Andrea
Canada
The Scholar Who Walks the Night
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It’s safe to say that this drama is very much slow. I think the pacing of the drama was slower than others is because of it’s complexity since it is a fantasy historical period drama, but the storyline is not that complex or complicated so this doesn’t give the production people much of a reason to slow it down. First of all, the first episode was one big giant prologue, it gave the wrong impression on me; they made it seem like Prince Junghyun was the primary lead, and I’m aware about the title being Scholar Who Walks the Night not Prince. But they put way too much focus on his character and this prequel, it shouldn’t have taken up one entire episode, it took away from the central plot and it’s quite misleading if you don’t exactly know what the show is about. Basically, what happens in the prequel is that the Prince has written many books relating to vampires in some way, but in his journal, he writes the keys to defeating the vampire that rules the kingdom. After his murder, the journal is missing and the Scholar spends 120 years looking for it (because he is immortal now since he is a vampire). And and the prequel consists of the Scholar’s romance with his lover, Myunghee, which has put him in great sorrow.
Kim Sungyeol, the Scholar was a pretty interesting male lead, he often spoke with his eyes and made small, sometimes vague, responses. When he turned into a vampire, he really grew as a person and it’s intriguing to see the way he was before when he was a human and best friends with the Prince and now he’s a vampire who needs balance and has to refrain himself from hurting others because of his blood-thirsty nature.
He meets a book merchant who is a woman dressed as a man to support her family, who helps him try to find the missing journal and they form a relationship. Jo Yang Sun, the book merchant is very likeable, she was humble, diligent, and always put people first; the romance between the Scholar and Yang Sun was believable, they had good chemistry and were enjoyable to watch on screen together. But there were scenes that dwelled too much on them, we get it, your love is forbidden, Yang Sun is a mortal, the Scholar is an immortal, dangerous vampire.
Now I have many, many thoughts on the antagonist of the drama, which is evidently, Gwi. He was very smart, cunningly smart, he would make you loathe the King for what he is doing to his people but that king is also being victimized by Gwi at the same time and it is Gwi who is causing all of this, not the King. Damn, he’s good. And that is what I liked about him so much, he was so low key and it takes you a while to actually hate him. Not much about his past is unveiled and I was always wondering what happened to him before he became a vampire, especially when he became more prominent toward the end of the drama and I was so invested in his character. I have to say that he is my favourite character of the drama, and I love the casting choice for him, someone actually told me that Lee Soo Hyuk looks like a vampire. He really suits these type of roles.
My second favourite character is Crown Prince Lee Yoon, I can’t exactly point my finger on why I like him so much, maybe it has to do with the fact that he is played by Changmin. I was invested in his conflict with his grandfather who was the King, from the moment he was onscreen I loved every second of his screen time especially when he encounters Kim Sungyeol and they work together, it really moved the plot forward.
Scholar Who Walks the Night was an entertaining drama, it had a very interesting plot with vampires in ancient Korea (or not so ancient in this case, I think this was placed somewhere in the early 1800s, whichever decade had the earliest set of guns??). This drama is not for everyone, I must say, you have to like the historical drama genre to like Scholar Who Walks the Night or else you might get bored. With that said, I think the show shouldn’t have had so many filler scenes and parts where it didn’t relate so much to the plot, it made the drama drag on a little bit, but overall, the fillers scenes were not the worst but could’ve been left out. The show didn’t get me really hooked until the last few episodes where the story started to patch up together to make a good climax, I could’ve liked the show a little bit more if the pacing was better, however, the drama as a whole was still decent and entertaining. The bottom line is that the characters is what made me enjoy Scholar Who Walks the Night, if they were poorly developed or uninteresting, I would’ve loathed this show.
I give Scholar Who Walks the Night a 7.5/10 stars for its good acting, intriguing characters, and awesome villain.
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High School King of Savvy
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I am going to be brutally honest here… This storyline was wasted. They could’ve made this drama great, our male lead Minseok has so much room to grow in this new job and could’ve had so much character depth built up but for some odd reason, they just didn’t do that. Nearly every character is one dimensional, I understand that side characters are just there for one or two purposes but don’t create cardboard cutouts. Yoo Ah, Minseok’s fangirl and schoolmate was seen as nothing other than a fangirl which is a wrong thing to do if she’s going to appear in the show quite often.
With that said, you’re probably going to be taken aback when I say this but I was actually hooked onto the first three episodes, I flew by them so quickly since I enjoyed them so much and I really wanted to know where the plot was going to go because I saw potential in it and was aching to know the mystery of Minseok’s brother and why he was gone.
It all went wrong when Jung Soo Young, played by Lee Ha Na, was introduced as the female lead. There is absolutely no chemistry between Minseok and Soo Young and I found myself gradually becoming more irritated by them. I tried really hard to see the faintest connection between the two but there was nothing there and they were still trying to convince me that their love was fate.
I’ll give credit to Soo Young on one thing; she was actually enjoyable to watch for the first few episodes. I liked her clumsiness in her dating skills when she was chasing after Director Yoo and how she was just an unlucky person. Although she was foolish, it was rather amusing to watch. Even though I liked her awkward character, I didn’t care enough for her as a female lead she fitted the role of a supporting character a lot better.
Yoo Jin Woo has to be my favourite character of High School King of Savvy, he was the most three dimensional of all the characters and I cared about his problems and life more than the male lead’s life. I loved every moment of screen time with Director Yoo. In this case, they should’ve made Yoo Jin Woo the main character because Minseok is such an uninteresting protagonist. Even though I wanted to know more about his troubled life and past, I didn’t as there were things left unsaid that are shown to us through flashbacks and a scene where Director Yoo looks at broken glass of a tail light and is triggered by that. They didn’t bother to explain any aspect of his past after because he became irrelevant to the plot since he was only there to be a part of a love triangle which shouldn’t be the case for any storyline.
I haven’t seen Seo In Guk in any other drama but I could see that he is a good actor as he was able to channel the jealous and conflicting emotions that Minseok went through really well and he played both Minseok and the character’s brother Hyung Seok and was able to make me believe that they were two completely different people which they are supposed to be so that was pretty impressive. The only problem is that he didn’t play a decent lead character that I connected with. The biggest problem with Minseok’s character is that he never changed or grew; he remains the exact same childish angsty teenager throughout the entire show. I have a big problem with this because in the end of the show, they did a Three Years Later segment and in three years, a person changes so much. I saw no character growth or change and he’s supposed to be an adult at this point, I get it that he’s supposed to be much younger than Soo Young so they had to show the difference in maturity between the two but come on, he still can’t remain the same hot headed teenager because he’s not even a teenager anymore!
This drama is not worth watching, you could make use of 17 episodes or more on a better show with better characters. I found myself getting bored toward the end and was hoping the romance between Lee Minseok and Jung Soo Young would blow off. Also, the big mystery with Minseok’s brother Hyung Seok was so anticlimactic, it was disappointing. As for Lee Soo Hyuk, please play in better dramas.
I am going to give High School King of Savvy a 5/10 stars for Lee Soo Hyuk as Director Yoo, for being invested in the show initially and hooked on the first couple of episodes and for Minseok’s grandpa. Minseok’s grandpa and Yoo Jin Woo made this show earn the extra star.
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I get it, Baek In Ho has stunning eyes… At least in the drama.
The drama sounds like a generic, typical drama but the plot is different from a lot of dramas I’ve watched. It’s definitely the characters that control the plot, I’ll say that, anything that the characters do takes the storyline to a different direction. Bottom line is that you would watch Cheese In the Trap for the characters, not the story. I don’t think that is a bad thing as long as you are invested in the characters. I also find that Cheese In the Trap teaches you life lessons about working with people if it’s school, a job, or any type of working environment.
I’m going to talk a little bit about Hong Seol the female lead; I had mixed feelings about her at the beginning, she didn’t exactly grab my attention, I didn’t find her that interesting, she also has a Bella Swan pout which was annoying to me, that’s a complete personal preference though. I grew to like her character as the show went on, and when she was taken advantaged by her classmates for a group project, having to do all the work I really understood her because I went through that, I think a lot of people do as well. I also knew where she was coming from for all the decisions she made.
My favourite character has to be Oh Young Gon, Hong Seol’s misunderstood stalker, he’s not exactly a good guy but doesn’t intend to be a bad one either, I just found him really funny every time he was on screen, his humour was dark since he was a bit off and I liked that about him.
Baek In Ho, who’s the second male lead was interesting to me initially, I was really into his character actually, but I lost interest in him by the middle of the drama because his story did not latch onto me, what I really like like was his conflict with Yoo Jung, those two completely clashed due to their past with each other.
We get to know Yoo Jung, the male lead toward the end as the plot unveils his past, just like Hong Seol, we see a different outlook on him and understand his character.
Now the ending for Cheese In the Trap has raised some controversy due to the producers no longer following the webtoon, it was rushed and some characters just disappear with no explanation, it was incoherent, you might be left with questions and confusion, I honestly blame the fact that they produced this drama before the webtoon ended, the ending probably would’ve been smoother if they had done it when the webtoon wrapped up. I will not spoil this part of the drama, but Baek In Ha, Baek In Ho’s sister has a meltdown and many fans were angry with that direction of the story but I found it very fascinating and was very invested on what was going to happen next when it occurred, and I don’t think that it happened just out of nowhere since Baek In Ha is evidently not a stable person and she did have some mental problems.
Cheese In the Trap is a decent drama, I cannot say it’s for everyone because I was not hyped about it but I know many others who were, you will just have to go into it and see for yourself if you like it or not. It did have some great acting by Seo Kang Joon who played Baek In Ho and I actually find that some of the supporting characters had excellent acting such as Yoon Ji Won who played Son Min Soo, Hong Seol’s follower (not to be confused with her stalker) and Ji Yoon Ho who played Oh Young Gon. I think Kim Go Eun who played Hong Seol was promising too. Cheese In the Trap is worth checking out, watch an episode or two to see if you like it because it may (or may not) appeal to you more than others.
I give Cheese In the Trap a 7/10 stars for it’s promising acting, diverse set of characters, but weaker plot, and unsatisfying conclusion.
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If I hadn’t known and loved Choi Woo-Shik I probably would’ve never knew of this drama nor would I have cared to watch it. This drama was everything I didn’t expect an Asian drama to have, the topics that were brought into question and talked about is rarely seen in Asian dramas, if ever. I think that Hogu’s Love stands out for that reason alone and I find myself relating to the show better because they cover issues of homosexuality, sexual assault, sex protection and single motherhood. That said, I may have not been through any of those big issues but it happens in our world today, these problems occur everywhere so I enjoy the realism and the awareness spread.
Initially, I didn’t see the plot going anywhere after Do Hee has the baby and Ho Goo tries to figure out who the father is until a big, amazing plot twist happened. Ho Goo suspects an old classmate from high school, a smart man known as Byun Kang Chul who was the school president who had a relationship with Do Do Hee and is now a successful lawyer. I have never seen so much misunderstanding of more than one situation in my life until I watched Byun Kang Chul’s involvement with Kang Ho Goo and Do Do Hee and that is what made me continue watching the show, there were backstories within these characters that are vaguely explained and I wanted to find out more about them because they were like mysteries that I needed to solve because it affected the plot and the characters’ feelings that came to be.
Our lead character, Kang Ho Goo has a heart that is obese, his absolute kindness to others and altruism tends to be taken for granted or taken advantage of. He’s weak in independence, he puts everything on the line for Do Hee throughout the series and is willing to take care of her and her baby. All that went through my mind was how pitiful the guy was, I pitied him so much to the point where it hurt. They purposefully made his character that way, Ho Goo was not meant to be a strong and independent protagonist, his personality takes after his own name, Fool. But I like him. I actually love this aspect of Ho Goo because everyone has a Ho Goo in their life, someone who’s always foolishly taken for granted or advantaged of, or lacks strength in dating. I enjoy that connection to the character. Ho Goo is very fun to watch, he’s feels like a friend to the viewer.
I want to mention that Choi Woo-shik was a perfect casting choice for Ho Goo, his physical appearance suited the role best and his acting was spot on with expressing a different side to Ho Goo of confrontation and honestly that shapes his character to be more than just a one dimensional fool.
Uee’s acting really sparks in this role as a young pregnant single mother, she did a great job on representing Do Hee’s personal afflictions as she doesn’t smile and speaks with a monotone voice as if all colour was drained out of her. I did have a difficult time relating to her though, I think that’s one problem with her character but I still liked watching her. The chemistry between Ho Goo was depicted as a lost love, it was as if their relationship was already built and now they just needed to revise it. It might have needed a bit more development for the viewers to see, I myself wanted to see more build up.
Byun Kang Chul, played by Lim Seulong, stole my attention and the show as a whole throughout the middle to end of the drama. His character was very interesting, he came off as cold, arrogant, and skeptical; I liked the depth within his character as his insecurities unfolded and his personal confessions were made, I was very immersed with him and I really cared about him. Even as an adult, throughout the drama he continued to go through a unique self discovery, (when you watch the show or if you watched it you would understand what I mean by ‘unique’). His relationship with Ho Goo’s sister Ko-Kyung was more developed than the two main leads, there was realization that came into Byun Kang Chul’s relationship that made it grow.
There is too much to say about Hogu’s Love even without spoiling it, one last thing I wanted to talk to share was how my eyes watered and I shed a tear during a certain scene in one of the last episodes where Ho Goo was telling Do Hee not to feel any guilt for what happened in her past and with her baby and reassured her that she doesn’t have to apologize all the time; something about the topic really hit me and I’ve never cried while watching a K Drama before.
Hogu’s Love has it’s flaws like every drama with one big plot hole that still bothers me (I cannot say it because it is a spoiler) but it can be overlooked, it really depicts certain morals and social norms of Korean society which makes an interesting subplot. I enjoyed the main characters without a doubt and was invested in their problems and wanted to know the outcome of it all as their issues were gradually growing. There was good comic relief in Ho Goo’s friends as well, I enjoyed every scene with them as well as Ko-Kyung interacting with her parents and drinking with her friends.
Hogu’s Love is a very interesting drama I must say with vulnerable and intense topics and themes that I haven’t seen in any Korean drama yet, it has a good balance of humour, drama and romance. It’s definitely worth watching, if you love plot twists and want to watch a drama without an actual love triangle (you will understand what I mean when you watch it) then this is your kind of show then.
Hogu’s Love deserves an 8.5/10
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