President Dad Manga ("Manhwa") Review

I don't know why, but our air-headed heroine doesn't look like a highschooler, lol

Publisher: Tokyopop
Author: Rhim Ju-Yeon
Volumes: 1-7

So it's been like, what?  9 years since the first volume was released?  Funny thing is that the only reason why I'm motivated to do a review of this now old series is that I was talking about manhwa with another girl, and this series I owned in my bookshelf came to mind.  And since I've been leaving this blog on the backburner and I actually have time in the summer, I might as well start this blog back up.

So anyways... I'm gonna review the entire series so SPOILERS AHEAD.  But I'm just gonna go over the story and the actual review will come at the very end at some post far, far away, lol.  



The story starts off with Ami Won, your typical average, high school student (Seriously?  Whoever did the summary on the back cover couldn't just omit that clichéd description?), realizes that she is now the daughter of the next president of South Korea.  She has a sadistic Aunt who is supposed to be her dead mother's substitute in raising her.  Last, but not least, Ami has a dad who is just as air-headed as she is, but he has his moments of mood swings, lol.  The moment Ami steps out of her house, shit starts going down.  And when I mean "shit" I mean a ring of light appears below her as if to indicate that her "spidey sense" is tingling in reaction to some kind of energy (WTF?). 

The right page starts from there and you get...

...this, the left page shows that our heroine is fangasming over a poster featuring her Justin Bieber.

Weirdness aside, her clumsiness got her 15 minutes of fame on national Korean television by knocking over a fish tank.  This causes the Korean S.W.A.T team to come in thinking it's terrorism, lol.  As a result, this causes her dad and aunt to go ASDFJKL;!!!!! when they see her on television and have to put her under the radar.  So eventually, Ami's aunt on her dad's side shows up to her school to kidnap her to her cousin Bi-Na's high school acceptance party as a way to properly introduce Ami to society as a decent lady (which she's not at the moment).  Ami shows up in a nice dress, says hi to her cousin, and her cousin becomes a BITCH.

 After Ami does some socializing here and there, a CLUMSY waiter over-pours her glass and soils her dress.  She gets compensation with an expensive dress, but is manipulated by Bi-Na to go an apologize to the manager.  Ami gets all chicken-shit for something she hasn't done and runs out of the hotel.  Not realizing that she has a dress shoe and sneaker on, she slips and almost falls on a dude only to have this happen to her: 

BOOM!!!  And that's how you meet the main love interest  >:D

 So she wakes up, the boy turns out to be Moo-Hyun Kang, and he drops her off in front of her place.  A
 Cinderella moment happens and that's when I'm like "TEAM MOO-HYUN FOR THE WIN!!!!!!".  Too bad for her that foreshadowing indicates that Moo-Hyun is someone dangerous.  The next day, she is excused for the rest of the semester cause she's the Korean president's daughter who needs to prepare for inauguration.  She feels like she's been kicked out and wander the streets head hung low until she sees her savior, Rick.  I swear, my respect for our lovely heroine is diminishing every time she fangasms over her Justin Bieber.  The thing here, however, is that to me the guy doesn't look like Rick cause he has that generic short haircut and not like long, flowing locks of hair.  So Ami makes an ass out of herself in a godawful wonderful attempt to get the guy's attention by awkwardly dropping her wallet.  He ignored it.  She drops one of Rick's CD albums on the ground and the guy notices, but he's trying to figure out where to dispose it in the recyclables or waste, LOL  XD.  She has enough of this tomfoolery so she throws her schoolbag down (WTH?) and this was enough to catch his attention.  She's like "YOU RICK, NO?!" and he's like "WTH are you talking about?".  And then she realized she made herself look like a joke.  They walk together through a park and the guy cheers her up by singing one of Rick's songs in the singer's actual voice.  Amazed by this sorcery, Ami asks who he is and he says that he is a bodyguard contracted by her late mother to watch over Ami.  The bodyguard walks over to a trash bin to find a wooden stake and tells her to hit him as hard as she can.  She's like "Wha?" and he says that hitting him will determine whether or not she is worthy to protect.  This makes her pissed and she steps up to the plate and BAM!!!

Ouch that has got to hurt, my respect for Ami just rose up two-fold

 Turns out that Ami passed and she obtained her own bodyguard.  Fast forward to the first day of high school and already Ami messes up by sitting in the wrong class.  Just as our heroine is about to be crushed of embarrassment of being in the wrong class (trust me, I can relate), she is saved by a mysterious girl and walks towards the direction of her actual class.  Wondering who she is, Ami's intuition kicks in and she realizes that the girl is actually Fahrenheit in disguise o__O.  Apparently, Fahrenheit is some kind of non-human freak who can change his physical appearance from top to bottom whether it's growing a pair of boobs or balls (or none at all).  So in a series of events, Ami's best friend, Eui-Jung, feels replaced, Moo-Hyun gets stripped for some cash (which there isn't any at all), and there's a total lesbo moment going on between Ami and Fahrenheit where he uses Rick's voice in a girl's body.  Moments later, Moo-Hyun shows up as the obligatory transfer student and doesn't remember Ami.  

Aww... Poor Ami needs a hug... Especially when Fahrenheit laughs at the awkward moment

 So next major event is Ami's bitchy, old aunt making a scene in order to push for favor of being the first lady.  The aunt abuses a house servant who said there aren't any dresses for the aunt to wear to the ceremony and then Ami steps up to the plate.  This made me give her more points for growing a pair of balls to go to the inauguration ceremony to be the first lady so she can save the house servant from abuse.  Aaaaannd... the volume closes with the aunt losing and it turns out that it was Fahrenheit in disguise as the house servant, lol WTF?  

Aaaaaannnd nooooowwww... We move on to volume 2.  This volume picks up where the first one ended where Ami goes under a makeover and actually looks a lot more mature.  Too bad all that effort into the makeover crashes and burns when Ami gets stage fright from looking at the sea of people.  So as a last ditch effort, this happens: 

AWWWW YEAH!!!  ANOTHER LESBIAN MOMENT!!!  Point 1 for Fahrenheit (Yeah, that's him again lol)

It was like WTF?! So Ami clears her head and sees everyone as pumpkins (lol, what?).  Pumpkins remind her of the time she spent with her late mom so she's at peace and wins over the people of Korea.  Ami's aunt (the nicer one) doesn't want Ami in the news anymore and hinted that Ami's mom died in a way similar to being exposed to the news.  So our cute heroine goes on a blind date and has a horrible wardrobe.  She was gonna leave the house in tacky clothing until Fahrenheit popped a couple of bullets around her and acts as if someone is harming her, XD.  Ami gets hooked up with a gold digger of a dude who promised the girl who hooked him up with tons of Louis Vuitton and Prada (two things I didn't understand in middle school, lol).  Fahrenheit gets separated from Ami and gets hooked up with a less-than-average looking guy.  Ami makes her dating session awkward with her frugality, Fahrenheit makes things awkward with her date, and Moo-Hyun is following Ami under North Korean embassy orders.  The final kicker is that Ami sends out the wrong signals to her date and he thinks she's into him so he makes a move.  Moo-Hyun sweeps in to break his arm and bursts his bubble that Ami wasn't into her and comedy ensues:

And then what you get next is Moo-Hyun asking Ami out:

At first I was like YAY!  TEAM MOO-HYUN WIIIINS!!!!!! but then I realized it's a misuse of the language, lol

So now Ami is up on cloud 9 in joy now that she has a boyfriend at age 14/15.  Fahrenheit kissed a dude (yeah... something about going out with a lot of people).  So the two act like your run-of-the-mill stupid, lovey-dovey couple (mayber even bigger ones) only to have the whole sky falling down when OMFG, MOO-HYUN AND AMI ARE COUSINS.  Thus this destroys Team Moo-Hyun into pieces, and it's so early in the game too.  How on earth will our heroine find another romance in order to continue calling this manhwa a romantic graphic novel?  Go to Part 2 of this review coming soon...