[Drama Review] 'Entourage' - Episode 11

AKP STAFF

Amber, Lee Kwang Soo, Seo Kang Jun, Lee Dong Hwi

Despite the turn-offs that last week's two episodes proved to be, unexpectedly and abruptly, I mustered up my hopes and gave episode 11 of 'Entourage' a chance. In this episode, we see Cha Young Bin (Seo Kang Jun) and Kim Eun Gap (Jo Jin Woong) caught up in a sort of meek, action-less trench warfare, both dug in deep on their respective sides after having fought and "parted ways".�

The drama overall has taken on a rather more sitcom-like structure, even the main storyline that used to have a more serious, drama-like tone. We get a lot of this as Eun Gap tries to cope with having "broken up" with his long-time actor that he's managed, Young Bin. Combined with the�already 100% sitcom-y portions of the drama consisting of the Cha Jun (Lee Kwang Soo) and Turtle (Lee Dong Hwi) combo, we may as well go ahead and call this, tvN sitcom 'Entourage'?

Every time she comes out her face is literally like, "What chu say bish?!"

The sitcom that 'Entourage' has become still manages to go by the original theme that it attempted to portray in it's beginning stages, because unlike last week's episodes, which were just balls of frustrations packed in to about 70 minutes each, episode 11 has several "relief" moments that allow us to smile. Cha Jun's long and arduous journey to finding his niche in the entertainment industry, finally, is starting to see some light. It was a lot more of a stretch this episode for the story to deal with Cha Jun's�prostatitis and put it in a comical situation, since last week's comedy element was a lot more generic and classic, but I found myself chuckling all the same. I can go along with the notion that this kind of more sensational comedy works with the public these days. The moment he found out the 2nd episode of his variety show blew up big and people were talking about him on SNS? It literally might have been the most triumphant "Yes!" moment for me in this whole series! It felt good, even though it was a sad-funny thing at the same time. Lee Kwang Soo's acting made it work.�

Epitome of sob-laughing.

The next "relief" moment comes when Eun Gap finally reaches out to Young Bin after their pointless warfare kind of arrives at a standstill, and he has such a nice dinner prepared for him, it really was heartwarming. (Most of you know by now that for Korean people, eating seaweed soup on your birthday means a lot, right?) Not to mention, Eun Gap has a bomb-worthy present for Young Bin for his birthday. The script for 'Im Hwa Soo', the movie Young Bin wanted to do so badly before the whole 'Imjin�War�Terminator' deal! I was personally peeved at the fact that Young Bin was getting things to go his way again, because I'm really not fond of Young Bin's 'I'm-good-looking-so-I-get-everything-my-way' character these days, but the drama did pull a trick on me in a good way with this turn of events. Because I don't know about you all, but I'd been hoping/expecting for Young Bin to suck it up and go back to doing the 'Imjin War Terminator' again, plus something along the lines of becoming friend with Sohee again, etc. But the drama is still at least headstrong enough to not go by the viewer's rather obvious expectations, and bring unexpected events into play.�

This drama is supposed to be outside of cliches and yet, "I'm rich and you better stay away from my daughter" appears...

Now we're standing at the odd crossroad where the drama and the viewer has to kind of work out whether or not we give a darn about the characters still to stay invested in the story, versus whether or not this drama will successfully continue with it's non-generic, unique format as K-dramas go. For this to turn out well, there has to be a little give and take from both sides, as in the drama needs to work harder to stay on its path and give viewers more to work with, while viewers (like me) need to give the characters more chances and more room to grow. There's a handful of episodes left, so in the very least, there's hope.�