Beanie level: Errand boy

#2022 Drama Round-up
Day 15. Nam Da-reum Award

The cutest were the younger versions of the Alchemy of Souls men but the one that impressed me was Kim Kang-hoon in Reborn Rich. He keeps improving year-on-year, very much like Nam Da-reum. Was already great in When the Camellia Blooms and Racket Boys and has only gotten better.



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    He looks nearly identical to SJK!!

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      Right? Great combination of acting and styling!

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    The tiny mages in Alchemy were super cute, but their acting isn’t yet as convincing as their hairstyles. I’m always amazed at the young child actors in kdramas.

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      Exactly lol. As cute and chubby as they were, had to vote my conscience 😂. And yes, k-dramas seem to have an endless supply of young talent. Rarely have I found the ‘younger’ version not working well for a show.

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#2022 Drama Round-up
Day 14. Most unnecessary subplot

Can I say the entirety of the FL’s existence in Café Minamdang? She adds nothing to the story. Even the writers couldn’t bother to make sense of how old she was, how long she was away, how she became a detective from a beat cop (esp. given her extreme incompetence). Just plot holes galore when she’s there 🤷‍♀️.

If you take her out, the show becomes funnier, crisper, and mercifully shorter. Plus it focuses on the actual Café squad!
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#2022 Drama Round-up
Day 13. Favourite kiss

The one I remembered immediately was the ladder kiss from Crazy Love so that gets first place. Their first kiss gets second place lol. Kim Jae-wook never disappoints 😘.

Honourable mentions – Good Job for giving us what Bossam didn’t, Our Beloved Summer for being very pretty.

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#2022 Drama Round-up
Day 12. Drama beanies loved but I didn’t / Drama I loved but beanies didn’t

Drama beanies loved but I didn’t – Our Blues because the omnibus nature of it just made it feel like a collection of ‘issues’. I didn’t really care for most of the characters.

Drama I loved but beanies didn’t – Maybe Insider? Not that they didn’t like it but possibly not many beanies watched it at all. Some of the violence definitely wasn’t for the fainthearted.






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#2022 Drama Round-up
Day 11. Favourite bestie

The lawyer bestie from Good Job was pretty great. Not only was he hilarious, he was also always there for his friend through thick, thin, and schoolboy outfits.



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#2022 Drama Round-up
Day 10. Favourite villain

Can’t really call them ‘favourites’ but I’ll go with all the villains in Through the Darkness, who were even scarier because most of them were based on real people.



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    Kudo to the actors who played them. They were really good and brought a lot to the drama.

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      Absolutely. The character actors added so much to the show.

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    The villains were scary and unsettling. The actors did a good job playing their roles.

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#2022 Drama Round-up
Day 9. The oldie (not 2022) that I loved the most

I watched a lot of pre-2010 dramas this year and by far the best was Two Outs in the Ninth Inning. If you like friends-to-lovers AND cohabitation hijinks, this is the drama for you! You get quippy, awesome chemistry as a bonus.

I was also so impressed by the quality of the conversations the leads have. It may look slightly dated but the script was fairly ahead of its time. This was proper rom-com goodness.






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    Loved it, still love it!

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      🤝. I think I might rewatch it soon lol.

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        Same! Loved this drama. And one of the best friends to lovers trope drama in k land.
        Too bad Viki doesn’t have it anymore.

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#2022 Drama Round-up
Day 8. The drama beanies convinced me to watch and I can’t be grateful enough

Since I already watched 80+ Asian shows this year, there don\’t seem to be any 💀. I am bracing myself for the FL\’s voice in order to watch Love Between Fairy and Devil, which a lot of beanies loved, but I\’m not quite there yet 😬. Maybe I should dip into Gaus Electronics instead…

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#2022 Drama Round-up
Day 7. The OTP I didn’t think I’d adore

The Shooting Stars OTP. I like both actors but I still went in with very low expectations given the year we’ve been having for k-drama rom-coms.

I didn’t need to worry though because these two were so gosh darn cute together. Plus I have a thing for OTPs where the guy is just head-over-heels but still oblivious 😂.

Honourable mention – From Now On, Showtime! for similar reasons.






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    I loved these two, too! I especially liked them and their relationship because friends-to-lovers is my catnip.

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#2022 Drama Round-up
Day 6. My favourite OST/BGM

I already recommended these when we were creating the BVIPP playlist but they are still the most played OSTs on my list so I’ll share them again –

1. Scars Leave Beautiful Trace from Alchemy of Souls

2. Maybe If from Our Beloved Summer

Sharing the latter because it’s pretty earworm-y and always makes me sing along.

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#2022 Drama Round-up
Day 5. The drama that will always live in my memory

Has to be Through the Darkness or the more apt Korean title Those Who Read the Minds of Evil. The show had perfect control over its story, pace, editing, characters and, most importantly, hopeful outlook. All of which was complemented by truly excellent performances.

You’d think a show like this would be too heavy to watch often but I’ve already rewatched it once and can easily see myself watching it often. A show to watch when you need to remember that hard work and diligence always pay off in the end and that there is always good in the world to counterbalance the evil.



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#2022 Drama Round-up
Day 4. Greatest disappointment

1. Love All Play with too much of its deeply unlikeable characters and too little of Chae Jong-hyeop’s smiles.

2. Why Her because all I wanted was for it to not suck and it somehow failed at that too. Special award for most WTF Truck of Doom in recent memory.






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#2022 Drama Round-up
Day 3. Favourite womance/bromance

Sismance – Twenty-five, Twenty-one and Extraordinary Attorney Woo for showing that rivals can also be the best of friends.

Bromance – Alchemy of Souls and Business Proposal for just being loads of fun!
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# 2022 Drama Round-up
Day 2. The ML I’ll never forget

Song Ha-young from Through the Darkness. We’ve gotten so used to the macho image of MLs in thriller k-dramas that seeing a sensitive, kind, quiet but still extremely professional protagonist like Ha-young was really refreshing. Can’t remember the last time I cared this deeply for a character’s well-being. How precious were the smiles we got from him 💕. The fabulous hair was the icing on top 😍.

Honourable mentions – Baek Yi-jin (Twenty-five, Twenty-one) and Choi Woong (Our Beloved Summer).
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    Everything about this show was perfect. Acting. Writing. Directing. Everything.

    One of its many memorable scenes is a montage where they wear progressively crisper suits to look more professional. It is such an understated scene but so on-point. Iconic.

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      That clothes-change montage is exactly what I was reminded of while looking for a pic to upload here! Agree completely about how perfect the show is. In every way.

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    Good pick! He’s probably my choice too! I’ve said enough and more about The Hair, but for that reason alone, he’s the ML I’ll never forget 😂

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    To me it’s him and Jang Geu Rae in Misaeng. I wanted to protect them above everything.

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# 2022 Drama Round-up
Day 1. The FL I’ll never forget

Queen Im Hwa-ryeong from Under the Queen’s Umbrella. Whether she’s putting her enemies in their place or teaching her (and others’) children, it’s done with so much flair. Plus her eyebrow game is on point!

Honourable mentions – Na Hee-do (Twenty-five, Twenty-one) and Mu-deok (Alchemy of Souls).
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    Same! I love her! She so slay (what my gen z daughter would proclaim haha). And totally agree with your honorable mentions. Good choice!

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About to watch Adamas Ep. 15-16 now and the temptation to fast-forward to the end of Ep. 16 is oh so strong. My heart can\’t take the tension 😅.

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    I was waiting for the show to finish so I can binge watch it in one shot. I’ll be starting my Adamas journey this weekend!!! Woohoo!!!

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Random kdrama coincidence – the dogs in both Once Upon a Small Town and The Law Cafe are (were 😭) called Nurungji. Makes me wonder if that\’s a common dog name in Korea.

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    I noticed that too so I googled it – I didn’t really answer my question but it seems like it’s a type of dog?
    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nureongi

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      Interesting statement at the link you shared: “Nureongi make up the majority of dogs farmed for food in Korea.” Perhaps this usage of the name for pets in kdramas is for humor? Dunno.

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      Thanks for sharing this! Good to know 😊

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      If the phrase means “yellow one”, then it might be similar to the Mandarin Chinese phrase “xiao huang gou” (little yellow dog). Since it’s used to refer to generic small to medium sized light brownish dogs, it is also kind of synonymous with “mutt/mongrel”.

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    I read your post as if you were asking about the name, not a breed. My googling found Nurungji means “scorched rice” in Korean. Not a particularly cute name.

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      I was talking about the name! The dogs are both named nurungji. I knew the meaning – Koreans tend to eat scorched rice as a snack or dessert pretty often so I’ve heard and seen it in kdramas and k-variety shows.

      It was probably just a cute coincidence that both shows gave their dogs that name 😊.

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        Maybe it’s the same dog and it can answer only to his real name :p

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        So kind of like calling your dog Biscuit or something? Maybe it’s just a popular name – I know four dogs called Max, I don’t even know very many people with dogs 😂

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          Ha I know someone with a dog named Max too 😂

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          we always have a dog called Max (or Maxie if female). My first dog was called Max, and when he died , the next dog we adopted , we named him Max – and so the cycle, goes.

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        but if they LOOK like scorched rice (white and a little burnished on top) then that would also make sense

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Trying to figure out what word put my Ha Jung-woo beanie recs comment into moderation 🤔🤔

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    I think it’s not you, it’s DB – there’s a notice from staff on the front page that they’re having technical issues with the spam filter. My perfectly innocent comment on ‘Love in Contract’ is also in moderation.

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Watching Narco-Saints and Netflix\’s tendency to take liberties with the translation is really grating on me. How does \”Don\’t worry. There won\’t be any trouble\” get replaced with \”Don\’t eat too much at the buffet. You\’ll get sick.\”?! This is just one of many examples and I\’m only on Ep. 3 right now.

Is this their attempt at making the dialogue funnier or are they trying to Westernise it? I just don\’t get why you\’d tell a story about Koreans and then remove all Korean flavour from it.

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    wow.. this is new.. i have seen some bad translations (from the very little korean I understand).. but where did buffet come from????
    It’s not even funny…
    this is sad..

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      I realised after starting Ep. 4 that it was showing English closed captions. I changed to normal English subs and the translations are fine there. Normally don’t use Eng CC so I have no idea why the system defaulted to that and I obviously didn’t check.

      Still don’t understand why the closed captions would be different though…

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        oh!! thanks goodness.. but still doesn’t make sense.. glad you were able to fix it! Let me know how you liked the series..

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        Closed captions are for dubs and dubs often take a lot of liberties to match up words and mouths.

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    That’s why I cry a little bit everytime I see a show goes to Netflix and not Viki. 😂

    This one is a Netflix original right? It’s literally their production, shouldn’t they have had more time to make the subtitles? Even if they don’t care about quality, shouldn’t they at least try to no make it so obvious? 🙄

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      Yup it’s a Netflix show. They’ve even dubbed the show in multiple languages. What I don’t understand is why they differentiate between normal subs and closed captions…

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        Google says. “While video subtitles are intended for viewers who can’t understand the language being spoken, captions are intended for viewers who can’t hear the audio […] visual display to provide additional or interpretive information”.

        That helps?

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          They also generally tend to be transcriptions of the dubs.

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I miss when kdramas had a beginning and an end, all within 8 weeks.

https://n.news.naver.com/entertain/now/article/018/0005293876

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    Huh. Can’t read it but I guess all we need to figure out is the “2” and the “2024”. I agree with you.

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      Ah sorry. I’ve set Chrome to auto-translate for me so I see it in English lol. But yeah you got the point!

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    I was pretty certain, it was going this route considering how the pd and writer hinted at it in an interview. But I may not tune in for that. The episodic format is a bigger hurdle for me in addition to how I want dramas to end by 8 weeks.

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    When the ratings took off, it was pretty obvious that the production company would do this. With the episodic nature, I do think they can make it work, but the charm’s been wearing off. At least they aren’t rushing it and can probably keep the cast if they wait til 2024.

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    I agree. But this kind of drama can make it work. It’s about Young-Woo’s growth as a character. It doesn’t depend on a big bad guy to catch for example. They want the original casting, they will have to wait for Kang Tae-Oh’s comeback from the army, they will have the time to work on it too like they had for this season waiting for Park Eun-Bin.

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    Ooo! Now this explains the inconsistency. I don’t mind a S2 and would love to see the same cast because the cases and the protagonist’s growth were refreshing to watch. I only hope if they are further going to expand the story based on ratings in S2, I want them to be prepared with proper character arcs.

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