We have laughs and chills coming up this week’s latest premieres.
The Great Show
Time slot: Monday & Tuesday
Broadcaster: tvN
Genre: Comedy, political
Episode count: 16 episodes
Reasons to watch: Song Seung-heon headlines as a former assemblyman who fell from grace due to a family scandal. Post-scandal, he’s just spinning his wheels when Noh Jung-eui shows up on his doorstep claiming to be his daughter (with her three little siblings in tow). There’s nothing he wants more than to return to the National Assembly, and he sees a path back to power with Noh and her siblings as his props. Though their family outing starts out as a charade, the children will end up having quite an impact on Song’s character and life. He’s not the only one, as Lee Sun-bin’s character finds herself back in Song’s orbit because of the four siblings. Though Song was her first love, there’s some bad blood there as he became the one person she never wanted to cross paths with again. Im Joo-hwan’s character is a both a rival and a bit of an antagonist to Song. The two go back 21 years, but their history is complicated and not quite friendly. I love a good dramaland schemer! And with My Fellow Citizens over, I’m up for another good political comedy to watch.
Hell Is Other People
Time slot: Saturday & Sunday
Broadcaster: OCN
Genre: Psychological thriller
Episode count: 10 episodes
Reasons to watch: Adapted from a chilling (and popular) Korean webtoon, Im Shi-wan moves from the country to the big city and city life isn’t what he hoped it would be. He manages to find a room in a cheap goshiwon and though he seems to have a nice landlady in Lee Jung-eun, the other residents are all a bit off-putting. We’re not talking stolen peanut butter and empty toilet paper rolls, more like sinister laughter while staring straight ahead, and random cursing and threats. Luckily, Im manages to make a friend in Lee Dong-wook so he’s not entirely alone, but is Lee Dong-wook truly the nice, friendly person he appears to be? I’m looking forward to seeing Im Shi-won make his post-army comeback and I hope we get to see Lee Dong-wook play against type and tackle something darker than his usual nice guy characters. This is the latest installment of OCN’s cinema-drama project.