Best School Dramas

School dramas are the best! This is my ranked list of the best school and college dramas I’ve seen so far. My criteria for inclusion is based on three rules:

1) it must be a true school drama (not just a drama with few scenes in school)

2) it must be really worth watching

3) it must include some elements of romance  (no school drama can be called such without having some love in it)

For example a drama like Pinocchio is very good, but only few episodes have school life as setting, so I didn’t include it. On the other hand a drama like Switch Girl is a true school drama from the beginning to the end, but it is awfully directed and not worth watching, so I didn’t include it. Also dramas like Gokusen are out of the list because of lack of romance (yes, there is a latent attraction hinted between shina and yankumi in the series, but it never become a romance), even if I consider it a masterpiece.

I have included Korean, Japanese and Taiwanese dramas. I don’t include Chinese dramas because of the horrible censorship, the forced redubbing and the soulless direction.

For your reference: in the asian drama world usually the quality goes in this order:

JAPANESE ANIME > KOREAN DRAMAS > TAIWANESE DRAMAS > JAPANESE DRAMAS > CHINESE DRAMAS

But there are exceptions to this rule, and I will report them in my reviews.

P.S. I also recommend this wonderful post about school doramas (japanese dramas):

https://mydramalist.com/article/the-most-interesting-heisei-school-dramas-by-goo-ranking-011013197