Hi everyone! Long time no WWW!

For anyone who doesn’t know, every Sunday I’m going to try doing a “What We’re Reading” post on the fanwall since I haven’t been watching much stuff lately. Would love to see what everyone is reading tomorrow!

Anyway, on to my dramas!

Frankly Speaking: I haven’t had time to watch episode 8 yet, but this show is a delight! Go Kyung-pyo is at his comedic best and Kang Han-na is so enjoyable in a much more up-beat role than I’ve ever seen her in before. The dating show idea is a bit tired, but I was glad it only lasted a few episodes. Ki-baek’s disinhibition makes for both hilarious and surprisingly romantic moments, and I love it.

The Atypical Family: This show is so odd and I am enjoying it so much. I don’t feel the romance at all, but for some reason that doesn’t really matter to me. I think my favorite parts are the interactions between Dong-hee and Grace and also I-na and her little crush. This show really went and got the best young actors out their currently for their show and I love it. Who knew I would be so invested in a romantic storyline between 13 year olds?

The Brave Yong Soo-jung: Okay, I clicked play on this just because I needed something mindless to watch while cooking! Don’t judge me! It truly is the most Daily Drama, and I think 3 episodes already filled my appetite for dead parents and evil aunts and stepmoms!

I should have more time to watch things since it is a long weekend here for me, so hopefully next week will have a longer list from me! Let me know what I need to watch! I’m eyeing The Midnight Romance in Hagwon, Dare to Love Me, and Crash.

See you guys next week!

Currently Watching
Carry Sun-jae and Run: 🏃‍♂️‍➡️❤️ I loved this week, and I still love everything about this drama! Sun-jae is my favorite ML in recent memory (ever??), and Tae-sung is my favorite SML EVERRRRR. Ep. 14 proves I like Sun-jae in any timeline. I love that what happens is not because of "fate," but because Sun-jae (knowingly) makes the same choices every time (also, the meta with the movie script is very nice - how will it resolve its own definition of happy v. sad endings?). Next week decides if this drama ends up in my Top-Ten list or joins my Heart-Breakers list!

Frankly Speaking: 👨‍💼🔊 Still enjoying it! Still finding it charming!! It's a comfort watch for me. It's a bit odd as rom-coms go, but I'm FAR more invested in their romance than I thought I would be. They're both such nice, normal people at their core. But unlike Lovely Runner, this drama's SML can go take a hike. I strongly dislike him.

Crash: 🚔💥 Crash is a standard procedural with some chuckles and cool driving thrown in. There's angst, but it hasn't veered off into complete melodrama yet. And now we're cooking up a juicy, (but not unexpected) conspiracy - yay!! But I want the drama to do MORE - more action, more comedy, more melodrama, more something - just pick a lane and commit to it.

Mr. Queen: 👨‍🍳➡️👸 (3-6) Still fun! I actually like court politics, and this one's politicking is more interesting than most! It seems like they also had a good action/combat choreographer for this, so I'm hoping for more sword fights, please.

JOL2: (1-5) The plots are plotting! I'm doing my best to keep up, but my memory of S1 is fuzzy, and I'm hampered by my inability to remember character names and titles (aside from Fan Xian, of course 😉). I'm officially behind on episodes, but that's ok.

In other news... My mom's one-sentence review of W: "Too violent, absurd, scary, and weird, with not enough relationship building." We also talked about how jarring all of the guns were, after being used to their absence in other dramas. She started Frankly Speaking and is enjoying it very much! We've watched a few bits together 😊 She really likes Go Kyung-pyo and his character: "he's sweet," and I agree!

Crash: This continues to be such a sweet show. I love the case of the week and how our characters are getting to know each other. I love their slow and steady cohesion.

Lovely Runner: This show makes me so annoyed. The writing for Sol is so bad. She makes the worst and dumbest decisions. She has some moments where she is so likeable, but when it comes to Sun Jae stupid prevails every single time. It is such a baffling writing choice. I can’t root for her and Sun Jae at all because he deserves much much better. I find her so exhausting. SMH

Frankly Speaking: The leads are so likeable individually and together. I also appreciate the awkwardness after the kiss that they showed. They are so cute and I am rooting for them. I also love the adorableness of Un Baek and Sae Byuk. They are so cute and such opposites, which somehow really works.

Uncle Samsik: It is heating up. So I love seeing the beginning of this coup. It seems Uncle Samsik got played Kim San. I wonder who will win.

The Midnight Romance in Hagwon: I am smitten by this drama. I love the slow burn of the romance and I think it makes a lot of sense, Joon Ho clearly makes Hye Jin feel alive. He very obviously likes her already, so I think it is cute they show her slowly starting to feel things for him.

LIVE WATCHES
Beauty and Mr. Romantic
Weekender delight. Let's goooooo makjang villainery!!! The upcoming shenanigans are gonna be lyfe...and like the best type of ajumma romance. 🫢

Crash
Gah. I think I dropped this. But you know what? Here's something to say to shock the Beanatariat. I wish this drama were available DUBBED. Then I'd probably watch because I could look away easier during times that weren't just the fight scenes and the basic conversational ones.

Frankly Speaking
Oh, Trot Star/Hunny Bunny. You messed up with your earlier lady, but that's cool. You learned. Look around! There are many, many other folks who will see and accept YOU for who you are. Also, stop working so hard; you'll get wrinkles. Besides, actions cannot absolve you of your sins. Only self-acceptance and empathy can do that.

FROM THE RESERVES
Link: Eat Kill Love
Picked this up on a whim because @mazarin mentioned it in passing alongside one of my most favorite "I like this...but I shouldn't...but I DO" dramas, Love to Hate You. And I loved it! I could NOT believe at episode 8 that it was going to make it all the way to episode 16 with this plot...but it did. I'd say that the drama was only about 75 minutes too long, blowing this year's slate of dramas out of the water; a time when there have been 12-episode dramas that dragged. I recommend it as an all-at-once watch--noting that I bet it had its frustrations as a live-watch, because the twists...just...kept...on...coming!

Zombie Detective
LOL. Now I have to finish this before Woman Who's Different Day and Night starts, because I'll get confused about whether in each scene Choi Jin-hyuk is going to be a prosecutor, a zombie, or a prosecutor-zombie.

ON DECK
Tale of Arang (reserve sageuk)
Lobster Show (hopefully dark comedy about love and rehabilitation live-watch; perfected name courtesy @zindigo)
Bitter Sweet Hell (hopefully delightful makjang live-watch when it finally arrives in the States)

COMPLETED
Chief Inspector 1958 - Quite an exciting finale with a poignant conclusion. Overall it was a simple show that didn't try too hard to be more. The cast was good too. I wouldn't mind a second season.

ONGOING
The Atypical Family - That was a good conclusion to the first half - the scammer stuff was getting tiring. Only way to go from here is up. I-na and Jun-woo are the cutest.

Dare to Love Me - This show has everything AND the kitchen sink - even a long-lost love in Paris!

Crash - It was a lot less funny this week but the workings of the traffic cases are still interesting. But of course his accident was a conspiracy 🙄.

Lovely Runner - The plot has turned into a colander - the reset timeline makes no sense. Did Sun-jae's watch say 3 as well? Are we getting 2 more dying-and-resetting timelines?? At least OTP remain solidly adorable.

Frankly Speaking - The meddling awful 'first love' is the only annoying part of the show. The leads together are cute and funny, just like the faces they made in the photo booth.

Uncle Samsik - My head spins keeping all the characters, their real-life equivalents, and Uncle's schemes straight. But it's nice to have a show that makes me focus and work hard.

C-DRAMAS
Joy of Life (Season 2) - This took a while to get rolling but things started heating up Ep. 4 onwards. I'm up to Ep. 12 and enjoying myself. There's definitely an imbalance between how much we're getting to see of different characters but the back-and-forth scheming remains great.

Wondering if I should try out Fox Spirit Matchmaker: Red Moon Pact 🤔.

Apparently The Double will be out next week too? The novel wasn't the greatest but maybe the drama will improve on it…

Flex X Cop: (Finished!) My husband was away for a few days last week so I zipped right through this and it was so fun! It feels sort of strange to get the drama ofthe FL and ML out of the way in the first season, but I’m not here to complain. I’m absolutely here to watch our reluctantly close team solve more crimes in season two and only sorry that I-soo never got to reconcile with his dad.

There are approximately 14000 things on air right now but somehow I started I Remember You/Hello Monster (up to ep 8) and in a shocking turn of events, I think I actually prefer the English name to the Korean one in this case (we’ll see once it ends if this is final). I thought about starting lots of other things, but the heart wants what the heart wants and in this case it wanted Seo In-guk being a genius profiler, Park Bo-Geom being *ambiguous*, and Doh Kyung-soo living in his ~villain era~. What can I say? My heart has very specific wants. DKS is in a minor role here, unfortunately (just makes me even more excited for Sculpture City or whatever it will eventually be called) but his villain is amazing. I feel simultaneously attracted to and repelled by him, and isn’t that what you want in a psychopath? His voice (used to great effect basically everywhere he goes) is so soft and smooth here, it makes you want to lean in to listen, but also, he would think nothing of murdering you as you leaned in. SIG is arrogant and insecure and bold and hesitant and confident and damaged in all the ways I love, and there is something about watching him get into the minds of the killers that feels both comfortingly familiar and bracingly fresh. More please!

Midnight Romance in Hagwon
Junho is... smoooth! Touching, invading Hyejin's space, taking over the wheel... and I was not sure I liked all of it. So far, surprisingly, I'm here more for the Hagwon than for the Romance... and I want to know what will be the consequences of that one message in the boys' group chat.

I'm Not a Hero
This show is so unique and every weekend I'm curious where to it will be taking me. It definitely has my full attention and I wish I had more time to engage in the discussion (sadly I'm swamped with work), because sometimes I have the feeling that I watch a completely different drama than the rest of the Beanieland. I find it natural that the chemistry between the leads is questionable, because Gwiju is NOT (yet) in love with Dahee. Yes, the kiss may have stirred something, but Gwiju is right now more OBSESSED with Dahee than truly in love - he sees her as his saviour, his escape route from his survivor's guilt... and his (easy) solution for his currently broken relationship with Ina (and the rest of the family). He is happy, he is elated. But there is no real love (yet). And we rightly feel so. I think the wedding was the turning point, bringing chance to start really working on the issues. At least I hope so.

Currently Not Running With Sunjae
I decided to postpone this week and watch the last 4 episodes together to avoid penultimate frustrations.

Instead I caught up with
Beauty and Mr Romantic
and I have to agree with everyone that in this case the amnesia is a blessing allowing Dora to live with a loving grandmother, without her Toxic Mother. Pilseung now knows and he is giddy and loving around Dora (totally confusing her 🙂). And I somehow wish Dora never recovers her memory and that even if other people around her find the truth, they decide not to tell her and shower Dora with love instead. And the best redemption arch would be that Toxic Mom finds out and also decides not to reveal herself to not to remind Dora of her painful past and forever keeps out of Dora's life.

One redemption arc has already stared - Oppa finally realised how hard it is to earn money and how frustrating Toxic Mom is with her easy spending.

Frankly Speaking
I'm still not sold on this dating variety show, but I had a silly smile on my face, because Woojoo and Kibaek are so adorably cute together 😍 (and I melted with that handhold 😊).

I wish I had more time and could watch the 4th instalment of Kishibe Rohan.

Frankly Speaking 5 - 7¼ - So far so good, I'm liking this. I'm living for Kwon Yul's cameos though. It is a major highlight. It won't be the last, is it?
Cho-hui is something else.
And Jeonghoon is kinda somehow. Deep down he's still insecure. Despite tte fane he enjoys, he doesn't mind not having the spotlight unless Ki-baek's involved. Which is where I'm both laughing and feeling pity for him. You have it all but you don't.

Focusing on the rom- and not the -com really helped.

Missing Crown Prince 3&4 - I already knew FL Dad was the other person in the affair. That was out in the open quite easily.
I like the bromance between Princes Dosung and ML. I hope either of them putting on the Red robe or the race for it doesn't corrupt their bond.

Find Me In Your Memory - I have no memory of what episode I've gotten to. The last time I kept track, I was at episode 4-5. I've progressed from 4-5 though.
I'm still skeptical about the response of Psychiatrist son when ML asked him about Ha-jin and Seo-yeon. I feel like there is more to it than he said.

Uncle Samsik - My currently best airing drama. Sell me some politics and I'm sold. This one sold it well. It wasn't easy not understanding the non chronological storytelling format but once I did, everything fell into place.

I don't trust Kim San. He seems to me like another Choo Intae in the making, whom I liked at the introduction but the admiration dipped drastically to the negative margin in two soul revealing successions of his. San operates just like him. The one thing that still has intrigued by San is that he's set to oppose Seongmin in the grand scheme of things.

Lee Kyu-hyung is eating it here. Where is my handsome righteous lawyer/administrator?

Runner (Episode 13-14) - Mood: C-
Ah yes, it’s always the person with dementia that remembers everything even in an alternate timeline. Speaking of which, it is amusing that the serial killer is still there despite Sol’s efforts, but I guess dramas always love to toy with everlasting fate and the tragedy of it all. It should be a happy ending given that the writer decided to throw out the plot but you never know.

The Atypical Family (Episode 5-6) - Mood: D+
Well, my years of watching experience might have disillusioned me to that reveal cause I was looking at the scheduling and I realised that with 3 weeks left, next week is going to be the happy kiss week, followed by the breakup in penultimate week before a reconciliation in the finale. And the kids’ arc’s kinda going from bad to worse because jealous girl will be a trouble.

Frankly Speaking (Episode 7-8) - Mood: D+
Yup, the show really lost me when the first love came in like a wrecking ball. It’s quite shocking that 0 thought was given to the characterisation and that we as viewers were supposed to just embrace that someone would actually join a reality dating show and forcefully impose themselves on someone who they haven’t met in awhile. And the 2ML is more sympathetic (sigh).

Crash (Episode 3-4) - Mood: D
Of course there was going to be some decades long conspiracy involving the upper echelons of society. Of course it wasn’t the protagonist who killed someone in the past and someone mysterious is out for revenge. The fact that we’re already into the ML’s trauma is bad news with 8 episodes to go cause I’m assuming this backstory is only going to get even more crazy.

WERACLE (YouTube): Korea’s current favorite couple, Song Jieun and Park Wi, recently won the Immortal Songs Romanic Couple competition. They are also in the process of getting married so their latest videos have been documenting their journey, planning and honeymoon PPL.

Alternate Endings Game:
Lovely Runner -- Sol finds out who the serial killer is, researches where he used to live, takes truck driving lessons, then goes back in time to ToD him.

Crash -- Since the ML doesn't want to drive, he eventually buys a car with Fool Self Driving, which then hits more pedestrians that he ever could by himself.

Finally got around to 2 shows that started last week but which seemed low-priority from the descriptions...
Dare to Love Me: 2.15 At 2:15 the FL screamed "Stop", so I did.
Midnight Hagwon: 4.56 Lasted almost 5 minutes, but I rarely like cram school shows and this one seemed 🥱💤.

Chief Detective 1958: 7.5 Passable, not great. For me it was a Seo Eun-su⌚. YMMV.

Missing Crown Prince: 6.5

The Atypical Family: 8.0

Lovely Runner: 7.5 I don't like it as much as many of you do, but that dig about resignation letters raises the score for this week.

Crash: 7.0 Not liking the ML's driving skills or his bike or the way they guilt-tripped him; otherwise ok-ish.

Frankly Speaking: 8.0 Kang Han-na⌚

Bittersweet Hell: 3.0 Description didn't sound promising; writer & PD haven't done anything I've liked; I gave it a half hour anyway but...

Connection: 6.0

Time travel is difficult to do without tripping over your past/future selves. To see it done right, go back in time and watch Queen In-hyun's Man. Repeat as long as it makes you happy.

Watching

Lovely Runner anyone else feel like this drama has been on air for the perfect length of time? Like it doesn’t feel like ‘omg it just started how are we already in the final week’, nor does it feel like I’m crawling to the finish line. I’m keen to get an ending but I’ll miss it all the same 💕

Bridgerton binging S1, S2 and Queen Charlotte now (again) because I’ve watched S3 part 1 like three times now. EIther I’ve convinced myself over repeated watches or I genuinely believe it, but I take back what I said in last week’s WWW thread about feeling uncertain on Polin. I do wish Colin had to suffer a little more in the friendzone but I’m very excited for them because ep 3 and 4 did the legwork to make up for Colin’s cringy persona in ep 1 and 2 (which I know was the point). It actually maybe could also be because I finished reading the book recently and I’m using context from there to fill the gaps on what isn’t shown on screen. Whilst I don’t know how I feel about all the deviations from the book - there are defs places where I wish they’d stuck to what happens in the book - but one creative liberty I do appreciate is how they’ve built up Lady Whilstledown to be a bit ‘meaner’ and also serve as the central point of conflict for this season. I can’t wait for part two, the drama is going to be at an all time high (also on this note, I still hate we have to wait for the second part but I totally get the logic Netflix was going for and it’s definitely working because the buzz will be more than sustained after the ending of ep 4).

Lady Revenger Returns from The Fire honestly an underrated gem, I really love the tight pacing and the characters - especially the ML and FL.

Maxton Hall everyone keeps going on about this German show on Instagram so I took the dive and am finding it surprisingly entertaining. The plot is the most basic paint by the numbers thing ever - hard working Cinderalla type girl on scholarship at rich people school gets entangled with the richest and most popular boy at school and now it’s a battle of wills as the ML gets increasingly infuriated that the FL isn’t bowing down to him like the rest of the school is. BUT, despite the plot being run of the mill,
the cinematography is quite nice and the acting and dialogue is really solid so it’s elevating the plot somehow 🤷‍♀️

Keeping an eye on Fox Spirit Matchmaker which just dropped - reddit reviews seem lukewarm at best, but I’m going to wait till a few more episodes are aired before trying it out for myself.

Finished Love You Seven Times and while the ending was slightly convoluted, it stuck true to the xianxia genre and overall I really enjoyed watching this drama! Also finished Peacock in Wonderland which was great till the ending 🤡 Though there is an alt ending/extended scene that was making the rounds on social media - it makes the overall ending a tiny bit better but still a little...

Crash This drama is nice to watch but nothing extraordinary neither.

Dare to Love Me I'm not sure what to expect from this drama yet.

Lovely Runner I understand why Sol acted like she did, my issue is Sun Jae spent 14 episodes to tell her he will always choose happiness over regret and she spent 14 to take it from him : singing and her.

Frankly Speaking This title does not keep its promises...

The Atypical Family I really don't care about the ML and FL's past trauma. I just want I-Na to be happy.

Connection I will try it.

The Midnight Romance in Hagwon The episodes are too short! I need more!

Uncle Samsik So many characters with different opinions and a lot of flashbacks make this drama hard to follow.

The Matchmakers 🦆🦆(5/16): What are these wispy beards doing here, shoo! Not you, Your Majesty. You. Are. A. delight. Wispy beards confuse things and wear boring robes. We do not like that. We want lots of fun! Colorful hanboks! Giraffe! Obong! The Donkey!🥰

Bridgerton Season 3 Part 1(4/4): I was underwhelmed by the show, but that is probably because I started the books and the series for Polin and built my expectations way to high as a result. Expectations aside, I enjoyed part 1 as much as I enjoyed the previous seasons and I will certainly watch part 2 asap in June!😊If only for more barbs from Lady Danbury and cynical remarks from Benedict!😊

Live watches

Lovely Runner
Please show finish well let these last episodes make sense so we are not left sweating as it’s all tied up in the last few minutes or annoyed that it fell flat.

Frankly Speaking
Loving the possibilities this show has to shine with side couples we can enjoy.

Dare to Love
Slow and steady. Who knew grandad knew about love but chose responsibilities for the community over his own desires.

Crash
The most fun each week. I don’t know how they manage to balance the silly with such serious cases.

Uncle Samsik
Who knew a political drama could be this interesting. So gutted they have slowed down the episode drop rate.

Film corner
My mother, the mermaid a touching film about an adult daughter getting to know her parents.

Other dramas
To the wonder - Chinese
I am so glad I watched this gentle drama about a writer experiencing the dying traditions of country folk.

Blossoms in adversity - Chinese
Just started this as lots of hype from other beanies

Every precious moment - Japanese
A young man living with amnesia has forgotten his friends, work colleagues and family so now runs a coffee truck where he can safely build short term relationships and then move on.

Book corner
As long as you need: permission to grieve J S Park
Non fiction written by a hospital chaplain

American Seoul - Helena Rho
Re read of a memoir by Korean woman who left Korea as a child because her dad was the last of a long line of first born sons and she was one of 4 daughters. She fulfilled her dad’s wish for her to follow in his footsteps and became a doctor but left the profession in her 40’s to be the writer she always wanted to be.

THE TRUTH S2: *heavy sigh* I need to finish HEROES first, that's just too many watching hours at once. But I did take a peek at newest episodes, and bwahaha, they're still super makjang with relationship tree thing – we have siblings, cousins (involved in a love triangle), grandkids from the future, engaged couples, long lost kids (that is – ZLH is now LYN's son who took after dad in height department lmao), BL-coded ships between supposed relatives but that's OK and we're not even half done with the show... Moar insanity!

HEROES (2024): I hate cdrama fast pass practice! Not only it doesn't give me any time to process properly yet another depressing ending (no way you expected anything else here! *bitter laugh*), I also had too little time to catch up even with all previous episodes, but now my tl is full of spoilers – not that any of them were shocking logically, but still, dammit! Let me live a bit first!

Rant over, don't worry. Overall, from Ep20 onwards things get slow, plot and characters keep running in circles etc... I said it before and will stress once again – magic monks, their mysterious “inheritance” and the whole thing with multiple seal to obtain the treasure are the cancer of this drama. If I wasn't so stubborn and didn't hear that action comes back shortly in 30s, I'd seriously considered drop. For the time being what keeps me going is the desire to see what happens to the freaking treasure and blatantly female gaze-y scenes of ZBF with sleeves rolled up playing with his sword (sounds dirtier than it actually is... or not?).

“Drama news” segment, 5.20 romance edition:

- forget trailers galore – this week is all about posters! Every historical drama ones – huge thanks to whoever compiled them so I didn't have to!
https://x.com/Allcbizmelons/status/1792426204542451914

- and modern ones, including few currently airing dramas:
https://x.com/Allcbizmelons/status/1792432268881055784

- ADWAD shared a whole bunch – seriously, this show is peak generous! Tagline got me rolling)))
https://x.com/CEntTeaTime/status/1792369385023369333

And aegyeo attack short videos. Someone already simps hard indeed:
https://x.com/yeoni_dream/status/1792376510764183840

Btw, leads' puppies also got their own couple photoshoot! I guess kids are indeed planning to debut in the show and thus lessen their parents financial burden a bit... Brb trying to guilt-trip my cats into doing something useful as well, wish me luck)))

- FOLLOW YOUR HEART poster separately – you can tell we're close to premiere date with how intense it is:
https://i.mydramalist.com/XdEevX_3f.jpg

Plus wedding (one of many!) and making videos:
https://x.com/LuoYunxiFanClub/status/1792382620292239630

Another poster to celebrate 1M reservations, this time a cute one:
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GOaDeiiXAAAWAFp?format=jpg&name=4096x4096

Is there a way I can compress a show and keep it in my pocket forever? Because I want to keep Thirty-nine somewhere that I can clutch or hug any second I have a desperate need to. Because I want to keep it in my breast pocket on my heart. Because I am at a loss and a mess. I cried my way through the last episode right now, and I have absolutely no desire to start a new show. Like ever. But that can't be. I need a remedy. Extra hot ttokboki? A dark crime thriller? Just let me deal with this dam of tears that won't end first.