Sex. Love. Literature.

The SLL crew takes a trip to the seaside and deep dives into another Korean drama: Netflix's Hometown Cha Cha Cha. This episode, we’re joined by friend/spouse-of-the-show Andrew Cooper as we chat about the "manic pixie dream guy," the allures of small-town neighborhood stories, and ask ourselves how much rom com is too much rom com 🤔
Corinne was a guest on the Afternoona Delight Podcast episode "All About Kdrama Kissing," which you can listen to here, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can learn more about the Noonas on their podcast website: https://www.afternoonadelight.com/.
You can find Hometown Cha Cha Cha on Netflix.
Don't forget to subscribe to Sex. Love. Literature! You can find us on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook @SexLoveLit.

Episode Content Warning: Brief Mention of Suicide and Abuse.
Introducing La Petite SLL, our new mini-episodes! This time, we take a quick look at the use of the tropes “Love Makes You Evil” and “If I Can’t Have You, No One Can” in the popular Korean Webtoon turned drama True Beauty. What happens when a female friendship turns sour because of jealousy over a man, and why do we hate it so much 😒??
Don't forget to subscribe to Sex. Love. Literature! You can find us on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook @SexLoveLit. Mention of abuse at (10:55) and of suicide at (23:44)

In this "La Petite," we check in about pop culture that has brought us joy in the past and present, and hopefully will continue do so in the future. We start off with a round of “What’s [Was] Sparking Joy” for us in January, move on to thinking about our favorite pop culture of 2021, and then what we’re looking forward to in 2022. What media are you looking forward to this year?
You can find Corinne on episode 199 of Vox Popcast, Nancy Drew & the Hidden Staircase to Pop Culture Immortality~
Don't forget to subscribe to Sex. Love. Literature! You can find us on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook @SexLoveLit.
All the lit discussed this episode:

• Midnight Poppy Land by Lilydusk
• Our Beloved Summer
• Ranking of Kings
• Bad Mode by Utada Hikaru
• Winterkeep by Kristin Cashore
• Hospital Playlist
• Mad for Each Other
• Daebak Realty
• Doom At Your Service
• Yumi's Cells
• Arcane
• Jujutsu Kaitsen
• Welcome to Your Fantasy (podcast)
• Afternoona Delight (podcast)
• In the Serpent’s Wake by Rachel Hartman (and Tess of the Road)
• Into the Spider-verse 2
• His Dark Materials
• Everything, Everywhere, All At Once
• Destiny 2

(This episode was recorded on January 22.)
The SLL Theme music is “Pluck It Up” by Dan Henig.
“What’s Sparking Joy” BGM is Candy-Coloured Sky by Catmosphere | https://soundcloud.com/ctmsphr; Released by Paper Crane Collective; Music promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.com; Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License; https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en_US
We used a room tone from http://www.freesound.org/people/klankbeeld/

This episode, on the recommendation of an SLL listener, we’re excited to do a deep dive into the Japanese Drama, Rinko-San Wants to Try. We get into how the show complicates conceptions of virginity, plays with the friends with benefits trope, and maybe get in our feelings a lil bit about a second female lead who really got under Ayanni’s skin.

As two people who study, analyze, and have a literal podcast about media, we stand in solidarity with the SAG-AFTRA strike. Without the labor of the actors currently on strike–along with their counterparts in other industries/countries, who also deserve fair wages and labor protections–none of the works we discuss here or in other episodes would exist.

Lit discussed this episode: Get Up EP by NewJeans, Pop Culture Happy Hour (this episode specifically: https://www.npr.org/2023/08/15/1193958358/newjeans-is-a-new-kind-of-k-pop-juggernaut), My Dearest, Hit the Spot, Because This is My First Life, Lost You Forever, Friends With Benefits, No Strings Attached, Nevertheless..., Extraordinary Attorney Woo, Sex Education

Bonus reading (aka works cited & consulted):

• Jones, Gretchen. "'Ladies' Comics': Japan's Not-So-Underground Market in Pornography for Women." U.S.-Japan Women's Journal, English Supplement, no. 22, 2002, pp. 3-31.
• Lieber-Milo, S. “Cute at an Older Age: A Case Study of Otona-Kawaii”. Mutual Images Journal, no. 10, Dec. 2021, pp. 93-108, doi:10.32926/2021.10.lie.otona.
• Sato, Kumiko. "From Hello Kitty to Code Row Kewpie: A Postwar Cultural History of Cuteness in Japan." Asian Intercultural Contacts, vol. 14, no. 2, 2009. https://www.asianstudies.org/wp-content/uploads/from-hello-kitty-to-cod-roe-kewpie-a-postwar-cultural-history-of-cuteness-in-japanA.pdf

Don't forget to subscribe to Sex. Love. Literature! You can find us on Instagram and Threads @SexLoveLit.

The SLL Theme music is “Pluck It Up” by Dan Henig. What’s Sparking Joy BGM is "Candy-Coloured Sky" by Catmosphere | https://soundcloud.com/ctmsphr; Released by Paper Crane Collective; Music promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.com; Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License; https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en_US

Recorded September 2023

SLL is a podcast relishing the romantic, the sexy, and the scandalous in pop-culture. English academics by day and podcasters by night, hosts Ayanni and Corinne take a semi-scholarly look at why the “sex-stuff” in media matters in the bedroom—and beyond.