Hi Bye, Mama! Because it had ghosts I thought it would be too scary for me but watched it and loved the story. So so sad to think about the ghosts who can’t go enjoy the afterlife as too worried about those they left behind. Also, really funny in parts. I think they got the balance right and raised some important points about letting go and moving on and holding on and cherishing the memories.

Beyond Evil for me. Didn't pick it up as it aired - seemed too dark and depressing and I tend to steer towards lighter things. But so much raving by other Beanies finally led me to pick it up and I was blown away. So tightly crafted, so compelling, so thought-provoking, so blindingly well-acted. Right up there in my top dramas.

Goblin for me.

I tried twice and it didn’t work. Felt like it was an utter waste of 8 or more hours of my life and couldn’t understand why it was raved so much. Wasn’t interested in the bromance between the ML and the SML.. and what? The ML is a goblin (what is that?) and the SML is a grim reaper? The FL who looks so plain? Urg no. Thank you.

Tried the third time, and OMG. I really liked it. Guess it was the right time, right mood, and the right thing thing? Adored it.

Just Between Lovers!
I'm so fussy this week because of this show. When this drama aired i intentionally ignored it because i heard it has sad story and the genre is melodrama. I knew it was famous back then and i knew beanies here love that show (i've lurked here for years). Even Junho's name wasn't able to change my mind.
My 2017/2018 self was still so happy, normal, and shallow and only want to watch something bloody like thriller dramas.

I decided to pick this up because of Link. I want similar shows like Link: painful, dark, a bit of trauma, and sometimes feels lifeless. JBL came out as one of recommended shows. Since i know it's popular, why not?
So so glad i decided to watch it. It has a lot of love and pain in the same time. Most characters are likeable and the actors are awesome. I still have few episodes left so i hope the show will finish strong.
I'm listening to JBL ost now😊

Chief Kim! I had a hard time imagining how a show about accounting fraud could be interesting and broad comedy isn't usually my thing, but it turned out to be an all-around delightful watch. It finds just the right balance between silliness and seriousness, Namgoong Min is phenomenal, and it lets its ensemble be wacky without ever reducing them to one-dimensional stereotypes. Should not have waited so long to watch this one.

Forest of Secrets... and then it became my favorite piece of media ever created.

You feel this way about Hospital Playlist. Wow! I loved Hospital Playlist, but your loved is unrivaled.

The drama I dismissed but slowly up warming up to is Extraordinary Attorney Woo. Why? I didn't want to rewatch the savant syndrome arc in the earlier episodes of The Good Doctor (American version), and that it(Savant Syndrome) be romanticized, drawing attention away from the fact the autism isn't the same for all autistic patients, and the struggles of the parents. Well clearly it is not doing that at the moment, and I hope it remains so.

Just like @daebakgrits , I also stayed far away from Hospital Playlist, because it was a medical drama, and I don't like them, at all. However, everyone was talking about it, about Shin PD's comeback (at that time I didn't know who he was) so I tried the 1st episode. It was sooooo long! I was like 'nah this is too boring'. Then one day I was scrolling through Netflix and stumbled upon this, and started watching again, out of boredom, and BAM! I just binged the whole thing and when I checked the time it was 5.30 in the morning! I made a Twitter account for the sole purpose of finding more wintergarden fan art and that was a huge leap out of the box because I really don't like hardcore stanning and fangirling and avoided Twitter like the plague. Oh the things I do for the love of HosPlay *sigh* 😂♥️

For me it's Revenge Returns/ Boksoo is Back 😁
The synopsis was way over the top, even Yoo seung ho wasn't able to pull me in. Later that year, I had a lot of free time so decided to watch the first two episodes just to see how over the top the plot is, and surprisingly telling myself "Let me watch one more episode".
It's not that I will ever be rewatching any time soon but it certainly exceeded my expectations.
Since then Yoo seung ho, Kim Minjae and to a lesser extent, Lee Jung Seok are the ones I trust to select on a solid script.

Also a really old medical drama starring Lee Yo won named Surgeon Dal Bong Hee. I was so ready to drop in the first episode but persisted and finally reached the ending and even found a gem of OST. The ML is totally not the eye candy which we expect from kdramas and was so grumpy till the final week that my roommate ( who doesn't watch kdramas was curious enough to watch till the last episode because she was so certain that he would absolutely not be able to have a romantic scene with FL 😄)

Also Jejungwon! I initially wanted to watch because it was timed at such a critical point in Korean history; how the first modern hospital in Korea came to be but the number of episodes almost dissuaded me. Thankfully I persisted and enjoyed a lot!

My Mister. I remember seeing ads about it on Dramafaver (RIP), but at the time I did not watch dramas live, so I ignored it. Then I read a very favorable review and I gave the drama a try. I am glad I did!

Bossam: Steal the Fate. I was not into historical Korean palace stories. But I knew Jung Il-Woo and Kwon Yuri from their cooking shows so I just happened to give it a watch since I had not seen either in a drama. It turned out better than I expected even though the palace arcs were the least enjoyable parts.

Healer. 😂😂😂 The description on Viki was off-putting and the first scene looked like the set-up for a Tom Cruise action movie, which is SO not my cup of tea. I tried several times before getting past those first few minutes.

I have seldom been happier to be wrong.

Too many dramas to list, but I'll try it out and after 1-2 episodes, it's not working, I read DB and get over the hump, so to speak. Dramas I ordinarily would have dropped. This site is so helpful!

very first..
I am not a Robot... 3 times picked n dropped at 4 episode mark..
then finally 4th time determined to pass 4th episode at least and reach till 8th.. but then i dont even when i fell in love with this absolutely cute n awwwdorable show.

2. Just between lovers
first time when i started.. i wasnt in situation to handle a trauma based show. i knew if went in id end up as emotional crying mess.. which i couldn't able to manage.
so 2 years when things were manageable i picked and binged it (but for sure with tissues and buckets by my side)

Probably for many of us it was Korean dramas in general. What, watch a 16-20 episode series about another culture with subtitles?
Dubious start - now look where we are! ^^

- More specifically, Forest of Secrets, Chief Kim, Racket Boys, Life on Mars, Vampire Prosecutor...

Right now it’s Extraordinary Attorney YWY. No way I was watching it, lawyers and lawyering and a line about autism I was sure would be mishandled, plus I have never liked PEB. I caved to the Beanie enthusiasm and have watched 5 episodes this week, really like it and would recommend to all. I am also now hyper aware of whaledom and even noticed whales on wallpaper behind a talking head on CNN this morning (will post on fanwall)
🐳, fighting!

There have been a few… I put off watching Shining Inheritance for ages because I don’t tend to like melodrama, and it was very old with terrible hair….then I watched the first few episodes and everything terrible happens to the heroine and it is grindingly depressing - and then it turned out to be great and I ate it up.

I wasn’t going to watch Mad for Each Other because it was about mental illness and kdramas tend to handle that poorly, but it was short so I tried it and it was so good (points off for the weird separation bit but I have come to accept there will nearly always be a quality dip towards the end of a drama).

Hospital Playlist was it for me too. Shopping King Louie was another one. I went in it blind, one of my initials K-dramas and the name and summary was not really helping but I watched it because I had a lot of time on my hand and Attorney Cha from "I can hear your voice" was in it.

I have too many to list! I think the most recent one was Attorney Woo! I did watch a couple of dramas that had characters like YW and they just failed at writing them/handling the topic well hence I was apprehensive until I saw tiktok edits and I knew i had to give it a shot and here I am, completely in love. The way they handled the autism aspect of the show (which is really important for me) is fantastic and I hope they keep it up!

Another one would be Hospital Playlist. I initially wasnt interested at first & struggled to get past the first ep till I heard from my friends that I should give it a shot and I'm really glad that I did, I enjoyed it from start to end!

A Business Proposal

I prefer slice of life and healing dramas over romcoms. Romcom isn't my fave genre, because they tend to do lots of fillers, and slapstick comedy that doesnt stick.

But with ABS, I did read some good things about it, and it was only after my cousin recommended it to me that I started watching it. It turned out to be one of the best thing I followed. It was an enjoyable drama.

PRISON PLAYBOOK.
I watched this after it had finished airing. I wasn't interested at all because nothing about this drama was appealing to me. The poster, the casts, nor the synopsis.
But then I kept seeing high recommendation on this piece with highly review rate. It made me curious and gave it a try.
It turns out that it IS really good in many ways that I can explain. BIG WOW... AMAZING...
It is touching, funny, memorable an full of message of life at the same time.
Now... I recommend this drama to everybody who hasn't watched it, and I have repeated watching it numerous times, as well as watching the clips here and there every now and then.
Good beyond words for me.

Far too many to count. There’s already a barrier for many of us here in dramabeans in making it easy to dismiss kdramas. Most of us are not Korean or of Korean-descent (I’m assuming, please correct me if I’m wrong) and so the very act of regularly watching television in a foreign language with vastly different cultural mores and shoddy subtitles could’ve been “not our thing”. I’m sure for many, it was a process of hearing about these shows, dismissing it as “not your thing”, reluctantly giving one episode a go and then the rest is history. I find it fascinating how once you get past these simple barriers, you can find a whole new world of entertainment. Bong Joon-ho was right about subtitles.

Anyway, my long spiel aside, I’ll go with a very recent “not my thing” pick: Alchemy of Souls.

In a fair world, Alchemy of Souls shouldn’t fall under this category for me. I am a lover of all things high fantasy and I especially love original fantasy worlds, so theoretically, this *should* be my thing. Alas, the issue is that it is being written by the Hong sisters, prime experts in crushing my hopes and dreams and nothing else. So when all the promos were coming up, I stayed firmly resolved against watching it. After all, the costuming looked haphazard, the cast was filled with mostly inexperienced idols and newcomers, and the wildly unprofessional behind-the-scenes drama surrounding the lead actress turned me off. I was finding reason after reason to avoid this. It seemed like a long shot that an original fantasy world drama can actually succeed in the kdrama format. However, as luck would have it, I couldn’t avoid it anymore. A friend wanted to check it out and so, we ended up watching the first two episodes. It was hook, line and sinker. Now I’m obsessed and in the “theorizing about future plot points and mysteries” phase. A big part of me is still incredibly afraid that the Hong sister will f*ck it up as usual, but ten episodes in and my only complaints are relatively minor. Maybe my current good opinion will age like milk, but for now, this is something not up my alley succeeding against all odds.

I ignored Hospital Playlist, Dr Romantic, Sky Castle, Just Between Lovers…. and got so hooked years after. Glad there was season 2 for HP and Dr Romantic.

Prison playbook
Even though I heard some good comments about this show at the beginning, I never thought I could like it. But once I started watching it, i couldn't stop. Actually I have watched it twice already, because it is so good... and I know i would watch it a third time, if I had more time... LoL.

I don't see any drama... Maybe I'm too stubborn? 😅

I usually watch the dramas live (a lot of hours by train). So I choose the ones that interest me and still read the recaps of the first episodes of the dramas I didn't choose to see if they could be good. But usually, I make my opinion in the 1-4 episodes and won't change it.

I know I can have a very different opinion from Beanies, so even they rave about a drama, I won't change my mind because my dislike for a writer, PD, actors or story made me skip a drama and I think I know myself pretty well.

If I have time to watch something that is not airing, I tend to choose dramas I already watched 😅

49 days - it seemed too depressing but Jung Il Woo turned out to be so funny
Arang and the magistrate - it looked so stupid and kind of.... closer to chinese drama. Gimmicky. well, it was a bit gimmicky, I loathed the Jade emperor and his world, visually. kitch... But I enjoyed it because of the story, and Teacher has FANTASTIC posture, and he looked so suave
Tunnel I was sure I was not going to enjoy it, and it was riding a whole wave of time travel dramas so it felt worn out. but it was so passionate and sincere, and maybe the 80ies related settings are a draw for me as a child of the 1980ies

Believe it or not, I almost passed on Hello Monster, because of the title and I didnt like the poster. but then folks were talking about some sweater and broad shoulders and im like "ooh?"
ended up watching it 51 times in a row

almost passed on Uncanny counter because I thought it was about accountants (not the type that take their clothes off either)

btw why is there no drama about a demigender strippar who has a side hustle of getting revenge on cheating husbands / wives (no discrimination). Or finds missing property. and gets peoples money back from scammers.

Beyond Evil. I didn't read much about it when it was released, but for some reason, I assumed it was a thriller centered around a run-off-the-mill cat-and-mouse game between a cop and a serial killer. While I don't mind the occasional violence in my entertainment, I have seen far too much gratuitous things in the name of making "bad guys" seem "edgy". Especially when the content is focused on violence perpetrated against women.

However, Beyond Evil managed to surprise me on so many levels. I love mysteries, so I was delighted to learn that there was an actual murder mystery here. Then, the many twists. So. Intense. I can't imagine having to wait for new episodes each week, I would've bitten my nails clean off. Dong-shik and Joo-won are two deeply flawed, hurt protagonists who find some kind of purpose in each other (with queer subtext if you squint). Lovely to see. The fleshed-out characters. The human tragedy. The atmosphere. The scenery. So good.

I binged the entire show a few months ago on Netflix and... Wow. Definitely one of my favorite K-dramas ever.

I think I would have to say My Ahjusshi. Down an depressing without a clear romantic payoff was not my idea of a good show. Even while watching it, I thought it was too melancholy, and couldn’t binge it properly. But it seeps under your skin and stays with you.

Mystic Pop-Up Bar - I didn’t used to consume anything with fantasy or supernatural elements (books, plays, films, shows, etc.). I don’t even enjoy magical realism. But for some reason, I found myself watching MPUB, and it opened up my world! Now I love shows that aren’t pure realism and Mystic Pop-Up Bar remains a firm favourite.

Mad For Each Other.
I don't like rude people, I hate fights, and I was so annoyed when they misunderstood the ML as a perv (I don't think that kind of misunderstandings are funny). But after a few episodes I started to understand our leads. It was a healing show and the couple was so damn cute. Loved it.

One the Woman.
I thought it was going to be some boring legal drama or makjang but it was so freaking hilarious and empowering. Honey Lee rocks!

Sweden Laundry.
People on Viki seemed to hate it and the first 10min felt off and it seemed like the story was cliche (the boring kind). But I was wrong, this drama is the best. It's also the show the made me convince myself that I could trust in anything with Song Ha Yoon unnie in it.

Zombie Detective.
Thought it was going to be serious and boring like Ghost Detective (sorry GD's fans) but it was so freaking hilarious.

Law School.
After the crazy editing in the first episode I was so damn lost. I was 100% I wasn't going to understand what was happening and get tired of it. Now I want season 2. My ship need to sail.

Be My Dream Family.
I don't know how to describe it. I don't even remember why I didn't love the beginning, all I know is that this is my favorite family drama. This show was such a sweet and warm journey.

Nokdu Flower was a drama that wasn't on my radar, and I watched it after it had aired. I generally do not gravitate towards historical dramas because court politics aren't my cup of tea. However, I am glad that I did give Nokdu Flower a chance because it is a beautiful drama.

Mostly every Beanie recommend ever? I will write them down then go hunt VIKI for the shows. I am committed to at least 4 episodes because that's how much I respect the B-wisdom.
As a result I have watched shows I would never have selected (Hot Stove; I Am Not A Robot; Healer). So I have a firm and fast rule - I will give any show at least 4 eps - except if it has zombies. I draw the line at zombies but you might notice - that comes pretty far down on the apha-order.

Law School for me. When I read the plot, I though it was going to be another heavy drama (and most of the times I do not have the energy for those). I did not expect to love this much though.
All the character were very well-written and progression of the plot kept me on my toes every time. The writers did a good job in portraying sensitive but important topics of modern day South-Korea. It honestly felt very realistic and the drama has become one of my all time favourites.

Kingdom - seasons 1 and 2 for me. I loathe any show with zombies. My sister raves about The Walking Dead and I’m like nope not interested. Not only did I binge both seasons of Kingdom but after watching 50 k dramas or so Kingdom is easily in my top 5. The acting is top notch and the pacing of the action is perfect. I especially enjoyed the character development of the prince and his relationship with his servant and the nurse.

Vincenzo. I looked into it because of Song Joon Ki, but it seemed way too over the top for me. Especially the Geunga Plaza crew - all those loud, weird, crazy characters made my head hurt. Plus, the episodes were really long, and this was early in my drama-watching career, and my husband didn't like it...
I did like the styling and the music, though, and after the 2 1/2 TODs in the first two episodes I had gotten a hang of how to watch this drama and enjoyed it enormously!

This literally just happened to me with "Remarriage and Desires." I don't typically care for revenge dramas (they all seem the same to me) or plots that feature women who lied about sexual assault to line their own pockets (this archetype is too prevalent in popular culture as it is, imo, and does real damage to the majority of women truthfully reporting sexual assault). Plus, in the case of this drama, I thought the title was clunky, the premise one big eye-roll (a matchmaking club for the super rich? Gross), and the potential for makjang way too high.

But after seeing some positive reviews, I pressed play . . . and then literally could not stop watching. The main female villain being the embodiment of the absolute worst stereotype of an ambitious woman still makes me feel a bit ill, but the writing and pacing are so tight I can get beyond that. I'm so glad I gave this one a chance, and can't wait to see how it all ends.

THIRTY BUT SEVENTEEN (2018) (Viki US)
NAVILLERA (2021) (Netflix US)
ON THE VERGE OF INSANITY (2021) (Viki US)
INSIDER (2022) (Viki US)
(All 5 stars.)

Romantic dr 2... I watching this drama just recently. I really allergic to medical drama, because I can't stand drama with too much blood and alot of focusing on surgery. So I skip it becausebI hate medical drama. They tend to has too much politic too. But I watched for Ahn Hyo Seop, bcause I start to like him in A business Proposal and he will be in Kim Jin Won PD drama, the leading man
So I end up watching the first episode, and i ate up the whole drama. Yo In Shik PD is so awsome directing this, despite it has so many dramatic moment, i love each character arc... Ahn Hyo Seop and Lee Sung Kyung is soo good here and deserved the award they get.

And Designated survivor 60 days just watched it last year because I want to get the impression of writers Kim Tae Hee previous work because she will write Song Joong Ki drama The conglomerate. I end up loving it and love Kang Ha Na performances.

There are quite a few that I ignored when it was running but end up loving after..

Reply 1994
Misaeng
Find Me In Your Memory
Prison Playbook
Search WWW

My Mister, Miseang, Prison Playlist, Reply 1988 WOW, these are fantastic but I was not bery interested based on the descriptions. Glad I watched them--not to be missed!