Cook TV, retro, cable dominate small screens in 2015
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Star chef Baek Jong-won in a scene from MBC’s “My Little Television” / Korea Times
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Kim Tae-ho
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Shin Won-ho
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Na Young-seok
By Kwon Ji-youn
Cook TV, music shows and drama series broadcast on Friday and Saturday evenings dominated the small screen this year, with star chefs, big name producers and oldies putting idol groups and reality shows to shame.
If 2014 saw celebrity juniors take center stage, 2015 placed the spotlight on celebrity cooks. Music shows found breakthroughs with innovative formats, while KBS’s “The Producers” and tvN’s “Reply 1988” kept viewers at home on Friday and Saturday evenings.
Internet shows were a mixed blessing for broadcasters, and cable came out the winner in a battle of sorts with the three major channels and the retro boom has yet to lose steam. Here are keywords that defined entertainment in 2015.
Cook TV
Cheftainers ― a neologism combining chef and entertainer ― including Baek Jong-won, Choi Hyun-seok and Sam Kim cooked up a storm in entertainment this year, teaching viewers how to prepare simple meals at home with readily available ingredients and keeping them enthralled with a sense of humor alongside skills in the kitchen.
“Three Meals a Day,” “Please Take Care of My Refrigerator” and “House Cook Master Baek” were among the many cookery shows that came up trumps.
Actors Cha Seung-won and Yoo Hae-jin also proved to be as adept in the kitchen, whipping up feast after feast with whatever ingredients they could get their hands on during their stay on remote Manjae Island in “Three Meals a Day: Fishing Village,” and tvN’s “Let’s Eat 2” brought romance and cooking together in a drama series based on the brass tacks of single life and the food that accompanies it.
Fri-Sat dramas, retro
This year, drama series that aired on Friday and Saturday evenings, which are not conventional prime time slots, prevailed.
KBS’s “The Producers” flaunted a stellar cast of Kim Soo-hyun and IU, an original plot and impressive cameos. With solid scripting and great acting, it went from great boast to great roast in just 12 episodes.
Cable channel tvN’s “Reply 1988” is now the talk of the town, with props, setting and narrative that take audiences back to 1988, reliving the joys and sorrows of the average working-class family, the purity of neighborhood friendships and first loves.
The success of “Reply 1988” proves the retro boom is here to stay, at least for the time being. The year opened with an “Infinite Challenge” episode subtitled “Saturday, Saturday is for Singers,” featuring performances by groups and soloists who dominated the music scene in the 1990s, and S.E.S., H.O.T. and Sechs Kies, idols of the 1990s, are rumored to be considering comebacks soon. Turbo released a long-awaited seventh album earlier this month, and original soundtracks for “Reply 1988” are topping the charts.
Other popular drama series this year included MBC’s “Kill Me, Heal Me,” starring Ji Sung and Hwang Jung-eum; SBS’s “Yong-pal,” starring Kim Tae-hee and Joo Won; MBC’s “She Was Pretty,” starring Hwang and Park Seo-jun; and tvN’s “Oh My Ghostess,” starring Park Bo-young and Cho Jung-seok.
Star producers
Producers Na Young-seok, Shin Won-ho and Kim Tae-ho are hotter than their shows’ cast. Kim, who spearheads the production of MBC’s “Infinite Challenge,” has carved a substantial fan base for himself, and Shin has proven he is irreplaceable with the “Reply” series. The most recent episode of “Reply 1988” on Saturday garnered an all-time high viewership of 16 percent.
Na’s web series “New Journey to the West,” featuring members from the first season of KBS’s travel show “Two Days and One Night,” was also an overwhelming success, despite it being a project for tvN’s digital content brand “tvN go,” meaning the show’s clips were streamed online through a web portal. Expectations are equally high for the latest series “Youth Over Flowers,” starring Cho Jung-seok and his friends, set to begin airing on Jan. 1.
Music shows
When entertainers weren't cooking, they were singing.
Music shows on novel platforms were well received this year, with “Mask King” steering the spotlight away from what the contestants look like, or what they are wearing, and instead placing it on how well they sing.
JTBC’s “Hidden Singer” made a successful comeback with a fourth season, the lineup of which included BoA, Gummy, Lee Eun-mi and Kim Yeon-woo.
Interactive online shows
Entertainment has witnessed a paradigm shift with MBC’s “My Little Television.”
The show invited professionals in all walks of life to share with viewers their knowledge and expertise. It brought out the star power in chef Baek, designer Hwang Jae-keun and origami master Kim Young-man, among others, and had them interact with the audience in real time through a chat room.
There were side-effects ― some of the commentary was ill-intended and the producers found it difficult to weed such out. But it brought the Internet, celebrities and audiences together in a unique, content-rich format, a combination that can’t go wrong.