Eye candy looks and almost perfect traits of protagonists in K-drama can have strong influence on expectations and stir fantasies. K-drama junkie shares the blurred line between her fantasies and real life relationships.
I am not a Korean. Neither do I live in South Korea nor have visited it. But I’m a Korean drama (K-drama) junkie!
Having caught the Hallyu[1]fever. I have binge-watched the cuteness-overload K-drama. Swooned over the aww-some men with pretty boy looks and masculine physique. Possessed by the die-for facial beauty of the women with flawless skin, v-shaped chin, double-eyelids and thin-bridge nose. And teared with inexplicable joy of kilig[2]or bawled over the emotional or troubled relationships.
Inevitably, my perception of the real Korea has been transposed by the celluloid Korea that I have come to know intimately.
After all, 90 per cent of obsessively-followed romantic K-dramas portray almost perfect male protagonists – well-endowed from looks to wealth coming from rich, connected and powerful families. While, it may be fairy-tale like, it can be excusably real when K-drama storylines repeatedly revolve around super rich and charming guy falling for poor but cute girl. Secret Garden or Boys Over Flowers are just two of many examples.
[For the benefit of yet-to-be-initiated into K-dramas] Hyun Bin plays smart, narcissist scion of family that owns a luxurious department store in Secret Garden. He falls for a down-to-earth stunt woman mistaken for an actress and goes through conflicting emotions and trouble in wooing her.
In Boys Over Flowers, poor but bright girl gets to an exclusive high school for elites for a heroic act. She has a run in, standing up to a notorious group of four rich brats led by the spoiled heir to world-leading conglomerate played by Lee Min Ho. She subsequently falls in love with one of the four, but not Lee Min-Ho’s character. This nemesis of hers too develops feelings for her and a love triangle erupts.
The male characters often appear to be a little too perfect, having unbelievably good genes and every good trait possible for an individual. These somehow has shaped my perception and made me loooooooong for the prefect counterparts in our real-life (as if they even exist!).
Now to snap out of the make-believe cocoon that I have spun for myself and to get real, It is said that most K-drama portray about 10 to 20 per cent of what Koreans go through in real life like the everyday stress of bali bali[3]
Like anywhere else other than Hollywood, Bollywood or Hallyu-wood , there are also (i) the unattractive, (ii) the regular looking, and (iii) the godly handsome looking.
One who’s addicted to K-dramas, however, cannot be faulted if influenced that all the guys and gals in South Korea have eye-candy looks and physique. In actual fact, it is but rare to find people like that in the streets of South Korea, I was told! A Youtuber, Asian Boss, went around South Korea and asked locals Koreans if they think there are any guys that are like a particular character in K-dramas. And you bet, the answers ranged from “definitely not possible” to “there are no guys like that at all.”
Sorry to burst your bubble. Ever since I started getting addicted to romance K-dramas, I have developed toooo many expectations in my own personal relationships. Call me delusional or unrealistic, but I do have a lot of expectations and expects the best of the best when it comes to relationships.
It is normal, I would say. As those of my dad’s generation too harboured dreams that there would always a Pussy Galore if one developed to be a Sean Connery-Bond!
So, please excuse me while I dream on to be the poor girl ending up marrying the young, handsome and rich guy. But let me state my preference here… I’d prefer the Lee Jongsuk type in looks and physique! So hit me if you fit that bill!