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Notes on the Armed Forces Korea Network (AFKN), R.O.K. TV, and DPRK TV: Armed Forces TV in Korea in 1980-1981 was bad. No, not bad, awful. No, make that egregious. No, make that... well never mind. It wasn't good. Programming consisted of such popular hits as Hello Larry and Nakia. Why were they showing programs that even the producers never watched? Apparently the year before, they'd spent their entire budget on the World Series or the Super Bowl. And while this was a popular programming decision, it of course had its cost. I suppose that if AFKN had been a parent with 10 children, it would have fed the family a 15 course gourmet meal on Christmas and unboiled maccaroni the other 364 days of the year. In any case, they did manage to show M.A.S.H. and oddly enough, Nova, a favorite of mine. I'll wager there were easily tens of G.I.s watching along with me.
Much more interesting than AFKN was South Korean T.V. If you've ever watched Spanish-language programming on Univision, you have a good idea of what Korean TV was like. It was mostly low budget videotaped sitcoms, melodramas, and variety shows. Not exactly X-Files, but a hands down winner over Nakia. Even more amusing though were the American shows and movies dubbed into Korean. There's apparently some convention of Korean dubbing which requires all women to have voices like Georgia Engle and for men to have voices like Isaac Hayes. One of the highlights of my Korean TV viewing experience was the movie 100 Rifles dubbed into Korean. Raquel Welch speaking Korean with the voice of Sailor Moon, is something everyone should experience... once. But the ne plus ultra of my South Korean TV adventure was the TV series Buck Rogers dubbed into Korean. I'll always fondly remember lines like, "Buku, anyonghasimnika, beedy, beedy, beedy!"
With the subject of North Korean TV, we enter the realm of the surreal. It was almost impossible to receive DPRK TV except on the DMZ, due to South Korean jamming. Lead off with the national anthem, which is really cool and sounds like the theme from a Boris Karloff movie. How to describe the programs? Imagine Charlie Schumer and Sarah Brady's worst nightmare of bad '50s TV with the gun makers as the only sponsors. That's the first thing you notice about North Korean TV. EVERYBODY has a gun. Imagine Ed Sullivan sponsored by Colt. Think of Your Show of Shows sponsored by Browning and Glock. Singalong show? Everybody's got an AKM. Girl's choir? Hang submachineguns on the little darlings! Toddler singing nursery rhymes? Give junior a Makarov to wave while he sings Twinkle, Twinkle, Little SCUD. What's on after the Smith&Wesson Amateur Hour? The "news"! See Kim Il Sung PERSONALLY harvest every rice plant! See the Great Leader feed the animals in the Pyongyang Zoo. After all, HE raised each one of them all by himself! That's what I call "Must See TV"!