Top ten korean series you must watch

Korean series are becoming popular worldwide these days and I am one of the crazy fans who enjoy watching korean series in my free time. Here is a list of top ten korean series I would recommend to anyone trying to check out korean series for the first time.

I have watched a lot of Korean series in the last 2 years and here is a list of 10 korean series I especially enjoyed watching. All of them are available on Netflix and Dramacool. I am listing them below in no order of preference -

• Hospital playlist (2 seasons)
• Reply 1988
• Something in the rain
• My mister
• Uncontrollably fond
• Crash landing on you
• Guardian: The lonely and great God
• Its okay to not be okay
• Descendants of the sun
• The Heirs

 

Hospital playlist (2 seasons)

 

Synopsis: This series follows five middle aged doctors who have been best friends since they entered medical school together

Lee Ik-jun (Jo Jung-suk) is a single father and an assistant professor of general surgery specializing in liver transplants. His character is shown to have cheerful charisma that allows him to connect with many people. He is a very popular figure among both patients and other doctors.

Ahn Jeong-won (Yoo Yeon-seok) is unapologetically good at anything he puts his mind to. An assistant professor of pediatric surgery, he is generous and caring. He is a devout Catholic. Due to the pain caused by seeing his patients suffer, he secretly plans to become a priest.

Kim Jun-wan (Jung Kyung-ho) is an associate professor of cardiothoracic surgery. He appears cold, rigid and professional, however hides a soft, kind temperament that rarely shows.

Yang Seok-hyeong (Kim Dae-myung) is an assistant professor of obstetrics and gynecology, who appears to be an aloof and introverted doctor. Though he comes off as detached, he is always willing to go the extra mile for the patients under his care. He is divorced and cares deeply for his mother.

Chae Song-hwa (Jeon Mi-do) is the only female in this group of friends. She is an associate professor of neurosurgery and is considered perfect by her colleagues. She treats her patients kindly, has performed hundreds of successful surgeries and comes with a great personality.

The story revolves around these 5 friends as they embark on the hospital adventures involving medicine, music, and relationships.

 

Reply 1988

 

Synopsis: Beginning in the year 1988, it revolves around five friends and their families living in the same neighborhood of Ssangmun-dong, Dobong District, Northern Seoul. It is the third installment of tvN's Reply series and received both critical and audience acclaim with its finale episode recording an 18.8% nationwide audience share, making it the fourth highest rated drama in Korean cable television history.

Lee Hye-ri as Sung Duk-seon/Sung Soo-yeon: She is the middle child of her family, infamously ranked 999th in school and is the only girl in their group of five neighborhood friends. Though not academically gifted, Duk-seon has a bright personality. She cares deeply for her friends but feels lost without a dream to pursue. Duk-seon moves through the stages of her youth alongside her male friends, and the mystery of which of them she eventually marries was the continual point of tension for viewers throughout the series.

Ryu Jun-yeol as Kim Jung-hwan is stoic and sarcastic. He is handsome and athletic, often taking on extra pressure of responsibility to fulfill the dreams of his older brother Jung-bong, who has a chronic heart condition. While Jung-hwan doesn't often share his emotions with others, he feels things deeply and uses his sarcasm and attitude as a shield. He develops feelings for a neighborhood friend early, but is reluctant to admit his crush.

Go Kyung-pyo as Sung Sun-woo is a class president, caring brother and dependable son to his widowed mother. Sun-woo is an ideal young man. He is devoted to his friends and dotes on his younger sister. Sun-woo harbors a secret crush on a neighborhood friend that lingers into adulthood.

Park Bo-gum as Choi Taek is an internationally renowned Baduk player. Taek is the quietest of his neighborhood friends. He dominates on the Baduk board as well as struggles with simple everyday tasks. He is generous to a fault and hesitant to make a fuss. When he realizes that the person he likes has another admirer, he has to weigh romance against friendship.

Lee Dong-hwi as Ryu Dong-ryong is the neighborhood clown who loves to sing, dance and play jokes on his friends. Not a natural academic, however his thoughtful insight and surprising wisdom serve him and his friends well. As the son of two working parents surrounded by tight-knit families, he feels neglected by his parents and makes up for their absence by acting out. Due to his nosy nature he ends up knowing many of the neighborhood's secrets before anyone else.

 

Something in the rain

 

Synopsis: The series explores the relationship of two people as they go from being acquaintances to a couple. The series give an intimate look into how they fall in love, struggle with their age differences (considered as taboo in some circles), and find the courage to go public with their relationship to everyone around them.

The series has other storylines running parallelly that includes the struggles female employees face in the companies as they try to climb the corporate ladder amidst severe sexual harassment, mistreatment, discrimination, and career sabotage from their male managers as well as about children who grow up without parents and society’s outlook towards them.

Son Ye-jin as Yoon Jin-ah is shown as a single middle-aged woman who works as a store supervisor for a coffee franchise. Despite being an easygoing person, she lives a rather hollow life. After being dumped by her boyfriend, she suddenly develops romantic feelings towards her best friend's younger brother Joon-hee.

Jung Hae-in as Seo Joon-hee is the younger brother of Kyung-seon's , Jin-ah best friend. He is a character animation designer at a computer video game company. He has returned to Korea after being in US for 3 years for work. While getting reacquainted with his older sister's best friend Jin-ah, he protects her a couple times and falls in love with her.

 

My Mister

 

Synopsis: My Mister tells the story of an impoverished and debt-laden young woman struggling to stay afloat as she nurses her deaf and sick grandmother by working temporary jobs. She develops a platonic relationship with one of her pitiful supervisors, which is subjected to scrutiny and manipulation by their colleagues, friends, and dysfunctional families. Enduring the weight of their respective lives, they come together, forming new relationships, keeping parts of themselves secret — but ultimately healing one another's past scars.

Lee Sun-kyun as Park Dong-hoon is the second oldest of the three brothers. He works as a honest structural engineer and has a safety-first approach to life. Though he is quiet and stoic, he also goes all in for the people he loves.

Lee Ji-eun (IU) as Lee Ji-an is a woman who is enduring a lot of hardships in life. She is tasked by her boss to discover Park Dong-hoon's weaknesses to be used against him and fire him from the company. However, she soon ends up falling for his warm charms and learns to trust someone for the first time.

 

Uncontrollably fond

 

Synopsis: Shin Joon-young and Noh Eul were classmates who were separated during their teenage years due to an ill-fated relationship but meet each other later in their adulthood. Shin Joon-young has grown up to be a a top actor-singer while Noh Eul works as a documentary producer.

Noh Eul (played by Suzy Bae) had a tough childhood. Her father dies in a hit-and-run. Noh Eul quits school to make a living for herself and her brother.

Shin Joon-young (played by Kim Wo-bin), on the other hand, had his life planned out for him. His mother wanted him to become a prosecutor following the footsteps of his estranged father, but an incident causes him to quit law school and he becomes a top singer-actor in the country.

Noh Eul and Shin Joon-young reunite when Noh Eul is tasked to film Shin Joon-young's documentary after telling the producer that she can persuade Joon-young to give consent to shoot the documentary. Joon-young initially gives Noh Eul a miserable time before finally agreeing to do the documentary and eventually tries to win her heart back.

 

Crash Landing on you

 

Synopsis: Yoon Se-ri is a successful businesswoman. She is her father's choice to take over leadership of the family business - the Queen's Group. Rejected by her stepmother and viewed as a threat by her half brothers, she steps away from the family business and successfully establishes her own fashion and beauty company, Se-ri's Choice, which makes her independently wealthy.

Se-ri's father is recently released from jail on probation and can no longer run the Queen's Group. He wants Se-ri to take over as brothers are no match to her talent and business acumen.

As the Queen's Group prepares to make the official announcement, Se-ri goes out paragliding to test her latest line of extreme sportswear. She gets caught in a sudden tornado, which blows her over the Korean Demilitarized Zone and into North Korea, where she has a fateful encounter with Captain Ri Jeong-hyeok.

Son Ye-jin as Yoon Se-ri is a successful South Korean CEO and chaebol heiress to Queen's Group. She has a troubled family history.  She is an illegitimate child whose biological mother died after she was born, and has a strained relationship with her stepmother. She meets Ri Jeong-hyeok after accidentally crash-landing in North Korea due to a paragliding accident. He shelters her in the North Korean military housing, and they fall for each other.

Hyun Bin as Ri Jeong-hyeok is a proficient Captain of Company Five in the Korean People's Army who is stationed along the North Korean portion of the DMZ. A piano prodigy, he was studying to become a concert pianist in Switzerland before being forced to join the North Korean military after his older brother dies in a mysterious car accident. He belongs to a powerful political family and hides and protects Se-ri after she accidentally crash-lands into his patrol territory. As he tries to help Se-ri find her way back into South Korea, he begins to fall in love with her.

 

Guardian: The lonely and great God

 

Synopsis: Kim Shin is a decorated military general from the Goryeo Dynasty. He is framed as a traitor and killed by the young king. Years after his death, he is cursed by the Almighty to stay immortal forever, enduring the pain of seeing his loved ones die as a punishment for the soldiers he killed to protect his country. He becomes an immortal goblin. He helps people with his powers despite his grieving past. The only way to put an end to his immortality is the Goblin's bride, whose aid in pulling out the sword will end his painful immortality.

Gong Yoo as Goblin is a 939-year-old immortal goblin and protector of souls who is in search for his bride, who is the only one who can remove the sword piercing through his chest. Once the sword is removed, he may finally move to the afterlife and rest in peace. This is until he slowly falls in love with his bride who gives him a reason to live again.

Han Seo-jin [ko] as young Ji Eun-tak is an optimistic and bubbly 19-year-old high school student and the legendary Goblin's bride. She can see ghosts and summon the Goblin due to her way of birth. Orphaned at age 9 and pursued by the Grim Reaper, she is forced to live with her abusive aunt who was seeking her mother's insurance policy. She immediately becomes interested in the Goblin, who takes her in his home. She is oblivious to her duty of removing the sword from the Goblin's chest, however, eventually learns the truth and struggles with the decision as she falls in love with the Goblin.

Lee Dong-wook as Grim Reaper is a good-looking, cynical yet humorous grim reaper (Angel of Death).  He guides souls to their reincarnations or afterlives and is the housemate of the Goblin. He prefers to be by himself, however, falls in love with a chicken restaurant owner named Sunny who eventually reciprocates his feelings and becomes a key to remember his past lives.

As the lives of Kim Shin, Grim Reaper, Ji Eun-tak and Sunny interweave, a deeper story unfolds, as they are not just strangers who met by chance, but people with deep-rooted relations.

 

Its Okay to not be Okay

 

Synopsis: Moon Gang-tae lives with his older brother Moon Sang-tae who has autism. They frequently move from town to town ever since Sang-tae witnessed the murder of their mother. Gang-Tae works as a caretaker in a psychiatric ward at every place they move to. While working in a hospital, he meets a famous children's book writer, Ko Moon-young, who is rumored to have antisocial personality disorder.

Moon-young after finding out that their past overlap from their childhood spent in Seongjin City, forms a romantic obsession for Gang-tae. She follows him to Seongjin where the brothers currently live. The trio slowly begins to heal each other’s wounds, unravelling many secrets, seeking comfort in each other and moving forward in their lives.

Kim Soo-hyun as Moon Gang-tae is an orphaned caregiver working at OK Psychiatric Hospital. He is empathetic to everyone around him but struggles with self-esteem as a result of his past experiences. He avoids having close relationships with anyone other than his older brother.

Seo Yea-ji as Ko Moon-young is a popular children's book author with antisocial personality disorder. She had a troubled childhood and her relationship with her parents is very. After a coincidental encounter with Gang-tae, she develops a romantic obsession over him and goes to extreme lengths to get his attention.

Oh Jung-se as Moon Sang-tae is autistic. He is a fan of Moon-young as well as an aspiring illustrator. He is the only witness of his mother's murder. He has an irrational fear of butterflies as they remind him of the traumatic experience. His fear develops into nightmares every spring forcing Gang-tae to move towns with him to run away from the butterflies.

 

Descendants of the Sun

 

Synopsis: Yoo Si-jin is the captain in a South Korean Special Forces unit. He and his friend Sergeant Seo Dae-young are off-duty when they witness a young man stealing a motorcycle and apprehend him. The thief is injured during the chase and sent to the hospital. Dae-young realises his cell phone was stolen by the thief and goes to the hospital with Si-jin to retrieve it where Si-jin meets Dr Kang Mo-yeon for the first time and is instantly attracted to her.

Si-jin and Mo-Yeon begin to date. During their courtship, due to their philosophical differences owing to their profession, they agree to part ways. Dae-young, on the other hand, faces a dilemma on whether to continue his relationship with Myung-Ju or risk being forced out of the army for breaking fraternization rules set by Myung-Ju’s father who is a three-star general and commander of the Special Forces.

Mo-Yeon and Si-jin continue bumping into each other at different places in their lives with on and off relationship.

Song Joong-ki as Captain Yoo Si-jin is the Captain and leader of Alpha Team, a fictional elite special forces team. He falls in love with Mo-yeon at first sight but gets rejected by her three times.

Song Hye-kyo as Doctor Kang Mo-yeon is a cardiothoracic surgeon who works at Haesung Hospital. She is a beautiful and strong woman who believes that competence should outweigh connections. She stands firmly by her principles. She becomes attracted to Si-jin rejects him three times as she finds herself struggling to accept his occupation as a soldier in the special forces and what it entails.

Jin Goo as Sergeant Seo Dae-young is the most senior non-commissioned officer in Alpha Team and Si-jin's right-hand man and best friend. He sticks to his principles and is extremely loyal to his commanding officer, Si-jin and comrades. He struggles with expressing his true feelings for Myung-ju due to the objection of her father who wants Si-jin as his son-in-law.

Kim Ji-won as First Lieutenant Yoon Myung-ju is an army doctor. She is the daughter of Lieutenant General Yoon, commander of the South Korean Special Forces Brigade. During an assignment, where she is the medical officer on duty during a training exercise, she meets Dae-young and is instantly attracted to him. Their relationship is well-known among other doctors and fellow soldiers but is considered a taboo due to difference in their ranks.

 

The Heirs

 

Synopsis: The series follows a group of wealthy, privileged high school students who will take over their families' business empires, overcoming difficulties and growing every step of the way.

Kim Tan is a wealthy heir to a large Korean conglomerate called Jeguk Group. He was exiled to the U.S. by his stepbrother Kim Won who wants to take control of the family business. While in the States, he meets Cha Eun-sang, who is there looking for her sister. Despite being engaged to Yoo Rachel, a fellow heiress, he immediately falls for Eun-sang. When he returns to Korea, his former best friend turned enemy Choi Young-do begins picking on Eun-sang, who is in the same school, to irritate Tan. Drama ensues when Young-do also falls for Eun-sang, and Kim Tan is forced to choose between his responsibility of pursuing the family business or love.

Lee Min-ho as Kim Tan is the future heir to the Jeguk. He is an illegitimate child as he is the son of his father's mistress. He is however listed in the family registry as the son of the second wife in order to be a legitimate heir. Though hot-headed and at times immature, Kim Tan is warm-hearted and honest. He is engaged to Rachel Yoo, but is attracted to Cha Eun-sang at first sight and falls in love with her despite her poor background.

Park Shin-hye as Cha Eun-sang works diligently in her part-time jobs to support herself and her mother after her elder sister leaves for the U.S. She lives in Kim Tan's home since her mother is a live-in housekeeper of the family. She is enrolled in Jeguk High School on a welfare scholarship.

Kim Woo-bin as Choi Young-do is the heir to Zeus Hotel Group. He is known for his volatile manners and is feared by his classmates, whom he bullies. He and Kim Tan used to be best friends but turn enemies due to a misunderstanding. Young-do begins picking on Cha Eun-sang to irritate Tan but soon realizes that's not the only reason she's always on his mind.