Dramas That Go Well With Wine
Today is National Wine Day. It is also this blog’s three year anniversary.
I initially started this blog because I wanted to talk more about dramas. I had been watching for a couple of years, and while it was fun trying to summarize the entirety of dramas like Goblin to my co-worker, I wanted to talk to people who were actually watching the dramas. I wanted to comment more on things, and at that time I was also transitioning from just casually watching dramas, to actually going out of my way to look up news and keep up with what was airing.
I ended up starting my Twitter and blog at roughly the same time. I always had the intention to start a blog and got Twitter to secure the name on socials/get movement through that. But as time went on, I spent most of my time talking to people on Twitter, which led to me stumbling upon people who I created a podcast with….and the blog become less of a priority. It’s not that I didn’t want it to be a priority, I just couldn’t make it one. It was mostly because of my extra time being spent on the podcast (I edit the podcast, so I do a lot more work than just host along with all the other things that take to make it, like researching the topics etc), and some of the things that I would have talked about here I ended up talking about there and it just felt like I was constantly repeating myself and I had lost something that was mine.
I think I was also always lacking a coherent path for the blog. I knew what I wanted to do, but a lot of the time I just felt that it wasn’t the right way. Or that it was so overdone and that I didn’t feel the need to do it. I know that was mostly a me problem, as I have a problem with always thinking that I’m not good enough/not worthy of the voice - but what I did know was that I wanted to keep up with the blog. Despite the struggles there were brief times when I was creating content and it was making me really happy. Especially in those first days.
I ended up adding music posts as a way to talk about something that I’ve always liked. I had started the blog liking music, but it was something that I wanted to separate because I was trying to just focus on the drama side of things. To this day it’s been one of the most consistent things I’ve done, and I know that part of it is that it’s a little bit easier to prep for music posts - to review a drama I have to sit and watch for hours, to listen to music I can do it even while cleaning - but it’s been fun, and it’s honestly what has kept this blog even semi-alive and creating something.
I’ve spent the past few years trying to figure out what I really wanted this blog to be, I knew that I needed to figure it out and couldn’t just keep pushing it aside or only focusing on it occasionally. With the next year of renewals on my hosting plan coming up, I knew it was essential…and because of that push along with this Covid-induced life crisis I’m forced in, I think that I finally know what I want from it. What I want this blog to be. Three years later. And I know now that I want to put in the time to make it work.
I am shifting to focusing almost exclusively on horror, crime, and thriller content. Obviously this shouldn’t be that much of a shock as I have been slowly incorporating it in aspects of this blog already (during Halloween) and most notably on my Twitter account. I’ve been talking to people about the way that those genres live in the frame of the Asian entertainment community and how it tends to be the outlier. Unlike in traditional media, the average Asian drama watcher skews towards romance. I’m not saying this a bad thing by any means. I do think that it’s great and essential that there is a community where that genre is more accepted than others. When you think of how romcoms and such are represented in spaces of literature or film, they are unfairly demeaned and having a community that uplifts it is essential. The only problem is that I’m not the average Asian entertainment watcher. And if we look at something specific like horror, that outside of the film fandom - which typically doesn’t watch other Asian content and doesn’t come at their viewings from the same angle as one that does - it’s harder to find a lot of people to connect with. At least to the point they are outwardly speaking and writing about it. Why not be that person?
Does this mean that I won’t stray from those topics and be sporadic at times? No. Of course not. I may not watch romcoms generally, but that doesn’t mean that I don’t ever watch them. I watch a lot of jdramas that fall outside of the crime genres too, and sometimes I want to talk about them (like I did with my In Time With You post). I’m also going to keep the music side of this blog going. While it’s probably some sort of SEO nightmare to not try to stick with one thing, I’m just going to stop caring. I’m the one writing these posts and designing this site. I need to like and connect with what I’m writing. I also need to let go of the belief that I have to make this blog run in only one direction when I don’t run in one direction.
And let’s face it - all of these things go well with wine, so I can’t be going in the wrong direction.
Stay tuned for the end of this week, I have something starting that I’ve been plotting for about two months now and am really excited to get into it that I hope will serve as a good introduction into this newest season of this little blog. I’m excited, and it’s been a very long time since I’ve been able to say that. It’s a nice feeling. Hope you’ll stick around.
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