Yay! My favorite catnip! ?

Oooh this one finally came....why are all these popular catnip so late :-P

"Age? It’s just a number. Sometimes an unhelpful number, but when everything else works… age doesn’t matter at all."

<33333

I love noona romances. Maybe as a noona to many of the hot young actors it somehow makes it seem like "hey, if Uhm Jung-hwa can get Park Seo-joon, well, heck so can I!" (That was one sexy romance. ?)

Becomes more relevant as I get older. ? ?

No What's Up Fox here? Love that noona romance.

For me it's 'I Do, I Do' (Kim Sun-ah, Lee Jang-woo)... Cold Noona, lively-warmth Dongsaeng.

Definitely one of the most favorites

How could you leave out Secret Love Affair starring Kim Hee Ae and Yoo Ah In? The chemistry between the two was really hot and you could see the emotional and mental meeting of mind and soul over piano playing. The age gap was very significant - 20 years and there were other hurdles such as marriage, jail time, career and countries.

Hmm, this is not really my catnip, but I do love the noona romance in Witch’s Romance! That's got to be my ultimate favorite noona romance. I love it when the younger guy is mature/thoughtful and not too puppy-like. Or maybe I just loved Park Seo Joon in it. xD

THIS IS IT! I THINK IVE FOUND MY CATNIP. As someone who actively avoids romance based dramas, just saying that there is a noona romance is enough to get me to watch a show. Which is why I've been dying to watch Secret Love Affair

I love it! ❤️

My all time favorite catnip.

Because of the reasons cited by Saya herself, I think Sam Soon is lastly a noona romance. That she's older does play into the story a bit but there's none of the thrill that you get with a younger man sweeping an older woman off her feet in real noona romances. It's way more P&P/Enemies to Lovers for me. At least, that's how it came across in translation.

Noona romance is not in my list of favorite tropes. However, when it's nicely dealt with and delivered with charm, I'm in. I enjoyed I Hear Your Voice, Biscuit Teacher Star Candy, and High School King of Savvy (except for that ending!!).

Not my catnip, but man did I love I hear Your Voice and High School King of Savvy! But I guess I loved them not for the romance but other factors? Kickass heroine in one and adorable happy-pill in the other?

Maybe I will start loving this trope in around 5 years from now though when most of the actors would be younger than me... but I guess even then I would still have Seo In Guk and other older actors to drool over ?

Finally! my catnip
aww Park Soo ha , I wonder how he is these days? I hope he is working hard in the police lol miss him so much!!!

I love this catnip! One of my favorite scenes in any Noon Romance is from Dalja's Spring and she's sitting on the couch with her fellow and they are trying to decide how to pass the time and she's *obviously* thinking sexy thoughts and he's all, "Are you thinking sexy thoughts with me RIGHT NEXT TO YOU?" and then there's a pause and "are you THINKING sexy thoughts when I'm right NEXT to you?!" And then they sweep away to make sexy thoughts sexy actions. And I swooned and laughed out loud.

I love noona romances. Definitely one of my favorite tropes. Witch's Romance, I Hear Your Voice, High School King of Savvy, and especially Secret Love Affair are some of the one's I've really enjoyed. It's a shame there haven't really been any noona romances lately. Here's hoping the one with Yeo Jin Goo is good.

Yasssss!!!!! I absolutely LOVED Biscuit Teacher and Witches Romance <3

the only noona romance I liked FOR being a noona romance was Flower Boy Ramyun Shop. But everywhere else I have just been in for the characters and their lives.

The Woman Who Still Wants to Marry - two noona romances for the price of one! Exes dating a mother-son duo - only in dramas (or so one hopes).

Among those, "I Hear Your Voice" is my favourite, not to forget "The Woman Who Still Want To Marry".

Is Hospital Ship gonna have a noona romance? No?

Yass finally!!! It's my ultimate catnip! ❤️

I love noona romances !! My fave is My Name is Kim Samsoon. It's just so epic in every way. Oohhh. What's up Fox is another great noona romance. It was hysterical.

This is totally 1 of my catnips, and quite possibly the most relatable. There's something really satisfying about seeing the hero work harder to get the girl(woman) of his dreams than in most romance dramas.

Witch's romance is 1 of my faves in this genre but hands down You Ah In and Kim Hee Ae in Secret Love Affair...whew those 2 had some hot steamy stuff happening. Even if the premise was in a morally grey area they still steamed up my screen all those late nights I stayed up to watch.

"they invariably come with buckets of self-awareness, which makes them burst off the screen and climb into your heart, though they can be jaded and unhappy when we first meet them. These women don’t necessarily want to be swept off their feet (who’s got the time for that?)—what they want is someone who’ll unfailingly be on their side, at their side."

i really think you nailed this one! my catnip of all catnips is a strong female lead--can that be a catnip? i hope it can--and many noona romances hit this on the ball, which is why i often tune into noona romances. witch's romance is one of my favorites!

I never realized what I was missing until I fell down the kdrama hole and discovered noona romances! I find them irresistible!! What's up, Fox, Daljas Spring, MNIKSS.....squuuueeeeee!!!!!

Totally my catnip. As a woman of a certain age, I love the idea of a puppy wooing me. Too bad I haven't found that perfect puppy for me. I did date a guy a few years ago with a Witch's Romance age gap (I was 35, he was 21). He was very sweet but it was never going to work. Oh well, I guess I have to wait for Lee Jong Suk or Park Seo Joon.

Baby Faced Beauty!!! Oldie but Goldie! It might be slightly different because he didn't know she was a Noona until later, but I think it fits. Also, Jang Nara is ageless.

My life is a noona romance. When I was a junior in college I escaped a stalker by moving back home and getting a job. I met a cute guy at work and since we both worked mornings, I assumed he was a college student too. He wasn't. He was 17 and still in high school. We became friends, then something more. I tell you, it was kind of embarrassing when I was 22 and he was 18.
Just like a K-Drama, there was "trouble." Besides being different ages, we were different religions, and from different economic backgrounds. We broke up, I went back to college (in another State.) I thought it was over. He came up to visit me and convinced me to quit school (again.) We married. Everyone said it would never last. Last week we celebrated our 44th wedding anniversary.

I love K-Drama Noona romances.

With the all-around famous theory that men mature at a later age than women, it's no surprise that this catnip is still an anomaly IRL. Personally, I'd even prefer a guy older than me so I could be the baby in a relationship for once. (Though with the rate my personal love life is going, I might be getting a Noona Romance coming - if none at all. ? As much as I love k-dramas, I'll gladly pass on any drama on my personal life, thank you very much.)
But still, I do love this catnip, I guess. Especially liked Witch's Romance. Will have to watch I Hear Your Voice soon. ^_^

As I always say ... They being over 18, for me that's not a problem.
All the dramas of Noona I watched, he were over 18 years old, despite being in high school, so i'm okay with age being just a number.

Noona romance is always good : )

Ah this is one of my catnip with the hero falling first as well. So some of my favourites are here and I need to watch I need romance 3, A witch's romance, biscuit teacher star candy, high school king of savvy, dal ja's spring then...

Aha! So you're the one that stole my first catnip pick! I guess I can forgive you, but only because it's you.

I'd add What's Up Fox (the epitome of noona romances in my estimation, although Dalja's Spring is a close runner-up) and some of the more low-key noona romances like in Let's Eat and Baby-faced Beauty or that are secondary romances that made me love them more than the central characters, such as Bo-ra and Eun-taek in Cheese in the Trap or Hye-young and Big in Surplus Princess (does that make Nam Joo-hyuk an official noona killer?).

I was pretty obsessed with the super-duper low-key potential romance with Hoya and Manager Jo from Radiant Office and am currently obsessed with his noona romance with Ms. Ahn in Super Family 2017 (along with Mom and her two-years-younger "boy toy"). Or maybe I just want Hoya to be in noona romances forever-n-ever (and not just because I like to pretend he's my own noona pet, nope, not at all).

Honestly, the fastest way for a show to get my attention is to have a side-story noona romance, even when they don't work out, like in Bottom of the 9th, 2 Outs (after all, friends-to-lovers kinda trumps the noona romance, except when it's a friends-to-lovers noona romance, which trumps ALL).

Other fave noona romances include the aforementioned I Do, I Do, The Woman Who Still Wants to Marry, and Secret Love Affair. Not a fan of the high school noona romances, though -- they squick me out the same way the reversed genders would. Although the only reason I made it through the entire season of Unstoppable High Kick was to see what happened with Jung Il-woo's student character and his crush on his teacher, so I guess there are exceptions. (Hmm, does that make Jung Il-woo the king of high school noona romances?)

Noona romances aren't too much of my thing (personally, I prefer either someone the same age or a little older), but I ADORED Lee Jong-suk in I hear your voice. (But I also adore him in general, so...)

Jisoo is the ultimate puppy. I also low-key shipped him with the mom in Angry Mom. But, then again, I ship Jisoo with anyone he sets his adorable, puppy eyes on. Drama Lords, please give me the ultimate Noona romance drama with Jisoo as the lead. PLEASE!!!!!!!

Somehow this is my favorite catnip even though I'm only 21 myself lol. I feel like I'm destined to marry someone younger. My first serious relationship was when I was 16 with a guy who was 14. For me the attraction to noona romances is the potential for a reversal or at least a balance in the power dynamics in the relationship. My favorite noona dramas are the ones with "beta" males. "I do, I do" had many problems with its writing, but it remains a personal favorite because it never tried to counter the reversed power dynamics. She was his boss, she was more mature and more experienced in relationships and life, and she made the decisions in the relationship initially without his input. I always get annoyed when most noona dramas try to "compensate" (and usually overcompensate) for the age difference by making the heroine a virgin, making the hero more experienced romantically, making him her boss, making him more successful, making him secretly wealthy, making him somehow way more mature than her, ect, ect. I have to say I don't usually care for teacher-student romances, at least when they are mutual and ultimately successful. I just cannot suspend my disbelief that much. However the jdrama Majo no Jouken is one of my favorite dramas ever for the unabashedly realistic way it treated the teacher-student relationship. It never tried to force the viewer to be comfortable with the relationship, it was always uncomfortable yet somehow you just couldn't help but root for them.

My favorite catnip in the whole world! I could probably write a thesis about how much I love this genre lol.

i like this trope so much even when the noona romance was not the highlight of the drama, just a slight clue that the lady is older can make me watch a drama. for example becoming a billionaire (lee bo young and ji hyun woo's character were almost siblings where lee bo young's character was the noona)

This is one of my favorite catnips. If I hear a drama is a noona romance I am almost guaranteed to watch it. I Can Hear Your Voice, Witch's Romance, I Need Romance 3, Flower Boy Ramen Shop are all favorite dramas of mine. The funny thing is I actually don't like dating guys younger then me, but absolutely love this drama trope.

I didn't think I had a catnip, but it turns out, noona romances are my catnip. Witch's Romance is hands-down one of my favourite k-dramas.

One reason why I love noona romances is that it's nice to see a leading lady with a wealth of wordly experience, one whose got most of her life locked down. I love all of our younger heroines as well but its get tiresome to see ingenue stories after a while.

Also older heroines tend to get the short-shaft, as if they stop living and feeling once they hit 30. It's always interesting to see someone in their 30's, 40's, 50's, 60's and more grapple with love and all it's added factors. If you've lived alone for a long time, how do you make space for someone. How do you come to count on someone? It's interesting to see how dramas with older leads answer those questions.

Plus, puppy-dog leads are always a plus-point. (I think I might be spoilt by Park Seo Joon, who is handsdown one of the cutest and kindest k-drama leads. His amazing chemistry with Uhm Jung-Hwa didn't hurt either)

Thanks for writing about this catnip Saya! I'll be watching the comments section for drama recs, WOOT! :D

Aw, I love this one, though it's interesting to note that only Dal Ja's Spring became an all-time favorite. I think I must really like that specific age difference (33 to 27). Just five years apart and both past their early twenties. Haha, and I guess I surprisingly prefer the savvy younger man to the puppy-type, though I loved Chun Jung-myung in What's Up Fox because he felt like the best of both worlds.

I also adore HSKOS, BTSC and thoroughly enjoyed IHYV!

my faaaaaavorite catnip !

This is my ultimate catnip too. I think I could watch anything just for the noona romance.

By the way, about this genre I recommend the following web dramas, since we don't talk much about them in Dramabeans but they are really well done and they feature noona romances too :

- Thumping Spike (the volleyball web drama with Song Jaerim as a high schooler)
- Love for a Thousand More (fantasy web drama about an immortal woman who meets a young musician)

The plot of INR 3 seems interesting, maybe I will go take a look now lol. A drama where sung joon is nicknamed sweet potato? Sounds hilarious to me already!

I often feel like a cougar for fangirling over some of the young hotties in kdramas since I'm old enough to be some of their mothers... sigh.

I'm grateful for this particular catnip. It makes me feel better about my guilty pleasure.