KBS has gone ahead and given an one word English title for the mouthful youth sageuk Thinking of the Moon When the Flowers Bloom. It’s called Moonshine and is absolutely apropos to the subject matter (illegal alcohol brewing during a prohibition era) but loses the lyricism of the original title which just reminds of a tipsy scholar looking skyward at the moon and thinking of his beloved. There has been a nonstop stream of promos from posters to drama stills to trailers so the network is spending the effort to get this drama out there on the radar but it just feels loosy goosy in the entire enterprise. Hyeri can do plucky, determined heroine but maybe even that character concept can’t be stretched into a sageuk setting, even I can’t tell from previews. Yoo Seung Ho looks so earnest and fish-out-of-water in the previews, also not clear if it’s just his character or that he’s not quite feeling the role. With that said, I want SO BADLY to love this drama and OTP, if it works it would totally be my jam in leads and concept, not to mention just how pretty the color scheme looks.
Previews for When the Flowers Bloom, I Think of the Moon:
Moonshine makes more sense as a title
The color scheme and village setting with cherry blossoms remind me of 100 DMP. Even Kang Mina’s shawl pose is similar to NJH’s Hing Shim.