Stephanie Shepherd
Queen In Hyun's Man doesn't follow this formula. Kim Boong Do is rich and certainly very confident and he knows how to boss people about - he's a nobleman after all - but he's also very respectful and understanding of others from the very beginning. The show further humbles him by its very nature - Kim Boong Do is thrust into a world he cannot begin to understand and in which he is basically a child and at least initially wholly dependent on Hee Jin. He is not resentful of being reliant on her but is instead deeply grateful and curious about everything. And he quickly begins to learn on his own because he is incredibly smart and clever. His cleverness is the source of many of the dramas best moments as he puzzles things out and figures out fantastical ways to outwit his enemies. The world of political scheming and treachery have also made him intuitive and able to read people - their motives and the emotions behind their words. This helps him to survive in the dangerous world he lives in and it has the dreamy side effect of making him a very thoughtful lover and friend. To top things off, he's good with words and completely genuine - there is no bluster or artifice about him and it's these character traits that draw Hee Jin in and lead to her teasing him that he is player.
One of my favorite things about him also is that he has a cheeky and adorable sense of humor. Probably my two most favorite scenes in the drama are when he whips out this humor to slyly tease Hee Jin (the car scene in episode 8 and when he admits that maybe he IS a player in episode 11). And despite all the horrible things that have happened to him in his life, he is completely open to the wonder of the new world he finds himself in. He's got an adventurous and playful spirit which responds strongly to Hee Jin's impulsiveness and "passionate" nature. He also never dis-respects her or is impatient with her even when she does some immature and annoying things. He knows why she is acting that way and wouldn't dream of de-meaning or begrudging her feelings. Sigh...... As you can tell I am seriously in love with this character and we haven't even gotten to the fact that he's a martial arts bad ass melon farmer AND a big goofy nerd. Or how quirkily and boyishly handsome he is or that he's got eyes that smile. And a super dreamy voice. Yup, I've got it real bad, lol.
And I shouldn't forget Hee Jin. While much of my love for this drama is concentrated on the character of Kim Boong Do, Hee Jin is also a well developed and interesting character and she is played to perfection by actress Yoo In Na. Seriously, a really stunning performance. I fully loved the character and she had all my loyalty even though on the surface she is not the type of character who usually earns my sympathy. She's pretty, successful, impulsive and not all that interested in learning and books. She has a wall-sized portrait of herself hanging in her apartment and she boasts that she is famous because she's so pretty. Despite all that she's incredibly loveable. She's kind-hearted and generous, transparent with her feelings, adventurous and has enough self-respect not to let herself get sucked in by her obnoxious, though very handsome and famous, ex-boyfriend. As mentioned above she does occasionally act a little immature and annoying but it is always with good and understandable intent. Her chemistry with Kim Boong Do is seriously intense.
That chemistry between the leads is what I think makes this drama truly awesome. The scenes between them sparkle and feel completely natural - like you are really watching two people fall in love. They feel so right together that I didn't even once 'ship Boong Do with his servant Yoon Wol, who has had a hard life with few advantages and has loved him unrequited for years so much so that she is the reason he can travel in time. She is the type of character I would usually root for in a romance but nope, it had to be Hee Jin. Never any doubt. Did I mention the awesomeness of the kissing? The chemistry is helped along by a really soaringly romantic original sound track.
So this is a romance, plain and simple, and it succeeds so so well in this department but it ain't no slouch in the overall plot department either. The writing of the show is really great with plenty of suspense and nuances. The overall tone of the drama is light but there are many emotional twists and turns and I will admit to tears in the last few episodes. There's some lovely parallels between the historic and modern-day story that are fun to pick apart and serve to strengthen the characterizations.
In the Joseon era, Boong Do is looking for revenge but is also trying to set things right by championing the Queen who has been bullied by one of the King's consorts and pushed into exile by corrupt political machinations in the court. In the modern day story line, Hee Jin is trying to navigate her place in Korea's new "royalty" (its drama stars) and she is being bullied by her co-stars. The two "Queens" are in very similar positions so it's not surprising that Boong Do feels the need to champion Hee Jin even as he falls in love with her. There are so many connected themes and plot points that occur early on and than pay off or re-appear in surprising and interesting ways later on. It's thoughtfully and smartly plotted down to the last minute of episode 16. Perfection, really.
And then there's the time travel which can be tricky to pull off. Boong Do's adaptation to the modern world is done really well and is a blast to watch while he at first must rely on the somewhat unreliable Hee Jin to orient him.
“When I listen to you, it seems as though the reason for everything in this world is to enable kisses. What kind of lustful world is this?” HEE!
Because he's so smart and curious, he starts to reason things out himself and this is equally fun to watch. It's clear how he uses the skills he had to develop in his much more treacherous time of origin to help him adjust relatively quickly to modern times.
The mechanism of travel is also dramatic and interesting and ends up playing a major part in the story on several different levels. The talisman is powerful but also unpredictable and fragile. The show does not shy away from investigating the ramifications of messing around with time but it is also not a slave to it. It's the perfect mix. There is some controversy about the resolution at the end but I for one thought it made perfect sense (as long as we're accepting the concept of magic to begin with:) and was a lovely and well-prepared ending.
FINAL VERDICT: This is a well-written and plotted romantic-comedy-fantasy that is bound to give your heart some flutters with the chemistry of its lead couple and the well chosen actors that play them. Watch it. Now. You won't be sorry. Unless you hate romance.
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THOUGHTS: As you can probably tell from my synopsis, there is a LOT happening in this mostly light-hearted romantic comedy. It also skims along the edge of being a little disturbing, and perhaps its most notable triumph is that it avoids making the the possible HUGE wrong moves regarding free will and consent and personal identity. Back to that in a minute though!
In the synopsis, I mention the 3 main characters but this actually has a pretty large cast. There are the three other cooks in the kitchen, there mostly for comic relief; there's Seon Woo's sister who is in a wheel chair and her policeman husband (the 4th in the dark suit picture above) who has a mysterious connection to the dead girl Sun Ae; there's also his mother and a long time friend that he thinks he's in love with; there's Sun Ae's father and brother who run a much more humble restaurant not too far from Seon Woo's; and finally there's a psychic who is trying to keep Sun Ae from going bad. So, a large cast and lots going on - it's part romance, part spiritual journey and personal growth, part mystery. It does a respectable job keeping all the story lines straight and understandable and each of the 16 episodes feels necessary.
This drama gave me serious Coffee Prince flashbacks because there were many similar elements. It takes place in a restaurant, with the three young men who work in the restaurant providing comic relief. They are similar even down to the fact that two of them are buffoons while one is a rather sensible and decent person. Seon Woo initially fancies himself in love with his closest friend's beautiful widow and she is partially why he has stayed single into his early 30s. He also has to make a pretty big leap of faith to embrace his love for Bong Seon - he has to believe in ghosts. So while I would not say that it hits the emotional heights of Coffee Prince it would be a good one to watch if you were in the mood for something Coffee Prince-like.
The most important thing about this kind of KDrama is its primary couple; so how was the chemistry? Interesting. And mostly okay. I like Chef (Seon Woo) but never really warmed up to him completely. He's pretty stiff and serious and disapproving for a romantic hero and while he does go through an evolution, he is not very different at the end versus the beginning. I really liked both Bong Seon and Sun Ae and did eventually really like where they went with their stories. However, I spent the first 6-7 episodes feeling very nervous about what was going to happen. Sun Ae has possessed Bong Seon without her consent and is doing all these things with her body that just made me extremely jittery and made me dislike Sun Ae at times, especially when it is revealed that Bong Seon has no memory of anything that happens while she is possessed. Later, they hatch a scheme to capture Chef's love by Sun Ae consensually possessing Bong Seon's body and using her more outgoing and aggressive personality to win him. This also feels seriously icky. Chef does fall in love but who exactly is he in love with? For a while I was worried the show wouldn't address these issues but they do and in a way that was satisfactory for me. I really enjoyed Bong Seon's journey that involves coming out of her shell and gaining more confidence. I'd give the chemistry of the main couple a 7 out of 10.
One last note: The subtitles on Viki aren't great - I think they tend to be more literal translations that don't always make sense rather than translating the intent. It was occasionally jarring but didn't detract too much from my enjoyment.
FINAL VERDICT: An enjoyable and complexly plotted romantic comedy with an interesting twist on a love triangle. Worth watching!
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City Hunter is a pretty typical need-for-revenge-made-me-a-vigilante type of thriller. Complete with the conceit that all it takes is a little strip of cloth over his mouth to make Yung Soon completely unrecognizable. If you've seen Arrow or Batman, this plot will mostly be nothing new to you. It's even based on a manga and has an awesome black and white manga style opening. (Random Question: Why are vigilantes always so wealthy?)
The twist in the story is an interesting one from a character stand point. While Lee Yung Soon wants to avenge his father, he is driven to it mostly by honor and the relentless pressure from his foster father rather than from any sense of real emotional betrayal by the perpetrators. The emotional drive behind the quest is Lee Jin Pyo and Yung Soon's desire to please him and earn his love. Jin Pyo is also still holding a lot of cards close to his chest and is blatantly manipulating Yung Soon. It is impossible to tell what his feelings for the boy are. He is an enigmatic figure and he and Yung Soon's relationship is deliciously complex. Their relationship takes what is a pretty generic revenge-vigilante plot line and bumps it up a notch. The pacing for the plot is really excellent for most of the show's run and even when that fails it still manages to have exciting cliffhangers in key places. The action/fight scenes are creative, well choreographed, well-shot and well- performed and are always exciting. In short, this drama overall is a ton of fun.
It makes sense that a complicated character and relationship are what make this drama stand out. What I've found in my limited experience with K Dramas is that developing characters and complicated relationships - and making the viewer 100% invested in them - is their major strength. They are certainly not above doing a little emotional manipulating but I'm down with that. I love characters that are conflicted in themselves and a vigilante plotline lends itself to that so well. Yung Soon's big conflict is that he just desperately wants a normal life and everything that comes with that. However, his upbringing has insured that he doesn't even know exactly what that looks and feels like.
My first impression upon being introduced to Lee Min Ho in his role as Lee Yung Soon, was that this kid was far too pretty to play a character that is meant to be a super duper bad ass vigilante. I mean look at him. He's really really ridiculously good looking (Zoolander reference intentional) not to mention slim and kind of willowy.
Apparently, Lee Min Ho is kind of a big deal in Korea. His career started as the ('a'?) lead in a hugely popular drama that I have not seen but I have certainly heard of, Boys over Flowers. That role and his good looks have pretty much guaranteed him a spot on every "hottest Korean actors" list you can find on the internet. What I didn't bargain for was that he is not only popular because of his pretty pretty face but because he is also a good actor. Probably the best I've encountered in the handful of K Dramas I've watched.
So it didn't take many episodes for me to realize that he is actually perfect for this role which has a serious bad ass side but also a sad and lonely little boy side (as so many vigilantes do) and he carries off the dichotomy really well. His look really works for this. He can pull off being an arrogant player prick one minute and a damaged little boy the next. Plus I don't know many dudes who could pull off looking and being bad-ass while wearing a pair of salmon colored skinny jeans.
The female protagonist, Kim Na Na (Park Min Young) also has her share of troubles. Ten year's previously, when she was just a school girl, her mother was killed and her father put in a coma by a car accident. She lives very stressfully, trying to pay her father's exorbitant health care bills by working multiple odd jobs like being a designated driver and selling sketchy health tonics. Despite these troubles, her personality is fairly cheerful and things take a turn for the better when she gets accepted to work as a secret service agent/bodyguard at the Blue House (the equivalent of the White House in the U.S.). Also working at the Blue House? Lee Yung Soon as an IT professional and unbeknownst to Kim Na Na, along with his revenge mission, Yung Soon has been asked, for some complicated unknown reasons, to keep an eye on Na Na. Mysteries everywhere! While he hides it well, he is pretty much smitten with her before he even meets her. And it's no wonder because Na Na is really lovely in a stunning but very girl-next-door sort of way.
She is also bad ass in her own right! She really annoyed me at first - there was a lot of over-the-top crying in the first few episodes and she is a little blatantly unfair to Yung Soon, though she of course does not know his secret. However, she eventually turned into one of my favorite female leads - she's strong, fearless, and compassionate. And way more emotionally intelligent than Yung Soon. Unfortunately, the drama seriously drops the ball on her character at a particular point but more on that below because it is tied up with my criticisms of the drama.
And what about the romance? It's development is fantastic. Slow burn, in best K drama fashion. Kim Na Na truly loathes Yung Soon, despite his good looks, until she starts to catch on to his secret and realize he is not quite the selfish a-hole she has thought him to be. And once she falls, she is so forthright and brave about her feelings - it is so sweet and confident and awesome. Unfortunately, once again, the Drama - despite putting a TON of screen time and effort into developing the romance - drops the ball.
Here's the reason why this Drama does not get full marks from me. It does a decent job of wrapping up the revenge plot line and resolving Yung Soon and Jin Pyo's relationship. Mostly. However, somewhere around episode 15ish it just completely goes off the rails regarding its characters and relationships which it has been meticulously developing. The romance and Lee Yung Soon's wanting to be part of a loving family are a huge theme of the drama but it mostly put those aside for the last 5 episodes or so and never really adequately picks theme back up and brings them to a closure. Kim Na Na, practically disappears from the show and her character is boiled down to two minutes of reaction shots per episode. The independence of her character completely disappears. The pacing in the last 5 or so episodes is also out of whack, spending lots of time on unimportant details so then at the ultimate end, everything feels rushed. It's a shame because up until that point the Drama was really hitting everything out of the park, so it was a shame to see it stumble in the end.
I'll end with some technical comments. The production values of the show are seriously top-notch. They are indistinguishable from a big-budget Hollywood action blockbuster and they sustain that for 25 hours of television. It's beautiful and stylish from the opening credits to the last shot.
I've also learned that it is impossible to properly review a K Drama without reviewing the Original Soundtrack. City Hunter's is AWESOME! The music was addictive and used really well to enhance the action. My favorite is the main "Heisty things are going down" theme music. Thence forth this shall be the music to accompany all my heroic ass-kicking. It has this driving jazzy drum beat, lush strings and then some bombastic and ominous horns come in mid way - Yum! The name of the song is Sad Run though as one Youtube commenter appropriately pointed out: " 'Sad Run'? More like Epic Strutting of Lee Freakin' Min Ho":0) https://youtu.be/evDbAajnosg
Finally, I watched the show on Viki.com which uses amateur teams of translators that are either volunteers or likely only paid a little to produce the subtitles. This is a cool system and it definitely allows the site to offer lots of dramas translated into many languages. However, my experience has been that you have to be prepared for a lot of meaning to be lost in translation. The translations are usually literal rather than meaningful and it can lead to confusion. (For example one translation I copied down: "You're sitting on top of your father's head now, aren't you?" Um, what?) Also because it is usually a team doing the translating, sometimes terms that are frequently used throughout the series can switch mid stream. For example there are two characters that are initially in early episodes referred to as ex-boyfriend and girlfriend but later in the show (and more accurately) they are ex-husband and wife. It doesn't effect my overall enjoyment and understanding of the show but I do feel like I maybe miss nuances. Something to be aware of if you plan on watching the show in translation on Viki.
FINAL VERDICT: If you like comic book revenge-vigilante plot lines you will love City Hunter which is well done and so much fun though it loses a little steam towards the conclusion and has a very frustrating ending.
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