“What is most interesting to me is what these various dramas can reveal about contemporary attitudes to history in Korea and contemporary fears and hopes about Korea’s place in the world and Northeast Asian order.”

I think your statement is particularly germane in regard to the recent explosion of Koguryo dramas, given that 1) to my knowledge there has never been a South Korean saguk based on Koguryo; and 2) some of the directors of these dramas (in particular the director of “Yeon Gaesomun”) have explicitly said that their primary motivation is to set the record straight in the context of the Koguryo ownership war with China.

And thank you very much for the info on the Gwanggaeto drama! I had heard that it was an independent studio creation so I was afraid I would’t be able see it for a while. (I don’t know how to use a Korean taja so an online search is problematic for me.)

I had a look for this other drama about King Kwanggaet’o at Naver and it turns out that it is called “T’aewang sasin’gi” (태왕사신기) and will be broadcast on MBC at the beginning of next year. Seems there is already quite a bit of hype about it, presumably because of the presence of ‘Yonsama’ and the set located in Cheju is already a tourist attraction! More info here.

And an old story from a couple of years ago about the drama, which makes it sound rather nationlistic.

I have, on the other hand, strong and mixed feelings about “Yeon Gaesomun.” I share Shin Chae-ho’s view that Yeon is one of the greatest Korean heroes who was perhaps wrongfully villied by Kim Bu-sik’s Silla-centric account, as well as later Confucian ideologues who (like American neoconservatives or Wilsonian democrats) reflexively castigate violent despots, regardless of the motives of the despot, the historical circumstances, or the ends–the three evaluative tools which the wise and sober Raymond Aron said we must always account for when judging a man. And to the extent that Yeon’s greatness is forgotten now and is being revived through the drama, I am escstatic.

But being a pedant, I adore the truth above all. And I am afraid that the drama is turning out to be what my mother derided as “sagiguk” rather than a “saguk,” as all dramas go. Of course, as contemporary sagiguks go, “Yeon Gaesomun” isn’t so bad. It is not like the revolting KBS rehabilitation of that Min woman whose sole claim to heroine status was that she was killed by the Japanese–whom she first invited in and then abandoned because for petty personal reasons. Above all, so far (with the exception of Yeongyang Wang’s bizarre boast that all of China used to be once Koguryo land during the reign of Gwanggaeto), the Chinese fears that the drama is a wholly anti-Chinese propaganda vehicle has not materialized. In fact, Tang Taizong, China’s greatest monarch arguably, has been depicted with the nobility and personal integrity that surprised the unrepentantcynic in me. Of course, that depiction could be self-serving as well. After all, Yeon’s nemesis must be great–almost equally great–to burnish Yeon. For what would Achilles be without Hector or even the rather unheroic Odyssesus without Ajax? Great men need great foil.

No, what disturbs me is that the drama slights other great Koreans, rather than the Chinese, through its multifarious distortions! Of course, history of the era is sketch. But there are certain consensus facts that the drama distorts to lionize its favored heroes and in turn diminish its disfavored heroes. Two examples will suffice. The Battle for the Anshi Fortress, one of the signature military victories of the Korean people, is said to have been led by Yeon, when few historians think Yeon was even present at Anshi. This is most certainly a double injustice to the Lord of the Anshi, whose name we no longer have but think is Yang Manchun. Another example is the treatment of the drama’s second most favored son, Ulchi Munduk. While records here are less clear, Ulchi was most likely not the commander of the Koguryo forces during the 1st Koguryo-Sui Wars. General Kang almost certainly out-ranked him. But in the drama, Kang is Ulchi’s sidekick and in fact another Guan Yu-like figure, all brawn and no brains. And the transfiguration of Yeon’s supposed father, Yeon Taejo, into a Zhuge Liang-like Taoist sage whose wisdom and psychic powers would move heavens itself? Well…

There are other serious distortions, many of them I am willing to live with, because they make the story interesting without fundamentally altering the meaning of the era and denying the men who shaped it their just desserts. You cannot, after all, expect absolute historical fidelity from a sagiguk. But the degradation of a man we shall call General Yang and General Kang is a substantial historical wrong and they were wholly unnecessary.