Lie to Me (2011)

Lie To Me
내게 거짓말을 해봐
(May – June 2011)

who’s in it
Yoon EunHye (Coffee Prince)
Kang JiHwan (Coffee House)
Sung Joon (Shut Up Flower Boy Band)
Jo YoonHee (You Who Rolled In Unexpectedly)
Hong Soo Hyun (The Princess’ Man)

what’s it about
Yoon EunHye works for the ministry of tourism and she considers herself a servant of the people. She has plenty of energy and has a tomboyish charm about her that is accepted well by her coworkers, as she has a casual and friendly relationship with them despite her tendency for bumble-headed goofiness.

Well, she’s liked by most people but the biggest exception is Hong SooHyun, who is married to Yoon EunHye’s first love (Ryu SeungSoo). This snooty gal often goes out of her way to keep Yoon EunHye in self-doubt, who she considers her ugly duckling childhood friend. She wants Yoon EunHye to always remember she is a subpar version of a girl and will never transition from an ugly duckling into a swan. However, when an innocent white lie by said ugly duckling to save some self-esteem turns into a gigantic misunderstanding in the elite circles, hotel magnate Kang JiHwan somehow finds himself cast in the unlikely role of Yoon EunHye’s Prince Charming husband. Needless to say, it’s not the sort of role playing the career-minded heir adapts to willingly, or with any civility.

Instrumental in all of this confusion is Sung Joon, Kang JiHwan’s happy go lucky but also not-so-happy-go-lucky baby bro who has just breezed back into town, and as these things go, at the same time as the girl both brothers had loved/still love. Jo YoonHee has stepped back on K-soil with the intention of getting back what she had lost...Kang JiHwan.

commitment 
16 episodes

network
SBS

first impressions
Surprisingly, a really good one. Lie is silly, as contract marriage drama plots often are, but if you’re like me and find fake relationship contrivance the best kind of kdrama reality bender, then you also are like me and forgive plot stalls in these ones more than any other type of redundancy. Many of my favorites seem to use the boundaries of marriage as their boxing ring. What can I say, I really do believe a relationship is a battlefield, and somehow, although I wouldn’t personally know, marriage seems like a downright cage fight! Anyhow, I just love the many back and forth emotional punches that always accompany these bouts!

Back to Lie: Kang JiHwan sometimes feels like he’s reprising his Coffee House role, but this version of him is far less eccentric and infinitely more relatable, and if Kang JiHwan does anything extremely well, this actor really knows how to play a handsome, rich snot with an inner lining of gold. As for our girl Yoon EunHye, she makes for a very convincing every day woman and isn’t afraid of going ‘ugly’ for a role. You have to appreciate that kind of freedom. She’s a very pretty girl, but she also has a very normal face. You just can’t help kind of relate to her.

I have a kdrama watching buddy, and she was really reluctant to watch this with me as she does not like Kang JiHwan, but even she admits this one is starting out to be a pretty fun watch—romantic enough to engage, not too narrow a story that growth couldn’t happen, banter quick enough to keep fresh, and just out of bounds wacky enough to make for some real laughs. All in all, not a bad start.

(first impressions initially posted Jun 1, 2011)

wildcard factor

Well, there’s a significant amount of good-looking to be found for female watchers, most especially relative newbie Sung Joon, who moved on after this to put his delicious deep voice to better use in 2012’s Shut Up Flower Boy Band. Some Shut Up fans might be motivated to seek this one out, if it hasn’t been seen already.

And, obviously, Yoon EunHye and Kang JiHwan fans will also have a reason to check it out.

You've Fallen For Me (2011)

You’ve Fallen For Me
넌 내게 반했어 / Heartstrings
(Jun – Aug 2011)

who’s in it
Jung YongHwa (You’re Beautiful)
Park ShinHye (You’re Beautiful)
Song ChangUi (Life is Beautiful)
Kang MinHyuk (You Who Rolled in Unexpectedly)
Lee HyunJin (Operation Proposal)
So YiHyun (Gloria)
Im SeMi (Hooray for Love)
Woo Ri (Crime Squad)

what’s it about
Welcome everybody to a college populated by hot young thangs aspiring stars—this school of arts is a musical place where extraordinarily talented people have gathered to inspire one another. Even the professors are hot young talented thangs (meet Song ChangUi and So YiHyun).

Park ShinHye is a traditional music major here, her specialty the gayageum, an old school Korean string instrument played by plucking, not strumming. She is the pride and joy of her famous grandfather, an authority in gayageum circles, and he wants the next generation of his bloodline to become just as well-known and respected. Our girl’s committed to her music, absolutely, but she’s no stuffy bore, she’s very personable despite her hard-working nature and has a quality circle of fun-loving friends who together form a traditional music quartet called the Windflowers.

Park ShinHye is not usually one to get involved in campus civil wars, but because of her love for all things responsible and traditional, she finds herself caught in a fight to defend the honor of traditional music against the too-cool-for-school campus hunk Jung YongHwa, a contemporary music student, and also the lead singer of a popular rock band called The Stupid. This boy appears to be ambivalent about everything but three things: his music, his family, and So YiHyun, the ballet instructor he has a wildly inappropriate one-sided crush on. Then this new girl enters his world and starts yanking on his strings, working up something that feels like an emotion when all he wants to do is play music and love the ballerina…will he be able to hold his cranky ground when faced with the full on cuteness that is Park ShinHye?

Oh right, there’s also some much ado about nada regarding a campus musical production Song ChangUi has been recruited to bring to glorious fruition, and that’s where supporting leads Lee HyunJin and WooRi play a part, but grievously little. There is also some university politics and parental boohoo subplots, but it is all sooo not worth mentioning.

commitment 
15 episodes (originally planned for the standard 16, but due to a car accident that involved Park ShinHye in week four of broadcast, only one episode aired, and the show decided to end its run early instead of going to 17—thankfully, for I cannot imagine how they would have stalled for another 120 minutes

network
MBC

director
Pyo MinSoo (Full House, Coffee House)

screenwriter
Lee MyungSuk

first impressions
An obvious lack of depth and variety in the writing plagued this show from the opening: gimmicky, shallow, hurried, and let’s not forget to mention the dreaded foreshadowing of student-teacher l’amour (blech). I had some lofty expectations, a side effect of having loved Your Beautiful too much and having foolishly tried to associate two wholly unrelated projects together just because it carried the same star power. My own fault for being greedy, so I quickly adjusted my frame of mind. I wasn’t completely loving the story presented, but I was going to go with the flow and stay open to it. Fortunately, the direction of the show was helmed by a man very comfortable in light romantic comedies with narrow plots, a director with a good track record for coaxing cute out of even the slimmest margin of story. The feel and look of the drama was stimulating on the senses, the soundtrack felt the right amount of breezy and catchy, and all of the cast seemed well recruited for their parts. Ah, yes, the people were going to be this drama’s greatest asset. We were given a little bit of everything.

The gorgeous idol: Jung YongHwa

The respectable actor: Song ChangUi

The energetic fresh face: Im SeMi

And, of course, a popular leading lady: Park ShinHye

Plus, as extra fan service: Kang MinHyuk

With these young stars clearing the path, how bad could it fumble?

City Hunter (2011)

City Hunter
시티헌터
(May – July 2011)

who’s in it
Lee MinHo (Boys Over Flowers, Personal Taste)
Park MinYoung (Sungkyunkwan Scandal)
Lee JoonHyuk (Three Brothers, Equator Man)
Kim SangJoong (My Man’s Woman, Life is Beautiful)
Goo Hara (KARA – idol group member)

what’s it about
In 1983, at night in the hostile waters of North Korea, a South Korean special forces group awaits evacuation after a clandestine assignment to infiltrate Pyongyang. However, instead of rescue, they are systematically executed by their own military. One survivor—Kim SangJoon—makes one of those maniacal blood vows to avenge the murder of his comrades.

Fast forward to now: Lee MinHo is the son of one those fallen comrades, one that had also been Kim SangJoon’s best friend. So naturally, to get the gears moving on his grand revenge, Kim SangJoon steals away his friend’s infant son into the jungles of Southeast Asia with the purpose of hoarding tons and tons of illicit drug money in order to train the kid into a lean mean handsome killing machine. Well, a lean mean killing machine, anyway, the handsome is just a lucky genetic bonus (for us).

The two converge upon Seoul like night vultures to exact their brand of justice—unfortunately, plans go awry when our faux-playboy slash secret-hunter-of-corrupt-politicians Lee MinHo finds himself questioning his purpose in life after falling in love with beautiful presidential guard Park MinYoung.

commitment 
20 episodes

network
SBS

first impressions
After the first episode of City Hunter, I was a smidge dismayed. Let’s see, we had several big explosions, a submarine, a couple of mass murders, jungle drug lords, landmines, and elephants—and that was all under one hour. Honestly, it felt like a hot mess, like some badly done sixty minute mash up of Lee JunKi’s 2007 kdrama thriller Time Between Dog and Wolf and the crazy 2008 Ben Stiller and Robert Downey, Jr. action spoof Tropical Thunder. Was this going to be yet another long nonsensical glare-athon mixed with some unintentional machine gun comedy? Everything about this premiere hour sat ill with me, the tone promising all kinds of mayhem that I normally feared of a typical action series.

At the time, I thought to myself, “MinHo, hon, I love ya, but I don’t know if I’m ready for this one.” The show was relocated to my back shelf and left to percolate. Months later, after the show concluded its broadcast run and kdrama fans around the globe unanimously loved it, I decided to go back for a second try. City Hunter fans, let your concerns ease away, the above is only my first impression of City, I have generally nice things to say south of here.

wildcard factor

As everyone knows, Lee MinHo is quite the CF princeling, a celebrity who can seduce people into buying almost anything, from coffee to Cadillacs. Realistically speaking, even in a fictional setting, the groundwork for the main character of this drama was a bit...um, how can I put this nicely...absurd? The concept of a trenchcoat-wearing city slick crusader called the City Hunter was a pretty tough sell: skinny pretty dude who looks like some sort of Burberry model is raised in the drug cartel jungles of Asia to master the art of assassination while cultivating superhuman ninja skills that can take out hordes of nefarious men in a frenzy of swirlies and kickeroos, and of course, not only is he a devil of a prizefighter, but an uber nerd with a surreal brilliant techgeek robot mind like Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook guy). This was a textbook example of improbable perfection...but Lee MinHo actually turned this far-fetched concept into a pleasing watch. I tell you what, he was good, really good at creating just the right persona and making you buy into it. Even if a part of you didn’t completely believe, your disbelief was no match for his self-confidence.

Lee MinHo goes undercover.

This was a huge wild card, in my opinion, as the character description on this guy was so hilariously implausible. I mean, how does someone raised for most of his life in a jungle become a hacker expert? How? Anyway, if Lee hadn’t done such a good job shrinking down the exaggeration into a credible person, this show would have flopped all ten thousands ways silly. They were really lucky to cast him.

Midas (2011)

Midas
마이더스
(Feb – May 2011)

who’s in it
Jang Hyuk (Tazza, Chuno)
Lee MinJung (Boys Over Flowers, Smile You)
Kim HeeAe (Snow Flower)
No MinWoo (My GF is a Gumiho, Pasta)

what’s it about
Jang Hyuk, the Jang Hyuk—Mr. Chuno-badass himself—gets all suited and tied in this melodrama that grabs its name from the Greek mythology king that turned everything he touched into gold. Jang used to be a badass money guy, in fact, he was soooo good at this particular career path that he had a KOSDAQ ticker scrolling across his forehead, down his arms, and wrapped around his little fingers. Ok, not really, but our hero was so damn offhandedly awesome with money that he got bored fed up with the greedy side of trading it and went back to school. What did he pick? The same thing all aimless career-lost people pick: law school. Well, it turns out, he’s also damn awesome with law manipulation and he writes a mean thesis about loopholes in the legal system, which gets some corporate wolves pretty excited.

So at present we get to meet the freshly law degreed Jang Hyuk who has the Seoul law community all abuzz in excitement to get him on their payroll. His girlfriend/fiance is Lee MinJung, a bright-eyed and youthful nurse at a VIP ward who is innocently planning their future of love together. (Unfortunately this VIP ward has nothing to do with Big Bang, but some fun trivia for you: Lee MinJung was invited to star in one of G-Dragon’s music videos in 2009 during his solo Heartbreaker promotions, but declined.)

However, when Jang Hyuk decides to throw down with a law firm that babysits a crazy rich family of powerful screwups that idolize Mario Puzo’s fictional mafioso Corleone family (emphasis on crazy here), our freshman lawyer gets in over his head. Warning to all: if any of your potential employers waxes poetic about Al Pacino’s Don Corleone, take my advice, run like hell. It’s not gonna end well, and that’s not a spoiler, that’s just good American trivia to live your life by.

director
Kang ShinHyo (Tazza)

screenwriter(s)
Choi WanKyu (Swallow the Sun, The Grand Chef)

commitment 
20 episodes

network
SBS

not interested, passed
Soooo…let’s see here, Jang Hyuk decided against rubbing his latte hotness up against Ha JiWon in the comedy Secret Garden in order to challenge his acting boundaries...by playing this ridiculously intense but, let’s face it, rather unoriginal role about a corporate lawyer who gets sucked into a whirlpool of greedy evil. He gets to make lovey dovey eyes with Lee MinJung, which isn’t a bad trade off in terms of costar actress hotness, sure, but the drama itself is lacking some key things. Logic, for one. Flow, another. This one feels like 2011’s effort at a Bad Guy redo, and I suffered through that one only because I fell for Kim JaeWook’s version of a sexy suicidal tramp stud.

Midas just doesn’t have what it takes to stay on my watch list. This show is clearly going to be a gnarly ride down a ridiculous story line. No thanks.

BUT for those of you who might care, eye candy is rich in here with the likes of pretty No MinWoo (who likes to frolic in trampy hotel harem five-somes) and studly Jung SukWon (who at first blush seems to be a nonessential character, but probably will develop into more, pity I don’t really care about the show), so if you love them lots, maybe it’s worth a check out.

My Princess (2011)

My Princess
마이 프린세스
(Jan – Feb 2011)

who’s in it
Song SeungHun (East of Eden, Autumn Fairytale)
Kim TaeHee (IRIS, Love Story in Harvard)
Park YeJin (Queen SeonDuk, Something Happened in Bali)
Ryu SooYoung (Lawyers of ROK, Bad Couple)
Lee SoonJae (Flames of Ambition, High Kick 2)
Lee KiKwang (High Kick 2, member of B2ST)

what’s it about
Background: ROK (Republic of Korea) wants to become CMOK (Constitutional Monarchy of Korea, or something like that) and reinstate the crown by heralding forth a long hidden blood descendant of Emperor Sunjong, the last monarch of the Korean empire. Emperor Sunjong apparently has one of his true bloodline living strong in contemporary times due to a heir he kept secret back in the day, this fact validated by a document long thought lost but now found and presented to the baffled public. This push to give rebirth to the royal heritage of Korea’s past is the result of diligent efforts by varying people with varying motives.

Presently:
A student and a part-time historical reenactment photo-op princess (whoa, mouthful), Kim TaeHee, doesn’t know it when she first meets the rich Daehan Group heir Song SeungHun, but she’s a real princess that Song’s own ailing grandfather has been longing to enthrone all his life. As far as Kim TaeHee’s aware, she’s little more than an orphan-turned-innkeeper’s daughter…and Song SeungHun’s the kind of rich kid that has a friggin’ museum named after him…so the two have very little in common when their universes initially collide. Well, little in common but for their mutually ridiculous cuteness. When his dry and condescending type of charm mingles against her loud, in-yo-face brand of all-encompassing vortex type of charm, there is surprisingly good synergy.

The darling prince of the Daehan Group, Song SeungHun, is actually a pretty nice non-stuffy guy who is working against a one-sided crush on the curator of his namesake museum, played by the fab Park YeJin. She’s just adorable, this woman. She should have been the lead gal. Hahaha, I joke, I joke, I’m just teasing you Kim TaeHee fans. Anyhow, YeJin’s already got her love triangle going when we meet the characters. Her first love, played with professorial dignity by Ryu SooYoung, is still madly in love with her, incidentally, this is to the chagrin of our princess-in-secret Kim TaeHee, who is also crushing hard on this intellectual sweater-vest type of gentleman. By the by, Kim TaeHee is also a nice gal, who despite her financial instability and slightly lonely life, doesn’t struggle with an inferiority complex (thank goodness!). She’s got a healthy helping of pride, and this next thing is pretty rare, she’s got a nose for self-preservation. This is a young woman who looks out for number one (but not in a nasty way) and she doesn’t seem the sort to be sacrificed on the alter of Kdrama “pitiable girl” syndrome. Or maybe I’m just hoping. We’ll see.

(what’s it about initially posted Jan 12, 2011)

director
Kwon SeokJang (Pasta)

screenwriter(s)
Kim Eun Sook (Secret Garden, On Air, City Hall)
Jang Young Shil

commitment 
16 episodes

network
MBC

first impressions
Oh, the handsomeness.
The Handsomeness. The Handsomeness.
THE HANDSOMENESS.
Be still, my beating heart. ^^ To say I’m somewhat partial to Mr. Song SeungHun’s brand of yummy would be like understating my love for fried foods. Doesn’t he totally look like a real life prince, or what?! Seriously now, let’s all have a moment to revel, didn’t Mr. Autumn Fairytale guy grow up oh-so very dreamy? Drooool.

Basically this beginning felt like the drama I was waiting for all last year, the kind of casual romantic comedy that takes immediate advantage of the really snappy chemistry between two main leads. Zip is hard to predict when casting the main couple, obviously, otherwise every show would be a hit. Here, however, it seems we have a real win. Pretty A-listers who don’t negate one another’s charms, fangirl-tastic Cinderella fairytale, lots of twinkling rapier wit and physical comedy; I especially liked the duo’s friendly gravitational reaction to one another, their immediate touchy feely coziness due to their innate meddling personalities (they resorted to banmal - casual language - pretty quickly with one other, Kim TaeHee often calling him “dummy” in affectionate teasing).

Helmed by the director of Pasta (a 2010 winner in my book) and the screenplay writer who scribbled On Air (another winner), I had some rather high hopes. The best part of this drama was that despite its type of humor, when it turned serious, it didn’t feel out of context and managed to be fairly real (well, minus the whole reinstatement of the monarchy bit, that’s quite a leap of faith, but I’ll bite). Considering the director and screenwriters involved, things boded well for Kim TaeHee and Song SeungHun’s fate. I’m definitely not minding a visit with this “adult” Goong…and obviously when I say adult, I’m not implying a pole dancing princess, but a more grown up interpretation of everyone’s favorite fantasy: orphan girl learning she’s really a princess. My Princess managed to find the appropriate tone in blending fairytale and reality.

Kim TaeHee is taking a page out of the Shin MinAh’s acting textbook and trying her spin on bubbly comedy (Shin rocked last year’s My Girlfriend is a Nine-Tailed Fox). Kim appears a natural for this kind of comedy (versus, imo, her more creative ventures...like 2006 movie The Restless, cringe cringe cringe! Or her mediocrity in the drama IRIS, snore, snore, snore! But that’s neither here nor there). As the Gumiho role did for Shin MinAh, this earthy and vivacious part suits Kim and shows fans her more approachable, down-to-earth side.

One small concern from me: for now, while Kim TaeHee is the cuter of the two, it’s Song SeungHun who delivers more for me when the plot twists become more serious. There are small moments when it feels Kim is trying a smidge too hard to please, when she feels just slightly off key, but it’s not a distraction, and she’s quite charming enough to make the misses inconsequential. I’m sure she’ll settle into her role once this really gets going. I’m looking forward to seeing her shine.

How much do I love this drama’s introductory steps? A LOT. My energy was sapped by the end of 2010 by holiday and cold, and it took all my last reserves to post my year end review but this drama has sent new energy coursing through me. What a pleasant way to kick off 2011. As of now, our lovable princess is trying to help the dashing prince win another girl’s heart…I wonder which of the two will fall for the other first?

*giddy*

(first impressions initially posted Jan 12, 2011)

wildcard
Well, this one was more about the pretty than about achieving any kind of profundity.

Be warned: while Princess did manage enough enjoyment to manage a respectable fan base—due to its successful packaging of Song SeungHun as the most handsomest man in all of Korea (nope, nope, I don’t want to hear any arguments on this, not today) and Kim TaeHee as a nicely wrapped fairy who wore poofy-skirts-too-short-for-winter—yet in the end, it lacked for a lot of plot logic. Now I don’t want to discourage anyone from giving it a try, as it was generous in its own way (as I mentioned, it gave us a lot of the pretty), but inevitably it cannot be ignored that Princess lived too far into self-centered confusion to be wholly recommended. The premise had a lot of potential, but the actual development of the story did not live up to it.

Dream High (2011)

Dream High
드림하이
(Jan – Feb 2011)

who’s in it
Kim SooHyun (Giant, Father’s House)
Taecyeon (Cinderella’s Sister, 2PM-member)
Suzy (Miss A-member)
Ham EunJung (T-ara-member)
IU
Wooyoung (2PM-member)
Uhm KiJoon (Hero)
Lee YoonJi (Goong)

what’s it about
The entire drama is actually a flashback about an artist called K who rises to international fame—WORLD STAR fame (oh, Rain, you better watch yo back!). Right away, we know K is a [money-making] big deal because our first introduction to K is at a Grammy awards ceremony, and we all know only the best of the best [who sell lots of albums] get to go to the Grammys [don’t mind my raging cynicism =)].

But K’s real identity is kept secret from us because...

Alright, let’s travel back in time and get to the facts. The director of Kirin Art School gets the story rolling, and he is played by Bae YongJoon, aka Mr. Winter Sonata (that’s what I call him, the show calls him Ghost…I like my nickname better). Real kpop idol-con Kim HyunJoong makes a quick cameo and gets named-dropped as a former student of Kirin, so we know two things right off the bat: 1) Kirin is a well-known performing arts academy in Seoul, and 2) this is not a violin and ballet kind of education, they totally do the kpop at this school.

Back to Mr. Winter Sonata, who is a man who wants to encourage aspiring young talent—which is…not too far from real life, actually. He handpicks three “special” students, letting them bypass the school’s traditional selection process, which sets off sparks between the jealous incoming freshman and these leapfroggers. There is also some mythology and wonder about some kind of pendant that supposedly gives good mojo to its owner…it is symbolic of dreams, I believe, but these kids take it more literally. It is the shape of a K. Dun-dun-dun.

The drama is about these Kirin students and their struggles to overcome their personal and professional growing pains. During Kirin’s open auditions, Mr. Winter Sonata tells all the hopefuls, “The contest has now begun. Don’t fear it, enjoy it.” It’s like he’s talking to us, the viewership.

Not unlike a sitcom, this one is an ensemble cast with multiple story threads intersecting a million different ways. Here are your main idols characters:

Relatively new, and real female kpop act Miss A donates Suzy (who plays Go HyeMi), a richly voiced girl with a richly bitchy attitude to match. When her comfortable world comes crashing down around her due to her father’s business failures and loan shark debts, she is forced to give up her dreams of Juilliard and head for Kirin instead. Her main motivating factor to attend a school she considers crappy is her fear that the loan sharks will focus their terrorizing intent on her little sister if she doesn’t somehow get rich and pay them back their money. Yet again, a kdrama Dad has run away all by hisself and left children to deal with the bag of horse pile.

Suzy

Of Bo Peep Bo Peep fame, cutesy female kpop act T-ara donates to the drama cause Ham EunJung (Yoon BaekHee), the most veteran idol-actor of the gathered crop. She plays Suzy’s meek ex-friend, a girl who has been contently living in her friend’s over-talented shadow...until she suspects her deep feelings of sisterhood may have been one-sided. When opportunity gives her the chance to shine alone, she gets a taste of glory and public validation…and realizes it is something worth a fight.

Ham EunJung

Popular male act 2PM gives up Taecyeon (JinGuk) for a while. In his second effort at acting, Taecyeon finds himself playing another character with some rough edges. Like every kid collected in this special group, he also suffers from father issues. It may (or may not) be of interest to you to know that he rides a motorcycle and has awesomely spiked highlighted hair. He’s gonna do just fine. Also, it’s obvious he has a thing for our lead gal Suzy.



Taecyeon

 2PM is feeling generous (or maybe it’s just cuz this show is one-half produced by Park JinYoung, their boss…), but not only do 2PM fans get Taecyeon’s ab-licious presence, they get a cool and charming Wooyoung (Jason) in the deal, too. He plays a foreign-Korean freshman, a kind-hearted dude who thinks life is just chill and, turns out, this seemingly unambitious starlet is the #1 ranked talent in the frosh Kirin class.

Wooyoung

Real life ingénue singer IU (Kim PilSook) makes her tv debut as herself (kind of). She is a musically gifted girl who has trouble managing her weight (I’ll let you figure out which part of that sentence is the departure from real life). She is, in a nutshell, completely lovable. She almost instantly falls head over heels for her foreign classmate Jason (above), who has charmed her with the usual classy Casanova trick: not being a douchebag. He notices her despite the fact that she tries to stay unnoticed, and wins her over completely with his common decency, a personality trait none of her other peers have learned from their parents.

IU

The best thing about having IU on the show? We kpop fans get little gems like the clip below. IU doing a cover of 2AM’s tearful crooner 죽어도 못 보내 (Can’t Let You Go Even if I Die):



Alrighty now, I’ve saved the best for last. Our lead-lead is played by the only actor-actor among the main cast (thank you drama gods), the natural talent-overflowing Kim SooHyun (Song SamDong). He plays a musical genius trapped in the package of a “country bumpkin,” but the sage Mr. Winter Sonata recognizes his musical talents and recruits him as one of his special project kids. Our country boy immediately falls for Suzy, the tough-talking city girl, and follows her to Seoul to join Kirin. Oh right, he also goes there to pursue his dreams of becoming a big star so he can make lots of money and take care of his mother.

Kim SooHyun

(what’s it about initially posted Feb 4, 2011)