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Apr. 10th, 2019 09:20 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
skygiantsWe've just finished watching The Greatest Love, a Hong Sisters kdrama about a vastly famous action-hero actor who falls in tumultuous love with a once-famous, now washed-up pop singer struggling to climb her way back into the industry by featuring on a Bachelor-style TV show.
Midway through the first episode, my roommateattractivegkry wandered in, had the plot explained to her, and remarked, "Can't wait for the US remake starring Jason Statham and Britney Spears!"
This comparison is not totally exact -- hero Dokko Jin is definitely more of an equivalent to one of the Ubiquitous Marvel Chrises, fame- and popularity-wise, while Gu Ae-yeong is really more like a Spice Girl than a solo singer -- but all the same it had a profound impact on the way we experienced various plot points in the show.
ME: Okay, so you're a personal assistant, and it turns out your boss, Jason Statham, has somehow never heard of Britney Spears and it's your job to explain her entire career to him --
tenillypo: Okay, so you're an elementary school student, and Jason Statham is on the playground, ripping open his shirt to display his nipples to a confused Britney Spears --
ME: And you don't know who any of those people are, because you're in elementary school --
ME: Okay, so you're in a movie theater, and you walk into the lobby, and Britney Spears and Jason Statham are sitting there cuddling on a bench, and she's whisper-singing 'Toxic' in his ear --
tenillypo: I'm not sure I understand why they want Dokko Jin to star in Ae-jeong's comeback music video -- I mean, he's an action hero? What does that look like in an MV?
ME: WE KNOW EXACTLY WHAT THAT LOOKS LIKE
(link resolves to Jason Statham's early career as a backup dancer; click at your own peril. We were deeply disappointed that the plot point about Dokko Jin potentially starring in Gu Ae-jeong's music video never resolved.)
Anyway. Statham and Spears aside, the Hong Sisters enjoy nonsense and there is a LOT of absolute nonsense in this show, but there's also a solid attempt at a critique of their own industry and its pervasive toxicity and double standards around behavior for male and female celebrities. Ae-Jeong's other love interest, a mild-mannered doctor who performs such thrilling reality-TV activities in his role as the Korean Bachelor as "putting together a puzzle in complete silence," appears to exist in the story entirely so that he can make confused and judgmental faces whenever anyone tries to explain the workings of the industry to him. And indeed one does end the show wondering why anybody would want to spend time in that world! Ae-jeong's best friend, a former bandmate who now runs a pizzeria, seems way happier with her post-stardom life than Ae-jeong does!
(Also as far as we can tell she ends up in a threesome with Ae-Jeong's brother and Dokko Jin's bright young metrosexual manager; who says you can't have it all?)
Honestly, if the show has a biggest flaw, it's that it never gets around to showing us why Ae-jeong does want to succeed in this field so much other than desperation. Most of the non-romance plot centers around the mystery of the breakup of Ae-jeong's band and the scars that it left on the various bandmates, and I spent the whole show wanting this to have a really meaty resolution that brings back what Ae-jeong and the other band members loved about performing with each other, and unfortunately this never really quite happens.
On the other hand, Ae-jeong does end up hosting a food show which sounds like an extremely fun job so it's not like it's not a happy ending, even though I'm a little confused how Britney ended up transforming into Anthony Bourdain! But it's not like I'm not here for it?
(Another unsung heroine: Dokko Jin and Ae-Jeong's agent, who spends the entire show patiently explaining to them how their planned course of action is likely to tank their career, watches her clients immediately go and do the thing that she has just finished explaining will tank their career, and then sighs and gets on the phone and goes back to fixing their career.)
Midway through the first episode, my roommate
attractivegkry wandered in, had the plot explained to her, and remarked, "Can't wait for the US remake starring Jason Statham and Britney Spears!" This comparison is not totally exact -- hero Dokko Jin is definitely more of an equivalent to one of the Ubiquitous Marvel Chrises, fame- and popularity-wise, while Gu Ae-yeong is really more like a Spice Girl than a solo singer -- but all the same it had a profound impact on the way we experienced various plot points in the show.
ME: Okay, so you're a personal assistant, and it turns out your boss, Jason Statham, has somehow never heard of Britney Spears and it's your job to explain her entire career to him --
tenillypo: Okay, so you're an elementary school student, and Jason Statham is on the playground, ripping open his shirt to display his nipples to a confused Britney Spears --ME: And you don't know who any of those people are, because you're in elementary school --
ME: Okay, so you're in a movie theater, and you walk into the lobby, and Britney Spears and Jason Statham are sitting there cuddling on a bench, and she's whisper-singing 'Toxic' in his ear --
tenillypo: I'm not sure I understand why they want Dokko Jin to star in Ae-jeong's comeback music video -- I mean, he's an action hero? What does that look like in an MV? ME: WE KNOW EXACTLY WHAT THAT LOOKS LIKE
(link resolves to Jason Statham's early career as a backup dancer; click at your own peril. We were deeply disappointed that the plot point about Dokko Jin potentially starring in Gu Ae-jeong's music video never resolved.)
Anyway. Statham and Spears aside, the Hong Sisters enjoy nonsense and there is a LOT of absolute nonsense in this show, but there's also a solid attempt at a critique of their own industry and its pervasive toxicity and double standards around behavior for male and female celebrities. Ae-Jeong's other love interest, a mild-mannered doctor who performs such thrilling reality-TV activities in his role as the Korean Bachelor as "putting together a puzzle in complete silence," appears to exist in the story entirely so that he can make confused and judgmental faces whenever anyone tries to explain the workings of the industry to him. And indeed one does end the show wondering why anybody would want to spend time in that world! Ae-jeong's best friend, a former bandmate who now runs a pizzeria, seems way happier with her post-stardom life than Ae-jeong does!
(Also as far as we can tell she ends up in a threesome with Ae-Jeong's brother and Dokko Jin's bright young metrosexual manager; who says you can't have it all?)
Honestly, if the show has a biggest flaw, it's that it never gets around to showing us why Ae-jeong does want to succeed in this field so much other than desperation. Most of the non-romance plot centers around the mystery of the breakup of Ae-jeong's band and the scars that it left on the various bandmates, and I spent the whole show wanting this to have a really meaty resolution that brings back what Ae-jeong and the other band members loved about performing with each other, and unfortunately this never really quite happens.
On the other hand, Ae-jeong does end up hosting a food show which sounds like an extremely fun job so it's not like it's not a happy ending, even though I'm a little confused how Britney ended up transforming into Anthony Bourdain! But it's not like I'm not here for it?
(Another unsung heroine: Dokko Jin and Ae-Jeong's agent, who spends the entire show patiently explaining to them how their planned course of action is likely to tank their career, watches her clients immediately go and do the thing that she has just finished explaining will tank their career, and then sighs and gets on the phone and goes back to fixing their career.)
no subject
Date: 2019-04-11 02:51 am (UTC)I don't even plan to watch this show and I'm disappointed, especially in light of the link which I had never before seen, dear God.
(Also as far as we can tell she ends up in a threesome with Ae-Jeong's brother and Dokko Jin's bright young metrosexual manager; who says you can't have it all?)
Okay, I approve.
no subject
Date: 2019-04-11 02:55 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-04-11 10:23 am (UTC)The underpants!!!!!!!!
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Date: 2019-04-11 11:48 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-04-12 01:36 am (UTC)