Sean Akizuki's East Asian Drama and Movie Blog

Yesterday's episode was starting to unravel more of the past that Mi Soo hasn't recovered yet. She was thinking that her hero was Seong Yun when it's actually Yong Jun. Some events that happened in yesterday's episode such as Yong Jun giving her a caramel, admitting that he easily gets a cold and Mi Soo's arachnophobia start to unravel the past. This has me thinking about the whole childhood scenario that makes everything come into full circle. She asked her to marry him when they were but children and now he's asking her to marry him. The love triangle between brothers still exists. Seong Yun whose memory was blocked believes that he was that hero in the past of Mi Soo. Yet, it turned out to be that Mi Soo was with another child. Mi Soo has a talk with the siblings' mother and things start to unravel to her. The audience already knows that it's Yong Jun ang not Seong Yun who was that hero. Yet, Mi Soo still thinks that Seong Yun is that hero. Some de...

Since it's Thursday so I decided to write a #ThursdayThrowback post on RPN-9's Chinese theater. The show would air Judge Bao which lasted for 236 episodes. Granted, it's a historical series so just expect it. What really made me go "HUH?!" was the fact that the show was once aired in CHINESE with no decent translations whatsoever. I wonder, did RPN-9 ever reconsider that they are catering to FILIPINO -Chinese and not to people from China? Just how many Filipino-Chinese ever learned to speak Mandarin back then, especially in the 90s when "American superiority mentality" was really the trend back then? And of course, we can't do without Madame Fu Pei Mei who died last 2004. While there were the Mandarin airings but later, there was the rather lifeless Tagalog dub as seen on TV. I thought about how I once thought she was just a Filipino-Chinese until I realized the Tagalog doesn't match her lips. Regardless, I found all those dishes really mouth...

What's Wrong with Secretary Kim now has its team building episode and some buried memories. So who was this childhood friend? The audience finally knows all the while the memories of Kim Mi Soo hasn't returned yet -- neither are the Lee brothers who still have their ongoing sibling rivalry . As confirmed -- there is also a love triangle to top the sibling rivalry. Mi Soo is still obsessed with finding who was that boy and yet she thinks it's the older brother Seong Yun and not Yong Jun. Yong Jun has his feelings of jealousy and the older brother Seong Yun admits that he does have feelings for Mi Soo. I guess this whole love triangle between Seong Yun and Yong Jun for Mi Soo will play itself especially with a childhood incident. What's interesting to know is that both siblings have some buried trauma deep within them after a kidnapping incident. I'm amazed at how Yong Jun asks Mi Soo to bury the past and her childhood crush altogether to focus in the present -...

I can't deny that I'm addicted to W even if you don't see me do an episode by episode short to medium sized review, right? The first five episodes focused on the thriller where Kang Chul starts as a comic book character in a suspense webtoon comic -- he loses his family to a faceless murderer. He nearly kills his creator out of insanity and I don't know why in the world would Oh Yeon Joo still want to save him after all that trauma? Crazy much? Yes, but that's what happened. Kang Chul who supposedly committed suicide later lives on. The next thing to happen is that Kang Chul "marries" Yeon Joo - which is really something. How can you get married to a cartoon character? You can think of how I would actually want to marry a certain fictional character. It's just absurd as like me marrying Mako Shiraishi or Sakura Nishihori -- both of them are completely FICTIONAL characters. But it happens and I don't know if I should really suspend disbelief. Th...

It's time for a bit of nostalgia for #FlashbackFriday, isn't it? Here's one Chinese song that I learned to appreciate in the most bizarre way -- it's because this is the song that Shan Tsai's mother would occasionally sing in the first season of Meteor Garden. It's called "When Will You Return" which was a sung by the very much old school 30s songstress Zhou Xuan then it was popularized by yet another dead singer Teresa Teng. What is she singing? Here's the real lyrics according to Peach Berries and the title is seldom spelled out as "When Will He Return": Lovely flowers don't bloom very often Beautiful scenes aren't always here to stay Worries dissolve my smiles Memories of love bring back tears After you leave tonight When will you come back again? After this drink, please have a little side dish We don't get drunk in life often Why wait to have a wonderful time? Come, come, come We'll talk only after you finish th...

Last episode left us with Kim Mi Soo learning that Morpheus is indeed the older brother of Lee Yong Jun. We also had a dangler whre Yong Jun's attempt to kiss Mi Soo goes really bad -- he recalls a terrible incident causing him to accidentally shove her. This results in a very awkward misunderstanding. I really laughed at that scene but behind it -- there's a dark story and dark memory that Yong Jun doesn't want to talk about. It's some kind of kidnapping incident way back in 1994 and now it's 2018. One of the sweetest things ever done in this episode is Yong Jun blending in to the very simple life of Mi So. So he takes a day off too -- to be with the woman he loves. He tries to sway her away on an expensive date but ends up entering into her world. Yup, talk about royalties falling for commoners which results in a rather mixed world. They ride a very nice looking bus which I wouldn't mind commuting on it every day if I don't feel like driving. They take...

I just like itching to write another update on "What's Wrong with Secretary Kim" -- which starts to highlight the sibling rivalry between the male protagonist Yong Joon and his older brother Seong Yun. At first, the female protagonist Mi So has no idea yet that the two are brothers. All she knows of Seong Yun is that he's using the pen name "Morpheus". I was thinking of the scene where Yong Joon wants to propose to Mi So but it's cut short because he catches his older brother. It's somewhat implied that Seong Yun has feelings for Mi So creating a love triangle between brothers. Seong Yun offers a copy of his book to Mi So -- only for Yong Joon to come out and literally shove it to Seong Yun! This causes a lot of trouble especially when Mi So wants to endorse Seong Yun for the grand opening. She has zero idea that they are brothers until it's revealed later in the series. There's the rather serious scene where Yong Joon and Seong Yun are...

I was watching episodes 1-4 of W and I find the whole comic world book to be pretty thrilling. It's a crazy world how the whole world of W ends up from a Manhwa or Webtoon into becoming what some may call an "entirely different universe". Yes, it's an entirely different universe and the artist behind it wants to end it -- by finally killing Kang Chul who has managed to survive many attempts. How Kang Chul a Manhwa character gained a life on his own is totally boggling in one way or another. As I mentioned earlier, the whole idea brings me back to Fushigi Yuugi. What would you do if you fell in love with a character who's just well -- a character in a book? It reminded me of Miaka's dilemma as she developed feelings for Tamahome. Oh Yeon Joo's adventures in the book start off as a misadventure -- she gets jailed, she disappears, she discovers time travels faster (or slower) in the Manhwa dimension, she gets involved with a man who's not supposed to ex...

So much for me not giving a new Kamen Rider Build update or opinion post every week, isn't it? I thought about how Gentoku Himoru's "true personality" just feels WTF and weird. So he had a feud with his father but later, his father revealed that he isn't really always that malicious control freak before the show started. So what does that mean? It's revealed that the Pandora Box incident warped the mind of Gentoku from someone who actually cared about the country to someone who's power hungry to the point that he established Faust and later joined with Seito to attain more power -- after his father had no other choice but to exile him out of Touto. It's later revealed that parts of his good personality started to resurface after he joined with Seito. True, he was now Seito's weapon but he soon started showing a more human side when his father was kept prisoner by the Seito government. He even risked to save his father, he reveals his regrets to...

What if the Webtoon you are viewing is actually a weird, mystical world? Well talk about trying to take the concepts of Never Ending Story or Fushigi Yuugi and replace the book with a webtoon. That's exactly what happens with W: Two Worlds. A webtoon itself becomes a parallel universe that connects two people of different universes -- a doctor named Oh Yeon Joo (Han Hyo Joo) and a fictional character named Kang Chul (Lee Jong Suk). The story of the W has a in a series of events. Kang Chul starts off as a champion sharpshooter, he loses his family, he gets jailed for the wrong reason, he attempts to commit suicide at a bridge, he wants to get justice for his family, he becomes a rich man and in all of that -- he ends up with a friendship and infatuation with Yeon Joo. What he doesn't know yet that early on, Yeon Joo is a real person and he's a Webtoon character so somehow managed to come to life. The whole adventure is a mysterious one. How does Yeon Joo even get sucked i...

I've just watched episodes three to four and it has me thinking of the latest plot that could brew -- it's the plot to defrost an ice king or prince while there's also sibling rivalry as part of the tropes. The latest episodes show quite some tension especially with Lee Young Joon and his unanswered feelings towards his not-so-attractive (but still cute) secretary Kim Mi Soo. Yet, it looks like a third wheel is coming into this series in the cliche when two brothers actually get involved in a love triangle. I was wondering what exactly turned the younger brother Young Joon into the ice prince or ice king of the series? He doesn't get along with his brother Seong Yun who is a best-selling author who lives abroad. I can't forget how Mi Soo or Secretary Kim runs into the older brother Seong Yun. Seong Yun ties the shoelaces of Mi Soo and they even run into each other -- heck, he even asks for her number! All the while, there's some cold war going on between the...

Kang Chi's tale in the past ends in tragedy. I decided to take a look at the epilogue which takes place centuries AFTER the series ends. So I decided to create an imaginary timeline and two shows that are totally different namely Tokkei Solbrain and Akibaranger to create this rather screwed up sequel on high doses of crack. So here's how the events turn out in my headcanon which is obviously not canon and will actually contradict the events of Akibaranger and Solbrain? Unwilling to suffer any longer as he roams the Earth -- Kang Chi seeks to be reincarnated as a human at the cost of his Korean heritage. He tries to do penance, hoping to remove his demon blood and he manages to die of unknown causes. He's later reincarnated into the Masuda family where he later gets a job as a police officer. Solbrain later disbands but memories of his past life soon start to reactivate into his head. In the year 2001, Kang Chi is now a rookie police officer. In the Year 2002, he becomes...

Okay, don't expect me to publish episode by episode reviews because well, I kinda want to focus on either my Lupinranger vs. Patranger reviews or I'm trying to figure out what kind of opinion post I'll do for this one (and in extension, Kamen Rider Build). But as far as I'm concerned, I would just update when I'm in the mood but I could give my first impressions towards this romantic comedy in two episodes. Yeah, I know it was last week but I just started watching it on Drama Bus and man, I can't wait for the next episodes today and tomorrow at tvN. We have a Park-Park couple -- Park Seo-Joon plays as the narcissistic Lee Young-Joon and Park Min-Young plays as Kim Min-Soo the titular protagonist. Young-Joon is a narcissist since he's obviously nearly got it all -- money, good looks, height and whatsoever. All the while, he's stuck with the not-so-attractive Min-Soo who's 29 years old but it's stated that she worked with him for nine years. So w...

I've been thinking it's some time since F4 was the very reason why I started watching Chinese media whether it'd be from China, Taiwan or Hong Kong. Meteor Garden was the very start of me watching Chinese drama series though why would I obsess over it (and the upcoming China remake) or even the just F4, F4 and all F4, right? Sure, I do still want to watch some of Vic Chou's latest projects and I miss Vanness Wu already, I'd probably like to see Jerry Yan have another movie (and I really wish he'd get a project with either Esther Liu or Liu Yi Fei) or have a Jerry Yan x Barbie Xu-Wang comeback series preferably a remake of the  Chin/Liu TV series  "After Many Red Sunsets" or "Secular Romance". I remembered the F4 craze when it started, I thought they were a Japanese boy band until I heard them sing in Mandarin. I couldn't forget how these guys took me to the craze with Meteor Garden all the while there were other Taiwanese shows to w...

I'm a fan of quality Korean drama (though I'm selective like every culture). What bothers me though is the annoying Koreaboo Bangwagon. What's a bandwagon you may ask?  Investopedia would define it as, "The bandwagon effect is a psychological phenomenon in which people do something primarily because other people are doing it, regardless of their own beliefs, which they may ignore or override. The bandwagon effect has wide implications, but is commonly seen in politics and consumer behavior." What's a Koreaboo? Weeaboos are those who aren't Japanese but overrates Japanese culture. Koreaboos are those who aren't South Korean but they overrate South Korean culture.  Some people just get into Korean drama or culture because they fear that they don't conform to their Koreaboo peers or even society even if it goes against their own productive individuality. Exposure to Korean culture was something new and people just picked it and more people pi...

I remembered rambling on the issue of the thickening plot of Evolt as well as Nanba Enterprises. It looks like we've got a lesson to learn. When something that's more powerful than you are offers you his or her services -- he or she may only be using you. This reminds me of how Long in Gekiranger pretended to serve Rio and Mele but he was only after his own interest. The same happened to the greedy Chairman Nanba. He effectively took over as the recurring villain from Faust, he took away Prime Minister Nido's position and this was all allowed by Evolt. Evolt as Blood Stark pretended to serve Chairman Nanba. Chairman Nanba was indeed a fool to believe that he could get the loyalty of someome -- especially if that someone is almost like someone that seemingly sprang out from the Doom video game series! Would you want to even have an alliance with someone like  the Icon of Sin from the second game? I wouldn't dare do it but Chairman Nanba himself foolishly made that de...

I couldn't forget watching the Gu Family Book some time ago and it's still a memorable series. Just in, I realized that both Lee Seung Gi and Suzy Bae are in for a second round love team -- while I don't like the idea of reusing a love-team way too many times but I'd like to see an occasional return series. While I was actually expecting a modern-day sequel of Gu Family Book where Kang Chi is reunited with Dam Yeo Wool's reincarnation -- we aren't getting it. Instead, we are getting a story where Seung Gi is a stuntman who saw his nephew die. Suzy Bae's character is a security agent whose late father was once a superior in the said organization -- which gives me the Chun Li from Street Fighter vibes. The show will still be aired early next year. Yikes! I'm already losing my fight against time itself! XD

I wasn't exactly a fan of the Endless Love series considering how the first one ended in an expected tragedy -- all the while Song Hye Kyo had such a beautiful performance it was praiseworthy. Now I thought about the whole Song Hye Kyo vs. Han Hyo Joo comparison -- I'd like to talk about both series where one was too teary eyed and the spring series actually had a perfect balance of tears. The contrast was one had a sad ending and the other hand a happy ending. I could remember the shallow reason why I watched Autumn in My Heart even if well, I know it wasn't going to end well. It was because of the attractive lead. The buildup concerning her leukemia plot was as well-implemented as the weak heart in Lavender. I know the main lead will die anyway yet I still want to watch it for how Eun Suh tries to cope up with the fact that she's dying. But that also led me to fear watching more K-Drama because of one single tragic death. Then I eventually picked up Spring Waltz ...