Sword Rose

Realistic Portrayal of Anti-Trafficking Cases; No Sugar-Coating. Good Drama with a Shoddy Ending.

Originally wanted to watch for Reba stepping out of her comfort zone of pretty and taking a gritty role and it paid off. Also knew the ML and several supporting characters. This series was a heavy one but it was a very real portrayal of anti-trafficking cases, zilch sugarcoating. A good drama but sadly with a shoddy ending.

Pros: For the first time in a long time it was the storyline and plots that took center stage not the actors themselves. Yes, they were important but they took a more sideline role here. The families, victims, the stories or abduction, captivity, abuse, sometimes torture, sometimes being sold more than once, release and reunion with family, which many a time took decades as the victims they focused on were children and women. You saw the absolute destruction of families when it happened, how they treated the anti-trafficking cops with panic and then rage which was very sad to see but understandable on both sides; families were frantic while the cops could only work when and if they got clues. Those didn't magically fall from the sky.

The FL or DY has childhood trauma of her own as she watched her best friend get kidnapped when she was no more than 8 years old. 24 some odd years later she still hasn't been found. That was why she joined the police force and eventually after getting successfully kidnapped on purpose and rescued, she was promoted to director of the anti-trafficking division. She also reconnected successfully with the mom of her kidnapped best friend who ran a simple noodle shop that doubled as a place where people with missing loved ones could come, pin their photos and write loving messages on the walls, they were also a community that held meetings where they branched out new ideas. As each case came along both sets joined in sorrow and gave the division something to work with. Turned out that they were essentially taking down a massive trafficking organization from the runner ants to finally the big boss (Cripple) himself at the end. It was he that kidnapped LR or DY's best friend and he had done it himself as his first time doing this.

Many were rescued or saved throughout but not without misery and sorrow. You really sometimes cried for these victims. Some were saved quickly, others not until decades later, and some were brought back no longer living but their families were still able to say their proper goodbyes. ML was a very enigmatic character who I'll speak more about in the cons but he did have his unfortunate realization that he lost his father who drowned saving a young boy who grew up to work as one of the middlemen for this trafficking organization. It took him a while but he finally was able to come to terms with it and decide that he in fact belonged following in his father's footsteps as a cop in this particular department. Sadly, we lost one officer and an elder on duty and that was a heavy hit for the department and viewers.

DY definitely was the brains but the team came together as a whole. There wasn't a time where they just sat there twirling their thumbs. Meanwhile the focus on the families was the most important and how they coped or didn't; divorce and even suicide was attempted, thankfully thwarted. Mom of LR was such an important part of the story and really the first case; she was the rallying force behind all families in the show. And her case was the last one solved. Every family and character, protagonist or antagonist were well portrayed; I can't think of one that was extra or unnecessary. The stories varied and many things felt unreal like even deaf and mute women were not off the table or because in poorer villages it seemed like they didn't know buying a human being was illegal. OSTs, small amount of makeup on everyone leads included made it more real. The twists in the story sometimes were pretty wild.

Cons: That ending made me pretty unhappy because DY and her friend's mom were the first case of this story and after everything they went through; the pain of 24 years of not knowing and than slowly inching closer, plus with the mom diagnosed with mid-stage Alzheimer's and starting to forget people and how she made her noodles causing one costumer to get sick because she put a cleaning solution in the noodles instead of what she thought was sugar. She even made the decision to go into a nursing home for proper care; so you would think once they found LR working in some field picking onions or greenery in some godforsaken village, they would have this amazing reunion; the three of them? Nope! DY called LR's name or nickname RanRan who picked up her head and smiled as she recognized the name and DY and than the camera panned away to a propaganda meeting where DY's division got an award and she made a speech where flashbacks of all the cases they solved and the families plus the officer they lost and her making some declaration about how they would keep working to bring more families back together. It was so unnecessary and made you feel cheated for the mom, DY, and LR! The entire show, there was barely any propaganda but now when it was the least needed, they packed it on and at the worst possible time. They could have had this wonderful reunion and than ended with a short ceremony in their office like they did the first time they got that award and then end out the show with flashbacks of everyone they saved with an OST. Why not? At least it would have done the three of them justice. This was just sad and inappropriate.

I had a problem with the ML; the man has virtually no expressions. He can be yelling or laughing and his face is frozen though his eyes do run around their sockets a lot. At first I thought when I saw him in Under the Skin that that's just his character but now I've noticed that nothing changes, even in real life when I saw him on an episode of Hi6. My assumption is that he's a high functioning autistic so these are the roles he takes. I do wish they had him practicing with the movement of his face more.

Felt the last few episodes were rushed as they were trying to get the rest of the rats caught in the net especially catching "Cripple" himself and his whole running for the border halfheartedly attempting to kidnap his supposed best friend's (whom he pushed off a building; dude lived, lord knows how) wife as he's obsessed with her, than holding her hostage at knifepoint and getting taken out by a SWAT sniper. Like what even? It was smooth going until those last few episodes, you could tell the pace picked up. It was still good up until this point and that BS ending.

Would I recommend it? Yes I would. Though the subject matter was heavy, it was also very hopeful. I'm proud of Reba here; she really played DY well and showed all of the proper emotions when needed. This was a realistic show and y'all should give it a shot.

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Sword Rose for a Mainstream Award

I'm a passerby and this drama is unusual for me. The story and acting/casting is top notch. I'm new to cdramas and have only ever been watching idol dramas, but I find this more interesting and captivating... the rewatch value is high. The beautiful and famous Dilraba is exceptionally good in this kind of genre. She's a great actress cos I'm seeing Deng Yan and not her. The supporting characters are superb and the director is insane. I hope it gets nominated for Mainstream award even though it's a very low budget drama (I heard), has little to zero promotion and not favoured by international cdrama fans.

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