People all over the world are obsessed with the quality of South Korean dramas. It is also undeniable that romance is one of the many genres...
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Yes, fictional romance dramas are enjoyable to watch, but have you ever considered viewing love, dating, and relationships from a more realistic perspective? Then you should try to slide into the world of South Korea’s dating reality shows!
Just last December to January, a Netflix original and Korean dating show titled Single’s Inferno has created a buzz in South Korea and around the world, with viewers sharing their contradicting opinions on the cast’s journey of finding love while stranded on a deserted island.
While dating reality shows are not particularly new in South Korea, the success of Single's Inferno appears to have prompted the industry to produce more shows of this type this year. While many shows are only available in South Korea, here are a few that are available worldwide via Video-on-Demand (VOD) platforms!
Change Days
In the middle of troubles you are facing as a couple, will you try to solve it and work on your relationship, or will you choose to end it and try to find someone new?
Change Days follows four couples who are on the verge of breaking up even before they appear on the show. They stay in the same house for two weeks and go on "change dates," which are dates with people from the show other than their current partner. In the midst of going on "change dates," the audience can see the couples attempting to communicate and resolve issues in their current relationships.
The show's format allows the audience to see everything from a third-person perspective. While watching the show, you can either find yourself rooting for couples to stay together or listing down reasons why they are better off alone or with another potential partner.
The 14-episode dating show lasts an hour per episode. It takes you on a roller coaster ride until the final episode, when these eight participants decide whether to stay in the relationship, break up and go home alone, or choose to be with someone they met on the show.
Change Days has recently ended and you can watch its complete episodes on Netflix!
EXchange
Can you try going on dates with other people while your ex-partner is around?
EXchange, also known as Transit Love, is about ex-couples who must live together under one roof for a month while trying not to reveal who their respective exes are to the other participants. It demonstrates how complex past relationships are, whether it is possible to make peace with previous struggles and reunite with ex lovers, or whether they are completely determined to leave the past behind and find a new love among the other participants.
The average two-hour length of each episode may seem lengthy, but EXchange’s fans still find themselves not getting enough of the dates between participants, interactions between ex-couples, honest and intriguing conversations, and raw emotions that the format of the show pushes to come out from the participants.
To date, there are only two episodes left, and viewers will finally know the anticipated decisions of the participants on whether to go back with their exes or move on and choose someone new in the end.
Between Love and Friendship
What if the person you're interested in has feelings for your friend? Or what if you and your friend have feelings for the same person?
Between Love and Friendship, as the title suggests, puts eight participants to the test to see if they can keep their friendship until the end of the show all while looking for a potential love interest.
This dating show takes two groups of friends, four women and four men, on a journey to find love. The participants live in a house together for a week, go on dates, and shoot their shot with someone they like despite the fact that any of your friends could do the same.
The show's format, with six episodes lasting an hour and a half each, will keep you on the edge of your seat with the shift between fluttering dates and possible misunderstandings among participants. In the end, viewers get to see whether the participants will sacrifice love for friendship or sacrifice their friends for love.
Some of us may not want to imagine ourselves in these situations, but they do occur in real life. What's great about dating shows is that they not only show us the good parts of dating, but they also reveal the reality and nitty-gritty of relationships.
What are your thoughts about dating shows? Feel free to share it with us in the comments! You can also follow our official Facebook and Twitter pages to be more updated with the most interesting Korean shows!
Written by: Niña Shane Cantero
Niña Shane Cantero is a Digital Marketing intern at PS Media Enterprise and an incoming fourth-year BA Broadcasting student at the Polytechnic University of the Philippines—Manila.
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