| Sandglass | |
|---|---|
| Also known as | 모래시계 |
| Genre | Drama |
| Format | Television series |
| Country of origin | South Korea |
| Language(s) | Korean |
| No. of seasons | 1 |
| No. of episodes | 24 |
| Production | |
| Producer(s) | Kim Jong Hak |
| Running time | Monday thru Thursday, 22:00 PM (KST) |
| Broadcast | |
| Original channel | SBS |
| Original run | 10 January 1995 – 16 February 1995 |
Sandglass is a Korean drama dealing with South Korea's politically turbulent recent past, airing on SBS in 1995. The drama lasted 24 episodes, and is one of the highest-rated dramas in Korean history.
Contents |
The Sandglass (The Hourglass) is the story of two men whose friendship is put to the test through the 1970s and 1980s, one of Korea's politically tumultuous periods. Park Tae-soo (Choi Min-soo), tough and loyal, grows up to become a gangster and Kang Woo-suk (Park Sang Won), smart with firm moral values, grows up to become a prosecutor. Yoon Hye-rin (Ko Hyun Jung), a beautiful and spirited daughter of a very wealthy casino owner, is a classmate of Woo-suk in college. Hye-rin is introduced to Tae-soo via Woo-suk and they subsequently fall in love.
A notable aspect of the series is its handling of the 1980 Gwangju Democratization Movement, an event during which the head of the military junta (which had taken over South Korea after the assassination of President Park Chung Hee), General Chun Doo Hwan, sent paratroopers into Kwangju to put down the rebellion resulting in a massacre of hundreds of civilians. Still a taboo subject during the airing of the series, the violent scenes (based on individual accounts), resulted in shock and grief for the South Koreans at that time (the mid 90's South Korea still had not come to terms with what happened after governments muzzled the free speech) to the extent that after the drama had gone to air, there was a visible output of films dealing with the subject (such as The Petal (1996) and Peppermint Candy (2000)) and even influenced the prosecution of ex-President Chun Doo Hwan responsible for the massacre (he was finally jailed, decades after the incident).
| episode | Seoul | Korea |
|---|---|---|
| ep. 1 | 30.7% | 29.8% |
| ep. 2 | 32.5% | 34.1% |
| ep. 3 | 36.6% | 35.9% |
| ep. 4 | 37.8% | 36.9% |
| ep. 5 | 40.3% | 40.1% |
| ep. 6 | 41.5% | 41.7% |
| ep. 7 | 43.2% | 43.3% |
| ep. 8 | 43.8% | 43.9% |
| ep. 9 | 44.1% | 44.0% |
| ep.10 | 45.9% | 46.5% |
| ep.11 | 47.0% | 47.9% |
| ep.12 | 48.3% | 48.7% |
| ep.13 | 48.5% | 48.9% |
| ep.14 | 56.6% | 55.7% |
| ep.15 | 59.1% | 59.6% |
| ep.16 | 60.0% | 60.3% |
| ep.17 | 60.1% | 60.2% |
| ep.18 | 60.2% | 60.1% |
| ep.19 | 60.3% | 61.6% |
| ep.20 | 60.6% | 64.1% |
| ep.21 | 63.4% | 65.7% |
| ep.22 | 63.3% | 64.4% |
| ep. 23 | 63.9% | 62.1% |
| ep.24 | 64.5% | 64.3% |
| average | 50.5% | 50.8% |