A Tale of Two Sisters (daily drama)

[ajk]

(also known as: Sincerity is the Way of Heaven; Sincerity Moves Heaven)

This is the daily drama they're running on KBS right now. Here's the DramaWiki page for it with the cast and other info:

wiki.d-addicts.com/A_Tale_of_Two_Sisters

It's VERY lightweight stuff; I've only had it on because I'm so glad to have subtitled KBS back, I'll watch just about anything right now. Not planning on sticking with it...

...but I have a question. One of the main characters said she wouldn't get involved with another of the main characters because she wouldn't want to marry into a "head family." What does that mean? Does that just generally refer to old-style households where the oldest male calls all the shots? Never heard the term before and it Googles sort of ambiguously.


P.S. Here's the Asianwiki page, which is better:

asianwiki.com/Sincerity_is_the_Way_of_Heaven

[sageuk]

Boy how many kdramas have stolen titles from movies already? In this case, a horror movie based on a horror folktale

[ajk]

Anybody else watching this one? I watched it the first few days KBS came back and had no intention of continuing…but the timeslot works for me; it runs halfway through before Letterman comes on. Between the first half and the Letterman commercials I’ve been catching most of it.

I know very little about daily dramas but this one seems pretty typical because I’ve already lost count of the characters who need a good smack. At least eight, possibly nine. And of course a couple of over-the-top hyperdramatic women, and the usual conflicts about adopted children and how everybody’s supposed to get married and the elders dictating everything.

But there are a couple of interesting storylines, and possibly others coming. Plus it’s easier to take than other dramas have been because it doesn’t take itself too seriously. And surprisingly, around once an episode somebody delivers a genuinely funny line that totally cracks me up. Somebody in the writers room has an edge. Guy is talking to his mother about a woman he likes, apologizing because she might have come off as a little loud. She tells him, “I don’t care if she sounds like a horse or a train. Just get married!”

Still not sure I’ll stick with it for the duration, but we’ll see.

[ajk]

Here's an amazing piece of news for anybody else following this show, particularly here in Chicago: KBS World has a YouTube channel and they've uploaded the earliest episodes, complete with subtitles. Just within the last day or so they put the first dozen episodes up and I happened to come across them. We missed the first fifteen in Chicago--presumably the other three will be up shortly.

Incredible what's happened in the last month with KBS.

[soapygrams]

Not watching this channel. As to changes made by KBS; perhaps it has something to do with the exit of their former president, the one who was the CEO a few years ago when KBS abandoned the Chicago maket

I have a long memory about that time because we were getting into the last third of Love and Obession; had to finish that series between Vikii and DF; both of which had some "broken" links problems.

Guess I have a bad taste in me from back then rea: KBS. I will probably eventually get over it though, in time .. . hope so. . .

[ajk]

You may be right about that, soapy...I looked into it at one point and was shocked at how political it all is. The KBS president is basically a political appointee; it's even written into the national constitution. The previous president, he left last November. From what I had read, he was talking a lot about the boosting-revenue side of the business. The new guy seems to be more balanced, and he's talked specifically about KBS having a responsibility to promote Korean culture abroad. So that's very encouraging for us here.

This is turning into a very enjoyable series. Of course plenty of the conventional drama stuff, but they keep throwing in some really clever twists. And there continues to be some very funny stuff, consistently.

[ajk]

So they just paid the bill for the liver transplant: $65,000. Did some checking into it; here in this country it's going to cost 4-5 times as much, minimum, and maybe much more depending on where you live. Assuming the show didn't just make up a number--I don't think they would, because it's too important to the plot--you wonder what they know over there that we don't. Maybe we'd better find out--FAST before we go broke.

Anyway...I'm more and more impressed with this show all the time. They actually are trying to give legitimate reasons for some of the bad behavior. The monster girl doing a lot of the bad things, she had a terrible trauma in childhood that would certainly have scarred her and motivated a lot of what she's doing. It still is very silly that she's not simply talking it out with her mom, but a lot of people are repressed into acting silly. Good job of giving us some backstory. And this doesn't seem like it's going to be the formula-type series where the bad person makes trouble and gets away with it the whole time and finds redemption at the end. I get the feeling the whole thing is going to take a big turn very soon and monster girl is going to get hit hard. There's a huge DNA secret being kept (like in That Winter, The Wind Blows) and I think it's all coming completely out sooner rather than later.

But the little girl is still the most sensible one in the whole bunch. Gotta love TV.

[ajk]

Episode 42...Oh what a happy day. The fridge hasn't worked for a week! AAAAAAAA-HAHAHAHAHAHA! Never saw it coming. Monster Girl gets busted for the bad pastries. Cooked up a lie to make it sound less horrible but still had to grovel and beg for everyone's forgiveness. And Jeonghyo has finally taken her off the pedestal--and not even because of that. She's liable to snap and do something really awful soon...which would sort of be a shame because she does have legitimate psychological reason to be terrified of The Big Secret getting out. And you have to be sympathetic to that. But I've been hoping for weeks that the dad/baker would get his reputation back; it didn't look like it would happen and after this much time has passed, didn't seem like there was any way it would happen. What a completely satisfying turn.

And Jaeseong starting to push back to Grandpa Anachronism--"It isn't the 19th century any more!"--icing on the cake. Totally enjoying this series.

[MisterBill50]

My wife and I were watching this since the beginning on Dish Network, but they cancelled KBS America today
I'm able to pick up channel 24.7, so was wondering what time the show airs on that channel? We used to watch it at 10:20pm, so I'm hoping the time is the same. Thanks, and all the best!

[ajk]

Yeah, same time on 24.7. Roughly--10:15 to 10:20 p.m.. And then they rerun it the next morning; the time has varied but it looks like it's 9:20 a.m. Chicago time now.

Good to hear I'm not the only one watching it. I am definitely NOT a veteran of dailies but I look forward to every episode of this thing. Am almost caught up on the first 15 I didn't see. Right now I'm just hoping it doesn't jump off the track when The Big Secret gets revealed.


P.S. As of last night, YouTube has all episodes through 22.

[MisterBill50]

Thanks for all the helpful info. We're glad we can still keep up with it in spite of DISH Network dropping the station with no warning. Our evening just got a lot better!

[ajk]

If you get any explanation on why they dropped the station, please do share it. Amazing that KBS would reappear over-the-air and leave a subscription service! The exact opposite of what happened in 2009.

In case you need it, the schedule thread in this 24.7 board explains how to get to a weekly printed schedule for 24.7 so you can locate anything else you were following before.

You've been here longer than I have...What do you think of this series? Is it as clever as I think it is, or have I just not seen enough of these dailies?

[MisterBill50]

So far all I can find is something to the effect that DISH Network thought the contract was too expensive, and that they bailed without advance warning. Hopefully, it will get resolved somehow.

"A Tale Of Two Sisters" is a good show, but in many ways, it's very similar to a few others. I think we're about 1/3 of the way along with the series, and I'll stick with it as long as I get a clear signal for viewing it.

Some of my favorites over the years are "Likeable Or Not"; "Jolly Widows; Smile Again Donghae"; "I'll Give You The Stars & The Moon ( I may have that title backwards or mixed up??)", and "Cheer Up, Mr. Kim". The stories and background music are great for those and others!

[MisterBill50]

Also, thanks for the detail on getting a schedule for 24.7!

[ajk]

No problem. Tonight's going to be a real acid test for this series. Monster Girl and PSBmom alone in the bakery, what the heck are they going to do in there? It could be very clever or very stupid; we'll see. It seems like they're pushing the pace a little bit all of a sudden...the wedding came right up on us, and PSBmom getting in good with grandma so quickly. I just can't believe they're going to keep this Monster Girl thing going much longer without The Big Secret getting out.

And the other big question is how will it get out. Either Jeonghyo gets so sickened by it that he finally cracks and rats them out...or else that long-ago DNA registration pays off. Depends on what PSBmom is going to do with that toothbrush.