#sh**ting stars

[fake-married-my-dead-fiance]

Moon in the Day has super angst, murdery, tragic enemies to lovers.

Sh**ting Stars has has bickering, spiteful, ridiculous enemies to lovers.

Alchemy of Souls has bickering, murdery, asshole enemies to lovers.

Doom at Your Service has supernatural, competitive, sacrificial enemies to lovers...

They are like vintages of fine wine, all delicious, but different notes of flavour.

[sombredancer]

Asian dramas and my favorite types of characters

There are my favorite types of characters as a list. A villain with a fatal weakness

Drama: The Scholar Who Walks the Night /밤을 걷는 선비 Character: Gwi Screentime: Secondary Gwi is an ancient vampire and a master of puppets (and Joseon's king is the main of them). He is merciless, invincible and scheming all the drama long, until he accidentally kills a girl, who was his hostage and recalcitrant puppet from her childhood on and was the only one who could scold him and deny him. Nothing about it is said directly in the drama, but after her death he goes insane, kills all of his puppets and this way causes his own death. So, I suppose, she was his only weakness, and I like this type of a personal drama for a villain. Punch-Clock Villain / the Dragon

Drama: 100 Days My Prince /백일의 낭군님 Character: Moo-yeon Screentime: Secondary Moo-yeon works as an assassin for the killer of his father, who is constantly threatening him with the life of his sister. Moo-yeon is a man of a very ill fate: his family was accused of a treason and executed, his sister became a fugitive, he was forced to sell his conscience for his and sister's lives and, as a cherry on the top of this cake, fell in love with the daughter of his captor. And died trying to save her... His story is sooooo sad, but it makes me feel for this character fully. Also, he is the king of whump because the half of the drama he is injured and suffers from his wounds. The whole sad story of this guy is analyzed by me here, here and here.

Drama: The King Loves /왕은 사랑한다 Character: Moo-suk Screentime: Minor Koreans, obviously, like this type of characters, too, so there is another Dragon of the main villain, Moo-suk. In his free from dirty deeds time he h̶e̶l̶p̶s̶ ̶o̶l̶d̶ ̶l̶a̶d̶i̶e̶s̶ ̶c̶r̶o̶s̶s̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶r̶o̶a̶d̶ literally saves cute children and restores self-confidence of young ladies. And then he falls in love, rethinks his life and dies from the hand of his master. Predictable and sad. Still a memorable guy, though. 50 shades of a Byronic Hero

Drama: The Wolf / 狼殿下 Character: Chu Youwen Screentime: Main A Mowgli boy was adopted by a wicked emperor, brought up like a cruel beast and was forced to do some dirty stuff for the emperor. He is mysterious, severe and you never know what's on his mind. As a true Byronic hero. He is some kind of Dragon, too, but it's a Chinese drama and he is a main hero in it, that's why he doesn't really do anything bad during the series. His soul is kind and his heart is pure, but he hides it from his love and deals with all of his problems on his own. It's the reason why all of this drama is a masochistic tango between him and his love. Whump lovers will be happy, too, because he is constantly in chains, pierced by arrows like a hedgehog or works as a slave in mines. As any other Dragon, he has a BE.

Drama: Lost You Forever /长相思 第一季 Character: Xiang Liu Screentime: Secondary A mysterious demon general, whose name makes everyone shake in fear. A former demon slave, who is true to his word enough to fight for his benefactor even if he knows crystal clearly that it's hopeless and he and his army will die in the end. A man who has huge problems with expression of his emotions in a socially approved way. Edward Cullen of Chinese dramaland. He is enigmatic, with thick vibes of a bad guy, yet very loyal to his benefactor as well as his love and very selfless. SPOILER TO SEASON 2: because of this loyalty he will die and the love of his life will never-ever find out about anything he has done for her during the story.

Drama: My Journey to You /云之羽 Character: Gong Shangjue Screentime: Secondary A guy was through trauma in his childhood and it made him look intimidating and unfeeling. A tsundere is born! He coped with his trauma by taking extra responsibilities for everything and everyone and turned to be a walking killing machine instead of a man. But an enemy assassin comes to his life and teaches him how to be a human once more. It's a painful experience, but it`s necessary in order to grow up as a character and is beautifully fulfilled. It was a great joy to know that he survives at the end of the story, it's a rare thing for this type of characters, so even if there is season 2 someday, I will not watch it in order not to spoil my impression of the first one. I wrote about him detailed here, here, here and here.

Drama: Princess Agents / 特工皇妃楚乔传 Character: Yan Xun Screentime: Secondary It's the transformation story, too, like a previous one, but this time it's transformation from an ordinary man to a villain. Prince Yan Xun is a hostage colony prince in a metropolis empire, but he enjoys a noble life along with other nobility youth. The society around him is awful, each of these noble youths is a psycho who appreciate human hunt and so on, but cheerful and easy-going Yan Xun doesn't think their bloodthirstiness could turn against him. When relationship between the metropolis and the colony become tense, though, Yan Xun's friends of yesterday are happy to drink his blood. He loses his whole family and, insanely longing for revenge, slowly turns to one of those monsters himself.

Drama: A Journey to Love / 一念关山 Character: Li Tongguang Screentime: Minor This guy has got a very realistic personality and background: he is a bastard who was deprived of mother's love since he was a child. The first circumstance made him power-hungry, scheming and outwardly emotionless, the second one made him longing for mother's love on insanely level. So he is invincible outwardly, but turns into a teary mess when it's about his female tutor, who is a mother figure for him. The contrast between these two personalities is enormous and makes this character very alive and interesting. During the drama he will not cope with his Oedipus complex but circumstances will solve this problem for him.

A pure-hearted hero

Drama: Creation of the Gods Ⅰ / 封神三部曲 Character: Ji Fa Screentime: Main It's maybe strange to find this type of characters in the list of my favorite types, but morality and selflessness of a character is very important for me, too. This story is some kind of King Arthur's legend, but in a Chinese way. The emperor is bewitched by a demon and is bringing the kingdom to it's downfall, the Gods are here to find the savior with the help of a magic scroll that can be opened only by a true king. Ji Fa, a hero of this story, doesn't care about scrolls, but his heart is loyal to his kingdom and to his family (in this very order). He genuinely wants to help his friend-prince to be a king his kingdom deserves and, despite awful things that were done to him and his family, doesn`t harden his soul and betray his ideals. And, I suppose, although he isn't aware of this, he IS the future King Arthur of China. Interesting character decisions

Drama: The Legends/招摇 Characters: Jiang Wu Screentime: Minor This character is something like a rival of the male lead. He is a xinmo - an inner demon of some other character and represents the darkest features of a human's soul. He is a ruthless killer, a dark sorcerer without conscience, but what was very unique, being literary the worst part of a human personality, he values his assistants a lot and genuinely cares for them. A villain is usually a lone wolf. He doesn't trust anyone and doesn't value anyone, his loneliness is usually his weakness and a key to his downfall. So I was pleasantly surprised that sometimes a villain is capable of building healthy relationships with his subordinates.

Drama: Sh**ting Stars / 별똥별 Characters: Do Soo-hyuk Screentime: Minor

This guy truly surprised me. Firstly, he is supposed to be something like a third wheel in relationships of the main couple, but he just calmly got a refusal from the female lead, said "OK" and, absolutely relaxed, proceeded to live his life further. It's something unbelievable for me, because I used to see the insanity caused by an unrequited love to be the plot engine of a lot of dramas. Secondly, he is well-written as a character, straightforward, principled and has tsundere-ish or Byronic vibes - all the character features that I like =) Part 3 will be about other interesting types of relationship, mostly between men.

[kdramasforever97]

Everyone my age: *Getting married*, *Having children*

Me: “I love Kdramas"🙆‍♀️

[ignitification]

this year’s trend is ‘male lead is an absolute dumbass with tsundere tendencies who is also 100% whipped and even admits so on occasion, to himself only and under heavy denial about it being anyhow related to his feelings while the female lead is badass and simply there to make the male lead’s life easier but she clearly refuses to do so because of the previous statement that she is heavily in denial about even caring about the male lead in the first place, and she is an idiot’

[teashh]

So I binged Castaway Diva yesterday and I had a few thoughts. Honestly, the first time I started Castaway Diva, I almost stopped when they introduced a love triangle. Because let's be honest; love triangles suck. But I thought of giving it a shot after seeing the trajectory the love triangle trope was taking in Korean movies and series, as seen in hometown cha cha cha, 20th century girl, Daily dose of sunshine, crash course in romance and etc. And needless to say, I wasn't disappointed. The drama is beautiful and heartwarming and heart touching and I especially loved the way they resolved the love triangle. Clear and open communication. And the realisation of the importance and worth of platonic relationships.

For too long, we have seen platonic relationships relegated to the place of a consolation prize. Something you get when you don't get the girl. But platonic relationships are beautiful and worthy of the same amount of love and commitment that romantic relationships have and it's about time that series and movies realise that and follow that instead of just throwing the second lead in the shadows. I hope the next trajectory will let us see some polyamory.

[wickedwitchofwisterialane]

Sh**ting Stars

I liked this drama it was funny and filled with scenes that left wanting more from the next episode. I give it an 9.5/10 just because of its depiction of Africa and I also wanted Tae-Sung to struggle more for Han-Byul's love. To sum up my review I liked who all the love interest ended up with and how they dealt with the conflicts in the story.

[kdramacrybaby]

My favorite drama couples

In no particular order and some minor SPOILER warning!) → Feel free to add your own favorite couples to the post, so we can share the love.

Sh**ting Stars (Oh Han-byul / Gong Tae-sung):

They are one of my absolute favorite couples in any drama I’ve watched so far. I don’t know what it is about them, but they are just so good together! (And it doesn’t hurt that the actors have an amazing chemistry). Enemies to lovers is a guilty pleasure trope for me, and this does it perfectly – they bicker so much in the beginning, but slowly realize that they actually make a great team, and they come to rely on each other a lot. They actually communicate properly, sharing their worries without being judged, and the drama never relies on something as silly as miscommunication as a point of drama for them. It’s not often a drama makes me actually smile like a complete lovesick idiot when watching, but this just goes straight to my heart. The drama might not be my fave overall, as it has its own issues, but I’ll watch it 100 times over for them.

Hidden Love (Sang Zhi / Duan Jiaxu):

At first, I didn’t think I was going to like this drama too much as I was unsure about the whole age gap thing, but oh my word. This drama had me giggling like a teenager with a crush, and I was unable to stop smiling for most of it. They are so stinking cute together, and the fact that they actually communicate their thoughts and feelings with each other throughout it all is so important – especially with how their relationship started. I feel like I’m just repeating myself from what I said about Sh**ting Stars, but both of these couples just make me happy to watch. This relationship in particular has raised my standards so high, I’m probably going to end up single for the rest of my life. This drama really is all it’s hyped up to be and more.  

Happiness (Yoon Sae-bom / Jung Yi-hyun):

A fake marriage of convenience between two best friends, who both secretly have feelings for each other ?- sign me the fuck up. Two strong people who support each other through everything (in this case, an outbreak of zombies in their complex) – what more could you ask for? They just get each other, and both are willing to walk through hell and back for the other. We sadly don’t actually get to see them together all that much after they’ve finally confessed, but they acted like a couple anyway, so I’m not too sad about it. 

Fight For My Way (Ko Dong-man / Choi Ae-ra):

They have known each other for so long and, though they bicker, they are always the first to defend the other no matter what. They support each other’s dreams the best they can (though Ae-ra does have a problem with the fighting, and she tries to make him quit by making him choose between her and fighting, which I am not about, but I do get she’s just scared he’ll get hurt again). Either way, there is just something so pure about their love and the way they both slowly realize just what their feelings have evolved into as they grew up together.   

Doom at your service (Doom / Tak Dong-kyung):

These two had a rocky start, but I also feel like it only made them work better as a couple. The iconic lines: “So my plan is to love you, then I'll be able to live without losing anything.” / “Then let's do it right, love me to the point that you want to destroy the world for me.” are forever ingrained in my mind. It’s about both of them learning what life could actually be if you let yourself feel and live for yourself instead of living for everyone else. They help each other through it all until they both realize they deserve love, and I find that really beautiful.

[wolha]

GONG TAE-SUNG & OH HAN-BYEOL in SHOOTING STARS 별똥별 (2022) dir. Lee Soo-Hyun

[tosailuponthesea]

if I had a nickel for every 2022 drama where Kim Young Dae found out that the female lead had spread rumors of his impotence and he got so indignant he threatened to show her proof otherwise, I’d have two nickels, which isn’t a lot but it is weird that it happened twice

[koreandragon]

“This time, don’t run away.”

SH**TING STARS (2022) dir. Lee Soo Hyun

[namchyoon]

When was your most dramatic moment in life? Do I have to pick one? Luckily, there were a lot of dramatic moments in my life. When I graduated from college. When my movie sold ten million tickets. When I won the first Best Actor Award. When I went to Africa. Gosh. What is this? She was in all of those moments.

SH**TING STARS (2022) dir. Lee Soo-hyun

[fake-married-my-dead-fiance]

After Tortured and Covered in Blood, my favourite type of Kdrama male lead is Extremely Silly but also a Capable Adult.

[kdramadaily]

SH**TING STARS (2022)

[deokmis]

when the love of your life doesn't give a crap about your celebrity status

[k-nonsense]

You know when you’ve got a good k-drama on your hands? When nearly all the side characters are lovable. What k-drama has the most lovable side characters?

[yesdramas]

SH**TING STARS 2022, dir. Lee Soo Hyun