I've started watching *Korean dramas sometime pre-pandemic (honestly, no idea when I watched the first, just that it was an international procedural crime drama, and I loved it) and at some point Netflix started showing other Korean shows too like variety programs, comedy specials, etc.
I've been watching a light-hearted variety show "Men on a Mission"(previous English title was Knowing Bros) in chunks of a few episodes at a go (or sometimes just 10 minutes) for a while, and I know the main cast of hosts pretty well.
Earlier, I needed a breath, so I switched to a thriller(?) with a supernatural revenge plot. I've learned that while I do NOT like horror or suspense, the cultural difference is such that I'm not scared by Korean horror genre so far. I'm not going out of my way, looking for more.
When I went looking for something a little different, I re-watched a stand-up special by. Korean artist and realised he was one of the main hosts on this other show, and I now had CONTEXT for a bunch of his jokes. The first time I watched it, I had no idea who he was, but I didn't hate it.
I'm on "season 4" which is not quite accurate as there were at least two new years specials and Chuseok specials in season 1 which on description was a collection of soem of the best episodes from the first two years.
I've been looking up terms and learned that Chuseok is what dramas have referred to as Korean Thanksgiving, which baffled me as I think of that particular word associated with North American Colonists. Learning that it is part harvest festival and part reconnecting with family I can understand with modern context (despite the historical genocide behind American Thanksgiving) why it has been called as Korean Thanksgiving. It's the most accurate cultural equivalent despite the upsetting truth about American Thanksgiving in particular, which was not the hand holding Love Thy Neighbor event I was taught in school.
I went a bit off sides for a moment there. So I watched the comedian Soo-geon Lee's special (made or at least released in 2021, his name is shown as Su-guen Lee) and because I'm faceblind while I thought might be him, it wasn't until he started his jokes that I was sure because many of them reference a co-host from this show, Ho-Dong Kang. I'm using American style name placement with the family name at the end for ease of use.
A minor frustration for me is that sometimes, when I'm trying to look up a Korean celebrity, their official English spelling is NOT what I've been reading on the subtitles. I've had this frustration before trying to look up official info on an actor to see if I'm remembering them right or confusing them with an actor or entertainer with a similar look or skill set.
So where was I going with this? I ended up watching part of either season 3 or 4 when I started because that's just where Netflix dropped me into the series. Once I realized this, I backed out and pulled up the look by episode menu and started from the first available episode. They do have the pilot episode as first, and then it skips around a bit as they hadn't settled on a concept and were nearly canceled by the end of the first 6 months.
So I've been watching this in chunks (and my understanding of Korean has improved even if just a little as they speak casually and I hear different dialects and accents from the hosts and their guests. So I've gotten possibly a much more accurate snippet of cultural information just by watching a silly yet entertaining variety show in the last few weeks or months than my at least two years of watching and sometimes re-watching my Kdramas.
I've also seen many of the faces I have started to recognize from dramas when they were younger and so many of them started out in idol groups (both male and female) and its been weird and interesting to see them before being legal adults (age 20 in Korea I think) how very young and talented they are outside of the specific pressure cooker a drama is and shows.
I no longer remember what I wanted to share so urgently that I had to type it all out, but I probably covered it.
*For the purposes of this post, I'm clarifying that I mean South Korean if I just write Korean.
