The Empress (2011)

I really liked Jotei, so I decided to watch Yeoje to see if it had a better ending or if it fixed some of the things i hated from Jotei. I will admit that I am a bit unfair in my critique because it took forever to finish this, and I ended up having to watch the last 2 episodes on my very limited knowledge of the Korean language.
I did like the updates to the story, some of the characters are older than they were, and some are younger. Yeoje was also way less pervy than Jotei, but the girls in Yeoje created senseless arguments. It was like the writter said, "these two are supposed to be in a conflict here". FOr the age of the girls the conflicts did not make sense like it did in Jotei where they were younger and immature. The use of technology is something that could not have been used in Jotei becasue it was so old, so it was cool to see gadgets used, in some cases i yelled "ha ha gotcha!"
I did not like the acting. It was awful, the actors were in some cases stiff, over emoting, stone faced, and in some cases looked like they came from acting 101. the main offender is the really hot male lead (who gets points for shirtless fan service), he had exactly 2 expressions and a really cute smile. I loved Matsuda in his role and I wanted Kang ji sub to bring it, but he dropped it somewhere before getting to set. The female lead wasnt really compelling either, although she had more expressions, i really hated her "i am strong" facade when she wasnt strong. Oh and her alligator tear scenes are hilarious.
Although the cast is really great looking, Yeoje didnt do something that Jotei was able to; Jotei made you feel for the characters, and even in the absurd situations they were in you rooted for them. Yeoje toyed with the main concept and in the end you didnt care whether everyone went up in flames or not.
Its not worth the work to find the drama (it was on cable tv), learn Korean to translate it, and then watch a over dramatizied version of Jotei. watch the first 3-4 episodes and then skip to the last one. If you watched the original you didnt miss anything.
p.s. the ending is the same.

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