Jeong Do Jeon Review

Title: Jeong Do Jeon

Genre: Historical, Political, Drama

Episodes: 50

Broadcast period: 2014-Jan to 2014-Jun

Cast: Cho Jae Hyun, Yoo Dong Geun, Park Young Gyu and Lim Ho.

This story is about the man who changed the corrupt Goryeo by making laws to help the low class and poor, and helped establish Joseon, by installing a new king on the throne.

Jeong Do Jeon (Cho Jae Hyun) is a low-class noble working for the government as a scholar in Sungkyunkwan. When the king, who was betrayed by his most loyal servants repeatedly, trials Do Jeon, the two come to an agreement, and decide to work together to fix the crumbling Goryeo. Unfortunately, the king is assassinated, by his guards, and the prime minister, together with his allies, put a young prince on the throne, to manipulate him behind the curtain. In opposition of this, Do Jeon becomes labeled as a traitor, and is forced in exile.

Loosing all hope and desire for the future, he meets the peasants of Goryeo, the ill treatment they suffer, and decides to once again help the government, but soon notices how bad the political situation in Goryeo is, so he decides to do the unthinkable: if the problem is the government, we change the government…

As a history buff this idea made me all excited, since it’s one of “those” stories/highlights of Korean history. Even if this has a lot of storytelling and a lot of moments, I kind of don’t understand the necessity of 50 episodes - which was one of the things that made my brown frown, when I started it. But as I went along with episodes, I noticed the “change” in history, which made me annoyed. Even if it didn’t change the overall history part it kind of made it “sentimental” or “emotional” without it being it. Also, simply historically incorrect. I don’t want to spoil, so I’m just going to say, trying to make a man seem like he is “feeling” bad for the poor people when he doesn’t care for his own family in the same sense is plain weird. Though I must give the production credit for portraying Jeong Do Jeon as he is portrayed in history books, and not some hero, is what made me continue this drama (even though the above mentioned annoyed me A LOT). Plus: Cho Jae Hyun is perfect casting. The rest seem okay, but the acting just seems like how any actor would act in the given roles - I mean like it doesn’t give anything extra. Besides that, this drama can seem boring - there is sooo much political TALK. They keep talking and talking, and unless you can see the history part, you’ll be bored. So they didn’t really think about that while making this drama.

OKAY, summing up: a fine drama with mostly accurate storyline, but has some flaws that just aren’t acceptable as a history buff, and can be quite boring for those who aren’t.

☆☆☆½ / 3½ out of 5 stars

♥♥♥ / 3 out of 5 hearts