The First Responders Season 2

I have watched hundreds of kdrama's and never wrote a single review about any of them but this one I was so fricking emotionally invested in this such a good drama i cannot recommend it enough although the writer did make me cry my eyeballs out when---- Dojin died and also the last 2 episodes the ending the plot twist oh God so happy that I came across this drama so sad that it ended so soon will miss waiting to watch every episode release every Friday Saturday's....p.s will miss my "jin hogae". "Soon seol" so much....😭Hope this drama will have a season 3... AGAIN TO ANYONE WHO IS HESITANT TO WATCH THIS PLZ DO YOU WILL NOT REGRET IT....✨from one kdrama fanatic to other❤️

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Brilliant from start to finish

I understand that a lot of people dropped/disliked and rated down this show due to [spoiler]. But I for one have to say that I'm very very glad I didn't stop watching then because every single minute of the show blew my mind.

Contrary to what the ratings might tell you, I actually felt that season 2 was superior to season 1 in terms of everything, cases, plot, new characters that were extremely fun and old characters that continued to be extremely fun. The leads did a fabulous job, and so did all the supporting characters. Admittedly the main antagonist was the typical psycho type that seems to be rather common in KDrama, but even their interactions with other characters was interesting to watch, and the final showdown was well done regardless so I couldn't even feel disappointed about it. But still, I'm someone who enjoys it more when the villain is well written, not just in IQ (which is true in this case) but also in EQ (which is unfortunately not true in this case), which is something impossible to do when it's a psychotic thrill seeker with no real motive for doing all the horrible things that they do, which is why I'm rating the plot slightly down. (The only show with a psychopath that I liked for the bad guy despite being a psycho is Hello Monster, which managed to pull off the psycho character quite well.)

(All that said and done though, I still teared up in the last episode's ending credit's last shot when they showed [spoiler]. So forgive me for ducking rewatch value as well.)

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Police + Firefighters + Forensic teamwork!

Season 1 left viewers with a cliffhanger and had me wondering if Dojin and Hogae died....until....the news of Season 2 came out and I knew they didn't die cos main characters don't die right?!

Only for the writers to kill off Dojin in Ep 3.. Very heartbreaking to witness Dojin's death but at least, they gave him a proper goodbye that speaks highly of his loyalty and pride as a firefighter. Dojin's death actually let side characters from Taewon Fire Station shine even more.

Season 2 cases are more entertaining because of the introduction of bombs + new characters (Kang Do Ha, Woo Sam Soon, Han Se Jin). Not to mention, the funny scenes between Dojin-Hogae, Myungpil-Hogae and Doha-Hogae. Their bickering moments are what made the drama a little less serious.

Conclusion is: You have to watch it yourself to feel the thrill throughout the 12 episodes.

I would have given this a 10/10 rating but I still can't get over Dojin's death thus an overall 9.5 rating.

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✒ ❗️Maverick Amuck °VG°

🚨Looks like there's a maverick on the force.

A firefighter, a paramedic, and a cop walk into a bar. It's not a joke. It's a script. It's pretty exciting, too. Watching them investigate is entertaining.

TFR is a 2022 release of 2 seasons consisting of 24 65-minute episodes and S3 is expected to be announced. It is rated 91 on AWiki. The name seems especially generic, so I wasn't convinced when I started it, but Kdramas with boring titles are often a pleasant surprise. These ? stories are downright arresting.

Kim Rae Won (Decibel, A Wild Apricot) is Jin HoGae, one of those universally cool types. His first credits are from 1998; he's been around for awhile. This is my first look at him and I get the appeal. He has several interactions with his father, and it's never been less convincing to me that two actors were related by blood. Their scenes seem slightly off, they're so unlikely to be father and son. HoGae must take after his mother. He's our maverick, and he's completely unpredictable.

In S2, HoGae is being promoted to head of the NOI investigation team. He's at the fancy ceremony. The auditorium is full. He suddenly stands up and announces that he can't accept the promotion. As he walks out of the building, somebody chases him outside and asks what he's doing? “I don't like the color of the building,” he quips. He rides off on his motorcycle. James Dean has nothing on him.

Son Ho Jun (Was It Love-7.4, Go Back Couple) is Bong Do Jin. He's got a nice presence. Both he and HoGae are interested in Song Seol (Gong Seung Yeon from Circle, Re-Born & My Only Love Song-8.7). This actress is a charmer. I'm a fan. There are, once again, amazing child actors. In ep5 a little girl steals the show. She completely upstages our ML. Director Shin Kyung Soo also brought us The Nokdu Flower & Six Flying Dragons, while screenwriter Min Ji Eun penned Partners for Justice.

In S2, ep1, Choi Won-Young plays an arsonist. He's brilliant. I've seen him in The Golden Spoon-8.1, Mystic Pop-Up Bar-8.2, The Heirs-7.3, and the excellent SKY Castle-9. He's different in everything; a real talent.

Oh Eui Shik makes an appearance towards the end of S1 and takes on a more regular role in S2. I've been a fan of his since Oh My Ghost-10, one of my gateway Kdramas. I love it so much that I love every actor on the cast. This guy really does seem to be sprinkled with fairy dust because he's in a lot of features, and they're all successful. I've seen him in While You Were Sleeping-7.3, Familiar Wife-8.5, The Hymn of Death-8.4, Romance Is a Bonus Book-7.9, Touch Your Heart-8.2, Hi Bye, Mama-6.5, My Unfamiliar Family-7.9 Hometown Cha-Cha-Cha-8.2 & Big Mouth-7.4. He gets to be more than a sidekick in S2. I just want to see more & more of him, now.

First responders are police, fire, and paramedics. The ME and prosecutors will also be at a live crime scene. We follow all these careers in the show. Cases that pop up are arson, kidnapping,
suicide under suspicious circumstances, statutory rape, a hit-and-run, missing persons, and all the while there's corruption teeming In the background. Among the decent folk there's the everyday clashes that must occur, especially among sleep deprived adrenaline junkie types who exist on instant food and soju. Jin stops a helicopter with a fire hose~>> B@d@$$. There's the promise of romance, too.

It has its lapses. In the last motif of S2, some things don't make sense. Two of the characters overheard the bad guy on a speaker and they should have been able to recognize him. Furthermore, Detective Jin had an opportunity to tell them who the bad guy was. It's inexplicable that he did not. While they address it later, it is less than satisfactory. The plot gets a tad outrageous in S2, which begins as a seamless continuation of S1. It's still quite a bit of fun. I didn't find it difficult to take the ride with them. Some certainly will. They kill off cats in both seasons. That's a problem Hollywood has had for decades. It's leeching out into Kcountry now.

Overall, TFR is a great ride. S2 has even more high budget special effects, particularly grand conflagrations and massive collapses. S2 also has a good old-fashioned gangland beat down showing about 50 men fighting with fists and sticks. It looks like a 1970s rumble.

Can a maverick go-it-alone forever? To the fiery end? Watch and see. You probably won't regret it. .


In order of ~lite&trite~ to ~heavy&serious~ you may also like:

💘 -
My Only Love Song 8.7 ~ excellent comedy,
Crazy Love-7.8,
A Witch's Love 7.8,
Love to Hate You 8.9,
Her Private Life 8,
Touch your heart 8.2,
Crash Landing On You 9.1,
Oh My Ghost 10,
It's Okay Not To Be Okay 9,
Love Struck in the City 7.3,
Be Melodramatic-8.7,
Was it love-7.9,
Hospital Playlist 9,
My Mister 9.5,
I'll See You When the Weather is Fine 9


⚡/🚀 -
Flex X Cop-8.5,Missing: The Other Side-8.3,
K2 8,
Private Lives 8.1,
Inspector Koo-8.4,
Revenge of Others-8.3,
The Golden Spoon-8.1,
Uncanny counter season-1 only °S1-8.4 S2-4,
Han River Police-7.4,
When the Camellia Blooms-8,
Moving-8.5,
Law School -8,
Sisyphus 8,
Tunnel 8.5,
Signal 8.6,
Blood Free-8.5,
D.P.-8.4,
The Cursed 8.3,
Flower of Evil 8.9,
The Man from Nowhere 8.9,
Black 9,
Squid Game 8.4,
Kingdom 8.3,
Sweet Home 8.4

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why is this one of the best drama

first of all, i just wanna say that i consider this season way better than season 1. i think some people will give a whole different review because of dojin’s death and some of them even dropped this, but i think this death didn’t changed the drama. Why is that?

So i really liked dojin’s character and even knowing that his death was unnecessary, i think it brought a whole lot more interesting plot to this drama. because if this was only about the first responders taking some risks and nothing happening to them, it would be a lot more repetitive and kinda boring. but they decided to change everything and killed a main character, it really changed our perspective and kept us interested in the outcome of his death. i really liked the new characters, especially Do-Ha. i feel like after this season i can really feel what’s the meaning of family to them (firefighters, paramedics, police and nfs). all of them are willing to risk their lives by trusting each other.

I don’t think i have any words to explain how much i love hogae, that man is a jindo dog indeed. nothing will spot him, he will do everything to protect his close ones and his look speaks louder than actions. his chemistry with Seol was out of this world and this season made me feel like a child about to get rewarded for something.

i love first responders season 1 and 2 and i cannot wait to see more seasons of this. see y’all soon ! 🩷

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Watch without regrets....

Ho Gae and Seol ended up together passed the hardest situations and the time together.

"The first responders" compare to two seasons Dex is the most underrated villian in this arc, he is powerful and manipulative committed more murders in Korea and USA.

Ho Gae and Seol romance moments in the final episode is good their chemistry and their love and care between the even in the hardest situations they care for each other, not giving up their love for silly reasons and they pass together in that situations. Compare to some other k drama couples, this couple is different.Ho Gae and Seol relationship progression in S1 & S2 slowly and steadily without rushing things compare to Do Jin.It's not a romance based drama but leads value their relationship in hardest time and not giving each other and give strength eachother.

Overall, drama has unpredictable twist and turns, writer killed even one of the main lead Do jin. It's worth to watch and invest time.

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Season 2 was amazing as season 1.

Story: It starts off continuing off of season 1 with the serial arsonist case and the cliff hanger of whether Hogae and/or Dojin survived the fire blast in the garage. The first couple of episodes of season 2 is wrapping up a case from season 1 so it doesn't feel like a new season yet. The big moment that happened was Dojin ended up dying early on. It's a big deal when the writers kill of a main character only couple episodes into a new season. I think these first 4 episodes could have been fit into the first season and having both seasons be 16 episodes like how most Kdramas are.

It doesn't feel like season 2 yet until after episode 4. They introduce two new characters to replace Dojin and Anna(I don't know why Anna had to be replaced). Doha filled in for Dojins spot in the drama as a member of the NFS team. Woo Sam Soon replaced Anna's role in the detectives team. Both showed more lively personalities that I was unsure of but later on I was fine with their additions to the drama. Another difference is more focus on the NFS team and much less screen time for the firefighters. When they killed off Dojin, they also killed off a lot of focus on the firefighters too. Instead of replacing Dojin with a new character in the firefighters team, they replaced him with a new NFS character and focused more on that team. It still had great suspense as I was on the edge of my seat in these cases. A lot of more bomb/explosion scenes than fires.

I was impressed by the teases and twists from the writers. The ones that stood out to me was the character of Doha(Dojin's childhood friend). They made him look very suspicious as the arsonist. He was in a hotel room by himself calling Dojin, he wore black clothes, was at the scene of the crime where Dojin died and he left, and was the childhood friend of Dojin that wanted him to help take out the fire. I thought he was the arsonist because of that reason. I was fooled by the writers and Doha turned out to be a good guy. I loved how in depth they also went at making us believe the MC Hogae did die at the end. Him being in the caravan as it exploded? The bodies found in it looked like it could be him. Hogae dying together with his father from a bomb at the rooftop of a building. They even showed us a autopsy of Hogae to make it look real. Even the characters that loved him showed real emotion of his death. Of course he was alive at the end and it was a heck of a plan to trick the main villain he died to finally catch him.

This drama is not a focus or heavy focus on romance but they did tease it early on and delivered. I adored the relationship between Seol and Hogae throughout the drama. Great moments between them that didn't feel forced. The romantic subplot was a perfect touch to the drama. It probably hooked viewers to stay and watch even if someone as beloved as Dojin died.

Acting/characters: The acting and characters have to be my favorite part of the drama from both seasons. The police team had the best chemistry between the teams. Everyone was so likable.

Music: The soundtrack was good. My favorite song was "Hold my breath". It has a sad tone and fit well into the sad moments of the drama.

Overall/rewatch: If they ever decided on a season 3, I will be ready to watch it. I can see why there wouldn't need to be as this one wrapped up everything well. Great cast, great plot, and best of what I like a subplot of romance with a happy satisfying ending. A amazing journey I'd love to watch again.

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So I ended up doing three no-no's which made me nervous about watching sequels to several dramas that I watched previously.

First: DP 1 & 2. I didn't watch the first season over because I didn't think I needed to but there were scenes that they recapped that I completely forgot about. If I had watched the first season over then I would've better understood what the recap was about.

Taxi Driver 1 & 2. I got this one right because season 2 picked up where season 1 left off.

Uncanny Counter 1 & 2. This one was a big mistake. If I had known season 2 was going to go in a different direction I wouldn't have watched season 1 over.

This one...I knew I should've watched the first season over but didn't!!

I remember from my first review how I stated that this drama was like the US Chicago franchise all-in-one! The second season is a continuation with newer characters.
They capitalized on the autopsy scenes a lot more and I gotta say I was impressed with the way they did those silicone bodies. I don't know how the actors who had death scenes felt about watching a recap of their bodies being cut open on a autopsy table (don't know the correct term for that) but I gotta tell ya, Kim Rae Won who played as Jin Ho Gae looked uncomfortable and who wouldn't blame him.

The main plot that the second season dealt with was arson and bombs but there were other small plots throughout in order not to be monotonous which worked for me.

I loved the cast choices. Sometimes a casting director can get it right. I loved the Bull dozer and Jin Ho dog chemistry but I also loved the bomb tech guy and the Jin Ho dog's chemistry as well. But my favorite character was Woo Sam Soon the female character with the two daughters. She was my favorite because she was tough, smart, and hilarious. I love female Korean actresses like this. Not Song Seol...She got clocked in the head so many times I was hoping she would've been written off but they had to add that sappy romance that I seriously hate which is why my overall score is low. It's also low because the way the last episode happened. The bad guy revealing himself out of the blue when the last few episodes he tried to hide his identity left me with a 'WTF' moment! Then he had to kidnap a girl and the male hero comes to save her and they fall in love....eye roll with a barf bag please!!! Can they not put that kind of romance in a drama??? It's so cliche and stale!!!

I would like for there to be a third season but after seeing Uncanny Counter 2 I've learned my lesson and will be satisfied with the 2 seasons we were given.

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not as good as s1 but still good XD

Overall s2 was still enjoyable XD I'd personally rate it 8.5/10. (I still think dramas of this genre shouldn't include obvious romance between main leads. Subtle attraction/tension is ok I guess if can't be helped, but nothing forced like what they did here on s2. I'm fine with it if it's with the supporting characters, like in partners for justice 2).

Episodes 1-3 was a good continuation of S1. I already know dojin was gonna die based on the spoilers (and now that I finished s2 his death was so much easier to digest, coz they demoted the firefighters to almost nothing but door openers and handcuff cutters lol there wasn't any major fires after dojin died).

My fave character is still Pil :) It was nice to see him be like a real cop this season and not just like an errand boy XD.
I still liked jindo dog but I'm sorry I just had to fast forward all his romantic scenes with FL (would've been better if it's just bromance all the way lol just my opinion).

I disliked that they wasted atleast 3 eps (I think it's up til ep 6 or 7 I can't exactly remember) on showing seol like a grieving widow. Her character on s1 was unlikely to accept dojin's confession (it was apparent that she only had romantic feelings for jin hogae and dojin sensed that too). But s2 just had to force some kind of romantic storyline for the 2 of them even after his death, like they were bfgf (Hell, if the prod team was seriously itching to insert a romantic arc they should've just stuck with the 2 bosses lol polar bear obviously liked the firefighter chief since s1).

Dojin and seol's characters were obviously demoted to supporting level. With that being said, I welcomed the addition of woo sam soon as anna's replacement. And kang doha :)
sam soon's portrayal was oftentimes loud and exaggerated (borderline irritating). But she had lots of cool moments and various expressions more than anna (who was always in a perpetual frown, except maybe when dojin died). And I really liked doha (he's my 2nd fave character next to pil). His interactions with hogae and pil were fun to watch lol.

S2 showcased NFS more than the firefighters (I really liked yun hong more than the fl so I'm not complaining). I just feel a bit saddened that the fire station didn't get as much action as it did during s1 which was a letdown considering the drama's alternative title. But I guess that's understandable, otherwise s2 will seem even messier than it already is. The director/writer already crammed too many autopsies in the 2nd half like they forgot it's not partners for justice XD.

Then there's dex. The way his character was written was too all over the place. Being smart was one thing; but they made him a doctor/forensic expert, bomb expert and a hacker on top of being tae hwa's master manipulator and hired killer. The way hogae defeated this genius on that abandoned building was quite anti-climactic (I hoped for a grander way of his arrest without any touch of romanticism from ml&fl, or maybe a slightly comical approach with hogae/doha/pil lol).

Anyways, the action/thrill/suspense and investigative themes of this series season were decent enough for anyone tired of watching romcoms. Just have to bear the first half coz the latter eps were good.

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I enjoyed it just as much as season 1, for different reasons

I have to say, I think I liked the stories in season 1, there seemed to be more variety. In season 2, the whole time was spent looking for the evil "man behind the curtain". I found it somewhat unbelievable that the main bad guy could have absolute control over everything, including all surveillance, CCTV, etc. And then at the end, he just gave away that he was the killer.

My favorite character was still Myung Pil. I loved his relationship with Ho Gae. This was even more spotlighting Ho Gae being the smartest person in the room, which is a little tiresome.

I still can't believe that they killed off Do Jin. I was hoping we would see more bonding between him and Ho Gae.

This would have been much better without the romance. It felt rushed, forced, and I didn't feel any chemistry between them. Seol actually seemed to have more conversations with Se Jin than she did with Ho Gae! I think the drama would have been at least as good without the romance.

Jeon Sung Woo as Han Se Jin was excellent...enough said.

I also loved Oh Eui Shik as Do Ha. With his behaviors and mannerisms, I was never quite sure if he was one of the bad guys or not. I really enjoyed the collaborations he had with Ho Gae.

I know that a lot of people complained about Baek Eun Hye as Sam Soon, the scientific investigator, but I really enjoyed her. She had a different sort of energy than the rest of the cast, and that added a beat of comedy that allowed you to take a breath from all the action.

I think the highest praise I can give this drama is that I didn't need to fast forward through anything. There was a ton going on and it was practically nonstop.

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Season 3 please!?

Althou I doubt there'll be S3, I'll gladly be open to that possibility!

Personally, I'm disappointed that DoJin died. Although I am happy at how they wrap up his death, I watch this show because of him! So, this is the one disappointnment I have. I also feel that the romance could be better. I am not very excited about the romance between ML and FL. I usually am the one who ship the couple, but not this one. I guess, I must have been on team Dojin lol...But, this is just my personal preference

Despite this, I'm still rating it 10, because objectively the drama is actually very well done

I actually enjoy Do Ha's role a lot. I find his role very interesting. It's first time I've seen someone who knows how to make and denote bomb and do autopsy at same time. That's dope! Samsoon is also a dope one!

Even Dex is a really well developed character, very cool and talented, of course I disagree and dislike his malicious intent, but at least he is good at being evil.

I suspected that the ML didn't die but then I got fooled when I saw the autopsy being carried out, but who knows that its a fake too! That, totally got me. What a plot twist.

Overall, I really love how well balanced this drama is. Solid teamwork within and across team. It's not a drama that focuses only one main characters, but truly everyone plays a part.

I really enjoy this drama. Thank you!

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