100 Days My Prince [백일의 낭군님] (Dramas You Can't Stream Legally in the US, post #1)

Since the demise of Drama Fever, there have been several dramas that I was really wanting to review which aren't available legally anymore on any streaming site that I know of for US fans. Most of my readers are in the US, as am I, so at first I was just bummed and thought I would just skip reviewing them altogether. I changed my mind however, because I really do want to review them even though you can't get them here anymore, because I DO actually have readers in some other countries. So on the chance that those readers can get it in their country, I will write reviews after all.
(UPDATE: Viki does now have this drama available for US viewers! Hooray!)

♥♥♥♥/♥ 

TITLE: 100 Days My Prince / 100 Days' Husband [백일의 낭군님]
ORIGINAL AIR DATE: September 10 to October 30, 2018 
WIKI: asianwiki.com/100_Days_My_Prince
SEASONS/EPISODES: 1 / 16 
US AVAILABILITY (as of 2020-03-04): Viki Standard

Crown Prince Lee Yul is the victim of an assassination plot but instead of dead he winds up with amnesia in a small rural village, where he's forced to marry a woman who claims his name is WonDeuk and that she's his fiancee. Not understanding how the world works after his sheltered upbringing, "WonDeuk" gets into trouble with a loan shark. Needing to earn money to pay back his debt, he and his wife start "Solutions Agency" where they solve problems and do odd jobs for money. Eventually all secrets have to come out though, and the amnesiac prince isn't the only one with a secret identity. Meanwhile back in the palace, those involved in the prince's assassination are getting away with murder. 

Basic plot intro: 

Crown Prince Lee Yul has been miserable since childhood. He was only the son of a noble (but of royal descent) when he met Yoon YiSa the feisty little daughter of a nobleman. The young boy fell in love with her almost at first sight. Wanting to better himself for her drove him to study harder to be a more educated and better person. He confessed his love for YiSa and swore to marry her. Before their love story could even begin though, her family was assassinated before his eyes and Lee Yul found out his own father was involved. Kim ChaEon is the puppetmaster behind it all, having convinced Lee Yul's father to replace the king and then using that to control him through the years, so they framed YiSa's father as a traitor to the crown. To add to the pain, Kim ChaEon convinced Yul's father to send his wife (Yul's mother) away when he becomes king, for political reasons, and as soon as she's away Kim ChaEon has her killed also. Kim ChaEon tells his new puppet king that the thing he wants most as a reward for making him king is an arranged marriage between his daughter and the new little prince Yul. Lee Yul grows up hating his father for the deaths of his beloved and his mother, and living as a cold and miserable crown prince who shuns anything that brings joy.
Meanwhile YiSa and her brother survived the initial slaughter of their family, barely, but they were separated when her brother hid her and led the soldiers chasing them away. YiSa was adopted by a kindhearted and loving stepfather and raised as a peasant named HongShim in a small rural village. She still holds out hope that her brother is alive and will find her someday.
When the crown princess' father, Kim ChaEon, finds out his daughter (who is the wife-in-name-only of prince Yul) is pregnant, he's livid. Prince Yul has never touched her and he has never made that a national secret by any means: basically the whole palace knows the marriage has never been consummated. If she can't get prince Yul into bed within a short enough amount of time to cover up her infidelity, daddy will just have to get rid of the prince so there will be no one to contest the child's paternity. The palace occupants pressuring the prince to consummate his marriage using the excuse of balancing nature so it will rain has only resulted in the stubborn and contrary prince Yul declaring that he can't balance nature alone so EVERYONE in the kingdom of marrying age will also have to marry, so as to more thoroughly balance nature. *giggle* When Prince Yul finds out his bride-in-name-only is pregnant, he is stuck with the riddle of how best to extricate himself from his unfaithful and unwanted bride, as well as solve yet another mystery: who has been slowly poisoning him for years. Prince Yul is also realizing that Kim ChaEon is the puppetmaster behind many awful things, and tries to reach out to his father. The king unfortunately becomes defensive rather than listening, and orders Yul to attend the rain festival, which Yul knows will put his life in danger.
Sure enough, masked assassins show up on the journey through the mountains and attempt to slaughter the crown prince and everyone with him. His closest friend and personal guard makes prince Yul change his clothes to trick the assassins, and thus in the confusion the person who is wounded and fell over the edge of the mountain is not realized to be the prince! Waking up with amnesia in a rural village, Yul is told he's someone named WonDeuk and that he's engaged to a woman named HongShim, whom he will have to marry IMMEDIATELY due to the crown prince's order that all unmarried adults be wed by that evening. 

Flow and sequence: 

In the first few episodes; see Basic Plot Intro above.
First main story arc: WonDeuk (prince Yul) and HongShim (YiSa) spend 100 days getting to know each other and falling in love in natural and gradual way.
Second main story arc: Things are coming to a head in the palace and "WonDeuk" aka Prince Yul is found and dragged back to the palace against his will. Still only having fragments of his memory and unsure of who his enemies are within the palace, he must search for clues secretively.
Third main story arc: The final battle is approaching... Prince Yul must outsmart his enemies and fight for his own happiness and the safety of those he loves.
Ending. See the spoiler section if you wanna know how that pans out. 

Cast/ Characters/ Acting: 

So many delightful characters! EXO's D.O (Do KyungSoo) makes a very convincing prince Yul. His acting can make you snort a giggle at his character's straightfaced denial of facts, or fight back tears of sympathy at the obvious pain and sadness in his eyes. His chemistry with Nam JiHyun who plays YiSa/HongShim is good (so much so that I had a hard time feeling too much of that dreaded second lead syndrome for the likable Jung JeJoon, played by Kim SeonHo), and the kiss scenes are verrrrrry good... hehe... Heo JeongMin plays a lovable dork similar to his role in Evergreen (That Man Oh Soo). Kim JaeYoung as the tormented assassin MooYeon who unwillingly works for Kim ChaEon. Speaking of whom, Cho SungHa is convincingly clever and evil in the role of that villain. Han SoHee is convincing and sympathetic as the unfaithful crown princess. One of my favorite side roles was Ji MinHyuk as crown prince Yul's younger half-brother, prince SeoWon. He never harbored ill will toward anyone and was a seldom-seen but still memorable and likable character. 

Writing and directing: 

Although some of the political nuances were *left unexplained, we figured it out well enough to understand the story as the drama went on. Over all it was a much more complicated plot than I expected- in a good way. The characters were more nuanced and the plot twists more numerous, also. I expected the "100 days" to monopolize most of the timeline and was at first just surprised when it was only a part of a larger plot, but later was actually glad they did it how they did because the story was so much deeper and richer. I loved the character development of Prince Yul during his time as WonDeuk, and I was pleased with how YiSa/HongShim and Magistrate Jung JeYoon were both true to their morals and didn't compromise those in the end (even if they wavered at first) even to keep or win the person they loved. Sometimes I feel like drama writers compromise established character qualities later in order to further the plot, and I'm glad they didn't do that for this one. It's believable for a character to waver in the face of potentially losing what they love or want, but it's not believable for them to go against their established character qualities without a significant driving force + angst over the decision + regret/remorse afterward and I see too many dramas where that is completely ignored for the sake of a plot device.
*I feel I should explain what would be the most confusing instance if you didn't know this already; when someone was named a traitor to the crown, their entire family was ordered to die along with them or be sold into slavery, even the children. The beginning of the drama may seem confusing if you don't know this because YiSa's father is framed for treason but the soldiers are ordered to kill his young children too, chasing them into the mountains, and Prince Yul grows up assuming they were all killed that night. Later, HongShim can't just come back and say "oh hey by the way I'm Yoon YiSa and I'm not dead!" because unless she was officially pardoned first, or her father's name was cleared, she could be immediately executed as the daughter of a traitor. This is why she is very careful not to be recognized or found, and why she doesn't out herself to gain access to Prince Yul at any point in the story. 

Other: 

My one pet peeve about this drama was actually the synopsis as found on wikis and streaming sites: They keep saying HongShim founded and ran the first detective agency in Joseon. Firstly, what she founded was something like "Solutions Agency" which was more like your local dirty jobs/ handy man sort of business and she made "WonDeuk" run it to repay his debt. One job was collecting leeches to sell, one was retrieving a valuable that had been dropped in poo, one was carrying water, one was posing as a suitor, several involved finding something that had been dropped on the road in travel (which simply required retracing the path and picking it up, no detective work needed), and often it was just transporting things around town... no actual detective work was involved at any point that I recall. I kept waiting for it and waiting for it. Lol! I thought maybe they would be detectives to find out WonDeuk's true identity as Prince Yul but nope. The only time detective-anything was even mentioned was in the very first episode when child-Yul said he would play detective to find out who that girl (YiSa) was. If that translation is right then detectives were already a thing long before YiSa grew up and started her fake-hubby's dirty jobs business. 

Happy Ending Factor?
We lose a few characters I was sad to see go, and several characters got a way better ending than they deserved, however our main couple survives everything this drama throws at them, and overall I give it a happy ending rating of 4 out of 5.

(SPOILER SECTION! SKIP to Final Summary if you don't want to know how it ends!) 

It's a long road but the clever Prince Yul eventually regains his memory and defeats the evil Kim ChaEon, even showing mercy to his lesser enemies for the sake of his beloved YiSa. He thwarts a war and pursues his beloved long after a man any less loyal and stubborn would have given up. It's a beautiful story and all the actors and actresses played their parts fittingly. 

Final Summary: 

I wish so bad this was still available in the US! Alas, Drama Fever had exclusivity on this one here and now Drama Fever is gone. I'm still holding out hope that Viki will pick this one up! It was such a great story. I would totally watch it again, if any of the US streaming sites ever get the license! 

Check out the 100 Days My Prince OST on Spotify! 

100 Days My Prince on Viki!
(Dramas may not be available on certain sites for certain countries. It depends who acquired the license for a specific drama for your country and who did not. Drama may be available on Netflix in your country but not even show up in mine, so check there if you have a Netflix acct. Ditto for Viki- may be available in your country but not mine. Click HERE for a list of legal Kdrama streaming sites and what countries they work in.)

If all else fails and you're desperate to know how the story goes, there's always the recaps on DramaBeans. ;) 

5 KDramas You Can Binge-Watch FREE in the US

1. Descendants Of The Sun
   Review
   Watch on Kocowa
   Watch on Viki
   Watch on ONDemandKorea
   
2. Orange Marmalade
   Review
   Watch on Kocowa
   Watch on Viki
   Watch on ONDemandKorea (English subtitles not available)
   
3. To The Beautiful You
   Review
   Watch on Kocowa
   Watch on Viki
   
4. You're Beautiful
   -When her twin Go Mi Nam needs someone to cover for him with his Kpop boyband for a while, Go Mi Nyeo leaves the convent where she grew up, cuts her hair, and disguises herself as her brother. Can such a sheltered and naieve girl make it in the Kpop industry without anyone finding out? Especially when she's sharing a house with her brother's bandmates... Starring Jang Geun Suk, Park Shin Hye, Lee Hong Ki (of FTIsland), and Jung Yong Hwa.
   Watch on Kocowa
   Watch on Viki
   Watch on ONDemandKorea (English subtitles not available)
   
5. I Hear Your Voice
   Review
   Watch on Kocowa
   Watch on Viki
   Watch on ONDemandKorea (English subtitles not available)

Orange Marmalade [오렌지 마말레이드]

♥♥♥/♥♥ 

TITLE: Orange Marmalade [오렌지 마말레이드] 
ORIGINAL AIR DATE: 2015, May 15 - July 24 
WIKI: asianwiki.com/Orange_Marmalade 
SEASONS/EPISODES: 1 / 12 
US AVAILABILITY (as of 2018-11-09): Viki (free w/ads), KOCOWA (free w/ads), ONDemandKorea (free w/ads, no Eng Subs) 

Orange Marmalade is a drama based on a webtoon (which you can read HERE if you're inclined) about a teenaged vampire girl and a teenaged human boy who fall in love. Before you dismiss it with "Oh so like Twilight but reverse the genders" ... well no not really. I mean it's a vampire story so there are similarities by nature, but instead of werewolves and Volturi we've got school bullies and prejudiced mob-mentality humans. And a mini historical drama sandwiched into the middle of the modern one. Orange Marmalade certainly seems to want to make more of a social justice statement. 

Ahh where to start? I have mixed opinions on this drama. 
First of all, I did read the webtoon, but I didn't want to spoil the webtoon by watching the drama first nor spoil the drama by reading the webtoon first, so I read/watched simultaneously. I shouldn't have worried: the two are vastly different. You won't give much (if anything) away by reading/watching one at a time, they are that different. 
I liked the female characters better in the webtoon, and the male characters better in the drama. I couldn't relate or feel sympathetic for second-lead Shihoo in the webtoon but Lee Jong Hyun's portrayal of Shihoo in the drama ripped my heart out and stomped on it a few times. The main male lead Jae Min was even more likeable as played by Yeo Jin Goo than the webtoon version. I know some would disagree with that but here's why I feel this way: To me, Jaemin in the webtoon was almost bipolar in his actions. Hot and then cold (back and forth from the extreme of being a complete stalker to not being able to stand the thought of Ma Ri) at the slightest provocation. I felt the extremes in his behavioral swings were unrealistic in the webtoon, but the drama dowplayed the extreme-ness a little bit, making the character of Jaemin more realistic. The downside of this was that he appears to have less noticeable character development during the course of the drama. Straight up comparing his first episode behavior with his last episode behavior you can see a change, but over the entire drama it's barely noticeable. 

Unlike the male characters, Ma Ri (played by Seol Hyun) as well as her various friends and enemies, were all so bland in the drama compared to the webtoon. Ma Ri for example was more bold and plainspoken in the webtoon, but in the drama she was not like that until the end; in the beginning she was a timid, shy, and cowering. I don't have a problem with a female character who isn't loud, bossy, and outspoken personally so it didn't bother me. I'm not one of those females who looks down on other females who have a "quieter" personality, but I'll admit that for the sake of dramatic effect I liked the dynamic of Ma Ri's don't-care attitude in the webtoon and kind of missed it in the early episodes of the drama. 

I liked the storyline of the drama better than the webtoon, especially the addition of the historical backstory, though it was a bit disconcerting to be watching a modern highschool drama for 4 episodes, then a historical drama for 5 episodes, then a modern highschool drama for the last 3 episodes. Halfway through the historical episodes I wondered if I was going to remember the modern storyline well enough to know what was going on when they switched back. Thankfully there were flashbacks to help reorient the viewer to the modern storyline so that wasn't a problem. If you don't like historicals, you could probably skip episodes 5-9 and still not be *too* lost for the ending. (A happy ending for most of the characters by the way.) :) 

Check out Orange Marmalade on Viki!
Check out Orange Marmalade on Kocowa!
Check out Orange Marmalade on ONDemandKorea (no English subs on this one though)! 
Check out the Orange Marmalade OST on Spotify!
(Above links based on US availability. Dramas may not be available on certain sites for certain countries. It depends who acquired the license for a specific drama for your country and who did not. Drama may be available on Netflix in your country but not even show up in mine, so check there if you have a Netflix acct. Ditto for Viki- may be available in your country but not mine. Click HERE for a list of legal Kdrama streaming sites and what countries they work in.)

***NOTE for those watching on Viki:
I will warn you that the timed comments on this drama on Viki.com were exceptionally obnoxious. Repeatedly asking if the comments are a live chat. (No but wouldn't that be nice, then the annoying comments would actually eventually go away.) The people (there were so many of them) who somehow missed that JaeMin is the male lead (HOW do you even miss that?!) and thus is destined to end up with Ma Ri, and decided that if they whine and complain loudly and obnoxiously in the comments then Ma Ri will wind up with Shihoo instead... They even went so far as to bully and hate on the young actor Yeo Jin Goo in the lowest and most classless manner as though being hateful would change the story. Then there are always the perverts who just say gross things for no real reason, the trolls who mention BTS not because they truly love or hate them but because they know it will incite a comment war between those who do, and those who spend endless portions of the drama arguing about what other Korean celebrities the actors each supposedly look like. (They look like themselves. Seriously. Most of the time I can't even see the similarity and I wonder if these people just basically think all Asians look the same so when they notice a feature seems barely-sorta-vaguely uniquely similar between 2 celebs they get so excited they want to brag from the rooftops that they have noticed a characteristic that these two share that is *gasp* different than allllll the other Asians!)
If you are a sort of emotional vampire yourself, one who gets off on contentious internet strife, then keep the comments on: you'll love it. Have fun charging up your happy little troll battery. If you'd rather watch it in peace however, I suggest you hide the comments for this drama. ;)

I (Can) Hear Your Voice [너의 목소리가 들려]

♥♥♥♥/♥ 

TITLE: I Hear Your Voice/ I Can Hear Your Voice [너의 목소리가 들려] 
ORIGINAL AIR DATE: 2013, June 05 - August 01 
WIKI: http://asianwiki.com/I_Can_Hear_Your_Voice 
SEASONS/EPISODES: 1 ssn / 18 eps 
US AVAILABILITY (as of 2018-11-08): Viki (free w/ads), KOCOWA (free w/ads), ONDemandKorea (free, no subs) 

After his father is murdered right in front of him, 9 year old Soo Ha gains the ability to hear people's thoughts. He spends the next 10 years learning martial arts to be able to keep his promise to protect a girl, Hye Sung, whose testimony sent his father's killer to prison. Hye Sung grew up to be a defense lawyer. This is a thrill ride as the killer gets out and comes after them over and over, deciding not to give up until either they're dead or he is. He messes with their minds and uses fear tactics and trickery. Soo Ha and Hye Sung will need to use their skills to protect each other through the various schemes of the villain... and hopefully survive long enough to live happily ever after. 

Basic summary: 
Two teenaged girls witness a murder in which a vehicle containing a father and his 9 year old son is struck by a large truck, then the truck driver gets out to finish off the father by beating him in the head. The murderer spots the girls and takes off after them before he has a chance to murder the boy. Hearing approaching sirens and unable to locate the girls, who have hidden in some bushes, the murderer yells out a threat he hopes they will heed: tell anyone and he will kill the girls as well as anyone they've told, or shut up and live a long life.
Seeing on TV later that the trial isn't going well because the victim's son, Soo Ha, is the only witness and he's been rendered speechless by trauma, the girls go to the courthouse to testify. Both are scared and count to 3 with the intent of going in together... however Do Yeon chickens out and runs away, and only Hye Sung winds up going in. Not a moment too soon either, as Soo Ha has written on a notepad that he can read minds (a talent he developed apparently from the head injury he received in the accident) and "heard" the murderer taunting them, and now everyone thinks he's crazy and his testimony is unreliable. With Hye Sung's testimony, Soo Ha's father's killer, Min Joon Gook, is pronounced guilty. Filled with rage, Joon Gook leaps past his guards and attacks Hye Sung, trying to strangle her and screaming in her face that he will come for her someday.
Later, Soo Ha and Hye Sung meet outside. Soo Ha tries to thank her for testifying but he still can't talk, and Hye Sung is terrified and lashes out, wishing she'd never come because now psycho Joon Gook was going to come for her. Soo Ha finally manages to speak and makes a promise that he will protect her.

10 years pass and Hye Sung has become a lawyer and has just gotten a job as a defense attorney. Her childhood Best-Frienemy Do Yeon is now a prosecutor. The little boy Soo Ha has spent 10 years learning martial arts and searching for Hye Sung. He finds her just in time as Joon Gook has been set free and is looking forward to enacting his revenge, but Hye Sung isn't the sweet angel-noona that Soo Ha has built up in his mind all these years. Even still, he must stick with her both to protect her from psycho Joon Gook, and to convince her to use her job to protect the innocent, something she seems to have lost faith in.
Throughout the drama, Joon Gook comes after them time and again, sometimes with devastating consequences. How many times can they escape before something has to give? And what hope is there for a puppy-love romance with a large age gap? 

Flow and sequence: 

For about the first half of the drama there are two storylines running parallel. The first is Min Joon Gook has gotten out of prison and is determined to kill Hye Sung as he promised to do. The second is that Soo Ha has to convince Hye Sung to care about her job and use it to defend her clients. She's been apathetic about her purpose for a long long time, and having the help of a 19 year old who can read minds is motivating and empowering, driving her to find the thrill in taking and winning challenging cases.
About halfway through the drama, things seem to come to a head with the villain and we get a somwhat false-finale sort of feel. There's a showdown that doesn't go as planned and important characters get hurt. Our underaged hero confesses his love for noona Hye Sung, and after the chaos he vanishes for a whole year (don't worry, they don't torture us with some long drawn out year's worth of boring scenes), during which time the police find reason to presume villain Min Joon Gook is dead. Soo Ha is suspect #1 of course, and the fact that he's missing doesn't help. When he's finally located, he's got no idea who he is let alone the man he's been accused of killing. In addition to that, he's lost his mindreading ability. He's a legal adult now and the courts want to try him for murder as an adult... The 3rd quarter of the drama centers around Hye Sung's legal battle to save Soo Ha.
The last quarter of the drama is the real finale and I can't tell you much without giving things away but this portion of the drama is much less about the legal battles and more about revealing everything that's been hinted at and bringing to an end all that's been brewing. 

Cast/ Characters/ Acting: 

Lee Jong Suk as Park Soo Ha - I found no flaw with Lee Jong Suk's acting. He always manages to play his roles convincingly, with emotion and realism, and I found this one to be no different. It was a little bit difficult to go with it when the storyline was saying he was a 19 year old in a school uniform and looking at his 24 year old face my eyes were arguing too much for me to really get into imagining him as a 19 year old. I expected to sense some awkwardness between him and the lead female because they are really 10 years apart as well as playing characters who are 10 years apart, but to his credit, for Lee Jong Suk's part I could feel no hesitation or awkwardness. I enjoyed seeing the difference between the carefree and hot-tempered person the character Soo Ha began the drama as and the more self-controlled and confident person he later became.
Lee Bo Young as Jang Hye Sung - The character Hye Sung was extravagantly annoying. She's arrogant and apathetic, self-centered, and mean. She got somewhat better through the drama... I presume the viewer is to attribute her personal growth to Soo Ha's good influence. Lee Bo Young's acting was good, but it's harder to appreciate good acting when it's a character you're supposed to be cheering for but whose personality you can't stand. Hye Sung was basically your quintessential drama-trope narcissistic lead male, except she was the female. She's not on top of my "lead female characters I detest" list (those positions are currently held by the female leads from My Love From The Stars and My Sassy Girl) but she was notably obnoxious. Good acting, but not great. I could find no flaw with her facial expressions, mannerisms, delivery of lines... but the something that's invisible is what I was having trouble finding: namely the chemistry between her and the male lead. She acted her part in a way that I can't name anything she could have physically done differently, but there was an underlying tension (and not the good kind) in her character's romantic interactions. I felt more zing from her fangirling over the second lead than I did when Lee Jong Suk's character was leaning over her on the couch. In fact that scene was a perfect example of what was missing. Hye Sung was basically crawling backwards away from him on the couch while Soo Ha looked at her with hungry eyes and advanced. The scene should have been literally buzzing with sexual tension. Despite her posture and facial expression being "right" for this scene, there was nothing in her eyes that made it feel real. While Lee Jong Suk's pupils were dilated and there was a hardness around the eyebrows making his acting seem very real, there was nothing in Lee Bo Young's eyes, making her acting seem like *just* acting. Any time he got near her for any sort of romantic interaction, her eyes went flat. Every kiss scene she stayed about an inch further away from him at all non-liplocked times than would have been comfortable. I have a feeling the fact that the actress got married in real life a month after this drama ended probably had a big part to play in why she couldn't get into the romantic scenes enough to convey the unspoken attraction that I felt was absent. It would be decidedly uncomfortable to act a romantic drama with another man a month before you marry your fiancee.
Yoon Sang Hyun as Cha Kwan Woo - As always, Yoon Sang Hyun gives a believable performance as a larger than life character. Lawyer Cha is a bit of a complicated character, appearing cheerful and childlike on the surface but being an emotion-driven optimist-by-choice on the inside. Yoon Sang Hyun has a tendency to steal the show with his great acting and eye-grabbing aura. He has a charisma that makes you pay attention to him whether you want to or not. The first thing I ever saw him in was Secret Garden, playing the self-tortured aging Kpop star Oska. I was so drawn in by his portrayal of that character! He's currently a minor side character in My Secret Terrius (an OBGYN who is the brother of a friend of the main character and has to patch up wounded Terrius a few times) and as usual he's a total scene stealer with his agelessly handsome face and his expressive eyes. 

Writing and directing: 

There were a few plot holes. Like how do we have a murderer being let out after only 10 years in prison ... a murderer who rammed a car containing a child with a truck and then bashed the head of the driver in repeatedly in front of that child and then attacked, and attempted to choke to death a 19 year old girl in the courtroom in front of judges, lawyers, guards, and witnesses, while screaming in her face that you're going to come for her. Yeah, let's just let him out after 10 years, great idea. Meanwhile his cellmate was also convicted of murder for which he's actually innocent and no body was ever found because the supposed victim was never actually dead, but he's in prison LONGER than the demented head-bashing, child-threatening lunatic? That was the most glaring but there were a couple other less glaring plot holes. 

Happy Ending Factor? 

I'd give this drama a 9 out of 10 for happy ending. The female lead actress had a fiancee to think about and a wedding to plan so I think she was just not feeling it with the male lead, thus her acting didn't quite reach her eyes at times. Truth is she's a good enough actress and Lee Jong Suk was so phenomenal that you could easily have a totally different opinion on that than me, you might feel like they had fabulous chemistry! Aside from my personal feelings on their chemistry, the drama was nearly perfect and all the happy-ending-requirement boxes got easily checked. 

Final Summary: 

I thought this drama was going to be about some mindreading guy who solves crimes with his lawyer girlfriend, but instead it was more of a serial killer thriller mixed with a legal drama. I really enjoyed it- I thought it was a sweet drama, but also a MAJORLY suspenseful and sometimes scary drama. My only qualms with the drama overall were the few plot holes and the female lead's lack of chemistry with the male lead. I am glad to have watched it and might watch it again in a year or two. I'd say watch it for sure if you like crime dramas or serial killer thrillers with some sweet romance as a secondary plot, but if you're not really into either of those and were hoping for a super steamy/juicy romance with a supernatural twist, this one promises more than it can deliver. 

Check out {I Hear Your Voice} on Viki!
Check out {I Hear Your Voice} on Kocowa!
Check out the I Hear Your Voice OST on Spotify! 
(Dramas may not be available on certain sites for certain countries. It depends who acquired the license for a specific drama for your country and who did not. Drama may be available on Netflix in your country but not even show up in mine, so check there if you have a Netflix acct. Ditto for Viki- may be available in your country but not mine. Click HERE for a list of legal Kdrama streaming sites and what countries they work in.) 

Dramageddon and the Viki vs. KOCOWA Dilemma

So I'm sure by now you all know DramaFever bit the dust. 

October 14th everything was normal. 

October 15th first they charged everyone with a subscription on time as usual (yes me too!), then they put a freeze on every airing drama with wording that insinuated everything would be back to normal ASAP. 

I was chatting with a YouTuber who said she actually got a bad feeling that day and emailed DF to make sure nothing bad was happening, only to have them reply that all was well and the delayed episodes would indeed be uploaded ASAP. If that's true then it's even more upsetting that not only were they shady but also liars.

October 16th, Dramageddon, according to several people I spoke to, they were still accepting NEW subscriptions (and the money that went along with that) up until late afternoon when (without ANY warning, contrary to a statement I saw in a news article where they claimed to have sent out an email) hordes of Asian drama addicts like myself were literally CUT OFF mid-watch by either an error message on mobile, or this ugly and thinly-veiled 'Thanks for the dough yo (we might give some back if we think we can't legally avoid it), we don't feel like we owe you an explanation OR apology, so Sayonara Suckers!' where the website full of happy sweet Asian drama cuteness used to reside. 

I spoke briefly online with an ex- volunteer employee from DramaFever who was pretty certain from what she knew that the employees who were laid off in this debacle went to work Monday morning not knowing they wouldn't have a job to come back to the next day. That makes me angrier than anything else honestly. I figured as much, because they were still updating things meticulously and adding writeups, posters, pages, episodes until about 24 hours before the site went dark (why would they work so hard right up to the day before Dramageddon if they knew?), but to hear my suspicions echoed by an ex-employee really made my heart sink.

Yeah so all that was a whole 3 weeks ago and I'm still seething. I NEVER got an email explaining ANYTHING, firstly. Would it have killed the powers-that-be at Warner to give their poor employees a heads up so they could, I dunno, look for a NEW JOB?! I hope they did. Would it have KILLED them to give their CUSTOMERS a heads up so we could at the very least write down what episode we left of on for each of our dramas? Did they really have to get so competitive about getting exclusivity for dramas like 100 Days My Prince, Age Of Legends, The Third Charm, and Devilish Joy, only to DUMP us mid-season with zero warning? Not to mention other dramas that were completed but they had exclusivity to, like Miss Hammurabi, leaving mid-season watchers of those dramas just as stranded as those who had been watching airing dramas.

Out of 4 airing dramas I was watching, I only found ONE on Viki or KOCOWA. (Terius Behind Me aka. My Secret Terrius and I found it on KOCOWA.) The others left me and so many others stranded on a midseason cliffhanger with no way to find out how it ends aside from abusing Viki's Request Form and hoping for the best, or finding a less honest way/place to watch the rest of what we PAID Drama Fever for before we got scr*wed over.

The kicker? Apparently there are rumors that Warner is wanting to launch it's own streaming service to compete with NetFlix and they were concerned that DramaFever would compete with it. If the rumors are to be believed, they hope to launch by the New Year and charge us more for a streaming service that mixes HBO programming with Kdramas. They might think we're going to go "Oh wow yes, Kdramas totally go well with HBO! Of COURSE I forgive you for yanking DramaFever out from under me the day after you took my money, I don't give a rodent's rear about the employees you screwed over, and I'm more than happy to throw twice as much cash at you monthly for the honorable privilege of subscribing to the new streaming service that you launched to replace my favorite Kdrama streaming platform. Where do I sign up?!"

How about no. I dunno about you all but I'm more like... "Thanks sooo much DramaFever. */sarc* I would have understood if there had been some warning for everyone affected, a decent apology, and at least somewhat of a real actual explanation. I'd have been sad to see you go, but accepting. The way you skipped out on us all like a one-night-stand however leaves me inclined to give you this little bit of advice: If you think I'm going to come crawling to you for a new streaming service, that I in any way think you understand your customer base if you're going to offer HBO alongside Kdramas, that I forgive you for your insane lack of employee and customer consideration, and that I'll ever want to trust you again, well you can take that big fat NO and shove it along with your rumored streaming service."

And on that note, this whole Dramageddon thing left so many Kdrama lovers in search of a new place to get their drama fix... Me too. I don't know anyone who wanted to wait around for December to see if Warner was going to launch that rumored streaming service after all. The two main players in the replacement category seem to be Viki and KOCOWA. [ Off topic but... How do you even pronounce that? Like a co(habitating-moo)-cow-a or like a coco(nut)-wa(ter)? I have no clue. Let me know if you know! ] I guess there's another one available to the US, called ondemandkorea.com but when I looked at it, not everything was subtitled and it seemed to be 99% the same things Viki and Kocowa had. If you're not in the US, I saw a good list of suggestions here: https://www.kdramapal.com/top-korean-drama-streaming-sites/

Back to Viki vs. Kocowa... From what little I know, KOCOWA is a Korean company that offers dramas from the 3 bigwig broadcasters in S. Kor. and has a partnership with Viki where they allow Viki to distribute most (but not all) of the dramas they offer as a part of Viki's most expensive subscription package. You would think that makes Viki the obvious choice, but alas, KOCOWA had "My Secret Terrius" which they did NOT share with Viki and I was going nuts to see the rest of it. (It's adorable and hilarious BTW, with bite-sized episodes perfect for my busy life.) Overall Viki seemed like the better choice. Viki is a subsidary of a Japanese company I guess? and they offer more dramas from other Asian countries than Drama Fever did. In addition, they have some older American movies (classics, action movies, westerns, Roy Rogers, John Wayne, there was even the Shirley Temple version of A Little Princess on there for a while but they seem to have just taken it off- glad my kids got to see it before they deleted it), Iniesta (Japanese sports & culture), Variety shows, Awards shows, telenovelas and they generate their own content including Viki-exclusive Kdramas and celebrity interview shows. They also have educational and socially interesting content by popular YouTubers such as TalkToMeInKorean.com and Drawing Hands. Oh and they are currently having a sale - 30% VikiPass Standard Annual. That means about $50 for a year of Standard (No Kocowa included.)

Some of the other disgruntled DramaFever Dump-ees I spoke to opted to go for either Kocowa OR Viki, some opted to get Viki Standard and Kocowa separately. I opted to get Viki Plus (which includes most of what Kocowa has, but not all) annual, AND Kocowa monthly.
[Hi, my name's Jessica and I'm addicted to Asian Dramas. I've hit both Viki AND Kocowa today. My last fix was 1 hour ago. I probably need help.] 
If Kocowa doesn't keep having enough dramas not shared with Viki to keep my interest, I'll cancel it eventually. For now though I have GOT to see how My Secret Terrius ends. (It's so cute! If you have Kocowa you so need to see it!!!)


[UPDATE 4/20/2019: If you like Chinese dramas, there's a new streaming site in town!]
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Did you get dumped on Dramageddon too? Did you find a new place to watch your dramas yet? How do you feel about the way DF ditched their customers and about the rumors surrounding Warner's possible new streaming service? Whatcha watching lately? Leave me a comment! :)