MsLattés Daebak Cybercafé (Kdrama addicts #18): Our piggyback taxi service has been suspended whilst we are socially distancing

[boatyardblues]

A quiet corner of MN for serious addicts of Kdrama, or the K-curious. (MsLatte is a Her Private Life reference.) Most of our viewing is drawn from Netflix and Viki, with a sprinkling of AmazonPrime. There are also platforms streaming content illegally if you go looking, but we don’t promote them as they are peppered with pop-ups of “Olga” and friends offering a good time, which gets in the way of the drama.

We also dip into Japanese, Taiwanese & Chinese drama as & when. The previous thread is here
but our ‘Addicts Recommend’ list below is cumulative so includes recommendations and favourites from all previous threads.


Shows marked with an asterisk are more uniformly loved or admired. In categorising series, its important to note most Korean dramas have multiple strands - e.g. supernatural, romance and a thriller; crime series with fantasy elements. Genre-busting mash-ups are normal. Series that are tagged as dark may also have moments of comedy or the absurd, likewise fluff can have heavier moments. View the categories below as best approximate & ask if you need guidance, eg about suitability for younger teens.

Comedy (with a side order of absurd)
I picked up a celebrity on the street (Viki)
My Fellow Citizens (Viki/Netflix)
The Fiery Priest (Netflix)

Crime/Thriller

Come and Hug Me (Dramafast)
Graceful Family (Viki)
Healer (Netflix)*
Heartless City (Viki)
He is Psychometric (Viki)
I Hear Your Voice (Netflix /Viki)

Life on Mars (classy remake of BBC series, no major site yet)
My Secret Terrius (Netflix)*
Signal (Netflix)*
Stranger - 2 seasons (Netflix)
Suspicious Partner (Netflix)*
The Lies Within (Netflix)*
Tunnel (Netflix)*

Historical/Period drama (“sageuk”)
100 Days My Prince (Viki)
Crowned Clown (Viki)*
Mr Sunshine (Netflix)
Rookie Historian Goo Hae-Ryung (Netflix)
Tale of Nokdu (Viki/Netflix)*

Romance - lighter & fluffier
Beating Again (Netflix)
Coffee Prince (Netflix)
Don’t Dare to Dream (Netflix, or as Jealousy Incarnate on Viki)*
Gogh, The Starry Night (Viki)

Happy Once Again (Netflix)
Her Private Life (Viki)*

His Master’s Sun (Netflix)

Love from a Star (Netflix)*
Pinocchio (Netflix)
Radio Romance (Netflix)

Romance is the Bonus Book (Netflix)*

She Was Pretty (Netflix)*
The Beauty Inside (Viki/Netflix)
The Secret Life of My Secretary (Viki/Netflix)
Thirty Not Seventeen (Viki) or as Still 17 (Netflix)
Weightlifting Fairy Kim Bok Joo (Netflix/Viki)
What’s Up With Secretary Kim (Viki)*
Where Stars Land (Viki)*
You are my Destiny (Netflix)


Romance - heavier weight/more grown up themes
Another Miss Oh (Netflix)*
Because This Is My First Life (Viki/Netflix)*

Chicago Typewriter (Viki/Netflix)*
Crash Landing on You (Netflix)**
Descendants of the Sun (Viki/Netflix)
Doctors (Netflix)
Fight For My Way (Viki/Netflix)*
Go Back Couple (Viki)
I’ll Go To You When The Weather is Nice (Viki)
It’s OK Not To Be OK (Netflix)

Just Between Lovers (Viki)*
Melo is my Nature (Viki)/Be Melodramatic (other sites)
My Strange Hero (Viki)
One Spring Night (Netflix)
Red Carpet - film (Netflix, very adult content)
Romantic Dr Kim - seasons 1&2 (Viki)
Search: WWW (Viki)*

Something in the Rain (Netflix)
The Handmaid (film, Netflix - content warning: explicit sexual content)
The Package (Viki)



Straighter ‘Slice of Life’ dramas on universal themes
Hospital Playlist (Netflix)
Into The Ring (Viki)
Itaewon Class (Netflix)
Live (Netflix)
My Mister (Viki/Netflix)*
My Unfamiliar Family (Viki)*
Prison Playbook (Netflix)*

Once Again (Viki)
Stove League (Viki)

Supernatural/zombies/vampires/fantasy/sci-fi - lighter & fluffier
Extraordinary You (Netflix)
Goblin (Viki)*

I am not a Robot (Netflix)
Legend of the Blue Sea (Viki/Netflix)
My Holo Love (Netflix)*

Orange Marmalade (Netflix)

While You Were Sleeping (Viki)*



Supernatural/zombies/vampires/fantasy/sci-fi - darker/more grown up themes
Black (Netflix)*
Hotel del Luna (Viki/Netflix)*
Kingdom (Netflix)*

Mystic Pop-up Bar (Netflix)
The Guest (no mainstream platform yet)
Train to Busan - film (Amazon Prime)

W: Two Worlds (Viki & Netflix)*



Guilty Pleasures (for the joy, not the quality)
Bride of Habaek (Netflix)
Hwarang (Viki/Netflix)
My Secret Romance (Viki)
The Last Empress (Viki/Netflix)
Sassy Go Go (Netflix)



Mad as a box of frogs/uncategorisable

Strong Girl Bong Soon (Netflix)
School Nurse Files (Netflix)

Not Korean but decent quality
Regulars also branch out into Japanese, Taiwanese and Chinese drama. The Chinese & Taiwanese stuff is much more variable quality-wise, so we’ve noted anything decent here:

Before We Get Married (Viki - Taiwanese)
Find Yourself (Netflix - Chinese)
Go Go Squid (Viki - Chinese)
Instead of Tipsy Why Not Get Drunk (Viki - Chinese)
Love O2O (Viki - Chinese)
Morning Call (Netflix - Japanese)
Put Your Head on My Shoulder (Netflix - Chinese)
Tientsin Mystic (Netflix, Chinese)

Thread Regulars’ Top Scoring Dramas of 2019
(courtesy of Hello’s kdrama spreadsheet, which are updated by/for thread regulars)

1. Her Private Life - 9.40 (5 votes)
2. Melo is My Nature - 9.00 (5 votes)

3.= Crash Landing On You, The Crowned Clown, The Lies Within, and The Tale of Nokdu - 8.75 (4 votes)

1. Hotel del Luna - 8.50 (4 votes)

5.= Romance is a Bonus Book, and Search: WWW - 8.17 (6 votes)

We are generally fans of all things Korean, so equally happy to talk about Korean cookery, language, film and music when the mood takes us. Quite a few of us are learning Korean, Japanese and/or Mandarin (some more diligently than others admittedly), so we swap tips and links to language resources. Basically, anything topical goes.


We have a few frequently used acronyms:

FL/2FL = female lead/2nd female lead

ML/2ML = male lead/2nd male lead

SLS = Second Lead Syndrome (where the FL/ML is too dense to realise the 2ML/2FL is better)
🥾🍑 (boot, peach) = kick up the arse to go to bed



We also abbreviate titles if they’re long, but usually with an obvious abbreviation. Some favourite actors & actresses have been abbreviated for speed/efficiency, eg Park Min Young (PMY), Kim Jae Wook (KJW). Don’t be afraid to ask for help/clues if we’re not making sense or have descended into acronym soup.



If you want to join us down the kdrama rabbit hole, welcome! Pull up a chair, say goodbye to early nights and get stuck in…

^Aesops hopefully, all your extra activities won't get in the way of your main job now - watching K-drama and feeding back to all of us

I think the men look ridiculous in their Joseon get-up in Nine Tailed, especially LDW and his half brother. The hair is way too girlish. Otherwise, I’m enjoying it a lot.

I don’t mind the long hair

I am meandering through I Hear You which is pleasant enough. I keep getting prompts from Netflix to watch Start-Up but I think I’m going to wait, I can only handle so many on airs .

Im half way through ep 3 of Start Up Bea. I'm not sure it's going to be amazing but Nam Joo Hyuk is looking like an adorable doofus/IT genius and I've definitely lol'd a few times. I've only stopped because DS is demanding interaction 😂

Sorry I meant bettys not Bea!!!!

TheGirl Nam Joo Hyuk is generally very watchable (except for in The Light In Your Eyes )

Netflix has two upcoming series that I've not seen, has anyone watched The Nokdu Flower or The Good Detective?

Flower of evil is very good. Psychopath serial killer married to homicide detective with a very cute daughter thrown in.

Anyone else watching? Just started ep 3

Huge plot twist on Flower of Evil
It's not as I thought at all!

Ooooh I’m getting FOMO now Aesops !

I've read soooo many good things about Flower Of Evil... I need to dive in to it!!

It's fantastic! Bea/Betty
You both know me well enough, I'm the gimme Melodrama/slice of life or light and fluffy poster.
This is none of them and I've been on the edge of my seat with so many plot twist - Perfect for Halloween!!

DS is hogging the big telly to watch an Adam Sandler film. 😱 I will kdrama when they’ve gone to bed.

Oh Flower of Evil is in my watch list, I'm gonna get that's started soon!

God I am SO enjoying Nine Tailed Fox. I'm a LDW fangirl anyway, from Goblin and have mined his whole back catalogue. (I even watched that absolutely appalling one he did where the FL got cancer and died just to make her enemies at work feel super bad, which is possibly one of the worst kdramas I've ever seen.)

But this! It's so fun! He's so fun! She's great too! Everyone is beautiful and shiny and epic. I'm happpppppy!

But this! It's so fun! He's so fun! She's great too! Everyone is beautiful and shiny and epic. 🤔 ummm 🙋🏻

Sorry about my incessant name changing! I've a good non-nefarious reason for it.

No worries (random shuffle of j, m, l & o) - as long as you stick to the same letters we’ll know its you.

Well this is what I hope! I do love this thread.

I also completely came around on It's Okay...

At first I was weirdly suspicious of it but it's ended up as one of my favourite dramas of 2020. I identified so much with the ML (I was a family carer and it's a really complicated, isolating, un-explainable way to be a teen and young adult) but it was quite painful so I think that's why I looked for reasons not to like it. But I was also really compelled by it and couldn't drop it, in the end. I went back, watched it all and sobbed along with him.

I’ve had a couple of evenings of dipping in & out of English language stuff that I’m not heavily invested in on Netflix because I’m tired & keep nodding off. The Crown S3 - very good, but grimy and glum with all the social realism. The Alienist S2 - good, but grimy and glum with all the social realism, plus many desecrated murdered babies/women. Queen’s Gambit - good, but grimy and glum with all the social realism. I turned off before what I expect will be a sexual assault on a minor in the orphanage. Now I remember why I turned to kdrama and haven’t looked back. All that grime and misery was really getting me down. I will be returning to sunny kdrama uplands tomorrow with a vengeance.

Yep, can't be doing with grimy & glum at the moment. DH was watching a Scandi drama (which I used to love as a genre) and that looked grimy and glum.

random shuffle of j, m, l & o glad you came around to It's OK even though it may have been painful to watch. Sometimes the sobbing can be usefully cathartic.

Yes I also quit western media because it's so depressing. And the rape, to be honest. It's so grim and awful. I just don't find it entertaining at all. I used to grit my way through it.... why!! And the horror is not enriching either, because it's (American shows anyway) so poorly structured and just sort of trails off or falls apart so it's really pointless in the end. I love kdrama for the endings. (And that's why I returned to novels, too, I think.)

Game of Thrones was the end of western media for me. Just had enough! No more!

I bowed out of GoT after the first two seasons. I’m pretty laid back about sex scenes and nudity on screen, but it was so gratuitous and unbalanced, made for the male gaze. Ugh. The story was OK but it pissed me off so much, I stopped watching. DH watched to the end and told me that all the wronged and abused women got to wreak their revenge in spades, but I don’t care.

They don't wreak their revenge at all. The ending was completely shit. It was so bad it was almost funny. I'm with her, basically.

I love epic fantasy and historicals, so I was hooked from the start. I was obsessed with LoTR from childhood, I'm an SFF nerd-- there's no way I could not have been entrapped by Game of Thrones. But no more. I've learnt my lesson.

I only have the cheapo Viki. If I buy the upgrade will I get Nine Tailed Fox quicker? I have bought it before thinking it would get me more episodes on some other show and it didn't so I downgraded again like the miser I am.

I'm an SFF nerd

Based on past posts, there are a few of us on here. 😉