@ langdon 813

Ha Ga In was the one who set me off down the K-drama road in the first place. I had long resolutely set my face against Winter Sonata and the likes. One day about two years ago I was idly channel-surfing when Ha Ga In's face hit my tv screen, and I was so fascinated by her beauty (and her mole) I stopped pressing the "change channel" button. The show was dubbed so I kept watching to find from which country this beauty hailed, and by the time I realised it was Korean, I also realized that it the show was rather fun and that nobody was going to die horribly or get amnesia in Witch Amusement. So I kept watching. And thus, as they say, history was made...

I'll concur, HGI is out of this world beautiful with her features...and I did enjoy 1st 5 eps of WA. ;)

@twin,

o my gosh!!! those kid actors r soooooo awesome, seriously that WXB, can we wait till he's grown a bit and just let him act the rest of it?!?!! how can u bear it now that u r in HXM's territory?!?!

that clip is just all the amazings of LC's writing (ok ZJZ has some cred as well)... how can u get kids to do kick ass wuxia?!?! and their moves r soo intricate and COOL!! haha and it's combined with lowdown wrist fight/frolicking, then tickling and all the dirty tricks of fighting boys! LOLZ
I think my mom has this dvd lying somewhere...will definitely check out the kiddos when I have time

I just wanna tell u MM has a new TVB series.. nobody there is buggin me yet. it's romcom, MM is playing a wimpy married guy whose wife is always suspicious of him cheating. I missed a whole chunk of ep , but my mom said it's fun (but she's a TVB junkie, her taste was successfully brainwashed long long ago)

anyways that loverboy song he tweeted on Vday 虎年情人节纯情推荐：李健《在每个想你的夜里》... hahaha it's a simple chinese folksy song... nth special, BUT the words r as follows:

在每个想你的夜里
词、曲：李健 我曾度过寒冷的冬天 有过多少难熬的夜晚 我为自己坚强而骄傲 以为从此以后一往无前 然而自从我遇见了你 发觉自己开始变脆弱 不能忍受短暂的分别 无依无靠就像是一个孩子 我多想给你看 我炙热的心灵 在寂寞的胸膛里 燃烧 我真的说不出 那甜言蜜语 我只想为你歌唱 在每个想你的夜里

u can imagine all the OMGs ...lol esp he just parted with lss

and there's an interview posted @ his baidu bar. apparently they did a lot of ad lib @LoCH and the ending of YH was MUCH more intense and he said that was his best scene. it's sth like NC dashes out of the house and holds the dying YK in her lap, he said he's sorry for all his wrongs, please take good care of their son and don't let him follow his dad's footstep...and he slowly dies while NC sings him a lullaby. PD decided that's too angsty and emo and did not survive the chopping board according to loverboy. ( ME WANT!)

@Samsooki, @belleza, @momosan or really anyone who can answer,

If I may make a few last inquiries, what then defines a traditional sageuk? What are the characteristics that must be present/absent to consider a show as such?

Honestly I don't mind fast and loose as long as it's entertaining, which is really the point of television in general. Historical accuracy is so far down my list of priorities for sageuks it barely registers, as I can always research on it if I want to know what really happened.

Regarding the Filipino Stairway, yes there is a white piano, but honestly that's where the similarities end. I wouldn't even bother with that cheap knockoff.

@ unni

Hee, I love that we don't feel the same way about Robbers, it allows us to have a single dissenting discussion once in awhile. I'll just yell "Robbers" when we're getting too lovey dovey. :-P

As for Han Ga-in, she's just flat out sheer perfection of facial beauty. Her acting, on the other hand, yikes.

And I hate dirtbag version of OJH, where is my strong, handsome upstanding OJH from many many dramas. Only JH and Eric can do sleazy well and still make you love them.

@ serendipity

So far, I'm liking Tazza more than I liked Robbers up the same point (ep. 3). And I really like HYS so far in Tazza. Tazza is all around more fun and furious than Robbers, but in the end, plenty like or dislike either, so you should check out an ep or 2 to decide for yourself.

I love LDH but would have never watched Robbers but for langdon and hjkomo's recommendation, and I still didn't like it, and I really didn't like LDH's character in the drama, and her performance also felt flat to me.

@ twin

That was such a cute song, and you and I are totally wink wink making a mountain out of a molehill, but still, what a way to miss your dongsaeng, loverboy! I would have *killed* to see that final YK death scene the way those two ad-libbed, I think by then the LC purists had already vomited blood, died of heart failure or headdesked themselves into a coma by all the changes made to LoCH in that drama, more angsty death scene for us melo-fiends would have been so much the cherry on top of the cake.

"Too angsty and emo?" Haa, I live for angsty and emo! Though the death scene as is was very in the spirit of wuxia and LC, spare and peaceful. Can you tell, I love LoCH 2008, the more time passes, it even grows fonder in my heart!

As for Royal Tramp - that child WBX is seriously da bomb, hubby is starting to check out a bit now that HXM has taken over, he's still interested, but nowhere near the 5 hours of staring at the screen we did when the kids were on. That child WXB is probably the closest performance I have ever seen that mirrors Tony Leung's interpretation of WXB. And it was done by a kid! HXM, Dickie Cheung and Jordan Chang (and if you want to count, Stephen Chow's movie version) ought to all be ashamed of themselves. They were collectively PWNED acting-wise by a 10 yr old kid, who managed to be all sorts of cute and sleazy AT THE SAME TIME. Bravura performance!

I wish ZJZ found old HK vets to play Chen Jinnang and Wu Sangui, and re-cast adult Kang-xi. You are right, Wallace as ZERO chemistry with HXM, and I blame Wallace. His KX is impossible for the audience to read, I can't tell if he trusts WXB or not, and at this juncture, he's completely trusting WXB, but Wallace's facial expressions are all off. He says one thing but his face has random moments of blankness. I miss Andy's KX, he was perfect, just perfect. I am dreading this version's trip to Mount WuTai, and what Wallace will do in that scene which when Andy played it, made me bawl like a baby.

I actually really really like HXM's version of WXB, yup, it's nowhere as sophisticated or technically as layered as Tony's version (umm, pretty much very few guys can out-act Tony Leung, so it's not a diss), but he's really charming and engaging on screen. He pretty much is in every single scene, so that's a heavy load and he's doing very well. Esp, since the wind machine has been banished and he can act without gusts of mighty wind blowing at him!

And wife #1 and 2 are really pretty and did a great job at being sweet and innocent Mu Jian-ping and bitchy and proud Fang Yi. Yup, the ladies roles are one-note, but darn it if they aren't all sorts of pretty eye candy. I'm going to give this to my mom when I'm done, I know she'll love it. Duke is her fave TVB drama and LC story, hee hee, my mom! loves the raunchiest and most anti-hero of all LC's novels.

momosan, mookie (I think it was you two who also 'came out' as curling fans)-- watching the game today, I'm reminded of my favourite joke when I was a teenager... How do you stop bacon strips from curling in the pan?

(--- You take away their little brooms)

Oh, ad is over. Gotta go.

Can someone help me, saw another ep of Jejoonwon last night (ep 2), and man if that show is on I can't look away, its riveting. Who is the Good Guy and Who is the Bad Guy? I don't want to like the Bad Guy by accident, as saguek Big Bad Guys tend to be pretty bad until they get redeemed, not everyone is all shades of awesome like Bidam.

It can't be my "Dong-woooooook-A", is it? Ah geez, if its Dong-wook (sorry, no matter what role he takes, YJH will always be Dong-wook to me), then I need my SSH robot to arrive and slap some sense into his lil'bro.

The score of Jejoonwon is exquisite, utterly seamless with the scene and lyrical to the extreme. I like Chuno's score, but Jejoonwon eclipses it by miles. Just wow!

@ djes

Let me know if you are liking Born Rich. I feel a TVB drama need coming on. Wondering whether I should start this one or go old school and watch The Greed of Man, which I am ashamed to admit I have never seen (I know, the drama that apparently tanked the HK stock market it was so good). Never liked Sean Lau back then, but liked him much better now, esp. after he married my cutie Amy Kwok.

@ mookie-twin

I almost forgot to share this gem from my youth. Watching Duke was a seminal family experience for us, we all loved it to pieces in the late 80s. And you remember when WXB knocked up Princess Jianning, A-ke and Su-chuan, and he had to pick names for his kids and since he's illiterate and a total brat, he decided to name the sons Wei Fu-tou (Axe) and Wei Tong-chue (Hammer), and then the Princess starts crying because these are just god-awful names and she doesn't want her kid to have such a terrible name, and the entire sequence I was literally laughing so hard I busted a gut. (oh god, LC when he's firing on all cylinders is such an unbelievable gifted storyteller - Duke is filled with scene after scene after scene of tension, hilarity and pathos).

Well, I made a bet with my brother 20 years ago that I would name my sons Axe and Hammer, and he would pay be a million bucks if I did so. Clearly I forgot the bet, because my son is named neither, but I also lost out on a million bucks. Oh, and of course the Princess has the only daughter, who had the lovely name of Wei Shuan-shuan. If I were WXB, I would divorce 5 of the wives and just keep Shuan-er and Mu Jian-ping. I'm going to ask hubby which of the wives he thinks is the prettiest and which one he would personally pick. Men think so differently than us women.

@ curling

*sob* I woke up (it's 5sth am here) wanna watch curling...CANT FIND IT!!! arghh....
seriously as momosan our OT curling club leader said... so very very zen. It chess and physics and making ice melt, making stones move and brooms. I still rem that Canada Finland game fr Torino. the strategies really fascinate me, how do u have in your mind how and where to place a stone to let it be in play when there r literally 32 moves u have to mastermind?!

@reluctantbutaddicted:
How do you stop bacon strips from curling in the pan?

(— You take away their little brooms)

lolz, but I actually find some of the ladies very cute and motherly... maybe it's the brooms

@cingdoc,
I'm so lousy in sports but I'm a junkie esp in things I cant imagine myself doing and I cant take my eyes off anything I can't understand but am intrigued (curling) ... Winter Olympics, I'm a superfan!!!

@twin,

HAHA did your brother still rem the bet?! it's nice of him already not to ask u pay back a million IF u didnt name your babies those names. I think all the guys will go for Shuan-Er... if they go for Princess...I'll be very worried. ;) But then a WXB will never divorce any of them, he needs all their love, but he can always be sleaze and shrewd and play favorite, cards in his hand esp with the buns in the oven! my hubby actually said y he didnt grab that Russian lady as his 8th wife.. knowing a WXB, he cant resist.

I watched it live on TV and I'm too young to really rem much, exc it's lol funny and my mom was addicted to the show! It's when I caught it @college and seriously homesick that I really sit down and savor it. Yes, I saw the styrofoam in the set, the wives r .... + 80s makeup in full force but it's just with so much heart!

my prob with HXM is not that he's too beautiful for the role, but that layer of unsavoriness is crucial to a WXB...he played it too cutesy, tried too hard to flesh the childish playfulness, lacked a cutthroat streetsmart, cunning connive that made WXB's 'adventures' plausible. WXB was never a kid, he's a pervie cunning old man trapped in that boy's body, he has to be. and HXM tried to overcompensate he's a bit too mature for the role in appearance. There r actors that can regress and play roles WAY younger than their years convincingly, HXM (and KSW) is not one of them.

and the genius in LC is exactly made us falling for WXB when almost everything about him is revolting...but we cant resist. making him too likable, it's not as fun

I just want to say YES!!! My download of the Young Warriors of the Yang Clan finally finished! Only took 84 hours! :) I've seen it before but I wanted to be able to check out my cutie in the big furry hat any time I wanted! :) Sometimes torrents can be a real challenge. At least the kid will be happy, downloads can play havoc with our internet connection( my computer is a wireless connection off of his). He has been asking me for 3 days "isn't that thing done YET?"

@ trixicopper

Yay for you! If someone can just edit Yang's Clan into ONLY scenes of our cutie pie as Yelu Xie, then I would shell out money just to buy it. :-)

I'm dying for Clothing the World, esp. now that filming is done, when will it air?

@ twin

Yes, so far, HXM doesn't have the same level of sleazy that Tony portrayed, even the child WXB got that trait down pat. HXM is playing WXB as cute, playful, naughty, more like an errant child than a streetwise hooligan. However, I'm enjoying this adaptation so much (goodwill from the child actor episodes plus the pretty wives plus the kickass scenary plus the not-want-to-headdesk-myself musical score), I am even enjoying his WXB, but knowing that its nowhere near as magical as Tony's performance, which won me over so completely, I had a hard time watching Tony do dramatic moody performances for a long time afterwards.

What you said - "the genius in LC is exactly made us falling for WXB when almost everything about him is revolting" - is so so so true, no wonder writers devote entire novels analyzing the genius of Duke.

"There r actors that can regress and play roles WAY younger than their years convincingly, HXM (and KSW) is not one of them."

Agreed! I think Jang Hyuk does it very well.

@ ockoala

I'm with you on that one. That is why I spent the time to download, not buy! :)

@ samsooki

"I wonder if a team of Olympic sweepers could compete with an automatic floor buffing machine."

Very likely. It's all in the technique.

I caught the first part of the Cdn men's game this afternoon (yay! huge start, it was great, and the Norwegian men's pants were pretty entertaining, too), but I only have 1 channel and the women's isn't on it, sadly.

I knew you'd bring it here, samsooki.

I predict - final count will be 9-2. In favor of the beauty school dropout.

BigBang!!!!! Off I went!

@nycgrl

Awwww, It was fantabulous! even though the show itself was about 1 1/2 hrs., only one encore and Daesung didn't sing "Look at me Gwisoon", wait, on top of that the girl next to me was screaming her lungs out for the whole duration of the concert. On the other hand, my seat was directly connected to the stage and the passage they run around(I don't know the name for it. the passage for fan service, I guess, since they ended up selling additional seats to accommodate more fans, tickets were sold as potentially partial view seats). So, when they were on center stage, the stage lights were directly in my eyes(no big deal), meantime, there were many occasions, one of them were like 3 meters(10'?) away from me! Daesung, G-Dragon was right in front of me!!!! I'd better post my Daesung picture on my facebook! You know, iphone, you can do close ups... Too bad. All of them were so cute with, really skinny(looked so much thinner than on screen) young boys with full of energy. The whole place was rocking. Anyway, will I do this again? Yes, of course.

Meantime,today was supposed to be my 2nd day off, but it ended up with noon meeting, 4pm early dinner meeting and 6-9pm class. And I found out the Japanese textbookl is so totally incomplete that I ended up stay up late last night to just translate the missing sections for tomorrow's class. It looks like I have to do that every night, sigh... At least I'm out of panic mode and I know I can manage. Oh,and I have to move to another hotel. it's kind of stupid but since I'm coming back here for 2 1/2 weeks next month again, I wanted to see my options and check out several hotels.

I'm so bummed about WUAS. It's something I look forward to... Feeling so deprived. I'd love to start on Woman who still wants to marry when I get a bit more time. it sounds like a good comedy.

@ cingdoc

Your Valentine day sounds nice and mellow. I would have liked one as well.

@ momosan

You may need to vote here, but perhaps samsooki will honor the votes already cast.

My tally so far - 5-3

Stockard Channing, no question. I was delighted when Rizzo turned up as the First Lady a couple of decades later.

Rizzo all the WAY!! I'm a jealous beast, when ONJ looked soo good in sth as impossible as skintight spandex/pleather + that voice. I have no choice

@ momosan, ty for your tips...but I'm in China and I think nbc is firewalled to the max... only msnbc and cnn upped that

I think the better question is. who do you guys think samsooki would pick, Rizzo or Sandy? But by all means...please everyone, do answer him and cast your votes!

8)

P.S. I'm Team RIZZO, btw.

Hey cingdoc! My birthday was December 30! :-D

And don't worry, if I ever meet my I LUB YOU I will speak to him quite calmly, quite coolly, and then promptly burst into tears. I don't think I'll faint, but I'm not ruling out the possibility.

P.S.

Hello, Newman...samsooki....whichever. o_O

@ cingdoc

You're so sweet, thanks for the good wishes! You don't have to get me a thing, I'm just looking forward to us all getting together when I come to SoCal in September!!

@ nycgrl

Update: I can't stop thinking about "Thank You". I think this must mean that it's in my top five. If top five is about "how much I was taken with it". Wow. I feel so blind-sided. Blind-sided, but happy. There's so much to be said for watching something with rock-bottom expectations!

Remind me: besides Mawang, Resurrection, White Tower and Thank You, what's the last item in your top five?

@ djes

You'll have to wait for my mookie-twin to answer about all questions TVB. All I know is, the system has worked decades but appears to be on the wane due to the lack of fresh talent. The most talented pool were the late 70s and early 80s vets, including Chow Yun-fat, the Five Tigers, Leslie (or was he ATV?) and Ray Lui. (btw, Ray looks phenomenal, seriously, and not waxy or botoxed, just classy slightly older guy, whereas his co-star in The Bund, who eclipsed him in every way, CYF, just looks plain old these days - but that's neither here nor there, CYF is iconic and doesn't need his looks anymore, tho I wish he'd pick better projects).

The 90s crew is merely okay, I like Chilam, think Louis Koo is just OK, Ekin I like but don't know why since he's a terrible actor, Gallen I don't much like and don't know why since he's the *best* actor in his generation, Sunny Chan just is (some guys don't make much of an impact either way), and lastly, Derek Wan, who I adore because he is Felix Wong's successor in style and acting.

I love the TVB style mega dramas, so different than anything from Japan, TW, China and Korea - and sometimes I'm totally in the mood for those as well. I mean, usually three generations of angst and secrets are involved, right?

Thought you curling afficianados should know, Google's image today is two curling stones! Hee hee.

"I mean, usually three generations of angst and secrets "

Witness the amazing power of East of Eden!!!! ;) (very, very, very obviously an attempt to do a HK saga)

DONGA!! HYUN!! DONGA!! HYUN!!! DONGA!! HYUN!!!

GRACUH!! BEGGAR AJUSHHI!! MIKUHH!!

"Can someone help me, saw another ep of Jejoonwon last night (ep 2), and man if that show is on I can’t look away, its riveting."

Ahhh, glad that you're taking to Jejoongwon. :) I, again, love this show. Madly, deeply, truly.

The "bad guy" is the arrogant character (but not really . .. it's a matter of perspective.) The real villain of the show is the Japanese, which will start to reveal itself more and more as the show progresses.

ok, have not kept up with OT this week - been way busy at work and then when i get home i marathon IRIS.

@ kaedejun

i just started reading your recaps as I was trying to not totally spoil myself before watching each episode. Thanks so much for them!! I really appreciate the time and effort you've put into them as well as your comments. I'm only finishing up eppie 15, but I see that you're a fan of the terrorist hacker guy Hyun Seok as well... any idea what his name is?? from his first few scenes i was intrigued. he's such a cutie! :)

It was HK sagas which taught me that essential Chinese phrase, to be screeched at the top of one's lungs, preferably while running a sword through swathes of people, "Bao chou! Bao chou! Wo yao bao chou!" or "Revenge! Revenge! I want revenge!"

Also, "Bei bi! Bei bi!" (Despicable! Despicable!), to be spat out in fury while surveying the freshly-slaughtered bodies draped around your family home / monastery / clan headquarters.

"“Bao chou! Bao chou! Wo yao bao chou!” or “Revenge! Revenge! I want revenge!”"

You killed my brotha. You killed my master. You killed everyone in my village. You must die!!! *fast close up shot*

He he, @ serendipity, your observation is quite true. Which is why LC's Duke of Mount Deer is truly revolutionary, as no one other than total douchenozzles in that novel ever utter the word Bao Chou! The douchenozzles are trying to Fan Qing Fu Ming (Topple the Qing, Revive the Ming), which makes them about as delusional as they are douchey. But the lead understands the revenge is neither food you can eat, wine you can drink, or gold you can spend - ergo, it has no value and is therefore worthless a pursuit. Of course, he's deemed to be a total miscreant and lacking in "honor", but you and I know better, right? ;-) He's probably the only sane person to see through useless pursuits of vengeance.

As for other classic wuxia stories, lemme see:

Wanderer: only one screaming Bao Chou was also a total douche, and willing to, ahem, castrate himself so that he can learn mighty kungfu to Bao Chou. Moronic douche.

LoCH: Hhmm, neither boys want to Bao Chou, but everyone else related to them keep screaming for them to Bao Chou, so they do, but everyone suffers. Forced douchery.

RoCH: Yup, here the lead, as smart as he is, spends half the novel screaming Bao Chou, but this is during the middle portion when he in fact turned into a lovesick douche, but is redeemed from a lifetime of douchebaggery when we sees the light of day right before offing his target. Redeemed Douche.

Fox Volant - 4 generations of Bao Chou, no shit! Uber-douchebaggery, except all the dueling was pretty awesome, heh.

Dragon Sabre - ah shit, so much Bao Chou here, I goes crazy from the he killed her mom, so she kills his aunt, and then he kills her uncle, and geez, a entire novel full of douches. Cases closed.

Anyways, much as I mock, the honorable revenge motif is quite important to anything set in period times, because it gives purpose and motivation to otherwise rather ordinary folks, and create the impetus to allow them to journey and create the story. So much as Bao Chou is usually pretty lame, when done right, creates the pathos we need to turn boys into men!

Witness Chuno - both DG and TH's motivations are rooted in deep emotional traumas and/or a pursuit of one's honorable goals. All variants of Bao Chou as a plot driver.

@ belleza

If EoE intended to style itself after epic HK dramas, why oh why did it not hew the age-old tradition of switching the OTP! See, all epic TVB dramas always always always, without fail, have the OTP switch partners mid-way through the drama, only to finally get back together at the end. It's done without fail, though the reasoning changes from drama to drama.

So silly Dong-chul should have not gotten together with Grace, she marries that walking male mannequin, he dates LDH, then LDH gets a ear tumor and dies, and that mannequin gets assasinated, and finally DC and Gracuh get back together.

But it didn't happen? So lame, no angst at all! I feel even more cheated by EoE, see, its the drama that years after airing, still manages to give me an afterthought sucker punch.

"So silly Dong-chul should have not gotten together with Grace, she marries that walking male mannequin, he dates LDH, then LDH gets a ear tumor and dies, and that mannequin gets assasinated, and finally DC and Gracuh get back together."

Well, see, if Lee Dae Hae had actually stayed on, DON-GA and Gracuh would not have gotten together. Gracuh would have stayed with Mikuh and probably would have stayed in the periphery while watching Beggar Ajusshi and Lee Dae Hae walk the dog together. Yay!!

Sigh. Mikuh was awesome. Not since Ivan Drago have I been so moved by the words of devotion "she is my queen!! I will break you!!"

@ ockoala

Oh, have mercy! I'm at work! Your Bao Chou Meter is so funny, I'm having silent stitches...

I guess there's something to be said for people going crazy, for vengeance or whatever. I mean, if everyone just calmed down and had a nice cup of tea, we would never have gotten Romeo & Juliet. Or Hamlet. Or Wuthering Heights. Or Wagner.

@ belleza

Drats! Now I have a horrible, morbid urge to watch East of Eden. Could you kindly administer another 3min inoculation? The last one was so good - I'm totally done with Stairway to Heaven now. ;-)

"Now I have a horrible, morbid urge to watch East of Eden."

East of Eden was basically designed as a HK uber-saga. It kinda flirted with being a Sandglass clone, such as Lee Dae Hae's character being named Hye Rin, a brief sequence of the student crackdown, and the frequent struggle between the newspaper press and dictatorship (again, expressed by Hye Rin.) But, at heart, the show kinda fit the HK Event Drama template. You had

1) Gangsters? Check.
2) Casino trips in Macao? Check.
3) Big-time revenge plot against essentially the JR of K-drama -- Shin Tae Hwan, whose cute smiling dimples pinched lovingly at the sheer evil he was making (aka "Evil is my business, and business is good!!") Double check.
4) Crazy women? Spoiled women? Check.
5) Secret birth switcheroo? CHECK!!
6) Song Seung Heon, aka Korean's answer to Taiwanese Idol Actor? Check.

But the best story of all was Lee Dae Hae's falling out with the show . . and you can actually see it happen in front of you, including LDH kinda winking at the camera that she wanted out of the show. :D

Or put it another way, her character was introduced during the student crackdown and was seen protesting against the government in student demonstration. Sound good, eh? By halfway into the show, she was only showing up for 5 minutes per episode, and pretty much doing things like walking the dog or helping out prune some plants or sharing a drink at a bar. THAT WAS IT. At one point, while walking the dog, she kinda look at the camera with her eyes saying "I'm walking a dog. I'm frigging walkin a dog."

This led to a conspiracy theory that Song Seung Heon was pulling favors for Lee Yeon Hee (who by the age of 20, has acted opposite Jung Il Woo, Yoo Ji Tae, Kang Dong Won, So Ji Sup, Song Seung Heon, Park Yong Ha, Hyun Bin, and Gong Yoo.) I feel bad for Lee Yeon Hee; she didn't sign up to be the lead female, but essentially she became one.

But the best part were the rumors around the writers. About halfway into the show, the writer bailed on the show due to exhaustion, forcing them to switch writers and director. However, during line readings, original writer stormed in and pretended that she hadn't lost her job. Everything was royally confused . . .

(The irony is that the 2nd writer vastly improved the quality of the show. Heh heh.)

Moreover, after LDH spoke out against the show, various actors started talking. Han Ji Hye (who IMO gave the best, most complex performance of the young leads) even wrote in her blog that she didn't understand her character at all, that it made no sense.

Anyway, the ending to East of Eden is maybe the single most disappointing ending I've ever seen in K-drama. When your lead male character is surrounded by a halo, you know who was calling all the shots. ;)

@ belleza

Nice! I now know all I need to know about East of Eden, I reckon, and I'm pretty much done *shoves away with ten-foot barge pole*. Thank you very much, Dr Belleza.