Strong, competent female leads, no whining

Descriptions may contain spoilers.
Image - Cinderella and Four Knights

Strong Leading Ladies

When a serial killer strikes women who all have a similar appearance, the police department’s Special Crime Investigation Team is stumped.

While Cha Ji An (Jang Nara), an elite detective, and her fellow colleagues are assessing the latest crime scene, the mysterious Lee Hyun (Seo In Guk) shows up and instantly assesses the trademark attributes of the killer.

Hyun is a genius criminal profiler with a degree in criminal psychology who received an anonymous email that brought him to the crime scene all the way from the United States. The serial killer seems to be sending a personal message to Hyun with the clues he leaves behind, and Hyun wonders if it could be related to an escaped criminal “monster” from his childhood who killed his father and was responsible for the disappearance of his younger brother.

Ji An has known Hyun since childhood and is ecstatic to see her childhood crush again, but Hyun doesn’t seem to remember her. With no leads to capture the serial killer, Ji An and her colleagues solicit Hyun’s help. Can Hyun and Ji An solve the case and find answers to their pasts?

“Remember You” is a 2015 South Korean drama series directed by No Sang Hoon.

Remember You

The Profilers

Lee Young Joon (Park Seo Joon) might be the vice-president of his family’s massively successful company, but that doesn’t mean he has what it takes to do a good job. Accompanied by his incredibly talented secretary, Kim Mi So (Park Min Young) for nine years, she has made him look like the shining star that Young Joon believes he is.
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But after Mi So suddenly decides to quit, her arrogant boss comes to realize that he can’t live without her. Having unknowingly shared a traumatic childhood experience, the pair come to understand that maybe they do belong together after all.
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With jealousy forming over Young Joon’s older brother, Lee Sung Yeon (Lee Tae Hwan), and his growing relationship with Kim Mi So, the boastful executive decides he has to win back his secretary no matter what.

What’s Wrong With Secretary Kim

The Perfect Secretaries Team

A dedicated professional, Sung Deok Mi (Park Min Young) lives for her work as an art gallery curator. Devoting herself to her work, she is exceptional in every way, save one. Beneath that cool, professional facade, Deok Mi carries a dark secret. A secret she desperately wants to keep from the world. A secret that has driven lovers away. A secret that rules every moment of her personal life...

Sung Deok Mi is the ultimate Cha Shi An (Jung Je Won) fangirl.

The devoted manager of a Shi An fansite, Deok Mi eats, breathes, and sleeps for Shi An. He is her sun, her moon. Her entire universe revolves around him. 

This is the secret Deok Mi must hide from the world. 

And hide it she does. At least until Ryan Gold (Kim Jae Wook), the art gallery’s new director, saunters into her life. A once famous painter, the former-artist-turned-director considers himself an indifferent being, unconcerned with the lives of others. But when he uncovers Deok Mi’s secret, everything changes. 

Based on the webtoon, “Noona Fan Dot Com” by Jeon Hye Jin & Kim Jin Hee, “Her Private Life” is a 2019 romantic comedy-drama directed by Hong Jong Chan.

Her Private Life

The Undercover Sasaeng Team

Cha Soo Hyun (Song Hye Kyo) is the daughter of a powerful, political family. She recently divorced her wealthy husband from an arranged marriage. Tired of living life guided by others, she decides to travel overseas. She meets Kim Jin Hyuk (Park Bo Gum), a free-spirited young soul on the way. Despite their differences, they are undeniably drawn to each other.

Will the two find true love amongst their differences?

"Encounter" is a 2018 South Korean drama directed by Park Shin Woo.

Encounter

🌈 My Rainbow, After A Storm ⛈

When the captain of a Korean special forces unit, Yoo Shi Jin (Song Joong Ki), catches a thief on his day off alongside his friend and fellow soldier Seo Dae Young (Jin Goo), he has a chance encounter with a hospital trauma surgeon, Kang Mo Yeon (Song Hye Kyo).
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Although he immediately falls for her, Mo Yeon mistakenly believes Shi Jin is a part of the thief’s criminal gang, but after he proves the truth, they begin an unlikely relationship. Yet it doesn’t take long for the couple to realize they have conflicting views on human life – with Shi Jin having to kill to protect lives while Mo Yeon does everything she can to save them.
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After they decide that these philosophical differences are too much to overcome, they decide to end their relationship and Shi Jin is deployed to the fictional war-torn country of Uruk. Some months later, Mo Yeon is put in the awkward position of rebuffing her hospital director’s advances.
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As revenge, she is assigned to a team of medical volunteers who travel to Uruk, setting up a reunion with Shi Jin where they bond over their differences and discover how powerful love can be.

Descendants of the Sun

The Sunshine Team

Ever since she was a child, field reporter Nam Hong Joo (Suzy) had the ability to see bad events before they occurred. However, she is often powerless to stop them from happening. Living across the street from her family’s restaurant is the prosecutor Jung Jae Chan (Lee Jong Suk) who has seemingly also acquired the ability to foresee future events as well. Jae Chan receives a premonition of Hong Joo being framed for the death of a police officer by the corrupt lawyer Lee Yoo Beom, who was once his tutor, and rushes to prevent it from happening. The police officer (Jung Hae In) survives and also gains the ability to see the future. These three individuals realize that their lives are somehow intertwined through the dreams they keep having of one another.
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Together this unlikely trio work to take down Lee Yoo Beom (Lee Sang Yeob), discover the reason why they were given these abilities, and find ways to protect the ones they love most from harm.&nbsp;
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“While You Were Sleeping” is a 2017 South Korean drama series directed by Oh Choong Hwan. It is not related to the 1995 American film by the same title starring Sandra Bullock. The script is written by Park Hye Ryun, who previously worked with Suzy on her acting debut in the television drama “Dream High” (2011) and with Lee Jong Suk in the drama “I Hear Your Voice” (2013) and “Pinocchio” (2014). The cast of While You Were Sleeping fills the Kdrama with laugh-out-loud moments, seamlessly transitioning to nail-biting sequences that are sure to get you hooked.

While You Were Sleeping

The Dream Team ✨

Is it possible live in the same place at the same time but in a completely different dimension? 

Oh Yeon Joo (Han Hyo Joo) is a second-year cardiothoracic resident doctor. Her father, a famous comic book creator, suddenly disappears one day and then Yeon Joo herself is kidnapped by a strange man covered in blood and taken to a different dimension. 

Kang Chul (Lee Jong Suk) is a former Olympic gold medalist in shooting and self-made millionaire. How will his world intertwine with Yeon Joo’s other-dimension universe? Is Kang Chul the only person who can help Yeon Joo escape from a parallel universe? 

“W” is a 2016 South Korean drama series directed by Jung Dae Yoon.

Cassiopeia

Nestled deep in the heart of Seoul’s thriving downtown sits a curious hotel, the like of which no one has ever seen before. Old beyond measure, the building has stood for millennia, an ever-present testament to the fact that things are not always what they seem. Running this hotel is Jang Man Wol (IU), a greedy, suspicious soul who has spent the past thousand years acting as the establishment’s CEO.

Cursed for a sin she can no longer remember committing, Man Wol is doomed to spend all of the eternity running this odd establishment, catering to the needs of a most peculiar clientele. Her only hope of escape is to find someone who has committed a worse sin than her own but after a thousand years, she’s beginning to lose hope.

However, things take an interesting turn when Goo Chan Sung (Yeo Jin Goo) shows up. Once the youngest assistant manager ever to work at a multinational hotel corporation, Chan Sung finds himself forced to manage the Hotel del Luna because of a deal his father made with Man Wol years ago. A stickler for rules and regulations, he’s a perfectionist to the extreme but that may be exactly what this odd establishment and its cursed CEO needs.

A tale of old curses, lost souls, and unexpected surprises, “Hotel Del Luna” is a 2019 mystery, romance, fantasy drama directed by Oh Choong Hwan.

Hotel Del Luna

🏨  Team Hotel Del Luna  🌕

JTBC

Do Bong Soon (Park Bo Young) is no ordinary woman. She is the latest in a long line of women who possess monumental strength. However, Bong Soon’s incredible powers can only be used for good. If she happens to use her abilities for selfish reasons or to harm others, she’ll end up like her mother, Hwang Jin Yi (Shim Hye Jin), who lost her powers forever.
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Although Do Bong Soon uses her bloodline’s remarkable force for good, her one true desire is to create a video game where she appears as the main character. While she struggles to find employment as a developer, Bong Soon’s abilities help her secure a position as the bodyguard for Ahn Min Hyuk (Park Hyung Sik), the chaebol heir and the CEO of the gaming company, Ainsoft.
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As Bong Soon helps her new boss track down someone making dangerous threats against him, she also strives to capture attention from her childhood friend and rookie police detective Guk Doo (Ji Soo), who’s searching for an insidious kidnapper. Between helping to solve both cases, Bong Soon finds great romance and humor along the way.

Strong Woman Do Bong Soon

Small but Mighty Team

Sohu

Getting inside the head of a violent criminal is not easy. 

But Simon Bo (Wallace Huo), a brilliant criminal psychologist, has the ability to get into the minds of even the most mysterious and violent criminals. He’s a professor at The University of Maryland and works as an analyst and advisor on the police department’s most violent or difficult cases. 

With the help of his young assistant, Jenny Jian (Sandra Ma), Simon delves into the thoughts and intentions of the criminal mind. As the daughter of a veteran police investigator with a deep sense of justice, can Jenny help Simon open up emotionally as they work together to solve crimes? 

“Love Me, If You Dare” is a 2015 Chinese drama series directed by Zhang Kai Zhou. It is based on the novel Close Your Eyes, Stay Close to Me by Ding Mo.

Love Me If You Dare

Gone with the Shirt Team

Sohu TV

In Season 1 of “Well Intended Love,” out-of-luck actress Xia Lin (Simona Wang) is diagnosed with leukemia but happens to run into a controlling conglomerate CEO named Ling Yi Zhou (Xu Kai Cheng) who would make a compatible bone marrow donor for her.

She asks him to help. He agrees, but only on the condition that he marries her!

Meanwhile, in a parallel universe, Xia Lin is actually a very famous actress and she is yet to meet Ling Yi Zhou.

However, their fates become intertwined in this universe, too, when Xia Lin attends a gala and ends up getting into an embarrassing spat with Ling Yi Zhou.

Things get worse for the duo when damning photos of their fight are published online.

They decided to hold a joint press conference to clear the air, but this event takes a sudden and bizarre turn when Ling Yi Zhou suddenly tells the media that they are actually engaged!

Can the duo keep up the presence, or will their cover be blown? And could this bizarre set of circumstances pave their way to true love? Or could a love rival derail the romantic gravy trail?

“Well Intended Love Season 2” is a 2020 Chinese drama series directed by Wu Qiang.

Well Intended Love Season 2

The Well-Intended Team

JSTV

Bei Wei Wei (Zheng Shuang) has both beauty and brains. A computer goddess, she aspires to be an online game developer. 

In her spare time, she plays her favorite role-playing game "A Chinese Ghost Story." After her online husband, Zhenshui Wuxiang (Zhang He), dumps her, she gets a message from the number one player Yixiao Naihe - to be her online husband! 

Little does she know that Naihe is also her college senior Xiao Nai (Yang Yang)! 

Will their incredible online chemistry lead to a real life romance? 

Love O2O is a 2016 Chinese drama.

Shows

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