@bspanda,

"Kim Bum Soo’s Memory MV with BINNIE and Lee Da Hae

(Is it the snow? Or is it cause I see keep thinking LDH looks like Yuri? Doesn’t it look like it could have come from Snow Queen?)"

What a great MV. The song is average, but the video is just awesome. Lee Da Hae is so pretty and I love her optimistic visage.

But what is it about Hyun Bin that makes girls die these terrible sad deaths in the winter time? Perhaps he should stick to liking girls in the summer time, like Kim Sam Soon.

@kb,

You should watch MNIKSS from the beginning. It isn't a typical k-drama, and maybe that turns off certain people because the main character tends to be a little rough edged and not a typical beauty. But what I liked about Samsoon (the woman character) was her depth of feeling and integrity, among other things. It is a solid base from which she can grow (in any infinite number of directions). I say this as a bit of advice for you, to recognize those elements in other people.

The nice guy finishes second here, and I think it is a good lesson to learn but the outcome could have been reversed early in the drama series and who knows whether Samsoon would have been just as happy in the long run. We know now that she was meant to be with Hyun Bin at the end, but in our own lives, we don't have the luxury of being able to look ahead to the future and then back to the present to see what we should do.

You are not meant to finish second in your own life, and so when I say that that blind date guy got shafted, I mean that early on, he lost out unjustly and if that were you, the lesson is not to have let that person go so easily.

samsooki,

'the lesson is not to have let that person go so easily.'

this is some sound advice. it resonates with me. i absolutely agree, some things are definitely worth fighting for. but knowing which ones to fight is the dicey question.

her affected front towards blind date guy notwithstanding, it appears samsoon gives clear indication her interests lie in hyun bin. in ep 10, to believe hyun bin when he tells her that one of the bakery workers is hurt, even though she knows he is manipulative and cunning, is very telling, given the fact that she's been telling the blind date guy all this time to not believe anything hyun bin is saying (he's crazy).

at this moment after she runs away with hyun bin with nary a good-bye, if i were the blind date guy, it's over. forget it. i don't care if she was the prettiest girl i've ever seen. this battle is not worth fighting. there is too much emotional baggage. perhaps a relationship could've worked in the future, but i am not willing to wait for that. as i said in post 142, she is not the right person for me at this time.

and here, i believe, is where you and i have a difference in opinion. in one of your posts in a previous thread, an issue arose as to whether or not your wife's brother should commit to a long distance relationship. if i recall correctly, you believed there is only one right mate for each of us, while your wife believed otherwise. i am with your wife on this one. if i were the blind date guy, maybe samsoon is the 'one' for me; fortunately, i believe there are others out there who can fulfill the role of the 'one.' i would move on because samsoon has clearly shown by her actions that she is more interested in hyun bin. if a relationship was truly meant to be, then she can contact me when her life is in order. i will not wait until that time.

as a 'nice guy' myself, i cringe when i hear the phrase 'nice guys finish last,' as if a guy lost out on a girl just because he was nice. the 'nice' guys lose out because they are needy, uninteresting, or just plain naive. in the case of the blind date guy, he didn't have much of a chance from the get-go. samsoon was never able to disentangle herself emotionally from hyun bin.

so back to the original question, what girl is worth fighting for? besides the obvious (meaning intial attraction), i believe it's a girl who gives an indication that she is willing to commit to a relationship by words and actions (key word being 'indication,' as it's tough to fully commit after one or two dates). at that point, i am willing to bust through all obstacles, and then let the chips fall as they may. in the case of samsoon, although she spoke a lot of the right words, her actions belied the truth.

EDIT

last sentence should read

'her actions showed the truth.' misused the word 'belied'

@hjkomo

Seems I cannot PM you, as you do not exist. I will try and find the mistake in my account settings first, because this is clearly a case of "you post therefore you are"...

@kb,

"‘nice’ guys lose out because they are needy, uninteresting, or just plain naive. in the case of the blind date guy, he didn’t have much of a chance from the get-go. samsoon was never able to disentangle herself emotionally from hyun bin. "

But that's not his fault, is it? he wasn't needy, uninteresting or naive. He was just too nice...? What if he had stood up, at the first meeting, disengaged HB's hand from Samsoon's wrist, and said, "I'm sorry, but you aren't wrecking my blind date meeting with this wonderfully intriguing woman."

At that point, Samsoon was not into HB, and HB was only screwing around because it amused him. Then the nice guy blind date guy would have had a much different life, and My Name Is Kim Sam Soon would have been a 2 episode arc...

"so back to the original question, what girl is worth fighting for? besides the obvious (meaning intial attraction), i believe it’s a girl who gives an indication that she is willing to commit to a relationship by words and actions (key word being ‘indication,’ as it’s tough to fully commit after one or two dates). at that point, i am willing to bust through all obstacles, and then let the chips fall as they may. in the case of samsoon, although she spoke a lot of the right words, her actions showed the truth.

I guess so. But I disagree with your conclusion. What girl is worth fighting for? Any girl that you believe is "right" for you is worth fighting for (of course, I advise caution in the determination of who is right for you). Why? Because who knows what will happen in the future. If you press the case only for those women who show reciprocal interest in you, then you are eliminating the possibility that those women could possibly be wrong about you.

How can you know whether that girl will be willing to commit to a relationship with you, unless you first press the issue. If it turns out that you were wrong and she is not right for you, then fine, at least you gave it a shot. And if it turns out that you were right, then you took a chance and found success.

But if you drop the ball before even getting into the game, then you will never find success.

That's why the blind date guy should have pressed the issue in Episode 2. He would have had NO idea what kind of woman that Sam Soon is, but without trying, he never really got to find out. Then, Samsoon fell for HB, and the blind date guy became a running joke, only to be pitied.

samsooki,

i didn't see episode 2, and i had assumed samsoon was emotionally tied to hyun bin before she first met blind date guy. my error.

in terms of the 'nice' issue, i should've said nice guys don't lose out on girls because they are 'nice'; rather, they lose out if they are needy, uninteresting, naive, or in the case of blind date guy, spineless. just because you're nice doesn't mean you have to be spineless too. it seems people lump all these unfavorable characteristics together and call it 'nice.' actual nice guys without these unfavorable characteristics can play the game too.

i see your point about pursuing and fighting for whoever you feel is right.

i really didn't feel much empathy for blind date guy previously because i wrongly assumed that hyun bin had samsoon's heartstrings at his fingertips before he even came into the picture. it was unreasonable to expect blind date guy to win. now that i realize he made an egregious mistake in ep. 2, well, i'll drop a tear in a bucket for him.

i wasn't able to watch episode 2 before my post 156 because my computer crashed on download, but i just finished watching the blind date scene. funny stuff.

after watching that scene, not only would i call blind date guy spineless, i wouldn't exactly call him an actual nice guy either. he stops in traffic to help some stranger in an accident, but he won't help his own date who was in obvious distress? he walks out while she's screaming and kicking? this isn't even about fighting for a woman. this is just common decency. i retract all my statements about 'if i was blind date guy,' because after watching ep 2, i don't think blind date guy deserves samsoon.

so he made the conscious decision to walk out. fine. he rejects samsoon. so what in the world is he thinking when he greets samsoon in ep 10?

running joke? he deserves it. to be pitied? no way. i want my tear in the bucket back.

kb,

Go to soompi.com and register for the forums if you don't already have an account there. Then PM me at soompi (my handle on soompi is also samsooki) your email address. I'll respond back to you with a beta invite to dramafever.com, which a lot of korean dramas in HQ streaming, with subs. dramafever has MNIKSS, for example. The website has permission for all the dramas it streams, and it is sort of like hulu.com, but for korean dramas (so it has a few commercials).

dramafever, at this point, does not charge any fees for watching its dramas, and only has very limited commercial interuptions.