"Han Myung Wol, are you watching? Han Myung Wol. Han Myung Wol. I love you."

[dangermousie]

Of all the airing dramas I am following, Myung Wol the Spy remains my favorite (except for the amazing The Princess' Man, of course). I remain amazed that I am in love with a romcom, breaking a years-long curse.



MW does a number of things right that normally drive me nuts in a romcom:

a. lack of clumsy/clueless/damsel-in-distress heroine - romcoms are chock-full of heroines who need to be rescued from the most mundane, ridiculous things and who act as if they are from Mars. Meet Myung Wol - she can take on a mob by herself and needs little rescuing ever. And while she's a novice to both love and South Korean minutia, there is a good reason for it - she is a North Korean agent.
b. hero who is obsessed about heroine off the bat - romcoms are full of heroes who spend half the drama running time pining after an annoying secondary girl or generally not noticing heroine much. Not so here. Kang Woo is a goner almost from the first minute he sees her and even as he denies it, you can tell he is beyond obsessed.
c. lots of shippy goodness - this OTP has more shippy and swoony scenes in any two eps of the drama than most romcoms couples have in the entirety of their run. Ridiculous, sexual chemistry between Eric and Han Ye Seul doesn't hurt
d. Stakes! We have them! It's no secret that I prefer epic period/revenge/etc dramas because the stakes are greater. In a typical romcom, what's the worst that can happen? Two decent people won't end up together. Not so here - what with spies and family secrets, there is always a possibility of a giant pile of bodies at the end. I've seen Love 2000 (Takeshi Kaneshiro as a spy who falls for his mark), I know how this can end. Yes, I am pretty sure that the ending will be happy, but the stakes to getting there are real. Not to mention that, by now, I am convinced that Kang Woo and Myung Wol can be happy only with each other.
e. This is the angstiest romcom I've seen in a good long while, which explains a lot - I am and always will be an angst junkie.

Anyway, when Han Ye Seul ditched, I spent close to a week terrified this was going to be cancelled and thinking I was a jinx of some sort. Thankfully, she's back on set and we are getting eps 12 and 13 next week. Thank God!

I was curious to watch ep 11 not just because I love the drama, but because I was curious to see how unavailability of HYS was going to affect the ep. Surprisingly, despite all the behind-the-scenes insanity, ep 11 is eminently watchable. You notice there is something off because there are a number of abrupt cuts and odd editing (e.g. the scene of MW coming to herself after the shot and KW's reaction to her waking up is missing) and random insert scenes:



but it still flows well.

There is some (1) delicious angst





(2) and woobie Kang Woo, suffering his love (my favorite kind)




(3) dysfunctional OTP goodness





(4) In A being an insane and evil secondary girl. I never got the whole 'I know you don't love me but I still want you by my side via blackmail' mentality secondaries often have (get a hooker!), but I loooove to watch it (anyone else got a flashback to Que Sera Sera in this scene btw? Eric was very fond of collapsing in manpain in hallways of his OTP's apartment in that one too).






(5) Ryu being awesome as secondary guy and almost making me switch ships





(6) career-destroying amazing love confessions



Also, it's official, I want to off the Chairman. Plus, so much of the dialogue is extra-hilarious in light of the bts shenanigans. Basically, my love for MWtS continues.

I can see where people who say that the situations are repetitive (they love each other but he denies or she denies for a variety of reasons and they do one step forward two steps back thing) are coming from, but I confess repetitiveness never bothered me if it repeats a type of situation I love in the first place and with characters I adore. Everyone keeps saying how repetitive Full House got in the second half and it never even occurred to me to notice or be tired of it.



All this delicious angst and it is all BEFORE he finds out she is a North Korean spy! *sluuuuurp*

Preview for ep 12:

Two words: bed scene!!!!!!!!!!

Comments

[algelic.livejournal.com]

Hmmmmmmmmmmm~ desperate love confessions~

Episode 11 really cracked me up with the similarities between the story and the behind-the-scenes drama. Han Ye Seul looked dead on her feet most of the scenes, poor thing.

LET THE HOT CHEMISTRY CONTINUE!

[dangermousie.livejournal.com]

I know! It was uncanny!

I heard the chemistry in ep 12 is as good as ever.

[blobofcolour.livejournal.com]

I adore Ryu but strangely I'm firmly in the KW camp when it comes to who gets MW. Hmm, I guess I prefer having Ryu to myself. Haaaa.

[moraitika1.livejournal.com]

You know when a guy is the best secondary lead when you ship him with yourself - so very sexy and angsty... and perfect for yourself

[dangermousie.livejournal.com]

LOLOLOL

[dangermousie.livejournal.com]

Heh. I am with you on both those counts :P

[spunspider.livejournal.com]

KJHDGJKS I LOVE THIS SHOW.

tbh i'm preemptively cringing at the thought of him finding out about her being a spy/him being an 'assignment', because the ~deception bit he's already been and gone through. i'm totally hoping that they'll pull a fast one re: eric being up to stuff himself (singapore auction!!!!!!!). while i do love this as the straight angsty romcom it's turned out to be, i wouldn't mind if it veered back into playful farce, either.

[dangermousie.livejournal.com]

I think it would be a fun twist for him to be a SK spy but I don't really see it gelling with what we have so far (though if any drama has proven they can take insane twists and make them work, it's this one). But yeah, the angst is going to be insane, poor guy!

[gwinna]

That's what I love about kdramas – even the romcoms are full of angst. XD This one especially, though, since the premise is inherently really angsty. I've never doubted that it will have a happy ending (otherwise I wouldn't be watching while it's airing), but in real life there's no way this wouldn't end in tragedy, and that means the conflict is real.

I just watched episode 12, and oh, they had such a short time of being happy together before the reality of the situation came back to haunt them. What Kang Woo suffered in episode 11 is nothing compared to how much the ending of episode 12 is going to make him suffer. It was painful to watch (I am way too emotionally invested). You'll probably love it. XD

Anyway, though I sometimes lurk on your journal, I think this is the first time I've commented, so, hi. :) I'm glad I'm not the only one who's loving this drama! I was so worried because of the crazy stuff happening offscreen, but I didn't notice anything off about the chemistry between HYS and Eric in episode 12, so it looks like the drama will be able to overcome the controversy and continue being awesome till the end. Yay!

[dangermousie.livejournal.com]

Hi!!! I am so glad this drama has fans - it's ridiculously underrated and I don't get it - it's so very good.

I haven't watched ep 12 (though I am getting dangerously close to watching it raw) yet but I am glad to hear the chemistry is unaffected. It's one of my favorite things about this drama.

Ohhh, poor Kang Woo. Yeah, I can see how there is more major angst in his future - I am really curious how this will end well because you are right, in rl, this is a situation with no exit.