Must-Watch K-Dramas for Staying Home from COVID-19: Binge Until Your Eyes Are Bleary!

Ugh, being stuck at home through such a stressful time, lots of you must be getting bored, right? On top of that, there are online classes, work and conference calls almost all the time. You can't even step out of the house, and every time you pop out to grab something to eat, you're stressed and anxious about whether you've caught the virus yet. If you can't go anywhere, then just lie down right here! Kick back at home and relax with 10 must-watch Korean dramas. Let's see which K-dramas will win you over!

Kingdom

I really can't leave out this must-watch K-drama. It tells the story of a power struggle in the royal court of the Joseon era, along with an outbreak of a disease that brings the dead back to life, or, simply put, zombies! Crown Prince Lee Chang has to deal with these zombies to save his people while also reclaiming the throne from the nobles at court. I'd love for you to watch it and see just how gripping it is. Season 2 came out just recently, so you can keep following the story. In it, more of the zombies' secrets are revealed, beyond the fact that they aren't afraid of sunlight, by the physician Seo-bi, who is trying to find out about the resurrection plant. Meanwhile, in the palace, Crown Prince Lee Chang has to come back and reclaim the throne that's rightfully his. After the king's death is announced, the palace officials start to learn the truth, switch over to the Crown Prince's side and fight alongside him. Season 2 also leaves some mysteries hanging, so to find out how it all wraps up, we'll have to wait for the next seasonnnn!

Extraordinary You

The next drama I want to recommend, I have to say, is one I completely fell in love with. It's so much fun and really addictive, another must-watch K-drama. The plot is based on a webtoon, and everyone in the story is a character in a comic called Secret. It starts when the heroine discovers she's just an extra whose job is to help the comic's hero and heroine fall in love, and on top of that, she's a character who's close to dying from a heart condition. So she has to stand up and fight to protect her own fate and live the life she chooses for herself. The hero, meanwhile, is an extra who doesn't even have a name. But one day the heroine falls down the stairs at school and the hero breaks her fall with his back. Her heart races, and she thinks this guy must be the one who can help her get what she wants: to live outside the script. So she searches for him until they finally meet, and she gives him a name. From then on, things get more complicated, because the hero wants to know where he came from, and the story leads back to where he came from. As for the second lead, the heroine's fiancé, he's hotter than a whole field of chillies, a total bad boy, girl! But the writer has plotted him to use the heroine as a tool and hurt her with cruel words all the time. Once he learns he's just a character in a comic, though, he starts to understand his own heart. In this story, the characters who've become self-aware can be themselves when they're outside the script, but once they're back in a scene, they have to play out the story the way the author drew it. The fun is in wondering whether the heroine can change her own role or the scenes in the comic, where the hero came from, and what will happen to the characters when the comic ends.

Crash Landing on You

Next up is a must-watch K-drama that had all the girls grinning from ear to ear and swooning, thanks to our very own Comrade Captain, Hyun Bin! He's paired with leading lady Son Ye-jin as a South Korean billionaire's heiress, and let me tell you, their chemistry is off the charts, girl! I just can't move on from Comrade Captain! The story follows Yoon Se-ri, a businesswoman who has an accident while paragliding when a sudden whirlwind blows her all the way to the North Korean border area. There she meets Comrade Captain Ri Jeong-hyeok, who decides to help her and breaks all kinds of rules trying to find a way to get her home to South Korea. Lots of scenes have a comedic touch too; it really has a bit of everything.

What's Wrong With Secretary Kim

This is another must-watch K-drama that's really addictive, with a male lead unlike anyone you've ever met, I guarantee. How can anyone be this perfect and this full of himself? Hahahaha! He's such a poser too. It's hilarious to watch but so cute. It's a romantic comedy, with a childhood trauma tangled up in it that makes everything complicated. And the heroine, Secretary Kim, is just gorgeous! The story goes something like this: Kim Mi-so is Secretary Kim to Chairman Lee Young-joon. She's his trusted right-hand secretary who knows everything about him, and she's the only woman who can get close to him. But then, out of the blue, she decides to hand in her resignation after working by his side for over 9 years, so she can find herself and do what she wants to do. Chairman Lee can't rest easy, wondering what's happened to his trusted Secretary Kim. Why does she have to quit? Doesn't she want to work for a perfect boss like him anymore? So he decides to do everything he can to make her stay.

Hotel Del Luna

IU fans, this way, darling! IU is sooo cute. I have to say the costumes are something else: every time the scene changes, so does her outfit, darling. She never wears the same one twice! This K-drama is about Jang Man-wol, a woman with terrible sins on her soul. She killed many people, both innocent and not, so she's had to go on living for over a hundred years without ever being reborn, stuck in a hotel where spirits stay before crossing the bridge to the afterlife. In other words, she's basically the hotel's owner. She trusts no one, because she was once betrayed by someone she loved, and she's moody, snappy and has a seriously bad temper. Then she meets the male lead, whom she had earmarked to become the hotel's manager when he grew up. He's kind-hearted and helps others, the total opposite of her. Each episode tells the story of a spirit who comes to her hotel, and the two leads have to help these spirits move on to the afterlife without any ties holding them to this world. The other characters are connected to her too, some from past lives, and some at the hotel have ties they just can't break free of, so they end up working as staff at the Hotel Del Luna.

Itaewon Class

This is another must-watch K-drama I want to recommend. The male lead is so cute. How can anyone with a chestnut bowl cut still be this adorable? I love the heroine's character too; it was love at first sight. The drama follows Park Sae-ro-yi, a determined young man who's training hard to pass the police entrance exam. But his dream comes to an end when he badly beats up Jang Geun-won, heir to a powerful food business, who's in the same class. On top of that, Sae-ro-yi refuses to kneel and apologise, which gets his father, who works for that big company, fired as well. Things get even worse: although Sae-ro-yi never finished school, he's set on opening a small restaurant to make his father's dream come true, but that dream is crushed once again when his father is killed in a car crash, caused once again by Jang Geun-won. This huge turning point sets Sae-ro-yi on a path of deep-rooted revenge. What will he do next, when fulfilling his father's dream with a great food business is the same road as taking revenge by bringing the Jang family's giant business crashing down?

Alhambra

The next must-watch K-drama has a plot based on a game. It's a bit sci-fi and not too focused on romance. The story goes like this: the male lead is the CEO of a technology investment company, and he wants to buy a game from the heroine's younger brother to use with contact lenses that show lifelike virtual images while you play. After the hero gets a call from the heroine's brother saying he'll sell him the game, he travels to the city of Granada in Spain. The hero then tries out the game, invented by the heroine's brother, a genius programmer, and wants to buy it straight away. But no matter how hard he searches, he can't find the brother, so he comes up with a plan within a plan: buying the heroine's hostel instead of buying the game directly, because the brother registered the game's patent under the hostel's name. That way, the contract makes the game rightfully his in the end. But after that, the hero discovers the game is becoming even more real. During a duel in the game with a business rival, a former best friend turned bitter enemy, the hero accidentally kills his friend, thinking he's only died in the game. But the next day, it turns out his friend really is dead. An investigation finds that the friend had been in contact with the hero, but he can't be charged because there isn't enough evidence. From then on, the hero's life is never the same again. It's as if he's stuck in the game all the time, even after he takes out the contact lenses. The twist is that the game has developed an error, and the hero has to track down why it happened, as the virtual game turns into something that's really happening. The fun from then on is watching the hero search for where the heroine's brother has disappeared to, and how he can escape the game himself.

W

This is another must-watch K-drama with a really fresh, original plot. The male lead is a character in a comic book, and the real world and the comic world play out side by side. The comic characters try to come alive and drive the story themselves, wanting to live outside the script the author wrote. The story goes something like this: a famous comic artist, the father of young surgeon Oh Yeon-joo, disappears while drawing the ending of his famous comic. Yeon-joo goes looking for her father and ends up slipping into the comic world, where she meets Kang Chul, the hero of the comic her father created. You'll have to watch the drama to find out whether the comic can ever end.

Weightlifting Fairy Kim Bok Joo

This one is really out of the ordinary, because our heroine isn't delicate or fragile in the slightest: she's a chubby weightlifter! It's a cute story set in the world of sports that will have you smiling nonstop because it's soooo cute. The drama follows Kim Bok-joo, a college weightlifter. She may be chubby, but she has a really cute face. She meets her childhood friend Jung Joon-hyung, a swimmer who always has some kind of mental block in finals, but Bok-joo is always there to help him. Joon-hyung starts to fall for Bok-joo and tries to win her over. It's definitely another must-watch K-drama of the year.

Her Private Life

The last must-watch K-drama I want to recommend puts the lives of K-pop fangirls like us in the spotlight, through a talented young curator whose image is all career woman, but who secretly runs a fansite (a fan account that follows an artist closely and photographs them at all kinds of events to share with other fans) for a male idol. One day, the museum where she works gets a new director, and the new director ends up discovering her secret life as a fansite master. Let me tell you, it's packed with romance and comedy, and the two leads have amazing chemistry too!