random thoughts: Ahjumma(?)-hood Blues

Age seems to be a perpetual problem when it comes to women in kdrama fiction land. In fact, age comes as a BIG issue (yes, with the capital letters and all) when it comes to MANY an Asian drama fictionland rom-com. I only ever thought it was just me and my own same-age friends (you know, I've never used that term before kdrama) lamenting the fate of rushing head-long into our impending thirties. In one of my friends' case, it feels akin to racing straight at a semi reluctantly, but with no other choices.

Yes, we have wasted many hours pathetically sobbing about becoming another year older for the past couple birthdays. Sometimes, we get superficial like that... and yes, it kills me to admit it. There are so many other things in life that we should be more concerned about.

However for me and my friends, the idea of growing old and slipping out of those youthful adolescent years had become a big sob story. Of course, when faced with a lot of the women I work with in real life who have long since trudged through the years that I am currently complaining about, I DO shamefully cringe and apologize about my dramatic agony.

After all, there is always someone older, and aging really isn't that big of a deal. But to my friends and I, we had spent the past four or five years trying to avoid talking about the big three-oh.

Not long ago, after watching a couple kdramas with gusto, I finally talked myself into admitting that I am twenty-seven years old and it's not the end of my life. It took a while, but I finally got there and proudly proclaimed my hold on my true age without wincing or trying to pretend that I'm about three years younger or that I will only ever be twenty-five for the rest of my life.

For one thing, I blame television (even if I really should be blaming one particular same-age friend for her own dramatic woes of "pushing thirty"). Television, especially Asian media, has brought to us the fictional fantasies of excitement and entertainment while only ever showing us eternally young faces of those very people who are enjoying their drama series' lives. After all, it's a good market -- younger generations prefer to see younger faces on the screen -- and who is the entertainment industry not to cater to their most rabid fanbase?

But really, it ISN'T all just a "for the fans" thing. Nor is it really a marketing ploy. In the past couple years, Asian media HAS been quite socially defining as a young people's paradise, even IF we still get to see the older generation make their talents and their faces seen regularly. But for the most part, because of the young new generation of talents, society has begun to stress the ideals of getting your life on track while still young enough to enjoy it. And this is where that stubborn "life before thirty" deal gets blown out of proportion.

The first time that I ever even saw age as an issue was upon watching interaction between Taiwanese Idols. Whether men or women, age seemed to play a big role in both popularity as well as reputation and dignity. I guess it was my own fault for having even submerged into the Taiwanese Idol arena in the first place; after all, the defining characteristic of the Taiwanese Idol is their eternal youth. After a certain age, even those former idols choose to move onto bigger projects and distance themselves from the title of "Idol."

Case in point:

Taiwanese Idol, singer, dancer, actor and MC Show Luo, Luo Zhi Xiang, has been pretty popular during his reign -- and he still is. But there is a running joke about him cringing at every mention of his age because he's well over thirty years old. He looks rather young, but that's an advantage of being both Asian AND in the entertainment industry -- Asian people already look young, T.V. tricks can turn you five years back in time. Whenever people mention his true age, however, he does his display of pouting and unnecessary temper tantrums. At that time, I had always wondered: "Is age really THAT important to celebrities?"

Yea... that was definitely a redundant question.

Taiwanese cult fandom television program, Mo Fan Bang Bang Tang, which housed some of Taiwan's youngest talents at the time had also made multiple jokes about age. The eldest of the boys during the 2008 run had been pushing 26 years old, which really didn't make him just another little boy anymore. While to me, at the time, 26 didn't seem like a disastrously old number, the fact that he was about ten years older than their youngest member came as a big teasing point to run with. And so for the sake of comedy and entertainment, the guy's age was poked at regularly.

Because we often forget that for teenagers, often times being two years older to them is very much older. The age gap doesn't start to shrink until you're well into your late twenties and numbers just start running together in blurs. And so for a 16 year old boy on that television program, someone who was even 21 could have felt old to him.

Conclusion: Kids are cruel.

You can pretty much say that, for me, presently at the age of 27, as well as a woman, this poking fun of age was kind of grating on my nerves. After all, for men, joking about age is merely joking. But for women, joking about age is another matter all together -- it stands on par with joking about their weight, their physical appearance, as well as their marital status.

Of course, I'm glad that I've always been of the minority in women who really don't care about any of the latter stuff that gets thrown around. Unfortunately, the age issue has always been a matter of avoidance -- once again, I blame my friends because of all their negative exclamations about getting older. I also blame the little teenage girl who tried to bluntly and rudely point out that she was ten years younger than me and already getting married. "What? You're 27? That makes you ten years older than me?" "... The last time I checked, there are only 9 years between 18 and 27..." Not like my argument really mattered to her. Well, the joke's on you, honey; you're not even legal to drink at your own wedding. Not that THAT ever stops anyone.

But I had never truly had an issue with any type of image, attribute or the like. Age, however, began to hover around me like bad, spoiled meat and the so the next thing I know, I'm lamenting being anywhere too far away from 21. It's a depressing thought only because I had never really cared before and really SHOULDN'T be concerned with age.

Recently I started watching Lie To Me which is what brought up this "ahjumma-hood blues" article in the first place. For starters, the scene kind of came out of nowhere and pretty much beat me up senseless for about twenty minutes following. Yoon Eun Hye's character, Kong Ah Chung in episode one had just finished suffering a bad turn at work only to have it shown on the news. And so off she goes to get her hair done so that it can make her look different and unrecognizable (like that ever works). As she is leaving her home, a little kid points to her and tells his mom: "It's that ahjumma from yesterday!"

I was shocked really. Because in this connotation, the word ahjumma is typically used to refer to much older women who may or may not already be married and have kids. At least that's MY understanding of the Korean title. For a girl of Yoon Eun Hye's age, the more proper title would have been noona. But kids are so precious as to tell it as it is, that you often wonder what their cut-off age is for noonas and ahjummas. And so the only way that I ended up reacting was to very painfully utter, "Ahjumma....?" for the next ten to twenty minutes. Even after the scene had come and gone, I was still feeling the sting.

Yoon Eun Hye, if her profile is true to form, was born the same year that I was born, which pretty much makes me the same age as her. But Yoon Eun Hye also looks much younger than I do physically. And so the idea that (even in fiction land) the physical embodiment of Yoon Eun Hye could even be referred to as an ahjumma kind of raked on me.

Mind you, it wasn't really in a bad way... but it still stung.

As javabeans comments in her recap of Lie To Me's first episode: "Ouch, all noonas on the verge of ajummahood can probably feel her pain. (Unmarried = noona!)" And the "verge of ajummahood" is more correctly referred to as that age where women are ripe for marriage -- in ajummahood, you've passed that phase and, by societal standards, should really be married or seeing someone seriously. After reading that, I did a subconscious recall of the scene again and cringed. Because, yes, the idea was kind of painful. And this is after I had very proudly begun my settlement into being a young woman in her late twenties.

The show further escalated into "old age = doomed fate" territory when Kong Ah Jung runs into her old friend who very rudely emphasizes the advantages and the niceties of being married early. It was a jab at Ah Chung's currently single status since the two seem to harbor a very hostile friendship based on hitting each other where it hurts, but the underlying concept was still there:

A woman married young = good for her; a woman still not married at this age = something is seriously wrong. I do believe I wanted to hit someone, possibly Ah Jung's "stab me in the back" friend from old times?

This article had been intended to be a random, quick thought about the "ahjumma" comment from Lie To Me's first episode. But the idea kind of stuck and now I'm rambling on as I always do. And so while I'm at it, I might go ahead and throw in yet another example of age as a social issue in drama land.

Scent of a Woman starring Kim Sun Ah as a terminal cancer patient, Lee Yeon Jae, had started off the series with the big age problem. Before she even HAD her melodramatic story line thrown at her, all of her colleagues and even her mother were already beating her up verbally because she was over thirty and still unmarried.

In my first impression post for Scent of a Woman, I had written:

"Why on earth is 30 years old such a landmark age? To this day, it confounds me why it seems that, after you hit the age of thirty, a woman seems to have aged to a hundred. If we don't already have things accomplished by that age, then we've pretty much lived a life of regret. If things are going to happen, they should happen while we're young and apparently, young coincides with any age under thirty."

To add onto that, I've noticed that even the five years leading up to thirty is referred to negatively as "pushing thirty." It makes me cringe to hear that, because you can't just be in your "late twenties", but instead, you're "pushing thirty." Double ouch! For some reason, the words "pushing thirty" just sounds worse than simply saying "thirty years old" or "twenty seven." I don't know why, but it hurts.

It's like, by 25 years old, if one has not gotten married, found true love, held hands with a boy or the like, then that woman forfeits her life out for criticism by the public. It's a bit scary when you think about it; especially when you're not even a public persona.

I guess that's drama land for you. The sad part is that, the age thing isn't even JUST restricted to drama land. The rest of the world also cringes from the fact that a woman is "pushing thirty" and hasn't done much with her life. The social standards of our world really DO manage to find ways to hurt a woman's pride thoroughly and mercilessly. I have a lot of friends in this age range getting married and starting families. I have other friends who indirectly inquire about my own single-dom and why I haven't found anyone yet; following, I get the all too annoying, "It's okay, you'll find someone sometime. I know there's someone out there for you. Everyone finds someone."

Why does everyone who's dating or married feel that someone who is single is simply miserable and needs to "find someone" so that I don't go home and drink myself into a lonely stupor? I don't get it, but that small tidbit only really has part to do with an age ordeal and is best left for a random soapbox in another time, so we'll move along.

I'm not even sure whether to blame society itself, or the forever young of Asian media portraying life as a refreshing and exciting youth's dream. If not the real world, I think rom-com world would be an even more cruel place to live in since the concept is emphasized upon even more as a story line rather than our true life anecdotes. At least in real life, I can tune out the issue since I'm not a main female lead no matter where I go.

random thoughts: A Tribute To Fangirl Insanity

Warning: This post contains a lot of senseless rambling. Proceed with caution.

Upon diving into a new area of entertainment, I always chance upon certain stars, celebrities, artists, actors, etc., that I become unconditionally attached. Basically, it's called an irrational, yet justified fangirl obsession and it becomes dangerously delusional... or something like that.

When I find someone in the entertainment world that I take a shine to, the following will happen: 1) I search for their works, whether music or other drama series and I enjoy them with a strong bias, 2) I web-stalk them for the duration of my obsession, 3) I look for YouTube video clips that other fans around the world have uploaded depicting my obsession in all the best features. Pretty much, for a good amount of time, I'm hooked to that person until he or she leads me into a new obsession (which sometimes doesn't take long).

For example, during my TVB Hong Kong drama years (which pretty much spanned my entire life) I have always found that, due to certain character roles, I end up falling senselessly for the actors behind that image. The very first time that my obsession ended up going into overdrive, however, was because of TVB celebrity Bosco Wong, known for many, many breakthrough roles and his ability to naturally blend in with the drama series he participates in without trying to steal anyone else's spotlight. Through him, I finally discovered what an obsessed fangirl could do when given the right resources on the internet.

I joined an English-based fan club for more news and information on him. I spent a lot of time on YouTube looking up anything related to him. I've seen almost every drama series he starred in (even the short cameo scenes from his earlier work). And I even began listening to his music when the company debuted him as a singer -- and I tried to justify that his singing really wasn't that bad, although ultimately I had to admit that he really isn't cut out for being a vocalist and should just stick with acting.

I was totally in love with this guy. This had been nearly five years ago when I saw him lead a series for the first time in a series which also show cased a rather cute romance line for him and rumored celebrity girlfriend Myolie Wu. Five years ago, I was still in that early twenties young adolescent stage where being a fangirl is still justifiable (in my opinion). Nowadays, I just refer to myself as the self-proclaimed fangirl, but really I'm a hermit otaku woman with fangirl tendencies...

But what are labels... really? Moving along now.

This is not to say that he's the one and only (or even the first) TVB star I've fangirl-ed. Others include Raymond Lam who, in comparison, is a much more refined actor and also an excellent vocalist. But during my obsession with Raymond Lam, it had never occurred to me that I could go online and "web-stalk" him like I did with Bosco. But that's okay. I tend to see Ray in the same light that I see my eternally beloved superstar Andy Lau anyway: I should only ever view his work, listen to his music and admire his talent rather than try to follow him around like a lost lamb. His talents are just too classy for me to fangirl him (not that I don't). But this guy has gotten to a point where he has entered my list of "Eternal Fandom" wherein no matter what he does or who I end up obsessing over next, he will still be in my list of top artists, right there next to Andy Lau, BoA, Utada Hikaru, Stephen Chow (Hong Kong movie director/producer/actor genius), and many others. Since the list hasn't officially been set, I'd hate to mention any other people and then end up denying them in the future. Because this unofficial list will only ever include the stars and artists who are there to stay and not just any random celebrity I happen to take interest in for a short few months (not that this list is really important to anyone else but myself).

TVB was where I started off finding my most beloved stars because I grew up watching Hong Kong drama series, and to this day still hope that I can get out of it what I used to when I was young. Several young actors from that broadcasting company had easily come into my interest aside from the above mentioned:

- Tavia Yeung -- Yes, she's a girl and it seems strange to fangirl her, but she's a talented young actress with some of the best crying skills I've ever seen and she's always got great chemistry with her co-actors, whether or not there's a love line. Her acting skills have always been consistently improving and has finally been able to pick up series as the main female lead without having to share the limelight with others, and that, in itself, had made me ecstatically happy for her.

- Steven Ma -- There's not much to say about this guy except that he's a naturally talented actor and there have been multiple character roles where he's caught my attention over and over again. But the obsession phase never really came around for him.

- Gordan Lam -- While he's no longer part of the TVB family and has moved on into shooting movies and the like, he's always been one of my favorites for one standard reason: his ability to emote feelings and tell a story with his eyes. To this day, the one thing I remember about him is seeing those eyes express something and being able to feel exactly what it is he's trying to express. There's talent for you.

- Roger Kowk -- I had a short obsession phase with this guy just because of one character role he played. But after that, I really only paid heed to the fact that he IS a good actor, but otherwise not really that attractive.

While there have been many others I've been attracted to in the past through TVB, I have to admit that the fangirl phase never really hit it's peak. The male stars in TVB had always been... well, typically the majority of them were way older and at the time that I watched TVB religiously, I never really could feel attracted to older men (with Andy Lau as the only ever exception). So the fangirl phase really only hit Bosco and Raymond even if I DID have a lot of other stars I became interested in.

But as my world began to expand, my new obsessions began to grow and I found that fangirling certain stars became increasingly easier due to the amount of wonderful talent in the realm of Korean entertainment.


Let's backtrack a little bit though before we dive into Korean entertainment:

My first dive outside of TVB drama series had actually settled in the anime and manga area and the first and only artist I fangirled was none other than very talented voice actor Suzumura Kenichi. You may find my post on him here: The Many (Anime) Faces of Kenichi Suzumura. While I had never officially seen this person, I had heard his voice in so many forms that I ended up putting him on my favorites list. He is quite a talent and to this day, I won't change my mind. But my "fangirl" period for him ended a little too quickly, I think. My obsession dwindled pretty fast. Thus, he hasn't entered the "Eternal Fandom" list.

There had been other voice actors I admired, but seeing as how I can't even pick out their names without looking anything up, they apparently weren't that significant to me. Sakurai Takahiro is a voice actor who is probably best known for some "handsome men" and "hero" roles, but I know him best as Cloud Strife-sama from Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children movie. There's also Kobayashi Sanae, a female voice actor who is usually known for voicing younger boy roles and spunky girl roles.

The funny thing about this anime and manga phase, however, is that I never truly fangirled any REAL people aside from Suzuken-sama. My fangirl tendencies usually strayed towards the fictional anime or manga characters. But we'll just leave it at that and if anyone is interested in my anime and manga obsessions, head right on over to the drama zone's sister site and enjoy some more insanity.

After that anime and manga period (which lasted a whole of five months) ended, I quickly made a leap into the next area of entertainment: Japanese dorama. This obsession lasted a whole of two drama series, both starring the eternally lovely Ikuta Toma-sama whom I still have inklings of obsession for, but not to the point where I fangirl him to oblivion. During that time, of course, I was about to breach the lines of sanity and dangerous because of him. For an idea of how much I liked this guy, you can check out the only Hana Kimi posts I have shared on this site. I think I swoon over him enough in the two posts about the Japanese version of Hana Kimi to make up for the short amount of writing I'm dedicating to him here. His admittance into my "Eternal Fandom" list is still in debate, because I still squeal over learning about new movies or drama series that he participates in, but I haven't been motivated enough to go watch them. I still follow a blog that is dedicated to him, but I don't always read everything posted there. And so I'm kind of giving him a few more months before I make that ultimate decision to switch mode from obsessed fangirl to eternal supporting fan.

I believe that the ultimate decision will come into play after I finally get around to watching the rest of the dorama he stars in as well as the two movies he has recently finished shooting.

Nonetheless, I shall always refer to him dotingly as the lovely Ikuta Toma-sama because I DO really love him so... *cue huge fangirl sigh*

Following the Japanese dorama phase, which is more correctly referred to as the "Ikuta Toma-sama fangirl phase", I ended up finally entering that Taiwanese Idol phase. Taiwanese Idol drama series and Taiwanese Idols have always been a big thing among young girls of Asian culture. The idea behind Taiwanese Idol Dramas, after all, were simply to show case the most popular celebrities in a series for all to bask in their prettiness. The majority of these drama series were romantic comedies at their best, featuring good looking men and women who were young and sometimes already quite widely popular. A handful of them were truly able to act, but the rest of them really just survived on their already accumulated popularity.

Admittedly, I can see the main aim of Taiwanese Idol Drama at young girls in their teenage to early twenties and older otaku girls like me who are suckers for romantic comedies.

It wouldn't be until the production of Taiwanese drama series Black and White that we finally see a break in the monotonous romantic comedy or melodramatic romance track that Taiwanese Idol Dramas have become known for, which are usually low budget and nothing spectacular aside from being fun entertainment. Granted, Black and White still show cased good looking people in the main roles, its story line and direction was a new experience for those of us already used to the typical Taiwanese Idol Drama formulas.

In this territory, I truly DID end up spending quite some time, nearing more than a year of interest. Remnants of my obsession with Taiwanese Idols still linger and I will find myself still looking for some possible drama series to watch from that area. But, of course, it hadn't really taken long for me to get tired of the same stereotypical story lines, over and over again, and the same celebrities playing the same pretty boy and pretty girl roles, over and over again. While this was the rather superficial reason why I liked Taiwanese Idol Dramas in the beginning (the good looking people as well as the fluffy romances) it is an indulgence than can only pique my interest for so long. And then, after a while, I realize that I'm yearning and grasping for something else with more substance. It would also be nice to see good actors on the television screen once again.

It's not that every Taiwanese Idol Drama is an empty shell filled with flower vase celebrities. I haven't exactly seen every possible Taiwanese Idol Drama possible. There ARE good story lines that aren't just fluffy romance pieces and there ARE good Taiwanese actors and actresses (Rainie Yang, Ariel Lin, Kingone Wang, Barbie Hsu, to name a few). But the main formula is pretty much predictably reused over and over again as the plot's resident attraction and the majority of Taiwanese Idols are too stiff at their best.

Once again, in every area of entertainment (in this case, every different country and culture) I tend to find a few stars I cling to rather easily. Looking back at my obsessions, however, make me realize that the Taiwanese Idol arena is truly for the young teenage girls.

For the first part of my Taiwanese Idol interest, I was a big fangirl for hot boy group Fahrenheit for one simple reason: Wu Chun. With a baby face and a killer athlete's body, this man is truly one of the most handsome men I have ever laid eyes on. And so because of him, I ended up becoming a fan of the boy group he was part of, listening to their music religiously, buying their concert DVD as a souvenir of my fangirling, and following their career through news sources and YouTube videos. I started picking out drama series which included at least one of the four boys (men?) and my flight of Taiwanese Idols obsession started there.

My love for Wu Chun, however, slowly faded in the presence of Fahrenheit's strongest vocalist, Aaron Yan Ya Lun who was the youngest in the group as well as the first official real life bishounen I have ever seen. Youthful and vibrant, this boy had all the attributes that I had never thought possible in the real world as a bishounen -- I always, always, always believed that bishounen could never exist in real life until Aaron Yan came along and proved that Japanese manga certainly had a basis for their "pretty boy" character descriptions.

Aaron Yan was easily picked out from the four person boy group because of his strong vocals and his obsession with music. But my love for him had been a slow and progressive one because of the fact that I was also basking in the superficial glory of other Taiwanese Idols during that time as well. With the likes of Rainie Yang, Mike He, Show Luo, Nicholas Teo and the like catching my attention, Ya Lun wasn't exactly the most stand out performer out there. So he is simply part of a small portion of my fangirl obsession as the youngest and cutest of the Fahrenheit group. Having and innocent personality, a gorgeous smile and almost flawless skin, this boy was adorable in his own way, but could have very easily passed off as a pretty girl if not for his deep voice.

Unfortunately, it didn't take long for me to admit to myself that none of the four boys in Fahrenheit held much conviction in their acting skills. Wu Chun is good looking, but his acting is awkward and stiff to say the least, though he IS quite well suited for action as shown in the movie 14 Blades. By far, I am most impressed by his role as the antagonistic basketball player with a dark edge and awesome-hot death glares in the drama series Hot Shot. As the semi-villain, he actually shows a rather attractive intensity (even if the actual character role makes no sense). Little Ya Lun is cute, but you can figure out almost immediately that he believes himself to be a good actor and so tries too hard to prove himself in that aspect. This ultimately ends up making his acting a little unnatural. Jiro Wang Dong Cheng is probably the only one in this group who even has remotely refined acting skills... but he's not very good at bringing his character to life and you can clearly see it as "Jiro Wang acting as such and such" rather than just seeing the character. I don't mention the last member, Calvin Chen, only because I have only ever seen his one supporting role (which was unnatural at best) and so I would unfairly judge him in this matter.

But anyway.... Moving along from Ya Lun, I entered a much confusing phase known to me strictly as the teenage BBT phase wherein I fangirl some of the youngest entertainers in Taiwan during their timeframe of reign. This is where I truly tried to return to my past youth shamelessly because these boys were strictly fangirled by teenagers.

BBT is short for Bang Bang Tang which came from the Taiwanese television program and talk show called Mo Fan Bang Bang Tang (which I will elaborate more on in a future post). But to be brief, BBT is a group of young boys chosen off the streets through days of auditioning to join a sort of "Super Star Training Course" that would focus on turning a couple kids into famous celebrities by putting them through several training classes with entertainment industry managers, singers, dance teachers, and the like. At the same time, these kids' own personal perserverence is observed through a television program where a classroom setting is arranged for them to show off what they do best and whether or not they can handle being on television professionally. For two years, these boys became a massive cult hit in Taiwan and sometime last year was when I first discovered them long after the television program had disbanded.

I ended up watching the entire television program from the very beginnings of the classroom selection in 2006 and up to the combining of the boys with their sister class in 2009 until I finally got tired of them sometime during their 2010 episodes. It hadn't taken long for me to crunch through all those years of broadcasting, and during that time, I also happily became accustomed to watching Mandarin-based T.V. shows without English subtitles. The best thing that ever happened to me because of BBT was that I finally learned to understand conversational Mandarin where it had always been confusing to my unskilled Cantonese speaking mind.

From BBT, I grew to admire a select few boys, thinking that they were really very talented and hardworking, even if they didn't end up becoming hardcore celebrities. Their skills are fairly unrefined, unfortunately. Acting wasn't a strong trait aside from maybe one of the boys and one of the girls in the sister class. Singing was also not a strong trait aside from three specific boys in the group who still have not found their big break. Dancing and comedy, however, was truly their calling and I think this is what made the television program as well-received as it ended up being.

Ah... the charm of boy bands... my inner teenager will always have her say...


This phase lasted for a short period of time, because I began to lose interest in the Taiwanese Idol arena after I finally picked up my second Korean drama series and said, "Wow! I'm following these more closely now!" Well, not exactly in those words, but seeing as how I've already breezed through one Korean drama series after another, it's no refute as to my cling to fangirling the entire Korean entertainment industry as a whole. It was like discovering TVB's charm all over again, but in a different country and in a different language, with several television stations and many, many more stars (unlike in Hong Kong where TVB was pretty much it as it overshadowed the weaker ATV studio).

The list of how many of the young male stars as well as some of the female stars I've become a fan of is slowly growing itself to the roof.

Jung Yong Hwa of CN Blue was an immediate love when he charmingly portrayed the sweet and romantic Kang Shin Woo in the highly popular You're Beautiful. I ended up picking up all of CN Blue's music as well as following closely along with Heartstrings, his second drama series project alongside female starlet Park Shin Hye, who has also become one of my favorites in the Korean entertainment arena because of her onscreen charm. While I don't fangirl female stars, Park Shin Hye is definitely one that I would willingly follow her career for because she has a definite "IT" factor to her that cannot be easily found with too many others. Jung Yong Hwa, simply put, is just good looking, musically talented, and charming -- unfortunately his acting is still rather lacking and I hope that he'll get the chance to improve upon that. Park Shin Hye is simply charming and a great actress.

The next obsession took form in Lee Min Ho... or rather the character role that he played in City Hunter, Lee Yoon Sung. To this day, I'm not even sure what had possessed me to pick up City Hunter since it's not really my type of series; but I'm glad that I did because I highly enjoyed it and it finally gave me that missing "substance" that I'd been looking for since the days of Taiwanese Idol Dramas and endless shoujo manga. And through City Hunter, I felt like my grasp on television drama series has expanded outside of romantic comedies to include so much more (despite romantic comedies still being my main diet). But Lee Min Ho easily gained my fanship for so, so many reasons, even the most superficial reason of him being extremely good looking and incredibly, sizzling hot. This young one is a talent no matter how you look at it, because I found in him that rare ability to emote with just his eyes and his facial expressions that few actors actually have. And so we let the fangirl obsessions begin... Of course, he's not the best actor out there as there are still some desirable improvements he can make, but nonetheless, I worship his kick butt hot character of Lee Yoon Sung in City Hunter and look forward to new projects in the future.

Not long after Lee Min Ho, my next obsession took form pretty quickly: Song Joong Ki, otherwise known as the perpetually beautiful pretty boy very easily caught my attention. While everyone else who watched the highly popular Sungkyunkwan Scandal may have leaned more towards the silent hero Moon Jae Shin, played by Yoo Ah In, I was fairly attached to the flamboyant and unpredictable Gu Yong Ha, played by Song Joong Ki, if only for the character's personality and significance and some finely sprinkled adorable goodness. And, of course, because of him, I ended up following through with the first ever Korean variety program I've ever watched, Running Man. I have plans to pick up other drama series that he has participated in, and I look forward to the day that he can be center stage in his own drama series. Because being pretty isn't his only skill, rather, his acting skills are decently refined and very well presented. The only disadvantage that he has so far, however, is that his acting skills aren't extraordinary and if it weren't for the character of Gu Yong Ha in SKK Scandal, or even if not for his cute looks, Joong Ki might not stand out as much. But since SKK Scandal is the only series I have seen of his, I might be prematurely judging his skills.

Nonetheless, there is no doubt that this darling little cutie-pie was quite the influence in my continuously molding viewing habits. There is the possibility that Joong Ki will be receiving an individual article in the drama zone soon, but I haven't quite made a plan for it yet.

Other Korean stars began to catch my attention as well while I continued to watch drama series after drama series. Yoon Eun Hye hit my list of favorites after watching her performance in Goong and Coffee Prince wherein she portrays two completely different character roles in each series. I then picked up a movie that she starred in and really enjoyed that as well. She is truly one of the greatest female stars of the current generation, beautiful and talented. Park Min Young was also an interest for me, having gained my admiration because of two fairly strong female personalities in two different drama series, City Hunter and Sungkyunkwan Scandal. Both series were very well received by viewers and myself and both characters she portrayed were readily lovable and unique; unfortunately, I have a bit of a bone to pick with her crying scenes as I have certainly seen much better ones, but overall, she's pretty good at what she does and she's also elegant and gorgeous while she's doing it.

Following, there hadn't been too many others who came into that "obsessed fangirl" level for me, even IF I gained a bit of love for them. There was just never enough spark for me to cling onto them tightly like I had done for a lot of others in the past. At least not enough for me to mention by name because I easily moved on from them fairly quickly to watch a new drama series.

Except now we approach the main reason why this article had been written in the first place.

I had begun writing this article, following my half-baked brainstormed notes over how to format writing about actor and singer Lee Seung Gi. I had even titled this article as "Lee Seung Gi". And as with a lot of other posts that I write, I love to start off with an introductory paragraph (or two or three or ten) that would eventually lead into the subject. The article for CN Blue had included such an introductory, talking about my love for music and my obsession phases of music. This had been my intention when starting the article for Seung Gi. But as one can tell, the writing process ended up getting a little out of hand, and halfway through, I resignedly scrolled back upward and changed the title to it's current glamour.

And thus, thanks to my often aimlessly wandering mind and a specific subject (komawayo Seung Gi ya) I ended up completing an entire article based on random rambling about my fangirl tendencies. It's not like I had never planned on writing something like this before, but I just never know how to format certain articles or even how to start them. So as we can see, I've finally written something quite worthy of posting in my blog as a type of "filler" random thoughts article that can very easily spiral into many, many other new articles to come. Also, it gives me something to post aside from all those "intro info" and "thoughts" pieces that I so very often slack off on, because it DOES sometimes get a bit monotonous for me to simply summarize and review a drama series, especially if I don't particularly know what to say about it aside from "I totally loved this" or "very excellent series that I recommend" or "what the heck was this story trying to convey".

I'm a writing fanatic, but recently, words baffle me and I have trouble coming up with wittier or more imaginative analogies.

But anyway... with the posting of this article, I have opened up the possibilities of including many more individual articles about all the other celebrities and stars I've mentioned up to this point. I had been meaning to make a list anyway, and with this article, my intentions, I'm sure won't be in vain. We WILL have more drama zone insanity focused on my fangirl tendencies because several of these people mentioned in the article will more than likely be detailed on in the future: two of which I have already decided would be added to my list of people to talk about.

Coming back to the initial intentions of this post, I mention Lee Seung Gi this and Lee Seung Gi that, but to be totally honest, I really plan on doting on him in his individual article more so than here, so the only thing I can really say is that I think I may have found an all-new young star to potentially raise into the ranks of my top favorites -- you know, that unoffiicial list mentioned at the beginning of this post that currently only includes Hong Kong's stars as well as two international super stars, BoA and Utada Hikaru. As I continue to follow his career from his debut in 2004 to the present, I have high hopes that he will surpass even my own expectations of him.

As someone else has stated in another blog somewhere that I read in passing, "How is it that Lee Seung Gi is just so good at everything he does?" Because honestly, this statement is NOT far from the truth as far as I've seen and Seung Gi is still young with a long road ahead of him. Going from an amateur singer to a now refined vocalist, his potential is still yet to be reached, but his music has become widely popular. I have yet to find a song of his that I didn't entirely like. Jump-starting his acting career almost immediately with the 2009 ratings killer Brilliant Legacy, Seung Gi's skill can very easily be recognized in that area as well and with some slight improvements here and there, he can readily move into the ranks of best actor with time. And finally, his variety and talk show hosting skills had come as a surprise to me entirely. Seung Gi's image was never really one I had pictured as an MC; he came off as a genteel, quiet and easily embarrassed type because of his age as well as his debonair looks. While this is quite true of him, it seems that it doesn't stop him from working hard at becoming a well-like and readily acceptable talk show host -- this boy has the skill to do anything that he wants and he does it exceptionally well too.

And so, in one paragraph, I have pretty much summed up the entirety of the Lee Seung Gi article I've been planning. But have no fear, the article itself will definitely have more detailed information as well as lots of very squeal-worthy pictures.

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Related articles:
people: Lee Seung Gi (Korean singer/actor)

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thoughts: Goong (Korean)

Also known as Princess Hours or Palace
(宫 - Goong)

Yoon Eun-hye as Shin Chae-Kyung
Joo Ji-hoon as Lee Shin
Kim Jeong-hoon as Eui-Sung Yul/ Lee Yool
Song Ji-hyo as Min Hyo-rin

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The following article is a very in depth discussion of the series and may contain multiple spoilers. For a less detailed summary and thoughts post, please read intro info: Goong if you haven't seen the series. Otherwise, proceed with caution.

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There is always an annoying flaw on how women are depicted by a lot of Asian drama series. And I recently started noticing this because of the endless manga that I've read -- I don't think I'd ever viewed it as a problem before until going from one short manga story to another and continuously seeing the same type of girl presented through those plots.

The typical heroine is always some form of ditzy airhead. She is the cheerful, girl next door type that anyone would find cute upon first impression. It doesn't matter if she's not entirely beautiful or if she's entirely graceful -- as long as she's cute, innocent and sweet and always happy, then she makes the perfect heroine to any story. And then we always like to make them stupid and useless as well, needing to be picked up by her Prince Charming who is the exact opposite of her in every aspect.

And then if she's not a ditzy airhead, there's some other part of her brain that's stupid anyway; nonetheless, the girl is always so clueless it makes you want to hurl things at her. She NEVER picks up on romantic hints from male suitors and when she does, she thinks that there has obviously been a mistake.

After all, men love to see a helpless damsel in distress who's role is simply to bring sunshine into their lives. Right?

Why did I start this article with such an introduction? I'm not even sure, but the idea of the ever-happy and ditzy female protagonist kind of bugs me at times. In fact, in the near future, I might finally climb on top of my soap box and write an entire article on how much I dislike the typical romance story female main character -- especially in shoujo manga. We can even call it a crossover post and share it on my other blog as well.

Yoon Eun-hye is cast as that particular free-spirited, loving, cheerful, and stereotypical airhead, Shin Chae-kyung in this particular series. I had been expecting the entire stereotype for her character since this series came from Manhwa which is categorized in the Japanese's shoujo genre wherein almost all female protagonists are stupid, worthless ditzes who's only saving grace is her penchant for sunshine and bunnies. Thankfully, Chae-kyung isn't entirely that ditzy airhead and has other admirable traits aside from simply being an everlasting ray of sunshine -- but she DOES start off the series in that fashion and it was a little bit depressing, but at the same time, I didn't completely dislike it as she also has those comedic tendencies that make you smile cause you feel embarrassed for her continuously.

Before I get any further into my rant, you can find the summary of Palace, or Goong, or Princess Hours (whatever works for you) at it's drama wiki site: http://wiki.d-addicts.com/Goong. The wikipedia version gives away too much of the plot and is actually a little bit incorrect in some of its summarizations. Of course, after re-reading my written post, I come to realize that I might be giving away a few spoilers here and there, so beware, and maybe you might want to read my article AFTER you've watched the series? (see intro info link above -- actually, here it is again: intro info: Goong) I think this post ended up being a discussion rather than a "short summary and review" of the series. But anyway, pretty much, the series involves a common girl who marries into the royal family because of an arranged marriage and supposedly turns the palace upside down.

Anyway, I have only ever seen so many Korean drama series, and The 1st Shop of Coffee Prince was the very first one which also starred Yoon Eun-hye, but in a much different role than this one. I can definitely say that I saw the versatility that she displayed from one extreme of character to another. In Coffee Prince, she was an absolute tomboy, with the short hair, crazy strength and a skill for throwing people over her shoulders. In Coffee Prince, the character of Go Eun-chan also had a distorted sense of what was right and what was wrong throughout the entire series, all the way up to the end and a lot of selfish tendencies.

Shin Chae-kyung is a very easily lovable girl who has a strong sense of responsibility as well as undying loyalty to her friends and her family. While she starts off as a big klutz who knew absolutely nothing outside of her classes, her friends, and her family, she had a strong heart of gold and a passion for life that a lot of people now-a-days lack. Aside from being an airhead, Shin Chae-kyung was a very ideal heroine and quickly grew on you as you followed her through the series. She was loving and she was caring and she was sometimes insightful to how others were feeling. She also had a tendency to "inappropriately" act on her first instinct, doing whatever she liked to do despite all the palace regulations -- which is what I loved about her so much. In contrast to Yoon Eun-hye's character in Coffee Prince, Shin Chae-kyung in Palace was more girly and pretty -- this is emphasized by all the lovely and elegant outfits and dresses she wore throughout the series. No two outfits were the same, and they all fit her really well.

My only complaint about her is that, as the story progressed, she began to change her personality into a much more melancholic one. I'm not sure if this is truly because of the fact that "Palace life" was changing her, but it sure did catch me off-guard. I found that I missed the Shin Chae-kyung from the very beginning of the series -- wherein, even if she didn't quite have enough courage to stand up against people, she still was able to stand up for herself instead of letting people walk all over her. She remained bubbly and happy and figured out how to survive in a place that didn't seem to suit her.

Many even claimed that the palace was molding itself around her and learning how to adjust to her presence. She was the type who didn't let anything change her in the slightest.

Except until she finally fell in love.

After that point, it seemed to be downhill for this girl and suddenly, she was the damsel in distress who didn't seem to have any fighting spirit in her anymore. No matter how many times someone would say, "Our Chae-kyung is a survivor. If you left her in a desert, she would build her own oasis," I rolled my eyes. Because there were so many times when certain things happened that I wished that she would just say, "To hell with palace life, I didn't even want to be Crown Princess in the first place!" But instead, she swallowed the injustices and apologized profusely for something that she didn't need to grovel about.

The girl made many little mistakes throughout her life in the palace, as anyone would expect from someone who grew up carefree and nowhere near strict regulations and the like. For crying out loud, that palace was like some sort of prison, a dictatorship, even, that controlled the everyday lives of each and every person in the royal family as well as their servants. You were not free to do ANYTHING at all.

But I guess that's the life of a royal. Being born and raised in America and living a common, middle-class lifestyle, I guess it's hard for me to understand the direness of strict regulation among a family of royals who are watched and criticized by the public and the government regularly. I understand family duty, obligations and honor... but these guys were taking it a little more extreme.

But anyway, this is my rant on the unfairness of how some females are depicted. Because while I can stand the ditzy airhead of Chae-kyung's character in the beginning of the series, that was because her saving grace was the fact that she was strong of heart and had a lot of good traits going for her such as excellent comedic timing. She also wasn't a complete idiot as she was rather good at what she went to school for and didn't lose out in other parts of her education such as English or the like. She had a knack for catching onto things rather quickly, which is more than I can say for a lot of other shoujo manga girls who are pretty much lost causes from the start.

By the end of the series, having matured and taken on more responsibility, she lost a good part of her airheaded tendencies, but then she gained a whole new flaw. Shin Chae-kyung became a helpless girl who didn't know what to do with herself after falling in love with her prince. She spent a lot of her time being depressed and moody; she suddenly based her life around her prince, crying continuously about him, for him, and with him. She'd lost that strength she had started off with and replaced it with a suddenly dreary life. Her moping around about her unrequited love and the hard adjustment to palace life often got to become irritating repetition.

This is not the Shin Chae-kyung that I had expected. But then again, I guess not everyone can be perfect, right? The story would be too dull and the series wouldn't have it's inevitable environment of tragedy like the rest of the Korean series that everyone fell in love with -- someone has to go through turmoil to fit the trend; or in this case, everyone goes through hell and back again, when a lot of it could have been prevented had someone just stood up for themselves. And then endless crying and melancholy ensues.

Thus is the life of royals, I assume. I can't complain too much. I really DID enjoy the series despite a lot of things that irritated me. And since nothing is perfect, there's no reason for me to expect every series to be ideal in my favor because you cannot please everyone. Nonetheless, I really, really had fun watching Goong. While there were many sad parts, the happy ending and the enjoyable, endearing moments made up for a lot of it.

Setting aside the character of Shin Chae-kyung, the rest of the series was rather enjoyable.

Joo Ji-hoon was cast as the prince, Lee Shin, who grew up in the palace as the lonely and restricted Crown Prince since he was five years old. He knows little about life outside of the palace, and because of his position, has come to the conclusion that the world revolves around him. Unable to publicly allow his emotions to show due to the way he was raised, this young man is probably the loneliest, most depressing main male lead ever. This is Joo Ji-hoon's first main role, I think, and he really does an excellent job portraying the array of emotions and the arrogance and playfulness that the prince struggled with throughout.

While it may have seemed like Lee Shin had everything in the world, there were so many restrictions placed upon him that it was almost akin to having absolutely nothing. All he really wanted was adoring love from his parents, which he could not receive because of his position, and he ended up wanting to have a dream rather than having his life conclusively planned out for him up until his old aged demise.

Regulations are everything in the life of a royal and so every person living in the palace is pretty much controlled to be the same, boring and dull "doll". They are merely present for the public to admire from afar and idolize and respect throughout life. In fact, they don't even really have the power to govern, so it made me wonder why it was even necessary to have a monarchy if they don't even have power. Tradition, maybe? These people were like famous movie stars or something.

It's nice to live the life of a royal when you think about all the nice things they get. Summer palaces, extravagant homes, luscious meals, beautiful clothing, large bedrooms, personal servants... etc., etc.... But compared to the rules and regulations you have to live by just to have all of this -- is it really worth giving up freedom for luxury?

And then what's up with the women staff being restricted to be single for the rest of their lives like nuns? This is a more modernized Korean dynasty, but why are we still succumbing to age-old customs for these poor women? As far as I know, back in historical monarchies, there was a very unofficial law which pretty much said that if you are a woman working as a servant in the royal palace, then you are ultimately the emperor's woman and must remain as such until you either die or are discharged from the palace. This is something I learned from watching various historical Chinese series and I almost assume that this is true to Korean monarchy as well. This is why women working in the palace were never allowed to get married or to be around other men -- it was inappropriate for any of the emperor's women to be touched by others.

But with this modern monarchy and apparently the kind who only has one wife, one queen, you'd think this tradition would have already been abolished.

But anyway, back to the series...

As far as character goes, Lee Shin certainly had a lot of growth and development throughout the series. Going from being an arrogant, self-centered, dull prince to becoming a more caring, more understanding, and less childish man, it really did show as he interacted with Chae-kyung and her family as well as went through his own obstacles. Sure, he started off as the untouchable and charming noble who had a secret heart of gold; but he was spoiled and arrogant nonetheless and it makes one smile to follow his progress.

Granted, he still had his irritating moments. I totally wanted to flip when it seemed like he wouldn't move on from being angry at Chae-kyung for making her first serious mistake. He had been involved in his own scandals, he had hurt her relentlessly, time and time again, and he always pushed her away, being untrusting and being uncaring, and never really thought about things from her point-of-view. The worst thing he did was push her away when he should have just opened up to her.

I understand the need to be alone to think things over when your life comes across obstacles. I understand that he had been so used to carrying his burdens alone that he didn't feel he could rely on anyone to help him. But if you don't allow someone else to share your trouble and then expect her to come running to you at all times... I'm not sure how that works out. If he never really trusted Chae-kyung to be there and if he never bothered to show her that he really DID care about her, how was he to expect her to come to him with her woes and sorrows when someone else was willing to hear her vent and rant? And then when she DID turn to him, all he had to say to her were nasty words akin to, "Well, you dug your own grave, how do you expect to fix it yourself? Don't come crying to me about your problems."

Yea. I think our little Crown Prince had a lot of issue with communicating in a better way.

And as Chae-kyung said, all she really wanted was a sense that he cared, even if all he knew how to say was, "It's okay. Everything will turn out all right." A hug, and some comforting would have been a plus. But Lee Shin couldn't even give her that much.

Whenever he hurt her feelings or betrayed her trust, she easily forgave him; but when she did it, it was like his world suddenly ended and he was extremely stubborn about forgiving her or even giving her the benefit of a doubt.

Some would say that maybe Chae-kyung was asking for too much. Maybe she could have been more understanding. Maybe she shouldn't have run into another man's arms just because he was better at comforting her than her own husband. Maybe she should have pushed harder for Shin's reciprocated feelings.

But the relationship that the prince and princess had was not built on trust to begin with. They continued on throughout the series doubting each other at every turn and every corner. Both of them were at fault for the problems that happened to them again and again. Because neither of them really quite knew what it was like to actually be in love and have that love reciprocated. On top of that, they lacked communication and honesty.

Nevertheless, the relationship between Chae-kyung and Lee Shin had its ups and downs. During the downs, it got to be somewhat irritating because this couple lacked a lot of communication and constantly got into one misunderstanding after another. They were the typical drama romance couple where, as soon as things started to look up for their love lives with each other, something happens, like an ex-girlfriend or a persistent suitor, and then the rapport they had built suddenly comes crashing down. All memories of having had fun and having had wonderful conversations with each other don't exist anymore. But during the happy moments, they were very cute together and knew how to be happy and have fun. It was rather interesting to watch two complete strangers get married and then slowly fall in love with one another, but battling that idea subconsciously just because they didn't think the marriage would last based on an arrangement by an already deceased royal king and a grandfather.

The rest of the characters were also interesting to follow. Chae-kyung's friends were more likeable than Shin's friends, I will personally admit. Kang Hyung was the typical nerd girl with priorities. I was almost expecting her to have a side plot romance for herself because of the fact that she's a pretty girl hidden behind a pair of glasses and a steel fist of duty and schoolwork. But I'm kind of glad that the story didn't do that, because it would have been pointless and kind of ridiculous to include something out of the blue like that. Tweedledee and Tweedledum were exceptionally wonderful as the comedic reliefs and best friends to our heroine -- I really enjoyed watching them. The three comprised a group of loyal friends until the very end, always supporting and looking out for Chae-kyung's well being and always lending an ear for her to vent her frustrations.

As for Shin's friends... I just kept wondering what the point was in having them around. They didn't share in any of his problems and seemed to make his life worse. They were the typical rich and spoiled brats who looked down on commoners, and aside from being a group of dudes for the main male lead to hang out with, I couldn't quite figure out the meaning to their existence. Their only redeeming trait was their sudden interest in Chae-kyung and Shin's welfare by the end of the series -- at that point did I realize that they actually DID exist as Shin's friends and not just as some guys that Shin hung out with randomly. They also seemed to exist as Hyo-rin's "gang of lackeys" when they were trying to help her bully Chae-kyung during random scenes -- these weren't really that significant though.

Lee Yool, also known as Prince Eui-sung, played by Kim Jyeong-hoon was the nice guy third wheel. As someone else had put it, he was a very admirable prince charming. He was sweet, caring, good looking, understanding, and he didn't act all arrogant like a royal normally would. And he fell in love with Chae-kyung and would have been the perfect man for her if not for her pairing with Lee Shin and a few unredeemable flaws that he ended up presenting. But he was a tragic hero. His love was doomed from the start and his life seemed to have been predestined to be miserable. As the former Crown Prince who lost his position at the tender age of five after his father died, he seemed to have lost everything in the world.

I'm not sure whether or not his greed or lust for something he couldn't have came with his fate or if it was just a trait passed onto him through his mother. But it was depressing to watch him continually pine after Chae-kyung, knowing full well that he shouldn't, but refusing to give up because some part of him was persistent to the point that he thought he had a chance at winning over a married woman who was obviously very much in love with her husband. It didn't matter that Chae-kyung told him again and again that she liked Shin, poor Lee Yool just didn't want to let go. And because of that, problems began to present themselves and in the end, his persistent love for Chae-kyung pretty much causes more trouble for her than was really necessary.

He was a very sweet and charming person; I will admit as much. But there is a very blatant flaw in his love for Chae-kyung that only serves to make me pity him rather than feel touched. In contrast, the role of Kang Shin-woo from a different series, You're Beautiful, was also a man who harbored a one-sided love for the main girl in the series; but his love for her was much more endearing and made me feel for him instead of pitying him. Like Yool, he was always there for the girl, lent his shoulder for her to cry on, and took care of and protected her in his own little way. He loved her secretly and due to circumstances, he never pushed for anything more than friendship until the very end when he knew he would never have another chance to tell her how much he loved her. This subject may or may not be touched upon later on in a different article.

Yool, on the other hand, selfishly forced his feelings onto Chae-kyung despite telling her that he didn't need any reciprocation from her. It was as if he thought that his passion would win her over if he kept moving forward and kept working his way into her life. He never heeded the warnings to keep at a distance, and he never seemed to step back to allow her the chance to breathe. Fighting for your love is commendable, but fighting for the heart of a married woman might be somewhat questionable, especially if she's already told you that she can only be friends. AND especially if her every move and action is being scrutinized by the public, by the royal family, and by the elders -- causing a scandalous affair to appear in the media because of his persistence probably wouldn't be the best way to show a girl how much he loved her.

Yool was plain and simply a selfish young man despite his princely attributes. He never once thought to look at how his actions would affect Chae-kyung and only thought about how he would show her how much he loved her. He only ever thought to make himself happy by winning over a girl who was unattainable to him.

In a different sense, the You're Beautiful role of Kang Shin-woo was in love with a single girl who wasn't receiving reciprocated feelings from the guy that SHE had fallen for. While she's still not hooked up or officially dating or serious with another man, Shin-woo had every right to try and woo her over to him -- and yet he still continued to give his girl the room and space she needed to breath. Lee Yool on the other hand, should have given up on the married woman from the start, especially after being warned, time and time again from Shin that he needs to stay away. Because, in contrast, there was much more at stake than just a lost love. Yool could just pick up and leave the country if he wanted to; but the world was watching Chae-kyung and a scandal about an affair would only serve to be disastrous.

The same went for Min Hyo-rin, played by Song Ji-hyo; except her reason for holding on was more legitimate. While Lee Yool fell for a warm and caring girl he had met for the first time and became attracted to because of his lonely history of having no friends, Hyo-rin had been Lee Shin's secret girlfriend for two years. Shin shared a history with Hyo-rin that cannot be replaced so simply. She might have been one of the obstacles in the way of our main couple, but she had good reason to be angry and jealous. In this aspect, I think Lee Shin's arrogant and spoiled personality had to do with their depressing end.

As a royal, he was being forced to marry a stranger in an arranged marriage. But he was also given the choice -- despite his choice being rather insignificant. He proposed to Hyo-rin, was rejected, and so out of spite for his family and the girl who chose her dream over her boyfriend at the age of nineteen, he agreed to marry another girl without even a direct objection. Nineteen is a very young age for a girl to have to give up her dream of becoming a famed ballerina and get married; aside from that, Hyo-rin had thought that he was just joking. I understand why Hyo-rin rejected the marriage proposal -- after all, it wasn't done as a means to tell her that he loved her and wanted to be with her forever. Shin proposed to her just because he didn't want to marry a complete stranger; he even told her so.

In this aspect, the Crown Prince was in the wrong and acted on an immature impulse. Marriage, after all, isn't something to make light of, and especially for the life of a royal, it wasn't something that should have been played with in such a fashion.

I felt sorry for Hyo-rin throughout the series and even found myself trying to make up excuses why Shin shouldn't be romping around with Hyo-rin when he was married to Chae-kyung. I couldn't help but to continuously tell myself, "Hyo-rin shouldn't be interfering. Why is she being so selfish and taking away Chae-kyung's man like that?" But as much as I like Chae-kyung, Hyo-rin really did get the bad end of the stick in this messed up love rectangle. She was not to blame completely for a lot of the scandals and problems going on. If one were to pin a fault on her actions, it would be the fact that she didn't stop persisting when she should have and that she used some rather disagreeable actions to "bully" Chae-kyung. After all, if a girl's present boyfriend suddenly shows up on the news as a married man to another girl, it hurts and he really doesn't deserve to be forgiven.

Hyo-rin, I felt should be able to do better than someone so fickle. But she persisted and then she damaged herself and caused trouble for others. I found that, after letting myself see things from her side of the conflict, I ended up fully respecting and admiring Hyo-rin's courage to want to keep her relationship with Shin going. She's the heroine that I sympathize with because she had been jilted and was merely trying to take back what belonged to her, even at the expense of looking like a horrible person. I felt bad that everyone else was making her out to be the bad woman and the terrible home-wrecker. Granted, I don't condone some of her actions, but apparently when you're in love with someone, you do a lot of stupid things.

Unfortunately, she ended up doing something extremely unforgivable and irresponsible that caused me to completely lose respect for her. For the sake of not giving too much away (assuming that I haven't already spoiled the entire series), I won't mention what it is; but the selfishness of her act made my admiration for her disappear almost completely. Because then she just turned into another damsel in distress who didn't understand that there are much more important things in the world than romance. At that young of an age, there is so much more life to look forward to that such a selfish action can never be the correct way out.

This series emphasized something rather important that many young people don't understand. While devastating at the time, nineteen is an age where you can experience a lot of downfalls, make a lot of mistakes, and still be able to move on. Because you are still young and you are given the opportunity to make mistakes until the sun rises again and again. Because as the elder Queen Mother mentions, after suffering a pain at the age of nineteen, you still have the age of twenty-nine and the age of thirty-nine and so on and so forth to experience more in life and move on from that pain.

A lost love isn't the end of the world -- even at an older age. Mistakes were meant to be made so that people can learn from them and become stronger and wiser for that reason.

The way that these kids were crying made it seem like they only lived until the age of twenty and that life was over after losing things and causing problems.

It was refreshing to see the contrast between the young ones and the eldest grandma; to see the mistakes that the kids made as well as hear it from the wizened and experienced grandmother that, life still continues to move on. It's a matter of whether or not you chose to move on with it.

There is a definite air of melancholy in this script. I noticed almost immediately that each character aside from Chae-kyung's personality at the beginning of the series, liked to mope about how life is unfair to them. Everyone seemed to repetitively remind their fellow co-characters as well as the audience that they were in a state of misery because of how they had "lost everything". Every single one of the royals seemed to be wallowing in their own self-pity, reaching out to tell the world that they are a victim of some untold history. Lee Shin lost his freedom because he became Crown Prince, Lee Yool apparently lost everything in his life when he was banished from the palace, Lee Yool's mother, Hye-jung apparently lost her life as well, and so on and so forth. They were all just trying to prove who was more of a victim in this lifetime and it got old real fast. When Chae-kyung joined the ranks of the depressing, "I lost everything" crew, I think I let out a groan of frustration.

My goodness, life was disastrous and terrible for these people.

I'm glad that in the end, Chae-kyung managed to return to her bubbly personality and her former self.

The life of a royal just seems so depressing when you look at it through their eyes in this series. It makes me determined to take the life of a commoner over rich aristocracy any time. After all, not just the kids, the even the adults seemed to have too many complications going on: rules, restrictions, reputation, etc., etc., etc.... It was frustrating to think that, these people with money and power who can have anything they want, can't seem to enjoy their luxurious lives and just spend day after day wallowing in self misery.

In contrast, a simple and small family such as Shin Chae-kyung's, struggling to make ends meet and rejoicing in any simple achievement made life so much more worthy of enjoyment. Even though they couldn't afford to buy anything extravagant and even though they were always worried that they couldn't provide for the family appropriately, they were happy and they could express their love and desires to their hearts content. And in the end, that was all that really mattered; that they cared for each other, that they were happy with their lives, and that they didn't continuously worry about the non-tragedies of living in a restricted environment.

Palace, or Princess Hours, or Goong... whichever title you prefer to use, is a rather extraordinary series. It is meaningful on many different levels despite it's obvious target at young teenagers -- being that it was adapted from Manhwa for young girls. I thoroughly enjoyed the experience, laughing at all the happy moments and crying along with the main characters. No one was essentially so malicious that you would end up hating them -- except maybe Lee Yool's mother, the Princess Hye-jung. But in that sense, I couldn't quite pinpoint what I thought about her.

The adults were really just there to propel the politics and family values and regulations. Chae-kyung's family showed up regulary to be supportive and show what type of hope there was for her outside of the palace, depicting the striking contrast between the two types of families. The King was a rather old fool and I really just got irritated with him a lot, and like with Hye-jung, I wasn't sure how I felt about the Queen's actions. At times, you understand why she does the things she does and why she acts the way she acts. But at other times, you wonder why she has to take things to such extremes and be so strict on everyone around her, including herself and her own blood-related family. She wasn't a very likable person from beginning to end and then her attempt at being turned into an understanding mother-figure was too sudden and too forced.

The court ladies were a lot of fun to follow, and I'm glad that Chae-kyung managed to remold her own two court ladies into friends rather than servants. By the end, even the overly strict and law-abiding, steel-faced Lady Choi ended up giving into Chae-kyung's persistence. It would have been fun if she also ended up finding a suitable male partner as well.

Each episode ended with a teddy bear modeling of our main characters which added onto the endearing feel of the series. I also liked Chae-kyung's Lee Shin pillow double that she made with a smiling Shin on one side and an angry Shin on the other.

Acting was great, direction was good, and the scenery and set of the palace was beautiful.

I would definitely recommend this series to anyone who is interested in a nice romance with a lot of good fun morale and friendship qualities mixed in. Despite a few of the unpleasant parts of the storyline that I question and well, ranted about, I really loved this series. I admit, without those parts that I've mentioned being faulty, I don't think the series would have been the same. Because not everything has to be cheerful and peaceful and peaches and rays of sunshine. Without a little misunderstanding and drama and semi-tragedy, the series would have been really boring. Because who wants to follow through a couple who's lives started off smooth, went by smoothly, and ended with a rainbow and a pot of gold?

As an afterthought, I may have mentioned a lot of things that irritated me, but as tradition has it, my blogs seem to get extremely long with series that I've actually enjoyed, despite the ranting. (For example, the City Hunter review from a while back which was the first review I posted on this blog.) It's the short ones that you'd have to worry about, because with those, I probably wasn't paying enough attention to the story to remember much about it. Of course, that's not always true, because I don't keep specific formats.