Ken really needs to come home soon. He sent this yesterday, and gave me permission to post it here (and to the Caid list). Do not drink any beverages while you read this, and it might be a good idea if you pee first. I'm just saying.

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(Warning--extremely long and silly ramble starting. There is no escape. In cyberspace, no one can hear you, well, at all.)

There are several drama channels out here. Before I figured that out I wondered what was going on, because all the Koreans on TV always seemed so serious and sad/upset/put upon. Except for the commercials, where everyone's smiling and happy like Jim Carrey on The Truman Show (cue big smile complete with flash-of-light and accompanying bell sound). They also run random foreign movies and shows, some dubbed, some subtitled in Korean, and some just because no other country would dare allow them to be aired in front of anyone except prisoners and the blind.

So let's see if I can describe a particularly amusing train-wreck of a show that I will now have to have seared from my memory. But before that happens, I'm going to inflict it upon, uh, I mean, share it with you. I may be a bit confused, as I did catch it halfway in, but I think I can accurately convey the gist of it all.

It's set in Normandy, or so they say, but it's pretty much wrong on every count. For starters, the "knights" are all wearing Templar tunics, except for sir William, who also has a late Spanish chest plate and a Roman helmet. I can't decide if his sword resembles a bad 80's LOTR rip-off (think Dragonslayer with the funny little man), or if it's from the Lego (tm) Adult-Sized Camelot Playset (tm). As you can see, there's about as much historical cohesion as your typical after-the-tourney-dinner-at-Sizzler, except with worse costumes.

At the point where I entered this abyss, William's being sent to war by the king, who looks like the dad from Eight is Enough but has a strong Aussie accent. (I think I've seen him in these historic dramas before. He must've done something really bad to suffer centuries of this drivel. Also note that all titles are in lowercase, as none of these "actors" has the talent for uppercase.)

Anyway, this turn of events dismays the princess, who may have come straight out of porn Hamlet except for her ditzy American accent. I figure they hired her because she already had the costume, but they still had to put here in a horribly bad blond wig to distract us from her complete lack of talent.

She's to wed our hero in a month, if he survives the gruesome battles. (Note that Monty Python's Holy Grail fielded more fighters than this show, and SCA boffers have more skill.) Apparently the Normans have invaded Normandy of all places and the English don't have enough men to fight them off. Did I mention the lead knight sounds exactly like Prothall, which is messing even more with my head? [Note: Prothall is a former King of Drachenwald and friend of ours. He's Swedish.]

Now, William has to stay alive for his betrothed, and he can't disappoint the king, who apparently adopted and raised him. So his brilliant plan is to quietly sneak into the enemy camp at night, and capture their leader, sir Phillip, who's decked out in splendid garb that he picked up off the mark-down rack at the local Ren Faire. And they must've also had a sale on cheap-cloth-fake-chainmail-coifs, because the whole cast wears them in an attempt to hide their true identities.

So they charge screaming into the camp (thus waking everyone up so no one misses out on a good rumble), proudly displaying the Union Jack, circa 1606 [sic] which points out to their enemies exactly where to retaliate. Meanwhile William, holding his sword like a golf club, approaches the guy with the biggest hat and the lisp. It's now time in our story for a bit of dialogue.

"Are you sir Phillip?"

"Yeth." (What would you say?)

"Then you've been captured."

(The following is spelled how it sounded) "I come from royal blud and demend to be treated with rethpect." (Because that line always works against the point of a sword held by your deepest enemy.)

(From somewhere off-camera) "Drop your sword because I've got you covered." (This is in an obvious female voice, and then we see a short fighter in a quilted Klingon doublet and the ubiquitous fake coif.)

(From somewhere else off-camera) "Drop YOUR sword because I've got YOU covered." (I wonder if that would work in a melee?)

(Note: It is at this point that I decide I have to save this "historical document" for posterity and any aliens races that may be monitoring cyberspace.)

So she drops her sword (made from tinfoil and bits of jam), and the English take custody of both prisoners. Now the rest of the Norman/French warriors must've buggered off to drink wine and dig truffles, because they're nowhere to be seen. The female fighter (don't even ask me what her accent was supposed to be) spouts off against the English cowards for not fighting fair (against five-to-one odds) and getting trounced on the field good and proper. When they try to restrain her, her fake coif falls down and oh-my-god-you're-a-girl-fighter?

(Did I mention that foreign dramas in Korea are screened in front of a live audience, who ooh and ahh loudly every time some amazing twist of the plot occurs. Plus, there is a narrator who pops up in a little window and explains these plot points in Korean, in case you missed the audience's surprise and glee. Please try to keep this local soundtrack going in the back of your head as you continue to read.)

So after he's tied up, Phillipette promises anything if they'll only let him go, including a full retreat from Normandy of his legions of unseen fighters. So the French whimper away, and William (well pleased because he didn't die) sends a letter to the king proclaiming his victory (super-rush-delivery, of course), and a letter to bimbo-princess promising to return and "take care of business, nudge nudge, wink wink" (or something along those lines).

But of course, he can't stop thinking about the not-quite-French girl, and the strange birthmark on her neck (which was THIS BIG because the camera zoomed in really close). And he's dying to get back to the castle so he can see what's really under that blond wig, if you know what I mean. Oh, how the angst builds.

Bimbette gets the letter, and rushes off to daddy-king with glee, only to overhear him telling an advisor "Dammit, I sent him off to war to die so I wouldn't have to kill him myself."

"But my leeegee" (again, spelled how it sounded) "you already killed his whole family, except for his sister whom you sold into French slavery." (Can we all see where this Luke & Leia romance is headed? And please don't make me try to describe the advisor's "costume". I tell you I just won't do it.)

As her world crumbles around her, princess bim-betty scrawls out a tear-streaked letter to warn her betrothed-dude and sends it across the channel using the special faster-than-email service reserved especially for distant lovers separated by cruel fate and a familial murder or two. (You may remember this plot device used to good effect in Braveheart.)

William, upon hearing this devastating news, rushes immediately off towards--wait for it--the French-ish chick, who's tromping off home hating the world and muttering unrepeatable things under her breath as sir Phillipina prances on ahead sniffing for truffles.

Our hero spies their party ahead, and fortunately for him the legions have gone on strike (again) so he rushes forward directly into defiant French-girls jam-sword as she cries "I TOLD you to leave us alone!" "But Rose!" "How do you know my name?!" "Because you're my sister!" Soon-to-be-ex-hero wilts into a bloody pile as an old, crumpled flower falls from his hand and French-I really-f*@&ed this-one-up-girl screams out--wait for it--"What have I done!?!" (I don't know what's up with the flower, as I thankfully missed the beginning of this wretched tale, but all I can guess is it's another homage [pronounced "blatent-ripoff"] to Braveheart.)

I don't know if that's the end, or if they dared to put the Korean version of "to be continued..." because at that moment I couldn't decide whether to laugh or just stare at the wall in stunned silence until the images purged from my reality. Either way, it's over now, and it can best be summed up as "mercifully brief."

It could be worse though, as they're also showing Meet Joe Black, and Dude, Where's My Car, which is the stupidest movie ever (Dumb and Dumberest not included because I've thankfully managed to avoid it/them so far by holding my eyes and ears and going la-la-la a lot). Note that this title should rightfully go to Freddie Got Fingered, except it was inane and astonishingly gross and deserves not just a woof, but something usually found at the other end of the animal. Don't even ask what they did with the elephant. Just don't go there. Rent Dee Snyder's Strangeland instead and rejoice in its relative brilliance.

Can you tell it's time for me to come home now?

Ken