Dear kfangurl: What do you think of idol actors?

Bubblebathdaisies writes:

Dear kfangurl,

(This is a long intro, so skip it if you wish) Hello! I’ve been a silent reader of your blog for a really long time, since I was thirteen and I just made this account to comment!

I’m sixteen now, and I feel like I’ve grown up with your blog- you introduced me to dramas and k-pop, and I still read your older articles when I feel down, it’s like comfort food for me. So thank you for that!

The question I have is: What do you think of idol actors? I don’t know if it’s just me, but it feels like a lot more idols are starring in dramas nowadays, and they may not always be good at acting. The general consensus among some of my other drama-watching friends is that idol actors take away jobs from better-trained rookie actors, and some think it’s unfair that they get to use a drama as an acting class.

Personally, I think it’s a bit of a gray area, since there’s plenty of perfectly well-trained and decently popular actors who can’t reeeallly act that well, but also it kind of ruins the drama for me if the lead cannot act well (fourteen year old me wasn’t that bothered about acting skills so much as ~swoon~ factor and watched The Great Seducer on repeat, but I watched it last week and had to skip a big big chunk of the scenes because the acting was…not the greatest) What do you think?

(But I think we all know idols are going to keep getting casted anyways, lol. They’re far too popular to miss out on for profit-related purposes, and some of them are really really good!)

Annie writes:

Would be interesting to read your thoughts on idols turned actors/actresses.

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Year In Review: 2014

If there’s one thing that everyone seems to be able to agree on, it’s that time is flying. Like, seriously. Where has 2014 gone?

I can hardly believe that 2015 is almost here, promising/threatening gifts of dramas chock-full of vampires, multiple personalities, and other psychological disorders goodies.

Before 2014 makes her exit, though, I wanted to come out and give credit where it’s due. Coz as much as so many of my friends in dramaland have been talking about a meh drama year, I feel like I had a pretty good drama year, actually.

I know. How did that happen, right?

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Review: Bride of the Century

THE SHORT VERDICT:

A light(ish) melodrama that’s high on the cute and low on the logic, Bride of the Century is the kind of show that would crumble under too harsh a lens. Given the right lens, though, it’s a fun watch that even gets pretty cracky in stretches.

The good news is, that lens isn’t a hard one to put on.

Yes, the show is so full of drama cliches that it feels like someone took every drama cliche that ever existed, put ’em all into a box, and the writers of this show then played a game where they took turns drawing out random cliches from the box and had to find a way to work ’em all into the show.

In the order in which they were drawn.

Yep. Sometimes plot logic took a beating; I cannot lie. But think of Cliche City as a game, and that ups the fun by a whole lot.

The shining jewel in this rather haphazard crown, is that this show has enough cute to mitigate almost the entire weight of the excessive drama tropes. Who can say no to this show, when you’ve got this cute of a puppy on your screen, right?

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What Makes Drama Crack Stay Fresh / Turn Stale?

DC1So today Stephanie posted on her blog Crazy for Kdrama a post titled Second-hand Crack. In it, she describes her experience re-watching Smile Dong Hae, and finding that it just wasn’t as cracktastic the second time around.

That really resonated with me, coz as some of you may know, I’ve been marathoning Beautiful Days for review, and that review’s been taking a while to actually get written.

The reason is pretty much the same as Stephanie’s experience with Smile Dong Hae. I’d loved Beautiful Days on my first watch, and had devoured it pretty quickly.

Fast forward several years, and now that I’m watching it for the second time, I still find it pretty engaging, but it’s just not as cracktastic as I had first found it.

Which begs the question: What exactly makes drama crack stay fresh / turn stale?

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