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Post by ajk on Aug 9, 2013 23:21:24 GMT -5
Uh-oh. Thursday turned out to be relatively uneventful, and actually had some nice moments. But I do NOT like the direction things started taking today in #45. This was the weakest episode so far, as far as silly things starting to happen that are really over the top. The kind of stuff I don't like about these series.
Grandma behaving like a complete drama queen, and at the same time being conned and screwing things up for Seyeong. PSBmom talking about marrying the baker just to become Seyeong's stepmom and screw up her life. Monster Girl becoming the new trainer so she, too, can screw up Seyeong's life. Melodramatic over-the-top clichés waiting to happen. This could get bad. And most of all, the DNA thing getting buried now when it really is time for it to come out.
And there was zero humor in #45. ZERO.
This series has been taking lively turns and not getting too bogged down in creating excessive miseries for characters. But the anti-Seyeong scheming has about reached its limit and it would be a huge mistake keeping it up. The Big Secret should come out now, and its consequences can send the show in good new directions. I don't want to watch Monster Girl stomping around and being a scheming little bitch for sixty more episodes.
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Post by ajk on Aug 17, 2013 0:23:20 GMT -5
YouTube now has all episodes 1-40, with subtitles.
Things kind of backed away from the precipice after #45 but the show has gotten much more conventional and I'm disappointed with that. Too many easy cliché things happening. Still no Big Secret out yet and still Monster Girl trying to screw Seyeong over again and again. Needs a big-time change of direction very soon.
About time for an update on everybody's smack status. There have been some changes! Will try to get to that this weekend.
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Post by Knov1 on Aug 19, 2013 7:08:59 GMT -5
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Post by ajk on Aug 19, 2013 11:41:33 GMT -5
I wondered about that too, especially since "Sincerity" isn't really any more prominent of an issue in the show than many others are. It might be that the Korean title was "Sisters" or something like it but the producers were told to find something different because of the horror movie with the same title. But they kept the original in English. Who knows.
If the "Sincerity" title seems odd, the original working title was "Sweet Springs" and an award goes to anybody who can explain that one.
Thanks for the links; the second one is the theme song. Which I was looking for; it has some very clever writing. But why do they have to synthesize everything? Bad enough they didn't pay for a string section; now they won't even hire a drummer? UGH. But it looks like there might be an acoustic version out there somewhere....
P.S. YouTube now complete through Episode 45--just one week short of where we are right now. Amazing. (Includes Episode 42--"Your fridge is broken?" Oh how sweet that was.)
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Post by TheBo on Aug 20, 2013 14:29:28 GMT -5
I searched these pages, and can't find a reference to this--the girl who plays Seyoung is the one who played young Soomi in Man of Equator. I don't know why I noticed this when I was looking at the cast pages, I just did.
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Post by Knov1 on Aug 20, 2013 19:44:17 GMT -5
Park Se Young, who plays the role of Choi Se Young, was also in Love Rain, Faith (She was Princess Noguk) and School 2013. This is her biggest role so far. If you read the KBS World description for A Tale of Two Sisters you could easily think they're talking about You're the Best, Lee Soon Shin. The only major differences between the dramas is the career choice (announcer vs actress), adoptive parent (single father vs single mother) and the other sister (Yerin is adopted. In the other series, she's also the biological daughter). |
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Post by ajk on Aug 21, 2013 22:05:43 GMT -5
I watched a couple of episodes of that You're The Best show when KBS first came back and you're right, it has some big similarities. But the thing was a deadly dull bore and I never went back. It seemed like the whole thing was made to feature the lead girl; apparently she's a pop star and I guess they're trying to make her into an actress. But the storyline isn't anywhere near as lively or funny or as varied as Sisters. Just kind of goes through the motions. She seems very young, and just isn't interesting as an actress, and the show seemed very ordinary. And nothing funny in it either.
But I have to say, the last week and a half, Sisters has sputtered. The liveliness and the humor are just about gone and it's gotten very conventional. The Big Secret desperately needs to be revealed, but it seems to be farther away than ever. And it just keeps going with Monster Girl screwing Seyeong over, and too many typical situations with lots of weight hanging over everybody. I don't know what happened, but something changed. Not happy about it.
P.S. Although, give credit, that was a heck of a chunk of backstory we got from the two moms in #52 yesterday. Where was all THAT hiding? A real surprise this far in.
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Post by TheBo on Aug 22, 2013 12:28:18 GMT -5
....But I have to say, the last week and a half, Sisters has sputtered. The liveliness and the humor are just about gone and it's gotten very conventional.... That is one complaint I have with the long daily dramas of late. Many times, they start out quirky and unconventional, exploring social mores in an interesting way, and then they settle back down into the safe, conventional route. For instance, Assorted Gems (MBC 2010) had a whole lot going for it, a cross-cultural romance, a second young woman who decided to work after marriage and was fully supported by her husband, a family dealing with early onset Alzheimer's, and an unsuitable child romance. As it drew to the end, it was all why can't you be satisfied with just having babies and I guess I'd better marry that doctor after all. Very disappointing after investing 49 hours to have, really, the last episode devolve into Ozzie & Harriet. This was not always so, and a good example of this is Who's My Love (KBS 2002). It managed to keep (particularly) the personalities of the female characters intact, even when they took on conventional family roles. Rather than simply becoming obedient little chickens, the family learned to work with them and everyone benefitted. Another good one was Life is Beautiful (SBS 2010 not the other one) starring Choi Jung-hoon (the villain in Man of Equator), Nam Gye-ri ( 49 Days) and numerous others you'd recognize, about a blended family dealing with such themes as homosexuality, child abandonment and sexual misbehavior (even in the elderly!). Sorry for the sidebar. I have so few people with whom to share these observations.  |
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Post by Knov1 on Aug 23, 2013 6:50:44 GMT -5
....But I have to say, the last week and a half, Sisters has sputtered. The liveliness and the humor are just about gone and it's gotten very conventional.... That is one complaint I have with the long daily dramas of late. Many times, they start out quirky and unconventional, exploring social mores in an interesting way, and then they settle back down into the safe, conventional route. Yes. It's why I've given up on daily and family dramas. Kim Song Jung - Can You See? MV There's a MV for Kim Song Jung's "Can You See?" for A Tale of Two Sisters. It's all scenes from the drama. The MV is likely to contain spoilers. |
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Post by ajk on Aug 24, 2013 11:24:42 GMT -5
Hold everything...there's life in this show yet! Suddenly a huge crack in The Big Secret dam...and maybe the funniest scene in the series so far. Still some weak stuff, but the trend is positive lately.
And amazingly, YouTube is now complete through Episode 55--YESTERDAY'S episode. The complete change of business strategy at KBS is just unreal. Of course it makes perfect sense to upload everything so that everybody watching the series can stay current if they miss an episode. And KBS sticks in a few commercials so they get some revenue from the YouTube viewings. Everybody wins. A shame they weren't this smart years ago.
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Post by ajk on Aug 28, 2013 12:31:18 GMT -5
Happy to say, back on track again. Some solid stuff in the last few episodes. And The Big Secret dam is ready to collapse, so we'll get all kinds of fresh angles from that.
Friday #60 is the halfway point (or at least it's supposed to be). Smack update then.
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Post by Knov1 on Aug 29, 2013 6:29:57 GMT -5
Makes sense that a person would have to register their DNA themselves. It seemed odd though that all the police gave Seyeong was a phone number. Seyeong hung up the phone right away. Did she recognize the voice on the other line?
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Post by ajk on Aug 29, 2013 12:51:32 GMT -5
Almost definitely. She knows Kim Juhui very well.
The actress playing Juhui has been very good lately. She was the Khitan empress dowager in Iron Empress and was excellent in that; her character in this has been sort of an enigma so far but the last few episodes have started to reveal a lot about her. All kinds of long-repressed baggage confronting the character and she's been playing it well. Finally learning the truth about her lost daughter and how overwhelming it was to learn everything after so many years, it was very touching.
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Post by Knov1 on Aug 31, 2013 7:12:09 GMT -5
Ep 60
The cat is out of the bag. The over the top brother is the one making the most sense. Go figure.
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Post by ajk on Aug 31, 2013 11:46:27 GMT -5
Giving this one a try, are you? You may not take to it like I did; I think MisterBill50 is the only other person here watching it. Too bad we didn't get this one from the beginning; maybe more people would have jumped into it.
Obviously when they sketched out the series they intended for The Big Secret dam to burst halfway through. What floored me is that Thursday in 59, Yerin cracked! And fessed up (mostly) to Seyeong. Which I really liked; showed she hasn't turned into a one-dimensional schemer. She had complimented Seyong early on about how she handled being an adoptee, and we heard that again now in 59. Maybe I can stop calling her Monster Girl now?....
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