The real hero

Some of you will be bored out of your mind with this post but I’ll write it anyway. On the whole, I enjoyed Full House though it definitely wasn’t as good as Sam Soon.

Hop on the merry-go-round with the love quadrangle.

First, the rich and talented trio (childhood pals) with their amazing blend of complexes and hang-ups:
Rain, popular actor, leftmost (sorry if that picture is rather unflattering!)

Pretty Girl, fashion stylist, 3rd from left

Charming Man (played by this guy called Kim Sung Soo), big shot in the media industry, right

Last player in the quartet:
Song Hae Gyo (henceforth SHG), aspiring writer, ‘ordinary’, kind-hearted girl, 2nd from left

At the start of the show, Rain is secretly in love with Pretty Girl (has been since they were nine!). Pretty Girl is (not secretly) in love with Charming Man (but apparently he’s the last to know it). Charming Man is not in love with anyone. SHG tumbles into their lives. Eventually, Rain and Charming Man are struck with the Mark Darcy syndrome and both fall for SHG.

Mark Darcy to Bridget Jones: ‘Bridget, all the other girls I know are so lacquered over.’ (upper class guy falls for ordinary, ‘commoner’ girl formula)

For a fuller version of the story, watch the show!!

This is one rare show where I thought the secondary man deserved to win the girl. Charming Man was really so ‘poor thing’. He did so much for SHG, he was there for her every time she needed a listening ear, laughed at all her corny riddles; he would have done anything for her and was just so sweet and sensitive with her all the time. I thought he understood her so much better than Rain did. Yet, he lost out to Rain who, for most episodes of the show, was yelling at her, treating her like a slave, walking roughshod over her and calling her names (even when he realised he loved her – sometimes you just feel like slapping him). It reminded me of poor So Ji Sup in Memories of Bali, who not only lost the girl but also his own life (murdered!).

Was the moral of the story supposed to be: true love will win, no matter what?
(‘True love’ because SHG really loved Rain and only Rain and, too bad, at most she was just very grateful to Charming Man.)

Anyhow, I thought that one theme in this show was surely ‘what one would do for love’. There was the think-about-yourself-first camp formed by Rain and Pretty Girl (for most of the show). Then there was the self-sacrificing type of love, played out by SHG and Charming Man. So, it was just too bad Charming Man's character wasn't the leading man and so he wasn't going to get the girl.

The saddest part of the show was when SHG had to bear the brunt of Rain’s family’s unhappiness with the couple. She was crying her eyes out and what was Rain doing? Sulking in his room when he should be the one explaining and apologising to them. Charming Man came right away to listen to her woes. Too bad… not meant to be…

Best of Charming Man’s parts:
Zwhen he tells SHG that he had never cared about the word ‘if’ till he met her and now he keeps wondering about it – if he had met her earlier, if she hadn’t had to marry Rain, etc. So poetic, right?
Z when he looks for SHG in the rain and is at a loss about what to do about her and then she falls asleep on his couch and cries in her sleep
Z when she tells him she likes him and he looks so pleased with himself

After reading Dee's and X-tongfang's comments in the previous post, I'm convinced it's an age thing that I prefer the SNAG to the immature kid (that’s exactly how I see Rain’s character). The legions of (young, I’m sure) Rain and SHG fans out there love them as a couple. In fact, there were people hoping the two would become a real-life couple. Us older women seldom or never have such thoughts or wishes. I have to say, though, that they do look more compatible than her and Charming Man but if I were her aunty and she asked me, I would still recommend the reformed playboy (Charming Man). I thought he was the real hero of the story.

Anyway, he does look nice with Pretty Girl in this publicity shot:

Entertaining, fun (with some rather sad parts) and funny show but the to-ing and fro-ing among the four was sometimes tiresome.

Full House pictures from here.

More pics of Charming Man here.

And, by the way, the N Korean debacle is... well... rather horrifying...