Freddy Krueger dancers

I'm sat here eating my breakfast as my wife watches a music show here in Korea. The show is Music Bank and features the usual popular artists. The 'artist'/'singer'/'dancer'/clotheshorse/lip syncer featured here is Narsha, more famous for being in Brown Eyed Girls. I have half an eye on this and half on my food when I noticed the backing dancers.



The are dressed like Freddy Krueger, the character from the Nightmare On Elm Street films. Very bizarre for a family music show. The song is called BBI-RI-BOP-A. BBI-RI-BOP-A, BBI-RI-BOP-A slice you in half? On repeat viewing you can see the lyric "bad bad dream" so maybe it makes sense. As always, the backing dancers are better than the main singer on music shows.

2AM singer demonstrates 'Power of beer'

Here is a recent beer commercial for Hite lager starring Korean singer Jo Kwon of boyband 2AM. 조권 is a staple of Korean 'family entertainment' programs of late, a ubiquitous presence who dances in an exaggerated fashion whenever he gets the chance and is representative of the prevailing 'humour' shown on Korean TV. Meaning that he does everything over the top and does something even more stupid than whoever is doing something before him in order to get a longer laugh.

A less convincing beer commercial I am yet to see. I know when I make the mistake over drinking the appalling beer here doing the limbo is the last thing on my mind. I also like the way he finishes his pint in under one second, without actually swallowing any of it. I'm crossing my fingers that we get a follow up.

End of my temporary liberation

It's Thursday and I haven't watched TV for four days. A record for my time in Korea. It's not because I like Korean TV, its just that I like hearing the English language while I'm at home, particularly as I am trying to sleep. The reason for no TV is because of a change of apartments - my new place having a TV but not having cable (or a remote control). That's about to change. Today the Internet 'guy' is coming round to sort out my new Internet account and presumably to hook me up to a basic cable TV package. This week we have been preoccupied with the moving process and have spent a lot of time listening to music and talking about things while we eat so there has been no need to watch things, but come the weekend...

I can't say I have missed the telly too much. There has been a slight sense of liberation. For the most part Korean TV channels are full of repeats, some from around 2006. Korean programs range from OK to Oh My God This Is Diabolically Bad. This is why I mainly watch the English language programs or the film channels. I do miss being able to watch the news. Though I have had to settle for CNN I have become attached to being able to watch it, regardless of the quality of some of their segments or programs. Also I miss the sports channels. I really need to have live access to football games from the Premier League. Without that, I really would go crazy.

*Edit*

The Internet guy came, but the cable TV guy is somebody else and they aren't coming today. Guess I'll have to go through Christmas without this time.

TV turn off

Perhaps now is the time to cut down on the old TV. Recent changes to my (apparently free) cable package have been on the negative side. I probably watch too much TV anyway but I like to go to sleep hearing some speaking English and am now restricted to either falling asleep to CNN or some film that's been on a million times before. Whilst many of the channels remain the same, some, like the Discovery channel have been replaced by a Fashion channel. Some of the more low profile film channels have been replaced with even lower quality 'entertainment' channels that show repeats of shows up to and beyond two years old - still better than having Dad's Army on endlessly! A quick flick through the channels tell me that there is now a fishing channel, a Chinese language channel, a Japanese language channel, two channels that show old men and women singing all day, three religious channels, two video game channels and two golf channels. I hate golf.

Korean comedy and Jerry Lewis

This is one of the funnier things I have seen on Korean TV recently.



Maybe it's a case of damning with faint praise. 48 million people seem to like it though. I think that probably means 6 billion people probably may not make it. I could be wrong. Perhaps.

Korea does not seem to have what we would traditionally call comedians/comediennes, someone who either tells jokes, anecdotes or has funny observations on life. Korea has people called 'Gag Men' or 'Gag Women'. They are people who don't tell jokes no invariably do they do say funny things. They SEEM TO just say funny things based on other peoples comments and their comments come quite quickly and frequently. They seem to be reactionary 'entertainers' who would be close to redundant if they had no-one in their company to make comments about. Some of these people are definitely funny, even if my lack of the language prevents me from being in on most of the jokes I can say some of them can be funny. There are a few people on the TV that you can definitely say are smart and quick witted but from my time here I can only say that Korea has no comedians, they have only clowns.

Every now and again here in Korea you seem to notice that trends here are off the pace from other countries - understandable as Korea is a country that has come a long way quite quickly, but is playing catch-up. However, Korean comedy is sixty years behind the Western World. Watching Korean TV makes Jerry Lewis look funny. I have never said the words "Jerry Lewis" and "funny" in the same sentence before, without using the prefix of "UN" (unless I am talking about The Day the Clown Cried). There is a place in the world for slapstick comedy but that place shouldn't be in the form of mainstream entertainment. For that is what we have here as the norm in Korea, slapstick comedy (custard pie in the face standard) usually at a hundred miles an hour and repeated week after week.

Gag Man is perhaps my least favourite Konglish word as it is usually a euphemism for unfunny and an indicator of a poor show. The high level Gag Men and Gag Women are on TV here ad infinitum and present shows on both TV and radio. At the top end they are on a lot of money, relatively. For what it's worth, the people who are on the comedy shows appear to be good at what they do, but that doesn't mean what they do is good. It is family entertainment stuff, but by that I mean that you do not require a brain to understand or think about what's going on, the lowest common denominator. Maybe there is an underground comedy circuit. Once again I wonder if Korea is hiding something from me.

Jackie Chan Mystery

From time to time I find myself watching things on TV here in Korea over and over again. I've seen certain things so many times that I know what line is coming next - a sure sign of being here too long. One thing that has always puzzled me is this. The film, Drunken Master is a staple of Korean cable TV and is on probably at least once every two or three weeks but... for some reason that I can't work out or find on the Internet, the film is in two languages.

What I mean is that of course this being a Hong Kong/Chinese action film the language spoken is Cantonese not English. When it's on TV here in Korea there are Korean subtitles but the spoken language is half in Cantonese and then half of it is in English (badly dubbed but very funny American accents). The alternation between languages is seemingly random and without thought and has no baring on the plot whatsoever. It remains a mystery to me but must be something to do with various dubbing's of the film distributed. Despite this, the film remains a delight.

Korea loves Jackie Chan, and why not? What is not to love about this guy? I think Korea loves the fact that firstly many of his (earlier) films are excellent. Korea also loves Martial Arts so many people will have seen his films over the years and perhaps taken more out of them than other audiences. Jackie Chan is also Asian and a star in Hollywood. Korean stars are rare in America. For me, his style brings back early childhood memories of films by Buster Keaton and Harold Lloyd. I await the next time I come across the Korean Jackie Chan mystery.

Passed to death

Last night's Champions League final was a showcase for possession football and what to do with it when it really matters. Although the scoreline was 2-0 the margin of victory in terms of class on the night was far larger. Manchester United fans would argue that if they had scored the first goal then it could of been different (based on the fist 10 minutes) but they didn't and Barcelona did. The side from Old Trafford have certainly had a good season and deserve plaudits but the midfield saw a massive gulf in class between the two teams and Guardiola certainly won the tactical battle. Messi rightly grabbed some headlines but watching Xavi and Iniesta was delightful. For Utd, Ronaldo was perhaps their best player but so many didn't really turn up. If Ferguson could have his way again, surely Park Ji Sung and Giggs wouldn't have started the game. Personally I think Carlos Puyel is a liability waiting to happen but somehow Utd didn't take him on and put him under pressure. On the night Barca showed up not the weakness of Utd's squad but the deficiencies of various parts of their team right now. It will be very interesting to see what affect this will have on both Utd and Ferguson. Will they splash the cash this Summer? Regardless, Bryan Robson's outrageous pre-match claim that if Utd went on to win the game then they'd be the best team EVER was blown out of the water.


Being a Liverpool fan for over twenty years I was in two minds whether or not to watch the game as I couldn't bear the sight of seeing Utd winning a fourth European Cup but I stayed up till 6am here in Korea and I'm glad I did. Usually I really miss the English language commentary on football games but was delighted not to here ITV's Clive Tyldesley waffle on about 1999 and "That night in Barcelona" as he has for the past ten years. The word Barcelona is now a memory of a different kind as well as carrying a different resonance. In the aftermath of the game I can't get it out of my mind at how overrated (though still very good) this Utd team has been this season. Surely based on the past three months evidence winning the English Premier League was something that my beloved Liverpool should have done. Perhaps we have blown our best chance for years to come - unless Benitez gets some serious spending money. Never mind, "This time next year we'll be millionaires"...

Korea loves Steven Seagal

Wow, didn't this happen just six weeks ago? Maybe. Korean cable TV is running another Steven Seagal movie season right now. I cannot explain the love affair that this country has with him. You can maybe go back to some early films of his and say they are OK B level action movies but anything after 1992 with him in it is shockingly bad. Yet curiously enjoyable.


Last night's film was Glimmer Man. In case you haven't seen it, here is the plot summary taken from Wikipedia.

Jack Cole (Steven Seagal) was once a government intelligence operative known as "The Glimmer Man," because he could move so quickly and quietly that his victims would only see a glimmer before they died. Having left the Glimmer Man job behind him, Cole—steeped in mysticism and not used to working with others—has become a detective with the Los Angeles Police Department. Cole is partnered with Jim Campbell (Keenen Ivory Wayans), a tough, no-nonsense cop who has little patience for Cole's New Age philosophies and outsider attitude. Cole and Campbell have to set aside their differences when they're assigned to track down a serial killer called "The Family Man," for his habit of killing entire households.

So Seagal is steeped in mysticism and is not used to working with others...hmmm, and we have a no nonsense cop. And they have to work together to solve murder cases. OK you may have seen something like this before but wait. Seagal demonstrates his powers in one scene, in a morgue overseeing a dead body his colleague comments on the dead girls dead body. Seagal "A little bit too nice" then promptly takes a scalpel and removes her breast implants and tracks down her identity from this. You had to see it to believe its outrageousness. In another scene, Seagal demonstrates that he can actually fly.



Usually Steven Seagal AND Keenen Ivory Wayans are straight to video guys, but not this time (1996). How can you not watch this when it's on Korean TV at 3am? Somehow they got Brian Cox to stoop low enough to be in this film. Shame on you Brian. Literally unbelievably Wikipedia claims this had a budget of $45,000,000. If so I wonder what it was spent on. Clearly not on Seagal's wardrobe. Perhaps on his lunch.


It is easy to parody Seagal and many have done so, but just like Jason Staham, fun can had watching his films. Yes the quality goes down film by film, as we see him grow larger and larger. Yes Seagal carries not weight of expectation but only the weight of ridicule. BUT how can you not enjoy this clip?



I guess my standards are slipping blame Korea! Glimmer Man, I think I have seen the film maybe four times here during my time in the ROK and I still don't know how it ends because I always fall asleep. A perfect cure for insomnia so everyone is happy.

All Ham and Cheese

It's Sunday evening again and I am at the computer. My girlfriend is watching the TV and there is 'not much on'. Repeats and repeats of repeats and some poor quality films so the familiar weekend ritual happens again and she is watching a Korean drama. These are weekly shows that, unlike soap operas there is a conclusion after twelve weeks or so and they are on the big three terrestrial channels throughout the evening. And they are awful. When one show finishes, the next week it is replaced by a new one.

I come from the land of Coronation Street, Eastenders and Hollyoaks so I know what I am talking about when I say I know what bad acting and bad television looks like. I also know what Olivier, Gielgud and other outstanding actors were like so I know the difference between good and bad. Dramas tend to be low budget, low quality and low expectations and Korea meets all the criteria. I mean it when I say that all these drama's all look the same. You can see what is coming up a mile away. And the acting, is sometimes worse or the equal of what you see in the famous UK soaps. You may point out that my Korean is poor and I cannot understand all that is going on, and you'd be right, but I can see with my own eyes that 95% of these shows are unequivocally abysmal. There is nothing wrong with these shows but they are fillers in the schedule and unbelievably people lap them up - just like in the UK. No doubt there have been some fine dramas here but all I see are predictable sentimental programmes.

In Korean TV dramas, less is more. Less acting that is and more shouting and the most important thing of all, more hysterical over the top reactions to literally anything that is happening. And god forbid any kind of male/female physical contact because that could make the earth just spin off it's axis. Who are the worst offenders? Older women just shout and look offended at everything, old men just shout and complain at everything. The younger women are usually some chaste individuals who dress like they are from another time, like the 50's. Younger men look like they came out of a men's clothing catalogue and quite frankly cannot be taken very seriously. I have never seen so many people wear ties in my life. There is drama in everything everyone does and it is all so over the top you couldn't make it up. The best parts are when there is some form of physical violence because this is when Korean males display a love of pushing and shoving unparallelled. How do all the people have such ridiculous lives? Often a semi-popular singer appears in the shows and proves that they can't sing or act. There is so much to admire and like about Korea but this shows aren't anything special. I like my ham and cheese but this just doesn't taste right.