Fantasy Couple, ep. 01-04

[oyceter]

Anna is a filthy rich woman who has spent several years (or most of her life? I can't tell) in the US. She's recently moved back to Korea, much to the dismay of her browbeaten, bullied husband, who married her for her money but who also seems to have loved her once. Jang Chul Soo is a handyman trying to pinch pennies, since he's raising his dead brother's three sons. They anti-meet-cute when he helps her with her car, and she mistakes him for a murderer and beats his head in with a shovel.

Eventually, she gets amnesia (my first amnesia drama! a milestone!), and he ends up convincing her she's his girlfriend to save on housekeeping bills and to get back the money she owes him.

Normally, this premise would have me hating the hero from the get-go. While I wasn't very fond of Jang Chul Soo in the beginning, I at least don't want to whap him multiple times because of his scheme, largely due to the slapstick tone of the drama. In the beginning, the humor is extremely broad -- Anna's snobbiness and meanness is hugely exaggerated, to the point where even I didn't like her, and I usually like "bitchy" women (scarequotes for problematics surrounding use of "bitchy" as descriptor, not to imply the women aren't actually mean). I have some problems with this, namely that the heroes of kdramas seem to be allowed to be alpha male and aggressive and often plain mean in a way heroines aren't; if heroines are, it has to be shown as being wrong. I was also completely unconvinced of the viability of Anna and Chul Soo as a couple, and I was (and am) bored by her husband's storyline.

That said, the third and fourth episode either improve tremendously, or I got used to the broad humor and started to like it. The entire thing with Anna knowing so little about housework that she makes things worse and not better is totally expected, but I still thought it was funny, largely because of Chul Soo's expressions. That, and the very cute laundry-in-a-tub scene.

Chul Soo's softening much faster than Anna is, despite Anna's (very few) moments of weakness, and that while the joke seems to be on Anna most of the time, it always ends up being on Chul Soo. Well, that, and they're hilariously cute when they bond over finding money. I am even growing fond of the snooty way she tosses her hair.

Am having the same class issues with this one that I have had with most of the other series I've seen (moral uprightness of being poor coupled with fetishization of the filthy rich lifestyle), ditto with race issues (socializing with white people as sign of breeding and wealth, knowledge of English as shortcut to coolness). But it's making me laugh, so I will probably keep watching.

Also, this show makes me crave jajangmyeon like crazy, even though I have only had it once in my life. Must find restaurant around here with it, so I can have some, though may settle for zhajiangmien if I can't find jajangmyeon.

Comments

[desdenova.livejournal.com]

*reads plot summary*

I swear this was a bad American movie back in the 80s. I can't remember what it was called or who was in it, though...

[oyceter]

Oh yeah! I think it was based on "Overboard"? Not that I've seen that...

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Overboard. The main character's name, Anna Jo, is a nod to Goldie Hawn's name in the movie, Joanna.

I *cough* am kinda fond of the movie...as a guilty pleasure.

I think the drama handles the story, better...the movie more tried to justify his actions, where the drama couldn't be any clearer that he was wrongwrongwrong and screwed up big time, but can't fix it.

[octopedingenue]

Now I'm going to have to watch this drama, so two of my guilty pleasure genres can BREED.

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Well, considering it's the one modern kdrama I rec to EVERYONE(though I suspect Lovers will end up being another) I shall say: wwwwwaaaaaaatttttttcccccchhhhhhhh.

[oyceter]

Oooo... I was reading your posts on Lovers and waiting to see what you thought of later episodes before starting (esp. since I already have a huge list of kdramas to watch...).

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

I'm on ep 10, and would largely be saying the exact same thing. Except, the secondary hero's hussy partner/gf/whatever? Is about the most awesome thing ever...and we're SUPPOSED to think she's cool, and we aren't remotely meant to look down on her for being a "loose woman."

One of my concerns seems to be coming true, unfortunately, but I'm waiting to see how it plays out.

[oyceter]

Oh! Awesome!

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

it's basically NOT doing everything that annoys me most of the time about modern kdramas...while still having all the elements. Most(that I've seen) go out of their way to manipulate you into disliking the other girl, too, but this one actually makes it so that you feel guilty wanting the hero with the heroine, even before you learn about the pregnancy. Of the main characters(not including parents) she's actually probably my least favorite, not because she's boring or there's anything wrong with her, but because the others are all just a little more interesting, but I'll be VERY upset if she ends up sad and lonely.

[oyceter]

Ooo ok! (averting eyes from reading too closely for spoilers)

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

I didn't say anything that isn't prominently feautured in even the briefest summaries or descriptions of the show.

[oyceter]

Waaaaaatch it! Also, if you are curious about any other of the kdramas I am rabidly blogging about (Coffee Prince! Have you seen Coffee Prince?), I, um, am very willing to put together a pimping package.

[octopedingenue]

Pimp pimp pimp to meeee! I am very curious about them, especially Coffee Prince, which has crossdressing and other Ouran similarities eeee!

The only kdrama I have seen at all is Full House, which I mainlined in about five days this summer when I didn't have internet, and which I need to watch again (after being pimped over kdramas!) because Ji-Eun is My (sensible, relatively) Girl and I can learn Korean for "I like you, but don't love you, because I'm maddening like that" and "marriage of convenience" and "SHUT UP, ROMANTIC LEAD GUY, YOU IDIOT." I love it to distraction in all its guilty glory.

(And as I didn't have internet I am only now looking at Wikipedia and seeing it was based on a manhwa OMG TO SCANSLATING GOOGLE I GO)

[oyceter]

BWAHAHAHA! YOU MUST WATCH COFFEE PRINCE! It makes me squee with delight! I have actually rewatched some of it, which is more than I can say for most things I have watched.

Also I will send you Damo (which I love the beginning of, though the ending so far is not to my liking) and Fantasy Couple and Kim Sam Soon and and and... I must go home and check out my hard drive. Also also, you know about jdramas?

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

A LICENSED manhwa, even(that I'm told is good but haven't checked out yet myself.)

I really need to see Full House.

[octopedingenue]

I am adding the manhwa volumes to my Bookmooch wishlist as we type, although I am confused over whether the characters' names are different on purpose or whether CPM was attempting to Americanize them. (After NETCOMICS, which at least has interesting titles even if they're incoherently translated, CPM is maybe my least favorite manga publisher ever. STOP GIVING TAMOKO TANIGUCHI MONEY FOR THE LOVE OF GOD.)

Yis you must so I can squee with someone!! For THEIR FAKE CELEBRITY LOVE ISSOPURE. And Ji-Eun maybe the cutest human ever.

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

I have a suspicion that this is an OTP where I will like because Samurai Deeper Kyo warped my shipping tendencies for all eternity, from what I've heard(it worked in Spring Waltz...)

I may regret asking, but who's Tamoko Taniguchi?

[octopedingenue]

Their meetcute is when she vomits on his lap and then later that ep punches him in the face, because she officially Does Not Take His Crap. I'M JUST SAYIN'.

Tamoko Taniguchi is the rare, special creator of the most bland and diet-coolwhip-fluffy shoujo manga to ever make me actively resent its multivolume licensing instead of, oh, Rose of Versailles, or Random Thing Yu Watase Drew in the Third Grade. Oneshot Princess Prince is the only story yet to make "sekrit crossdressing royal siblings" so dull I could not finish the volume, even without the random sexism/racism/homophobia. I could summarize the plot of Just a Girl, stretched to an agonizing two volumes, but it would probably make it sound more entertaining than it actually is. (Hint: important plot points concern the feelings of stuffed animals. And more random homophobia.) Maybe I am a little too bitter; I have read and loved my share of scanslated shoujo with worse art and less coherent plots. But for this they wasted shelf space and licensing negotiations and hard-earned reading time of crossdressing-royalty lovers!

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Their meetcute is when she vomits on his lap and then later that ep punches him in the face, because she officially Does Not Take His Crap. I'M JUST SAYIN'.

Sounds close enough to the modern version of "Beg me for your life or die!" *vicious headbutt to the chin* "SCREW YOU, LOSER!" to me.

(What is this meetcute? I keep seeing it this week but don't think I have ever before.)

That mangaka does sound rather bad...what kind of homophobia are we talking, anyway?

[desdenova.livejournal.com]

Right! It had Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell!

I'm so glad I wasn't just imagining the similarity--it's intentional!

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Yes...it was a COUPLES MOVIE!

Mostly similarities that obvious are intentional...it's just whether or not it's admitted.

[octopedingenue]

I thought that reading the summary too! Overboard! When I was a kid, reruns on TBS gave me a deep affection for it among miscellaneous terrible Kurt Russell movies*. Until at some point my hindbrain took over and was like "Pssss, really freaking smugly sexist and awful, btw, wow." But I still have an odd fondness for the pre-Photoshop photoshopped wedding pictures.


*Soldier would be a bulletproof-kink-movie for me were it not so indescribably awful in every conceivable way.

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Sigh...Kurt Russell really was unforgivably alpha male in that movie, and yet...I must still like him in it. I think he just has a sheer likability(plus the looks and body...) that gets him past it, even when you really should hold the entire movie against him. Everytime I watch, though, I keep hoping she'll tear into him more and make him work a little harder to get her back, but she never does...

[octopedingenue]

I never said I turn it off when it reruns on TBS now, mind.

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

I never said my parents' copy of it(and other such movies) doesn't magically end up in the player when I spend weekends at their place, catsitting.