“The King: Eternal Monarch” Under Fire For Its Excessive Use Of Product Placement, Is It Too Much Or Are Netizens Overreacting?

Published Categorized as K-Dramas and K-Movies
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“The King: The Eternal Monarch” is under fire, again!

The popular SBS drama has been generating a lot of controversies since it began airing, some justified while others not so much. The drama has landed itself in hot waters again for its excessive use of PPL (Product Placement).

Product Placement is when a company pays the drama production to place its products throughout the series, the products are then used by its cast and it’s a good advertising strategy especially if the drama generates a lot of buzz.

Since “The King: The Eternal Monarch” was one of the most anticipated releases of 2020, many companies lined up to have their products shown in the drama and its most recent episode generated backlash for its excessive advertisement.

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“The King: The Eternal Monarch” integration of PPL is being discussed because netizens argue that it feels forced and unnatural, one particular scene shows Lee Min Ho’s character raving about a coffee product saying,

“The first taste is rich and the after taste is clean,”

The character goes on to praise the product even more but the scene came off very weird and unnatural to viewers. But that’s not the only PPL in episode 8, there are a lot more.

Other scenes included advertising for fried kimchi, futuristic face masks, lip gloss, and boba. In one other scene, Kim Go Eun’s character is seen putting a lipstick all over her face only to then advertise another product (the fried Kimchi) in another scene almost instantly.

What do you think of this?


My Personal Thoughts

The previous episodes of “The King: The Eternal Monarch” were okay in terms of its use of PPL, and honestly I don’t mind it because it’s not even catered towards me, I live far far away. But I was surprised that the boba drink was PPL, I just thought it was the café’s signature drink and it wasn’t available in real life, idk why I thought that.

Other than that, I thought the scene with Lee Min Ho was especially cringy because it almost felt as if he was going to look me in the eyes and start advertising the product to me, it felt so out of place and it interrupted the plot, the same goes for the scene with Kim Go Eun. It felt like a break in between takes and it feels so forced.

I know many Lee Min Ho fans are sick of people picking at this project but honestly, sometimes, it’s like the production team is asking for it. It’s not the fault of the actors and everyone knows that, but I guess, people expected a lot better from such a huge production. I think there is a lot of criticism because it’s a Lee Min Ho drama. I highly doubt others would care about less popular dramas doing the same.

There is another drama called “Find Me In Your Memory” that keeps trying so hard to advertise Samsung flip phones, but its not generating the same response because its not the popular.  

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By Hilda Moore

Hi all, my name is Hilda and I am a huge kdrama fan, I am responsible for covering news in relation to Kdramas on jazminemedia.com~ My all time fav kdramas are: My Mister, Hotel Del Luna and Kill Me, Heal Me.

1 comment

  1. PPL is expected in any K drama but the way it was done in this episode was particularly egregious. Whole scenes were set up for no other reason except to sell product. From the way Jangmi holds the Kimchi packet with a knowing smirk then JTE taking a bite and remarking “it’s so refreshing” and then go right into Jangmi responding to a legit question from JTE with “what is that little gadget”…It was just too much in the face of the audience and stopped the drama dead in its tracks. Don’t even get me started on the coffee drink…that phone call between the characters was nothing more than a commercial. The PPL made the exchange between the characters unnatural and stopped any story flow which this drama has precious little moments of in the first place. Other products were advertised too but they fit in with the story and/or scene such as the Aston Martin. There was just a beauty shot of the product as the character gets out. That’s PPL done well.

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