Pasta is a 20 episode Korean TV Drama that aired in 2010.
SPOILERS AHEAD!
Story: Yoo Kyung is a lowly kitchen assistant working at an upscale Italian restaurant. She works hard and dreams of becoming a top chef one day, but her life is soon turned upside down when an abrasive new head chef takes over the restaurant she works at and promptly makes everyone's lives miserable. The new chef (Hyun Wook) is a skilled yet demanding boss, and he's also a smug misogynistic prick who belittles everyone he comes across. Inexplicably, Yoo Kyung and Hyun Wook start to develop feelings for each other and soon begin a cautious relationship.
From there, it's standard K-Drama fare that employs the mismatched budding romantic leads plot, along with two alternative love interests with their own back stories, and a host of side characters along the way. Just follow along with everyone's personal & professional lives to see where it all goes. It's the same pattern as always, only this show takes place in a kitchen/restaurant environment (instead of a hotel, hospital, etc.).
PROS
- It's Predictability: There is something to be said for how comfortably familiar these shows often are. It's like wearing your favorite old jeans or sweatshirt, or, perhaps a better analogy would be eating your favorite comfort food; If you're a regular viewer of these types of shows, you know exactly how this particular show is going to "feel & taste" right from the get go.
- Lead Actress: Gong Hyo Jin plays Yoo Kyung; she's become one of the go to actresses for these types of shows in recent years, and she's really good in general at playing the "girl just trying to get by in life who stumbles into a romance". However, this is not one of my favorite roles for her.
- The Food: DO NOT watch this show on an empty stomach!...There aren't many shows that consistently presents food on screen so exquisitely as this one does; we're talking hard core food porn here as this show often focuses on the kitchen chefs creating and producing one fantastic looking dish after another. It's mostly Italian cuisine, with some Korean flair mixed in, along with lobster, filet mignon, fine dining meals, entrees, various presentations, and so forth. And, of course, lots and lots of pasta. Everything looks absolutely delicious!
- Soundtrack: Nobody does TV show soundtracks & musical scores like KTV does, and I think this is one of the most regularly undervalued aspects of all of these shows. As usual, there are a half dozen recurring melodies or so that are utilized to suit the varying moods as needed throughout this show, plus (if I remember correctly) a couple of a KPop stars on hand to sing a duet or two as per norm. This is not my favorite OST by any means, but I don't know how many times I've watched these shows and thought "that's a catchy & appropriate tune", "that's a nice song", etc.
- Pacing: This show does keep everything moving along. There is some repetitiveness to it, but very little of the endless pauses and longing stares of people reminiscing about stuff that just happened. I have very little tolerance for that nonsense in my K-Dramas.
- Ending: It's (SPOILERS) no surprise that everybody lives "happily ever after" in some fashion or another by the time it all wraps up.
CONS
- It's Predictability: Yes, this is listed as one of the "Pros", but this cuts both ways. If you're hoping for anything out of the ordinary or unexpected to happen here, you can forget it. There is little doubt what will eventually happen to all the players involved by the middle of episode 2. It wouldn't hurt for a few more of these shows to try to be a little more diverse every now and then.
- Endless Over Acting: The main characters don't have to endure this too much, but almost all of the auxiliary characters are forced to over act to the point of buffoonery at times. Sometimes this is cute & effective, but it's simply annoying and obnoxious way more often than not.
- Lead Actor's character: This is by far the biggest problem with this show! The lead male chef character is played by Lee Sun Gyun. He represents the stern teacher figure type that supposed to grow and soften over time as the main love interest, but his evolution is so poorly executed that he rarely ever becomes even an acceptable person (much less a love interest character to root for). What woman in their right mind would want to be with this guy?...He's arrogant, stubborn, childish, condescending, verbally abusive, and offers little in the way of being a desirable mate. And, the stupid smirk he's always wearing on his face doesn't help matters any. By extension, the mere fact that Yoo Kyung actually likes this guy reflects very poorly on her character.
Summary: It has its moments, and is by no means terrible, but the Cons often outweigh the Pros IMO. And, it's severely hampered by its choice to write the male lead character as they did; this guy is just way too much of a jerk for the viewer to identify with why the female lead character would ever like him in the first place. If this were real life, these 2 people would clearly be headed for a depressing relationship, or divorce, or worse, if they decided to be together long term. It would be one thing if this show were aiming for that type of future dismal outlook, but it's not; this is all somehow supposed to be romantic, and you're supposed to be persuaded that the male lead is just perfect for our female lead, and that everything will work out great between them in the end. I, however, think this show fails miserably at trying to accomplish that.
Bottom Line: 6 out of 10 stars!
