Lee Jong-seok and Park Shin-hye courted for Pinocchio

Okay, this is one reunion I’m rooting for in dramaland: Lee Jong-seok is considering a reunion with the PD-writer team behind I Hear Your Voice, for their new fall dramaPinocchio. It might actually wash out the part of my brain that went mushy trying to hold onto some semblance of sanity while watching Doctor Stranger. Maybe. It’s too early to count any chickens since he’s just considering the offer, and I’d take the casting rumors with a huge grain of salt since an earlier round initially had Kim Woo-bin in contention for the role for about a minute. Is casting both of them out of the question?

I’m a little less excited about Park Shin-hye being courted to co-star, even though I like her fine in most things… it’s just that Heirs kind of tipped her over for me on the ratio of actress to number of sad Candy characters played, and bad associations linger (to be fair, they do for Lee Min-ho and Kim Woo-bin as well). On the upside, I do actually trust the I Hear Your Voice writer to come up with a heroine who stands up for herself and speaks her mind; on the downside, I’ll probably be sad that Lee Bo-young isn’t playing her.

Pinocchio is SBS’s late-fall Wednesday-Thursday drama from PD Jo Soo-won and writer Park Hye-ryun, that tells the story of young reporters who are on duty ’round the clock at the city news desk in search of the truth. I fully expect the show to do a late reveal that it’s about a hero who has the power to tell if people are lying or something, but maybe it’ll veer away from being a carbon copy of Voice’s setup.

The writer also scripted Dream High, which was an endearing youthful drama about banding together to chase your dreams. I can see Pinocchio melding the two, with reporters instead of laywers and twentysomething dreamers instead of teens. I basically felt like You’re All Surrounded was that setup for cops, so perhaps we can expect something similar for rookie reporters.

I’m sure casting will go through numerous rounds of Will they or won’t they since it’s still August; Pinocchio follows She’s So Lovable (after It’s Okay, It’s Love) in mid-November.