Jang Geum's Dream Commentary: Season 1, Episode 3

6/30/16

Season 1, Episode 3: The Taste of Nature

Watch the episode here! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_8l_dsEowZw

               Howdy readers, I'm back again!  It's now the third episode, and the quality of the animation and color is getting distinctively better. More detail is showing up on people, and it' really improving; you can now clearly tell that Janggeum's eyes are brown, unlike the first episode where they sometimes looked gray. 

                When Janggeum and Yeonsaeng go explore, I bet it was an opportunity to display Korean architecture back in the day. And display they did! I believe the two stone beasts in front of that part of palace are lion dogs. I did some research, and apparently they're called Haech, and they are supposedly guardians of shrines and homes of the wealthy. So I then figured that the statues were guarding a shrine, which I guess is the thing at the top of the stairs that looks like a giant pot. 

             

Super cool! Next time someone tells you that you don't learn anything from TV or browsing the Internet, just show them "Jang Geum's Dream!"

Now, I'll be gone for a while this month, so here's a meme(picture with funny caption) that I hope will make up for this month although it probably won't. *sweatdrops*

8 weeks pass...

                    And I'm back again! Sorry to keep you all waiting, thanks for your patience! School will start really soon. So I'll continue to work on it as often as I can, unless I have last minute homework. :P

          So Janggeum and Yeonsaeng are exploring when they run into a woman that we learn is named Doctor Haeya(pronounced 'HEY-ya"). She seems like a tough woman, but I suppose she's just doing her job. She doesn't say much, but I had a feeling that she would have a bigger but menacing in the series when the camera zoomed in on her face like that. However, I wasn't sure whether she would be involved in a plot twist or just a supporting character. Either way, I was a little uneasy.

            Dayum, Korea! Back at it again with the epic hats! I seriously want one of those. The messengers or whoever they were apparently came from the Ming Dynasty that reigned from 1368 to 1644. The Joseon(or Chosun, whatever) Dynasty lasted from 1392 to 1910, if you remember from the first commentary I posted. So this helps narrow down the time period a lot, yay! So now I can assume that the time period in the show is around the late 1300's or 1400's; I'm thinking 1400's. And now the huge awesome new pet is revealed to be a lion dog. I was just as shocked as the ministers, that dog was so big that its footsteps echoed in the room. Good thing I wasn't there, or I'd try to make a beeline for the poor dog and cuddle it until the guards pry me off. I can't help it, really, because I have a HUGE weakness for dogs with short legs like corgis and American bulldogs, but I also love big furry dogs that you can hug like a giant teddy bear(huskies, German shepherds, the like). And that new dog looks just like a gray Newfoundland. And those are the BIGGEST, CUDDLIEST dogs you would ever see. (づ｡♥ヮ♥｡)づ   Remember the second episode where I said I was surprised that the Court teacher wouldn't let poor Yeonsaeng keep the turtle even though it was such a small animal compared to the dog? Well, I guess it wasn't one of the king's animals so it couldn't hang around in the palace. Too bad.

          At the court ladies' meeting, obviously the woman with the purple hair meant trouble. Since her hair is purple, I'll call her Eggplant. She favored the girl Geumyeong, who was the one who cooked the rice inside the squash. The bossy, annoying girl Yeungro also reveals that Geumyeong is the niece of one of the high-ranking court ladies, so this ties her to Eggplant. Because of Geumyeong's hair color, I'll just call her Magenta. Now that I think about it, I guess the purplish hair runs in the family. Yeungro and Eunbee bossing people around with the quiet girl staying back sorta made me think of Mean Girls. I'll show you what I'm talking about. Here was how the scene originally went: 

Cady: I grew up in Africa before I moved to Illinois.

Regina: If you're from Africa, why are you White?

Gretchen: Oh my god, you can't just ask people why they're White.

So then I thought of this:

      I just love how much the drama is teaching us while keeping us entertained. We can use our knowledge from Jang Geum in our daily lives when we need to find the perfect radish in the grocery store! 😂 But suddenly when Haeya appeared again watching from afar, it was confirmed that she was up to something suspicious; all arguments are invalid.

     Now, a lot of you might be thinking that Yeonsaeng was foolish to place the egg in between the blankets, but just let me share my thinking. Yeongsaeng had plenty of common sense, as the egg shouldn't lie on a hard surface. And how could Yeongsaeng know how close the egg was to hatching? If she didn't keep the egg warm, then the egg could have gone bad before the superior court ladies even decided how to cook it. Plus, there obviously wasn't such thing as a refrigerator in those days. 

     When Blue and Suro Jang(I now call him Big Red) were talking, it was sort of evident that they knew each other for a while. Hold your horses, as we'll learn more about them in season 2! 

      

       I understand that Korean names can be difficult for some people new to Kdrama, so I'll come up with nicknames for most of the major characters. In my next post I'll make a list of nicknames for the characters in season 1, and I'll make another for reference for season 2.

     Once again, thanks for reading! I encourage you to share this blog with people you know, as my goal is to shed more light and love on Jang Geum's Dream.