As always, you will quickly find TV Tropes that will be humorous.. eventually.
Someone always gets a piggy-back ride somewhere in the series is one.
They make it way way too obvious who will end up with who in the dramas. One show that didn’t was “Coffee House”.
Don’t always expect happy endings, especially if its not formulaic (those who watch a lot of Kdrama will recognize the formula shows rather quickly).
A lot of them have stories that drag. They can turn the same story into a 90 minute TV movie or a 16 episode series it seems like.
They are mostly pretty low-budget (compared to US shows) but there are exceptions like IRIS (a 20-episode show that cost something like $17 million)
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I found that Chinese grates on me (although I can endure it if Rainie Yang is on screen), Japanese shows were not my cup of tea. The Korean language doesn’t hurt my ears.
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Variety shows like “Running Man” are pretty funny. I don’t even much like the cast individually but the show is good.
Thanks, I’ll definitely check them out. I enjoyed some Japanese series in the past on local channels, but they’re long gone or shown without subtitles. Always looking for original, non-formulaic dramas, and other than Doc Martin on PBS, I don’t watch anything these days.