TV Show: Who Could Use Some Love Advice?

Love Naggers | 연애의 참견 (2018 ~)

Netflix | Love Naggers

Love Naggers launched back in 2018, and is one of Korea’s most loved long-running TV shows. Discussing the quirky real-life love dramas that viewers write on the show’s website message board, the five panels (Seo Jang-hoon, Kim Sook, Kwak Jung-eun, Han Hye-jin, and Joo Woo-jae) give their advice on whether the relationship should go on. As the show gained popularity, more and more viewers started sharing their stories which allowed the show to get more intense by the episode 😂 During the past four years and three seasons of Love Naggers running, it seems the amount of shock you can get from this show is limitless! 

KBS joy | Love Naggers

Love Naggers is divided into largely three sections, which vary in each story’s depth. The show opens with “Ssome Nagging,” where the storyteller wants opinions on whether there’s a possibility for romance by giving an example of their questionable experience with someone. “Ssome” (썸) in Korean dating means that there’s “something going on between two people,” that can lead to a relationship. This “ssome” however, can be very awkward when only one of the two people thinks it’s going somewhere while the other is not - hence why they want opinions! The panels try to find out if they can find clues of evident flirtation and if so, suggests a text message they should send to take the “ssome” forward.

KBS joy | Love Naggers

Next is “War of Jjal,” where the panels reenact the received stories, rewritten in scripts, with engaging and hilarious acting. “Jjal” (짤) means “meme” or a “screenshot” in Korean, hence the name of this section - the stories are backed up with real screenshots of messages or photos to prove their legitimacy. Because the screenshots confirm the realness of the scripts, both the panels and viewers easily get absorbed. 

One of the most mind-striking stories that I heard from the show was the story of a girl with 11 year older boyfriend that was in the same industry field, with a very stable job, caring and loving. This boyfriend was perfect, except for the small fact that he falls asleep at a very early hour and often doesn’t share his schedule with her. One day, a day before his planned overseas trip with his friends, he said that he was at someone’s wedding and that he would call later. A few days after, she coincidentally found an Instagram account that seemed very familiar. On the account, was a photo of her boyfriend standing at a wedding hall as the groom 🤯 After some searching on the internet, she found out that his “overseas trip” was actually his honeymoon 🤯🤯 Mind you, this is just one of the thousands of the astonishing dramas in Love Naggers...

KBS joy | Love Naggers

Finally, there’s “Yeoncham Drama,” where a true-story-based short film plays and the panels add their comments on the situations. With professional actors in these short films and the scandalous Korean drama-like plots, it’s almost as if we’re watching a K-drama together with the panels. Similar to the “War of Jjal,” at the end of the story, the panels share their opinions and give advice about the future of the relationship. If you have a brief time to kill, have a click on YouTube playlist of Yeoncham Dramas, and you could find them interesting to watch - lucky us, the KBS N channel started subbing their Love Naggers videos!

KBS joy | Love Naggers

The show calls the advice that the panel gives “nagging,” which sounds like it holds a negative meaning. But in Korea, the act of nagging is also a sign of affection and worry that normally families portray to each other. The five panels take each episode as if they’re talking to a close friend or a family of theirs - hence why they call their advice ‘nagging’! The way each person genuinely feels happy, sad, and worries about each situation allows the viewers to get immersed in the given situation like it’s my own. Each story that gets featured holds such juicy and debatable topics that it’s fun to talk about them with friends and lovers as well - even some of the couple balance games originated from this show 🤣 If you’re roaming around Netflix trying to decide which show to watch, give Love Naggers a try and you’ll probably find the trashy love dramas quite interesting 👀