SBS Romance Sageuk Lovers of the Red Sky Premieres with 6.6% Ratings and Audience Surprise to Strong Fantasy Element with Tons of CGI

Talk about burying the lede, SBS. Perhaps the delay in starting promotions for sageuk drama Lovers of the Red Sky (Red Sky) is because the network couldn’t figure out which element to lead with. It decided on the female painter empowerment aspect and then the comedic meet-cute fated OTP piece. It totally missed the giant elephant in the room that is the straight up fantasy with goddess and demon smoke monsters and eye swapping and CGI up the wazoo. The first episode was WILD peeps, and in a good interesting way because I powered through that sucker and never felt bored for a moment even though adult leads Kim Yoo Jung and Ahn Hyo Seob don’t even show up. Episode 1 was the story setting with the ancient battle and balance of power between the life giving Mountain Goddesss granny and the death bringing Smoke Demon devil (the smoky version of the Chernabog straight out of Fantasia), how the King used the Smoke Demon to obtain power and then try to seal it away, two babies born on the same night – one with sight and the other without, and how the Smoke Demon is unleashed by yet another power hungry royal kiddo ten years later and then gets sealed into our poor male lead and his eyes transferred to our plucky female lead. This drama reminds of me the strong fantasy/supernatural sageuk Tale of a Night Watchman but with a tighter story and also stronger leads. I can’t wait for the second episode today!