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White Christmas: Episode 1

Visually stunning, deftly written, and completely engrossing, psychological thriller White Christmas premiered in 2011 as an eight-episode addition to KBS’ ongoing drama special series, receiving lukewarm ratings despite its critical acclaim and a cult following I’m happy to be a part of.

Helmed by PD Kim Yong-soo (Equator Man, Hometown of Legends) and written by Park Yeon-seon (Alone in Love, Wild Romance), this is pretty much your dream team of writer/director duos – and it doesn’t hurt that Kim Yong-soo is just about my favorite PD working in dramaland right now. I love that he doesn’t rely on slick tricks and sticks to the basics as far as editing goes, because who needs all that when you can create truly iconic, mesmerizing images just by the way you compose your shots? That, my friends, is a gift.

Top it all off with a fresh-faced ensemble cast cut off from the rest of the world with an experimental psychopath, and you get nothing less than a masterpiece. Let’s dive right in.

[Note: I’ll be covering this as an ongoing recap series as it was originally aired – once a week – so because we’ll be going on a blast to the past, please refrain from posting spoilers and try to keep the discussion to the episode at hand. It’ll be hard for me, too.]

SONG OF THE DAY

White Christmas OST – Andreas Scholl “Nisi Dominus (Andante)” [ Download ]

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

 
EPISODE 1 RECAP

Welcome to Susin High, a private boarding school nestled in the middle of the mountains, which houses the top 0.1% of students and is non-affectionately referred to as “Alcatraz.” Its year-round rigorous study program only allows one eight-day break each year, beginning on Christmas Eve.

This is where we begin our story, in a glass prison and architectural maze that takes its inspiration from the famous Louvre Museum, as buses filled with overjoyed students file out of the gate, leaving our protagonist PARK MOO-YUL (Baek Sung-hyun) looking over a snow-covered, yet empty campus.

In voiceover we hear him say, “The story I’m about to tell is about my fight with a monster, and how I had to become a monster myself for eight days to fight it.”

Cameras placed all throughout the school, even in the dorm rooms, follow his every move. He’s a fastidious student without a hair or pencil out of place, but he’s haunted by a black letter he’s kept hidden in his drawer. We find out why when we hear him read the troubling contents:

You tainted me, made me pitiful.
You made me a monster in the corner.
You silenced me.
You ridiculed my false hopes.
You took the only thing I had and put it around your neck.
I held out my hand to you and let you go.
You deleted me from your eyes.
Finally, you overtook me.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.
After eight days, walk up the path by the Zelkova tree.
Under the clock tower, you will see someone dead.
The night that Jesus was born, I curse you.

Moo-yul isn’t the only student staying behind, since he and six others are called over the PA system to meet in the cafeteria, where two other students are already waiting. One is YOON EUN-SUNG (Esom), a girl whom Moo-yul curiously passes by without acknowledgment, and LEE JAE-KYU (Hong Jong-hyun) who seems nervous and shy as he prepares the dinner table.

They’re each being filmed and introduced by a smiling boy with a hearing aid, YANG KANG-MO (Kwak Jung-wook), who calls Eun-sung the “prettiest girl in Susin High” and tries to get Jae-kyu to introduce himself, which just ends in Jae-kyu looking around awkwardly, waiting for an exit.

So Kang-mo keeps the scene lively by spinning the camera toward the tall and lanky YOON-SOO (Lee Soo-hyuk), the “Angel Gabriel of Susin High”, with earbuds and an indifferent expression firmly in place. When asked for an introduction, he flips the bird. Ha.

Next up is the impeccably dressed, stone-faced CHOI JI-HOON (Sung Joon), of whom Kang-mo notes: “Isn’t he really something?”

The last student to arrive is one Kang-mo doesn’t even want to film, the smirking bully and class jjang, JO YOUNG-JAE (Kim Young-kwang). That brings the grand total to seven students, plus the one teacher that’s stayed behind to watch over them, the family-less YOON JONG-IL (Jung Suk-won). Phew, that’s a lot of characters at once.

Teach serves wine for the minors on account of the holiday, wondering why the group of seven have stayed behind. Young-jae makes a joke that he didn’t go home because his stepfather will walk in on him while he’s showering, and no one else – especially Eun-sung – thinks it’s funny.

Everyone mostly keeps to themselves during dinner except for Yoon-soo, who arranges beans into a piece of art on Jae-kyu’s plate, making the nervous kid even more nervous when he explains, “It’s my heart.” Yoon-soo’s a bit kooky, but this moment seems somewhat genuine, and hints at some homosexual overtones for his character – or he might just be using everyone else’s fear of homosexuality to deflect attention away from himself.

Teach then tells the kids the school’s ghost story, claiming it’s a true event from eleven years ago about a lone female student who stayed during the Christmas break. It’s telling that the kid who acts the toughest, Young-jae, is the one most scared from the story, and is the first to jump out of his seat when the campus-wide alarm suddenly starts ringing.

A bloody hand grips the school’s front gate as Teach leads a group of students through the snow, his flashlight revealing a man bleeding from the head. They help the man inside, but Jae-kyu curiously stays behind to eye his surrounding suspiciously.

Inside the school clinic, Teach tends to the bleeding man while Moo-yul calls 911, only once he tells them that the man’s injuries aren’t severe, EMS tells him that they can’t schedule a pick-up – a radio news story from earlier revealed a huge highway pile-up, and they’ve got their hands full.

The bleeding man with the strangely piercing gaze has only one contact for Moo-yul to call, but no one answers.

As for the kids who stayed at the dinner table, Young-jae tries to get a rise out of Eun-sung by reminding her that there’s now a ghost in the girl’s dorm, only for Ji-hoon to deadpan that the school became co-ed two years after Teach’s ghost story supposedly took place. Yoon-soo thinks this is the funniest thing he’s ever heard, and his laughter echoes eerily.

Young-jae stalks Kang-mo outside, and gives a pretty confrontational apology for an incident in the past where he broke Kang-mo’s hearing aid and left him deaf for a week. He doesn’t understand why Kang-mo can’t move on, and produces the same black envelope Moo-yul had as proof. Young-jae: “We can use words. How dare you send this?”

He starts shoving Kang-mo around while Kang-mo protests his innocence, and is stopped from doing serious damage by Moo-yul. This gives Kang-mo the chance to pull an identical black envelope from his pocket: “I got the same letter too.”

To add to the confusion, Jae-kyu reveals that he got the same letter. And for that matter, so did Moo-yul.

Kang-mo thinks the letter is a joke and stuck around because of his journalistic aspirations, but Moo-yul isn’t so sure, and Jae-kyu stays oddly quiet. In voiceover we hear the letter’s contents again as the camera pans over the other students, revealing the same black letter in Ji-hoon’s trash-bin, and one on Yoon-soo’s wall.

According to Teach, the school now has state-of-the-art security because of an incident five years ago when a graduate broke into the school, set the teacher’s dorm on fire, and committed suicide by jumping off the roof. The suicide note they left behind decried their three years in high school as a nightmare, to which Accident Man (who’ll now be staying in the teacher’s dorms) replies, “Then the kids here are in someone’s nightmare.”

The next morning, all the students show their identical black envelopes except Ji-hoon, who casually claims he threw his away. It seems like everyone but him stayed because of the envelope, and he stayed just to have some equation-solving quiet time.

No one cops to being the sender, so Eun-sung proposes that they tell Teach so he can find the culprit. No one wants to, because the letter could be real, and no one’s exactly innocent. Eun-sung: “The innocent one will tell the teacher.”

And when Teach arrives, everyone quietly pockets their letters.

We finally get a proper introduction to Accident Man, looking much fresher with a change of clothes. Turns out he’s a psychologist named KIM YO-HAN (Kim Sang-kyung) and he’ll be staying until the roads are clear. We’ll call him Doctor Kim.

Yoon-soo jumps on the opportunity to get psychological advice, and tells Doctor Kim about a dream he keeps having where a nude male ghost chases him around. It’s hard to tell if he’s being serious or just making a joke, but it’s cute that he lies on the couch all patient-style, only for the rest of the students to pile up on him for fun.

Their antics are broadcasted via security cameras to a laptop somewhere in another dorm, with an occupant we don’t see, but can hear showering.

The mundane task of shoveling snow becomes a fun snowball fight for the students, only Moo-yul breaks from the pack to get some alone time with Doctor Kim. Weirdly enough, when he asks Doctor Kim if he’s really a psychologist, Doctor Kim’s answer is: “For now.”

Moo-yul asks him to do some handwriting analysis on the black letter, making it seem like he has a good idea of the person who wrote it. Doctor Kim gives it a once-over (while Jae-kyu stops in the middle of the snowball fight to eye the pair) and declares that whoever wrote it is in a dangerous state of serious depression and aggression, in need of immediate treatment. I wonder if the dead body bit tipped him off.

Back inside, Moo-yul relates the information to a curious Jae-kyu, while Yoon-soo retreats to his room to take an unmarked prescription. It seems like Moo-yul has taken up the mantle of investigator with Jae-kyu as his sidekick, and questions Yoon-soo about the letter and why he stayed. Yoon-soo: “It’s an honor. Someone hates me so much they want to die. It’s polite to be there when it happens, right?”

But his normal apathetic facade is broken the second Jae-kyu touches his statue of the Virgin Mary, and he orders him to put it down immediately or else the monster in the corner could appear.

This immediately pings on Moo-yul’s suspicion radar, since a line of the letter read: “You made me a monster in the corner.” The answers Yoon-soo casually gives to his questioning are simple and disconcerting – he operates under the belief that the Corner Monster sent the letter, and believes there’s one in every house because that’s what Mom told him. He’s seen it ever since he was kidnapped at the age of five, and one side of its face is blue.

Moo-yul asks if he’s seen it in the dorms, but Yoon-soo says no and looks to the Virgin Mary statue as the reason why.

Moo-yul and Jae-kyu then try going through the record books to see if anyone has a blue-ish facial birthmark, and Jae-kyu happens upon Moo-yul’s page where he put his mother as his role model, only his mother is dead. Aww.

They turn to Ji-hoon next to ask if he knows anyone with a blue birthmark, though Jae-kyu quips that Ji-hoon probably doesn’t even know what his classmates look like. However, Ji-hoon is the one to emotionlessly note that out of the eight black letter sins, “You deleted me from your eyes” fits him the most. So either one person committed all eight sins, or eight different people did.

It’s clear that Moo-yul and Eun-sung have an unsavory past, since he knows everything about an incident she had with a stalker, and she’d ran to him for protection right away. She thinks her actions were thoughtless now, but Moo-yul brings up one of the stalker letters she received which he published in the school newspaper in an effort to stop the stalker, which it did. But it was also a form of ridicule, so Eun-sung’s black letter sin is: “You ridiculed my false hopes.”

She immediately retorts with what she think’s Moo-yul’s sin is: “You took the only thing I had and put it around your neck.” No idea what that means, but we’ll find out.

Moo-yul holds an impromptu meeting with Kang-mo, Jae-kyu, and Young-jae, in the hopes of finding out if there’s a thread that connects them all. The one thing they can’t understand is why there are eight sins for seven people, and the investigation goes awry when Young-jae accuses them of trying to fit him in as the sender.

He confronts Moo-hyul, “Why didn’t you mention Ji-hoon? You try your best, but you can never defeat the born genius. You’re Salieri to his Mozart. You wish he wasn’t around. You want to kill him, right?” His accusation seems spot on, and only made more real when they realize Ji-hoon has been standing in the doorway.

They decide to break for lunch, and file to the cafeteria while Yoon-soo remains hidden and lost in his own world up in the rafters. He rejoins the table later to the sound of them calling him “Angel”, which they then explain to a curious Doctor Kim as being because Yoon-soo got into the school by donating a ton of money.

Eun-sung has been picking on Young-jae the entire meal, though they’re interrupted when Kang-mo wonders about a murderer who’s still at large, as told to him by the news on the radio. There’s no motive for his murders that they can tell, and Young-jae simply passes it off as the murderer just being crazy.

He remarks on something we hear in the news a good deal – the interviews with the murderer’s neighbors, where they’re always baffled because their murderous neighbor was “always kind and quiet.” Eun-sung shoots back at him, “If you got caught doing that, this is what I would say: ‘Well, I knew this would happen one day.'”

Young-jae’s gaze goes dark. “I don’t think you’d say that. If I did such a thing, you’d be the first victim.” Dude, not cool. I know she’s not being cool, but not cool.

Ji-hoon finally asks, “Are monsters like him born that way, or are they raised into monsters?” He argues that murderers must have problems be they natural or learned, and their tendencies could be the result of a brain malfunction or something in their DNA. Basically, if murderous intent is a disability, is it right to punish them?

Then he argues that even if monsters aren’t born, if they’re made by alcoholic fathers or irresponsible mothers, is it their fault?

Then it’s Doctor Kim who asks, “Do you think that criminals shouldn’t be punished then?” And Ji-hoon almost scoffs, of course they should be punished for society to function. That wasn’t his point, “I was just considering whether such ethical, emotional criticism is right,” indicating toward Young-jae.

“It is,” Moo-yul finally responds. Ji-hoon’s brows furrow as he asks why. Moo-yul: “Even if he has problems in his brain or if he was raised in bad conditions, he chose to kill even though he knew it was a crime. If he chose to commit a crime, he should be criticized.” Ji-hoon starts cutting in about how hormones affect brain activity, only they’re interrupted by a late arrival.

And all of it is watched from that laptop in that mysterious dorm room, and we get a partial view of its red-haired, gum-chewing, rock-music-listening occupant.

Doctor Kim finds Yoon-soo after lunch and apologizes for asking about his nickname. Yoon-soo gives a normally weird Yoon-soo reply: “It’s okay. It’s my fault for being born into a rich family.” And he’s not being sarcastic, he means it.

Back in his room literally covered in mirrors, Yoon-soo overlooks his previous unmarked pills and goes for some extra unmarked pills, the kind that come in a velvet-lined secret box. Eek.

Eun-sung visits Doctor Kim in the nurse’s office, complaining of a headache. He hands her medicine, and she notices the huge scar on his palm. He brushes it off as the work of a stalker – sometimes patients become obsessed with their doctors – and smiles secretly when Eun-sung asks about the fate of his stalker, clearly thinking of her own.

We check back in with Yoon-soo who, to put it simply, is tripping balls.

Moo-yul and Jae-kyu try to check the internet for the ‘monster in the corner’ and come up with nothing, concluding that Yoon-soo’s mother must have made the story up. That’s when they hear the sound of breaking glass, and rush to Yoon-soo’s room to see him smashing all of his Virgin Mary statues into pieces.

“It’s all useless now,” Yoon-soo says. “It’s here already.” And one of his many mirrors reveals the image of a small boy huddled in the corner, half of his face blue.

Doctor Kim tells Eun-sung the secrets he uses to get patients to open up, like bringing up the weather or how he almost died in the car crash. Even knowing all this, Eun-sung makes a conscious decision to open up and play the game, eventually asking about the car crash just like he knew she would.

After finding Yoon-soo’s secret drug stash, Moo-yul asks him to describe the monster in the corner. Yoon-soo says it’s usually a child, with one exception – and we flash back to a school trip in Japan, where Yoon-soo was frightened out of his mind by a mysterious man advancing on him with half of his face blue… only he dropped a wallet, indicating his basis in reality.

Doctor Kim opens up about his car crash, only he begins to tap his pen like a metronome as he sings the folk song he claims he heard just as his car was flying off the cliff.

Now our scenes with Yoon-soo and Eun-sung begin to intercut at a faster rate, just as Yoon-soo reveals that he gave the Monster in the Corner its name, and says that it likes Eun-sung. Yoon-soo: “It will probably eat her up.”

We flashback briefly to reveal Yoon-soo passed out on the school trip, in full view of the wallet the ‘monster’ dropped with a picture of Eun-sung inside, just as Eun-sung gives the go-ahead to tell her story to Doctor Kim.

A child’s voice now sings Doctor Kim’s folk song as Eun-sung walks out in a daze, as though Yoon-soo’s monster in the corner were singing it. Hide so I can’t find you, hide so I can’t find you the lyrics go, as Eun-sung finally stops at the clock tower, while Moo-hyul and Jae-kyu run to find her.

In voiceover we hear, “The gates to heaven open wide on Christmas. The worst snowstorm ever and seven letters. After seeing the results, things that seem unrelated come together to form one, and unimportant moments all feel like destiny. We’d find out later that the monster was already with us. We’d let the door open for the monster to enter.”

Moo-yul, Jae-kyu, and Kang-mo start running through the snow toward the clock tower, and the camera pans to reveal Eun-sung lying still near its base. The snow around one of her wrists begins to grow red – she’s cut them.

Back in the mysterious dorm room, we finally see the face (and muscled torso) of its occupant – we’ll come to know him as KANG MI-REU or Mad Mi-reu (Kim Woo-bin) – as he literally throws in the towel.

 
COMMENTS

So. Awesome.

This first episode did a fantastic job of setting up our core group of characters within a genuinely haunting and atmospheric vibe, helped in part by the cinematography, architecture, and stark lighting. There’s a certain kind of lifelessness that filters through every shot that also helps to bring cohesiveness to the production – the title White Christmas isn’t just for show, in case the pervasive snow-covered surroundings didn’t clue us in.

However, this drama did go through a title change before airing, and was originally titled Monster, which was probably more fitting in hindsight. I found it interesting that during an interview about the show the scriptwriter said that she’d pushed to cast only tall boys, and cared more about their height than their acting ability. This normally raises some red flags but it’s a tactic that totally works here – most of the actors are green, but the directing, and especially the writing, elevates them into something more.

So why tall actors? There’s definitely a uniformity factor going on, although each character has a chance to show their very different personalities, whether through subtle speech patterns (Ji-hoon’s very monotone line delivery) or overt actions (Young-jae’s bullying tendencies). I think that it’s also an interesting testament to how thought-out every facet of the production is, even down to the look of the actors compared to the crisp lines that make up their glass prison. It’s as if they want us to take the sameness of the body types at face value so that they can then prove, We’re all the same, yet we’re different.

I like that everyone starts out as strangers or acquaintances at best, with Moo-yul and Eun-sung as the only characters with tangible past ties, even though they barely associate with each other now. Moo-yul becomes oddly entangled with getting to the bottom of the black letter, and I loved that one of the most telling bits of dialogue in the episode dealt with Moo-yul’s hero complex being an overcompensation for his lack of natural genius as compared to someone like Ji-hoon.

Moo-yul is the character we can relate to most because we see the most of him, but even then, there are a lot of question marks surrounding him. The stalker incident with Eun-sung was especially troublesome, and while Moo-yul doesn’t seem the type to set up some sort of grand stalker conspiracy, there must have been something that happened between him and Eun-sung for her to turn out the way she did.

Which brings us to the question of the hour, and one that Ji-hoon poses – are monsters born, or are they made? I really wanted to hear the rest of his debate with Moo-yul, since it’s a question that has a universal end (as Ji-hoon says, monsters should be put away for society to function) but controversial beginnings. We have our semi-obvious monsters like Young-jae, and even Eun-sung to a degree, leaving everyone else as a cipher, especially the new resident psychologist.

There are so many questions propelling us forward and so many unexplored connections that I’m grateful for the pretty simple setup of locking a group of people up together with no foreseeable exit, because the conflict is already rife with possibilities and the overarching question so existentialist in nature. Are we merely what we were born to be, or are we the consequences of our own choices?

 
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Wahh this is a surprise! I was hoping somebody would do a review of this drama!!!

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OMGOSH...I just started watching this today...on a whim. I'm only on episode 3 right now (and I stopped because it's nearing midnight and I'm getting scared LOL). This drama is just amazing, I'm so happy dramabeans decided to cover it all of a sudden. Now I can share this ride with everyone yay!

Also, so many people we know from other dramas is in this drama! Double Yay!

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YEP! choong shik from big! (: this guy can ACT.

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I also can't help but notice how similar our names are... it's even more similar to my viki username... interesting...

and I must second on your statement about the lovely Baek Sung Hyun, he's definitely on my radar for future dramas!

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Yep!
Kwak Jung Wook from Shut Up Flower Boy Band (Maro)
Sung Joon from Shut Up (Ji Hyuk) and Lie To Me (Sang Hee)
Jung Suk Won from Rooftop Prince (Yong Sul)

The cast sounds awesome already!

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Kim Young Kwang from A Gentleman's Dignity too.
Lee Soo Hyuk from What's Up.

whew! that's a lot of cute familiar faces I'm seeing.

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This has been on my must-watch list, so will for sure now that you are doing recaps. Thanks, Heads!

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I LOVE YOU. I've been hoping for a recap of this series on dramabeans since forever.

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Now I HAVE to watch this. Thank you, Heads! It's a big plus that a drama like this has a recapper that can do it justice :)

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Ooh! This sounds good Heads!

Thanks for the recap.

Nothing like a scary drama set in WInter to help beat the Summer heat:)

Look forward to seeing how the story pans out.

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I'll read it tomorrow when the sun comes out and all my family members are home lol.

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YES THANK YOU.

the acting might have been somewhat questionable and some plot points rushed but this is hands-down my favorite drama so far.

thank you so much, i'm so excited to read these!

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Thank you so SO much for recapping this! I watched this before and LOVED it, though I really wanted some comments from people on Dramabeans. This is like a dream come true, thank you so so much. Also, Choi Ji-hoon (Sung Joon), why so cute?

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Choi Ji-hoon (Sung Joon) is sooo cute here. Sort of a young Korean Mr. Spock. :)

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I'm so glad to see someone recapping this drama! I finished watching it a few weeks ago, and I was so sad to see that I couldn't really find any recaps of it anywhere.

I completely love this drama, so I will definitely be reading the rest of your recaps. Who knows, even though I finished it not that long ago, I may watch it over again.

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I loved this drama, nice to see you're covering it, Heads! :)

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Gil Choong Shik!

Aw, he's cute even when he's terrified.

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Is there a place to watch this streaming with subtitles? I've heard so much about it but haven't been able to find it yet.

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i have the same question, i don't where to find.

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http://www.dramacrazy.net/korean-drama/white-christmas-episode-1/

Or, you can easily google it. Someone uploaded it to YT.

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i did that yesterday after writing this comment but thanks anyway and yeah google was easy.

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I had the same question. Thanks everyone~!!

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Sorry, another question: does anyone know where I can download it??

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if you want to download using torrent go to d-addicts or if you want direct download:

(only the MF links are working though): http://doramax264.com/6784/white-christmas/

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It looks like the MF links aren't working either :/

I've already watched this streaming, but want to show it to my brother who I think would LOVE this show.... but he doesn't like streaming >.>;

So.. uh, every link I've found is dead. Any ideas where else I could download the raw?

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I am so glad you're covering this! I've yet to watch it but people have been telling me how awesome it is - so glad you wrote the first ep recap for this because now I'm so motivated to watch this. ((:

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Loved this drama. I really had a hard time telling the actors apart. Like you said, they all have pretty tall stature and similar facial features.

I've seen some of actors whom I was very unfamiliar in subsequent dramas such as Sung Joon, Baek Sung hyun, Hong Jong Hyun, Kim Young Kwang and Jung Suk won.

They are all really amazing and talented in this taut horror suspense thriller. It keeps you guessing in every episode.

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OH MY GOSH YES!!! i read recaps of the first two eps somewhere before but could not find the rest anywhere! im too scared to actually watch it but i was dying to find out what happens... this is like a dream come true!

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OMG!!! You recap this!!!
I love love this drama. It was so beautiful to look at ( the cinematography, casts) & the twisted plot really pull me in... My go to drama for creepy drama. Love that the music even add up to the creepiness.
& This is the drama that introduced me to Sungjoon, Baek Sung Hyun, Kim Young Kwang & Kim Woo Bin. Maybe I should watch it again...

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I need to watch this. It feels like ten little [...] or something like that... and Sung Joon, I want to see his movie too when it is filmed, till that, I guess, this is good enough.

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I have problems with the writing and how some characters are portrayed. I was surprised when you mentioned that the actors where chosen because of their height because the writer lucked out on this one some of these actors were mesmerizing. Another thing this drama had going for it is the OST love the songs and the shot composition like a sophisticated mv.

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The OST is truly awesome. It opened with the Pixies' Debaser. Then, it had Suede. Clearly, whoever responsible came of age in the late 80s / early 90s. Loves it!

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Oh, man, I LOVE this drama ! One of the best.

I was curious about White Christmas as I saw that this was where a lot of the young actors I drooled over these days began (okay, I watched it after Shut Up Flower Boy Band), and after reading the synopsis there was no way I wouldn't watch it.

Highly recommend it.

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my favourite drama EVER!!!! <3

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Thought provoking series. Thanks for recapping "White Christmas"; I'm looking forward to reading your comments.

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Wow, HeadsNo2, this is awesome news-- thanks to you, it's Christmas in July for us! It was really fun when Samsooki took us down Memory Lane with MNIKSS last year-- I hope a lot of beanuts will participate this time too. And being that the drama is White Christmas, maybe Santa will make an appearance this time 'round?

I had been saving this drama (along with one or two others) for a rainy day but it'll be much more fun to watch with a group. All I really know about it is that it's supposed to be very intense and really well done. I'm glad that it has such a good reputation that I don't need to worry about the writing. I'm still trying to wrap my head around the fact that the same person wrote both Alone in Love and Wild Romance-- Alone in Love was so gentle, grounded and well-written, whereas Wild Romance became a ridiculous, poorly-written makjang. (It started off okay, but totally derailed into WTFville.)

*boards the White Christmas train and tries to summon the discipline to watch only one ep. a week*

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honestly the first episode didn't pull me in. But I thought it necesary for plot development. It took me for 3 episode to make me hooked and become one of my favourite

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yAAYYY,, THANK GOD FINALLY SOMEONE RECAPPING THIS MINISERIES!! I AM SO REALLY HAPPY!

THANK YOU HEADSNO2.

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It took at least 3 episodes for me but after that it was just full speed ahead

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Yup, I tanked through the series in 2 days. So good!

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Been considering this for a while. Actually, its been so long a while that I forgot that I was considering it. Love the length.

Thanks Heads. :D

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Omg THANKS A LOT for this!! I watched one episode of it on kbs world and it made me really interested :D

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Oh cool I haven't heard anything about it.Will go and download it and watch it as you recap.Thanks.

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wow, can't believe this one is new to you :) There are quite a few die-hard fans on the OT, and it comes up every couple of months. Each time, we drag someone else into the net!

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I'm glad to see a recap for this series. It sort of makes me want to watch it even though I know what will happen which takes the fun away from a mysterious series like this. But, I enjoy reminiscing! The atmosphere and music enhances the drama experience for this one..

I can imagine Young-Jae character will look so weird now that I watched him in Love Rain, all poised... I found him creepy the first time I watched it.

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One of my all time favorites
Hope these recaps get more people to watch it!

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Thank you, HeadsNo2! I'm so glad you're recapping this!

I watched this series over 2 nights on YouTube earlier this year due to Sung Joon love, and I thought it was very well shot - great cinematography, use of music, symbolism etc - which kinda made up for the plot holes. Still a very arresting drama, and I'm grateful for your recaps because I was sure the English subtitles were not quite getting the meaning across sometimes. And they weren't! This recap filled in a few gaps I still remember I had 8-) Thanks again.

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OMG I always wanted to watch this but never got around to it. Thank You HeadsNo2! Wow, I see a lot of familiar faces with this young crew. Isn't one of them in Big as the bro and the other in AGD? I think his name is Woo Bin but I'm not sure. Anyways thank you again. Off to read!

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Gah! I want to watch it now. Funny thing I totally mistook the Vampidol guy for Woobin lol. So I was a little shocked he was in it as the red-headed hottie with the body.

Can't wait to watch and read the next recap!

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Mad Mireu (Kim Woo Bin) is my favorite character out of the bunch, although I love them all.

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Mad Miroo is the best and in imo the smartest too (yes, even more than residdnt genius Ji Hoo)

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To think that Baek sung hyun is a love slave of Suzy right now....

well,, he's a very good actor right?

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So, I was smart and decided to watch the second episode after reading this, because it was intriguing. I didn't care that it was already after midnight, and these sorts of things tend to give me nightmares, or at least give me trouble sleeping. No, I went ahead and started watching. Then I stopped to get a drink and go to the bathroom. I came back and it was super dark, so I turn a light on to comfort my nerves. I was just about to sit down, but I was SCARED OUT OF MY MIND when I heard a loud "pssssssssssst" from across the room. I think I woke up everyone in the house with that scream. Oh boy. Dearest mother, why are you awake and on the computer at 1 AM? I was hyperventilating for a couple of minutes and I'm still shaking from that scare. Yeah, I think it's time to go to bed.

Thank you for the recap, though, Heads! I look forward to more! :)

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headsno2! you are just pure awesome sauce. thank you so much :)

lee soo hyuk's face is just so crazy mesmerizing to look at.

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Oh My Gosh !! I am really in love with this !!! :D Thanks Heads :))

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So excited to see recaps for White Christmas here! I'm always intrigued but also a little terrified of dramas and movies that veer into this genre but this recap's sold me and I think I'm going to have to watch and read along with your weekly recaps!! Thanks so much and can't wait for next week! (The suspense is getting the better of me heh).

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the scriptwriter might not have cared if the actors can act but fortunately, while maybe a little green, they can all act which is good because script writing and directing alone don't make a drama as awesome as this

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"White Christmas" is at the top of my must-watch list...

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Do you mean "green" as in not ripe? Like a banana?? Lol, that's what I'm getting.

Anyway! I love this drama, truly one of my favorites and this is such a surprise. Hope everyone who's just giving it a try enjoys it and don't get scared, guys! Lol :)

The first episode was really good and I don't say that about many dramas since most of them can take at least 5 episodes or longer to get good. But, since this only 8 episodes, I guess they started it off with a bang, which I like. Also like all the actors I got introduced to through this show: Lee Soo Hyuk, Sung Jun, Kim Woo Bin, Baek Sung Hyun, Kim Young Kwang stood out most to me-- I think they have a knack for acting and hope they continue to do well.

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Finally! Thanks HeadsNo2 for this...

So pleased to see a recap of this show! Definitely up the top of my list of favourites! Great music, atmosphere, acting, photography: it has it all!

I have been searching for the OST with no success. Does anyone know where to find it?

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Thanks for the link whimsyful!

Love the music. Its why the drama worked so well for me.

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oh wow, thanks so much! Will definitely watch this when the next drama slump comes - and if it doesn't (likely, the way they keep on churning out good dramas in Korea), I'll just watch it anyways :)

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Thank you for the recap! I am watching it for the first time now hehehehe Did anyone else look past Sung Joon to notice the teacher (Jung Suk Won) is our favourite royal bodyguard from rooftop prince? kekekeke

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YES VERY RE-CAP WORTHY DRAMA
have fun watching everyone ^^
'tis a thrilla

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Wow! I just started watching White Christmas yesterday!!... all because of Kim Woo Bin in A Gentlemen's Dignity...

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Oooh thanks for the recap! It looks so interesting and made me even watch the first episode, though i scare easily, i feel like i need to watch this! :D

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watching this when it was aired in kbsworld. this recap brought back memories of how i always wait for the next ep. the storyline is good and it kept you anticipating for what will happen next. my fav character here was also mad mireu, it's fun to watch his relation with the bully young jae.

this drama deals with human nature of when they were faced with extreme situation, you just can guess the ending.

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typo, meaning to type can't not can

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I am glad this series is being recapped here. This was a very good drama containing only eight episodes. The characters are all well explored and each nuances is captured and expanded over the course of series.

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I love this drama. Everything about it is perfection.

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OMG. I LOVE this drama. Watched it like 3 times already.
The storyline and cinematography is so beautiful~

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