Perfect Marriage Revenge. I didnt like the first episode. If a beanie didnt suggest to watch ep2 first then go back to ep1, I wouldnt continue watching this show past ep1.

Two of my favorite dramas, Coffee Prince and City Hall, both have initial episodes filled with slapstick and low-brow humor, and if that isn't your cup of tea (it was rough going for me) it's easy to be turned off. It takes awhile for the fabulousness to develop.

I will go check my list and come back. I just came to petition a chat about crappy dramas with great first episodes. This will be a chat to remember.

First of all, here's to the Run On shout-out, @dramaddictally!!! I hope you give it the time for a rewatch--for myself, I usually start at episode 3 because I don't need to see Lee Jung-ha get beat up (ever) again. Ugh. The rage.

My contribution to this particular chat is only a partial match, though, because I note on my list that if I don't like the first episode of a drama, I'm also usually not likely to like the end of the drama (I'm looking at YOU Wedding Impossible) so that doesn't count as a "great drama."

But LTNS was a short drama that started with a messy opening episode that left you with the impression of "What's all this then??" But then it got better and more nuanced with each successive episode until one was left with the impression of a thoughtful drama that wanted to build up to its conclusion. The acting performances of Esom and
Ahn Jae-hong are also, of course, fantastic.

I will take the risk and say, a great drama with crappy opening eps or let's say less interesting than the rest of the drama is The Matchmakers. The first episode was boring and I almost dropped it and it isn't until the Maeng sisters were formally introduced that the story grew on me. Make no mistake the drama is one of my favourites but its opening week needed a push.

Full House. Even in 2004 no one could accuse the drama of being great 😉 but it was my gateway drama and I'm feeling nostalgic about Rain. The first episode was enough to scare anybody away from K-dramas. Glad our family persevered. My mother giving strict instructions to Rain on how to behave properly was another memorable off-screen drama we all remember fondly till date.

The first episode of Healer is not bad, but I remember being confused on my first watch. Who is working for whom? Whose DNA sample is everybody after? But I kept watching because of the Knitting Hacker Ahjumma.

Return of Iljimae and Fermentation Family are two dramas that ended up being lovely despite alarmingly bad first episodes. In terms of more recent shows, Stranger season 2 is an example of a drama where it seemed like literally nothing was happening for the first 5-6 episodes until the writer suddenly started to pull all the various random threads together. It ended up being one of my all-time favorite shows, and in some ways I think it's more brilliant than season 1, but if I hadn't already been attached to the characters and trusted the screenwriter I probably would have dropped it.

Healer: I wouldn't call this bad, but quite frankly, I understood very little about that first episode. Funny enough, I was so confused after episode 1, that I was looking for a summary of it, which is actually how I ended up discovering Dramabeans. So maybe the confusing first episode was a good thing after all?

I don't really have any other examples. Usually when I don't like the first episode, I won't even watch the second one, and sometimes I might not even finish the first episode. There's too much stuff to watch, and not enough time to watch multiple episodes of something I may or may not end up liking after all.

I watched Reply 1988 a long time ago and have forgot almost everything about episode 1 plotwise, but what I remember is that there was a lot of shouting and hitting, and I remember disliking it. But if I'm not mistaken, the end of episode 1 was Deoksun's grandma's funeral, and the scene when Deoksun's dad and his brother hugging each other and crying gave me teary eyes, and that's when I decided to continue. It ended up in my fav list of all time.

Gaus Electronics. The first episode had so much cartoonish "comedic" violence and made the FL look like such an abusive a**hole that I almost didn't continue, but fortunately there were many recap comments from later episodes that let me know that wasn't the whole story. The second episode turned it around into the little show that could - clever, funny, absurd, sexy, and sweet. One of my all-time favorites.

This is going to be controversial, however I wouldn’t call the first episode disgraceful, and maybe it was just how I personally felt at a specific moment in time, but the first episode of TWINKLING WATERMELON gave me heart palpitations. The near death experiences gave me anxiety, especially as I didn’t really know the reason for the time travel, I assumed it was because someone from the family died. Anyway I’m glad I gave it another shot as it’s the best drama I watched all year, and if I watched it last year it would’ve been my pick for the best 2023 drama.

Another example is GAUS ELECTRONICS. I watched the first episode and immediately dropped it. Only from beanie buzz did I decide to continue as I’ve read that it got much better. Well it’s one of my favourite comedies, which is a feat considering I rarely enjoy the office/corporate workplace genre

Disgraceful you say? That skews the number of dramas I want to crucify to a minimum. I'm going to assume anything but great and give my response.

The first is Gaus Electronics. This one was not just about the first episode, it was about the premiere episodes. Save for Baek Ma-tan of Power Group's iconic entry, an entry that I can bet 10000000000% King The Land copied, the premiere week was ruined by the female lead. This hasn't stopped me from recommending this to people, and gosh! They've all loved it, I warn them not to watch the first two episodes. Infact, I don't have the premiere week in my storage.

Perfect Marriage Revenge - This was one of the dramas that premiered at the time when I was already pissed with the narrative trend in kdramas. Perfect Marriage Revenge was a ride. But, thanks to my intuition telling me to read the recaps first before watching, I was angry just reading the recaps. It was no use seeing how magnified the anger will be if I watch it. Thankfully, the time travel happened in the first episode, and I'm going to give them full credit for doing that. So I began right at episode 2. And, it was a blast.

Family: The Unbreakable Bond - This was one expected drama that ruined its first week thanks to translation. It seemed like autobots were responsible for that week's subtitles so it was all over the place. It was so bad that the subtitle ruined the writing, direction, and even execution of the script. And in truth, Jang Hyuk, Jang Na-ra and Chae Jung-ahn could not save Family from the disgrace the subtitling caused in the first week. For those who skipped because of this, let me say it only got better right at episode 3.

Hands down, without a doubt “A Piece Of Your Mind”. It wasn’t disgraceful, just very confusing, off and quite concerning at first? But it turned out to be one of my favorite Jung Hae In / Chae Soo Bin drama and i was sad it was cut down to 12 episodes. Probably took a tad too long for the drama to set its tone and allow viewers to figure out what it was on about.

Doctor Slump. I wouldn't call its first episode "crappy," but Truck of Doom makes an appearance in the first three minutes, and our leads don’t start out as very likable. The ML comes off as a spoiled rich kid making the 2ML pull out his chair and pour his wine, and the FL is in denial of having depression and throws away her medication. But by the second episode, she comes to accept it and picks up her meds from the trash, and he learns to rebuild his life after hitting rock bottom, and they both become so endearing and relatable. It's really a great healing drama that will make you sob.

Nothing comes to mind.
But I do have favorite dramas that I always rewatch starting from episode 2.

W
Mr Queen
Oh My Ghostess

I just like the chaos. And in fantasy that chaos usually starts in episode 2. Episode 1 feels kind of boring to watch when I already know what's the charm of the show.

I was feeling just this way watching Midnight Romance in Hagwon and it took me several episodes to really catch the fever but boy I love it now! The description and title did not seem to fit the first episodes as they were all about charter schools/problems but I see it differently now as it all comes together as the story gets going to the slow/ soft/ yet persistent romance heating up nicely as they realize a few things about themselves.

Crash Landing on You
I hated the first episode and dropped it. Picked it up years later and realized the error of my ways.
My Mister
First 3 episodes were a snooze fest. I got sucked in before I realized what was happening.

I would not use the term disgraceful but I can think of three favorite dramas that suffered poor ratings imo because of the way writer-nim introduced the main characters so negatively. Some folks were probably one and done but if you hung in there until around episode 4 or 5 you found yourself a terrific drama:
1. tvN’s CHICAGO TYPEWRITER (2017)
2. MBC’s I AM NOT A ROBOT (2017/18) and
3. tvN’s A POEM A DAY (2018)

Maybe an honorable mention (for shaky first episodes) could go to
4. SBS’s YOUR HONOR (2018)
5. SBS’s CONNECTION

I have two:

The Matchmakers - It took me good four episodes tp warm up to it, and then fall in love with it.

Freaking Cinderella - I almost dropped it, and even though it still might go south, it has every possibility to become a sleeper gem, but I wasn't impressed with the first episode.

But isn’t disgraceful a rather harsh term to use here as the dictionary definition is “shockingly unacceptable”. If something is a “shrill makjang” or “dramas that didn’t start out great at all”, these arguably aren’t tantamount to shockingly bad. Just garden variety bad. I would say “disgraceful/shockingly unacceptable” should be applied when a drama fails on multiple/all fronts: directing, writing, acting, sound/music, chemistry between the actors, set design and has bigoted/regressive social, political, cultural and economic messages and punches down.

Not necessarily the entire first episode of KILL ME, HEAL ME, but the first scenes set in the US were shockingly bad and cringey. If I hadn't known it was going to get better, I would have dropped the drama.

Dramas I'm glad I didn't drop, even though the first episode (or first two episodes) almost made me do it. But then I really enjoyed them until the end:

_ Psychopath Diary. Amazing how this show got better and better until the end, imo. Now it's in my Top 11.
_ Seasons of Blossom. The first episode doesn't invite to continue watching, but it's a beautiful series. The feels...
_ Webdrama Real Time Love. The beginning was so silly and amateurish... But I really enjoyed the whole series. I was hooked for days. I couldn't watch anything else.
_ My name is Kim Sam Soon. Fortunately I didn't stop after the cringey first episode. I would have missed this hoot of a show.

Nothing to loose (Judge vs Judge)> They made the FL, a judge, acting like a crazy girl during a trial... But after, the drama showed a real nice friendship/love story between the 3 leads.

Thank You is one of my all-time favorites, but I found the first episode really off-putting, with Jang Hyuk going beyond even the usual sure-he's-a-jerk-now-but-you're-going-to-love-him-later and Choi Kang Hee not getting to do much. The end of that episode is poignant, though, that's where I feel the series really starts.

Hospital Playlist. I found the first episode super confusing as to who was who, how did they know each other, what was everyone's specialties again, when was the guy from Oh My Ghostess going to show up (Jo Jung-Seok, whom I now adore), etc. And not to mention sifting through the medical jargon on top of it all. But once the five friends finally met up again, the show came together and voila! Magic.

In recent years— because my memory to remember things from waaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyyyy back isn’t the same anymore— it’s got to be my beloved, my whole heart and soul, the C-drama, The Untamed:
I remember being so confused and bored by the premiere episode and wasn’t sure what other Beanies—whom were also watching or had just finished watching at the time— were talking about and why it was being praised to the high heavens. Boy, I have never been so glad to be so wrong about a drama and was glad I went back to it later (ahem 2 weeks later, to be precise 😅), and I’ve never looked back, nor has life ever been the same! I think re-watched the drama about 15-16 times after my very first watching of it (albeit, some of those times, it wasn’t a re-watching of the entire drama, just bits and pieces). Even after all these years— it’s been 5, the drama was released in 2019– it still holds a very special spot in my heart and the things I took from it still cross my mind, but I will say that I have not done another re-watching of the drama for about 2 years now, because I just cannot afford to go down that bottomless rabbit hole anymore like I used to ♥️

I’m going to say QOTs because his joy about him having a way out of his marriage by her dying was a bit much. And the drama ended up being so much better than the first episodes.

I liked Gaus Electronics’ opening so much because it didn’t take itself seriously and was most obviously satire. But if you missed that and thought they were being serious, that would have been a turn off. But that show was amazing satire overall. I loved it.

Moonlight drawn by clouds. I’ll admit, I didn’t think I’d like it that much until PBG fell into the trap. 😂 He sold it then and there.

Call it Love— First episode is forgettable. Hair pulling, yelling, all the standard loud women, usually a turn off for me. Also the coloring of it many had to be desensitized to. I watched it on a regular TV and had no problems with it. The writing ended up being the best thing about the show.

For me, Queen of Tears didn't start out great and I was watching the first couple of episodes more as background noise than as a binge watch. I'm not sure if it was my mood or frame of mind or Soo Hyun playing what seemed to be a bit of a slimeball character and Ji-Won not coming off very likeable, but I had a hard time getting through the first episode or two. I'm not sure when it kicked in, but I ended up becoming totally hooked on the story and character development and it ended up becoming one of my drama faves.

I’m late to this chat but here’s some notables I’ve dragged from my memory -

Jealousy Incarnate was a real struggle to get past episode one; I think I had to try a couple of times then it turned out good.

Shopping King Louis everyone raved about and i found it such hard work at the start. I only managed to get through the start because I’d just watched Hello Monster so I wanted more Seo In Guk 😄 but after about five episodes it really gets good and I could see why everyone liked it.

Ah, was expecting this after the Favorite First Episodes list.

And now, after taking cover (so I will not be smacked), here's my list:

1. She Was Pretty - stop shouting NaDae Jung Eum Nim (Hwang Jung Eum)!!!

2. Hometown Chacha - There, I said it. Hated the FL 😤 until episode 4-5

3. Suspicious Partner - hmmm 😐

4. My Golden Life - successfully dropped after episode 1. Hurray 🎉

5. Gu Family Book - Episode 1 was too sad. I cried like a goat 🥹