Thank God It's Dark Knight Day!!!

I found my new favorite Korean rock act. Native Korean Rock and the Fishnets . . . fronted by KAREN O!!!! (And yeah, I just learned right now that Karen O is half Korean. If somebody tells me my favorite J-rock band Tokio Hotel isn't Japanese I'm going to cry . . . ) They should cast her in East of Eden too. Dennis Oh and Karen O!!

And in off topic news, sisters (and Kobe) gotta keep it real. Don't let Kang Ji Hwan divide the Dramabean sisterhood (and uhhh abscond with half of the site . . . wow, what happened over there?!?), mm kay? ;)

"They should cast her in East of Eden too. Dennis Oh and Karen O!! "

I'm little drunk but LOL

Ooh the Dark Knight!!! Can't wait to see that!!

Glad it's friday, finally!

What's everybody else up to?

Painful breakup with the (ex) boyfriend. Heath Ledger and Christian Bale better do my soul some good.

Just watched the dark knight!!!! I thought that it was sooooo good but also sad. I definitely think that ppl should go watch it. Heath ledger is such a good actor! It is a bit heavy though... Won't spoil it for ppl so I'll stop there. Hope everyone else enjoys it as much as I did!

"almost attempted making a pot of coffee without the pot"

Ahhh, Dramabean's word play is so multilayered . . .

belleza loves to state the obvious
heh

Sorry to dissappiont you belleza but Tokio Hotel is not a japanese band, they're German, I thought they were japanese too but my friend who loves them told me otherwise.

@ belleza,

no....way....i always thought Karen O had partially asian looks, but i didn't investigate the matter bc i figured it would be too good to be true....now i know....is it just me, or are koreans taking the world of music & film by storm now?

& i thought the same thing about tokio hotel..it would be 2 good 2 b tru if they were really japanese & i'm not surprised they're german :D if you go to houseofblues.com i think you can find special fan appreciation tickets to see them.. they're playing in anaheim next month...

i'm still stuck on my nell albums...they're like my security blanket...

@anu,

Yeah I was being tongue in cheek about Tokio Hotel. But I'm still crying inside. :D

@marcel,

Yeah I never thought about it until I saw the Pitchfork news bit. I'm kinda slow about that though. It didn't occur to me ATDI was mostly Hispanic until I heard Mars Volta sing in Spanish. I think it would be awesome if Karen O and Tablo did something together. Epik O

Part of me associates Yeah Yeah Yeahs with "WASP Rock", that "buy this CBGB shirt Linkin Park fan!" pseudo-indie stuff that got marketed along with the Strokes. But their EP and debut album were deadly good, who knew JSBX meets the Pretenders could work?

It's taking awhile for Separation Anxiety to grow on me. Maybe I'd feel more comfortable if they called it a Kim Jong-wan solo album, his "Eraser" so to speak. Whenever I finish Anxiety, I kinda reach for Let's Take a Walk.

Question, please. Why is your website addy "Dramabeans" but your headers and signage, "Javabeans?" Was the domain already taken?

w00t for friday....which means Dalk Dong Jib at Dang Sung Sah tonight! :-D

I'm planning on going to the Bites of Seattle tomorrow.

Anyone else into foodie festivals?

you have great taste in music. love morcheeba!~

@ belleza,

i'm actually enjoying separation anxiety a lot.. maybe KJ needed a bit of time for introspection like we all do now and then... "down" is the track i've been repeating a lot from let's take a walk... looping it over and over again.. driving everyone around me nuts..

HOLY MACKERAL!!!! Dark Knight was amazing. At least I thought it was. So dark though, hmm. Humans are very interesting things. I watched it with my family and my mum was all paranoid after. I parked far and she was like, why did you park in the dark!!!!! hehehe that rhymes :)

I know no one really cares but I gotta tell people this. Should I be excited or am I being retardedly...happy? College orientation is tomorrow and I'm like nervous about meeting people and worried about classes. My friends tell me it's a really fun but they're all pretty outgoing people aka outrageously crazy. Who's been to orientation and felt it was awkward?

ps...It's kind of late so I highly doubt I'll be getting a response :D

Got back from The Dark Knight. It's a touch too long, but it's also brilliant in many, many places. A little bit of Heat, Zodiac Killer, Blade Runner, and Taxi Driver reworked around the Batman myth. Toward the last 20 minutes, I felt the script belabored and postured a bit. But, afterwards, I was appreciative that the screenplay really saw through the themes and arguments it was making, even if the psychology was still comic book.

Heath Ledger's performance really is as good as published. What makes it so terrifying is that you sense no aggression (not even the passive aggressive sarcasm of Nicholson) or even anger from the Joker. This Joker is intimate, soft spoken . . . genuinely happy. And therefore, because you can't sense his intention, none of the other characters can't prepare for him. He enjoys the abyss and thinks you should too.

@coffeewhore,

Yeah, orientation can be an awkward vibe for most people. Freshman year is like that because you really want to make friends and kinda replace the social support system that you had in high school. Or at least at first. You want to be liked.

Later on, you'll wish your friends would just go away already. Welcome to 2nd semester of freshman year. :D

I'm saving my whole batman experience for imax next weekend. So I decided to watch "mama mia" instead with my mother. I was briefly reminded of our generation gap as I found myself rolling my eyes at some of the abba sequences while my mother sang along like a peppy cheerleader.

Meryl Streep is a goddess. Didn't know she could carry a tune. Her "winner takes it all" rendition was the absolute highlight of the film, and being the sentimal sucker my mother is, ate it all up with tears down her face.

Oh well, I wasn't the intended demographic for the film, so I can't complain.

It will be interesting see if superhero movies will get a few oscar nods.

Batman will win a few awards in the technical categories, and Heath Ledger will probably get a supporting actor nomination. Because it's a supporting role, he might actually *win* too.

The movie will also get a shot at a Best Picture nomination if the movie has longevity, and if the winter season doesn't produce a Hollywood prestige film that clicks with the audience.

@marcel

I just had to post because you made me laugh since I have a younger brother I regularly call KJ. I just didn't expect to read that.

@belleza

Heath Ledger actually was playing the Joker based on a specific comic book take. Basically the "zombie Joker" version, which I think (not seen it yet!) will be epic to see. So take a look at the comic book (or is it books? I can't remember) if you could find that specific take. It should be interesting to see what inspired Heath Ledger's take on Joker.

@coffeewhore

Now my college is insanely small (450ish tops) right now. So it'll be different 'cause I bet you'll be going somewhere else. However, I found my to be generally fun at orientation - but I also used that time to sneak away with the friends I made to go hang out, outside of the schedule they gave us. You really don't need to be that outgoing, I've quite a few friends who aren't. When in doubt, the outgoing ones really tend to find you. I met my group of friends from a (FREEZING!) slip and slid time where we just were chatting, someone mentioned how the stars were really bright, and so we snuck off to the rose garden to have a better look from all the lights. Just bring some spontaneity and I'd say you'll be golden.

Wow, seems like The Dark Knight has been getting rave reviews and incredible buzz, and it's only from the midnight preview!

*continued from open thread #38*

@belleza

"Thanks to our lord and master Yonsama, Korean-Japanese relations have reached new heights!"

Lol, yeah. What next...Rain hooking up with Ayumi Hamasaki? :D

"Oh I think Women in the Sun (or at least up through Episode 8), it’s close to brilliant. The story takes the familiar revenge melodrama formula, and then tweaks it into a story about fear, isolation, human duality, familial bonds, etc."

I've downloaded WotS up to episode 8 already and will start soon after I finish with Time of Dog and Wolf (it's so engrossing right now!). From your description, it sounds really good, like a classic HK drama from the golden 80s. heh. Revenge, familial ties etc, multi-generational conflict was what HK dramas were famous for (btw, I think SSH's 50 episode drama East of Eden is pretty much a korean retelling on a HK melodrama - except for the switched at birth part, lol).

Time of Dog and Wolf is much better than I expected. It's a bit like Infernal Affairs mixed with Shanghai Bund, lol. Lee Jun Ki's acting is still somewhat lacking in depth, but my estimation of him has increased from 'My Girl'. But his foster brother in TODAW almost stole the show from him. Jung Kyung Ho deserved to win the best supporting actor award last year if MBC had this category. His performance was stellar.

"Jung Kyung Ho deserved to win the best supporting actor award last year if MBC had this category. His performance was stellar."

I think you may be disappointed, then with the 2nd half of the show. His character seems to drift away from the main storyline as the show progresses. Unfortunately, in that vacuum, Nam Sang Mi's character takes over . . . . and uhh even Choi Ji Woo would slap that woman silly! :D

"Time of Dog and Wolf is much better than I expected. It’s a bit like Infernal Affairs mixed with Shanghai Bund, lol. "

Oh no doubt. TODAW was written by the people who made Typhoon, and it's almost a classic HK police story -- "us" vs. "them", right and wrong be damned, corruption all the way to the top! And the plotting of the last 1/3 of the story is just marvelous, literally you're holding your breath until the last 5 minutes. And then in the last 5 minutes . . .

I like Lee Jung Ki (and he's gloriously cocky after the plot twist), but I still feel he (like Nam Sang Mi and even Jung Kyung Ho) were miscast for the show. His adolescent, indecisive rage would have been perfect for the Oh Seung Ha character in Mawang. But, here, it's a touch hammy, and well out of depths against actors like Choi Jae Sung and the Great Kim Gab Soo, both men who walk like giants among the dogs and wolves.

If you end up liking Dog and Wolf, I really recommend Iljimae. Once you make it past episode 7, the show becomes one heck of a page turner.

"(btw, I think SSH’s 50 episode drama East of Eden is pretty much a korean retelling on a HK melodrama - except for the switched at birth part, lol)."

I'm hoping East of Eden is a remake of Dallas, and Dennis O gets to play JR Ewing.