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Pierce Conran

Lead cast: Im Yoon-ah, Lee Jun-ho
Latest Nielsen rating: 7.54 per cent
A young woman starts working at a prestigious Seoul hotel under its new head manager, the handsome and sharply dressed heir of the corporation that owns the hotel.
He does not smile much because of past trauma and has to deal with a family member who does not want him involved with the hotel.
This is the basic synopsis of not one, but two dramas that debuted on Korean cable networks on June 17, both of which are being carried globally by Netflix.
One of them is the fantasy romcom See You in My 19th Life, which, to be fair, has a bit more going on.


The other is King the Land, a new vehicle for Girls’ Generation idol Im Yoon-ah and Lee Jun-ho of the boy band 2PM, which has precious little to offer beyond that basic set-up, save for grating romcom clichés and painfully repetitive scenarios.
The glass-panelled King Hotel shines like a beacon on the slopes of Namsan mountain in Seoul. Anyone familiar with the city will recognise that it stands exactly where the Grand Hyatt does.
Inside the hotel on a sunny day in 2015, interviews for a short-term internship are being conducted by Gu Hwa-ran (Kim Sun-young), daughter of King Group’s Gun Il-hun (Son Byung-ho) and head executive of the King Hotel.
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One of the applicants is the fresh-faced Chun Sa-rang (Im), who enters the room with poise despite having just broken off a heel.
Hwa-ran is surprised that this not-college-educated hopeful slipped through the cracks, but takes notice of those rock-hard calves.
Believing she flubbed the interview, Sa-rang commiserates with her friends and roommates, flight attendant Oh Pyeong-hwa (Go Won-hee) and duty-free-shop sales agent Gang Da-eul (Kim Ga-eun), with beers and clubbing that evening.

The next morning, she is woken up by a call – she got the gig. As she celebrates with her hungover friends, a plane flies over their house. A man in a suit jumps out and coolly paraglides to the roof of a building, across which he struts while adjusting his suit.
This is Gu Won (Lee), son of Il-hun and the younger half-brother of Hwa-ran. It is his first day interning at the King Group. He is doing so secretly, but his attitude and flashy threads are making him stick out.
When a superior lashes out at fellow new intern No Sang-sik (An Se-ha), Won puts him in his place. He is fired for his principled display but takes Sang-sik with him, promising him a full-time position.

Won has just returned from London and his dad wants him to start working in the company. Hwa-ran, who wants to take over someday, pushes him to return to London.
Before leaving, he spends one night at the King Hotel, where he is mistaken for a pervert by newbie Sa-rang, who is wiping down sweaty gym equipment on her first day.
Won returns to London and Sa-rang, after impressing Hwa-ran, is immediately promoted to the lobby.

The years tick by and Sa-rang, with her dazzling smile, gets a permanent position, while Won eventually returns to become the head manager at the hotel. He has not forgotten Sa-rang’s outburst, and they start off on the wrong foot.
Whether Won wants to take over his father’s business is not clear, but there is something he wants from the King Hotel which involves someone who worked there in the past. Whoever this person is, both Won and Sa-rang’s pasts seem connected to the hotel – pasts that surely feature their mothers.
Handsome heirs of Korean chaebol (family-controlled companies) are the bread and butter of K-dramaland, but King the Land takes the cake with a protagonist who mopes around London and lives in a gigantic Gothic mansion with its very own British butler.
He has all the trimmings of Batman – except that he does not actually do anything.

Won is eye candy with a sad past, a past that has made him traumatised by … smiling. Since smiling is Sa-rang’s job, it is the main obstacle keeping them from getting on with the business of falling in love.
Although anything could happen with the next 14 episodes, it is hard to imagine this flaccid and shallow fantasy improving as it goes forward.
King the Land is streaming on Netflix.


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Im Yoon-ah in a still from “King the Land”.

Im Yoon-ah as hotel employee Chun Sa-rang in a still from “King the Land”, a tacky, dated and unimaginative K-drama romcom co-starring Lee Jun-ho of the boy band 2PM that is streaming on Netflix.

(From left) Kim Ga-eun as duty-free-shop sales agent Gang Da-eul, Im as Chun Sa-rang and Go Won-hee as flight attendant Oh Pyeong-hwa in a still from “King the Land”.

An Se-ha (left) as intern No Sang-sik and Lee Jun-ho as Gu Won in a still from “King the Land”.

Lee Jun-ho as Gu Won in a still from “King the Land”.

Im Yoon-ah as King Hotel employee Chun Sa-rang in a still from “King the Land”.

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Ahn Bo-hyun (left) as Mun Seo-ha and Shin Hye-sun, as Ban Ji-eum, in a still from “See You in My 19th Life”.

Ahn Bo-hyun as Mun Seo-ha in a still from “See You in My 19th Life”.

Shin Hye-sun as Ban Ji-eum in a still from “See You in My 19th Life”.

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Kim Sun-a as lawyer Do Jae-yi in a still from “Queen of Masks”. The K-drama has threaded its way to a very satisfying conclusion in its final episodes.

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Girls’ Generation idol Im Yoon-ah and Lee Jun-ho of the boy band 2PM star in King the Land, a painfully shallow fantasy about the goings-on in a hotel
Im stars as a perpetually smiling hotel employee, Lee as the new head manager, whose father owns the hotel – and who is traumatised by … smiling. Really


Girls’ Generation’s Im Yoon-ah and Lee Jun-ho of 2PM fame are the leads in Netflix K-drama King the Land. Sadly, that is all the show has going for it – this is tacky, dated and unimaginative fare.
