Beginning Recommendations for K-Drama Newbies
These series showcase what is so good about K-Drama, with stories and characters that are easy to like and cheer for, good production, skilled acting, relatable humour, high stakes, great soundtracks, profound insights, and wonderful, sincerely-portrayed relationships. You could watch them in any order, but this order gives a good balance between lighter, heavier, modern, historical, and fantasy.
-
1. Touch Your Heart
Korean Drama - 2019, 16 episodes
Funny, heartwarming, sweet, and satsifying. Great office 'family'.
-
2. Ghost Doctor
Korean Drama - 2022, 16 episodes
Characters you don't know you're going to like, but end up liking a lot. Frustrating baddies, a mystery that grows before being solved, lots of laughs, and heartwarming kindness between people who used to be strangers.
-
3. Sh**ting Star
Korean Drama - 2022, 16 episodes
Funny and sweet - not everything's perfect, like most series, but the good stuff is highly enjoyable.
-
4. Queen In Hyun's Man
Korean Drama - 2012, 16 episodes
A captivating love story with time travel/time slip elements, a wonderful hero, and lots of challenges for the characters to go through. Production, supporting characters and acting, and some story elements, have flaws; but the love story at the centre is beautiful and makes this absolutely worth watching.
-
5. Delivery Man
Korean Drama - 2023, 12 episodes
A cute, funny, sincere story with some of the best K-Drama hallmark elements.
-
6. Bossam-Stealing Destiny
Korean Drama - 2021, 20 episodes
Profound, moving story with very likeable main characters, and some very unlikeable villains and others. Excellent acting from the main actor and actress. This is more of a heavy-ish story, a bit longer than most, with lots of political machination and injustice being faced and fought against. It's so rewarding, though, and I would recommend it because it's a really good example of a historical Korean series, better than others I've watched.
-
7. Tale of the Nine-Tailed
Korean Drama - 2020, 16 episodes
-
8. Sleep Memo
Korean Drama - 2023, 20 episodes
Even if you only watch this to gze at Park Hyung Shik as the awesome Prince Yi Hwan, it's worth it. Some furstrations, but overall a good story, very well produced.
-
9. Just Between Lovers
Korean Drama - 2017, 16 episodes
-
10. Is It Fate?
Korean Drama - 2024, 8 episodes
-
11. The Woman Who Plays
Korean Drama - 2024, 16 episodes
-
12. Splash Splash LOVE
Korean Special - 2015, 2 episodes
-
13. Lovely Runner
Korean Drama - 2024, 16 episodes
Watch as long as you're aware that nothing else will come close to this - don't be expecting that other shows will meet this standard.