We have a diverse set of premieres this week: a medical slice-of-life drama, a legal drama posing as a crime caper (or is it a crime caper posing as a legal drama?), and the noona romance that’s brought Sohn Ye-jin back to the small screen.
You Who Forgot Poetry
Time slot: Monday & Tuesday
Broadcaster: tvN
Genre: Medical human drama
Episode count: 16
Reasons to watch: This is the new lighthearted slice-of-life drama from the writer of Drinking Solo and the crew behind the long-running workplace comedy series Rude Miss Young-ae. It’s set in a hospital, but unlike every other medical drama about surgeons or ER doctors, this story focuses on the support staff that usually takes a backseat in other dramas, like nurses, lab technicians, and physical therapists.
It’s a coming-of-age story centered around struggling youths, much like Drinking Solo was, but this one will have a framing device—a poem in each episode that’ll represent their struggles thematically, and bring them healing along the way. The ensemble cast includes Lee Yubi, Lee Jun-hyuk, and rising young actors Jang Dong-yoon and Shin Jae-ha; and while I’m not expecting the same hilarity we got from the Noryangjin idiot trio in Drinking Solo, I do expect relatable foibles and genuine laughs from them, and a chance to highlight some of the unsung heroes in the medical field.
Switch: Change the World
Time slot: Wednesday & Thursday
Broadcaster: SBS
Genre: Legal drama, crime caper
Episode count: 32 (half-hour episodes, 16 hours total)
Reasons to watch: Jang Geun-seok is back in a two-for-one role as a geeeeenius con artist and a law-abiding prosecutor in this undercover caper about using any means necessary to get justice. It’s definitely attempting to be another Police Unit 38, where officers of the law get in cahoots with bad guys to catch the even badder guys, and this time we have a convenient set of doppelgangers on either side of the law.
When the prosecutor gets attacked and put in a coma, his partner (played by Han Ye-ri) enlists the con artist who looks just like him to take his place and go undercover as a prosecutor. Also conveniently (I know, there are a lot of convenientlys in this premise), the con artist has studied for the bar exam and knows the ins and outs of legal procedure. Of course he does. But if you’ve managed to suspend your disbelief up to this point, you’ll be in for mistaken identity hijinks galore, and Jang Geun-seok having a blast in the dual role.
Time slot: Friday & Saturday
Broadcaster: JTBC
Genre: Romance melodrama
Episode count: 16
Reasons to watch: Up-and-coming leading man Jung Hae-in romancing pretty noona Sohn Ye-jin? What’s not to love about this setup? There’s almost nothing else to the premise—it’s literally just a love story between an older woman and a younger man—but in the hands of star PD Ahn Pan-seok (Secret Love Affair, Heard It Through the Grapevine) I expect an intricate, melodramatic journey made up of subtle nuance and dense emotion.
Sohn Ye-jin plays a manager at a coffee company who grew up in a happy, average middle class home with loving parents and a little brother. Jung Hae-in is her little brother’s best friend and she’s his older sister’s best friend, so he was always around her whole life and practically part of their family. He goes abroad for a few years to start his career as a 3D graphic artist and comes back a successful young man… and is shocked when the noona he grew up with suddenly looks pretty to him. Be still my heart.