he gave new meaning to the term guyliner!
*finger hearts finger hearts*

Justice to hot beautiful guys in guyliner!! Wae Truck of Doom you taketh when they are almost instinct?? Thank you @leetennant. Let us create a cause for this injustice (I'm thinking commercials with PPL) Let it be heard and known.

😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭
*scrapes off debris on my windshield*
😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

Beanies, the Fairies of mercies, I, the Truck of Doom, sincerely ask you for your forgiveness of my perpetual sins. Through the ministry of Dramabeans, please give me pardon and peace.

Absolve me, @leetennant, from all my sins in the name of bleeding flowers, our son Byung-hee, in the land of Drama we worship. I thank you.

I'm speechless. Even the stills leave me shattered, and your writing encapsulates the incandescence (no, the burning hot flame) of Lee Min Ki.

Beneath the swagger, the stark eyeliner and the self-possession, he was damaged and sensitive. His sad, intense eyes undercut confidence and spoke of an adolescent bravado that masked who he really was with the projection of how he wanted to be seen.

This is why I think I can't continue watching, and you finally put it into words for me. I knew this kid, I knew several of them, and only one made it out of adolescence.

I knew once this segment started that he would be mentioned but I still dreaded it. He really was the most wonderful character, I found myself willing the show to change its plot while watching.

I now think I should watch this much beloved performance. Just the first episode? Or how many ever LMK is in.

Oof the face of Byung-Hee staring at me was the first thing I saw when opening DB. I am still traumatised. If anything, he was everyone else’s Muse.

Just a suggestion for the editors: maybe these posts should have a “Spoilers warning” at the top, just in case?

This......completes me. Thank you for nailing down why it lingers long after others fade.

I'm just gonna go ahead and start your fanclub, @leetennant, you must be tired of me telling you how much I freaking love all you write!!
It's a shame you knew the TOD was coming, I didn't when watching and it scarred me forever (not that I want you to be scarred, but the experience was definitely something). It took me around 3-4 weeks to pick it up again, and still don't know how I finished.
He was the one who came to mind when reading about this month's theme so thank you for wording everything so beautifully! <3

Heartbreakingly beautiful post, ChinguMode~

The writer was a sadistic one, gave us this magnificent electrifying layered character (of course with LMK's power) only to treat him like this. Tragic. One of the scenes of kdramas that still traumatize me to this day. Sigh.

*googling what is pulchritudinous

I will never be over it. I didn't know it was coming, and I was new enough to k-dramas not to understand how a character like Byung-hee is too good for the world. I have never seen a drama before or since where the *absence* of a character was a character in itself, and it nearly broke me. I almost quit k-dramas, to be honest, but I couldn't give up the hope of seeing this kind of magic onscreen again (sadly, only once or twice since then).

I had to look up “pulchritudinous” and if there was a word that describes Lee Min Ki in this show, that would be it. I also am mesmerized by your writing and feel grateful you allowed me to write one of these themes with you, although ultimately failing. (Still salty!) But you? Splendid, as per usual!

A beautiful tribute to one of my favorite K-drama characters. I think I knew he didn't last more than a few episodes before I watched, but I didn't know how shocking his death would be.

👏👏👏👏👏👏

And some performances steal our hearts, touch our souls, and take up permanent residence in our minds.

As do certain Beanies I know whose writing hits me where I live. Thank you for composing this essay. ;-)

Holy guacamole, @leetennant ChinguMode, that first screencap is worth a million words. You had me at "pulchritudinous." That adjective describes both Joo Byung-hee and Lee Min-ki to a T. My vocabulary thanks you. ;-)

But what really slays me are your turns of phrase. They brought tears to my eyes and prompted me to rewatch the first two episodes. They also reminded me of musicians, some now deceased, whose music makes a difference in my life.

Beneath the swagger, the stark eyeliner and the self-possession, he was damaged and sensitive. His sad, intense eyes undercut confidence and spoke of an adolescent bravado that masked who he really was with the projection of how he wanted to be seen...

He knew already what the others took 16 episodes to learn. He was incandescent and so of course he burnt out early, as all good rockers do...

He just was this character in all its complex, sexy, punk rock glory. And after he was gone, his absence – the absence of a sun – sucked the others in toward the singularity left by his passing.

BECAUSE THIS LIFE IS OUR FIRST was my introduction to LMK's work. It captivated me. I, too, read the hushed references to SHUT UP FLOWER BOY BAND, and went ahead and watched it anyway. He truly conveyed the vibe of some of the wild and woolly musicians I encountered in my college radio days. Byung-hee would have looked at home on stage at the late, great CBGB or Max's Kansas City in NYC.
https://www.cbgb.com/

I never completed this drama because I didn't know LMK was gonna die and when he did I was so heartbroken that I couldn't continue watching it. That was five years ago, to this day I haven't continued the drama. It was way too tragic for me ugh
TOP 10 worst drama deaths for sure. Along side Eun Shi-kyung and Bokgil.

I remembered watching that episode and that traumatizing scene just flash by and I ended up jaw slacked staring at my laptop. The epsiode continues but my mind still stuck at that scene.
Is that really happen?
My heart is in denial...
No way.. there is no way it happened.
But drama gods was against me for whatever reason, it really did happened.
While I'm not exactly a fan of TOD, I never blame it but not this one.
How could you...

Omg, what a scene stealer indeed! I'll never forget how utterly shellshocked I was when the truck of doom struck, and I STILL have this feeling of anguish when I think about Byunghee saying, "I want to die at my happiest moment." Luminescence is the most perfect word, and he is such a deserving scene stealer. Congrats, @leetennant, this was a great read!

I loved Shut Up Flower Boy Band. It's one of the best coming of age dramas that I watched. No filler or draggy episodes. But, I still wonder about the drama that could have been if Lee Min Ki/Joo Byung Hee had been the lead...

@leetennant This is just... perfect 💖💖

Oh my dear @leetennant!
A great many thanks for immortalizing the essence of this larger-than-life character and one of my favorite LMK performances. 💖🌹

Your words are nothing short of delicious and exquisite. They take me back to watching SUFBB, and the state of horror and heartbreak that Byung-hee's death left me in; but also the utter delight, fascination and awe from watching LMK work his magic in such a short amount of time. He really WAS the character.

ㅠ.ㅠ after all these years and his death still gets to me. I went in knowing he would die too, but I still got attached anyway. What a great post!

Thank you for writing about this drama !! Unlike you I didn't know LMK's character was gonna die, and I was in complete denial in the next episodes. I think that while watching the rest of the drama, I started to accept his death alongside the rest of the band, but it was soooo hard !
This drama holds a special place for me, because when I watched it, I had finished high school for some years, and I missed my band mates with whom I played some rock music. Seeing the guys joking, eating, chatting and playing music together made me so nostalgic...
You perfectly described why the leader of the flower boys band was so memorable. And you made me want to rewatch that drama. So thanks :)

I light a candle to the scene stealer's scene stealer.
Guyliner glory and TOD punch.
@leetenant, thank you so much for writing about the one who sets the bar so high for all other scene stealers... it is somewhere up in the stars. With him.

"Spinning beautiful castles of big dreams to mask our true small ones – friendship, family, security, love. "
So beautifully written @leetennant 😭👏👏👏

LOVED. LOVE. WILL LOVE him in Shut Up Flower Boy Band. He made such an impression. Love the actor ever since.

I was devastated when his character died.

What a great write-up (especially the opening), and a beautiful tribute !

This is one of my favorite kdramas of all time, including the OST. I rarely listens to drama OSTs outside of the dramas, but for Shut Up, I listened to the OST long after finishing it.

AMEN!!! TTTT__TTTT

Can I be honest here? Lee Min Ki ruined this drama for me.... I never got over his character's death so I never saw past his episodes. He was wonderful,poignant, powerful, weak and just beautiful. I never got over it. To date it is Lee Min Ki's most memorable character for me even when I've liked his acting before since his Rainbow Romance days and after most recently Beauty inside... His Joo Byung Hee felt ephemeral, and visceral.. Someone who I would have loved in real life.

His character is still iconic. He was barely there in the drama... but what a memorable scene stealing character!

Once I realized he was gone, I couldn't finish the show. Years later I went back to try to finish it but I made the mistake of starting with Ep 1 again and, yup, there was no interest in watching the rest, knowing that this character would not be back in my screen.

Byung Hee was an enigma!!

After his untimely death, it took me too long to pick up the pieces and watch the drama till the end. But the profound emptiness of the stage without Byung Hee was too obvious to ignore that it made my heart bleed when I watched them performed without him.

R.I.P. Byung Hee. I love you and will always do -wipes tears-

OK, this article (and the screenshots, what can I say, I'm a sucker for guyliner) convinced me that I must watch this, but I can't find it anywhere! Looks like DramaFever was the only place to watch it online with English subs, but without that I'm out of luck. :( At any rate, thanks for sharing this analysis/tribute, ChinguMode, it's beautifully written!