Lee Soon-jae, Kim Hye-sung

…but it IS “through the roof.”

The producers of Season 2 of Unstoppable High Kick have decided to christen the new show with a different name; rather than calling it “Season 2,” it’s being tentatively renamed High Kick Through the Roof [지붕뚫고 하이킥]. (They are entertaining other options, but “Through the Roof” is a top contender.)

This name change is probably a good idea when considering that while Through the Roof is using a similar format to its predecessor as well as one of its main actors (grandpa Lee Soon-jae), the new series is not a spinoff, or even a sequel. It’s simply a similar setup being produced by the same folks of the original, but employs different characters and storylines.

Still, expect to see some familiar faces from the original: For insance, Kim Hye-sung, who played the smart, well-adjusted “Min-ho” in the first season, will be making a cameo in Through the Roof. It’s being reported that “most of the main actors of Unstoppable High Kick will be making cameo appearances” throughout the sitcom’s planned 120 episodes. (This ought to come in handy for ratings purposes — a reunion with Kim Hye-sung, as well as Jung Il-woo, Park Min-young, and Kim Bum? I bet they won’t all come back at once, but one can hope.)

Episode 1 airs on September 7.

Via Asia Economy, Today Korea

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Apparently the folks at MBC had been looking to revisit their hit family sitcom from 2006-07, Unstoppable High Kick, according to some reports. However, an MBC rep stated on the 16th that a Season 2 is looking unlikely. My question is: Was anybody expecting one?

The show had pulled in high ratings, and though it was built around three generations of one family, the new faces made it particularly popular with the young set. I had heard they were considering making it into a High Kick movie, but that didn’t work out.

The rep explained that while they’d like to make a Season 2, the greatest difficulty would be in reassembling its cast. The older actors would probably be easier to get back (Lee Soon-jae, Na Mun-hee, Jung Jun-ha, Park Hae-mi), but one crucial leg of the love triangle in the middle generation (and youngest generation), Seo Min-jung, got married, had a baby, and moved to the States.

And then there are the youngsters, who were all unknowns back then and now all budding stars in their own right. (By the way, if you’re a new fan of Kim Bum, you’ve gotta see how adorable he is in High Kick, particularly because he and Kim Hye-sung love each other — they’re best friends — so unabashedly it’s a scream. The characters are both straight, but their bro-love is played up for laughs.) For instance:

(I took this fanmade vid from youtube; credits and thanks to shykiwi1132.)

A quick rundown of the young stars now: Jung Il-woo is headlining his own drama, Return of Iljimae. Kim Bum is experiencing a fresh wave of popularity for Boys Before Flowers. Park Min-young is about to kick off her new drama, Princess Ja-myung. And Kim Hye-sung has been busy with film work and a role in Kingdom of the Wind.

It’s possible that PD Kim Byung-wook will helm a new sitcom instead, though the MBC rep didn’t completely rule out the possibility of a High Kick 2. But really, two years after it shot to popularity, is anybody thinking about the show anymore?

Via Star News

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I’ve been talking about the short queer film Boy Meets Boy for a while now, and it’s finally being released.

The nearly wordless short film, starring Kim Hye-sung (Unstoppable High Kick) and Lee Hyun-jin (Kimchi Cheese Smile) as 18-year-old high school students, is billed as a queer romance about first love, and bears the tag “based on a true story.”

The film held its press conference on November 5, and will have a theater release in six theaters — unusual for a short — starting on November 20, which will also feature a segment on the making of the film. (Because it won’t be shown with other shorts, the ticket price is also lower, at about half the price of regular movie tickets.)

More from the press conference and film stills >>

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On October 5, the short film Boy Meets Boy held an open discussion at the Pusan International Film Festival with its stars Kim Hye-sung (Jenny, Juno) and Yeh Ji-won (Mixed-up Investigative Agency) and director Kim Jo Kwang Su.

I remember being intrigued when I first heard about Boy Meets Boy [소년, 소년을 만나다], which marks Kim Hye-sung’s departure from his family-friendly image in Unstoppable High Kick. His early career had been marked by an emphasis on his pretty face more than anything (he rose to fame as an internet uljjang with thousands of fans, got a couple movies, and then the hit sitcom High Kick), but he seems to have a grounded perspective of his fame (as he explained in the interview linked above).

Not only is he portraying half of a gay romance in the short film, the narrative is expressed without dialogue — the director opted instead to tell the story mostly in the characters’ gazes.

More photos and discussion points from the event >>

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I’ll admit I haven’t paid much mind to KBS’s upcoming sageuk (and manhwa adaptation) Kingdom of Wind because, well, I never cottoned on to Jumong and felt no particular thrill to see Song Il-kook back in his old-fashioned threads playing Jumong’s grandson.

But I will say I’m a little surprised at the casting of two up-and-coming new pretty boys who have hitherto been known mostly for their good looks, in their first sageuk roles: Coffee Prince’s Kim Jae-wook, pictured above, and Kim Hye-sung, who’s just started expanding his repertoire (Jenny, Juno; Unstoppable High Kick) to more daring roles, like the queer short Boy Meets Boy. (Well, everyone knows that when you want to prove your acting mettle, you either go theater or sageuk.)

Furthermore, three of Kingdom of Wind’s main cast are also making their first sageuk attempts: lead actress Choi Jung-won (Infamous Chil Princesses), supporting actress Oh Yoon-ah (Old Miss Diary, Someday), and actor Park Gun-hyung (Dancing Princess). Generally I find that an actor’s first time in a sageuk is often marked by stiff, awkward acting (because the cadence of a historical drama is so different from a modern one), but the mark of a versatile actor is one who adapts to the new milieu quickly.

Must be their strategy to try to rope in the younger viewers, I suppose? The drama’s competition will be MBC’s Beethoven Virus, with whom it shares a premiere date — this Wednesday, the 10th — and SBS’s Painter of the Wind, which premieres two weeks later on the 24th.

Via My Daily

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