The Anxiety-Provoking Plot Twists Of "Empress Ki" Still Generate Top Ratings

This week the two leading dramas offered plenty of plot twists for viewers to be anxious about.

"Empress Ki" is now in its final episodes and yet there is still enough diabolical court intrigue and cross plotting to keep the pace of the drama moving along at breathtaking speed. Wang Yoo, played by Joo Jin Mo, was brought to the Yuan capital on trumped up charges and would have been executed except for the intervention of Seungnyang, played by Ha Ji Won. Seungnyang found out that the prince who hates her is actually her long lost son.

"He is the son you thought died," Bang Sin Woo tells her. And that is heartbreaking news for so many reasons.

Such intense developments earned the drama ratings of 25.5 on its most recent episode. That is 1.2 percent higher than the previous episode. For a while it seemed sure that the drama would reach or surpass 30 percent in the ratings but that has not been the case.

Fortunately, history has told us how this story ends, so that we don't have to be all that anxious for Seungnyang's future or little Ayu, the emperor-to-be.

Meanwhile "God's Gift - 14 Days" is more like one of those wooden Russian puzzle dolls in every episode. There are mysteries within mysteries. Lee Bo Young's character thinks she has solved the mystery of her daughter's disappearance only to find more villains lurking in the shadows. And viewers think they know a character only to have that character present an entirely different part of him or herself. Dangerous crazy people are everywhere in this drama. Which makes you all the more concerned for the safety of Lee Bo Young's drama daughter Saet Byul.

By touching on every parents' worst fear, "God's Gift - 14 Days" reached 8.9 percent in the ratings. The ratings dropped only 0.3 percent from the previous episode's 9.2 percent.

"Full Sun," which has struggled to compete with these two supercharged dramas, never managed to make decent ratings. The drama, which stars Yoon Kye Sang and Han Ji Hye, never rose above 5.2 percent and ratings dropped as low as 2.2 percent. The last episode earned only 2.7 percent. It rose slightly, 0.1 percent from a 2.6 percent rating.

"Full Sun" did not have much of a chance competing against performances by last year's Daesang winner Lee Bo Young and the actress who is likely to win next year's Daesang, Ha Ji Won.