Our enduring love for Crash Landing On You, and how we’re finding it tough to move on.
How we can’t seem to find much information on the music composer from Kingdom, Mok Yeong Jin.
How Kingdom is set at the start of the 17th century, three years after the end of the Imjin War against Japan. Although Kingdom is entirely fictional, the Sunjo Annals describe a plague that swept through Korea in the early 1800s. Other annals report on a famine between 1670 and 1671 that resulted in mass famine.
The main characters: Crown Prince Lee Chang, physician Seo-bi, Chief State Councilor Cho Hak ju, the Crown Prince’s body Mu Young, the mysterious peasant Young shin, and the Queen Consort.
The mystery behind the king’s illness and disappearance from public life.
Court hierarchy and how the Crown Prince, as the son of a concubine, is in danger because the Queen Consort is pregnant. If she bears a son, that son will be the Crown Prince, unless the king dies before the child is born.
The Crown Prince’s audacious decision to leave the palace, search for physician Lee Seung hui, and travel the great distance to Dong Nae.
The Crown Prince’s confession to Mu Young that it was HE who committed treason by writing the letter and getting the other scholars to sign it.
Young shin’s decision to take Dan I and turn him into soup, which ultimately leads all of the patients at the clinic to turn into monsters.
References
Until this point, I have firmly avoided zombie dramas. 아니요 No Nope No way. No matter how many people recommended Train to Busan or how often I have been tempted to watch it for the cast, it's still been a no. But I'm going to trust you on this and join in the Kingdom watch.
ReplyDeleteCece, I am with you on the zombies. Never interested me. But I am trusting Joanna and Sung-hee on this one and will watch and listen along.
DeleteThank you, Cece and Malcolm, for trusting us to go on this zombie journey. We are flattered and honored that you have this faith in us! We will do our very best to make it worthwhile. For me, I believe in the process: whenever we have embarked on these Kdramas, I have always found far more to them than I ever imagined. And this is on top of already choosing shows that we expected to have a lot of substance.
DeleteCece and Malcolm, I'm sort of overwhelmed and grateful for your words. Thank you for your faith in us. We will do our best to make Kingdom worth your time and head space.
DeleteMe too! This will definitely be my first foray into anything zombie related but you have piqued my interest...though I will be honest and say that I have my remote control at the ready in case I have to fast forward through any bit. Yikes! I am only doing this because I recently found your podcast. Ay!
DeleteSo the first episode had two beheadings, torturing Confucian scholars by branding with hot irons, murdering a servant for not knowing where the Crown Prince was, human soup complete with a finger, and finally zombies eating a person. But Joanna couldn't finish Something in the Rain because... 'checks notes'... the mom was so terrible! Hmmm..... Can't say I'm hooked yet, but will be interesting to see where this goes!
ReplyDeleteI'm laughing too hard to answer this one. I'll defer to Joanna.
DeleteMalcolm, I hear you and I don't really have an answer to why I couldn't get through Something in the Rain, but I got through Kingdom a couple of times. Based on your recommendation and Sung Hee's, I promise to come back to Something in the Rain. Especially since you're coming along for the Kingdom ride!
DeleteI'm sorry, Cece and Malcolm. I'm all about the zombies! Train to Busan actually spoiled me on zombie media for a while. Korea has actually done really well with the genre the last few years. Besides Kingdom and Train to Busan, I've seen #Alive and All of Us Are Dead, as well as part of Happiness. There is also a really good zombie Webtoon called Surviving Romance, but I put it on pause when All of Us Are Dead was made into a drama.
ReplyDeleteI tried a few different methods to find the composer, including using different things in Hangeul.
It's good to know that it takes place following a war with Japan. My son says that the notices are Japanese and I was wondering what the historical influence for that would be.
I've seen scenes of forced cannibalism in films before. A film in a popular horror franchise had a very similar reveal with a fingerbone. But it was brushed off as being a peppercorn.
I will probably mention some zombie lore at some point.