2007 was a rich year for drama-land. There was something for everyone, whether your tastes ran toward dark thrillers (Devil), intense dramas (White Tower), heart-warmers (Thank You), off-the-wall eccentrics (Mixed-up Investigative Agency), trendy fare (Coffee Prince), romantic comedies (Dal Ja’s Spring), and so on.
2008, on the other hand… not so much.
Every drama has its good and bad points, but it’s a lot easier to decide how you feel about one when those qualities are expressed in the extreme — i.e., very good, or very bad. When everything is a muddle in the middle, though, it’s harder to draw the lines.
That’s why in contrast to last year’s “Best” and “The Rest” designations, this year I don’t really distinguish “good” versus “bad” — or even “favorites” and “hated dramas” — and can only grade on a spectrum. I call that spectrum “MEH” with the extreme poles representing “generally watchable” and “generally unwatchable.” It’s just been that kind of year.
SONG OF THE DAY
Painter of the Wind OST – “색” (Color) by JOO [ Download ]
The K-drama world rolled into 2008 still riding the high that was 2007, a year in which a startling number of quality dramas were made, and enjoyed. Maybe it rolled in too fast. It ended up getting smothered by the waves of its previous success. In fact, you could say that it even got hit on the head by a stray surfboard, and sunk to the bottom of the ocean.
Depressing enough intro for ya?
But seriously, 2008 was a dark year for the K-entertainment industry, with not only dramas, but also movies suffering and generally showing poor quality. And not only that, but the economy went kablooie, and we suffered a sobering amount of tragic K-celebrity news.
Personally, this was a supremely frustrating year for a longtime and devoted K-drama fan like me. Before this year, I always gave dramas the benefit of the doubt, and would usually watch at least a certain number of episodes before I passed judgment on them, and decided to continue or discontinue watching. But this year, with every stomach-churning dud, I became more and more impatient, and started going through drama episodes like a vulture searching for roadkill. And boy, did I find a lot of roadkill.
I’m pretty sure 2008 was a record year for me in terms of abandoning dramas. And to think that I used to be the girl who would finish every drama she started, no matter how bad or how boring they were! But the older I get, the less patience I have, and the more critical I become. Besides, I’ve now realized just how precious my time really is. I don’t want to waste it on useless pap, thankyouverymuch.
Still, despite all that, there were a small handful of quality dramas this year. None of them quite matched the heights of some of the dramas of 2007, but still, any kind of quality was more than welcome in this gloomy year.
[And thus begins the year-in-review series for 2008 dramas! This'll be a four-part series, and I'm honored to have three lovely bloggers -- Sevenses, thunderbolt, and Dahee_Fanel -- offering up their reviews in addition to mine. Hope you enjoy! --javabeans]
Year in Review – 2008
- In which I practiced my ?? face a lot.
Well, I’m but a wee babe in dramaland compared to Sarah, thundie and Dahee – I really started watching kdrama in earnest in late 2007. *pause while everyone picks their jaws up from the floor*
Caveat: I don’t have a huge base from which to compare, so this is all in my own humble opinion. You don’t have to agree, and you are definitely welcome to discuss. (No trolling, though, or I will start waving the Baton of Baleetion.) First of all, I’d like to say that my watching dramas is purely for the sake of relaxation – I have enough stress and overwork from school already, plskthx. Therefore it’s rather unlikely for me to take a huge tearjearker and run with it, if you know what I mean.
(And the concept of tearjerkers in general just baffle me a little. Why make yourself unhappy? I do love Atonement to the itty bitty pieces of my fairly battered heart, though that’s neither here nor there.)
So, looking over at the ones I watched this year, I’m actually fairly monogamous about my dramas. (Yay for having schoolwork?) The one thing that kind of stood out in my memory of this year, however, is that mostly all of them tended to have many ‘bleh’ moments – including the ones I’d loved and watched like an obsessed thing.
SONG OF THE DAY
Alanis Morissette – “Orchid,” as it is currently my favourite song ever and I wanted to share it.
[ Download ]
How gorgeous is that promo shot or what? It reminds me of the whimsical artwork of old-school Final Fantasy, doesn’t it? Somehow it manages to be fantasy-like, but not too weak or caricaturish.
Talk about changing my mind, both firmly and quickly. MBC’s Return of Iljimae has managed to do that in a really short period of time, and I admit that it’s for totally superficial reasons. But hey, that’s effective marketing (and art direction!) for ya. And image really is a huge component when we’re talking entertainment-industry success. (Also: who could have predicted that pretty-boy Jung Il-woo could pull off such a drastic image shift?)
Based purely on aesthetic, it looks like MBC will be going for a very different feel from SBS’s more overt comic-book-y influences. SBS’s Iljimae was kind of intentionally exaggerated, sometimes jokesy, and I don’t think MBC will be taking that tack. I don’t meant to belabor the comparison, but it’s rare that you get the chance to see such a stark comparison of two very similar things done (probably) very differently — it’s an interesting study in drama production, if nothing else.
Return of Iljimae premieres on Wednesday, November 19.
