I hope everyone is having a good week. You know, sometimes I miss some of the old commenters from the Dramabeans community, who i interacted with regularly, who no longer comment here for whatever reason. I want to give them an update into a snippet of my life we'd spoken about before. But alas. I hope all old commenters and lurkers are doing well.

When I went to Korea in 2018, it was at the height of tensions between North and South Korea. North Korea had been aggressively spending rockets over South Korean airspace and making threats. For the first time in decades, South Koreans were uneasy about the situation with their northern neighbor.

This week, the unease has returned in spades. Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean dictator Kim Jon Un signed a comprehensive strategic partnership agreement that included a pledge to “provide mutual assistance in case of aggression.” The agreement requires both Russia and North Korea to provide immediate military assistance if the other country is the subject of armed aggression. U.S. officials have told NBC News that in exchange for military assistance in Ukraine, Russia might provide North Korea with the technology it needs to evade missile defenses or launch a nuclear missile from a submarine.

Since the Ukraine invasion, Russia has been isolated from the western world trade. North Korea has been embargoed for a long time as a punishment for its nuclear ambitions. This new pact gives Kim potential access to nuclear technology while Putin gets a second battle front if his threats against NATO countries are carried out. Recently, KIm's troops have been trespassing in the DMZ. It does give two scary leaders the ability to start WWIII.

This does put China in an awkward position. It has pulled back from its ties with North Korea while upping its beef against the US (Taiwan), Japan (island disputes) and South Korea (missile defense and competitive trade issues). Those issues continue to fester. This new pact will prolong the Ukraine conflict and perhaps spread aggression to other areas of the world.

K. Will really did make a sequel to Please Don't!
No Sad Song for My Broken Heart https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=JZ9ysYY-qqI&pp=ygUGayB3aWxs

And apparently, I need it explained to me cause I didn't know certain things such as the butterfly or the watch are symbolic of things.

Happy Friday, Beanies! Summer continues to be scorching hot, so my brain is a little fried lately... I mean, we're gonna make it short today. Well, relatively – you know I physically cannot be truly laconic^^

This week LYN had a live stage, despite still being sick (btw his cold has gotten to his ears – hopefully he's getting it treated properly aside of usual “I'm a tough guy, this is nothing” mantra *rolls eyes*), and you can certainly hear it in his vocals, ouch. Esp in “Offer” - yep, we were wrong thinking he's done performing it, there's still few TV channels left in China that need to experience this trauma firsthand. At this point he should just take NYZ's armor home as a souvenir and maybe display it among other “fun things” to impress his livestream viewers with instead of rummaging AJTL production storage again and again. Ah yes, I do like how he's dressed here, even though that jacket is LOUD. Let's sob once again:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xhsSQzOoWic

Hunan TV decided to add insult to an injury and not only cut the second track he sang, but also blocked all good versions of it on YT – this bitch! Not that it stopped people, me included, so here it is, if somewhat blurry – his same-titled OST of movie YOLO which was apparently a small hit earlier this year. You don't hear his sickness as much in this song because its concept was “sing it like a person with tone deafness zero vocal skills” - I'm still not sure how I feel about the idea, honestly. Like WHY?! If there's a brilliant irony somewhere there, it's lost on me. At least he didn't need to strain himself much...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qj_kxVCeH24

Full studio version subbed – the point was the lyrics, I guess:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XMWo8Qx8J2Y

Did this platform recently renewed their contract with him or what? I keep getting fresh reuploads of his old songs there in my recommendations lately, hah. No complaints ofc, but it's a bit funny. The newest one is “What if”, OST of VACATION OF LOVE (so much love in c-shows, literally! lol) drama. Not very memorable to me, but he sounds nice and that's all that matters. Weird thing is that video claims to have subs but I see none – do you, perhaps?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yx6uXaTyI1M

And a bit of covers since I'm not in the mood to search for more OSTs rn. Who was complaining about grandma glasses last time? He has lots of them to trigger you lmao))) Ngl, I personally like this look, especially hair – makes him appear extra soft and delicate, which we don't get much these days. Song has hella weird title “Matchstick heaven” - no, I dunno what this means either – jumpy rhythm and sounds like a tearjerker:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gozB7Zo9HhU

In case anyone was wondering where the Top 10 compilation update is: Sorry, but I’ll need to delay another week. I keep thinking i have it essentially done, and then another issue turns up. I am close, but I’m at a family reunion right now, and I just can’t prioritize it. I’ll definitely have the post up next week.

For anyone just wanting to see the Top 10s from this year, though, those are all complete and ready to be viewed on the Top 10 Spreadsheet. It’s just the “All Years” tab that isn’t updated yet. :)

Happy weekend beanies. There is something I got curious about so I am hoping to discuss it with you.
Moon Lovers is a drama that I enjoyed watching though I have to admit I had issues with the last 4 eps or so. But I learned many people got frustrated with it. If you did watch it, could you share your thoughts, please?

My nieces and nephew are coming to eat at my house tonight, I need transform the Mordor into Disneyworld 😰

I don't watch the Jewel Box show often but sometimes when I do, I gain such an appreciation for the guests. This time I watched episodes that featured Lee Seung Hyub, Song Seung Heon, and Yoo Teo and it's interesting seeing the different types of engagement at play.

For Seung Heon and Teo, they've known the host for years so there is a familiarity and comfort there. Teo seemed really sweet on that show and it made me think I should watch Past Lives (just to watch a project of his even though I'm not interested in it despite it supposedly being good) Then there's some of the younger guys who appear such as the guys from Hiearchy, Lee Chae Min & Kim Jae Won. The sole reason I tried that show was because of their appearance on Jewel Box.

Similarly, I once again felt like watching Lee Jun Young projects after seeing him on Jewel Box haha.

Because Mouse is now Amazon Prime, I'm reminded of the topic I mentioned a couple of weeks ago about bromances and just guy dynamics in general and how it translate onscreen. Mouse was a prime example, for me, where the guys had more chemistry vs with their female costars. That made the betrayal and reveals hit even harder (in my opinion).

Mouse is a good show and has good performances but man, knowing certain things makes watching so painful haha
Like "aww these poor characters. You don't even know"

Speaking of guys and their onscreen chemistry, I wonder if Chief Kim would be another example of that. I'm not as entralled with that show as others but there were definitely moments between the two guys that made me laugh, chuckle, or smile and think "can they just stay in each other's lives" haha
(Like when the rude boss was on the phone and chief kim started walking beside him & was saying something only for the rude boss to turn to yell in his face and then keep walking or something like that haha)

Happy weekend Beanies and keep Beaning On!

I celebrated my birthday last Wednesday with a double birthday party for me and my little niece. I prefer to keep to myself and enjoy the silence on my day, but to quote the other birthday lady and her little brother:

‘If there is a birthday, there must be cake!’🎂

How could I go against such wisdom?🥳

My niece celebrates her birthday this weekend, but combining the celebrations has its perks, like having to party only once instead of twice and now having the weekend mostly to myself to continue bingeing my shows!🎉

This was totally that feeling/moment when you invite your friend to do something only to find out they're an ace at it haha
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mEL0QnZPspg

Finding out they're friends actually kinda made me feel like watching All of Us are Dead but bleh, I didn't even like it like that haha
Especially their thing haha. All I kept thinking was how irritating In Soo's character's obsession/determination to get Chan Young's character was. Oh! How I hated that haha. It was also the beginning of me not liking damn near any of In Soo's characters haha (it was my first time even seeing him yet it was the beginning)

However after seeing In Soo in this video, I'm kinda liking him as a person, maybe also as an actor.

Seeing Yoon Chan Young here also makes me appreciate his fighting scenes in High School Return of a Gangster even more

An International view of Korean beauty standards: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-06-22/the-dark-side-of-korean-beauty-can-be-toxic-for-men-and-women/103917022

9TAILEDVIXEN'S MUSINGS ON THE 3RD WEEK OF JUNE:

1. Horror, Horror

I'm mulling over the differences between Asian Horror and Hollywood Horror and have decided that my current jam is Asian Horror because:

(a) I very much prefer supernatural tales and Asian Horror is choc-a-bloc with such stories.

(b) There is less usage of The Gross Out that much of Hollywood Horror seems to rely on.

(c) This might seem silly but in many Hollywood Horror movies, White People Characters (TM) simply don't have a sense of self-preservation at all. When you're told that a house or building has a history of supernatural violence, you don't go "explore"! If you hear a scary sound, you don't run towards it! If there's a monster coming at you, you don't try to be a hero - you RUN!

To be sure, when Hollywood does Horror right, they do it very well but it seems to be becoming rarer and rarer, just as the Rom-Com genre seems to have gone on indefinite hiatus with Nora Ephron's passing.

2. Aerial Yoga Update

I'm still going for Aerial Yoga and have been falling off the silks every other lesson as I practice trying to get to the next basic upright position. But eventually I know I will get there. I just need to keep working on my arm strength, core strength, and flexibility.

3. This Week in Korean Women's News

(a) S. Korea has far more unmarried men than women: study

As South Korea faces a falling marriage rate, a recent government study showed that the unmarried male population here outnumbers its female counterparts by nearly 20 percent.

Researchers noted that the gender disparity among singles can be attributed to gender attitudes that persisted from the early 1980s up to 2006. Factors that contributed to such phenomenon are the nationwide preference for sons, faltering fertility rate, and technological advances that allowed parents to know the sex of the fetus, they said.

https://www.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud=20240618050517

(b) South Korea is known as the surgical capital of the world. But is there a dark side to Korean beauty?

Los Angeles journalist and podcaster Elise Hu, who wrote a book about Korean beauty standards, says "What I found in Korea was a society that upholds beauty as a form of political, economic, and social capital."

But Hu says the social expectations can be toxic. From the hundreds of women she interviewed while researching her book, many "shared stories of burnout and exhaustion from the work required to fit the narrow standards required for social capital", she said.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-06-22/the-dark-side-of-korean-beauty-can-be-toxic-for-men-and-women/103917022

I'm just getting around to finally discovering Military Prosecutor Doberman
It's been on Netflix for a little while but they are absolutely hopeless at writing a decent synopsis or even picking a meaningful scene, so it's be intentionally off my radar for ages. It just looked so terrible because Netflix on platform promotion is devastatingly crap.

Anyway, back to the topic.
I am loving Major General Noh Hwa-young (Oh Yeon-soo). Such a brilliantly written villainess, and more importantly, so fantastically well played. There's a scene in which she cuts someone's leg off (one could argue that it is for plot purposes and political reasons, but let's be honest: she does it for fun) and the way that stern Major General announces, beaming with pride and joy with a little girly laugh "I cut his leg off"... Aaaah 😍 Be still my heart, we can't fall in love with a baddie. But, she's so good at being bad. She's exactly the female psychopath I've been after all this time!

She's also fighting the patriarchy with literal murder, which, frankly, can't be topped.