Confucian heroes in popular Asian dramasIf Naoki’s emblematic filial love transforms him from a private citizen to an iconic figure, his
own fatherly duty poses a unique challenge to the configuration of an idealized public persona.
To free the hero from potentially fraught parental expectations, the show turns his son into
a straw figure. In ten episodes, the boy never once makes an appearance. At most, the viewer
sees a preoccupied Naoki returning home after spending all day fighting against the draconian
forces at work to give a bland nod to a closed door in a domestic setting before asking his wife
a generic question: “Is Takahiro asleep?” Our hero has no word or time to pass on to the next
generation the moral principles he beholds and even embodies. The fatherly love is a eulogy that
can only be written after his death.
Given the absences of his mother and son, a narrative pattern emerges: the story streamlines
his performance as a filial son to his dead father to limit other exposure to criticism. The func-
tion of Naoki’s son is a “place holder” that exists to make the hero seem as comprehensive a
citizen as possible, who has now completed his life cycle as a son, father, and husband on record.
In a similar vein, My Love from the Star endorses a gendered and partial filiality that gives
the father a privileged position in the community. There are two distinct paternal figures. One
is Song-yi’s prodigal father who is welcomed back into the family after an unexcused long
absence. The other is the dual son–father role Min-joon plays. As a four-hundred-year-old who
appears twenty-five, the hero parodies a postmodern aspiration to be wise and yet stay young.
This respect for age and resistance to aging shape a metaphorical dilemma for many who
see past traditions venerable and yet bend rules to accommodate new ideas. In this regard, the
Korean drama is more self-conscious than the Japanese series about flawed human nature prone
to erratic behaviors, rash judgments, and social mishaps.
This self-criticism is gender specific. The show derides women’s follies while dignifying
men’s prudence. Exploiting the comedic talent of his lead actresses, the director Jang Tae-yoo
makes Song-yi and her mother Yang Mi-yeon (Na Young-hee) the comic relief of the story. Vain,
greedy, and shallow, the mother and daughter are blind consumers of a capitalist culture, falling
deeper and deeper into the monetary trap of a glamorous lifestyle. As a single parent, Mi-yeon
gets the blame for turning Song-yi into a material girl but not the credit for raising her to
become a TV star. Her runaway ex-husband Cheon Min-goo (Uhm Hyo-seop), on the other
hand, receives no blame for his disappearing act. Calm, quiet, and modest, the long lost father is
what his belligerent ex-wife is not. Working as a janitor, he never buys high-end goods and pays
little attention to fame and fashion. In the media circus of show business where everyone wants
to be somebody, Min-goo stands out with his desire for anonymity.
The contrast of Min-goo as a humble worker and Mi-yeon as a depraved schemer jus-
tifies the filial hierarchy that the show promotes. Whereas the paternal figure inspires trust,
confidence, and love in his children, the garrulous mother evokes fear, distaste, and despair in
those around her. Such dichotic melodramatic sentiments become less clear-cut in the show’s
construction of Min-joon as a figurative son/father, endowed with the requisite morals and
“all seeing power” from above.
As a figurative son, Min-joon turns his lawyer friend into a surrogate father, falsifying a
narrative about his filial connection. Such plot within the plot reveals a postmodern skepticism
about a grand narrative on the indissoluble bond between blood relations. If genetic connections
no longer serve as proofs for the basis of familial kinship, where is the place of filiality in the
Confucian moral network? Does Min-joon’s outsider perspective guide us to see the arbitrari-
ness of treating biological facts as the foundation of moral principles? Despite its conservative
undertone, the show does not shy away from questioning filial virtues as fictional tales cons-
tructed to ignite the public imagination about a spiritual life better lived in the past.