Scholar Who Walks The Night

밤을 걷는 선비 (Scholar Who Walks the Night) is a South Korean drama series that was aired on MBC from July 8th to September 10th 2015. It consists of 20 episodes and is based on a webcomic.

Story: When the Goryeo Dynasty collapsed vampire Gwi helped the first King of Joseon to build his new empire. In return, he was promised to be honored by the King's descendants but 200 years later, Crown Prince Jung-hyun tries to get rid of him. Jung-hyun visits a guardian vampire with his best friend Kim Sung-yeol in order to stop Gwi with a secret plan but the evil vampire finds out about it and fights the guardian vampire while imprisoning Jung-hyun. Trying to help his friend, Sung-yeol gets to the place where the guardian vampire lives - and is turned into a vampire by the guardian to fight Gwi. While the guardian passes away, Sung-yeol is going through the process and wakes up 3 days later only to find himself turned into a "monster" and his best friend to be executed along with his father. Gwi also captured his fiancée and first love, Myung-hee and Sung-yeol goes to find her but is too weak to beat Gwi. In order to let him live and fight against the evil vampire controlling the kings of the Joseon dynasty, Myung-hee choses death in the underground palace.
For the next 120 years, Kim Sung-yeol goes into hiding and tries to find Crown Prince Jung-hyun's memorandum that supposedly has the secret plan in it. In order to find it he asks book seller Jo Yang-sun to search for it. Yang-sun, a girl who dresses as a boy for reasons she herself doesn't know for sure, starts to look for the book in any place but can't find it at first - instead she finds herself falling for the good-looking scholar who happened to save her live quite a few times.
To be honest, this is just a summary of the beginning as I don't want to include too many spoilers but this whole story has way more to it than I expected at first. I'm not the biggest fan of vampire romance, and this is also paired up with historical things (I'm still trying to figure out when exactly the story is set but I assume episode one plays around 1592 or 1600 (since the 200 years were probably not exact) so the main story takes place around 1820) but I found this story to be surprisingly interesting. Yes, it is a lot of cliché but at least the vampires are not sparkling in the sun (sorry, no offense meant, I used to love Twilight when I was younger until I realized that a huge part is actually rather funny). Of course the good vs evil was obvious and to be honest this is highly what this drama is based on. Surprisingly the love triangle was not as bad as I thought - in fact I suspected there would be one but in the end there wasn't anything. I liked a lot of elements of this story after all, especially when Hye-ryung was brought in. Also the political issues and curruption which definitely existed. After all it was a solid storyline to me and I liked it for that reason.

Cast: Lee Joon-ki as Kim Sung-yeol. I know this guy is in a bunch of historical dramas even though I did not watch many so far but I actually quite liked him in this drama. However, it sometimes shines through that the character is from a webcomic/manga because some expressions were overacted to fit the description from the illustrations. I still quite liked his acting though.
Lee Yu-bi as Jo Yang-sun. If I ever saw her in any drama before I definitely don't remember her but I think her acting was actually not bad. She looked really young to me though so I spent half of the time trying to figure out how old her character might be. Anyway, I found her acting to be very good in this role even though the character was by far not my favorite.
Shim Chang-min as Lee Yoon. I think the character really was something Chang-min did well. While many people say he can't act I didn't find this bad at all, rather a reserved Crown Prince who couldn't show his feelings because he had to keep a certain emotional distance. As a character, there was one very quick.. development about his future wife that confused me. While at first he didn't really know her it seemed that he definitely loved her just a few episodes later and I was really confused because of that.
Lee Soo-hyuk as Gwi. When I first saw him in a drama before I was sure he would make a good vampire. Holy crap, I was so right with that. I loved him as Gwi even though I also have to admit that sometimes the webcomic villainish feel came through for me. Still he did really good in this role of the vampire thirsting for power.
Kim So-eun as Myung-hee/Hye-ryung. I actually quite liked her as Myung-hee, a kind-hearted young female just in love with a scholar. As Hye-ryung, her acting was cold for reasons but I couldn't really believe everything about that.
Jang Hee-jin as Soo-hyang. Overall I found her acting good but towards the end I did get the feeling - just a little bit - that she had enough of her character for some reason. However, she still delivered a solid enough performance for me.
Choi Tae-hwan as Ho-jin. Oh that poor thing broke my heart in the end! I loved the character and I think Choi Tae-hwan did a good job portraying him, especially the loyalty towards Kim Sung-yeol. I can't really criticize anything about him.
Yeo Eui-joo as No Hak-young. I absolutely loved his acting, too. He was for sure one of my highlights in this drama and I hated Gwi for doing that to him! (don't mind me, I'm just weird). In all honesty, he makes the drama even better.
Lastly, Han Jung-soo as Baek In-ho. The more I think about it, the more I feel like he definitely was made for historical dramas because he really seemed like someone who could've lived during that time (to me). I adored his acting even though he didn't have enough screentime by far but he was just a side character in the end.

Soundtrack: The soundtrack was good but not entirely great. Of course they featured quite a lot of good and famous singers but some songs were overused. I still like G.NA's "Don't Cry" but it will forever be connected to this drama for me. Is that a bad thing? Not really. And it's a nice thing to remember her like this as she probably won't have a comeback anymore due to a certain scandal.


8.5/10
As you can tell I quite enjoyed the story and most of the acting in this drama. I didn't really have high expectations because usually I don't like historical dramas a lot, and vampire stories that are not about crime are totally not my cup of tea anymore (actually) but this drama still was quite good and could become my favorite vampire romance drama. Yes, it did have a few WTF moments, especially during the action scenes because it lookes so overdone but it was okay in the end and I still enjoyed it even though I think the final fight was just.. too fast? I don't know.
Recommended to vampire love story fans and fans of fantasy meets historical. And of the actors, you won't be too disappointed.

Vampire Detective

I bet some of my regular readers have been waiting for this and totally saw this review coming up this year. While I actually finished this drama back in June or July, I just placed the review in November because I already had too much stuff planned and written before.

뱀파이어 탐정 (Vampire Detective; Vampire Personal Investigator) is a South Korean drama series that consists of 12 episodes that were aired on OCN from March 27th to June 12th every Sunday.

Story: Yoon San has a police/military background but ends up working as a private investigator with Yoon Goo-hyung after some tragic events. One day he gets involved in a case that changes his life completely and gets him turned into a vampire while looking for Han Gyeo-wool's brother. Han Gyeo-wool joins the team to find out what exactly happened to her brother and so they solve different cases. Doctor Hwang and the nurse Se-ra offer the medical support when needed and support them with connections as well, while Detective Park delivers information based on the data the police collected on certain people or incidents before.

Cast: I think a reason why many people ended up watching this drama is or was Lee Joon as Yoon San. His acting was really good in this series and I believe that he is doing way better as an actor than he was back in his idol days. Also his role in a crime series seems to work well with him in general so while I was a little bit skeptical in the beginning I did enjoy his acting in this series.
Yoon Goo-hyung played by Oh Jung-se got me shaking my head from time to time. His methods are not the common ones and he's not the brightest light around but it works somehow - and he cares for San a lot. The acting itself was good enough to get me into the story and to sympathize with him, especially in one of the episodes that shows a deeper side of his character (I think it was episode 6 but I don't remember that clearly). The actor(s) (since there was Oh Hee-joon as the younger Goo-hyung in that one episode) did a good job portraying the character in his different ways and it all fit together somehow.
Lee Se-Young as Han Gyeo-wool was outstanding in my honest opinion. Very smart and a rebel she represented the kind of female characters I really like in dramas and movies. She is willing to fight and her sarcastic nature makes it even better to watch. As for the acting Lee Se-young definitely delivered a great piece of work and made her character become real.
I was a little bit surprised when I saw that Jei (Kim Jin-hee) of FIESTAR is in this drama. She was the exact opposite of Han Gyeo-wool as Se-ra. Quite honestly I would say she played a pretty but dumb nurse that was mainly in this drama for being able to sympathize with others and to appeal to the male audience. As of now I'm still not sure what to think about idols in OCN dramas since I personally love the idols they choose but hate most of the (female) characters those girls play. Her acting wasn't too bad - she portrayed the dumb but pretty female perfectly. Actually so good that I'm seriously hoping she's a lot smarter in real life.
Kim Ki-moo played Doctor Hwang, a character that just seems to be around for some minor stuff in the beginning as well but not only turns out to be a good friend but also gets his time to show the depth of the character and the behind story. I was quite impressed by the acting and the story build around the character so I couldn't help but appreciate the fact he was part of this drama.
An Se-ha really had a minor role in this movie though. Detective Park mainly eats and delivers information which is important but somehow his role lacked something. The acting also brought a comedic aspect to the series which was a great thing to losen up the atmosphere at times.
Since this already got too long I just want to say that Lee Chung-ah was in this drama as Yo-na, a character that still makes me thing about certain issues. Kim Yoon-hye as Jung Yoo-jin did her part but I think she lacked chemistry with San even though there was something supposed to be. And Jo Bok-Rae as Kang Tae-woo managed to become one of the male character I hate the most - out of all dramas I watched.

Soundtrack: I wish I could tell you more about this but everything is explained by: it's OCN. They are so good in supporting a dark atmosphere with music that I usually love each and every soundtrack. As for this one, I didn't listen to the titles specifically but I can tell that it is a good soundtrack as usual.


So how did I rate this? 8/10. Now many people might wonder why after all the positive stuff I said which is totally legit and I will gladly talk about my reasons for not rating it as good as other people would expect.
One part, even though a really weak reason, is the fact that I'm still mad at OCN. If they don't deliver a damn good series instead of finally finishing the other dramas they have with a last season I do think that it is something I do unconsciously.
I do know OCN can do better than they did with this series. After all I had a hard time finishing this not because it was uninteresting. But once I stopped watching it for a few days I had to force myself to continue - and then watched at least two or three episodes in a row. But it still made watching this drama a little bit more difficult than others.
A whole episode consisted pretty much of past events. It was just too much at once. Having parts of this spread throughout the series would've helped a little bit and the viewer would not have seen everything at least two to three times in this series.
The reason for the whole chaos in my opinion also was pretty much a personal thing that makes people do a lot of stupid stuff but come on - they couldn't come up with anything deeper but it can all be brought down to jealousy?
And in the end the chemistry between Yoon San and Jung Yoo-jin was almost non-existent for me - I think there was way better chemistry between San and Gyeo-wool so I don't quite get it..

After all OCN this one isn't bad BUT OCN does have more exciting and better series. This is by far not bad though and definitely worth a watch even though the vampire-part didn't add much to the story in my opinion.

Vampire Heaven

ヴァンパイア・ヘヴン (Vampire Heaven) is a Japanese drama series that aired from April 12th to July 5th 2013 on TV Tokyo. It consists of 12 episodes with an average duration of 24 minutes.

Story: The count is a vampire who wants to marry Sakurako. When she decides to go to see him, her best friend Komachi, also called Koma-chan, gets her out of there and the two of them run away together. They end up in contemporary Tokyo and meet Hayato with whom Sakurako falls in love. Living with a young human, Kentarou, and working for Midnight Cafe's owner Aoi the two find out they're not the only vampires in the human world - the count is looking for his fiancee Sakurako...

Cast: At first let me say that there is nothing outstanding about the acting in this one. Aya Oomasa as Sakurako was somehow the typical naive female you find in lots of dramas. I didn't really like her character until the very end. Tsubasa Honda as Komachi was just incredibly cute. While I really really really loved her character, her acting wasn't too special either but then again she was the most refreshing part about the 'main cast' in this series. Yuta Hiraoka did well as Hayato though but then again I don't know whether his acting was that special - sometimes he just seemed to be too calm about things, especially in the end.
Noriko Eguchi was somehow awesome as Aoi though. Or maybe I just found her character to be pretty appealing because she was just cool about almost everything. Especially when she was talking to Kentarou and telling him her 'secret' she seemed to see it as an almost funny thing (which it indeed was). Speaking of Kentarou, Satoshi Tomiura seemed like a 13 year old boy most of the time. I don't want to sound rude but his voice didn't really change the effect, and at first I was confused because he looks so girly in this and his voice is so high but.. Ken is a male name. Oh well, once you get used to it.
Lastly, there's Eisuke Sasai as the count. I don't remember ever hearing people using his name but though he was supposed to be a villain I couldn't help laughing from time to time about him being so damn stupid. It was funny to watch anyways.

Soundtrack: Please let's not talk about the opening and ending songs. I don't really like the Japanese idol culture so the first time hearing the opening song I was like "Okay... well, whatever" but after hearing it three times I wondered if they couldn't do better..


After all this drama is a 5.5/10 for me. I know people are criticizing it for it's basic plot, pointless romance, lack of story and character development and of course the fact that they aren't following their own rules! Saying vampires need to take care because of the sun but then again when they just lose a scarf or anything nothing happens. Sure it does have it's flaws, and there are a lot of those (though I think there is a story actually). It's nothing but the usual vampire stuff with only the fact that there's a female vampire now.
But then again, it's entertaining, and the whole series doesn't take longer than six hours to watch. It's perfect for a weekend if weird effects and even weirder fighting scenes make you laugh - and it's not as bad as many people make it seem. Especially those two spying on Sakurako, Aoi and Komachi for the count. THESE GUYS made me completely crack up.
I honestly found the Komachi and Hayato to be good characters, so maybe I'll rewatch some scenes just because of them.

Vampire Flower

뱀파이어의 꽃 (Vampire Flower) is a South Korean mini drama series that is/was available on Naver TVCast. It consists of 6 episodes with a duration of about 10 minutes per episode.

Story: Louis stumbles upon Kang Seo-young, a girl with the "golden scent". He needs her help to finds the 'Vampire Flower', a flower that has been stolen by humans around 150 years ago. He falls for Seo-young but deletes all her memories at some point to protect her from Ashel.

Cast: Most of the characters that appear regularly are played by members of idol group A-JAX. We have Seo Jae-hyung as Louis, Kim Hyeong-kon as Reika/ Rehka, Lee Seung-yub as Baekhan and Moon Hyo-jun as Akan. Now I wouldn't really criticize their acting but rather the story and the non-existent character development - how could characters develop anyways in such a short series. Kim Ga-eun accepted the role of Kang Seo-young. I've never heard about her but well, her acting seems to be fine. It's difficult to judge though.

Soundtrack: The OST is probably one of the things I really loved about this drama as a huge fan of A-JAX. The group recorded two songs, "뱀파이어의 꽃 (Vampire Flower)" and "Fate In (달빛주문)". Maybe I'm even happier about this because of DSP not promoting them properly but that made me really happy.


This mini series could've been better. If they would've made it a little longer. Or at least explained some things. 6.5/10 though because.. we all know for what reason I've watched this. The cast is lovely, and that's it. The story is somewhat close to the oh-so-lovely-vampires we've seen too often. It's not as bad as expected though and as long as DSP keeps on ignoring A-JAX, I see myself watching this over and over again.

And yes, Jae-hyung, I do. Many people do.

Vampire Prosecutor (Season 2)

Please note that this entry may involve fangirling, ranting and cursing about a TV channel. Don't mind me, it's just me freaking out because of frustration.

뱀파이어 검사 2
(Vampire Prosecutor) is a South Korean drama series that aired on OCN from September 9th to November 18th 2012.

Story: Prosecutor Min Tae-yeon is a vampire using his special abilities to solve crimes and catch the criminals. However, he stumbles upon another vampire in is series that becomes more commonly known as "L" who seems to enjoy playing games. Trying to safe his team consisting of Detective Hwang Soon-bum, Prosecutor Yoo Jung-in and Choi Dong-man, he solves some cases with them but has to deal with the final enemy on his own..

Cast: We see Yeon Jung-hoon again as Prosecutor Min Tae-yeon. His acting is just awesome, I seriously fell for his character but then again the end left me seriously frustrated (I won't say anything else about this). As Yoo Jung-in we see Lee Young-ah and I definitely prefer her in this season. It's just like her character isn't nagging as much as I remember from the first season so that might be the reason. Lee Won-jung appears as Hwang Soon-bum again and after this season I somehow find his character more and more interesting. Sure he doesn't seem to be an incredibly smart detective but then again, with his good instincts, he's an important member of the team. Choi Dong-man was played by Kim Joo-young again and I seriously came to like his character for lightening up the dark atmosphere in this series.
Lee Kyung-young is new in this series as Jo Jung-hyun. And this man.. I don't know what I should think about him. Weird but effective and him not being a part of the team anymore will be a huge loss? Not the most charming or lovable character but his love for Kim Ji-young as Lee Ji-ae is really touching. I think you'd need to watch the series to understand what's behind this but it's adorable how much he's caring for her.
Kwon Hyun-sang appears as "L". So, except for me wondering why there are so many characters named "L" in Asia (is this some nickname based on stereotypical features?), his madness is damn well acted. I loved to hate him. But he seriously had too much time making plans and observing his enemies.
Others in the main cast include Jung Hwan as Park Hoon, Park Jae-hoon as Ra Jae-wook, Yoshitaka Yuriko as Luna (and seeing a Japanese fortune-teller made this series a lot better in my opinion, I loved her character) and Kim Bo-young as Chief Prosecutor Joo Hyun-ah.

Soundtrack: The ending theme is "Danger" by MC Sniper. Now I'm not a huge fan of rap but I came to like the rock and crossover influence in this song. It's not used that much in the drama though and only appears at the end. As for the instrumentals, they worked well - supported the atmosphere. Watching the drama without sound would make most of the scenes less atmospheric.


My personal rating is a 9.5/10. There was one episode (I think it was Ep. 8, Rude Min Tae-yeon) that seriously got on my nerves. Yes, the last five minutes are important. The rest of the episode seems to be a complete joke. I'm not saying that a few scenes that make you smile or laugh are bad but this episode just didn't fit the overall atmosphere at all.
We get some more information on the characters though, and that is actually really well-played by OCN. Since I've heard that they're still talking about a 3rd season (as of January 2015 it might be aired in Summer/Fall 2016) they need to keep people interested. Same with the ending which seriously leaves me frustrated. If they would liked an open ending or a cliff hanger, I think about 2 minutes earlier (right after the explosion - I hope I'm not saying too much about this) would have been better in my honest opinion.

Overall I'd definitely recommend this to people into crime, mystery and some 'hinted-romance' stuff. While it bothers me that the hints become actually really strong in this season (I prefer my crime series without romance at all), others seem to like that a lot.
But if you want to watch a typical vampire-teenage-romance, this is definitely not the right drama for you.
One more thing I have to add: The fights were awesome. Just awesome. Loved it more than anything.

Vampire Prosecutor (Season 1)

뱀파이어 검사  (Vampire Prosecutor) is a Korean drama series that aired from October 2nd to December 18th 2011 on OCN.

I'm not a huge fan of vampires. Like not at all. Personally, I think that since Twilight it's already a good sign if vampires don't sparkle. But then again, thanks to this topic being used over and over again after the hype a certain movie series caused, I just came to think that it's all about popularity and I probably shouldn't watch anything involving vampires anymore except for the good old horror movies.
So how did I end up watching this? Just by reading the first paragraph of this entry, you might be able to notice something. It's an OCN Original series, and that's basically a guarantee for a crime series with 100% quality.
That being said, this entry might include fangirling, ranting and cursing because of a certain love-hate-relationship I've mentioned already like ten times before.

Story: Prosecutor Min Tae-yeon becomes part of a Joint Investigation Unit consisting of detectives and prosecutors. He seems to have worked with Detective Hwang Soon-bum before who's one of the few people who know Tae-yeon's secret: The prosecutor, after being bitten by someone he doesn't know one day, became a vampire and uses his abilities to solve mysterious cases. Soon, he figures out that a serial murder called the 'Vampire case' from years ago was committed by a vampire and while solving some cases with his team, he tries to find the other vampire.

Cast: Yeon Jung-hoon accepted the role of Min Tae-yeon, and to be completely honest, if vampires would be like this - I'm want them to come out, we need them. Speaking all honestly I loved his acting from the first minute to the last. It's as simple as that. Lee Young-ah as Yoo Jung-in is the female member of the team, and she's one of the strong and confident female characters in a drama series that I come to like a lot usually. Lee Won-jung as Hwang Soon-bum is a detective who works well with Min Tae-yeon. After having roughly 25 years of experience, he has seen a lot of things. To be honest, after watching the first season, I still wonder why he knows of Tae-yeon being a vampire and basically no one else does but then again I'll try to be patient and I hope I'll be able to figure that out when watching the second season.
Kim Joo-young joined the cast as Choi Dong-man. Though the use of his character might not be that obvious at first, I found myself thinking that he lightens up the atmosphere with his bright and somewhat funny character.
Jang Hyun-sung can be seen as Chief Prosecutor Jang Chul-oh, and while one cannot understand his intentions at first, I was confused even in the end. But nonetheless, I feel like this role was perfect for him, the whole atmosphere fit well. So either he's just good at playing that kind of characters or he's simply a really really really good actor.
As the bartender Ra Jae-Wook (and yes, I did look this up because I think all we get in the first season is "Mr. La") we seen Park Jae-hoon. Sure he did something bad when he was still a doctor but then again I seriously can't judge him for doing that and as someone who has been helping Tae-yeon all along I really liked this role as well.

Soundtrack: Oh, there was a soundtrack? Okay, okay, joking, I did notice like one song and after looking that up I think it was performed by Lee Jung but that's basically everything. And since it is not used that often, it doesn't get boring. I'd love to listen to the instrumentals played during the action scenes though since especially crime series tend to have a quite interesting and exciting soundtrack.

Conclusion? 9.5/10. The first episodes seemed a little bit chaotic to me but good nonetheless.
But then again I'm a huge fan of crime series and to be completely honest I think the 'vampire'-element wouldn't have been necessary. They could've just used a human who's good at observing as well so I think THAT actually was to get attention for the series. And that's not bad at all, sure they need people to watch a production.

*I never thought that a Korean with bright blue eyes could be that attractive since I usually prefer dark eyes but then again it's perfect.

**One of my favorite scenes, I had to laugh so hard and that smirk is seriously worth to capture.

***Excuse the quality of those screenshots, and yes, it's pretty much not my style but I've been watching a few episodes online due to some technical issues. BUT why am I sharing those screencaps? To be completely honest it's just because.. I went to that place. And my friend and I took a photo using that mirror as well. Forgive me, I was pretty much done seeing those pictures in a drama series now.