5 K-dramas nominated for APAN Awards 2022: will “Extraordinary Attorney Woo” defeat “Squid Game”?
The competition to win “Best Drama” at the 2022 APAN Awards is more intense than ever with 5 extremely strong K-dramas nominated
2022 has been filled with extremely great K-dramas, making for quite the competition at awards ceremonies. For the 2022 APAN Star Awards, 5 contenders have been selected, and the winner is basically unpredictable. Below are the 5 nominations for Best Drama of this awards ceremony, their strengths, as well as changes for winning.
First of all, there’s the megahit Netflix original “Squid Game”, which is basically known to K-drama fans and casual watchers alike, and has become viral all over the world.
In the K-drama world, “Squid Game” introduces a rather unique topic with meaningful messages of its own. However, there are a lot to be improved about this series, making it a great, but not excellent work.
Nevertheless, it’s irrefutable that “Squid Game” is the most popular K-drama out there, with topics surrounding it taking over the entire world, and endless parodies and related contents being made. This makes “Squid Game” an extremely strong competitor to reign over APAN Stars awards.
Now, if “Squid Game” is the king on international grounds, then in Korea – the home of K-drama, “The Red Sleeve” would be the most adored.
Laced with a soulful plot, fleshed-out characters, and gorgeous settings, “The Red Sleeve” is considered “the revival of Korean historical drama”, and so also entails cultural values. This particular series managed to strike a perfect balance between critical acclaim and commercial reception, and so are both hailed by the professionals and the public. In addition, its boasts high viewership ratings and top-notch acting performances.
As the only candidate from MBC, there are high chances that “The Red Sleeve” will come out on top, and that most people will agree with it winning.
The third nominee would be the “dark horse” JTBC series “My Liberation Notes”. While it saw the lowest viewership ratings among the candidates this year, “My Liberation Notes” is loved by basically everyone that watched it. At first, the series started with an extremely low viewership, which constantly rose overtime, and its popularity is not earned via virality, but rather via recommendations from people that truly enjoyed this somber yet hopeful work.
For young people in Korea and also in other parts of the world, many messages in “My Liberation Notes” resonate with their soul. The drama is strangely realistic and relatable, with its own fair share of humor and hope, and stories that we can find happening in our mundane life.
Of course, with the intense competition that it is facing, “My Liberation Notes” may not come out as the victor this year, but the fact that it earned a nomination is already a clear testament of the series’ quality.
The 4th nomination for APAN Awards’ Best Drama is none other than “Our Blues” – which is an omnibus drama that follows various “imperfect” yet meaningful lives, and healing stories.
Instead of having one to two main characters and one main storyline, “Our Blues” has an entire cast where everyone will get their own focus. It also features plenty of leading actors and actresses, such as Lee Byung Hun, Han Ji Min, Shin Min Ah, Kim Woo Bin, Lee Jung Eun, Cha Seung Won, and more, making the K-drama a highly-anticipated series from day one.
The ride that “Our Blues” provides is filled with ups and downs, and with great story value, popularity, and portrayals, it is no surprise to see this series nominated.
Finally, the 5th candidate is the recently-concluded drama “Extraordinary Attorney Woo”.
Of course, there’s no denying the intense popularity of this series both on international and domestic grounds, not to mention that reactions towards it are mostly positive. With a meaningful story, healing messages, well-developed characters, and brilliant acting, “Extraordinary Attorney Woo” comes extremely close to being a “perfect” K-drama to most viewers.
“Extraordinary Attorney Woo” is also sensational and groundbreaking with its topic, and receives ample praise from critics as well.
