New Gisaeng Story premieres, Flames hits a high
by javabeans
New Gisaeng Story is the new kid on the weekend block, taking up the SBS broadcast slot recently vacated by the much-watched Secret Garden. The drama premiered yesterday with its first two episodes, and pulled in a pretty respectable 10.4% and 12.2%.
At least, those are what I’d consider respectable numbers; the media’s already jumping to call it a marked failure to carry over Secret Garden‘s 30%+ ratings, which seems like a silly thing to claim since even the popular dramas tend to build ratings over their runs. Secret Garden‘s 17.2% premiere was strong, but a long ways off from its 35.2% finale. A double-digit premiere in this day and age? Safe, I’d say.
New Gisaeng Story is set in the present day and centers around a traditional gisaeng house (the only one of its kind, which caters to an upper-crust clientele) and the women who work there. An interesting concept, given the mix of old-fashioned and new, high-class and low, classy and tawdry. I haven’t seen it yet so I don’t know if its execution lived up to its potential, but based on the premise alone, I’m interested in seeing where it goes.
Meanwhile, MBC’s makjang extravaganza Flames of Desire benefited from the removal of its main competitor and hit its series high with a 20.5%, up from its previous high of 17.7%. It’s been performing solidly all along, but I suspect it could have been much higher without Secret Garden dominating the weekends. With nearly two months left to go in its 50-episode run, I anticipate that Flames will be performing a lot more strongly now.
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