This will be my first post talking about a Korean Drama (K-drama) that I’ve watched. Truthfully, I’m actually a newbie to this scene although I know that people have been following this for years. I’ve only watched a few K-dramas completely thus far (only 3) but the first one that I completed was You’re Beautiful (Minami Shineyo / May also be known as He’s Beautiful or You’re Handsome).
Here’s a short synopsis of the drama:
The management company of the idol group A.N.JELL insisted on adding a new singer to the group as the lead vocal, Tae Kyung’s voice was hurting. However,the new member, Mi Nam, had to go to the States to repair a botched eye job just before signing the contract. His agent came up with the idea of having his twin sister, Mi Nyu,to stand in for him and pretend that she was her brother. The two of them grew up in an orphanage and Mi Nyu, who was all set to become a nun, agreed to this charade as she didn’t want to spoil her brother’s chance of fame which would make it easier to look for their mother.
This drama is actually a fairly recent one, just being broadcast from October to November of last year (2009) in South Korea by SBS. It’s a romantic comedy (I admit I like these a lot) and I had a lot of fun watching this. I picked up this series about 2 months ago and finished it in about 2 weeks. The one thing I realized about Korean dramas is that each episode is extremely long, ending at about 1 hour and 10 minutes for each episode. That’s without commercials. In this particular drama, there were 16 episodes, so that means 18 hours and 40 minutes of drama. Now that’s a fair amount. It took me about 2 weeks to finish this drama, but the story was good.
Cast of You're Beautiful
Park Shin Hye plays Go Mi Nyu (female) and turns into Go Mi Nam (male) to help cover for her twin brother who has been rushed to the States to fix an eye problem (which is quite funny when you find out what it is). She signs the paperwork and enters into A.N.Jell which is the newest and hottest boy band around in South Korea. Anyway, as you can probably tell, this spirals out of control when she mixes in with the other 3 male members of A.N.Jell, who all start to have feelings for Go Mi Nyu and of course the news of a female being in a boy band is media worthy so problems arise from that also. A lot more stuff happens in the drama which I can’t tell you without spoiling it for you, so I suggest you pick it up and watch it if you have a chance.
Watching a full K-drama is just like watching a very long sitcom. I felt like the episodes themselves could’ve been split into even smaller parts, but I heard from my Korean friend that Koreans don’t like commercials and they like to sit through long episodes on TV. I have no problem with that, it’s just that I find it takes a very long time to finish these dramas. However, it was worth it! You’re Beautiful is a great romantic comedy. But I have to admit that I’m a sucker for that genre… haha.
You’ll find a lot of familiar faces if you’re a fan of K-pop. UEE from After School is present as the somewhat diabolical Yoo He Yi, as well as Jung Yong Hwa from the newly debuted CN Blue as Shin Woo and also Lee Hong Ki from FT Island as the adorable Jeremy. Also, K-pop artist and actor Jang Geun Suk plays the leader of A.N.Jell, Hwang Tae Kyung.
I think one of the only problems I had with the drama was that Park Shin Hye who plays Go Mi Nam really looks like a girl. She’s supposed to look like a guy when she fills in for her twin brother, but c’mon, even when they dress her up in guy’s clothing, she still looks like a girl. And a pretty one at that! I mean, look at her!
I think that’s really the only problem I had with this drama… haha. The girl who’s supposed to play a boy is too pretty for her own good. But I guess there’s nothing really to complain about. The drama was well written and it was enjoyable. I just thought that it could’ve been split up into many more shorter segments. But then again it’s good to know that you have only 16 episodes and that the story is complete. Sometimes with other sitcoms they just keep releasing more and more episodes which are basically just full of filler. The good thing about these types of short series is that once they’re done, that’s it. You’ve enjoyed a long story and you’re free to move onto the next one.
Which I realize could be a deadly perpetuous cycle if I continue to get caught up with these dramas. They’re really well written though and more interesting than other dramas I’ve watched! Seriously, I found myself laughing out loud during many segments of these things (not the “lol” type where you just type it and not actually do it… I mean the kind where I actually DID laugh out loud). Very funny drama. I’m a light hearted kind of person. (Did I mention how I love romantic comedies? No? Well I do. ๐ )
If you enjoy a good romantic comedy then look no further! You’re Beautiful might be what you’re looking for. ๐
As I said before, I’ve completed 3 K-dramas so far. I’ll be talking about Coffee Prince and Boys Over Flowers in my next few posts, so keep a look out for those. ๐
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