“The Wonder Coach” (MBC, Prime Video)
Lee Eunseo: Can a great player become a great coach, too? Kim Yeon Koung, the world’s greatest volleyball player, decided her first new gig after retirement would be coaching. On the MBC series “The Wonder Coach,” she takes on the role of coach for newly formed team the Victorious Wonder Dogs with the goal of turning them pro. According to the rules as laid out by the show, the team will be disbanded if they lose more than four of seven matches. There are 14 players on the Wonder Dogs, all hoping to go pro, including semi-pro, formerly pro, and retired players. “The Wonder Coach” follows Kim in her first year as a coach as she takes a group of underdogs and transforms them into a team of Wonder Dogs.

In South Korea, soccer, baseball, basketball, and volleyball are often referred to as the big four in sports. And yet, volleyball is the only one of them without a second division. Unlike other sports, where underperforming players can move down from first to second division, work on their performance, and climb their way back up, volleyball has no such system, forcing players to either be released from professional teams or accept retirement. Even athletes with potential often end their careers prematurely due to a lack of opportunities. It’s difficult to foster players in a system like this or advance the sport as a whole. That’s where the “The Wonder Coach” comes in, and why the ultimate goal for the Wonder Dogs is to establish a pro volleyball team and plant the seeds for a second division. As a coach, Kim Yeon Koung’s leadership is unwavering. She has meticulous plans and strategies for everything, making sure her players focus on teamwork to ensure every play is executed according to plan. There’s a clear purpose to each drill she has her players run, which Kim explains thoroughly and makes sure everyone understands. Kim’s style of coaching places more importance on the process than on racking up points right away, which is why, when Enkhsoyol’s offense diverges from the plan, Coach Kim gets angry at her, and also why, even when they’ve just managed to bring the game to a tie, she gets on Yoon Young In for playing too passively and tells her to spike harder.

“The Wonder Coach” is more than just a story about one player’s journey to become a coach. Drawing on 20 years of experience, Kim Yeon Koung trains her players using her signature approach to volleyball focused on strategic analytical play. In a match against Kwangju Women’s University, the reigning champions of the U-League, the Wonder Dogs win in a 3-0 shutout. After the game, though, Kim singles out moments from early in the match where the team lost their focus and stresses the importance of reflecting on the day’s performance. From then on, change begins to take root within the Wonder Dogs. After practices, the players run seminars and share their postgame analysis with their coach. As the athletes’ attitudes shift, what used to be one-sided video meetings evolve into reciprocal discussions between Kim and the players. From there, the Wonder Dogs go on to win against the Suwon City volleyball team, the JungKwanJang Red Sparks, and the Heungkuk Life Pink Spiders, finishing their impressive season 5–2. All the players on the Wonder Dogs come in with their own approaches but they come to work together like an orchestra in perfect harmony—a great start for Kim Yeon Koung’s vision for the future of volleyball.

David Byrne x Fresh Air (Christmas Playlist, Spotify)
Seo Seongdeok (Music Critic): The release of the newly remastered “Stop Making Sense” in Korea this year put Talking Heads and their frontman, David Byrne, in the spotlight. Even after the band broke up following their peak in the 1980s, Byrne has remained an icon of American new wave and art pop. His way of incorporating music from Africa, Latin America, and other non-Anglophone countries not as mere exotic seasoning but as integral parts of the music stands out in particular as the right way to do it. Even today, the musician continues to curate a remarkably diverse and internationally inclusive series of playlists every month under the name Radio. So, what would it look like if David Byrne created a Christmas playlist?

The popular interview program “Fresh Air” on American public radio station NPR sought to answer that question last Christmas Eve when they had Byrne come on with a one-hour playlist curated exclusively for the show. While he mentioned that his main aim was to “not take it too seriously,” everyone knew his choices would be anything but predictable. If you’re already familiar with the Latin pop Christmas song “Feliz Navidad,” this is the perfect opportunity to discover “Mi Burrito Sabanero.” Or how about the somewhat off-kilter New York music of the Pogues and their fusion of Irish tradition and punk? The pragmatic messaging of James Brown’s “Santa Claus Go Straight To The Ghetto” transitions into Clarence Carter’s “Back Door Santa,” which, in turn, segues into Run-DMC’s “Christmas In Hollis,” itself famously built upon a sample of Carter’s song. Though only an hour long, the playlist makes sure to showcase talented artists from today like Sabrina Carpenter and Samara Joy, too. If you’re yearning for some Christmas music that stands out from the lack of variety found in the neatly gift-wrapped playlists offered by the big streaming services, Byrne’s selection is worth a listen.

All the Birds in the Sky (Charlie Jane Anders)
Kim Boksung (Writer): The Charlie Jane Anders novel “All the Birds in the Sky” introduces us to Patricia, a young witch who can talk to birds but can’t control her powers, and Laurence, a tech-obsessed kid who can already build his own (limited) time machine. As impressive as they are, they’re introduced to each other in middle school because everyone else sees them as weird. And while the book itself is pretty weird, it’s this meeting of fantasy and science fiction that makes it such a pleasure to read.

Anders doesn’t just bend genres, but other classifications, too, with the first part of the book reading like young adult fiction, while the second turns more adult. Many years after the two main characters go through the hardships that lead them away from the normal education system and into worlds that let them hone their skills, Patricia and Laurence meet again as adults to the backdrop of a world on the verge of collapse. Unfortunately, two competing approaches to saving it—the scientific one and the magical one—color the pair’s rekindled relationship with tension as well.

This Harry-Potter-whimsy-meets-Marvel-catastrophe story is definitely a wild and funny ride, but it ends up grappling with big questions—like the difference between saving humanity and saving the Earth—while reminding readers how important it is to accept yourself when the whole world just sees you as being weird.