Racket Boys

This is a charming coming of age tale against the backdrop of country life and high school sports.

🏸B is a great show for families to watch together, as long as the subtitles aren't an obstacle. Qualities that the show reinforces include: Loyalty, standing up for what's right, defending the weak, hard work, compassion, respect, and teamwork.

It follows badminton teams from schools in rural Korea. There's not alot to do in a town that doesn't have sufficient population to support many forms of entertainment. It's even difficult to get wifi. Sports and friendships are what the kids work on most. We follow them through regular match-ups, individual and team competitions, and various family dynamics, as they gradually become a cohesive unit. The show, additionally, addresses the problem of vicious hazing and other abuses that can arise in a group of uber competitive Type-A personalities.

Positive cross-generational relationships are displayed in RB. The elderly couple that lives down the road loves to host the kids. They share a meal and, more significantly, their wifi. In return, the kids help them with reading and operating their cell phones. It's darling.

YIKES! A Fight❕ We see another side of the coin in a town hall where a village elder and one of the young players tackle eachother over conflicting ideas over how to generate more business in town. The problem, apparently, is that they have matching personalities😉. Neither one of them has good ideas anyway😆. It's a funny scene.

The kids help plan a birthday party for the oldest grandma in town. The whole thing is precious. As grandma is from Busan, can you guess what movie they played? Yep, the Zombie thriller: 🚄 To Busan. All Young-tae saw was that the title contained the word "Busan." Some of the party-goers didn't open their eyes for 2 hours, lol.

It's impossible to review this show without addressing the controversy that has arisen around it. In ep5, an athlete was met with some boos while playing in 🇮🇩Indonesia. There were some that saw this as an insult to their country. In The West we generally don't understand much about Asian culture. It does appear that they are sincere about their complaint as it is a matter of their honor, and we should accept that. However, being offensive was obviously not the intent of Netflix & the show creators.

Instead of giving feedback, a world wide vocal group took to their keyboards and attacked the show and Netflix as if insult was intended. It spread over social media and the ever-outraged went out of their way to give the show a low rating. Most Kdramas have under 3000 viewers on IMDB registering their ratings of a given show. Contrast that with 🏸B, which had a whopping 24k ratings of "1" weeks before all the episodes were out❗ I actually watched 🏸B to find out how bad it was. I'd never seen such a low rating on IMDB.

I wonder if most of the people on the 🚄-to-umbrage actually saw this show before they rapaciously rambled down the tracks? Anyone posting a review having never watched the show is neither genuine nor trustworthy. The show creators are much tougher on their own🇰🇷country than anywhere else. I initially breezed by ep5 and never noticed anything offensive. (To be fair, I'm originally from right outside of Philadelphia, where the fans are notorious for being ill-behaved. I'll grant that my bar must be a little skewed downward by that;)

There's no perfect country. Perhaps everyone should unclutch their pearls, remove the shuttlecock from their eyes, and take a wider-angle view of the issues here👀: What happens in ep5 is trivial compared to what actually goes on in sports.

Fans in 🇬🇧Wembley🏟 have booed during other team's national anthems.

It's shocking to hear that fans in 🇪🇦Spain have done monkey chants and thrown bananas at African players😱.

Sadly, fans in 🇺🇲Philadelphia really did boo 🎅 and throw snowballs at him.

Suspicions were raised against the New England Patriots that they had listening devices planted in the away locker rooms. Peyton Manning would not discuss anything sensitive in the locker room at Gillette🏟. Tony Dungee would not allow his players to have possession of their playbooks as anything left in their Boston hotel rooms was liable to end up with Belichick's staff prior to the game. There's other stories of away locker rooms with poor lighting, bad smells, no heat or the thermostat not working right, no hot water, etc etc. Are the outraged here even sports fans? If so, they would know that some fans can be rabid maniacs. Right or wrong, sports is a venue that fans utilize to vent their frustrations.

I've even seen reviewers sneering at badminton: They write that it is a poor concept for a show. Badminton happens to be quite popular in all of Asia. The competition is intense, with the shuttlecocks, or birdies, typically flying off the racket at speeds up to 250 mph. Speeds have been recorded as high as 267 mph. This makes it the fastest sport in the 🌎 That Shuttlecock would win its share of pro drag races at those speeds.

Most of the actors in this show are KIDS. They all delivered first rate performances. People are heartless to trash the WHOLE show into which these kids clearly put their whole hearts. Their efforts deserve praise. Kang Hoon-kim (Yong-tae) is particularly special. He is a scene stealer; a top-shelf talent. Tang Joon-sang, who plays Hae-kang, is also quite talented. He plays a boy with Aspergers in Move To Heaven, and the sweetest North Korean soldier ever, in Crash Landing On You {Don't miss that one, btw}. The parts are characters that are completely unique from each other, and he's convincing in these roles. Ahn Se-bin plays the coach's youngest daughter, age 5 or so. She steals every scene she's in, and she also teaches the elderly couple how to read. It's cuteness overload.

Finally, the whole show is cuteness overload. It couldn't be more adorable, and these kids could not be more precious. So give it a fair go and cheer these kids on; even if you are a Pats fan :) 😉 ;)

Loved this. A story about playing badminton. Have respect for badminton players because we tried it at school, and I had neither the grace nor temperament for it.

Characters are all well depicted. Cussing involved is not a whole lot compared to the unintelligent use of the fword in grade A or grade B pictures. But comes from mouths of kids. Why I'm not surprised or offended? As one who entered teaching service in 2005, less than 20 cusswords minus the fword is nothing compared to what I heard in my first hour on a compound. Rough baptism indeed.

Depiction of characters is top-class and comedic intent in some scenes undeniable. But plot and subplot raise social issues and delivery of latter provoked deep respect for creators for doing so. So, while not as interesting as main plot, it is top of the class among subplots because it has worth and specific to local audience. Many may disapprove because it doesn't take them far from reality and cussing raises an uncomfortable truth- it jolts you back to earth.

But if you let go of your offense at cussing or annoyance at a few of the characters in the subplot, you find hilarity that is both good for the bones but bad for under garments. So, thanks for keeping art with a social conscience alive. Today's viewing is often about escapism via mindless entertainment and not necessarily an act of curiosity. Too often we demand more from television and other entertainment services than we have the courage to demand from politicians and too much market trends bear witness to the awful truth: in this modern world too many are not as smart as their phones yet pride themselves on being smarter than their ancestors.

If you need to laugh, watch this. If you desire to learn of the fate of other sports or care to learn about, or from, a different culture or people, watch this. If you want to see good talent in an under-rated drama, watch this. If you can stand not to be part of fashion trends on social media, watch this.

If not, be happy with allowing your phone or social media to direct your train of thought. New colonialism is subtle but powerful and makes millions for the few everyday. Deadly, invisible, effective... Racket Boys just contain a little antidote. Why be bitter or complain. Even if powerless, never hide from the truth.

I'm from Indonesia. I'm sad for Ep 5 too. BUT, wont it be way better if we SHOW people that we're not like what Indonesia look like in Ep 5?? I mean, Rusia often potrayed as bad country in numerous films, Arab-related country as terrorist etc. What makes people dont feel that way? Because in real life, ITS NOT TRUE! Show people that indonesian supporter are not like that! SHOW PEOPLE, dont act like you're strong just because you guys can speak freely in social media

This drama is not really badminton-centric that shows intense competition with badminton retaled story in every episode (in football, like tsubatsa hahaga). Its more an entertaining, fun with young artists type of drama. There're lots of young artist playing in this drama, so many crews put effort for this drama, etc. Just because the writer's fault, you guys give such a very low score. I mean its cruel:")

It's a decent-ish drama but there is some scene in there that is kinda disrespectful.

Dear writernim & PDnim, I admire your amazing script with lots of beautiful & heartwarming stories just like in your previous dramas. I love this series but please cut that inappropriate scenes in eps 5 immediately!!! It hurts us as citizen of a country who have great history in badminton.