To Drop or Not to Drop? 5 Reasons to Abandon a Kdrama

I'm not usually a quitter. When I start to eat, I eat everything on my plate--even if it means that I am immobile for several hours afterwards in fear that my stomach might explode.  I painfully dragged myself through the last few seasons of The Office because I had already committed to see the Dunder Mifflin crew through to the end.  I can count on one hand--okay, one finger--the number of books on my Goodreads list that I started without finishing.

For the record, it was Middlemarch, and I only stopped when I realized that I was 100 pages into it and we were still getting exposition.  Even so, I'm a little ashamed of myself every time I see it in my book list.  It's a sore subject, okay?

So I was pretty far into my kdrama-watching career before it even occurred to me that I could stop watching a show if I wasn't feeling it.  The first time I dropped a show, I felt just a little bit guilty, but also really liberated.  I didn't have to waste 10 more hours watching that show!  I could move on to bigger and better dramas!

Unlike Coco, who is possibly the most fickle show watcher on the planet, I give most dramas the benefit of the doubt for as long as possible.  That being said, here are some of my top reasons for jumping off of a drama ship:

Drop-worthy Offense #1: Lack of Chemistry

Case study: Manny

Up until episode 11, I had been enjoying Manny for the charming interactions between the handsome male lead and his adorable charge.  Then the lead confessed his feelings for the boy's mother, and I suddenly realized that I didn't actually believe for one second that the main couple actually wanted to be together.  The whole scene was kind of awkward, and I lost all interest in watching the show once the focus shifted to the romance.  

Moral of the story? Don't let the adorable Korean children fool you!  Rom coms need some base level of chemistry to work.

Drop-worthy Offense #2: Distracting Previous Roles ("It's Not You! It's Me!")

Case study: My Fair Lady/Protect the Young Lady

This one is completely subjective, and I know I'm going to take some heat for putting such a popular show on this list.  Everyone keeps recommending My Fair Lady to me, and I keep trying to watch it.  The first time, I got 20 minutes into it before I had to stop.  The second time, I got all the way through the first episode, but I lost all will to push the "next episode" button.

Here's the problem: I can't take Oska seriously as a love interest. Yes, I logically know that Yoon Sang Hyun isn't Oska in real life and that I should give him a chance, but no matter how hard I try, he's just Oska to me, and Oska isn't the true love interest. It seemed especially weird when paired with Yoon Eun Hye trying so hard to pretend to be mean.

Although I didn't quit the show, I had a similar problem when I watched Dating Agency: Cyrano after A Gentleman's Dignity.  

Maybe the next time I watch My Fair Lady, I will get through two full episodes, but I'm calling it quits for now.

Drop-worthy Offense #3: Overplaying the "Unlikable" Card

Case study: Twelve Men in a Year

Misleading poster aside, the premise to Twelve Men in a Year sounded so fun: she dates one man for every astrological sign! It seemed like a light, fluffy show that I could watch in a breeze. 

Then I watched the first episode and realized that the female lead was kind of a terrible person.  Now, almost every single drama starts with one of the leads being completely unlikable, so I was almost willing to let it slide. Then I realized that I would be really, really angry if I watched the whole thing and she never got any better.  

Internet to the rescue!  Pretty much every single review of this show indicated that the unlikable lead never progressed as a character.  I put this show into my imaginary kdrama trash can and never looked back.

Drop-worthy Offense #4: Too Much of the Same Thing

Case study: My Girl

This is kind of an unfair category.  Everyone who has watched more than a handful of dramas learns pretty quickly that kdrama cliches are everywhere.  That being said, there are only so many versions of poor girl/rich guy that a person can watch before you hit your breaking point and need something new.

My Girl was my breaking point.  After 4 or 5 episodes, I noticed that I knew the outcome of almost every single scene before it happened.  While some dramas take the familiar formula and play with it just enough to keep things interesting, My Girl wasn't one of those dramas.  It came out in 2005, so I can't really blame it for having so many copycats, but I watched it too late in my drama career to have the will to get to the end.

(*Whispers*) Guys, as much as I love LMH and PSH, is anyone else nervous that Heirs is going to have this problem? 

Drop-worthy Offense #5: I'm Good Here

Case study: Flower Boys Next Door

This might sound crazy, but every once in a while, I stop watching dramas even when I really, really enjoy watching them.  Yes, now that I've typed that, even I think it's crazy.

So why do I do it?  These dramas usually get dropped in episodes 14-16, right after the couples get together, and right before the writers drop in their random plot twists to stretch out the final few episodes.

If any of you have watched Finding Mr. Destiny (With Gong Yoo! On Netflix! Watch it now!), I think it's kind of like that girl who never finishes the last bite of her cookies: I just want to end at the most satisfying moment possible.  With FBND, I was perfectly happy once the main couple got together.  When they tried to introduce the creepy stalker plot at the end, I decided that I was too sleepy to worry about such nonsense, so I stopped watching.

I did the same thing with Scent of a Woman. Coco accidentally told me the ending before I was done, so I got to a happy stopping place and skipped the last few episodes.

So who else drops the occasional kdrama?  What are your reasons?  Anyone who stays to the bitter end, no matter how much you hate it?

To Drop or Not to Drop? 5 Reasons to Abandon a Kdrama

Guest Post at Viki: More Kdrama Texts to a Bestie

The team over at Viki has kindly asked us to write another guest post for them.  In case you missed our first guest post, check it out! This time, we decided to do a second installment of one of our popular posts in the past: Kdrama Texts to a Bestie: We sometimes wonder how we would react to the female leads if they were our best friends in real life. Can you just picture the text conversations we would have? In Part 1 of Texts to a Bestie, we imagined texting Jan Di, Eun Chan, Gong Ah Jung and Park Ha. Here are more imaginary texts with some of our favorite Kdrama heroines:

 1. Flower Boy Ramyun Shop

2.  You're Beautiful

3. Full House

3. Flower Boys Next Door

5. Personal Taste

Which other kdrama heroines would you like to text with?

Guest Post at Viki: More Kdrama Texts to a Bestie

Guest Post at Viki: Kdrama Love Squares

Hey guys, the excellent streaming/news/everything kdrama(and every other kind of drama) website Viki asked us to do a guest post for them on their blog!  We were really honored that they even found our little blog over here, let alone that they let us work with them!  Thanks, Viki!

We are including the post here as well for anyone interested, but let's be honest:  You were going to  spend your Saturday streaming kdramas anyway, so you might as well check out our post on their website while you're at it!

Kdrama Love Squares: Keep 'Em or Cut 'Em?

Anyone who has watched more than one K-drama on Viki has probably figured out that the heart of every series is the “love square.” You would think that we would get tired of them after the amount we’ve seen, but they still get us every time – clichés and all. Let’s take a look at what we would keep or cut from the typical K-drama love square.

Female Lead

First up: K-drama female leads – love them or leave them? She’s the girl whose antics get her into all sorts of awkward situations. With two attractive rich men fighting over her, she’s also the luckiest girl in the world! Female leads are typically hardworking poor girls in desperate need of a makeover. They break down into either sassy girls who don’t let anyone mess with them, or girls who are downtrodden and overly accepting of nonsense.

One of the things that attracted us the most to K-dramas were the spunky, confident female characters, such as Sam Soon from My Name Is Kim Sam Soon. This type of female lead is an obvious keeper. But the dramas in which the female lead follows the male lead around like a puppy (Playful Kiss) are ones we might cut.

In their defense, downtrodden female leads are not all bad. It’s really satisfying to see someone go from frumpy and passive to beautiful and empowered, but only if the progress is extreme. For example, in Scent of a Woman, the female lead starts out painfully wimpy and homely, but by the third episode, BAM, she’s a total powerhouse. In spite of problems, we would keep her because deep down, most of us still feel like that awkward girl who hopes to become powerful and miraculously snatch the man of her dreams.

Male Lead

Male leads – at least they’re consistent. Ninety percent of the time, they are abnormally attractive, abnormally wealthy, and abnormally selfish and rude. However, by the end of the drama, they’ll end up with girls who are less attractive than they are, care less about their money, and become decent human beings with deep feelings. Although these male characters are in almost every single K-drama, we love them anyway. (Not to mention the brooding shower scenes!)

These male leads do come with their share of problems, though. Sometimes their version of a “decent human being” isn’t decent enough. Even though we don’t want to cross Boys Over Flowers fans, you can’t tell us that we’re the only ones who found Jun Pyo’s intensity just a little bit unsettling. Especially when he said things like, “I will encircle you forever so that you can never leave me.” There has to be some minimum standard for change.  For example, don’t beat someone’s faces to a pulp. Totally reasonable, right? 

Although they are ridiculous, overall we can’t help but say KEEP the traditional male lead trope.

Second Male Lead

Second male leads are easy to spot. They’re the handsome ones lurking (or stalking) in the background, doing thoughtful things for the female lead while she makes ugly crying faces over the rude man she loves. They’re the type of guys your dad wants you to marry.  

Second male leads occasionally end up with a terrible girl, but most of the time, they just end up brooding and sad. And for all of this brooding, they don’t even get shower scenes. Don’t they have to shower, too? Or maybe they don’t shower, and that’s why they lose the girl.

It’s this sadness that makes us dislike second male leads. And here’s why: we love them too much. We suffer from “second lead syndrome” on a regular basis (Flower Boy Next Door being the most recent example). So when the second male lead implies he will “never love again,” we get a little cranky. If you need to create jealousy in a drama, introduce an old love for a couple of episodes and then send the person on a business trip or have the person get hit by a car. It’s something that happens all of the time in dramas! Just cut these nice guys and give them a break.

Second Female Lead

The girl we all love to hate: the second female lead. Or, as it often happens, the first love who is often a raging monster in disguise.

What we would keep is the flexibility of the second female lead. Although most are monsters, some are kind, sisterly types who respond maturely to their jealousy. For example, Coco loves the second female lead in Coffee Prince. If she could, she would be best friends with her in real life. They would hang out at art galleries and eat brunch (because she’s too classy for lunch).

In reality, we have to recognize that sometimes second female leads literally kill people. In fact, we would rather have her be a horrible person and a murderer, rather than be tricked into liking some previously terrible person. But let’s face it: we fast forward through 90 percent of second female lead scenes anyway, so keeping them isn’t a big deal.

To sum up, we have pretty conflicted feelings about all of these characters. But conflict is at the core of K-dramas, which is why we adore them so much!

Guest Post at Viki: Kdrama Love Squares