Know what your audience thinks, makes catering to them more precise! So! This is what a segment of your audience thinks about K-dramas!
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Obviously movies and TV shows are not going to be completely realistic if the idea is to create something entertaining and escapist.
And donât people want to watch characters in shows that represent the best and not the worst qualities of human beings?
Standards of beauty are somewhat subjective, and they are drummed into our heads by (DUH) social media, but I prefer attractiveness to ugliness. That is, qualities that are appealing. They donât necessarily have to be obvious.
The shows that make me feel as if I have some beautiful qualities about MY life are the ones I enjoy most.
However, I think that the most relatable shows are the ones with humor. My favorite K-dramas are the ones that give characters moments of being regular people struggling to live like anybody else, and in the end, they show that ordinary life has moments of great beauty and that there is great satisfaction in simple things.
And!
Gong Yoo . . . when he is not standing in front of cameras with special lighting, when he is not wearing carefully chosen outfits, and when he is not posing half naked . . . I think heâs a pretty ordinary-looking guy. (Heâs got a bit of a receding chin.) Itâs more his inner qualities than his outer ones that make him noticeable.
I think that the most appealing thing about any human being is his or her desire to break down barriers and communicate genuinely with others.
(The narrator is a little annoying. âOoh, WE were so shocked to discover that there are some Korean actors who can speak more than one language!â)
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This was such a fun video. Korean or not, I share the same sentiment about k-dramas. Theyâre so much fun because theyâre so unrealistic, but at the same time, so organic and warm. And I love the way almost every genre of drama has a romantic plotline 
Thereâs space and time for love anywhere you are! These things are what make k-dramas k-dramas.
I agree with @entwyfhasbeenfound⊠if the ML has a beautiful character and good character development, he automatically becomes really attractive to me. Thatâs why I feel like some MLs get more and more handsome as the episodes pass. 
Thatâs also why Iâd choose a lot of MLs over the cute, puppy-type, too-nice SMLs. I remember thinking Yoo Seung Ho was the most handsome man on the entire planet when I first got into kdramas. Many dramas later, I chanced upon a picture of him and thought he looked pretty average. I started re-watching Iâm Not A Robot and, by the third episode, I was already re-falling head-over-heels in love and wondering how I could ever have thought the man was anything less than perfect. 
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Waaaay back when I first encountered Asian dramas online, I watched a dorama in which a shy young woman who NEVER came out of her room decided that, one way or another, she would get out and engage with the world.
She had one problem, however, and that was that everyone around her was too âshiny.â Too clean, too bright, too positive. She had to get over her own sense of self-doubt and learn to believe that she had something to offer AND that she could also be âshiny.â
I think that the attraction of many K-drama stars is basically that they strive to be genuine, open, helpful, thoughtful, kind, and âshiny.â
To go back to my fave-y fave Devil Judge, the basic character of the ML was, despite ALL the heart-break and deception he experienced, very deep and pure, and the way Ji Sung portrayed Kang Yo-Han, that basic character got shredded almost to death, but it never died.
There are some K-drama actors and actresses who do a good job, and then there are some who carry an inner light into every project they take on. It is that inner light that rivets my attention when I see it.
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You phrase everything so well! I agree completely!
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In my part of the world, itâs now lunch time. Not a bad time to have some coffee and . . . goat curry from a Nepali-Americanâs brotherâs wedding this past Saturday. Nanny nanny boo boo! I have some and you donât!
Literally. Or maybe not. I donât know if the goat in question was a nanny goat or not. But it was bought as a kid by all the relatives pooling their funds, raised organically on a farm twenty miles from here, and slaughtered and butchered by my neighbor and a couple of his brothers, cousins, brothers-in-law?
Donât want to offend vegetarians, but the flavor of Hindu my Nepali neighbor is is one of those flavors that allows for eating of meat under certain circumstances. And when I consider that many Nepali folks live and work near Mount Everest, the âroof of the world,â and trek up and down mountains . . . and ride BICYCLES up and down mountains, it makes sense that their flavor of religious observance would include high-protein, fatty meat.
But oh, boy, is Nepali stew good. And Nepali momo. And sel roti.
Before I get too far gone on food (who would do that in this thread) . . .
KSKA is designed to be a real script with characters that could be portrayed by any number of people. And depending on who those people might be, there would, as there usually are, be script tweaks to account for why (for instance) a half-Korean/half Japanese is playing a Korean-named character or a Japanese-named character or a Japanese-American character or a Korean-American character.
Despite TV show scripts being mostly about imaginary people and situations, TV viewers want characters and actors/actresses to be very matchy-matchy.
And to have a lot of reminders thrown in about why they have a perceived accent of some kind (or not) or a parent of a different ethnic background (or not) or a foreign education (or not) . . .
But for right now . . . I am wondering if it would be useful to seriously develop a âcharacter boardâ for KSKA as a parallel activity to fitting scenes and dialog within the framework of a script.
I think a lot of questions would get answered about what our characters would do and say if we had a clear sense of what they look like, what âcolorâ they are in terms of personality, what their clothes look like, what their environments look like, and even what time of day they are most active (quiet, misty morning? noisy,scruffy mid-day? sophisticated and smooth late night?).
Lately, I have noted the prevalence of a number of dramas based on webtoons or referencing webtoons. I get the feeling that a lot of Asian drama producers are looking to webtoons as the best and cheapest source of ideas at the moment. It might not be a bad idea to think of KSKA in that light. It might make things seem a little less overwhelming and more like the time-honored âgreat idea scribbled on a paper napkin.â
Discussing things and then going off in a corner, so to speak to âscribbleâ ideas down in real time on a real piece of paper or on a tablet . . . or on the palm of a hand . . . whatever . . .
AND then scanning and uploading or just uploading those things would add a layer of concreteness that we donât generally have.
I mean, yes, we play around with photos of actors and actresses we assume are real. And we post photos of food we like to eat, flowers we grow, and occasionally pictures of our feet when they get in the picture.
We donât generally post photos of ourselves or things that (in my opinion) would serve as reminders that we are real people with real ideas and are truly collaborating with each other. I understand that some people are shy, some people may have cultural prohibitions about sharing images of themselves, and some people have issues with making themselves a more obvious focus than they are now for the random folks I think of as the âdrive-by Viki visitors.â
They rollin, they talkin trash, they thowin Starbucks iced cappuccino bottles on the street. A little like a few folks in my urban neighborhood, a neighborhood remarkably chill despite ethnic diversity like you wouldnât believe.
In fact, last year, I looked up a few stats and discovered that the most ethnically diverse city in New York state outside the Big Apple itself is my adopted hometown of Rochester.
I went out running this morning (something I started doing two years ago after years of neglect but failed to sustain thanks to COVID lockdown). I saw a young Karen mother holding a tiny boy by the hand, taking him to the pre-school program at the elementary school around the corner from my house. He waved at me and said, âHello,â and I almost burst into tears.
I saw a Somali woman wearing glasses striding purposefully toward the same school with a courier bag hung on her shoulder. I nodded at her in passing.
Her demeanor and her being out on the sidewalk at seven-fifteen in the morning gave me the strongest impression that she teaches at the elementary school. âGood morning class, how are you today? So happy to see your shining faces. I know we are going to have a good year together if we all work hard and follow a few simple rules.â
In front of a house further down the street, next to a stop light pole and a cross walk, was a tiny pair of snow boots and two tiny pairs of what I call âfluffy scuffies.â
Tiny, neatly lined up. Little childrenâs shoes. The first thing that came to my mind was that somebody in a hurry to get to work left them their for a neighbor to pick up for his/her kids. These were not the random dirty hoodies and slides and dirt-crusted beanies that I have occasionally found in my yard early in the morning or in the parking lot of the grocery store where I most often shop.
These were all the concrete, simple, real, basic events of life that real people were doing despite living in a city that has been through some real social, political, encomic, and spiritual turmoil.
My view of what we are doing on this thread, as insignificant as it may seem at times, is that it matters a lot, and it can matter a lot more than it does now.
I keep running across cool poets, and here are two quotes from Rabindranath Tagore that I think sum up what good our little project can do. (One of my poetry professors in undergrad school was crazy about him, and my father knew his work as well.)
âThe butterfly counts not months but moments, and has time enough.â
âA mind all logic is like a knife all blade. It makes the hand bleed that uses it.â
We are doing something that is so simple and beautiful and joyful. And we need to find ways to add dimension to that experience.
Drawing, writing ideas in rhyme, uploading our own music (or the âfreeâ sounds that every social media site seems to offer at the moment) . . . we need more dimension for even more fun.
And now, off to find chocolate . . .
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wanna join the watch party? Itâs going on rn!
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Sounds like maknae vive is playing hookie from Badgers Production. I am sure 
thereâll be other Badger Production cast, crew, and affiliates at that party!
Aâhem! While Madam Executive shoots out info, and encouragement on the direction of KSKA.
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Itâs to improve the bonding at Badgersâ Production. Like office workshops! Our wonderful HR Department gives us a chance to relax and watch the one thing we all loveâ outlandish, hilarious dramasâ with each other as we chat non-stop in real time!
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Miss Willow is highly encouraged by the thought of many entertainment notables attending a watch party put together by Maknae Viki.
Perhaps her cousin the creative but ever-so-slightly dissipated, distractible, and time-challenged OSPD-nim will learn something, especially if (as @leerla73 seems to indicate) the ingenious and gently self-deprecating Rowan Atkinson, CBE drops in to demonstrate his use of a watch.
Miss Willow personally has no plans to attend a watch party since she does not believe in watches but relies instead on her own circadian rhythm and the sun and the stars to guide her daily activities.
In addition, Miss Willow must remain in the office to over see the resurfacing of the entire back parking lot so that it can more easily accommodate the arrival of large tractor-trailer trucks.
She learned in a pleasant but surprising phone call this morning that someone who has yet to be forthcoming with Marmite Bikky Stix (as per spoken agreement in the hallway some time ago) just recently ordered a large quantity of shepherdâs pies from Tesco and had them flown to Korea.
(Tesco)
Never mind that a Certain Person has deprived many grannies and babies of the joy of one of the most classic of comfort foods.
Never mind that his purchase has deprived many young entry level workers in the city of London, nay, in the entire United Kindgdom, of a simple, inexpensive, nourishing meal.
Never mind that his rash action could potentially disrupt the entire banking industry in London, the economic nerve center of Europe.
Never mind that if a panic ensues and spreads around the globe, it will deprive Badger Productions of all material support.
Miss Willow supposes that, if one can so easily obtain light frozen refreshment at the expense of so many others, then he can also pay for the parking lot (or should she say car park) resurfacing and get his own car out of the auto impound (where Miss Willowâs friend the Gagnam District Chief of Police suggested she have it moved for safekeeping).
(Giphy)
Because Miss Willow has emphasized to the resurfacing company the special nature of Badger Productions and its employees and friends, and because the resurfacing company has pledged to do a job worthy of Badger Productions, the bill should come to only 400,000,000 KRW.
(Giphy)
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Thinking about the look of Badger Productionsâ inaugural project, I took a look at some website design websites, and this one had some very helpful information.
There has been so much about done about the significance and influence of color. Whether the issue is one of set design, props, costumes, makeup, bumper stickers, or merch designs [thereâs an area to be explored], color is a very powerful yet subtle force.
(Pixabay by PencilParker)
https://99designs.com/blog/tips/website-color-schemes/ . . .
11 website color schemes to help you find the perfect palette
Red: speed, energy and passion. Redâs a great color to use when you want your audience to take action. Red is often used for ecommerce website color schemes as well as restaurants and takeaway appsâwhen youâre hungry and ordering a takeaway, you passionately want your food fast
Orange: optimism and happiness. Orange is universally seen as a âfunâ color and using it in your web design is a great way to show you donât take yourself too seriously.
Yellow: warmth, an inviting feeling, positivity. The color of sunshine, yellow is associated with happiness and joy. Super cheerful and accessible. This is a great website color to use for service industriesâyouâre happy to help!
Green: nature and health. Calming and natural, green is the perfect choice for a color scheme when designing for a healthy brand. Green is also a great color choice to convey eco-friendliness and sustainability.
Blue: the most versatile and universally liked. Blue has been shown to inspire feelings of trust, making it a heavy favorite in website color schemes.
Purple: creativity, wisdom and confidence. Purple is a unique, strong color to use within a website color scheme as it demands attention and stands out.
Pink: creativity and exuberance. Pink is having the time of its life at the minute, more than ever itâs being embraced by people of all genders and identities, meaning brands are following suit and incorporating it into a range of industries.
Brown: wholesomeness, warmth and honesty. When used in web design, brown is a comforting color. It gives websites a natural, down-to-earth vibe and often goes hand in hand with traditional, vintage-inspired designs.
Black: modernity, sleek, neutral. Its minimalism is great for luxury websites; many cosmetic brands adopt black as their key color to signify that their product is quality, which possibly helps you justify spending so much�
White: minimalism, transparency. Sometimes the best color choice for minimal web design is no color at all. White is a neutral shade, which means it can easily be combined with other colors for branding purposes. It is primarily used as an accent or background color.
Gray: maturity, authority. If youâve got a more serious website, gray is a great color choice, it shows people you mean business.
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How many followers of this topic have been taken by surprise in the past two weeks (as I have been) with how transitioning from summer into fall (official on Tuesday, September 21) and going from summer school to âregularâ school just throws EVERYTHING off?
Itâs not so much the subtle changes in the times of dawn and sunset, and itâs not so much the changes in weather.
(I LOVE the cool morning air of early fall where I live and am running in the mornings with delightâbecause Iâm completely confusing the kids in my neighborhood: sheâs too old to be alive; can she do that?)
And for most people itâs not so much the changes in schedules either (whether the schedules involve herding only oneself through the day or children who need occasional direction with a cattle prod).
I think itâs part of our bodiesâ physical and psychological need for periods of dark as well as light to be healthy in tangible and intangible ways. Supposedly if we get too much light or not enough, and if we eat at the wrong times (too little or too much), and if we sleep at the wrong times (too little or too much), our digestive rhythms, biorhythms, circadian rhythms and who knows what else can get messed up.
I know for me the onset of the quieter, more meditative fall and winter months are always appealing. Summer can be quite the rat race . . . and there is that thing of every day being hot, but I just love taking time to be more reflective.
And yet somehow, that reflectivity throws my awareness, my sense of determination, and even my sense of humor into a sort of hibernation.
Today I joked at the YMCA I go to that they should work on developing sleep yoga. We could sleep through winter, stay in good shape while doing so, save tons of money on food and clothes, and wake up in the spring looking gorgeous.
I got home from the Y and spent half an hour just wandering around the kitchen, looking at stuff on the shelves, reading the sides of the box of flax milk that I drink for the astounding amount of Omega-3s in a serving. La la la.
Meander, wander. Wander, meander. I came home at about two p.m. my time, itâs about seven p. m. my time as I write, and finally I am settling down to share some really cool words from the flaxmilk box that I think perfectly describe the participants in this thread.
Not the stuff on the green background. Soy, dairy, and gluten figure prominently in various Asian cuisines enjoyed by some or all on this thread. And there are a few nuts rattling around loose.
But âWe believe good makes good . . . Letâs do good.â All of that really resonates with me and seems to describe all of us. (Good Karma is the brand.)
If anybody needs inspiration and encouragement during the meditative months of 2020 and 2021, I think these words are perfect.
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I am having so much fun right now just taking in the beauty of possibilities.
KSKA could be a story unfolding in any number of ways since it is a work of the imagination. Thatâs what makes it so hard to pin down and put in a concrete form.
But there are certain images that make it seem like a real script that a real production company would actually spend several hundred thousand dollars on.
The hotel below seems so right (to me) for the setting where Ha-Neul and Haruto enjoy a brief but luxurious honeymoon. It is very interesting to me that a first class, very expensive, very exclusive hotel has managed to create an experience that is (at least based on the website) almost like being transported back in time to a much simpler, much more organic way of life.
https://www.aman.com/hotels/aman-tokyo
If you click on âExperiencesâ on the home page and then click on âAman Tokyo Journeys,â you end up with a list of three guided toursâone takes guests to spend an evening with a geisha, one takes them to modern and classical art museums, and one takes them to watch sumo wrestlers during a training session. Wow.
Information under âWellnessâ describes a spa that seems to be located in some mystical alternate universe.
But what made me think that THIS hotel could be âourâ hotel is this description under âAccomodationsâ:
âAman Tokyoâs Rooms and Suites are lofty urban sanctuaries drawing design inspiration from traditional Japanese residences. High above the bustling city below, they blend wood, washi paper and stone with modern technology and sumptuous fabrics for a unique stay in Tokyo. Every room offers magnificent views including the Imperial Palace Gardens and Mt Fuji on the horizon on clearer days.â
And under âExperiencesâOverviewâ:
Aman Tokyo stands on the doorstep of the Imperial Palace, formal residence of the Emperor of Japan, and the verdant green expanse that surrounds it, with birdâs-eye views from many rooms. Visitors can explore the East Gardens and the ruins of Edo Castle â the heart of the city for centuries â and Aman Tokyo can arrange private tours of the palace grounds.
This could be the place âourâ kami lives. A harmless, gentle little kami who loves its little garden and has been happily taking care of it for a looooooong time. It shifts shape . . . to amuse itself? To entertain the night shift staff? To delight small, bored and lonely children whose richy-rich parents leave them alone with the nanny while they go to the spa?
What might the kami look like?
Perhaps its true form is a baby fox, a shy, gentle kitsune who likes butterflies.
(Pixabaxy)
Perhaps its entertaining form is a lively, noisy baby Japanese macaque
(Pixabay)
Perhaps its playful form is a child-sized chef who turns rolls of artisanal toilet paper into gooey chocolate cake while nannies are dozing in a chair.
(Pixabay)
And perhaps it has a form for blessing lovers who love truly and joyfully that it assumes when they are asleep, covering them like a soft blanket.
(And perhaps, being such a small and gentle kami, it gets easily tired and likes to take naps in warm places, which is how it ends up being seen by Ha-Neul and Haruto and being packed in a suit case and separated from its Special Place.)
(Pixabay)
Whatever the case may be, looking through the Aman Tokyo website is an unexpected and delightful experience.
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This is your KSKA speaking
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We are doing this. But it takes time. Which, in the Viki-verse, moves contrary to time in the ânormalâ universe.
I heard someone say recently, âIf you want to get something done in a hurry, immediately slow down.â
Which makes sense. Since beginning running again, I have discovered that if I am running too fast to get to a goal way out in front of me, I will inevitably trip and fall.
Also, if I choose to run toward a goal on a road that is not well-prepared, I absolutely need to take time to negotiate possible pitfalls.
I think it would do so much good toâtrulyâsit and meditate on those real-world things that embody the basic âstuffâ we want to convey in our creative collaboration.
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The hotel where KSKAâs ML and FL for KSKA put a kami in their luggage is is an important location. Another one is the airport out of which they will fly back to Korea.
Here is extremely useful airport information:
https://trulytokyo.com/arriving-at-tokyos-narita-international-airport/
Hereâs what to pack to fly to Tokyo:
https://trulytokyo.com/packing-list-for-japan/
The Truly Tokyo website has a lot of practical information about getting around in Tokyo. As far as getting from the airport to a hotel in downtown Tokyo . . .
(Google screen cap)
(Google screen cap)
Obviously someone who lives in the places described in KSKA would have an easier time evoking a sense of place in writing a TV script. But thatâs part of the creative process, creating something that might be out of what is.
And Badger Productions silliness aside, it is @ninjas_with_onions who (I think) provided a bit of a push to do something with a depth and sophistication. I had a totally wacky American sitcom in my head when I proposed imagining a K-drama weâd like to see on Viki.
But even the craziest K-dramas have moments of reflection, and even the grimiest have moments of beauty. And when they are over, the best K-dramas (in my view) have somehow broadened my awareness of how amazing life is.
And doing amazing does, I think, take a bit of . . . looking before leaping?
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Aaah! Câmon! Theyâre attending watch parties !
Instead of creating dramas! No more lottery, they seem to have a knack for winning. The result, trips passed off as business trips. Light a fire under their tail, back to work! The lot of you!
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Iâve been stuck in procrastination mode for the past week, although I keep promising to snap out of it but every time I try I keep putting it off! Ugh!
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tenor
Let me know when you need the All Supreme Casting Director - Iâm out getting some
Tteok-bokki 
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