Secret Garden is a body swap kdrama. No sense in beating around the bush, because that’s the central premise, the reason why I watched the show, and its main redeeming factor. It might seem counterintuitive that the show’s strangest element, the one that requires the most suspension of disbelief, is the main reason to watch it, but that’s the case.
Because no matter how sizzling their chemistry, I had a hard time buying into the main couple’s relationship. Kim Joo Won is just so nasty to Gil Ra Im; he has such a terrible case of Darcy Syndrome, that I don’t think I even rooted for the couple until their relationship was long established and had hit the serious passionate, they’re ready-and-even-attempt-to-die-for-each-other stage.
Being in each other’s bodies can make for awkward moments, especially in public.
It’s all worth it, though, because that’s just how good the body swap stuff is. That’s entirely down to lead actors Ha Ji Won and Hyun Bin. Hyun Bin is the real standout; he’s given the funniest material, and he commits to and pulls it off 100%. He’s fantastic when acting as Ra Im in Joo Won’s body, whether it be waking up in bed next to Ra Im’s favorite idol star (and coincidentally Joo Won’s cousin), giggling around said idol star and dressing Joo Won in socks with his cousin’s face on them, or being horrifically embarrassed in the men’s steam room at a spa.
Hyun Bin might stand out with the flashiest body swap material, but that doesn’t reduce the strength of Ji Won’s acting as Joo Won (and if you’re having a hard time keeping all this name- and body-switching straight: so am I). She completely transforms into Hyun Bin (or Hyun Bin playing Joo Won); the angles of her body straighten, as if she’s straining to be taller than she is, the lines of her face stiffen, and she broadcasts the haughty like few kdrama leading ladies are ever allowed to do.
Before we get into more specifics about Secret Garden, we ought to go over what the show is actually about. It won’t take long, because aside from the body swap stuff it’s rather typical. Kim Joo Won is a chaebol heir running a giant department store. He lives on a gigantic country estate, owning several buildings that could each easily house a large family. Given that he only ever seems to actually live or spend time in one (his cousin Choi Woo Young, Oska to his fans, lives in another), it’s especially ridiculous.
That’s because stunt woman Ra Im really is that cool. If only she carried that confidence over into her personal life.
He encounters Gil Ra Im, a poor stunt woman. He mistakes her for the leading actress for whom she’s standing in and shenanigans ensue. He’s attracted to her almost immediately; it takes him a while to admit it out loud, but he thinks that she’s really cool, especially when she’s on the job.
You wouldn’t be able to tell it from the way he acts, however. I went back and watched some episodes in preparation for this article, and while the body swap ones were fantastic, the early episodes were hard to watch. Joo Won is terrible to Ra Im. He’s incessant in shaming her for her social standing.
He berates her for making him look bad by daring to appear beside him. He says she’s not even good enough for him to claim he’s playing around with her; he doesn’t judge by race, color, sex, or religion, he says, but he refuses to be seen with anyone who looks “shabby.”
Which, just, ugh, Joo Won, I want to kick you in the gonads. First, I bet whatever clothes Ra Im’s outfitted with actually cost a lot; this is a television show, so I’ll be they’re designer “shabby chic,” even if they’re not supposed to be within the world of the show. Second, your cousin Oska was raised in the same environment as you, and he’s nice to and respectful of Ra Im, so you have no excuse. Third, and most importantly, classism isn’t any better than any of the other forms of bigotry you listed, so you need to shut up and go away.
The worst part of it all is that Ra Im sits there and takes everything. She even apologizes to Joo Won for making him look bad. She doesn’t even try to stand up to Joo Won until he keeps coming by her house and harassing her to date him. With him spouting off such romantic ideas as, “let’s just date for a while until I get you out of my system; you can be like the little mermaid and turn into bubbles once I’m done with you,” who wouldn’t want to date such a prize?
It’s terrible because the show initially set up Ra Im to be a much more dynamic and decisive woman. In her opening scene, Ra Im chases down a woman who tries to treat her like dirt, and reads her the riot act. Why does she suddenly turn all meek when faced with the kdrama leading man? It makes no sense.
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That Secret Garden get to receive great following, and achieve great success could not but prove total acceptance of the characterization by the entire cast, particularly by both characters Kim Joon and Gil Larm, The assertion that Gil Larm was a weak character should have doomed this Korean drama a failure. Granting that Kim Joon alone carried the show over Gil Larm is a big stretch of opinion. To repeat the great success of the show would not have happened if the fans only appreciated the characterization by the male lead character. Actually, both lead characters competed, and performed excellently at acting out and defining their supposed personalities and roles in the show. To particularly state Gil Larm was a weak character, person in the drama would prevent the show from getting such rapport from viewing fans. For actually strength was acted out and demonstrated effectively by Gil Larm by her possession and articulation of her inner and fundamental principles and beliefs. To say she departed from her initial portrayal as a strong girl/woman presented in the first episode was not accurate; time and again, she did physically and masterfully asserted her defending of her character vs Kim Joon. E.g. her ability to offset or wrestle Kim Joon’s physical size and strength both by her catching him off-guard with kicks or actual arm wrestling were enough illustrations she remained that athletic girl in the first episode. But to repeat, she exhibited, convinced, and moved viewers such compelling steadiness about her principles, and timely responses/rebutting of both Kim’s and his Mom’s abusive words and atitudes with outright counter principles and way of thinking, eg. not coming empty handed per Dad’s clear teaching when being a visitor at someone’s home, and her downright telling it to his face the rudeness if taken lightly or treated as fair game by getting Kim chase after her in his own car to make him feel how it is if he were in the receiving end of someone’s rude behavior.
And whereas indeed Kim’s Mom literally repeatedly abused Gilarm, on each occasion Gilarm’s courageous standing up to Mom per her above mentioned counter responses of profound principles only won her great rapport from the viewers: heartfelt sympathy and compassion. True thinking viewers saw and perceived her inner and real strength. For she convincingly belies/unravels the disrespect by the Mom of Gilarm’s Dad’s irrefutable heroism as a valiant firefighter rescuer, including of the Mom’s son. In the end, the one, which most touched viewers, was her her committed sacrificing of her love for Kim, and her concession to the Mom that she give up having Kim if only to stop Mom’s threat, (and Mom’s ultimate act of viciousness) to ruin her very own son.
And at the very end, Gilarm would yet be willing to continue to wait marrying Kim with the hope her further forbearance might yet make a little change of heart of the Mom. At this point, the two lovers already have proven their love for each other; and so it could not make Gilarm insecure about losing Kim just so they might have waited for Mom’s “permission”. And so, again, this may not be interpreted to be Gilarm’s act of cowardice, but patient act of forgiving of Mom, and consistent forbearance on her part. Although, of course, it behooves Kim Joon’s man of the world character that he makes the decision to literally stand up to his Mom per this specific act of legal formalizing of the couple’s intention of marriage and the life of mutual love according to the plot of the drama.
More popularly, more likely, or more probably Koreans subscribe to Asian religions, like Shintoism, Buddhism, or Confucianism. Yet the technique employed by the producer or scriptwriters of Secret Garden re: the switching of bodies as well as the ritual acted out with Gilarm’s Dad in the main dream referred to during the period of coma by both Gilarm and Kim Joon are figurative and metaphorical of both the Judaistic religion and the Christian faith. The ceremony and rite of the drinking of the wine makes a hint of the Eucharistic liturgy in the Catholic Mass, symbolic and a reenactment of Christ’s sacrificial shedding of His blood in the name of love, which Christ himself pre-figured by his converting the wine, that he asked the apostles to drink, into his own blood during his last supper with them, his disciples. Then the general idea of switched bodies could have been implication of the early Genesis verse statement about the couple’s becoming one body and one spirit by virtue of the union of love between a couple.
The main story-line of Secret Garden really revolves around Gilarm, or around Kim Joon’s fascination and admiration for Gilarm or for Gilarm’s very strong character, which initially Kim Joon tried hard not to see, ie. his repeatedly rubbing it to her how she is in reality not in the least his type of girl or within his very elevated class, but per the story-line and plot it ultimately registered and got stuck to Kim Joon’s fine psyche. That all dirt was thrown upon Gilarm both from Kim Joon himself, and from all other nemesis to her poor life status only highlighted and made shine Giarm’s true preciousness and charm. This is namely her indomitable but humble self respect and self reliance, who in the words of Kim even seemed like a ‘man’ as a figurative presence of human invincibility against all odds that no matter how social forces might want to reduce her to nothing, she remains like an indestructible fortress of human decency and charming respectability. She is indeed appropriately a Cinderella, a real worth to be pursued by a cavalier prince in the person of Kim Joon. And so like the maltreated Cinderella she deserved, in the end, the prize of her prince Kim Joon.
The tipping point of lthe story, and of why I consider Secret Garden in line with Christian belief was when Gilarm’s Dad, who in the context of Christian faith represents one of the Saints of God and therefore, a representation of the forgiving and caring/providing/protecting Christ, during that rite of the drinking of the cup between Kim Joon and Gilarm, told her daughter she has bowed her head enough and has shed tears enough, (ie. has sacrificed for love enough), and as well to Kim Joon having fulfilled his promise of looking out in love for Gilarm, his daughter. And so, just as in the Christian faith is promised the new life after the embrace of the cross of sacrificial suffering, here the Dad conveyed God’s satisfaction of love and happiness thereafter for this true loving couple, Kim Joon and Gilarm, with a new lease of life upon their waking up from their comatose state of falling asleep.
Most touching moments between Gilarm and Kim Joon
Most afraid and fearful of Kim Joon’s Mom’s most serious threat to hurt and destroy her loved sweetheart, Kim; and thus convinced she really needs to have to give up Kim Joon, Gilarm made every feasible lie to get Kim to think he has to part from her. And so she made up excuses.
1) Thus, she pretended she could not bear to keep thinking Kim was the reason her Dad died while all along loving him and enjoying life with Kim.
2) Even more touching was her further pretending her receiving and keeping that memorable broken handbag newly fixed by Kim with a very elegant looking clip, specially purchased by Kim would only hurt her feelings as it would presumably remind her how Kim looked down on her because of that broken cheapy handbag. Whereas in fact that broken bag fixed with loving tender hands of Kim actually poignantly only endeared Kim to her even more, and made her aware how truly that broken handbag ironically and very memorably now serves a bond of their profound love for each other. It was so moving because this Kim’s most genuine expression of tender loving of Gilarm had to be ruined by Gilarm’s most hurtful sacrificial repression of her truly touched loved heart having to pretend with her lying despise for the handbag pin, which she would actually, rather, cherish lovingly like a very precious jewel from her beloved.
3) The her two good byes to Kim Joon: The scene at the Mall when pretending she was calling from the movie shooting set, with the pretext she was occupied with shooting movie scenes afar, she most emotionally expressed to Kim how she misses him so very much. Right then she had just consented to Kim’s Mom her sacrificial breaking up with beloved Kim so Mom would spare punishing and destroying Kim with the threat of total impoverishing of him; and right then, too, when she had just left Kim her truest memento of love, (which I am citing next as # 4 excuse); so seeing him supposedly for the last time, him – who “.. created a miracle for her” – was certainly breaking her heart so painfully.
4) To repeat, convinced it to be necessary that she parts from her beloved Kim, the incident in the home library of Kim when, with Oska as accidental but very proper witness, she secretly left her very own memento of final goodbye with the inserting of the image of her – the self-denying, self-sacrificing mermaid – bidding her beloved Kim farewell as she, now, most unwillingly and most agonizingly will have to disappear like a foam and a bubble according as fate had ordained her in relation to her beloved Kim.