K Drama Chat Weekly

Today, we’ll be discussing Episode 3 of Gyeongseong Creature, the hit K Drama on Netflix starring Park Seo-joon as Jang Tae-sang, Han So-hee as Yoon Chae-ok,  Wi Ha-jun as Kwon Jun-taek, Kim Soo-hyun as Lady Maeda, Jo Han-chul as Yoon Joon-won, Ji Woo as Myeong-ja, Jo Han-chul as Yoon Joon-won, and Kim Hae-sook as Nawol daek. We discuss: The song we feature during the recap: Time by Baek A, the acoustic version Whether or not we think Jang Tae-sang had an affair with Lady Maeda Jang Tae-sang’s plan to re-enter Ongseong Hospital The game mahjong The drawing of Yoon Chae-ok’s mom and how it landed in Jang Tae-sang’s hands through the tailor Jang Tae-sang’s encounter with the samurais who beat him up How Sachimoto helped Jang Tae-sang and Kwon Jun-taek  re-enter the hospital How Yoon Chae-ok doesn’t hesitate to kill the doctor when she saves the children The significance of fireworks to the Korean military and Korean culture The amazing cinematography in this episode, particularl...

Today, we’ll be discussing Episode 2 of Gyeongseong Creature, the hit K Drama on Netflix starring Park Seo-joon as Jang Tae-sang, Han So-hee as Yoon Chae-ok, Wi Ha-hun as Kwon Jun-taek, Kim Soo-hyun as Lady Maeda, Ji Woo as Myeong-ja, Jo Han-chul as Yoon Joon-won, and Kim Hae-sook as Nawol daek. We discuss: How we are grateful to our listeners! We have listeners all over the world and our audience is growing! The song we feature in the recap: Forever by SUHO. How the Japanese and Korean characters in this show speak both Japanese and Korean and it can be very confusing. How knowing what language our characters are speaking gives you a sense of who has the upper hand in the conversation. The sleuths, who are really good, because they figured out where Myeong-ja is and how she got there (she was sent there by Lade Maeda). How Mr. Gu wonders if Myeong-ja is another of the many women and girls who have disappeared in Gyeongseong, a reference to the Japanese Army practice of kidnapping wome...

Welcome to Season 6 of K Drama Chat! In this season, we will recap and analyze Gyeongseong Creature! Today, we’ll be discussing Episode 1 of Gyeongseong Creature, the hit K Drama on Netflix starring Park Seo-joon as Jang Tae-sang, Han So-hee as Yoon Chae-ok, Wi Ha-jun as Kwon Jun-taek, Kim Soo-hyun as Lady Maeda, Ji Woo as Myeong-ja, Jo Han-chul as Yoon Joon-won, and Kim Hae-sook as Nawol daek. Gyeongseong Creature was written by Kang Eun-kyung, directed by Chung Dong-yoon and Roh Young-sub. The first seven episodes were released on Netflix on December 22, 2023. The last 3 episodes dropped on January 5, 2024. We discuss: The song we feature during the recap, Time by Baek A. How the setting of this show is personal to both of us because our parents were kids in Asia who lived under the Japanese occupation during WWII. The Japanese Army retreating from Harbin, China. Turns out Unit 731 of the Japanese Army, which was based in Harbin and was later discovered to have been doing human exper...

Today, we’re doing a special recap and review of Mr. Queen with Professor Ernabel Demillo. For those of you who don’t know Ernabel, or Ernie as we call her, she is Department Chair of the Communication and Media Culture Department at Saint Peter's University and host of the Emmy-award winning "Asian American Life" show on CUNY-TV. We discuss: Why we chose Mr. Queen in the first place for Season 5 Our favorite scenes from the entire season The scenes we found the funniest, all of them involving Shin Hye-sun, of course! That we think the show is ultimately about identity, change and transformation How every one of the main characters was transformed in some way Whether the king will love the queen in the same way, now that Jang Bong-hwan has left her body The small issues we had with the show How King Cheoljong DID try to enact some reforms, but was not successful Asian-American Life (AAL), the only monthly TV show devoted to the Asian-American diaspora, life and experience...