A Dabble in Drama: City Hunter

Image courtesy of koreandrama.org

So I have been watching a lot of drama shows lately...
For those who don't know I ABSOLUTELY LOVE watching Asian drama! Usually there's an add capped on to the end of a drama I'm watching, or a poster picture that catches my eye and I can go from drama to drama. However, every so often I find myself in a bit of a slump not knowing what to watch next. This is what it was like for me when it came to the end of the season for Bel Ami and Prime Minister & I. Sometimes, (I have to stress it's not always like this), it's like having a gap in your life that needs to be filled. I know that sounds sad but I don't feel bad as I like to watch them when they come out before I go to bed, (or after work), as a way to relax.
When faced with this dilemma and nothing seems to draw me in, I like to look back on drama's I started and never finished or ones that I planned to watch and never got to as well as one's that seem to be pretty popular.

Enter City Hunter center stage. This drama absolutely b l e w . m y .  m i n d .
I've known about City Hunter since they [Japan] handed the project over for Korea to film, it's a few years old and definately falls into the planned to watch just never got around to it category.

City Hunter is based on the popular Japanese manga of the same title by Tsukasa Hojo. I hadn't read the manga before watching the drama and have since started reading a few chapters as I was curious to see how similar the stories were. Most of the manga based drama's I have seen have been pretty close to the stories or at least keep the integrity of the characters. It might be too early to make a judgement yet but from what I have read so far it seems that the drama is just loosely based on the characters from the manga. I also think that in this particular situation it's a win win scenario as the drama has a pretty kick ass story line.

The drama follows the protagonist Lee Yun Seong as he attempts to carry out the 'cruelest revenge' ever as plotted by his adoptive father. What I loved about this was that from the first episode to the last this drama delivers and is consistent with it's action packed scenes. The choreography is really appeasing to watch and is shot in a way that just makes it look damn cool.
There is of course a romantic aspect to the story but I really enjoyed how this didn't dominate the overall theme of revenge, corruption and good vs evil. 

A lot of the 'actiony' dramas I have watched always start off strong and then somewhere through the course of the story the romance aspect overpowers and it's like all of the purpose and strength that was delivered in the first episodes becomes muddled and lost along the way, and so that's why I really appreciated the integrity the writers had for City Hunter.

I do have to say that I found Lee Min Ho, (who plays Lee Yun Seong), particularly attractive in this drama, enough to make me officially a fan. I've seen his previous dramas' including the latest The Heirs or Inheritors, (which FYI is also awesome), but there was just something about his character and style in City Hunter which I found really cool and... there's no denying it, he's hot in this drama.

What makes this so good for me though is that it takes me back to the moments in my life where I watched my first asian dramas'. The feeling of newness, excitement, anticipation and just all round love of a good story, is something that I find can be absolutely soothing to the soul and a cleansing antidote to a bad day/week/month. Now this doesn't mean that I only find great drama's when I'm sad, it just means that I enjoy being able to relive those feelings and emotions from a time in my life where everything was new and exciting, happy and carefree, and it takes a good story to get me there.

I know this is a bit different to things I normally post, but I'm hoping this year to blog about more of the things that I really love and hope to be able to share more about my experiences with asian drama in the future.

I'm currently on the look out for more interesting shows to watch and would love to know if you have any suggestions? I love learning about cultures and languages so it doesn't matter what country it is from, leave a comment with your suggestions.

Till next time!

Maisy xxx