Most Korean dramas are excellent and addictive.  Once you start watching them, you're hooked.  Unfortunately, Air City is not most Korean dramas.  And it's not a good one to start with if you're new to KDramas and you want a favorable opinion of the genre.  For a good intro to historical stories, try Jumong or Dae Jang Geum, if you like romantic comedy, try Lawyers of the Great Korean Republic or My Lovely Sam Soon, and for heavy-hitting drama, try Ruler of Your Own World or Tazza.  Don't start with this one!

 

And it's not the fault of the cast - they're all great.  Lee Jung Jae in his return to TV dramas does the best he can with his part.  And so does his romantic counterpart, Choi Ji Woo.  But most of the rest of them are good comic/character actors, and it's just not that kind of show.  Maybe if Air City were written as a straight-up comedy they could have pulled it off, but as a wanna-be intense spy/romance drama with airport-y stuff thrown in, it soon begins to drag.  It's mainly the limited scope the show has to work with.  Being set in an airport causes certain limitations to plot lines.  The first episode is brilliant - all action, spy stuff, fun characters.  But then they all end up stuck in one airport.  When they begin to run out of plot (the bird episode springs to mind), all hope is lost.  

 

Basically it's a romance-action-spy-thriller-meets-airport-sim kind of thing.  It''s awkward at best, dull and strained at worst, and it goes absolutely nowhere in the end.  But if you love everything about air travel and flight security and have always fantasized about running an airport (or making out with one of the leading characters), give it a go.  And I'll still forgive you for cringing during that triumphant handkerchief-token Ride of the Suitcases during the baggage-routing trouble episode…

 

Here's a sweet little music video highlighting the more romantic scenes.  Note the line about being bored with airplanes landing and taking off.   Pretty much sums it all up: