall. SJK is also great as Saya on Arthdal Chronicles. Not so much as Saya's dull goody-goody twin cause that kind of vanilla role and 80s perm don't do anyone any favors. But he's really amazing as Saya who also looks like a Rivendell Elf.
So this is a live-shoot drama? But don't they have to somewhat follow the original story? I mean, since this is…
aren't all dramas live shot after ep 4? I wished they weren't. Oh I know they have to follow the book but that doesn't always prevent changes.
Didn't know KYJ had health issues.
Don't like KSH at all. One of the most overrated drama actresses, IMO. Always looks petulant no matter the role. I keep hearing about her range yet I haven't seen it and I had to drop 2 of her dramas cause they were trash (Love Alarm and River).
Shaman characters are always dynamic. I call Kataro's dad Auror cause he catches dark spirits like an Auror lol. Well he did before he was killed.
The child actress who played Hong Hong Hong is impressive.
I love this so far but I'm proceeding with caution cause:
16 episodes have never been justified. It's too much for any drama and redundancy is going to settle in sooner or later. Good thing: it isn't 20 episodes!
it's a known thing that they film first 4-5 episodes w/o audience feedback but after that, they change the writing on weekly basis due to feedback. Which is why many dramas start as one thing but turn into something else (and mostly worse) by the end.
that said, what I like about the drama:
1. FL! Shocker of the century cause I usually can't stand drama FLs but this one is so genuinely likable, charming and charismatic I'm totally enchanted. I don't understand why FL from terrible River Where the Moon Rises is more in demand for she has none of these traits and secondary FLs are always prettier than she. OTOH, no girl upstages Red Sky's FL. I know that they starred on Moon Embraces the Sun together where River FL's petulancy served her well in villainous role, but that is all wrong for Love Alarm, River, etc where she's supposed to be a heroine. And Red Sky FL was much more radiant even back then.
P.S. Moon/Sun drama is a wash after the kids and teens grow up and are replaced by adult actors. Worth watching only for first 5-6 episodes.
2. Mythical creatures! Wigen (the butterfly Goddess whom I call by the name of the actress' celestial character from Uncanny Counter), Steppenwolf (cause he looks exactly like Steppenwolf from Justice League lol), Flying Jack Sparrow (ML's alter ego fusion with Steppenwolf that looks exactly like the savvy pirate captain), Mini Florence Pugh who turns into the Netflix tigress...they are all awesome!
3. Young Prince. With charisma in spade and entertaining character, he's bound to create Secondary Lead Syndrome.
4. Decent mythological story. I'm very engaged and can follow easily.
5. FL's BFFs. They are fun.
What I don't like:
1. ML! Plank of wood has more charisma and range. He should stay in his Jack Sparrow mode forever. Oh and every drama actor has impressive abs so he doesn't have anything unique.
P.S. I call him Kataro cause he's a water-bender or something. Not gonna lie, that water bubble that saved him was awesome.
2. They met as kids yadda yadda and Love Triangle. If you are going to do a love triangle than don't make the endgame so obvious with this trope. If you want an obvious endgame, which this trope always is, than don't flirt with love triangle.
P.S. This tired trope is why True Beauty FL and ML have always been the endgame and dragging HIY character through this drivel as the third wheel was just ugh.
3. Harry Rotter aka the villain with the Harry Potter scar. Another plank of wood, not scary. I prefer Bellatrix (the shaman lady)
I feel like her intentions and the information we're given, if we don't consider the Kingdom series, kept her…
she unleased the plague that killed people including children that had nothing to do with her family's demise except that they were Koreans. So she's a villain. Not at all different from the Queen who got pregnant women and newborn girls killed cause she needed a son.
she was amazing, so beautiful and charismatic and likable, everything that FL was not. It was really hilarious that FL had superbeings fight over her like in Twilight when KYJ was right there.
For a moment, I thought they would gender swap and have KYJ play the psycho. But not. Oh well.
Super stoked that she got the starring role cause she totally obliterated crappy FLs from Tale of the Nine Tailed and KTEM. Finally someone saw the FL potential in her.
Vincenzo himself is the most vanilla anti hero ever. He is given the faux anti hero/villain background (raised…
he's bland af and upstaged by almost everyone including Inzhagi. I'd say only FL doesn't upstage cause she's so annoying to watch you actually wish for Vincenzo blandness.
it's the worst when women get these roles and just become the male versions of the poor written male characters…
no word on S3. They haven't even announced it. OTOH, they are making a Lee Chang episode/movie a la Ashin episode/movie. So now they are just feeding us those prequels but no movement on S3.
If you ask me Yeon Shin is the character whose history is worthy of a movie or a limited series if they want to milk viewership before S3 drops.
it's the worst when women get these roles and just become the male versions of the poor written male characters…
I'm worried about S3 without the Queen and her father. They were fantastic villains. Ashin is garbage. I'm afraid they will give Lee Chang and Ashin a love affair just wait. And then she'll be spared or, worse, get beloved characters killed.
From dramas that I've seen, here's my list of anti-heroes that worked and those that didn't:
Vincenzo
AH That Sucks: Vincenzo (vanilla)
AH That Rocks: Jang Han Seo, Park Seok Do
Tale of the Nine Tailed
AH That Sucks: Lee Yeon (they couldn't decide between AH and edgy hero but ended up with a smug d-bag)
AH That Rocks: Lee Rang
CLOY
AH That Rocks: Goo Seung Jun
Kingdom
AH That Rock: Young Shin, Jo Beom Pal - 2 very different anti-heroes, one that approves of cannibalism for the greater good, and the one that is a coward but toughens up as they go
Arthdal Chronicles
So many AH That Rock! While Ip Saeng and Saya are textbook AHs, Ta Gon and Ta El Ha walk the line between AHism and villainy and that's always exciting.
Sweet Home
AH That Rock: Pyeon Sang Wook, Lee Eun Hyuk
The Naked Director
AH That Rocks More Than It's Humanly Possible: Muranishi Toru
it's the worst when women get these roles and just become the male versions of the poor written male characters…
Kingdom Queen was fantastic! I loved her character. She was even more evil than her father cause that pregnancy ploy was just vile (killing mothers and newborn girls for she needed a boy). Truly deplorable. I couldn't believe they went there but they did.
Ashin is a stupid character on top of being just a plot-forwarder and then a full-blown villain at the end. I never had any sympathy for characters who kept zombie relatives alive. By that point, everyone could see they weren't going to revert so you have to be really nuts to keep them around even for sentimental value.
Worth the time reading this articles about antihero and I love it. Antihero is my favorite troupe in a drrma character.…
Vincenzo himself is the most vanilla anti hero ever. He is given the faux anti hero/villain background (raised by Mafia) but he never does anything anti-heroic. It's all pretty classic heroism. On the same show, Park Seok Do and Jang Han Seo, are much better anti-heroes with better character arcs let alone performances. I love them so much. I love SJK but Vincenzo is one of his blander roles.
BTW, when you have time, cast Battlestar K-alactica. :)
Buffy the Vampire Slayer - don't care what names they will get, as long as Buffy/Spike is the OTP, and nonsense with Angel (the lesser Spike) and Riley Finn is absent from the drama. Plus please no Dawn! Also, drama culd feature mythical beings from Asian folklore which would make it different from the American counterpart
Lost - keep Skate, ditch Jate, explain the mysteries, fix the ending
Battlestar Galactica - Space Sweepers shows that Ks have SFX team to make space look good so why not a take on the best space show ever?
International shows that I would like to get a K makeover:
Dark - German mind-bender with complex time travel and parallel universes is something that would be a natural fit for drama's facination with weird
Didn't know KYJ had health issues.
Don't like KSH at all. One of the most overrated drama actresses, IMO. Always looks petulant no matter the role. I keep hearing about her range yet I haven't seen it and I had to drop 2 of her dramas cause they were trash (Love Alarm and River).
Shaman characters are always dynamic. I call Kataro's dad Auror cause he catches dark spirits like an Auror lol. Well he did before he was killed.
The child actress who played Hong Hong Hong is impressive.
16 episodes have never been justified. It's too much for any drama and redundancy is going to settle in sooner or later. Good thing: it isn't 20 episodes!
it's a known thing that they film first 4-5 episodes w/o audience feedback but after that, they change the writing on weekly basis due to feedback. Which is why many dramas start as one thing but turn into something else (and mostly worse) by the end.
that said, what I like about the drama:
1. FL! Shocker of the century cause I usually can't stand drama FLs but this one is so genuinely likable, charming and charismatic I'm totally enchanted. I don't understand why FL from terrible River Where the Moon Rises is more in demand for she has none of these traits and secondary FLs are always prettier than she. OTOH, no girl upstages Red Sky's FL. I know that they starred on Moon Embraces the Sun together where River FL's petulancy served her well in villainous role, but that is all wrong for Love Alarm, River, etc where she's supposed to be a heroine. And Red Sky FL was much more radiant even back then.
P.S. Moon/Sun drama is a wash after the kids and teens grow up and are replaced by adult actors. Worth watching only for first 5-6 episodes.
2. Mythical creatures! Wigen (the butterfly Goddess whom I call by the name of the actress' celestial character from Uncanny Counter), Steppenwolf (cause he looks exactly like Steppenwolf from Justice League lol), Flying Jack Sparrow (ML's alter ego fusion with Steppenwolf that looks exactly like the savvy pirate captain), Mini Florence Pugh who turns into the Netflix tigress...they are all awesome!
3. Young Prince. With charisma in spade and entertaining character, he's bound to create Secondary Lead Syndrome.
4. Decent mythological story. I'm very engaged and can follow easily.
5. FL's BFFs. They are fun.
What I don't like:
1. ML! Plank of wood has more charisma and range. He should stay in his Jack Sparrow mode forever. Oh and every drama actor has impressive abs so he doesn't have anything unique.
P.S. I call him Kataro cause he's a water-bender or something. Not gonna lie, that water bubble that saved him was awesome.
2. They met as kids yadda yadda and Love Triangle. If you are going to do a love triangle than don't make the endgame so obvious with this trope. If you want an obvious endgame, which this trope always is, than don't flirt with love triangle.
P.S. This tired trope is why True Beauty FL and ML have always been the endgame and dragging HIY character through this drivel as the third wheel was just ugh.
3. Harry Rotter aka the villain with the Harry Potter scar. Another plank of wood, not scary. I prefer Bellatrix (the shaman lady)
So all in all I'm hooked.
Super stoked that she got the starring role cause she totally obliterated crappy FLs from Tale of the Nine Tailed and KTEM. Finally someone saw the FL potential in her.
If you ask me Yeon Shin is the character whose history is worthy of a movie or a limited series if they want to milk viewership before S3 drops.
Vincenzo
AH That Sucks: Vincenzo (vanilla)
AH That Rocks: Jang Han Seo, Park Seok Do
Tale of the Nine Tailed
AH That Sucks: Lee Yeon (they couldn't decide between AH and edgy hero but ended up with a smug d-bag)
AH That Rocks: Lee Rang
CLOY
AH That Rocks: Goo Seung Jun
Kingdom
AH That Rock: Young Shin, Jo Beom Pal - 2 very different anti-heroes, one that approves of cannibalism for the greater good, and the one that is a coward but toughens up as they go
Arthdal Chronicles
So many AH That Rock! While Ip Saeng and Saya are textbook AHs, Ta Gon and Ta El Ha walk the line between AHism and villainy and that's always exciting.
Sweet Home
AH That Rock: Pyeon Sang Wook, Lee Eun Hyuk
The Naked Director
AH That Rocks More Than It's Humanly Possible: Muranishi Toru
Ashin is a stupid character on top of being just a plot-forwarder and then a full-blown villain at the end. I never had any sympathy for characters who kept zombie relatives alive. By that point, everyone could see they weren't going to revert so you have to be really nuts to keep them around even for sentimental value.