별을 따다줘 (2010) SBS 20 Episodes
Romantic Comedy, Family
Masterpiece, Grade: A+
Korean Drama Review by Jill, USA
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Several years ago I watched this warm-hearted and delightful Korean romantic drama-comedy mix, Stars Falling From The Sky (2010), which quickly became a favorite of mine in my Top Twenty, after my friend Alison highly recommended it. I bought a DVD set for it for my permanent library, which was very smart of me since the main legal K-drama streaming site airing it dumbly took it down. This is a great family oriented romantic comedy with a delightful cast and deserves its full grade of A+ from me.
The many faces of Pal-gang (actress Jung-won Choi) the lead female character
who undergoes a tremendous amount of personal growth and maturity
The Story: Pal-gang Jin, nicknamed Red (actress Jung-won Choi, who does an absolutely superb job here with a difficult lead role) has worked at a giant insurance firm for five years, but she is foolish, spending more than she makes on her hair and her clothes; she has racked up credit card debt and still lives with her parents (played by Ji In Yoo and Young Bum Lee) at age twenty-five. She has a huge crush on the president of the company, the arrogant and aloof Kang-ha Won (handsome actor Ji Hoon Kim from Flower Boy Next Door) and her life's greatest goal and dream is to gain his attention and affection, and make him propose marriage to her.
FULL RARE OST
However, life throws her a giant curve ball when her parents suddenly pass away at the same time in a collision with a truck while they are driving (they are murdered, which isn't discovered for quite some time). Overnight Pal-gang becomes the guardian for her five younger adopted siblings (all named for various colors), including an infant child. Her parents left no money and even their house is taken back by the bank, leaving Pal-gang destitute and homeless with five mouths to feed. She has to grow up quickly because the adopted siblings do not want to be separated or sent to an orphanage. Not only does she have to worry about practical matters like housing and food and clothing for her siblings, she has to be the primary person responsible for their emotional well-being. In a dramatic scene she enters a bathroom and cuts her hair. "I am no longer a woman. I am a mother," she says to her reflection in the mirror. She effectively throws away her former immature self and decides to finally grow up. But her new-found maturity comes too late for Pal-gang economically; she is fired from her job at the insurance company, which only deepens her crisis. She does have a close friend to lean on emotionally, but she doesn't have much money, the be-speckled Jin Joo Han (Hyun-sook Park).
In a colorful order adopted siblings:
Blue, Orange, Yellow, Green, and the adorable baby IndigoThe performers playing Pal-gang's parents' adopted children in this drama are all outstanding little actors and actresses. They are so adorable. They have so many terrific child actors in Korea. It's something you will notice if you get into their films and dramas with any regularity. The children are Joo Hwang (Orange - Ji Bin Park from Boys Over Flowers and The Suspicious Housekeeper) as the oldest adopted boy, and sort of the ringleader of the others, sometimes in defiance to Noona (oldest sister), is a brave, good sport with a good heart; No Rang (Yellow - Yoo-Ri Kim) is the oldest adopted girl, a firecracker with wise eyes and a brutally honest personality; Cho-rok (Green - Ji-Won Joo) the youngest adopted girl is sometimes naive but definitely has her own unique ideas about life and people; and the funniest of all, the youngest adopted boy Pa Rang (Blue), who develops a worshipful attitude toward Pal-gang's boss Kang-ha and follows him around like a puppy-dog, similar to the way Pal-gang did before her transformation. And then there is the baby, beautiful boy Nam Yi (Indigo - I suspect they didn't release the baby actor's real name in the cast list for security reasons, for he was so cute he could have been kidnapped!).
Becoming A Mother Of Five Overnight
The sympathetic brother Joon Ha (Shin Dong Wook) of the insurance company's president Kang-ha offers Pal-gang a job as housekeeper at the home which he shares with his brother and a comical cousin named Tae Gyu Woo (Kyun Lee), newly arrived from America. He has no idea that she has so many siblings however. She moves into the basement apartment and hides her siblings in boxes to get them into the home! Kang-ha is not amused at her arrival and orders her out of his house; he is all too aware that Pal-gang had a romantic crush on him at work and he wants no part of this crazy lady who at the time stalked him and went moon-eyed over him for years. Joon Ha insists she must stay and tells him of her parents' tragedy. However, little by little, each child begins to give away their existence in the home. What will all the men's reactions be when they discover that Pal-gang is caring for five younger siblings in their house, not to mention that her housekeeping skills are not exactly something to write home about? Pal-gang is no Bok Nyeo from The Suspicious Housekeeper! She can't even cook something as simple as rice correctly!
For even more dramatic tension we have some characters on the sidelines with their own secret agendas regarding Pal-gang: an adopted "grandfather" character Jung Gook (Lee Soon Jae from Beethoven Virus) who re-enters the siblings' lives, pretending he is poor when he is in fact rich and could hold the key to their future economic prosperity, and the siblings' parents' murderess ingratiates herself into their lives while at the same time aiming to get rid of them permanently for financial reasons, Kyung Lee Min (Jung Ae Ri), and her dolt of a husband In Goo Jung (Gyu Chul Kim) who misses out on all kinds of clues about how evil his wife is.
One of the cutest aspects of this show is the
growing relationship between Parang and Kangha
For the love triangle we have the sophisticated Jae Young Jung (Young In Chae) who has set her sights on marrying Kang-ha. However as Pal-gang remains in Kang-ha's home and he starts to grow attached to her and her siblings (especially Parang - Blue - who absolutely adores him, even sleeping at his feet!) it looks less and less likely that Jae Young will succeed in getting him away from Pal-gang.
Everything concludes in a dramatic way with a kidnapping but an ultimately happy ending. Lives are changed forever for the better. Villains receive justice. Be warned: it takes a bit to warm to the main female character Pal-gang in the first episode but by the second episode you will begin to feel protective of her and to root for her success. It perhaps takes the lead male character of Kang-ha too long to fall for Pal-kang, that's about the only "fault" I can see with this drama, but then again, when he eventually does fall for her it makes it all that much more rewarding.
Perhaps better than any other Korean drama Stars Falling From The Sky proves that love is the cohesive ingredient that binds souls together in a Family, not simply blood-ties.
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