Hello!!!
Welcome to another episode of binge. It is a collection of all the dramas I have watched over time from a specific actor. Its been a while since the last binge episode but I am so happy that I am back to writing it. I takes a lot of time to watch newer works and I had to take time to digest it before rating it.
Here are the links to the last 2 episodes of Binge : Ep 1 & Ep 2
For this episode we will be checking out an actor that I love so much, and honestly he makes me cry so hard in every drama, he is just so good at bringing all my emotions to the surface (and basically I just cry ugly tears)
LEE JONG-SUK
I am not even going to address how hot I think he is, you can obviously tell. He began his career back in 2005 and has slowly risen to the spotlight. The first time I watched him in a drama was in the 2010 drama ‘Secret Garden’ where he played a supporting actor, he left an impact, then I watch ‘School 2013’ and I was blown away by his acting (don’t get me wrong, a lot of Korean actors have their sh*t in order) but he is just exceptional. An understatement would be that he can act well in any role he is cast in.
.
MOVIES
Compared to all the dramas he has been in, he has been in very few movies. I tried to watch all the movies he has been cast in but I don’t think I watched them all. So I will be talking about the ones I have watched in the order of their release dates.
As One
A 2012 film set during the 1991 World Table Tennis Championship in Japan, the North and South Korean form a unified team. Jong-suk plays a north Korean tennis player Kyung-Sub who falls in love with a south Korean tennis player Yeon-jung. I really loved his acting in this film and he really represent the characters rage and switch of emotions well.
No Breathing
2013 film following the life of two swimmers. He plays Woo-young a national swimming star who has always been overshadowed by his friend. He gets into trouble and as to enroll in school and start from the ground up, which is when he meets his old friend again (played by Seo In-guk). They both fall in love with the Coach’s daughter as they practice for the upcoming swimming championships. We follow their story of love, friendship and acceptance. Jong-suk and In-guk displayed fantastic acting and it was an avalanche of emotions.
Hot Young Bloods
If I could pick without bias, this has to be one of his best films. A 2014 teen romantic comedy set in the early 1980. Jong-suk plays Joong-gil, the playboy Casanova who can get any girl he wants but he never tries to get Young-sook (play by Park Bo-young) because he views her as the girlfriend of the leader of the rival high school gang. She is secretly in love with him and when everyone finds out it leads to outflow of pure comedic gang war and romance. This was just so funny, the time it was set in really made the atmosphere of the movie special. He is such a good comedic actor, he has the facial expressions and voice tone that it makes it all the more hilarious. I highly recommend this drama.
V.I.P
Although this film received mixed reviews, mostly about violence to women. It’s a fine line but one have to remember that this is a crime-thriller movie following a north-Korean serial killer who is being hunted by Interpol and the North and South Korean Officers around the world. Jong-suk plays the serial killer and gosh you should see his eyes and his freaking smirk. Gosh!!!!!!!!!!. I should say that I love mystery and thriller, they are my cup of coco.
.
DRAMAS
This is the part where I am a specialist because I have watched all the dramas that he has been cast in. So I will go about review them briefly in the order I watched them. Although I have watched all of them, I will just be reviewing the ones that let a huge impact. Majorly dramas that he played the main characters, for example I will not be talking about Secret Garden, Prosecutor princess and the others in which he was a supporting actor.
I Can Hear You Voice
This is a 2013 drama that is so popular and it is one of the dramas that really thrusted him into the spotlight. He was paired with Lee Bo-young and they were absolutely perfect together. He plays a high school student who as a result of a traumatic childhood can hear people’s thoughts by looking into their eyes.
This is one of my favorite fantasy themed Korean dramas and it contains the age gap trope that I really enjoy, he falls in love with a lawyer who is years older than him. He acted alongside Lee Bo-young who is well known for her passionate acting. They made a fantastic pair.
Doctor Stranger
You don’t want to know how many times I have watched this 2014 drama, I absolutely loved it. I have a thing for medical dramas and this is no different. I have watched too many medical drama and a lot of them tend to forget the drama part of it and just focus on the medical part but this one had the perfect balance and I just love it so much. The cast did all the work, although the story was so well written and the characters well developed. I can rave on and on about my love for this drama but lets not forget that Jong-suk basically carried this drama on his shoulders. He was just perfect for the role, his ability to show adverse emotions is just exceptional.
In this drama we follow a boy and his father (who is a doctor) who were tricked into going to North Korea. Years later the boy grows into an amazing doctor who is fighting for his life as he escaped to the South while searching for his lost love.
Pinocchio
This is definitely one of my favorite dramas of all time. The cast was just so perfect and it really made me love it. That’s not to say that the script wasn’t amazing, because it was fantastic. This is a 2014 drama that really hit my heart.
It focuses on a guy (which was played by Jong-suk) whose family was destroyed as a result of false news, years later he decides to become a reporter which is when he finds out the real truth behind the tragedy that befell his family. But as you can probably expect, there is a love story thrown in here, he is paired with Park Shin-hye who has Pinocchio syndrome (she cannot lie, or rather if she lies, she hiccups)
W– Two Worlds
This drama is another favorite of mine, although it might not make it to my top ten list but it is one that I would really recommend. This drama really set the trend for dramas about comic books, if you are interested you can check out my review of extraordinary you, which is a drama that I really enjoyed too. In this drama he is paired with the talented Han Hyo-Joo (check out my post on Queens of KDrama) who is really hilarious and was really fantastic in this drama.
We follow a webtoon character Kang Chul who is very popular in his world but of course he doesn’t know he is the main character in a webtoon until one day he is saved by a mysterious woman. This woman happens to be Yeon-Joo who is the daughter of the webtoon writer and illustrator.
This drama is just dramatic genius, the story and plot so well structured, the locations fit so well, the characters really sat well into their roles. Jong-suk was really the one person that could have played this character. There was a particular scene that broke my heart and once in a while it pops up in my head and I can’t help but tear up a little.
While You Were Sleeping
This is a 2017 drama, that was really hyped but I just didn’t feel it that much. Okay lets be honest about this drama, I didn’t like the story, I didn’t like the cast combination, something was just off with this drama but I can’t overlook his amazing acting in this drama. It made it bearable, he was able to breathe life into his character and that gave the drama a whole new weight.
In this drama he is paired with Bae Suzy (okay what I am about to say might come of as insensitive but it is just my opinion; I don’t really feel her acting at all in this specific drama, it came off a little bland for me) who can see the future in her dreams and it happens that anyone that she saves as a result of her precognition will also develop the same ability, which is how Jong-suk develops the ability and the two of them try to solve crimes and save people.
Romance is a Bonus Book
This his is most recent work, although not my favorite but it still deserves to be on this list. This is a 2019 drama where he plays a writer who also works as an editor at a publishing firm. He is paired with Lee Na-young and although I don’t think I have watched any of her other works seem to be a good fit for the role she plays in this drama. I just felt that they really didn’t have the chemistry that would have made this drama memorable.
So a bit of context, this drama follows the life of a woman Kang Dan-i, who is at the edge of her life, unable to get a job, sending all her money to her daughter who is at school abroad and her husband who cheated on her with another woman. Then we have Cha Eun-ho who is a very popular writer, professor and editor at one of the leading publishing companies in the country. Eun-ho and Dan-i have known each other for a long time and he is in love with her, he is unable to form any lasting emotional attachment because of the love he feels for her. The situation she is in leads them to living together and I guess you can probably picture how that would go.
Like I said, this is not his best work in my opinion.
Hymn of Death
This one I watched recently and I really enjoyed, honestly I enjoyed it more than I was expecting to. This historical drama follows the life of soprano singer Yun Sim-deok and playwriter Kim U-jin. In the start of this 6 episodes drama we follow them as they study in Japan. They plan to perform in Joseon when they get back home. He acted alongside Shin Hye-sun who was fantastic in this drama.
As of now, Jong-suk is currently in the military and is expected to be out in 2021 and I cannot wait for his upcoming works. I really miss him so much (holding in my tears).
Thanks for reading. Are you familiar with his works?