The Problematic of the Unproblematic

JoAnne: This is Episode 12. Of at least 20. I think the tension will kill me before then. Do you think that these actors finish a scene and then just clap for each other as the freaking geniuses that they are? Also. There's a lot to cover in this episode. I barely get to squee because I'm so busy trying to keep the basic plot movement outlined and this gets really long. I'm sorry. Not really. Episode 12 JoAnne: This opening scene, the whole thing, from the cafe to the parking lot - this was fantastic. His face. His resigned delivery. Her anger and her sadness. That moment of surprise in his eyes when they discuss what it meant when he shared his name, and he realizes that for her, it was the beginning of a real connection. Ugh. For him it was a goodbye. They are so going to break my heart into a million tiny pieces. kakashi: Better yours than each others. And better than sticking little blurry knives into each other's hearts, too. But I agree ......

This is the last of the Arang vs. Faith comparisons. It is a bit late, since both shows have ended - but the Internets are still abuzz with people getting over this very fact. One of the Faith pages on Facebook has actually started to dedicate each day to a Faith episode: That's some laudable coping strategy! Heck, it was an intense drama summer and not least because of these two shows, which kept us company for so many weeks and made Monday to Thursday drama-expectation days. And if you like the romance aspects of KDramas, both Faith and Arang and the Magistrate made you get your money's worth.   Faith The Imja-couple doesn't exactly start off on the right foot. He kidnaps her from modern Seoul and she is terrified of him for the first few episodes. Well, at least until she stabs him with his sword and almost kills him - not because of the stabbing, but because she operates on him, which causes sepsis. Choi Young has great healing abilities and a strong inner ki...

Faith , now that you are over, a new era starts ... a faithless one, obviously, but also one that is less stressful, I hope. This summer was truly drama-crazy, and it is taking its toll on me: I am so far behind on all the KDramas I'm watching, it's not funny. Or, put differently, real life is constantly interfering with my drama-watching, which is even less funny. To be frank, Faith was a mediocre drama at best. The directing, that is well established and acknowledged by quasi everybody now (even by vicious die-hard Lee Min-ho fans), was bordering on criminal, the editing was often choppy and felt rushed, the story was going in circles or even backwards more than forwards, and many of the characters were just plain redundant. And, would you believe it, this show has done it again : simply removed one of the central characters in the most anticlimactic way possible, this time major bad-add-for-some-episodes Deok-heung . So he just went to Yuan in episode 22 and that'...

Last time, we looked at Lee Min-ho hairstyles. This time, it's the different man-dresses he wears in Faith that I am interested in. In general, the costumes in Faith are quite okay, though all of them look brand new, which is about as believable as Lee Min-ho's pearly white teeth or Kim Hee-Seon's perfectly manicured fingers and still red-without-roots-showing-hair after weeks and weeks in 14th century Goryeo. Anyways, the costumes are better than many other things in Faith. Especially Prince Deok-heung gets to wear rather fabulous garments. Choi Young on the other hand doesn't get to wear anything splendorous, which is good, because it would be out of character completely - this famous Korean general (I'm sure he is wishing in his grave or in heaven or wherever he is that he looked just a little bit like Lee Min-ho in real life) is known for his modesty and simplicity. Nonetheless, Choi Young is sporting quite a number of different clothes (though it isn...

In tonight's episode of Faith , Doctor Jang Bin was killed off-screen. We didn't even get to see his body. This type of meaningless non-death is the worst you can do to a drama character, but it is strangely befitting the non-character of Jang Bin (played by Philipp Lee, who had to leave the drama at very short notice for eye surgery). Philipp Lee, like Kim Hee-Seon, was faithful to Faith despite its two-plus years in production limbo. And what do they do to him, instead of rewarding him for his loyalty? They make him a non-character, like our two wasted villains , Flute-boy and Lady Microwave. Initially, Jang Bin would have had special ki -powers himself (as obvious from the very first Trailer for Faith). Later, he was touted as "one of the most gifted physicians" and a counterweight to the modern medical ideas of the time-travelling doctor. But then, on screen, he was just a very calm (if not phlegmatic) non-entity that lent a shoulder to a troubled woman from...

Because I felt ever-so-slightly bad about bashing Faith all the time (sure, it mostly deserves it, but still...), I thought long and hard about categories in which Faith was bound to win. Long I thought, but then it had a sudden inspiration: the props! And I don't mean any ol' prop, but meaningful props. Little objects that matter to the story and that matter to us, the audience. As always, be aware, there are some *spoilers* ahead. Faith 신의 The number 1 endearing prop in Faith was The Police Shield . Choi Young brings it with him to 14th century Goryeo from modern day Seoul and uses it several times to fight off the bad guys, even sexily throwing it like a boomerang. Alas, Ki Chul brutally kills it in episode 7: He uses his own supernatural ice-powers to halt the shield in midair, freezes it over and then ... *sob* ... shatters it into tiny bits!! This moment touched me more than the death of the slightly overweight Woodalchi in episode 18 (the name is Joo-seok...