kdrama: Maids
Jul. 17th, 2016 09:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
meganbmooreMaids is a recent sageuk set during the reign of King Taejong, about an arrogant young noblewoman, In Yub, who becomes a slave after her father is framed for treason. She's sold into the house of her former romantic rival, who proceeds to make her life miserable, and clashes with the existing servants of the household, who she had been arrogant towards before. The head of the household is a high ranking official, and In Yub sets out to find a way to prove her father's innocence, while trying to adjust to her new life. There's also the shenanigans by the ACTUAL traitors, and their plots to overthrow the king. Somewhere in the mix, there's the secret offspring of the king who various people are searching for.
As the title suggests, the main focus of the series is on the maids of the household. The political aspects drive a lot of the plot, but are secondary to the character stuff. In Yub isn't difficult to like or sympathize with at first-in the first episode, she throws a temper tantrum that results in the second female lead, Dan Ji, being severely beaten, and this is after several smaller acts of arrogance and mistreatment of servants. The show does make a point to say that she's usually much kinder to servants and is only acting that way because of stress, but it still makes her someone who takes out her frustrations out on people who can't fight back. Naturally, In Yub is pretty well hated by the other servants of the household at first, but since no one really wants to spend 20 episodes watching the main character be arrogant while everyone else bullies her, she soon grows up and becomes friends with many of the other servants. While her actual character arc to make her more likable and sympathetic is well written, I mostly credit the actress with the fact that I came to love the character as much as I did.
On the romantic end of things (it IS a kdrama, after all) In Yub's former fiance, Eun Gi, is also trying to find evidence that her father was innocent. I initially liked Eun Gi a lot, but he's a bit less upstanding than he initially seems, which I would have been fine with. I was not, however, fine with his being so determined to "save" In Yub that he ignored the fact that many of his efforts actually made things worse for her, and made her requests that he stop doing things that get her beaten, almost married off to human slime, and almost sold to another household as a surrogate and so on be all about him and his pain at being rejected. At one point, he starts bemoaning about how there's no one in the world who is more miserable than he is, referring to the fact that his ex is suffering a lot while he's off visiting gisaeng and eating well and wearing nice clothes and literally benefiting from her labor. On the flipside, we have Moo Myeong, the head servant of the household who many other servants consider to be hard and cruel, but is actually secretly trying to protect them. He may or may not be involved in all the political shenanigans, which puts a kink in his status as the better love interest. There's also a secondary romance between Dan Ji and the young master of the household, whose name I forget. I spent most of the series thinking she could do much better, but I guess he proved himself well enough towards the end. There's also, of course, plenty of femslash options around, given the setup. The most obvious one being In Yub/Dan Ji, but also In Yub and Sa Wol, her maid from before she was a slave, who eventually joins the household. Even the villain ships In Yub/Sa Wol.
A lot of the plot and developments are fairly standard for the genre, but the show manages to stay largely fresh and exciting by the writing and the acting. It also escapes one of the huge downfalls of many of its kind in that it never stops being completely In Yub's story, even at times when many series would cheerfully let the focus shift to the male characters.
Interestingly, Jeong Yu Mi and Lee Cho Hee (In Yub and Sa Wol) went straight from Maids to six Flying Dragons, which is about King Taejong in his younger days.
As the title suggests, the main focus of the series is on the maids of the household. The political aspects drive a lot of the plot, but are secondary to the character stuff. In Yub isn't difficult to like or sympathize with at first-in the first episode, she throws a temper tantrum that results in the second female lead, Dan Ji, being severely beaten, and this is after several smaller acts of arrogance and mistreatment of servants. The show does make a point to say that she's usually much kinder to servants and is only acting that way because of stress, but it still makes her someone who takes out her frustrations out on people who can't fight back. Naturally, In Yub is pretty well hated by the other servants of the household at first, but since no one really wants to spend 20 episodes watching the main character be arrogant while everyone else bullies her, she soon grows up and becomes friends with many of the other servants. While her actual character arc to make her more likable and sympathetic is well written, I mostly credit the actress with the fact that I came to love the character as much as I did.
On the romantic end of things (it IS a kdrama, after all) In Yub's former fiance, Eun Gi, is also trying to find evidence that her father was innocent. I initially liked Eun Gi a lot, but he's a bit less upstanding than he initially seems, which I would have been fine with. I was not, however, fine with his being so determined to "save" In Yub that he ignored the fact that many of his efforts actually made things worse for her, and made her requests that he stop doing things that get her beaten, almost married off to human slime, and almost sold to another household as a surrogate and so on be all about him and his pain at being rejected. At one point, he starts bemoaning about how there's no one in the world who is more miserable than he is, referring to the fact that his ex is suffering a lot while he's off visiting gisaeng and eating well and wearing nice clothes and literally benefiting from her labor. On the flipside, we have Moo Myeong, the head servant of the household who many other servants consider to be hard and cruel, but is actually secretly trying to protect them. He may or may not be involved in all the political shenanigans, which puts a kink in his status as the better love interest. There's also a secondary romance between Dan Ji and the young master of the household, whose name I forget. I spent most of the series thinking she could do much better, but I guess he proved himself well enough towards the end. There's also, of course, plenty of femslash options around, given the setup. The most obvious one being In Yub/Dan Ji, but also In Yub and Sa Wol, her maid from before she was a slave, who eventually joins the household. Even the villain ships In Yub/Sa Wol.
A lot of the plot and developments are fairly standard for the genre, but the show manages to stay largely fresh and exciting by the writing and the acting. It also escapes one of the huge downfalls of many of its kind in that it never stops being completely In Yub's story, even at times when many series would cheerfully let the focus shift to the male characters.
Interestingly, Jeong Yu Mi and Lee Cho Hee (In Yub and Sa Wol) went straight from Maids to six Flying Dragons, which is about King Taejong in his younger days.