How do you rate Sejong with other Historical Drama

[MTR]

Rather other Historical K Dramas you have seen ?
I Noticed a lot of DJY fans did not stick with Sejong (Excluding those that dropped off because of the demise of AZN .

So now we are nearing the end how does it compare with other Historical K Dramas you have watched ?
I Guess to make it fair lets base the comparision on Enjoyment only .

Im going out on a limb because i did not see AOW or EWG which seem to be the bible of K Dramas historical .

For me id say its the best ,i have seen about 10 /12 historical dramas (Korean anyway if i include Japanese it jumps to another 40 but we are only going Korean )
why its the best ?
budget
production values
musical score
fast moving story
acting
costumes
cinematography
its smart ,has great balance of action and drama .

[JP Paulus]

domyoungchun,

i wonder if some people dropped out because of time...i knowi have less time to watch dramas, let alone get into writing & researching them, like i used to.

Others, who might have been used to the action of Age of Warriors, Yi Soon SHin and Dae Jo Young, might have been disappointed.

I have been watching them for over a decade, starting with Chang Nok Soo.

I personally love this show for all the reasons you mentioned...i would probably rank only Dae Jang Geum and Emperor Wang Guhn above Sejong.


If Barack Obama had anytime (like when he's on Air Force 1), this would be a great show for him to wacth.


Any idea what's next?

I personally

[MTR]

Empress Chunchu AKA The Iron Empress
Chae Si Ra portrays the ardent buddhist queen who thought the way to enlightenment was through over indulgence in every aspect but for this drama they have given her a huge makeover and transformed her into Warrior Queen scourge of the Khitans .
2 new Korean Films i must point out the first is a must for Sejong Fans
Divine Weapon covers pretty much the same ground as eps 67 -72 of Sejong and the film was a major hit in Korea
best look for it on DVD .
Frozen Flower opens on 12 /30 and covers the end of the koryo Dynasty ,with the leads from Musa and King /Clown this film also with a gay theme (and male female nudity which is a real big deal as many Korean's are very conservative about such things )like Clown but still this looks like a big budget bloodbath .
The film has already garnered rave reviews and has sold out nation wide for the first two weeks of release .
Weapon also has a huge budget and both Sejong and Yongsil are major characters .

[mikey]

Dec 10, 2008 20:03:03 GMT -5 MTR said:

I Noticed a lot of DJY fans did not stick with Sejong

Actually, there’s at least one of us here who didn’t stick with DJY, either.

I’d give GKS a B, or maybe a B+. The show’s serious attempt to maintain historical accuracy is GREATLY appreciated, and the power politics of the early Choseon era is nicely shown. And, although it’s a small point, I really like seeing the Japanese characters actually speaking Japanese, and the Chinese characters speaking Mandarin. That adds a lot to the credibility of the show.

But, I think GKS spent a little too much time in the early going on trivial matters - and yes, some of that got boring after a while. There were times where I’d find myself “watching” GKS . . . but not really paying much attention to the show.

The actor playing King Sejong is doing an okay job, but it doesn’t come close to some of the really memorable character portrayals we’ve seen in the past (like Lee Duk-hwa as “The Archfiend” in AOW, or Kim Myung-min as Admiral Yi in IYSS). The only GKS characters that really fascinate me are Jo Mal-seng (played actor Jung Dong-hwan) and Hwang Hee (played actor Kim Gap-soo - though Kim’s presence in the show has been disappointingly minor).

And I also have to give an honorable mention to the actor who plays Wang Zhen (I don’t know his name) who is doing a nice job of portraying a really scary, evil kind of character.

GKS’s musical score is kind of blah. I can’t say that I have any great urge to rush out and buy the OST. And that dumb pop music that sometimes appears during tragic moments would have been best forgotten about.

So, GKS isn’t really a fantastic series in my evaluation - but it’s a good one, and I’m glad I’m watching.

[mikey]

Wow, is no one else interested in responding?

And I really messed up when I said there weren’t any standout acting performances in GKS, for I completely forgot about Kim Yeong-cheol’s portrayal of King Taejong in the first half of the series.

In the early going, I think he really stole the show.

[MTR]

Kim Yeong-Cheol no kiddin many times i wished the drama had been about Taejong because he was so good .
Check him out in the Korean Gangster Classic "A BITERSWEET LIFE "(2005)as the gang boss ,he is really great in that ,its also one of the best Korean Movies i have ever seen it plays like vintage John Woo (HK late 80's early 90's )crossed with Spaghetti Western's .
It airs on Sundance every now and again or the DVD is easy to find .

[ozzaib]

Only seen 4 of these dramas, and thought in order from best ot worst were
Immortal Yi Soon-Shih
The Great King Sejong
Dae JoYoung
Seoul 1945 (or whatever it was called)

Interested enough by IYSS to get the translations of the Admiral's war diaries, which the series mirror so well, thay must have been used as source material.

[seven stars]

Thanks Domyoungchun,

I'm not sure if anyone will read this by now but I quite enjoyed GKS. In fact I actually think its the best K-Drama that I've seen. From my perspective the storyline was continually engaging, the acting was excellent, the soundtrack was good, and the production quality was top notch.

Another thing I enjoyed was the fact that Chinese and Japanese characters actually spoke the appropriate languages. That detail added some novel sophistication to the series. I also appreciated a well written storyline that wasn't based around military activity but instead centered around cultural and technological advancements.

Sejong Dae Wang reshaped my top five K-Drama list...

Great King Sejong
Immortal Yi Sun-Shin
Emperor Wang Guhn
Age of Warriors
Dae Joyoung