My Top Ten Kdramas of 2018

Here are my favorite dramas I watched this year. Turns out that five of them are new ones (aired this year in 2018) and five are old ones (aired 2017 or before.) What a nice balance eh?

First some numbers:

Dramas watched: 22

Five Hearts: 8
Four Hearts: 11
Three Hearts: 3

Aired this year: 11
Aired before this year: 11

New-to-me favorite actors:
Seo In Guk
Lee Min Ki
Lee Hong Gi
Lee Joon Gi
Lee Jun Ho
Park Bo Gum
Yang Se Jong
Lee Seung Gi
Yoo Seung Ho

WAH SO MANY!!!

Favorite Dramas From 2018:

30 But 17 (Still 17) This drama is very funny and had me LOLing so many times. Plus it's heart wrenching and the dude who plays our guy is one of the best criers EVER! And he gets to do this a lot! And the nephew dude is just... so perfect! Basically, I fell in love with every character on this show. There is not a bad dude. The bad thing in this drama is inner conflicts. Anyway. I loved it. The girl is a violin player so there is a lot of classic music as a backdrop. And the nephew is on a rowing team, so there's a lot of that too. And there's a cute dog and a funny chicken. And the maid is also hilarious with her own tragic back story. So many good things. And beautiful characters. It was a perfect.

I Am Not a Robot:  And of course, he is so charming that she falls in love with him but there is no way she can ever let him know that  SHE IS NOT A ROBOT! AH!! But.. just tell him already!!!  No, it's not that simple.  Anyway, things get very complicated from there and yeah... it's awesome.  I loved loved loved it. I pretty much just want to watch it all over again. 




Just Between Lovers: Our dude's character grows from an angry young man, to a loving guy... mostly. He has found people in his life that have taken care of him over the years and part (a lot actually) of what makes this drama so awesome is those relationships. One with an older grandma lady, one with his landlord lady and her mentally disabled but bright and beautiful son. And one with a "lady of the evening" who he saved back in the day and so she has taken him under her wing and she is now like an older sister to him. He also has his true sister who he is struggling to help and provide for as she is going to medical school.

Meanwhile, our girl has all her family issues to deal with too. Many after effects of what happened with the mall event as pulled them apart and made them live a lonely life.

Together, they help each other deal with things, and they learn and grow and love and heal.

Are You Human Too? The premise here is that our guy is a robot... his genius mom made him because her human son was kidnapped from her when he was about 10 years old by his grandpa (her father in law) and she was never able to get him back. So he was raised by this crazy powerful guy and so she, because she could, made a robot replacement.
The robot is nice, mannerly, kind, rule abiding, sweet, compassionate and etc. The human is... arrogant, mean, ruthless, playboyish, snotty, greedy, and etc. They are as different as can be.One day, the human son is trying to track down his mom, but he is being followed by a hitman hired by the bad guy and is nearly killed. The robot son witnesses this and is freaked out. The mom rescues the human son and begins to nurse him back to health.Meanwhile, she asks the robot son to step into his place in the corporate crazy world so that the bad guys don't know what happened, and so that the human son doesn't lose his place to inherit the company.

Yeah.
The Smile Has Left Your Eyes Anyway, once these two decide that they do in fact love each other, then the romance is absolutely perfect. So much kissing and hugging and all. And he is suddenly smiling a lot and believe me, when this actor smiles... IT'S OVER! AH!!! But of course, we knew that stuff is going to go down to ruin it all





Favorite Older Dramas:

Because This is My First Life: The issues addressed? Well, of course, much is said about the nature of love and marriage. About pleasing your parents or doing whatever the heck you want to anyway. Much is said about gender roles and women's rights and feminism and all that. Much is said about traditional vs. non. Much is said about family, love, friendship, relationships, emotions, feelings, etc. So.. I loved it. 

Scarlet Heart: It's an epic sweeping royal family saga that is beautiful in all the ways it interprets this story! Like everything is just... beautiful. I don't know how else to describe it! There is some cheesiness here and there. And some convenience things. But yeah.. it's an amazing production.

There is one prince that is hard to ignore right from the beginning. And he rises to the top for our girl after awhile. He is the scary, angsty, hurt, vulnerable, pained, tortured anti hero of which I love to love from all my books and movies. He is a good bad guy, or a bad good guy. Not sure which. The lines are very blurry and I love it.





Moonlight Drawn By Clouds: It's a great one for a fun, but not confusing, historical drama. Park Bo Gum is adorable. As is all the rest of them. The music is dramatic and epic, the love songs beautiful. Everything! I loved it.





Shopping King Louis So. They end up helping each other out... trying to navigate the city and modern life when neither one of them knows anything... and they don't have any money. And so it goes from there! And it's very cute and funny and heartwarming and all that. I loved it. It is a bit over the top silly at times. But you know. Who cares. So much fun!




Falling In Love With Soon Jung (Falling for Innocence) Well. Next thing we know the detective gets run down by our dude with issues and is rushed to the hospital where he dies.... sad. At the same time, our ruthless CEO dude collapses from heart failure and is rushed to the hospital.... and ends up getting the heart transplant he needs... from the detective dude. And he doesn't die. Yeah. So when he wakes up, he starts changing. And he is drawn to the secretary and she to him. And things get weird and complicated.