1
This review may contain spoilers
"He was just so rude to you!"
The standouts in this show are the
1. The acting - The two main women were incredibly good in their roles in this show. The resilience of their characters is nothing short of admirable, likely even breathtaking
2. The critique of the justice system - I think this got swallowed up in all the noisiness of the 'who dun it' mystery, but the story does show us how the legal system fails its people.
For example:
a. Mo Eun - They saw that she killed and didn't seem remorseful, and quickly wrote her off. Sure, she didn't do anything to disprove their assumptions, but had someone taken a minute to wonder why she did what she did - rather than write her off as a psychopath - likely, none of this would have happened.
b. An Yun Sun - A victim of the 'fundamental attribution error.' Her fault was that she was too smiley and didn't cry. They saw a woman who didn't act the way she was supposed/expected to once her husband died, and they (the people doing the investigation) quickly assumed that she was guilty. And then did everything to prove themselves right
c. Prosecutor Beak - This man pissed me off the entire show. If I were to list his crimes, I'd say he was guilty of having tunnel vision and confirmation bias, largely against Yun Su. He saw her smile, found that sealed orphanage record, and immediately decided she was guilty. He did everything to prove that she was guilty, sending her to spend the rest of her life in prison.
The anger I felt in me when he admitted that he (1.) sent her to prison simply because he believed she was guilty and (2.) when he admitted that he'd had doubts of her guilt in the 1st round but buried them to find anything to prove her guilt... Oh Lord. And in the end, he got to keep his job.
He's so frustrating, but what makes me angrier is that Baek is an unfortunate reality of the people we have in law enforcement IRL. People with biases who will send others to prison just to prove that they are right. Or just so they can win. It's all about ego, not the human behind the accusation.
d. The investigation team - Victims of group thinking and authority bias. When Beak came in to say that Yun Su was for sure guilty, they all went with that line of thinking. Which is crazy because in the 1st episode, they clearly had nothing on her. She was weird, yes, but weird doesn't equal guilty. And throughout the show, none of them had a single disagreeing thought with Beak. What he said went. I still can't believe that they let that old man walk around after he'd assaulted a prison guard and stabbed Mo Eun
e. So Mang - Yet another victim of a flawed justice system. Money greased hands, and her rapsit was not only allowed to go free, but to continue tormenting her and her family, leading to their deaths. And their lives would have just been swept under the rug like yesterday's trash had Mo Eun not come back for revenge. Had the women not worked together, no one would've cared or remembered. That trashy boy and his parents may have actively led to her and her father's deaths, but everyone who turned a blind eye helped quietly nudge her onto that rooftop.
f. The prison system - The amount of bullying that goes on in there is crazy. Idk how, but prisons everywhere need to find ways to keep all that from happening. Or at least minimize it. Idk if increasing guards would help, but the ratio of prisoners to guards is always crazy low IMO
3. I think the women were written rather well in this show. Apart from An Yun Su, who remains good throughout the show, all the other women who had a lot of screentime were nuanced humans.
i. Mo Eun looks like a psychopath at 1st but she isn't.
ii. The main prison guard actively fights against her bias against the criminals in her care. Wanting to see them as and treating them as human, even though she fails at times.
iii. Yun Su's probation officer, like Yun Su, is a little naive and too smiley. But her heart, which matters in this case, was always in the best place. Instead of letting her work with criminals taint her, she tries to help and gives the benefit of the doubt. This specific case needed that
🚨Things I Didn't Like/Thought Could've Been Better🚨
1. The pacing - It's not all bad. Actually, the 1st say 4, maybe 5 episodes are well paced. The last 3 or so episodes also did a great job keeping my heart racing. However, those middle episodes.... I was so frustrated and was super close to dropping the damn show.
2. Decisions made in the middle episodes - Especially by Yun Su. She made very little sense. Somebody explain to me why
a. She kept visiting that house, even taking her kid, without considering that the tracker actually logs her location.
b. When she finds out he died, she goes back to that house and lets herself be seen as if she is not among the most infamous criminals at the time. Her face was everywhere!!!
c. When she becomes a fugitive, she keeps the most obvious feature about her - her hair - open for everyone to see. Logic dictates that when you're on the run, you hide your most obvious features!!! Cover up tattoos, switch up piercings, cut your hair, or tie it up if you cannot cut it. Maybe even dye it. But no. She keeps her super long, beautiful, wavy hair just flapping around in the wind
How no one in the streets ever saw and reported her is beyond me. She didn't need to be an expert in all this. I get that. But in this age of technology, and for someone who said she's watched all episodes of CSI, she was being hella dumb.
3. The ending - Like many reviewers and commentators, I'm torn about the revelation of why Yun Su's husband was killed. It really does seem like such a weak reason. However, if I look at it from another angle, maybe it makes sense. As shown in many dramas, there is a lot of classism in Asia. They pay a lot of attention to one's reputation.
Now, if you consider how the lawyer and his wife saw themselves as better than the artist and his plagiarism statement as tarnishing their reputation, then the anger could make sense. Someone they deemed lesser than threw figurative mud at them, making them lose face among their peers. To them, that was unacceptable.
4. The lack of justice (regarding the villains) - In my perfect world and perfect ending, that lawyer wouldn't have died. He'd have had to go to prison. That reputation he cared so much about would have gone straight to hell after a very public trial.
I hate that the wife seemed like she'd get away with it, or rather, have a lesser charge. After all the women (especially Yun Su) went through, that was annoying to see.
5. The prosecutor kept his job.
Final Thoughts
1. This was an engaging watch, albeit a little frustrating in the middle.
2. There was no standout music in this tbh. Aside from that song that played in the finale, you know the scene showing the scenery in Thailand and the credits on screen? Yeah, that one. I regret not looking for it.
3. I wouldn't rewatch this tbh. Not only am I not huge on rewatching shows, but thrillers and mysteries especially lose their appeal to me after the 1st watch
1. The acting - The two main women were incredibly good in their roles in this show. The resilience of their characters is nothing short of admirable, likely even breathtaking
2. The critique of the justice system - I think this got swallowed up in all the noisiness of the 'who dun it' mystery, but the story does show us how the legal system fails its people.
For example:
a. Mo Eun - They saw that she killed and didn't seem remorseful, and quickly wrote her off. Sure, she didn't do anything to disprove their assumptions, but had someone taken a minute to wonder why she did what she did - rather than write her off as a psychopath - likely, none of this would have happened.
b. An Yun Sun - A victim of the 'fundamental attribution error.' Her fault was that she was too smiley and didn't cry. They saw a woman who didn't act the way she was supposed/expected to once her husband died, and they (the people doing the investigation) quickly assumed that she was guilty. And then did everything to prove themselves right
c. Prosecutor Beak - This man pissed me off the entire show. If I were to list his crimes, I'd say he was guilty of having tunnel vision and confirmation bias, largely against Yun Su. He saw her smile, found that sealed orphanage record, and immediately decided she was guilty. He did everything to prove that she was guilty, sending her to spend the rest of her life in prison.
The anger I felt in me when he admitted that he (1.) sent her to prison simply because he believed she was guilty and (2.) when he admitted that he'd had doubts of her guilt in the 1st round but buried them to find anything to prove her guilt... Oh Lord. And in the end, he got to keep his job.
He's so frustrating, but what makes me angrier is that Baek is an unfortunate reality of the people we have in law enforcement IRL. People with biases who will send others to prison just to prove that they are right. Or just so they can win. It's all about ego, not the human behind the accusation.
d. The investigation team - Victims of group thinking and authority bias. When Beak came in to say that Yun Su was for sure guilty, they all went with that line of thinking. Which is crazy because in the 1st episode, they clearly had nothing on her. She was weird, yes, but weird doesn't equal guilty. And throughout the show, none of them had a single disagreeing thought with Beak. What he said went. I still can't believe that they let that old man walk around after he'd assaulted a prison guard and stabbed Mo Eun
e. So Mang - Yet another victim of a flawed justice system. Money greased hands, and her rapsit was not only allowed to go free, but to continue tormenting her and her family, leading to their deaths. And their lives would have just been swept under the rug like yesterday's trash had Mo Eun not come back for revenge. Had the women not worked together, no one would've cared or remembered. That trashy boy and his parents may have actively led to her and her father's deaths, but everyone who turned a blind eye helped quietly nudge her onto that rooftop.
f. The prison system - The amount of bullying that goes on in there is crazy. Idk how, but prisons everywhere need to find ways to keep all that from happening. Or at least minimize it. Idk if increasing guards would help, but the ratio of prisoners to guards is always crazy low IMO
3. I think the women were written rather well in this show. Apart from An Yun Su, who remains good throughout the show, all the other women who had a lot of screentime were nuanced humans.
i. Mo Eun looks like a psychopath at 1st but she isn't.
ii. The main prison guard actively fights against her bias against the criminals in her care. Wanting to see them as and treating them as human, even though she fails at times.
iii. Yun Su's probation officer, like Yun Su, is a little naive and too smiley. But her heart, which matters in this case, was always in the best place. Instead of letting her work with criminals taint her, she tries to help and gives the benefit of the doubt. This specific case needed that
🚨Things I Didn't Like/Thought Could've Been Better🚨
1. The pacing - It's not all bad. Actually, the 1st say 4, maybe 5 episodes are well paced. The last 3 or so episodes also did a great job keeping my heart racing. However, those middle episodes.... I was so frustrated and was super close to dropping the damn show.
2. Decisions made in the middle episodes - Especially by Yun Su. She made very little sense. Somebody explain to me why
a. She kept visiting that house, even taking her kid, without considering that the tracker actually logs her location.
b. When she finds out he died, she goes back to that house and lets herself be seen as if she is not among the most infamous criminals at the time. Her face was everywhere!!!
c. When she becomes a fugitive, she keeps the most obvious feature about her - her hair - open for everyone to see. Logic dictates that when you're on the run, you hide your most obvious features!!! Cover up tattoos, switch up piercings, cut your hair, or tie it up if you cannot cut it. Maybe even dye it. But no. She keeps her super long, beautiful, wavy hair just flapping around in the wind
How no one in the streets ever saw and reported her is beyond me. She didn't need to be an expert in all this. I get that. But in this age of technology, and for someone who said she's watched all episodes of CSI, she was being hella dumb.
3. The ending - Like many reviewers and commentators, I'm torn about the revelation of why Yun Su's husband was killed. It really does seem like such a weak reason. However, if I look at it from another angle, maybe it makes sense. As shown in many dramas, there is a lot of classism in Asia. They pay a lot of attention to one's reputation.
Now, if you consider how the lawyer and his wife saw themselves as better than the artist and his plagiarism statement as tarnishing their reputation, then the anger could make sense. Someone they deemed lesser than threw figurative mud at them, making them lose face among their peers. To them, that was unacceptable.
4. The lack of justice (regarding the villains) - In my perfect world and perfect ending, that lawyer wouldn't have died. He'd have had to go to prison. That reputation he cared so much about would have gone straight to hell after a very public trial.
I hate that the wife seemed like she'd get away with it, or rather, have a lesser charge. After all the women (especially Yun Su) went through, that was annoying to see.
5. The prosecutor kept his job.
Final Thoughts
1. This was an engaging watch, albeit a little frustrating in the middle.
2. There was no standout music in this tbh. Aside from that song that played in the finale, you know the scene showing the scenery in Thailand and the credits on screen? Yeah, that one. I regret not looking for it.
3. I wouldn't rewatch this tbh. Not only am I not huge on rewatching shows, but thrillers and mysteries especially lose their appeal to me after the 1st watch
Was this review helpful to you?
