Gloria

This series - although I have not completed it in it's entirety has thus far been quite entertaining. At 50 episodes in length, I am currently halfway through, but I have this much to say about the current half.

It takes some time to warm up to some characters - in particular the JinJin and Lee Hanseok. However - there are enough side stories going on concurrently that keeps you entertained while these individuals grow close to your heart.

At times however, there are some moments which are so aggravating that you really wish someone would just punch him. e.g. Lee Jiseok. I must say - as these episodes progress - someone does punch him, and it's my favorite part of the drama thus far.

A little bit of advice before starting the drama
- the song JinJin sings does change - so don't feel disheartened that it is a little repetitive at the beginning.
- Jiseok will rattle your nerves, and you'll wish someone will punch him. Someone does - so just be patient.
- Yeonseo is gorgeous. As a guy - it was pretty easy to just keep watching. I don't know if girls will feel the same way about Dong-ah, but he has some cool hair.

Good luck!

I've completely fallen in love with this show. It is a bit soap-opera esq, but that's ok. I've kind of come to expect that from a lot of these shows. I love JinJin! she's got so much spunk and strength. Hanseok and Dong-ah are hot (totally a girl perspective) and I think it's well done. I will say that Jiseok drives me nuts pretty much the entire show. He's such a four letter word that I can't use here and every time someone hits him, I cheer. I really hope he gets his in the end and I'm really looking forward to the end.

Aren't all dramas soap operas? Anyway, I started watching Gloria on this site first, and as I didn't know, the show was still on the air in Korea, so I had to wait till the fans uploaded the next episode online lol. I then did some googling, and found out that the show would air on TV every weekend, Saturday and Sunday. There's some other sites that really got into this show, and they would record the next episode and upload it right away after its done airing in Korea. Talk about keeping up with each episode. I like the effort of the fans who fansub each episode in English. Good work.

There is something about this show that I like so much, and maybe because I can relate to some of the characters to why I kept watching. I was very worried to how this series was going to end. After all the chaos, I wanted certain characters to die, and at the end, I don't wanna spoil it, but there is death. I just wish they showed it graphicly. The final episode doesn't disappoint in my opinion. They do have enough good stuff written down to please y'all. If it ended more like a movie, that would have worked a little better cinematiclly, but overall I wasn't complaining.

I've been reading what others had said. They aren't reviews, more like comments, complaints about the show recycling its plot over and over again. Well, other k-dramas do it as well, so I don't know what the problem is. The same plot plays out differently. In most Korean TV series, if you've notice, not only they use the same ingredients, but they connect like all the characters together, it's like connecting dots. Also, like they'll have the protagionist be in a situation where the antagonist once were. It's like a bad case of karma or something. Korean story telling on TV is mostly like this.

The show intrigued me and I enjoyed it. If you don't like the risk they took, don't bother. Like making Bae Doo-Na sing, and she's not a singer. Through the show, she does get criticize, so they don't hide it. If she sang bad, they do have characters tell her off. Some of the problems in the show, I felt that needed to be taken care of, is the songs Na Jin Jin sings at the night club. Most of the time she's singing the same songs, but from the way they showed how the night club works, it's like walking into a Chinese restaurant where you hear the same music repeat itself lol, just think of it like that I suppose.

About the cast, they have quite a team here, a lot of talented actors you can say. I was excited seeing faces I know collaborate together. Starting with Bae Doo-Na, since I feel like bragging about the stars now. I first saw her in the Perfect Neighbor, and I had no idea she was in the movie Ring Virus (Korean version of The Ring). Seo Ji-Suk, I saw him in The Bow, and Hearts of 19. Han Jin-Hee, who plays Lee Chun-Hee's dad, is in Hearts of 19 as well, and he played So E-Hyun's dad in Assorted Gems aka The Jewel Family. As you see them in Gloria, So E-Hyun and Han Jin-Hee, just remember it's not Ruby and her dad this time lol. Kim Yeong-Ok, who plays the old granny, is from Coffee Prince, and Assorted Gems. Lee Chun-Hee, I remember him from the film Too Beautiful To Lie, so seeing him in Gloria, on a TV show was something new. Lee Jong-Won, I first saw this guy in Sad Love Story, and since that show is one of my favorites, I remember him. Na Young-Hee and Lee Yeong-Ha who is also from Sad Love Story are in Gloria too. They were kind of a dysfunctional couple in Sad Love Story, and their son is played by Kwon Sang-Woo. In Gloria, they aren't a couple, but friends, but they could have been a couple, and this is one of the ideas that got to me. Na Young-Hee is the mistress of Yeon Kyu-Jin, and their son is played by Seo Ji-Suk. You get what I'm trying to point at? It's kind of neat. So if Na Young-Hee got with Lee Yeong-Ha, we get Kwon Sang Woo. If she got with Yeon Kyu-Jin, we get Seo Ji-Suk lol. Oh Hyeon-Kyeong, is from High Kick 2, she plays Na Jin-Joo in Gloria. She's very attractive and pretty, but she was over acting a bit. If any of you are fans of hers, you probably know about her scandal that messed up her life for a while. Lee Seong-Min and Choi Jae-Hwan are both from Pasta, so seeing them in Gloria was cool. For the 2 dancers in the show, Jo Hyang-Gi and Ha Hyeon-Ju, they are both cutie pies lol. I would love to date Jo Hyang-Gi, or Ha Hyeon-Ju hehe, because they're just hot. Seong Byeong-Suk who plays Lee Jong-Won's mother did a terrific job too. For the rest of the cast, they all did a fine job. At times, over doing it I say, but I don't know, maybe they were excited lol.

Going into the music of the show, there is a few I like, and the one I enjoyed the most is Ha Dong-A and Jung Yoon-Seo's song. Each couple have their own love song lol. When you see Jin-Jin and Kang-Suk, you hear their song. As for the musical score, and the rest of the songs, they're all good.

The show does have its Korean touches. Stuff you've seen before, so if you don't mind those same stuff, the drama is a winner. They just had to add in toilet humor, which I felt... I don't know... I think the toilet scenes shown in Assorted Gems was enough. I don't understand Korean humor all the time. Anyway, another element that was a plus, was the fight scenes. I still remember the kick Kang-Suk did. It kicked ass, and I bet even Tony Jaa would be impress.

One last thing I want to go into is, the surprise guest star you can say, who helped boost the show in my opinion. The character Lee Ji-Seok who had an affair with Na Jin-Joo, was to marry another woman, so Jin-Joo is like his mistress. The other woman, who accidentally died, her grandmother or mother lol, of all people we think we wouldn't see appears, and she's out to seek revenge. She turns out to be Kim Yeong-Ok's friend, and she is played by Ban Hyo-Jeong, who you all might know from Brilliant Legacy, and Seeking Love. Some of the stuff written for her, if I didn't know any better, is a throw back to Brilliant Legacy, because of the things she says and do.

I am a white American housewife and have watched about five different drama series including My Wife is a Superwoman, Get Karl, Couple or Trouble, but so far I have loved Gloria the best. All the angst, and drama dealing with social class differences and the setting in the cabaret kept me watching. I am so bored, uninterested and disgusted for the most part with American TV I can't stand it anymore, so I find my self watching less and less American and more foreign fare.

Gloria is refreshing and interestiing as far as storyline. The show gives both male and female viewers the ability to relate to the very well acted characters. I started watching it and when I got to about the 10th episode, a fight sceen caught my husband's attention and he started watching, then got hooked too. We find oursleves laughing, crying and cheering in each episode. We got up to episode 42 then were waiting for the next set to get released and are now going back through the first episodes that my husband missed. I am catching nuances and connections the second time around that I didn't catch during my first viewing, so that has been a great experience as well.

Gloria! Watch it! Love it!

I have to say that after I finished watching this, I tried to think of what other drama's I loved just as much as this and I couldn't think of any and I quite a favorites list going.

I was going to try to be neat and organized in my review because I find it impressive when see other reviewer do that , but that's just not me. But I this review is still helpful to you.

There are fifty episodes in Gloria but when I first started watching it, I didn't know that. I don't really like watching dramas that have so many episodes because they tend to be needlessly repetitive. The music is a little repetitive in the beginning but it's only for a few episodes. It's about a group of people on opposite sides of the tracks who's fates are intertwined. Jinjin aka Gloria, has been taking care of her older disabled sister since she was kid because their parents died in a car accident. She works six part time jobs trying to make ends meat. Through a series of events she ends up as singer for a company called Double# Entertainment. As she and her boss, Kangseok, start falling for each other, she finds out that her sister used to be a singer for the same company and that she had an affair with Kangseok's brother Jiseok. In fact, it was because of Jiseok that her sister ended up the way she did. While this is going on, her best friend Dongah, meets and falls for a woman, Yoonseo, who is the daughter of a very wealthy powerful man, who loves him back but is supposed to marry Kangseok and who is also the love interest of Jiseok. If that's not enough drama and twist for you, you'll be at the end of your seat because there's much more. This drama never gets boring. You may get annoyed with certain characters but all of the actors are great and play their characters well. I'm not a romantic but this drama had so much heart ache in it that I teared up and cried at times. I just finished the final episode and while it did cause me to tear up and feel sympathy for characters I never thought I would, I was really happy with it and very glad that I was fortunate enough to watch this.

I don't think you'll be disappointed.

Its one of those stories that you dont think could be good from the description but you are bored so you start to watch.
Then you REALLY get into it, so much that you stay up all night trying to get in as many episodes as you can.
Man i even suffered through stop and go lag at my moms to watch this. X.x

The bad guy is an awesome bad guy because he makes you feel sorry for him and hate him at the same time.

I think the story made me start to cry a few times and then gasp at the epic parts and was all like WTF! at the omg parts.
It just puts you right in the shoes of each character and leaves you wanting more.

I thought I had seen bad parents before but the parents represented in the drama had to be the worse. What I did like about the drama was that there were not 2 but really 4 main characters paired together for their own love story. This drama is different as the real focus to me is on Korean class structure and family dynamics in general. The love story between Dong Ah and Yoon Seo was so sweet but at times devastating to watch (you'll know what I mean on episode 39, WOW! I cringe!). The other two characters of Jin Jin and Kang Suk evolve differently and even though their feelings are revealed early in the drama, their love turns out to be the worse to maintain. The hated/evil characters are so evil, this is definitely a sign of great acting! The parents, all I can say is watch this and especially anyone who are parents of daughter, I'd like to know whether my assessment on parents is true. Even though this is a 50 episode drama, it keeps you interested. Don't be mistaken that this is a pure musical drama, its not. Even though, at times, the songs are repetitive, its not really about the music but you will not want to miss a moment! 4 days later I completed this drama! Could not stop!!