49 Days

49 Days Synopsis: (from DramaWiki)
A young woman named Ji Hyun was enjoying absolute bliss as she was about to be married with her fiancé, but her perfect life is shattered in a car accident that left her in a coma. She is given a second chance at life by a reaper, but it comes with a condition: she has to find three people outside of her family who would cry genuine tears for her. In order to do this, she borrows the body of Yi Kyung, a part-time employee at a convenience store.

Cast:
Lee Yo Won as Song Yi Kyung
Nam Gyu Ri as Shin Ji Hyun
Jo Hyun Jae as Han Kang
Bae Soo Bin as Kang Min Ho
Jung Il Woo as Scheduler/Song Yi Soo
Seo Ji Hye as Shin In Jung


My comments:
Watching 49 Days (SBS, 20 episodes) was an interesting experience because I wasn’t that invested in the story until the last 4 episodes. The last 2 episodes were pure sob fest and I swear that I have puffy eyes the next day. I was struggling during the first three episodes because I found Ji Hyun’s innocence or maybe Nam Gyu Ri’s performance annoying. If she spent more time moping about Min Ho and In Jung's betrayal, I would abandon the drama for sure. However, once Ji Hyun found out Min Ho and In Jung’s affair and got a hold of herself, the drama got better. I got annoyed at first by Ji Hyun to end up cheering for her during her journey, especially when she bravely faced her death with a smile.

What moved me the most was the bonding of Ji Hyun and Yi Kyung during the short 49 days. Both women saved each other’s lives in one way or another. Yi Kyung was the cause of Ji Hyun’s coma but eventually Yi Kyung was the one who helped Ji Hyun live again by letting her use her body. And through Ji Hyun, Yi Kyung found the purpose of life again by having friends and family. I didn’t see the twists of the last episode regarding Ji Hyun’s third tear and the relationship between Ji Hyun and Yi Kyung. I also liked that there are no evils in this drama. Despite Min Ho and In Jung’s greedy schemes, they did love Ji Hyun deep down.

Lee Yo Won was the one who shine in this drama. She did really good in portraying the zombie and lifeless Yi Kyung and the bubbly, cheerful Ji Hyun in Yi Kyung’s body. She had great chemistry with the three leading actors. The most surprising thing is that she made a believable (and heartbreaking) pair with Jung Il Woo who is 7 years her junior. The ending was bittersweet but satisfying because character wise, Han Kang and Yi Kyung can never be together no matter how much chemistry Jo Hyun Jae and Lee Yo Won shared. I'm glad that I watched this nice littel drama.

The Man From Nowhere

The Man From Nowhere Synopsis: (from AsianMediaWiki)
A heroin deal is set to occur at a nightclub. Undercover police are also in the nightclub waiting to make their move. A nightclub employee takes the heroin into the locker room. While the nightclub employee changes out of his uniform he is tazered from behind. Hyo-Jeong (Kim Hyo-Seo), a dancer at the nightclub, walks off with the heroin.

Cha Tae-Sik (Won Bin), known only as "ajusshi" in his neighborhood, runs a dilapidated pawn shop in a seedy part of town. He associates little with those around him except a young girl named So-Mi (Kim Se-Ron). So-Mi lives near Cha Tae-Sik's pawn shop and often comes over when her junkie mother Hyo-Jeong has men over. One day, So-Mi's mother Hyo-Jeong comes into the pawn shop. She pawns off to Cha Tae-Sik a bag with a camera, which he will hold until she pays him back. Cha Tae-Sik is unaware that in the bag is the heroin she stole from the nightclub.

In a few days vicious mafia men come looking for So-Mi's mother knowing she stole the drugs. In the process they break into Cha Tae-Sik's pawn shop and holds him up. He hears on a cellphone young So-Mi's screaming voice and then gives the gangsters the bag that was brought to him by So-Mi's mother. The gangsters leave the pawn shop, but before they leave they shoot one of their own men dead. The gangsters also drive off with So-Mi and her mother.

Cha Tae-Sik must now go after the dangerous mobsters who stole So-Mi. In the process, Cha Tae-Sik must also face off against the police and his own mysterious past...


My comments:
I didn’t see an action movie that was as good as The Man From Nowhere since maybe Taken. Both movies have similar plot/concept in which Taken was about a dad saving his daughter but for me, The Man From Nowhere had greater emotional impact about a lonely guy saving a little girl, his neighbor, his only friend.

Won Bin was pretty impressive as the Tae Shik, his connection with little So Mi, although subtle but was powerful. So Mi didn’t have a dad and Tae Shik lost his unborn child so they found comfort with each other. I’m actually surprised to see Kim Sung Oh in over-the-top evil mode in this movie. He was delightful as Secretary Kim in Secret Garden, creepy in Sign and an ordinary dude in the little that I saw in Midas. Overall great movie with nice fight scenes.

Happy Birthday to me!

OMG, I'm turning 29 today, one more year before hitting the big 3-0, embracing spinsterhood!!! Anyway, I can always daydream the following gentlemen offering cakes and flowers today...haha!

Jay Chou looking kinda unwilling...:p

Jo In Sung oppa!

Jang Geun Seok

Song Joong Ki

Kim Bum and flowers, how cute!

Jo Hyun Jae

Hyun Bin, see you in 2 years!

Rain

I'll be happy to get a rice cooker from Khalil Fong

All jokes aside, this above is my real birthday cake, which I devoured 3 days ago. It doesn't look appetizing from the pic but it was yummy!

* I spent half the day looking for the pics above just to prove how loser I am...Oh well, happy birthday to me and to Im Joo Hwan too, who is also turning 29 today and who just left yesterday to fulfill his military duties. Another one gone…

So...

So, the winter offering of K-dramas has been disappointing overall. I had expectations for Midas but I dropped after 4 episodes. The acting was fine; I love Jang Hyuk and I like No Min Woo (although he had minimal screentime from I've seen so far) but I was mostly uninterested for the stock/trade/funds and the whole Yoo family backstabbing against each other.


I tried a 'younger' drama Paradise Ranch too and the acting was mostly bleh and I didn't like any characters to begin with so I dropped too.

Khalil Fong - 15

Finally got it and I’ve been holding myself from sampling his album in Youtube so I can savor the overly long anticipation of Khalil’s 5th album. The packaging is interesting but I’m having a headache to where to put it since it can not fit in my CD shelves. While the lyrics/picture booklet is nice to look at but the CD is put in a very thin envelope…




The album starts with a track with a long intro in Gotta Make A Change and concluded with a long outro in 好不容易. My first impressions of this album is that the first 2 plugs 因為你 and 好不容易 are considered listener friendly songs of the whole album. It’s not an album for usual Canto pop listeners as it takes time to warm to the songs but it grows on you. I only didn’t like 曇花 and 張永成 because I think they were a bit too "loud".

I already said before that Gotta Make A Change is probably my favorite track currently as I find myself tapping my fingers everytime I listen to it. But lately, I’m frequently repeating Over over and over [he!] again.

無菇朋友 is a cute kiddie song feel about staying away from drugs. For 自以為, the cuteness of this song is more or less enhanced by the MV.

From 四人遊's story of an ex-couple's ambiguity to 三人游's story about the third party self-sacrificing, watching the couple from afar to now 二人遊's story about the one in relationship warning the third party not to butt in. So, I wonder what will be 一人遊's story in the future?

Playlist of early May

- 除下吊帶前 - Fiona Sit => Khalil Fong's composition + Wyman Wong's lyrics. The song title itself can generate a lot of talk. I think that Fiona handled the nice quite nicely and she changed her singing style; more maturity, less cuteness.

- Gotta Make A Change - Khalil Fong => My favorite track of his new album. I’ll post about my comments of the album later…

Crime Squad

Crime Squad Synopsis: (from DramaWiki)
This drama focuses on a group of detectives in the Seoul Gangnam Police Homicide Division who solve crimes based on real life cases with their variety of skills and investigative methods. At the forefront of the team is the impulsive and hotheaded detective Park Se Hyuk and the cold, commanding police chief, Jung Il Do. Park Se Hyuk's passion for his work and rough personality results in a tendency to take action first before thinking later, in contrast with Jung Il Do's by-the-book style. However, his greatest weapon is an instinctive knowledge of a criminal's tricks and mental workings that he gained from his father, the legendary thief, and his own childhood in the streets. Together with the other members of a special team formed to catch Lupin, a notorious burglar, he juggles work with his own personal quest to find his father and confront his older brother, a crooked detective.

Cast:
Song Il Gook as Park Se Hyuk
Lee Jong Hyuk as Jung Il Do
Song Ji Hyo as Jo Min Joo
Park Sun Young as Heo Eun Young
Sung Ji Roo as Nam Tae Shik
Sun Woo Sun as Jin Mi Sook
Kim Joon as Shin Dong Jin


My comments:
Crime Squad (KBS, 16 episodes) was a drama that I used to kill time during the Easter holidays. I watched it for Song Il Gook and I only find this drama average, nothing spectacular or memorable but not overly bad. Each homicide case usually takes about 2 episodes to get solved and some of them did give me goosebumps. Take a moment to notice that most victims of the cases in this drama were women. I think the cases are what kept me going, along with the mystery behind Il Do secrets regarding Se Hyuk’s daughter.

The biggest problem with this drama is that the cast seems to have zero chemistry with each other. The homicide team’s chemistry was passable but everything else failed. Romance chemistry between the leads – failed, even the supposed tension between Se Hyuk and Il Do, sorry not really there. It doesn’t help that Lee Jong Hyuk’s appearance keep reducing as the drama progresses and he just appears like maybe 2 times in an episode to give the heads up and he wasn’t much involved in the case solving…

I thought the ladies were so underused in this drama as they were all uninteresting and boring that I didn’t care much for them. It also didn’t help that the romances were so minimal that their existence was merely for background use. Song Ji Hyo has a meatier role than Park Sun Young and Sun Woo Sun and she was cute and likable but as a leading role she was too ineffective. Park Sun Young who was so alive and bubbly in 19 vs. 29 but here, she was like sleepwalking while looking pretty. Also, no wonder that Sun Woo Sun dropped after episode 7 because it seems that the scriptwriters didn’t know where to go with her character…Overall, forgettable drama.

* Opening credit of the drama