Moonlight Drawn by Clouds

Moonlight Drawn by Clouds

6.5/10

Moonlight Drawn by Clouds

Genre:                                Episodes: 18                                 Year: 2016

Romance

Historical

Synopsis:

In order to earn a living, Hong Ra On disguises herself as a man and counsels men on how to woo women. In order to settle a debt, she is sold to become a eunuch in the palace. She is stationed at the East Palace, the home of Crown Prince Lee Young. To stay alive, she can’t let anyone discover that she is a woman, but the Crown Prince’s growing interest in her makes life in the palace dangerous for both of them.

Cast:

Park Bo Gum (Crown Prince Lee Young)

Kim Yoo Jung (Hong Ra On/Hong Sam Nom)

Kwak Dong Yeon (Kim Byung Yeon)

Jin Young (Kim Yoon Sung)

Chun Ho Jin (Kim Hoon)

Kim Seung Soo (King Soonjo)

Chae Soo Bin (Jo Ha Yeon)

General Thoughts:

I feel like I missed something with this drama. There’s this big ol’ hype-train filled with love and emotion for the series…and I’m not on it. It actually reminds be of ‘Moon that Embraces the Sun’ in a lot of ways. Hot new sageuk starring a hot young actor with lots and lots of pretty.

The pretty is undeniable

However, the two shows are similar in some not so fantastic ways too. A prince (or King) with no power seems to care more about his first love than about his country, a heroine that does literally nothing beyond the halfway point, me wondering how in the world the show was getting so much attention and cracking 20% ratings.

Basically how confused I was comparing the hype to the actual drama

It’s not a bad drama- I just fail to see how other people find it so much drastically better than anything else on Korean TV. The casting was all wonderful, as was most of the acting, and any lapses in acting ability were mainly due to the inconsistencies or incomprehensibility of the characters. Park Bo Gum was just awesome all the time- though admittedly not as awesome as he’s been in other roles. Kim Yoo Jung was awesome for the first half of the series before (surprise) her character took a dive and forgot how to do anything except breathe and look slightly startled. The boys from the broken bromance were excellent, giving a ton of emotion to their characters and hinting at the past relationship between the friends. This part relationship doesn’t really get explored much, but Park Bo Gum, Jin Young and Kwak Dong Yeon do such a fantastic job at acting that I was able to grasp the general idea around their fallout even if it was never explicitly stated beyond Yoon Sung being a part of the Kim clan.

Oh bromance- where art thou?

All the eunuchs were hilarious and I particularly loved Lee Joon Hyuk as Eunuch Jang. He was able to bring some comedy even in the dramas most angsty episodes with his exasperation and quiet acceptance at the all Prince’s antics. As for the plot…well…yeah. While the drama focused on Ra On posing as a man in the palace and the Prince’s growing feelings for her, things were pretty peachy. Sure, not a lot actually happened story-wise, but it was still so fun and so addictive to watch.

When there's this much cute, does the plot really matter?

At this point I understood all the hype surrounding the series, as Park Bo Gum and Kim Yoo Jung had soooooo much chemistry between them, and every interaction between their characters either left you laughing your head off or getting butterflies in your tummy.

Seriously though- look how cute these two are

I watch a lot of K-Dramas and they have a lot of cute, so it’s been quite some time since a drama has managed to sweep me up and engage me so completely by just how plain adorable its leads and their relationship is. But before long the cuteness disappears as the plot becomes unnecessarily serious. While it was necessary to have a plot that went beyond ‘look how cute these two are’, I didn’t think it needed to get quite as angsty for quite as long as it did. Can we all just be grateful that the extension to 20 episodes never happened? I know I am. It’s a sageuk so of course there are a bunch of grumpy old men with too much power making life tough for our cute lil’ Prince and his girlfriend. And there’s a whole rebel plot that made very little sense to me beyond making Ra On a character of mild significance outside of her relationship with the Prince. I don’t know how much of my inability to understand is based on my limited knowledge of Korean history and how much is due to the confused writing, but either way the writer defiantly relied on external knowledge of the Prince and the rebellion to add tension in this drama.

I have less than no idea what the dealio is here

I had no clue that Park Bo Gum’s character actually died young before he became King (until I heard it after the show), so I didn’t have that extra layer of anxiety that the Korean viewers might have had that revolved around how the writers could be historically accurate and also have a happy ending. (Spoiler alert: they don’t. They ditch history.)

Ohhhmygod Hong Jyung Rae! Should...should I care?

I also didn’t (and still don’t) have much knowledge about the rebellion or Hong Kyung Rae, so the complete panic character’s entered after hearing his name or hearing that his daughter was alive left me feeling pretty baffled. I also don’t understand why Ra On gave a toss about the rebels. She knows they’re aiming to bring down or kill the man she loves, and it was this rebellion that took her father from her. Yet she still chats happily to those in the rebellion and lets them involve themselves in her life. Um, why? I also don’t understand why she didn’t just leave. While I usually hate heroines that do this, Ra On was in a lot of danger and was causing a lot of trouble for the Prince. The two had already said their teary farewell (many times), yet she still remained close to the palace and practically everyone knew where she was. Not such a smart plan if half the country wants to kill you. Needless to say, the plot went from cute and engaging to angsty and irritating. Once a drama loses its sense and I begin to get frustrated it’s hard to win my interest back, but the last two episodes of ‘Moonlight’ captured the humour and heart that it had in its original 12 or so episodes.

Aaaaaand back to happy fun time!

I wouldn’t say I was 100% back on board, but it did lessen the sting that the hugely melodramatic episodes left, and while I didn’t leave the drama ecstatically I was at least satisfied and mildly amused.

100% best cameo I've ever seen

Also the greatest cameo ever did raise my opinion of the show. Kim Seul Gi cameoing as another assumed crossdressing eunuch was definitely a highlight. If you’re not sure what I’m talking about, go check out ‘Splash Splash Love’- a shorter (and dare I say better) drama about a different girl posing as a eunuch while accidentally romancing the King. Taking a step back from the plot and the characters, everything else was done in a very satisfactory manner. The music was lovely cutting between typical sageuk instrumentation and more modern sounding pieces. The costuming and cinematography were stunning, though I could have done with a few less close-up shots of our characters that lingered for maybe a smidge too long.

What Was Great:

Crossdressing Comedy:

The first 12 or so episode that focused purely on Ra On as Sam Nom were golden. Sam Nom was hilarious as the love-guru giving advise here and there to set people up, and her initial contact with the Prince was both funny and unforced. The whole situation where she was forced to pretend to be a eunuch was pure hilarity, as were all her interactions with the Prince and the other eunuchs.

Oh the pure hilarity

It wasn’t all just fun and games, with the show also hitting some nice emotional beats as Sam Nom unwittingly continued her/his dating advice from inside the palace. Not only did these smaller points bring some emotion into the series, but they also provided a learning curve for our main leads. Through the King’s romance and his undelivered letters, our hero and heroine learned that even the King doesn’t have complete power in the palace, and it’s difficult even for him to engage in a real romantic relationship- as it is for our Prince. The love-line between a eunuch and a palace-maid was not only engaging and touching but also gave the Prince the courage to move forwards with his love.

Oh the pure adorableness

While at this point he still thought Ra On was a man, he planned to at least acknowledge his one-sided love. And that’s what led him to finding out Ra On was a girl, and a cute secret romance begun. The secret dating and adorable honey-moon phase were just too cute for words, and I truly wish the drama had kept at least some of the adorableness going as it made its way into its endgame.

Park Bo Gum:

While not his best performance, Park Bo Gum is still one of the major reasons so many people stuck around for so long.

So fab in so many ways

Most of the character shortcomings came from the way the Prince was written, and Park Bo Gum did an excellent job at always making him an appealing character despite his unclear motives and mildly unwise decisions. He also got an alarming amount of chemistry going between himself and Kim Yoo Jung despite the very minimal amounts of skinship. The two were able to use nothing more than their expressions to display their emotions, and it had an amazing result considering how often K-Dramas rely on skinship for that initial spark. I adored Park Bo Gum as the Pince, but wish the drama had allowed him more room to manoeuvre his vast acting ability.

What Wasn’t:

Too Much Candy:

Candy heroines are annoying at the best of times, but in Joseon they become especially irritating. Females tend to already have an air of powerlessness about them in historical settings, so adding a Candy personality on top of that…eeish. For the first half or so of the drama, Ra On was a fun and slightly quirky character.

She didn't even have half that much personality by the end

Sure, she wasn’t vastly different from other K-Drama heroines, but she was at least making her own decisions about what she wanted to do and how to handle her situation. But once the external conflict (omg rebels, everybody panic) started kicking in, she lost every once of her decision-making ability. Ra On kept getting caught up in dangerous situations and literally did nothing about it. Where did that Ra On who was willing to sacrifice herself to China to save the Prince go?

Oh no. Ra On's in trouble (and unwilling to do anything about it) again.

I think Kim Yoo Jung is an astounding actress, but she was drastically under-utilised in the second half of this series. Even if it’s an actress I like, I get frustrated so quickly when I see only two expressions- startled rabbit or sad in acceptance of the situation.

70% of the drama right there

So many times I found myself wishing that Ra On would do something whether it would endanger them or not, because I just got so sick of her waiting around for something to happen. But on the bright side, at least she seemed age appropriate for her role- not like that other sageuk this year. It didn’t help that to go along with our Joseon Candy, we had a plot that didn’t actually get our characters motivated to do anything. Sure, it’s a dangerous situation- but it’s not one that Ra On and the Prince have actively involved themselves in. It just kind of happened. Our Prince and Ra On were off happy living in la-la-land until all this sh*t started happening around them. They had no interest in said sh*t, and had no real ability to alter that sh*t in order to form an out for themselves. The drama was basically sit-around-do-nothing-and-be-happy and then sit-around-and-do-nothing-until-this-sh*tstorm-blows-over. 

Unoriginal:

While the original happy stage of this drama was fresh and entertaining, the later stages turned into every sageuk we’ve ever seen.

All these power plays we've seen 100 times before

There’s a Prince who wants what’s best for his people- but even this characterisation is weak, as for 90% of this drama our Prince has only cared about Ra On and not given a rip about the rest of is subjects.

Most sensical plot-point in the whole show

Then there’s old men who want to keep the King and Prince powerless so they can do mildly illegal things and earn a lot of money. It’s a typical Joseon power struggle with a lot of under the table dealings and threatening talk- but not much actually happening. Though I will give the show props for so clearly showing the advantages of marrying the nobleman’s daughter. Not a lot of sageuk’s make me think ‘oh yeah, marrying that chick you don’t love is definitely in your best interests’, but ‘Moonlight’ gave some excellent insight into how much easier the Prince’s life would be if he married Ha Yeon.

Yoon Sung’s Death:

I always called that one of the three friends was going to die before the series wrapped up. It’s not the act of Yoon Sung’s death that bothered me, but the way it played out.

Alas, poor Yoon Sung! I knew him well.

It was nice and poetic that he died defending Ra On, but also pretty pointless. I mean, those men fighting him were his men. Could he not have ordered them off along the way to Ra On’s place? Or just not taken them to her house? And then everyone seemed to forget that he died pretty darn quick. It also didn’t help that Byung Yeon had a much better, much more dramatic, much more emotional death (except he didn’t die) the episode before.

Prince got the girl, friend got the cool death scene. 

Yoon Sung’s death would have been a success if: 1- there was a decent reason he was involved in that fight (because it felt like the writers were trying way to hard to kill him off) and 2- if his mate hadn’t had a much cooler death an episode before him. 

Re-watch?

Probably not. While I did enjoy large parts of this series, I was also frustrated for large parts of it. Honestly speaking, the drama left me feeling pretty disappointed on several fronts.

Had to see it once- for all the pretty if nothing else