[2022 Year in Review] I just want to watch a K-drama when I want to watch it

[2022 Year in Review] I just want to watch a K-drama when I want to watch it

by Guest Beanie

By @ally-le

Is it just me, or does it seem harder to watch dramas now that we have all these different streaming sites available? I’m mainly going to be talking about drama accessibility here in the U.S., but I realize there are other parts of the world that have been dealing with this issue for years, and I sympathize!

This year, I had — in very much a first-world problem — not less than six streaming sites to choose from to watch K-dramas legally. SIX! And honestly, you had to have them all to watch all the dramas that were available. No longer do just two or three sites have all the popular ones. Also, good luck trying to watch many of them live — you’ll needed a VPN for that.

I like watching live and discussing what I’ve seen on Dramabeans with others on the recap pages, but several dramas that I wanted to watch this year were just not available when they were released in South Korea, so the buzz was gone by the time it was available to me subtitled. And that’s what made this year so frustrating for me: there were good shows, but not when I wanted to watch them.

Below, I picked three shows that aired live in South Korea and Asia — but not in the U.S. — and I’ll be sharing what happened to me while I watched.

#1: There is No Goo Pil-soo (a.k.a. Never Give Up)

I was looking forward to this one since I knew Yoon Doo-joon was starring in it – and it was his first legit drama since military, and a full year after he was discharged during the pandemic. I was worried when I heard it was airing on a new channel called ENA, but I had hope when I heard it was being picked up by Netflix. Unfortunately, it was Netflix Asia only, and it wasn’t even close to being subtitled. I tried watching it with a VPN set to South Korea which worked — but no subs (sad face emoji here because even though I eat, drink, and sleep K-dramas, I still have about the vocabulary of a two-year-old).

The drama didn’t come to Netflix U.S. until months later, so it was about two years after army that Doo-joon finally made it into my living room. And it was GOOD! Really good! But I bet less than 5% of international K-drama watchers even saw it, because it came out so much later, and more buzz-worthy dramas aired as it was released (i.e. Extraordinary Attorney Woo).

Never Give Up was a redemption story — not one with really young actors, but more seasoned ones — with nuanced performances that somehow melded the seriousness of middle-age adulting with wit and humor. In a year of middle-aged melancholy and depression (I’m looking at you Thirty-Nine, Our Blues, and My Liberation Notes), this was such a refreshing show with the same age depicted, but in a very hopeful way. I’m glad I never gave up trying to watch this one.

#2: Snowdrop

Who doesn’t love Jung Hae-in, right? How many of us were dying to see this? Just me? It also had Yoo Inna and Kim Hye-yoon, and it would have been my ride-or die-drama. But, because it aired on Disney+ Asia, it was nearly impossible for any of us in the West to watch it while it was airing.

It looked amazing; the nostalgic beauty and cinematography alone would have made it a hit here. The spy aspect was intriguing, but it was mired in controversy even before it aired, so by the time Disney+ U.S. got it, most people were just tired of hearing about it. I waited until after it dropped in the U.S. to watch it, and I liked it, genuinely, up until the point I didn’t. Episode 6, maybe?

Why didn’t I like it more, you ask? It just ran out of steam for me. This is a drama that I keep thinking I’ll come back to, but just haven’t. I’m almost sure that I would have been able to continue with the Beaniedom behind me, watching it with me, and critiquing it with me, for better or worse. But I felt alone watching it, so I (snow)dropped it.

#3 Link: Eat, Love, Kill

For this Disney+ title, I did pull out the VPN, and was happy to see that it was subtitled relatively quickly! I did end up participating (as I always have) on Dramabeans for this one, typically as each recap was published. But… the electronic acrobatics and hoops I jumped through to get this one to work on my TV was more than I could do some days. I had to turn everything off, turn everything on again, point my VPN to an Asian country, wait for a connection that hopefully didn’t time out, then reopen Disney+ to get to the Asian titles, and even then it didn’t work at times.

Then I would watch it on my phone, which didn’t always connect to the Wi-Fi or cast to the TV consistently. And what good is watching Yeo Jin-gu on a 6″ inch screen, when I have 72″ where I could be watching every strained look he gives?

I have so much appreciation for those K-drama stalwarts who watched dramas in the “olden days” through even greater means. (I’m sure our matriarch, javabeans, can empathize with me.) In short, my VPN link, sometimes ate up all the love I had for K-dramas to the point where I wanted to kill Disney+ for not just releasing it in the US. when they did in Asia!

So that was me in 2022, frustrated and exhausted I couldn’t watch my K-dramas when I wanted, where I wanted, and how I wanted. You would think that it would be easier to watch K-dramas by now. Maybe my curmudgeonliness is getting the better of me, or maybe it’s my acid reflux talking.

I did enjoy other dramas that aired live and that I was able to watch and discuss on this magical forum. I’m still not super happy with the randomness of Netflix dropping K-drama episodes all at once versus weekly or bi-weekly, but that’s another essay for another day. I’ll still be here in my middle age watching them — maybe just complaining a bit more about it.

 
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[2022 Year in Review] I just want to watch a K-drama when I want to watch it
Source: Buzz Pinay Daily