Anatomy of a K-Drama

Chapter 6 told the history. This chapter takes a K-drama apart: who makes it, how long it runs, how often it airs, how it is shot, which channel carries it and how its audience is counted. Three dramas, Extraordinary Attorney Woo, The Uncanny Counter and Start-Up, serve as examples throughout, because they are the kind many viewers meet first, through streaming.

The Team: One Writer, One Director

The Korean-drama article says that "a single director usually leads a drama, which is often written by a single screenwriter." Extraordinary Attorney Woo fits: its article credits director Yoo In-shik and writer Moon Ji-won. I did not read the crew credits of the other two examples.

The Run: Sixteen Episodes, Two Nights a Week

• Miniseries. The article says the 12 to 24 episode miniseries became common in the 1990s (Chapter 6). A source for Indian streaming adds that a "16 to 20 episodes format" is easier for binge-watching.
• Two nights a week. The article says dramas "usually air on two days every week", which fits all three examples. It also says weekday daily dramas run "every night from Monday through Friday". The article does not reconcile the two statements: the second refers to the evening slots for daily dramas.
• Daily dramas. The 19:00 to 21:00 slots have usually held daily dramas in the style of telenovelas, "rarely running over 150 episodes".

Shot While It Airs

The article describes the live-shoot model: "The first four episodes... are usually shot in advance, but the rest are shot continuously as the series is being aired." It says the model "remains widely used", that productions use "three camera crews", and that some dramas in 2016 were fully pre-produced. The article gives no reason for the system, and does not say how it affects the writing, so I do not guess. I did not find which of my three examples used it.

Channels: Terrestrial and Cable

The article names KBS, MBC and SBS as terrestrial networks (EBS appears in a related list), and tvN as a cable channel. Cable channels "normally have a relatively smaller audience", it says. The three examples show how cable and streaming change that picture:

• ENA. Extraordinary Attorney Woo began with a nationwide rating of 0.948 percent for episode 1, reached 4.032 percent for episode 3, which the article says set the record for the highest rating in ENA's history, and ended at 17.534 percent (19.210 percent in Seoul). The "ENA record" claim is repeated in the article but cited to a single source.
• OCN and tvN. The Uncanny Counter began on OCN, where the article calls it the "highest-rated OCN series so far", and its second season moved to tvN. The first season's finale is given as 10.999 percent in a table, "11%" in the text and 11.9 percent in a cited headline; the article does not reconcile them.
• Cable's high-water marks. The article's cable list is headed by The World of the Married (JTBC) at 28.371 percent, yet puts Crash Landing on You (tvN) at number 5 with 29.683 percent, which is higher. It is a contradiction in the article, so I treat both figures as unverified.

Genres and Where Stories Come From

The article lists "action, historical, school, medical, legal, and horror comedy" among the genres. The examples show the range:

• Legal. Extraordinary Attorney Woo follows a rookie attorney at a large Seoul law firm. The article describes the lead, played by Park Eun-bin, as "the first attorney with ASD in Korea", and says her colleagues at first see her communication as "odd and awkward".
• Fantasy and action. The Uncanny Counter is set in the fictional city of Jungjin, where four demon hunters called the Counters fight evil spirits that escaped the afterlife. The article lists its genres as fantasy, mystery, thriller and action. It is "based on the Kakao Webtoon Amazing Rumor by Jang Yi", so it is also an example of a webcomic turned into a drama. Season 2 is set three years later.
• Romance in a business world. Start-Up is set in a fictional Silicon Valley called Sandbox and follows people in startup companies. The lead is credited as Bae Suzy.

A note on the title: you may know the second show as Uncanny Counters. The English article is titled The Uncanny Counter (singular), and "Counters" is the name the article gives to the demon-hunting group. I use the article's title and mention the other so that you can recognise it.

Streaming

The articles give a hedge about streaming for all three. Extraordinary Attorney Woo is on Netflix "in selected regions", and The Uncanny Counter is "available for streaming" on Netflix, "in selected regions". The Start-Up article says "available for streaming on Netflix", but the line rests on a 2020 announcement and may be out of date. Where a drama is available therefore depends on your country and the date, which is why I give no list of services. On Netflix, the article says Extraordinary Attorney Woo was "the most viewed non-English show globally" in two weeks of July 2022, with 348.15 million viewing hours after the finale. Chapter 9 returns to streaming.

Continuing a Story

Whether a drama gets a second season depends on its channel and its ratings. The Uncanny Counter had a second season of 12 episodes in 2023. For Extraordinary Attorney Woo, the article says a renewal was confirmed on 17 August 2022 and a season "expected to premiere in 2024", and it does not say whether that season aired; it also lists remakes planned or released elsewhere. I treat season 2 as unconfirmed.

Exercises

Next chapter: The Auteurs, which returns to film and looks at Bong Joon-ho, Park Chan-wook, Lee Chang-dong, Hong Sang-soo and Kim Ki-duk.