See why the critics say the romantic teen comedy Korean drama, Palace (Goong) aka Princess Hours is the future of Korean television.
Based on the manhua (Korean comic book) by PARK Soh Hee, Palace (Goong in Korean) aka Princess Hours is set in a ficticious world where the monarchy still exists in contemporary South Korea.
Bright and cheerful Chae-Kyung (YOON Eun Hye) agrees to marry the cold and aloof Crown Prince Shin (JOO Ji Hoon), an arrangement made through her grandfather and the late King, to help her family out of bankruptcy. She soon finds out that being Crown Princess and the palace's stack of rules and regulations slowly choke her spirit and her dream to become a fashion designer. It doesn't help that her husband, the Crown Prince is unsympathetic and can only think of the woman he couldn't marry, the prima ballerina Min Hyo-Rin (SONG Ji Hyo). In the midst of all this there is political unrest as an uprising of supporters who wish the monarchy be abolished when the Crown Prince's cousin the former Crown Prince Eui Sung also known as Yool (KIM Jeong Hoon) and second to the throne returns to Korea after 14 years of exile wanting to claim what was taken from him.
This rates as one of the better dramas, if not one of the best I've seen. It has enough of everything, romance, comedy, intrigue, mystery and suspense to keep any teen and adult glued to all 24 episodes. Staying true to the formula of most Korean dramas; girl meets boy, girl and boy get into some sort of arranged deal that is a quick fix to problems they're both having, girl ends up falling for boy who is in love with another girl, friend of boy falls for girl. This odd love parallelogram seems to be a constant theme in most Korean dramas I've seen. What makes this particular drama interesting is that I never once felt irritated or annoyed by any of its character's motivations. That the amount of sheer coincidences that occur in most other dramas, always comes across like a natural progression rather than a forced plot point.
According to several articles, each episode cost approximately $230,000 USD to make its part costume, part contemporary production come to life. It's nice to see HD technology being put to such great use. Its 2 years of pre-production can be seen in its costumes, production design and cinematography. It became so popular that the series extended its original 20 episode story to 24 episodes with a second season set for broadcast in late 2007 to early 2008. This is, of course, not to be confused with the spin-off Goong S aka Prince Hours, care of another production company whom despite being currently in copyright limbo, is set to air January 2007. At the time of this writing, it is unconfirmed if the original cast will return.
Performances are consistent throughout surprisingly as all four leads are relatively new faces. Former member of girl pop group Baby V.O.X, YOON Eun Hye plays Crown Princess Chae Kyung with life and energy while balancing the weight of the character's tragic circumstance. JOO Ji Hoon plays Crown Prince Shin as a rebellious teen needing to have the freedom to make mistakes in order to grow and mature into the King he needs to be. KIM Jeong Hoon's gentle and compassionate Yool wavers his ambition to become King against him wanting to be with Chae Kyung while SONG Ji Hyo's desire to be with the current Crown Prince, her ex-boyfriend is played with so much empathy, you realize why there are so many references to the British Royal Family.
YA Entertainment packages all 24 episodes (8 DVDs) in a beautiful fold-out boxed set and adds an extra disc filled with about 2 hours of English subtitled special features including cast interviews, blooper reel, behind the scenes footage including CG, promos and a press conference.
'Palace 1.5' is a treat to watch as the cast sits down and looks back at all 280 days of shooting. MCs SEO Kyung Seok and PARK Kyung Lim lead the cast in behind the scenes footage with bloopers and quirky antics involving the cast.
Just before Eun Hye started shooting Palace, she was a regular on the most popular variety/ game show in Korea called X-man. One of the team leaders was PARK Kyung Lim, of which, Eun Hye was her vice captain, so a good portion of the subtitled jokes in 'Palace 1.5' allude to her to having super strength and connected with a popular singer named Kim Jong Kook.
HIGHLY recommended.
