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This review may contain spoilers
A Joseon Robin Hood
I love a good vigilante story so this one was never going to be an exception. However, the entire show is like one weekend long, automatic writing session after a vivid dream that was used as the script and never corrected. Go into the show in the same way a child would watch their favourite super hero shows.
Personally, I really enjoyed this despite it's obvious flaws. The biggest one being the end. They seemed to have little to wrap it up with, so even though it is an ending, it feels like an unsatisfying one as you are left to write your own. It's the type of ending that leaves the door wide open for a season 2, which, since this is from 2008, is clear it never happened.
The plot overall, is the story behind the man, including the ending. Young Geom is shown to be a very treasured son of an honourable nobleman and is a very quick and intelligent thinker. One night his father is killed and framed for treason, while a young Geom is locked in a cabinet. He sees the mark on the killers blade and it is this that his later revenge plot centers around. Who is the owner of this sword? After a horrifying ordeal watching his father's corpse publicly mutilated and forced to deny his own mother to save his life, he is taken in, unbeknownst to him, by his father's secret lover and her thief husband.
Its understandable that a young child would suffer memory loss after what he had endured and young Geom grows up to be Yong, a carefree and arrogant rogue who is frequently bullied at school.
Yong at first, isn't a very likeable character as he's depicted as lazy and thoughtless. And yet when we see him nearly killed by his bullies and then again by an assassin, we are left wanting to root for him as he somehow manages to escape and survive.
If the invisibly cloak in the first scene wasn't enough to tell me that we need to suspend a lot of belief in this show, Yong's miraculous ability to survive impossible situations will. Many times I found myself throughout the show thinking, 'now, the human body doesn't work like that' or ' how the heck did he manage that in a short time'.
When Yong slowly, and painfully, becomes Iljimae, the show becomes more fun as long you've continued to keep your brain off. I had whiplash from the amount of twists and turns that are frequent and dare I say even over used. It was like the writer was doing everything they could to hurt your feelings. Even something so simple as turning around, so Yong misses seeing his biological mother multiple times.
It's this frequent onslaught of frustrating moments that for me is what ruined the ending the most. For me, since they used the opening scene as the ending, and that 3 characters were sitting around the table, I take that as Yong having survived and the young brother at the end, basically telling us what happened. From that we can conclude that Yong is in hiding and visits his friends and family but we never see Yong properly reunite with his mother. Poor Bong Soon has been left to wonder alone probably believing that he is dead. Eun Chae may also be feeling that he as died as well. Did the King clear the Lee family of their charges? We see that he never stepped down from the throne, so why did it take 4 years for Yong to come back?
This is where I feel the 'the story behind the legend' feeling. As though this was all a lead up to an even greater plot, the legend of Iljimae it's self, and we are just simply left to write our own stories afterwards.
Iljimae, much like Robin Hood and other figures of folklore like him, becomes something of a ghost that keeps the wicked scared and the vulnerable heard.
The King is seen to have clearly lost his mind, wandering paranoid and scared that Iljimae will come for him.
The last scene is of Iljimae sitting on the garden wall by the tree, glaring at the camera, like a reminder that he will seek justice and he will come for you. I am actually ok with this kind of ending. It is inline with the triumph of folklore, that the legend goes on. It's just simply lacking the emotional fulfillment of having certain scenes missing, after all the abuse we took throughout the series.
I had no issue with the music but there was one scene that left me genuinely wondering what the director was thinking. During an emotional moment between Yong and Eun Chae, the background music is of two violins playing out of sync with each other. I get the symbolism but it was very, very hard to listen to and ultimately distracted from the scene that was meant to be painful and emotional.
Yong himself is the 'jerk with a heart of gold' character and becomes more loveable when he begins to mature. It is his adoptive father who is the real hero of the show. A man forced into stealing by corrupted officials, who treasures his two adopted sons heartwarmingly, and his willing to do literally anything to keep them alive and happy.
I had no issue with the romance part of it but it is a very brief subject. An almost touched on romance that if it had been developed further, would have been a very beautiful Robin and Marion love story that I could imagine for myself at the end. Perhaps Iljimae and Eun Chae could meet each other again at the blossom tree?
It's just one of those scripts that really feels like a first draft and that can lead a lot of viewers to feel disappointed.
Despite all of that, I thoroughly enjoyed this series, I couldn't stop watching, and I had a great time admiring a baby faced Lee Joon Gi and his mid-00s hairstyle.
Personally, I really enjoyed this despite it's obvious flaws. The biggest one being the end. They seemed to have little to wrap it up with, so even though it is an ending, it feels like an unsatisfying one as you are left to write your own. It's the type of ending that leaves the door wide open for a season 2, which, since this is from 2008, is clear it never happened.
The plot overall, is the story behind the man, including the ending. Young Geom is shown to be a very treasured son of an honourable nobleman and is a very quick and intelligent thinker. One night his father is killed and framed for treason, while a young Geom is locked in a cabinet. He sees the mark on the killers blade and it is this that his later revenge plot centers around. Who is the owner of this sword? After a horrifying ordeal watching his father's corpse publicly mutilated and forced to deny his own mother to save his life, he is taken in, unbeknownst to him, by his father's secret lover and her thief husband.
Its understandable that a young child would suffer memory loss after what he had endured and young Geom grows up to be Yong, a carefree and arrogant rogue who is frequently bullied at school.
Yong at first, isn't a very likeable character as he's depicted as lazy and thoughtless. And yet when we see him nearly killed by his bullies and then again by an assassin, we are left wanting to root for him as he somehow manages to escape and survive.
If the invisibly cloak in the first scene wasn't enough to tell me that we need to suspend a lot of belief in this show, Yong's miraculous ability to survive impossible situations will. Many times I found myself throughout the show thinking, 'now, the human body doesn't work like that' or ' how the heck did he manage that in a short time'.
When Yong slowly, and painfully, becomes Iljimae, the show becomes more fun as long you've continued to keep your brain off. I had whiplash from the amount of twists and turns that are frequent and dare I say even over used. It was like the writer was doing everything they could to hurt your feelings. Even something so simple as turning around, so Yong misses seeing his biological mother multiple times.
It's this frequent onslaught of frustrating moments that for me is what ruined the ending the most. For me, since they used the opening scene as the ending, and that 3 characters were sitting around the table, I take that as Yong having survived and the young brother at the end, basically telling us what happened. From that we can conclude that Yong is in hiding and visits his friends and family but we never see Yong properly reunite with his mother. Poor Bong Soon has been left to wonder alone probably believing that he is dead. Eun Chae may also be feeling that he as died as well. Did the King clear the Lee family of their charges? We see that he never stepped down from the throne, so why did it take 4 years for Yong to come back?
This is where I feel the 'the story behind the legend' feeling. As though this was all a lead up to an even greater plot, the legend of Iljimae it's self, and we are just simply left to write our own stories afterwards.
Iljimae, much like Robin Hood and other figures of folklore like him, becomes something of a ghost that keeps the wicked scared and the vulnerable heard.
The King is seen to have clearly lost his mind, wandering paranoid and scared that Iljimae will come for him.
The last scene is of Iljimae sitting on the garden wall by the tree, glaring at the camera, like a reminder that he will seek justice and he will come for you. I am actually ok with this kind of ending. It is inline with the triumph of folklore, that the legend goes on. It's just simply lacking the emotional fulfillment of having certain scenes missing, after all the abuse we took throughout the series.
I had no issue with the music but there was one scene that left me genuinely wondering what the director was thinking. During an emotional moment between Yong and Eun Chae, the background music is of two violins playing out of sync with each other. I get the symbolism but it was very, very hard to listen to and ultimately distracted from the scene that was meant to be painful and emotional.
Yong himself is the 'jerk with a heart of gold' character and becomes more loveable when he begins to mature. It is his adoptive father who is the real hero of the show. A man forced into stealing by corrupted officials, who treasures his two adopted sons heartwarmingly, and his willing to do literally anything to keep them alive and happy.
I had no issue with the romance part of it but it is a very brief subject. An almost touched on romance that if it had been developed further, would have been a very beautiful Robin and Marion love story that I could imagine for myself at the end. Perhaps Iljimae and Eun Chae could meet each other again at the blossom tree?
It's just one of those scripts that really feels like a first draft and that can lead a lot of viewers to feel disappointed.
Despite all of that, I thoroughly enjoyed this series, I couldn't stop watching, and I had a great time admiring a baby faced Lee Joon Gi and his mid-00s hairstyle.
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