Kdrama to Miss: My Sassy Girl (2017)

 

My Sassy Girl (2017)

Grade: C

16 Episodes, 1 hr each

Viewing Platform: Netflix

Hye-myung, the princess of Joseon, often sneaks out of the palace to drink and carouse – very unacceptable behavior for royalty. When the returning young scholar Gyeon Woo bumps into the princess (unaware of her station) on one of her drunken escapades and saves her from trouble, she repays his courtesy by barfing on him and then accusing him of attempting to rape her! What happens when Gyeon Woo discovers the real reason behind the princess sneaking around? Will it jeopardize his new prestigious position as the crown prince's instructor?

*Too much politics, not enough romance! The costumes and colors are very bright, and there are a few funny moments, but in all my years of reading and watching TV/movies, I have NEVER come across such an impotent, ineffectual king! The bad guys walk all over him for YEARS, and I never see the king do anything to try and shift the power back into his own hands! Not only that, the first two-thirds of the show are about how the naughty princess keeps sneaking out of the palace, but by the end, she's outside whenever she feels like it and nobody says “boo.” She also becomes exponentially less “sassy” as the drama unfolds, and I'm tired of the feminist endings where the girl doesn't want to get married because she wants to be “fulfilled” before she commits to the guy. Plus, it's clearly freezing during their night shots, with snow on the ground in many scenes, yet we're supposed to believe the princess has access to a palace garden in full summer bloom. (It was clearly a greenhouse; there are even a few scenes where you can catch glimpses of the modern structure.) The villains are disposed of much too quickly as well; it's disproportionate to the grief they caused. I wouldn't watch this again.*