Korean Webtoons

           Something that Korea has but America doesn't - webtoons, or comic on the website, hence the same. So it's like manga that's available online 

          As I live in America, I know the prejudices that the majority of American students have against manga. Unless you read manga, they're just looked down upon as some comic book that too-old students read. But actually, these are not mere comic books, as the content is not always suit for some little kids. Not only that, it's not accurate to say manga isn't a good read because you assume that the difficulty level is low. So I just wanted to shed light on this fact for those of you who may have these kinds of prejudice.

        Anyway, manga is actually a Japanese term and they are Japanese. But manhwa (만화) is completely Korean, and although they're not as popular worldwide as mangas, they still exist. 

        I'm bringing up manhwa because our 21st century has allowed for a new way of viewing manhwas, and it's through the Internet. Webtoons. Unlike manga-readers in America, manhwa/webtoons are not just read by certain cliques in Korea, it's pretty safe to say everyone has read at least one volume of manhwa before. Of course, people who don't read it, just don't read it, but unlike America, it's not necessarily a set group of people that read it only. (Unless of course we're talking about rated-R manhwas here, then yes, a set group of people read it.........)

        Webtoons have been revolutionary. I did my research, and although other popular Korean portal sites like Daum and Nate do offer webtoons, Naver has the most popular ones so far. This may also be because out of the three, Naver seems to be used more, it's the Google of Korea, and I personally am a Naver user. The webtoons are drawn and posted by normal Koreans who can draw and it's tremendous how these ordinary Korean citizens debut through Naver and become so successful. Naver webtoons are revolutionary because some have been so widely read that they've even been considered turning into a drama, such as Fashion King. Fashing King the drama is not the same as the webtoon, but I heard a drama titled "Gangnam Style" will be same as the webtoon. 

         I tried reading Fashion King, and I read a few episodes and then stopped because it didn't meet my own style and the plot line was getting a little weird, and based on the comments, I wasn't the only one weird-ed out. Nonetheless, Fashion King remains as one of the most popular webtoons. Two that I read that I still have special spots for in my heart are "My Young Cat and Old Dog" (내 어린고양이와 늙은개) and "Bittersweet Life" (달콤한 인생). The first one consisted of episodes of the author's pet dog and cat and it was both touching and humorous. "Bittersweet Life" was just a comical and relateable set of episodes of singles and couples. I wish they were transcribed into English, because they were well worth the read. Then after finishing these two (with a lot of sadness), I started another one, but that one was only like a preview in webtoon form for the book. I was really frustrated when I was left with a mega-cliff hanger and left with the option of paying money for the book or just finishing it so I picked the latter choice (shipping globally is also expensive and my parents wouldn't have allowed it anyway). 

          Then after not reading any webtoons for awhile, I got bored after finishing my homework just three days ago, and I was looking at the the list of popular webtoons on Naver and I came across "Dating Revolution" (연애혁명). I actually didn't know what the title meant until I looked it up on the dictionary just  now for this blog post and wow. The title, epecially in English, does not give a sufficiently good outlook on the webtoon as a whole. So far only 35 episodes are out, an episode comes out every Thursdays (Korean time), and on that day, I read 33 out of the 35 episodes. Then I read the remaining 2 episodes the next day. I am terribly obsessed with this webtoon and the wait for the next episode is nearly killing me. This webtoon, I found out, is popular for a reason, it's just so good. There has been news articles related to this webtoon. So yes, webtoons are a big deal in modern-day Korean culture.


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