Adventures in Asia

I enjoyed Lee Seung Gi’s performance in “You’re All Surrounded” so much I looked into another of his dramas, “King 2 Hearts,” and when I learned the lead actress was Ha Ji Won (Gil Ra Im from one of my all-time favorites, “Secret Garden”) I was sold. And the cast did not disappoint. “King 2 Hearts” is set in a world where the nation of South Korea has a constitutional monarchy form of government. From the get go, the stage is set for conflict when North Korea and South Korea attempt to join a global military competition as one team. To complicate things further, the King tricks his little brother, the slacking and arrogant Crown Prince, into joining up as a Southern representative. The team leader for the South side is the head of Royal Security, Eun Shi Kyung. The team leader for the North side is beautiful Special Forces officer Kim Hang Ah. Naturally, a romance buds between the snotty Prince and the kick-butt Northerner. The villain of the show is Kim Bon...

After a relaxing vacation States-side, I’m back to Asia, back to teaching, and back to watching kdrama! And my first drama since being back was sure to be historic. My curiosity about the so-called Prince of Asia had peaked, especially after reading about his charms online and constantly running into cardboard cutouts of him in Caffé Bene. He starred in my first kdrama, “You’re Beautiful,” and I felt it was time to see him again. Thus I started Jang Keun Suk’s latest, “Bel Ami” (or “Pretty Man”). This drama was, in fact, historical for me, but for a quite different reason. It can be marked down as the first kdrama of my watching career that… I QUIT. I can only put up with so many hours of every woman on screen ogling over and clinging to an arrogant, gold-digging pretty boy. I can put up with even less pathetic female lead, who has a degree but no job, no self-esteem, who pools her miniscule earnings to buy things for said pretty boy who’s never so much a...