irmar

Yes, but was it realistic that there wasn't a roster of the people who would be invited to speak? That the sister had invited that politician behind Gu Won's back and didn't even tell him or that Gu Won didn't bother to cancel with the politician, let him know he wouldn't speak after all? How was this organized? It bothered me a bit, because it wasn't explained in a way that would make sense.

I think that it was the respite, and now the sister will start her attack. Of course she will learn about the romance and she will attack Sa Rang viciously.

Yes, we are supposed to understand that what we see is what he does before work, after work and in the weekends and assume that the rest of the time, when he's not courting Sa Rang, he actually does work. But I agree with you that it would have been nice of the screenwriters also show him, albeit briefly, ehm... managing the hotel.

What's with the friends' screaming in horror as if they saw a giant cockroach? This is something I've seen in many Korean dramas, they treat intimate relationships as if it were something terrible and unconceivable. The hypocrisy of it is sometimes disgusting, although this one is of course a comedy.

Yes, I know it wasn't expected to and it was okay (the watching point was a cool feature while it lasted), but today, if we had to leave MDL, I don't know where we could find something that would offer the same features.

Americans of Greek origin, yes. This doesn't change the fact that the portrayal was super-cliché, exaggerated and at times embarrassing. Every single stereotype you can think of about the Greeks was there, all the boxes were ticked.
And you are rich, to call racist a person who was married to an Arab for 12 years.

That's how she always is. Remember her in The King Loves? But now her acting has gotten much better, I must say.

Maybe their two mothers are connected, and our couple had met as children - which is a must in this kind of drama Not putting it into spoilers because it's just a wild guess.

She can keep her religion. The marriage, however, is only legal if she belongs to the other two monotheistic religions, Judaism and Christianity. If she's a Buddhist, Hindu, atheist, it's non-valid.
"And (lawful in marriage are) chaste women from among the believers and chaste women from among those who were given the Scripture."(Quran 5:5)
However getting a divorce for a woman in Muslim countries is not a piece of cake. She has to prove that there are the accepted reasons for it. Even more so if she's a non-Muslim.
If her husband dies, she and her children will have as guardians her late husband's father, or if he's dead, his uncle, his brother etc... Any male of her husband's family. And, if they get divorced, her children will go with the husband's family. By law, physical custody of any children born of the marriage is automatically transferred to the father at the age of ten for boys and twelve for girls. New child-custody laws were enacted in 2005, permitting a divorced mother to have custody of her children until they are 15 years old. But those laws are only for Muslim women! If the mother is non-Muslim, they will leave the baby with her only until he is weaned, at the age of two, Because, being a non-Muslim, how could she be able to teach them about Islam properly? At least this is Egyptian law, there might be some differences in other countries.
(I have read the Egyptian family law book from cover to cover before my own marriage, that's how I know. I also spoke with two Greek lawyers in Alexandria. They told me a very well-known case of a Greek woman there (she even had my name!) who, after her husband divorced her, had to become her children's nanny in order to see them and be with them when her husband re-married. And it was considered kind of the man -and his new wife- to allow it.
It seems that Civil Law was made more European, with the sole exception of family law, which remained very near the Islamic law.
Non-Muslim women who marry Muslim men are subject to the Shari’a, but are not automatically entitled to all the privileges accorded by that law, such as inheritance rights.
Regardless of familial relationship, non-Muslims cannot inherit from Muslims.
https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/document/E-7-2010-0674_CS.html
A man inherits double the share of a female.
A wife inherits one-eighth of her husband’s estate if they have children and one-quarter if they are childless.
A daughter inherits half of either parent’s estate if she is an only child. If there is more than one daughter, they inherit two thirds of the estate.

If you're interested in the marriage and divorce laws in Egypt, read this page , a report from Human Rights Watch.
https://www.hrw.org/reports/2004/egypt1204/1.htm
As for the Human rights record of Saudi Arabia, here are some facts (from 2018)
https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2019/country-chapters/saudi-arabia#49dda6
What about United Arab Emirates?
"Discrimination on the basis of sex and gender is not included in the definition of discrimination in the UAE’s 2015 anti-discrimination law.
Federal Law No. 28 of 2005 regulates personal status matters. Some of its provisions discriminate against women. For a woman to marry, her male guardian must conclude her marriage contract; men have the right to unilaterally divorce their wives, whereas a woman must apply for a court order to obtain a divorce; a woman can lose her right to maintenance if, for example, she refuses to have sexual relations with her husband without a lawful excuse; and women are required to “obey” their husbands. A woman may be considered disobedient, with few exceptions, if she decides to work without her husband’s consent.
UAE law permits domestic violence. Article 53 of the penal code allows the imposition of “chastisement by a husband to his wife and the chastisement of minor children” so long as the assault does not exceed the limits of Islamic law. Marital rape is not a crime. In 2010, the Federal Supreme Court issued a ruling, citing the penal code, that sanctions husbands’ beating and infliction of other forms of punishment or coercion on their wives, provided they do not leave physical marks."
https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2019/country-chapters/united-arab-emirates#d91ede

My point is that the worst representation of Muslim countries is done by themselves, their laws, their practices, in short their culture. Not by a Korean comedy.

Very calmly? Google translate says that this is what she wrote, so since you understand Arabic, please correct where this is wrong. Are all these parts wrong? Was the language milder?
"not allow", "we will be hostile and fight anyone who dares to do so", "we will bring you down" etc?
Translation according to Google:
We from Saudi Arabia do not allow someone to talk about our culture in an unreal way. We know your culture, so you must educate and know our culture before you show it in an inappropriate and unreal way at all.
We will not allow the rulers and the people to underestimate us, and we will be hostile and fight anyone who dares to do so, and we will bring you down just as we raised you, for we are great from a great country.

"a collection of everything negative". I think you haven't watched the two episodes, or if you did, you had pre-conceived ideas.
I saw a kind, humorous and courteous gentleman, a bit immature, yes, but neither entitled nor ruthless nor snob. Classy in his tastes, not tacky at all. He played a prank on Won, his old classmate with whom there was probably a past, but it was harmless. All in all he behaved quite well. I found him charming. Even his courting, although insistent, was never vulgar or menacing or whatever, and he took rejection with a smile. From what I've read and heard about the real Arab princes and their family, I don't think all of them would be like that, frankly. Drinking is the least of their sins.

I disagree with cutting off that scene, giving in to stupid bullying. However it seems they did it because they don't want to lose the money from streaming rights and international viewers.

You can see that scene on Kissasian https://kissasian.mx/Drama/King-the-Land/Episode-7?id=76131
I saw it. I don't know if you can even call it a scene, it lasts a few seconds. He is in a bar, surrounded by women, and answers the phone when Won calls him to tell him to choose to stay at his hotel and not to the other one. They exchange two sentences each and then hang up. That's all. But the women around him and the glass in his hand were enough to spark controversy.

Alcoholic? Because he was shown drinking once in a party? The next time, when he held the event for Sarang, Won poured him a whole glass and he said "do you want me to die"? Expressing that he thought it exaggerated to drink a whole glass of wine. That's not what an alcoholic looks like. All the Korean characters, on the other side, are shown drinking much much more. Did you see, when Sarang drinks with her friends, the number of beer bottles on the table? I bet you cannot even tell from memory how many there were on that table, for only three girls. For Koreans, drinking is something very normal, they don't think that someone is an alcoholic until he or she is completely gone!

Holds a lot of significance in their culture? Do I have to re-watch that episode? I thought it was a thing for tourists.

The point is, after watching the actual episodes, that he was portrayed as a very decent fellow, good-natured and a gentleman. Yes, he had a fondness for women. But that's not a crime. He never imposed himself, he was very considerate of Sarang, and took rejection handsomely. He also played a prank on Won (maybe because he considered him stuck up and a snob in college, so he wanted his little revenge?), but at the end they parted in a very friendly way. There was nothing negative about the character, and the actor was charming and nuanced. He wasn't a comic caricature. I mean, as caricatures go, the character of secretary No is much more of a caricature than him.
I was much more pissed at the caricature of the Indian guru or monk in Strong Woman So-And-So (I never remember Korean names, sorry!). Yet the Indians, although displeased, didn't raise such an uproar about it, although it would have been understandable.
Did we Greeks scoff at "My big fat Greek wedding"? which was chock-full of distasteful clichés and caricature. Yet we good-naturedly laughted about it.

Yes, usually when you see a new couple having nice moments together, it means there will be angst coming in the next episodes.

That unnamed streaming site never had the level of organizing your watched shows that you can see here. And of course you cannot include those you have watched "elsewhere". I also always come here to find out how many episode the shows has, which at the unnamed streaming site is not said, at least not before it finishes airing. )By the way, why aren't we naming it? Is it taboo here?)

I'm your woman. I waited until two days ago and I'm binge-watching, I am up to episode 8 and I'm loving it! It is almost as good as Secretary Kim (not quite as good, in my opinion, that was the perfect office rom-com, hard to top). Yes, cliché, but done very well.

I just watched the Arab prince episode. He came out as a very likeable man (maybe it was the actor, too, with his kind, charming smile). He was very gentlemanly with Sarang: never did anything appropriate, didn't drop any lewd hints, didn't ever lay one finger on her, the dress he chose for her was very ladylike and elegant: not sexy, not gaudy, but in perfect good taste. He also took rejection very handsomely, like a good sport. Yes, he seemed to have an grudge with Won as an old classmate and sort of bullied him, but in a rather playful way, and he even made peace with him at the end, hugged him and called him his friend and brother. The overall impression of him was very favourable. At least that's my humble opinion as a viewer. Also, the comedy wasn't even too crude or slapstick, surely not more than the overall tone of the drama, or other episodes involving other characters (for instance Secretary No's scenes are much more slapstick).
Yes, from the point of view of Muslim viewers, I understand that it was shocking that he drank alcohol, partied and had girlfriends, but from what we read in the news, many people in his position do this when they are abroad - he didn't do anything criminal or shameful otherwise. And this doesn't mean that every person in his position does this. I read about it before watching the drama, and now that I've seen the episode I am really surprised (or maybe I shouldn't be, sigh!) at the exaggerated reactions.