malaya

userdramas event 04: love → snapshots of eugene choi & go ae-shin (mr. sunshine, 2018)

The arrival of the rising sun🏮

Cinematography of Mr. Sunshine

Video to highlight the outstanding cinematography of Mr. Sunshine. I've yet to see another drama that comes close to Mr. Sunshine's visual beauty.

Ae-sin's dream🍁

Kdrama: 미스터 션샤인 Mr. Sunshine

Here's part 3! I decided to keep making these since you all seemed to like the first two. Fair warning, I'm starting to get confused on which episode is which, so I apologize for any innaccuracies.

In no particular order here are my favourite shots from S1.E14 - S1.E18 of Mr. Sunshine 🌞

Its your girl, E. And I'm back for part 2!

(part 1 here x)

Lee Byun-hun and Kim Tae-ri as Choi Eugen and Go Ae-sin in 'Mr. Sunshine'

Recently, I’ve found myself loving media wherein romance is only considered a subplot but is also what keeps the watchers hooked for the next episode and the one that comes after that. ‘Mr. Sunshine’ would be one of those shows.

‘Mr. Sunshine’ is what I would consider the most well-produced Korean Drama I have watched so far. Based on both facts and fiction, the show tells a moving story of a romance that blooms between a noblewoman and an American Military officer as they plot to prevent a dark scheme on the country's colonization at night. 

Choi Eugene and Go Ae-sin, episode 6 of ‘Mr. Sunshine’

L-O-V-E

There is complete intimacy between Kim Tae-ri and Lee Byung-hun’s characters despite the lack of skinship found throughout the show. Being a noblewoman and an American, Lady Ae-sin and Eugene keep their progressive friendship a secret from the public eye, not only as lovers but as members of a militia called The Righteous Army.

Can I ask you a question since you’re American? What is "love"?

Go Ae-sin, episode 3 of 'Mr. Sunshine'

The transition between Ae-sin’s innocence to her full knowledge of what the English word “love” means and feels was like watching the process of an artist starting out with a clear image in their head, making a mistake, and then having a completely different story sold twice more than the original worth. Ae-sin asked a single question and received several answers.

Let’s do it. Love. With me. Let’s do it together.

Choi Eugene, episode 6 of 'Mr. Sunshine'

One boat ride between the noblewoman and “her wherryman” and the contrast between the world’s then-current tragedies and killings made you understand the experience of how quiet the world could be. The moment that peace was taken away, you suddenly find the desire to have stayed there forever, rowing on and on and never continued watching.

Yoo Yeon-seok as Gu Dong-mae in 'Mr. Sunshine'

HISTORY AND TV

Apart from being what I consider the most well-produced K-Drama, ‘Mr. Sunshine’ is also the most diverse I have encountered so far. Despite so many characters and stories to follow, screenwriter Kim Eun-sook was able to build it all together at a compact pace without letting you feel it was too heavy or difficult to keep up with.

If it’s my fate to survive everything only to die in your hands, then I should.

Gu Dong-mae, episode 7 of ‘Mr. Sunshine’

‘Mr. Sunshine’ was able to have you appreciate its second leads rather than feel completely angry or sorry, as most dramas intend to do. The application of history added to each character’s depth and complexity makes you ponder on life’s ways.

Do you know what the first thing I did after coming to Joseon was? I let everyone know that I was a runaway son of a butcher. Unlike my father, I was able to cut anyone down.

Gu Dong-mae

It was difficult to convince myself that I hated Gu Dong-mae because I didn’t. And it was not only because of his love and help towards the Lady Ae-sin, but for the way his character was structured and written.

The obvious display of different social classes and power led me to think of all the real lives and years lived by people and ancestors, and how so little society has come to change. Similar to ‘Pachinko’, both historical dramas depicted the realities of Korea’s turning point in history and lets you compare it to the present world.

Choi Eugene, episode 24 of 'Mr. Sunshine'

GLORY AND SAD ENDING

This show made me think of several could-have-beens yet somehow never made me choose an alternate ending over what was already provided, despite Eugen and Ae-sin’s absolute deservedness of a peaceful life full of loving each other.

Will our final destination be somewhere between glory and a sad ending?

Go Ae-sin, episode 9 of ‘Mr. Sunshine’

If I had to choose between those two words to describe this ending, I’d rather see it as a glorious one. An ending where two people's love for each other was able to help thousands of the Nation. An ending where Go Ae-sin was able to live and succeed as what she had always wanted to be — a flame that burnt brightly and wilted.

And one day, we can be walking on a street we’re familiar with and go all the way to New York, where you used to live.

Go Ae-sin, episode 16 of ‘Mr. Sunshine’

I like to think that among the several worlds in the universe, Eugene and Ae-sin walk hand in hand in one of them, far from the cries of their dying nation.

(Click HERE for Writing Commissions)

Which makes sense cause of the aesthetics KEKW but almost always one of them is so willing to go against their nature for the other it's so sweet.

Superhero!Phil: I would break the law for you

Villain!Kristin: poggers

Or the other way

Villain!Kristin: I will burn everything down for you

Superhero!Phil: aw mate 🥰

But now I'm thinking about what happens when you flip it around and Kristin is the hero and Phil the villain, I like to think they have the same dynamic as when Kristin has tech issues on stream

Villain!Phil, very clearly evil: oh so if you angle your gun a bit higher while hiding behind this, you should have enough of an angle to hit [his coworker] in their Blindspot

Take this crumb art i did a while back :DD

They’re broken tokens of gods. Functionally Immortal, their rules are strange and their forms are varied. A lost race. A lonely race. The multiplayer servers like parkour and bedwars are memories of when they ruled, before the gods fell, before the rules came. Competitions, festivals, challenges, all held in celebration of their skill. When mortality was nothing but a sport. They were endless, infinite.

Each  is flung into their own world, or worlds. Their spirit not the same as their person. Some united, sometimes entirely mortal just for the challenge, all to their choosing. Even then their spirit can still visit like a ghost, spectating. The myths and epics go they can create a home in a devolved planet if they’d like, one personalized, a common form is one completely bare and flat simply to make it easier for them to build one up themselves.

They have unnatural sway over animals. Completely ignored, never hunted by bears or foxes, only attacked in defense. Even stranger when they tame them and gain complete undying loyalty, able to hold them in place forever with a single touch. Able to grant them the agelessness they carry.

Their ability to create, magnificent and impossible. Their ability to create destruction even more so.

They are not hurt in ways that matters. Their bones don’t break, their skin doesn’t bruise, they can be harmed but not in a way that impedes them. The only way you can tell you’ve hurt them is to kill them and even that’s rarely permanent. A simple flash of red and they stand where they last slept, untouched and in perfect health. They say even those who’ve stayed dead for a millennium can return if it so pleases them.

They can break and store items, punching down trees with their bare hands. Their ‘inventory’ different than a mere pocket or satchel. They are walking pocket dimensions. When they die anything they hold in a ‘slot’ spills out. Food they harvest doesn’t spoil. Torches they craft remain forever illuminating but never burning. With a blessing of bone they raise nature to their whim. Even in their endlessness they remain impatient, always looking to speed up a process.

Their mastery over red stone is nothing but sorcery to the rest of the world. How their minds and abilities are so functioned and in tune they can practically bend reality without shedding their mortal form and cheating their vulnerability. They can shape the world while needing to survive in it. The red stone is simply a magnifying glass, mass destruction or mass beauty, perhaps simply (or rather complexly) a tick in their clock to whittle down their ever impatient call.

The villages hear whispers, of course. Legends. Some are able to meet them, it can be terrifying. They can end up slaves. Tools. Abused and shapen by these powerful strangers. Sometimes it’s pleasant. They defend them from harm and trade easy, quickly racking up a request without sleep for weeks. Traders gone off to wander in search of other villages have a quiet fear more than mobs or robbers. Like local folktales. Spin the wheel, perhaps they’ll be helpful, more likely they’ll kill you.

One that they’d rather not think about is a legend that players have the ability to end the world whenever they wish.

They’re broken tokens of gods. Functionally Immortal, their rules are strange and their forms are varied. A lost race. A lonely race. The multiplayer servers like parkour and bedwars are memories of when they ruled, before the gods fell, before the rules came. Competitions, festivals, challenges, all held in celebration of their skill. When mortality was nothing but a sport. They were endless, infinite.

Each  is flung into their own world, or worlds. Their spirit not the same as their person. Some united, sometimes entirely mortal just for the challenge, all to their choosing. Even then their spirit can still visit like a ghost, spectating. The myths and epics go they can create a home in a devolved planet if they’d like, one personalized, a common form is one completely bare and flat simply to make it easier for them to build one up themselves.

They have unnatural sway over animals. Completely ignored, never hunted by bears or foxes, only attacked in defense. Even stranger when they tame them and gain complete undying loyalty, able to hold them in place forever with a single touch. Able to grant them the agelessness they carry.

Their ability to create, magnificent and impossible. Their ability to create destruction even more so.

They are not hurt in ways that matters. Their bones don’t break, their skin doesn’t bruise, they can be harmed but not in a way that impedes them. The only way you can tell you’ve hurt them is to kill them and even that’s rarely permanent. A simple flash of red and they stand where they last slept, untouched and in perfect health. They say even those who’ve stayed dead for a millennium can return if it so pleases them.

They can break and store items, punching down trees with their bare hands. Their ‘inventory’ different than a mere pocket or satchel. They are walking pocket dimensions. When they die anything they hold in a ‘slot’ spills out. Food they harvest doesn’t spoil. Torches they craft remain forever illuminating but never burning. With a blessing of bone they raise nature to their whim. Even in their endlessness they remain impatient, always looking to speed up a process.

Their mastery over red stone is nothing but sorcery to the rest of the world. How their minds and abilities are so functioned and in tune they can practically bend reality without shedding their mortal form and cheating their vulnerability. They can shape the world while needing to survive in it. The red stone is simply a magnifying glass, mass destruction or mass beauty, perhaps simply (or rather complexly) a tick in their clock to whittle down their ever impatient call.

The villages hear whispers, of course. Legends. Some are able to meet them, it can be terrifying. They can end up slaves. Tools. Abused and shapen by these powerful strangers. Sometimes it’s pleasant. They defend them from harm and trade easy, quickly racking up a request without sleep for weeks. Traders gone off to wander in search of other villages have a quiet fear more than mobs or robbers. Like local folktales. Spin the wheel, perhaps they’ll be helpful, more likely they’ll kill you.

One that they’d rather not think about is a legend that players have the ability to end the world whenever they wish.