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| Fanfic got Shi Won into college, after all... |
I recently finished reading the book Everything Bad Is Good for You by Stephen Johnson. In it, Johnson argues that our engagement with modern pop culture actually makes us smarter, more alert, and more capable when it comes to problem solving—all of which sounds like a lot of wishful thinking, but still holds some merit as far as I’m concerned. For proof, look no further than my obsession with Kdrama. Hour by hour, episode by episode, I’m leaning the Korean language practically by osmosis. I’m discovering a culture I never once thought about before, and I’m coming to understand more of the limitless ways that life can be lived on planet earth.
These
are some pretty impressive developments, especially considering that
television soap operas are their catalyst. I also have Kdrama to
thank for one more thing: I haven’t written this much or this
regularly for years. And when I did write, my
words were in service of an employer rather
than myself. The daily grind of being a grown-up made me forget about the
English degree I earned once upon a time, and that I used to dream about writing books when I was a kid. I’d even lost sight of what a
thrill it can be to have something to write and know I can write it well. This is an experience I suspect many civilians live their entire lives
without having; there are only a few people who actually make their
living writing, after all, and people who aren’t obsessed with the
Internet don’t have much call for lengthy critical analyses of
their favorite show or think-pieces about gender-bending in Asian
dramas. (Poor things.)
(Of course, there is a flip side to that thrill: the times when writing a paragraph seems more difficult than building a space ship from items in my kitchen’s junk drawer and using it to travel to Mars. On those days I can write and erase a single sentence twenty or thirty times, with my mood becoming less and less pleasant every time I hit the delete key. But writing fails are the price all of us pay for writing successes. Without the first, the second couldn’t exist.)
(Of course, there is a flip side to that thrill: the times when writing a paragraph seems more difficult than building a space ship from items in my kitchen’s junk drawer and using it to travel to Mars. On those days I can write and erase a single sentence twenty or thirty times, with my mood becoming less and less pleasant every time I hit the delete key. But writing fails are the price all of us pay for writing successes. Without the first, the second couldn’t exist.)
Clearly,
I’m not the only one who’s having my horizons broadened by Korean
dramas. As I surf around in search of new sites to include on my list
of Kdrama links, I’m always impressed by the variety and quality of
writing there is out there. From the short to the long, from the
funny to the serious, blog posts are as unique as fingerprints and
just as varied. I’ve come across two discussions that touch on
this lately: The first was an article on My Drama List that poked
gentle fun at a number of different review styles, and the second was a longer piece offering blogging advice at
Thundie’s Prattle.
It
actually took months of blogging to settle on a review format that
worked for me, and hopefully works for the people who read this site. My
raw materials were my own preferences: When I read a review I don’t
want to be told every little thing. A quick introduction to the facts
is helpful, but there’s no need for a full cast list or an
exhaustive outline of every single plot detail. (That’s what
dramawikis and streaming sites are for.) What I’m really looking
for is the writer’s own opinion of the show, and whatever new
perspectives he or she has to offer about it. I don’t even mind
writers who include spoilers: I almost never read a blog post about
or review of a show I haven’t already seen. I usually decide what
to watch based on the general ratings and comments at
Dramafever or Dramacrazy, but anything more in-depth than that waits
until I’m caught up with watching. This might make me weird, but I
read reviews to enrich my understanding of the show, not as a preview
of what I’ll see if I decide to watch it.
The
review format I eventually settled on is a bit of a cheat. I repeat
specific categories so I don’t have to re-invent the wheel every
time I sit down to write, and also to sidestep actually crafting a
single cohesive discussion of the show. Building bridges to get from
one point to another is my least favorite part of writing, and thanks
to my headings I never really have to do it. That work gets saved for
the few shows I really love (or, theoretically, the few shows I
really hate).
Because
I’m a Hermione-style geek who feels the need to research everything
ever, I also did a lot of reading of other people’s reviews when I
was trying to formulate my own style. This was an opportunity to
borrow what I liked and also helped me see what
other people might find useful. (In retrospect, I hope my borrowing
can be counted as taking inspiration and not plagiarizing.)
In my searching, I came across a few key types of blog posts that I really, really love reading.
• The
syllabus. When
I was first exploring Kdrama, my ultimate source of guidance was the
Dramabeans rating page.
The show descriptions here are so short and to the point that you
might actually think they’re easy to write—but I bet you’d be
wrong. As millions of Twitter users know all to well, brevity is
hard.
But as Shakespeare knew first, it’s also the soul of wit. Take
Javabeans’ rating of the 2007 drama Air
City: “Hot
boys. Cold plot.” That kind of dispassionate restraint is hard, but
these four words tell us all we need to know about the show. Whether
they’re accurate, I couldn’t actually say: I took them to heart
and skipped that drama altogether.
• The
lab report. Some
bloggers have literally turned reviewing into a science. Their reviews are full of graphs and complicated rating systems based on mathematical formulas that would make my old
algebra teacher swoon with delight. Built around empirical backbones,
these posts are straightforward and easy to navigate, and allow
both writer and reader to focus on their particular points of
interest. They also invite readers to compare dramas category by category and provide a standard format that can be expected from each new
review. For particularly deft examples of this species, see any of
the reviews at Daily KTJ Drama and Kdrama Guk (which seems to be
inactive these days, sadly).
• The
doctoral dissertation. Lengthy,
insightful, and prone to referencing Foucault, reviews falling into
this category are rare for good reason: they take forever to write
and conceive. They plumb every smile and plot twist for meaning and
significance, and can open your eyes to unimagined nuances in the
simplest of scenes. As far as I'm concerned, there’s no pleasure like reading a downright
scholarly discussion of a great show, like the ones found on Idle Revelry, The Vault, Mihansa, and High Yellow.
Like everything else in life, being obsessed with Korean drama is a mixed bag. I would get more exercise if I’d never discovered Drama Fever, but I probably wouldn’t be doing as much writing. While this blogging business doesn’t use my quads, it does give the critical thought center of my brain quite the workout—which is what I value more, anyway. Ultimately, blogging is hard work. It requires thought and effort and time, but its rewards can be pretty amazing: There’s the pleasure of being another voice in the communal discussion of something you love, and the ability to meet likeminded people from around the world.
And who knows? Maybe it also refines our thinking and makes us smarter, just as Everything Bad Is Good for You would have us believe.
*** *** ***
SIDEBAR: BLOGGING PRINCE
When
I first started reading Kdrama blogs, it amazed me that so many
people had so many different things to say about the very same
episodes. To appreciate the variety (and as an excuse to think more
about my favorite show of all time), I went through the sites included on my list of Kdrama links and searched for posts devoted to
Coffee Prince.
Here’s what I found.
• Crazy
for Kdrama: Coffee Prince Review
• Dahee’s
Plastic Castle: 호점 Review
• Daily
KTJ Drama: 2 Good 2 Miss: 2 Good 2 Miss: 1st Shop of CoffeePrince, Stand Up!!, 1 Litre of Tears
• Dangermousie:
Coffee Prince Ramblings
• Ginkgohill:
Coffee Prince Review
• Idle
Revelry: Coffee Prince: Anatomy of a Scene
• Korean
Drama Ratings: Coffee Prince
• K-What?:
Coffee Prince
• Oishiithoughts:
Coffee Prince Review
• Outside
Seoul: Drama Review: Coffee Prince
• Puddingpost:
Someday My Coffee Prince Will Come
• Wishiwasasian:
Day 1 of the 30-day Kdrama Challenge
