Moonlight Syndrome

“From now on, I will treat you like the most precious lady in the world.” – Lee Yeong

 “A proper farewell is as sincere as love. Who knows, if the memory of being loved could give you strength to go on with your life?” – Ra On

 “My heart doesn’t flutter as it does. My body doesn’t go where my heart doesn’t lead”-Kim Yoon Sung

 “I wish that in my last moment, I could just be your friend. “- Byeong Yeon

 

These quotes from the phenomenal Korean drama “Love in the Moonlight” or “Moonlight Drawn by Clouds” melt my heart and until now these kept on lingering my head.

I’ve heard about some Korean dramas from my friends and read good comments about them on social media, but my interest was as bland as a tasteless vegetable salad until I saw the trailer on the local channel about this drama. In an instant, it seemed like an arrow of cupid hit my cold-blooded heart and made me loved the drama even more. The charisma of the male character and his chemistry with the female character warmed my heart and made me watched the drama again and again. I was fortunate enough on the next day when a colleague gave me the full episodes of the drama. It took me two days to finish it, and the sleepless nights were all worthy because it taught me wisdom about life, politics, culture,  leadership, love, friendship, and family.

Although it has been five months already since KBS’s ‘Love in the Moonlight’ wrapped up its run in South Korea, the success of the drama goes on as it dominates local viewership in the Philippines on its time slot.

The drama headlined by Park Bo Gum, Kim Yoo Jung, Kwak Dong Yeon,  and B1A4‘s Jinyoung premiered in the archipelago under local network ABS-CBN last March 6. Receiving much buzz and attention from local viewers, it recorded an 11 percent in viewership rating on its pilot episode.

Aside from dominating the rating game, the drama is also consistently trending in the Philippine trends of social networking site Twitter. The pilot episode of the drama trended on the number one spot on the local trends, as well as its lead actor Park Bo Gum. It continues to dominate local trending topics during its nightly broadcast.

Philippine TV personality and comedian Vice Ganda has also dove into the Moonlight Syndrome. The comedian posted series of tweets on Twitter, gushing about the drama and its actors.

“Moonlight Drawn by Clouds” is an engrossing period TV production starter for me as a new Kdrama addict recruit. The mixture of youthful romantic vibe and the seriousness of historical plot will offer a kind of genre which is not boring as it seems. Like most of the girls these days in Asia, I willingly plunge to “bogum virus”, regardless if it will break me or not. Watching each scene and understanding each line delivered by the characters relieve me from stress and made me understand about one’s struggle, pain, sacrifices, faith, and imperfections. The full drama package was commendable due to its poignant sketching of the main characters and the writer’s impeccable timing to pin me on my spot and not sway away from following the story in those moments when I almost did.

Among all the characters, I was lured by this “bogum magic” and can’t stop myself to search the net and download photos and videos, behind-the-scenes of his drama and films, tv commercials, OST, and read news about this multi-awarded Korean actor Park Bogum. I even followed him on Twitter! From charisma of the crown prince to the sorrowful of a man who loves a woman, he delicately portrayed various emotions with his acting through his eyes and left a lasting impression on me.

Park Bogum is indeed an actor adored by fans of all ages! I’m sure everyone misses the drama just like me. But do you know that he has a lot of new nicknames now due to his recent drama? ‘Prince of endings’, ‘god of endings’, scene-maker’, shot-taker, just to name a few because of his strong ending scenes in the drama. Would you believe that there were 2,000-3,000 comments every single episode? Every time you end it, you really need to talk to somebody. That’s the power of Park Bogum.

The drama reached to highest ratings. It reached to 22.2% where he said to Kim Yoo Jung, “Nae Saram” which means “She’s Mine!” It went 23% when he said, “I’ll treat you like the most precious woman of the world”. Then the highest rating was 23.9% when they kissed. Another high rating was 23% when Kim Yoo Jung wears woman handbook and Park Bogum sees her for the first time and he calls her “Ra On”.

All those strong moments including the beautiful crying, mischievous smiles of Park Bogum, the versatility of Yoo Jung, and the exceptional performances of the supporting cast, this heartwarming love tale will tap on those youthful romantic memories when our love views were not yet corrupted and just free flowing. Not cheesy and heart-fluttering, nonetheless, Prince Yeong and his first love will take you to an amazing ride of fun, smiles, tears, fear with their binding commitment in not giving up on love.

What attracted me to this drama was the genuine and unconditional love of the man to a woman. Their love is so quite touching because it showed no boundaries. It’s the love between the Crown Prince and a daughter of a traitor. It’s kind of like a Joseon dynasty’s version of Romeo and Juliet love story.Indeed netizens responded very well to a love that transcends social classes. # responses of Netizens to park Bogum because of this drama was, “I can’t sleep because of Park Bogum!”

This drama did wonders for Park Bogum. This has been exported to other countries like Japan, South East Asian, and even America.

In this drama, Park Bogum and Kim Yoo Jung won 2016 KBS Drama Awards’ Top Excellence in Acting Award, Best Couple, and Best Kiss. Recently, Bogum and Yoo Jung also won Star Century Most Popularity Award during the 53^rd Baeksang Arts Awards on May 3, 2017.

Ayeeee!Can’t help but watch it over and over again and I look forward to another project of this gorgeous couple.

#bogum, #bogumEffect, #bogummagic#loveInTheMoonlight#parkBogum#boyouCouple