entirely ruined her disposition with books

I've decided to start keeping a post of my recs for Korean dramas to help you figure out what you might want to watch. This won't be a list of all the dramas I watch, just the ones that I think are good enough that other people should watch them too. I'll be updating it as I find new ones, and I'll be making this a sticky post within the next few days. I hope it can lead you on your way to loving Korean TV dramas!

At the moment, all of the listed dramas are available on dramafever and/or hulu. Dramafever officially licenses these dramas, so if you watch there (or on hulu) you are NOT participating in piracy--you're getting things straight from the source. In the future, there might be some dramas that aren't available on those sites (for instance, I've got Capital Scandal on my harddrive at the moment and Resurrection/Rebirth currently torrenting, and I expect to add both of them to this list) and I know that those sites aren't available to all of my friends, so you can PM me if you're trying to find something you don't have access to. I'll try to help you out, though I make no promises.


( dramas behind the cut! )

Let's talk about Coffee Prince, which was SO DAMN DELIGHTFUL I DON'T KNOW WHAT TO DO WITH MYSELF.

Okay, first off: most gender-bendy thing EVER. If you enjoy that, get thyself to hulu or dramafever or something and watch this series. Yoon Eun Hye (my Kdrama girlfriend for sure) is a girl who's super tomboyish and often gets mistaken for a guy. She's the breadwinner in her family (her dad's dead, her mom is pretty useless and her little sis is still in high school) and constantly needs to find ways to make more money. She ends up running into the layabout grandson of a (badass) lady owner of a big food company and he mistakes her for a guy. She thinks he's a jerk, so she doesn't bother to correct him. But then he hires her first to play his boyfriend so he can convince girls his grandmama is setting him up with that he's gay and secondly at an all-guys coffee shop (the workers are all guys, the customers are everyone). So obviously she can't tell him now that she's a girl--she'll lose her job, and she really needs it!

Cue all sorts of shenanigans and adorable "male"-bonding and conflicted feelings and of course falling in love. It's a romantic comedy, after all.

In short: YOU SHOULD WATCH THIS.

It is so lovable, y'all. YEH, who was adorably teenage girly in Goong is adorably not at all girly in this. Her physicality is awesome: she takes up space in ways that most women have been culturally conditioned not to, flopping her limbs around and moving like a teenage boy who hasn't quite managed to figure out how his body works yet. She also completely gives up any attempts at vanity: there are moments where her character is the opposite of attractive, and she goes all the way with it.

Another little detail I liked was how realistic the relationship between YEH's Eun Chan and her little sister felt. They felt like real siblings to me, and I rarely see that on TV, as much as I love my TV siblings. They love each other a lot, get on each others' nerves, make fun of each other, flop around on the floor play-wrestling, are incredibly different, insult each other, misunderstand each other, and love each other some more.

And I just love this whole cast of characters. The boys in the coffee shop have the most adorable little friendships (I especially love Min Yeop and his pursuit of Eun Chan's little sister and also how he always calls Eun Chan hyung and is basically a big dumb but sweet guy. Awwww! Also: Sun Ki is hot, so).

( spoilers )

Blah blah blah. Lots of feelings. Probably left some stuff out, but whatever.

I also watched the first half of Shut Up Flower Boy Band yesterday, which I actually ended up enjoying way more than I thought I would.

First of all: HAHAHA THIS KID. ♥



I love him and his coked-out whackjob amoral androgynous nonsense. THE EYELINER ALONE. I mean, I knew going in that he would only be in the first two episodes, and it broke my heart because: LOOK AT THIS KID. This show got 6,000% less punk after he was gone. But writing him out makes sense for Watsonian reasons, too, because the life that this boy would lead would never, ever be airable on Korean TV. He would take all the drugs and sleep with all the people and probably have severe mental health problems all the time and then die young. This. Kid.

But I started loving all the other kids, too, after the first few episodes where I couldn't tell them apart.
( spoilers )

So yeah. I'm liking it. It's an easy watch.

And I never realized till recently just how much LONGER an hour-long episode feels than a 40-minute one. But the difference is staggering.

Let's talk about Coffee Prince, which was SO DAMN DELIGHTFUL I DON'T KNOW WHAT TO DO WITH MYSELF.

Okay, first off: most gender-bendy thing EVER. If you enjoy that, get thyself to hulu or dramafever or something and watch this series. Yoon Eun Hye (my Kdrama girlfriend for sure) is a girl who's super tomboyish and often gets mistaken for a guy. She's the breadwinner in her family (her dad's dead, her mom is pretty useless and her little sis is still in high school) and constantly needs to find ways to make more money. She ends up running into the layabout grandson of a (badass) lady owner of a big food company and he mistakes her for a guy. She thinks he's a jerk, so she doesn't bother to correct him. But then he hires her first to play his boyfriend so he can convince girls his grandmama is setting him up with that he's gay and secondly at an all-guys coffee shop (the workers are all guys, the customers are everyone). So obviously she can't tell him now that she's a girl--she'll lose her job, and she really needs it!

Cue all sorts of shenanigans and adorable "male"-bonding and conflicted feelings and of course falling in love. It's a romantic comedy, after all.

In short: YOU SHOULD WATCH THIS.

It is so lovable, y'all. YEH, who was adorably teenage girly in Goong is adorably not at all girly in this. Her physicality is awesome: she takes up space in ways that most women have been culturally conditioned not to, flopping her limbs around and moving like a teenage boy who hasn't quite managed to figure out how his body works yet. She also completely gives up any attempts at vanity: there are moments where her character is the opposite of attractive, and she goes all the way with it.

Another little detail I liked was how realistic the relationship between YEH's Eun Chan and her little sister felt. They felt like real siblings to me, and I rarely see that on TV, as much as I love my TV siblings. They love each other a lot, get on each others' nerves, make fun of each other, flop around on the floor play-wrestling, are incredibly different, insult each other, misunderstand each other, and love each other some more.

And I just love this whole cast of characters. The boys in the coffee shop have the most adorable little friendships (I especially love Min Yeop and his pursuit of Eun Chan's little sister and also how he always calls Eun Chan hyung and is basically a big dumb but sweet guy. Awwww! Also: Sun Ki is hot, so).

( spoilers )

Blah blah blah. Lots of feelings. Probably left some stuff out, but whatever.

I also watched the first half of Shut Up Flower Boy Band yesterday, which I actually ended up enjoying way more than I thought I would.

First of all: HAHAHA THIS KID. ♥



I love him and his coked-out whackjob amoral androgynous nonsense. THE EYELINER ALONE. I mean, I knew going in that he would only be in the first two episodes, and it broke my heart because: LOOK AT THIS KID. This show got 6,000% less punk after he was gone. But writing him out makes sense for Watsonian reasons, too, because the life that this boy would lead would never, ever be airable on Korean TV. He would take all the drugs and sleep with all the people and probably have severe mental health problems all the time and then die young. This. Kid.

But I started loving all the other kids, too, after the first few episodes where I couldn't tell them apart.
( spoilers )

So yeah. I'm liking it. It's an easy watch.

And I never realized till recently just how much LONGER an hour-long episode feels than a 40-minute one. But the difference is staggering.

And let me just go ahead and apologize to all the people who are on my flist for reasons that have nothing to do with kdramas. Sorry.

+ I am really annoyed at whoever did the translation, because they aren't translating honorifics. Instead of Eun Chan's little sister calling her "oppa," they had her saying, "hey boy!" Which...makes no sense. They could have at least had her saying "big brother" because in this case that's what she meants, since she wasn't using it the flirty way. At the beginning when Eun Chan called Main Guy Han Kyul "ajusshi," they translated it as "mister." Which, okay. We can go with that. But now that she's calling him "hyung," they just write his name there instead? NOT COOL. Basically we're losing all these interesting insights into how these people are interacting, and I am not pleased about it!

Which, okay, I get why they did this. If I hadn't watched kdramas before and I saw the word oppa or ajusshi or whatever onscreen, I wouldn't have any clue what that meant. But why couldn't, the first time that word showed up, they do that thing they sometimes do with other culture differences where they put a definition in parentheses and then from there on out you know what it means? I have to be listening really carefully to pick up what title people are using for each other.

Like, I can't imagine if the person who translated Personal Taste didn't show that the guy BFF was calling the girl BFF "unni." Like, THIS IS A HUGE JOKE (and a great one) and also a characterization thing, and if that isn't acknowledged, you're missing out a ton of the interaction between these characters (I nearly squealed every time he called her that). So when these things aren't showing up on the drama I'm watching, I get to worrying about what other things I'm missing out on.

I would also really like it if they'd tell us the first time people switch from jondaemal to banmal. That would be awesome, since I can't always tell just by listening.

+ That said, I'm enjoying the show immensely. I've watched four episodes and my main reaction thus far is just to yell I LOVE EVERYONE IN THIS BAAAAAAR!COFFEE SHOP! Because I do like everyone? Which never happens? But there aren't any villains at this point! I feel like in another show, I would have to hate Yoo Joo, but I don't. I do think she's not making great decisions since she's kind of stringing both boys along, but I think she's a nice person. And when she and Eun Chan had their little bonding session (talking about streakers! LOL), I just wanted her to figure out that Eun Chan was a girl and the two of them have lots of lady bonding sessions. That would be the best.

+ I can't wait to get home tonight and watch the next episode.

+ HAHAHAHAHA OMONA THEY DIDN'T EXISTS. Further reasons why the internet is my boyfriend: best sense of humor. You better bet I'm gonna go trolling there for icons.

+ SPRING IS HERE! I'd been saying that I thought we'd have one more cold snap before spring formally shows up, but I'm not so sure about that now. All I know is that it's been in the 80s for the past week, and things are turning green, and all the redbuds and dogwoods and tulip poplars, etc. look so gorgeous it makes me want to die. And tulips! Everywhere! I had forgotten how happy warm weather makes me, especially the greenness. I am wearing sundresses all week (with cardigans to make them work appropriate) in celebration.

+ So about that "YOUR ISP WILL STOP YOU FROM DOWNLOADING THINGS!!!!!!" post: I'm not freaking out yet, mostly because I just don't know whether it's true and if it is whether it'll actually be widespread or whether I'll be able to switch my ISP and avoid this problem. Basically I'm withholding judgment.

+ This post contains interesting discussions about that whole 50-Shades-of-Grey thing (which my feelings are basically: pointing and laughing--but not in a mean-hearted way--at the people paying money for the porn they could get for free on the internet). After all the media attention this is getting (most of it with people flailing in confusion), it's nice to see an actual fandom conversation about it, since, uh, we actually get it? Also, a few interesting mentions of BtVS AU AH fic.

+ OMG MODS OF GRAPHICS COMMUNITIES: USE TAGS AND MAKE PEOPLE USE TAGS AND OMG I CAN NEVER FIND ANYTHING WHEN I WANT TO FIND IT THE TAGS ARE RIGHT THERE THIS IS NOT THAT DIFFICULT.

+ Does anybody know where there are English-language non-Western-media fanfic sites? Basically, I want Kdrama fic, and I know it has to be out there, but I'm not sure where to find it. Non-Western-media fandom doesn't overlap with Western-media fandom in some interesting ways; if I get into a new Western show, I know how to go searching for fic. But this is beyond my ken, basically.

+ Speaking of which, Personal Taste/Preference. Cute enough, with some fun side characters (I especially liked Main Girl's BFF and her relationship with Main Guy's BFF who always calls her "unni" and also Director Choi was interesting in ways I wasn't expecting), but I wasn't in love with it or anything. Most of my feelings, honestly are Lee Min Ho-shaped, what are you expecting. As a side-note: he is very good at playing sexually frustrated. It makes me giggle.

+ I watched the first two episodes of Coffee Prince last night, and I'm mostly just crazy about Yoon Eun Hye's physicality. The way she flops herself around, paying no attention to what her body's doing, I totally understand how someone could mistake her for a teenage boy. Comparing her character in this with Goong is such fun. This woman knows how much how she moves makes the character.

+ SPRING IS HERE! I'd been saying that I thought we'd have one more cold snap before spring formally shows up, but I'm not so sure about that now. All I know is that it's been in the 80s for the past week, and things are turning green, and all the redbuds and dogwoods and tulip poplars, etc. look so gorgeous it makes me want to die. And tulips! Everywhere! I had forgotten how happy warm weather makes me, especially the greenness. I am wearing sundresses all week (with cardigans to make them work appropriate) in celebration.

+ So about that "YOUR ISP WILL STOP YOU FROM DOWNLOADING THINGS!!!!!!" post: I'm not freaking out yet, mostly because I just don't know whether it's true and if it is whether it'll actually be widespread or whether I'll be able to switch my ISP and avoid this problem. Basically I'm withholding judgment.

+ This post contains interesting discussions about that whole 50-Shades-of-Grey thing (which my feelings are basically: pointing and laughing--but not in a mean-hearted way--at the people paying money for the porn they could get for free on the internet). After all the media attention this is getting (most of it with people flailing in confusion), it's nice to see an actual fandom conversation about it, since, uh, we actually get it? Also, a few interesting mentions of BtVS AU AH fic.

+ OMG MODS OF GRAPHICS COMMUNITIES: USE TAGS AND MAKE PEOPLE USE TAGS AND OMG I CAN NEVER FIND ANYTHING WHEN I WANT TO FIND IT THE TAGS ARE RIGHT THERE THIS IS NOT THAT DIFFICULT.

+ Does anybody know where there are English-language non-Western-media fanfic sites? Basically, I want Kdrama fic, and I know it has to be out there, but I'm not sure where to find it. Non-Western-media fandom doesn't overlap with Western-media fandom in some interesting ways; if I get into a new Western show, I know how to go searching for fic. But this is beyond my ken, basically.

+ Speaking of which, Personal Taste/Preference. Cute enough, with some fun side characters (I especially liked Main Girl's BFF and her relationship with Main Guy's BFF who always calls her "unni" and also Director Choi was interesting in ways I wasn't expecting), but I wasn't in love with it or anything. Most of my feelings, honestly are Lee Min Ho-shaped, what are you expecting. As a side-note: he is very good at playing sexually frustrated. It makes me giggle.

+ I watched the first two episodes of Coffee Prince last night, and I'm mostly just crazy about Yoon Eun Hye's physicality. The way she flops herself around, paying no attention to what her body's doing, I totally understand how someone could mistake her for a teenage boy. Comparing her character in this with Goong is such fun. This woman knows how much how she moves makes the character.