Welcome to the newest entrant into the "evilest drama parent" sweepstakes!

[dangermousie]

I lied. I am watching ep 3 of Spring Waltz now and I have only one thing to say:

diediediediediedie Su Ho's (aka Jae Ha's) Dad.

Seriously.

Every kdrama I watch ups the ante on evil parents. Let's see. He stole the money necessary for a life-saving operation for the ten-year-old best friend/crush of his son. And then ran away from the isolated island community leaving his ten-year-old son to shoulder all the fall-out and the blame and the guilt.

I am living in hope he will get attacked and eaten by zombies. Or werewolves. Or even sparkly vampires.

I have to say Eun Young and Jae Ha are about the most unlucky/mistreated kids out there...Poor things.

I also have to say grown-up Jae Ha seems remarkably functional considering. A little iciness, brusqueness, and stand-offishness is a superbly well-adjusted, taking everything into account.

Comments

[kitsune714.livejournal.com]

I am living in hope he will get attacked and eaten by zombies. Or werewolves. Or even sparkly vampires.

LOL!

Hey, don't worry -- it's kdrama, remember? The evil parents TEND to get their comeuppance eventually.

[dangermousie.livejournal.com]

Oh, I hope so. But then I was wary of hoping for too much after Something Happened in Bali where arguably the evilest Dad of them all didn't get any comeuppance (well, his company got in some trouble but we never saw if it affected him).

I loathe Sparkly Edward and I loathe Jae Ha's Dad - so it would be perfect for edward to have lunch on evil daddy. Evil Daddy would die and Edward would get indigestion because evil daddy is so unwholesome. Win-win.

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

It hink Jae Ha turned out functional because, all in all, the adoptive parents were pretty much good parents, and they had him longer. Not that there aren't massive ISSUES there, too, but it helps.

[dangermousie.livejournal.com]

Weren't the adoptive parents calling him by their dead kid's name and pretending he was their dead kid? Not to mention they told him Eun Young was dead? I don't think they are winning any parent of the year awards. Though by kdrama standards, considering they didn't try to beat him to death, they are definitely stellar parental units, so yeah - I still vote for most people needing YEARS of therapy in the situation :).

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

More to it than that, but pretty much. Like I said, ISSUES. But they do love him (more convincingly than a lot of biological kdrama parents), and at least there's more to the controlling and trying to keep him than most kdrama parents.

[dangermousie.livejournal.com]

You know what's scary? By kdrama standards they are rather remarkably good parents :) I can count on one hand the number of dramas where all parents involved were good which is rather peculiar if you think about it.

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Well, the villification of family is kind of one of my problems with kdramas...

For non-evil parents for the leads? With context considered, Damo, Dae Jang Geum and emperor of the Sea seem to do pretty well, but they're all sageuks. The only modern kdrama I've seen with non-villified parents/parental figures is Fantasy Couple. Where all the parents are dead. Then again, parents like the heroines' parents in Goong and Vineyard Man (similar setup...all but sell her because they need the money) seem to be intended to be cute. There's also 1% of Anything and Hello! Miss. Her father in Hello! Miss was pretty weak and caused a lot of her problems, but he did mean well, and both sets of parents in 1% object to the leads getting together, but for culturally sensible reasons, and support them when it's clear they won't give up. But both series also have the aunt who's obsessed with her son surpassing the hero, resulting in his having Issues, much like Mobster Mom in Lovers.

[dangermousie.livejournal.com]

In both Capital Scandal and Coffee Prince all the parents/family members (even step) are good. I wonder if it's because it's written by the same person. Full House also had all the parents be OK but that was a different writer. So far ever parent in Slingshot is good. But yeah, those are a minority.

I think the reason dramas often set up family conflicts is because it's such a minefield/effective obstacle in Korea especially, due to Confucian nature of society and obedience/deference due to elders and importance of family bonds.

[darkeyedwolf.livejournal.com]

OMG FIFTEEN MINUTES INTO SPRING WALTZ

LOVE LOVE LOVE UTTER LOVE OMG OMG

[dangermousie.livejournal.com]

Told you!

Also, don't you think Secondary Girl shows delicious signs of craziness?

[mishane.livejournal.com]

Just here for your icon. So pretty and so sad. :(

[dangermousie.livejournal.com]

My favorite secondary otp ever.