TheDramaReader

Are The Car Windows Tinted? AKA I Created an MDL Account Just to Review This

I just came from watching Signal, which for me was quite literally the greatest drama I've ever watched and if I could I would give it a 12/10. Having quite enjoyed Lee Je Hoon's acting in it and enjoyed the break from romantic themes, I searched for a drama that would hopefully produce similar results. I read through comments, choosing to disbelieve the nay-sayers because i OH-SO wanted to love this drama, but i cant, I just cant. Episode 14 is the episode that broke me.

What frustrates me so much about this series is the fact that the plot devices are SO inconsistent. Furthermore, the characters don't learn and make the same mistakes, they just aren't always caught by the plot unless it's convenient to the writer. Most of all, despite appearing so invincible and intelligent, they do things that make absolutely no sense. I want to give several examples below:

SPOILERS BELOW:
•Are the deluxe taxi's windows tinted? In every scene so far the deluxe taxi's windows were tinted pitch black. So dark that when all those news vehicles and helicopters were after it no one could see inside. So WHY OH WHY when it's convenient to the plot for the Prosecutor lady to drive by him at night to perfectly be able to look into the vehicle and see the male lead's face? It makes no sense.

•When the second female lead finally gets her hands on the cellphone of the perp who ruined her sister's life, she steps on it, crushing it. I'm just like DOES THE PHONE NOT HAVE A MEMORY CARD OR CLOUD BACKUP STORAGE? Like isn't this girl a hacker? Shouldn't she have confiscated the phone to delete the manual and cloud forms of the video as well instead of just stepping on it?! Like they literally blew up servers for that case but they couldn't do a tiny bit more due diligence? I got so upset.

•When our parallel universe batman male lead just came from saving an important character, he turned his back to the villain and got STABBED because of it. He's not wearing any protective gear despite getting stabbed several times before. THEN, RIGHT AFTER this event, he goes to save another important character (ep. 14), punches the bad guy (who is still perfectly conscious and able) and GETS STABBED AGAIN. I just want to know...IS IT SO HARD TO RESTRAIN THE BAD GUY BEFORE MOVING ON TO SAVING THE INNOCENT?

•Why are they always giving their names and identities/faces to the perps? If something goes wrong in the mission they have their identities and wont be able to know how the perps will demand retribution. Which leads me the stupidest part when Jang Sung Chul got stabbed by that other dude I was like "this man's family was murdered and he has NO home security systems?" also it didn't make sense that the guy who stabbed him didn't go for the kill, like why? There was nothing in that character's characterisation that would indicate he would spare him.


The show makes the male lead out the be this invincible character who solves all his problems by dropping bodies, but for a show with so many complexities this isn't SUPPOSED to always solve his problems and yet it conveniently always does. It's SO incredibly frustrating.

The other concern I have about this show is about the themes of revenge and philosophy of justice. It felt so lackadasical for Jang Sung Chul's character to think he had the answer to all of morality. The revenge schemes were also highly dissatisfying for me because they literally basically involved beating people up then throwing them in that makeshift prison. The reasons prisons exist is first and foremost to keep those who are harmful to society away from society. How are you going to trust a CRIMINAL to keep other CRIMINALS and think everything will be okay.

I just feel like the writer thinks this drama is smarter than it actually is, but there are SO many plot holes, philosophical holes, judicial holes, criminal holes, character-identity holes, conflict resolution holes they might as well have called this drama "HOLES."

What I Liked:
•The acting. The rag tag bunch of vigilantes had excellent chemistry together and really felt like they worked as a team. I thought they worked so well together that I actually feel invested in their relationship, despite the fact that I didn't love the story.
•The initial story--I liked the idea of a group of people coming together to support one another in a unique way which could have made for a more interesting story, but instead it just wasted a lot of potential on messiness.
•The PURSUIT of philosophy. I did NOT like at all Jang Sung Chul's moral condescending nature, but I did APPRECIATE his PURSUIT of morality and at least realising that even though the judicial system is flawed, he on his own cant be responsible for "reforming" criminals/ "fixing" them.

In any case I will probably still finish it. I might even try to watch the second season next year. But I most CERTAINLY wont be rewatching season 1.

4 stars 14.5 episodes in. Will update after finishing.

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Excellent Cast; Lackluster Story/plot

Im a lover of great stories and faithful characters. To be honest I actually quite liked the first 8 episodes of AOS part 2. It has more of a rom com vibe and i don’t really understand why the writers kept trying to input conflict into the show when that clearly isn’t their strong suit. Every major conflict the show presented was solved so easily— there was no journey, no trepidation or wondering whether things would work out, and nothing significant lost or taken from the characters. The writers literally took no risks. Even if I didn’t watch the ending I could have told you that all the bad guys die and all the good guys live… and that’s exactly what happened.

I’m completely underwhelmed with the ending of AOS part 2. There was so much bulld-up concerning so many different plot lines:
- the fire bird that’s going to destroy the whole world “oh no!”
- the evil unanimous assembly who were greedy for the ice stone even from part 1.
- Jin mu pursuing his only character trait “im evil muahahaha”
- The protection of jinyowon and powerlessness of the jin family
- naksu/cho yeon/ jin bu yeon is definitely going to die— she definitely is..the story promises it! (spoiler…she lives)

The resolutions to the plot’s “major conflicts” were all solved SO QUICKLY it made me wonder what was the point of having them as conflicts in the first place? Especially the fire bird scene, the build up of that was across the ENTIRE part 2 show yet was resolved in less than 5 minutes… its just SO underwhelming.

Even that funeral they held for the “death” of the 3 main characters was also resolved almost immediately and then never addressed again. It was just so frustrating. Because I enjoyed the first 8 episodes enough, that made watching the final 2 episodes so shockingly disappointing. Sure its a happy ending, but how can you have a “world is going to end” scenario where all the main/ “good” characters survived no problem and fight scenes were over with a overwhelmingly crushing defeat to the opposing side? I think the writers really should have just stuck to the rom com concept. Also i gave up on the plotline of naksu as a fierce strong assassin from part 1. I felt like the writers themselves just didn’t want to write a fierce female character so i’m not going to put down the show for that plot line.

Ultimately the best part of the show was the actors and what they did with the characters they were given. Basically i liked the friendship chemistry with the characters and felt annoyed that the writers kept trying to push ‘love’ unto Cho Yeon where friendship suited the relationships better. Ultimately I did mostly enjoy the show before the last 2 episodes, so i cant rate it too harshly.

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Excellent Subversion of Expectations and Wonderful Overall Execution

The movie definitely subverts expectations until the very end. How I thought the story would progress and what I thought the story would focus on was absolutely not the case; however, the movie executes this in a way that is unsettling yet deeply hopeful. I was surprised that in the backdrop of such a hopeless setting, the story that was told focused on the unforgettable love of one’s family, and how each person hopes that love will set their loved one free. I think this is a must watch.

————————————

Spoilers below

The Love of a Mother and Daughter
(this was the original title of my review, but I felt it might spoil the premise of the movie)

I found the theme of how the mother (Jung E) did all she could to save her daughter’s life, but even then 40 years later the same problem of cancer still plagues her daughter AND now she, Jung_E is trapped to a life where she is abused by the system and can’t even truly ‘rest in peace’.

Initially I was definitely more focused on the dystopian horror setting and how they were going to win the war more than I focused on the heart of the story, which centred on the love of a mother for her daughter and love of a daughter for her mother. I think the execution of the movie was flawless in subverting our expectations but also drawing out spectacular performances from our two female leads.


Also want to say RIP to the main lead actress, Kang Soo-yeon. Jung_E was both her comeback performance and her final performance. She really did a phenomenal job. Great work by all the production and team members— “Jung_E” really captured my attention!

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It Should Have Been 16 Episodes | How Story-telling Can Cheapen Acting Performances

Hear me out— Perfect Crown ’suffers’ from two completely contradicting ‘issues’: The premise of the story is actually extremely deep yet the storytelling is strikingly shallow.

Disclaimer: At the point of writing this review, I haven’t yet watched the last two episodes.


At the beginning of the episodes I felt like something was missing from the two main lead’s acting. It felt like there was a backstory that was never told. Seong Hui-ju has a kind of “chip on her shoulder” personality that is a little off-putting and uhh…well, a bit exasperating. It’s actually obvious over the course of the series that, in the earlier episodes, she is putting on a front, yet we are supposed to pretend like we understand the character and sympathise with the character from episode 1 even though we know nothing about her.

The few snapshots of her past just weren’t enough to have me hooked to her character, and I probably only continued watching because I felt like IU would have picked a more nuanced character than the earlier episodes depicted. In reality, Song Hui Ju is a scared little girl who just wanted to be loved by and a part of her father’s family, and sought to get there by being the best at everything—essentially buying her family’s love through perfectionism.

The reality of Song Hui-ju is that she isn’t as much of a sociopath as the earlier episodes lead us to believe, and I know that this is the point, but by adding 4 more episodes (16 eps total) there would have been time to understand her backstory or even show the first moments she first began trying on that sociopath-type mask. They could have shown us the loneliness she felt after feeling abandoned by her mother, and her obsessive need for love from her father from such a young age by really digging into the backstory. And then shown us Song Hui-Ju’s first devolvement into her sociopathic front and how it WORKED FOR HER as the reason why she kept putting up that front. But all we get is jumping right into a female lead who we have little reason to like. The only clue that Hui Ju may not be crazy is how loyal her secretary is to her—meaning she must be a pretty good boss. There is basically no context for IU’s performance in the earlier episodes, which kinds of makes watching the character of Hui-Ju a little uncomfortable. IMO, I think IU nails the portrayal and the “mask” Hui Ju wears. I saw some characters saying IU’s acting felt fake because it felt like she was pretending to be Hui Ju--but i think that’s the point! “Mean” Hui Ju is an exaggerated persona of the real Hui Ju. When the mask starts to slip in the later episodes we get a glimpses of her true nuances. Think about:

........Sp0iler: the car scene and how the immediately pushed the car to the side to protect the young king, therefore putting herself in more harm. A sacrificial nature in Hui Ju is not depicted in the earlier episodes at all, but it IS in her. I feel like they could have told a better story by letting the mask slip at least a little bit to foreshadow that more nuances to the character is coming


It’s the same thing with I-AN’s characterisation. I-AN is characterised by restraint but there’s no full backstory to really understand what he is restraining from. We get bits and pieces of backstory that he’s a “spare,” but how are us real-world commoners supposed to understand the weight of existing as a back-up who—conceptually—will likely never be needed. That kind of backstory is incredibly deep, but its storytelling portrayal is surprisingly so much lighter than the premise behind the character.

.........SP0ILER alert: the layered performance of BWS in the earlier episodes makes so much more sense after finding out that he knew all along that his sister-in-law denied his late brother’s request to abdicate the throne, meaning every interaction they had she was lying to his face and HE KNEW IT.

BWS’ performance in earlier episodes gives restraint, disgust, and most importantly a numbness that is difficult to understand without story. The earlier episodes force us to dive right into a backstory that we could never relate to, which I actually feel like cheapens the performance.


I am a fan of both BWS and IU, so seeing their acting be criticised made me do some real thought digging, because, when watching the earlier episodes, I actually AGREED—I was off-put by both performances and couldn’t figure out why. In the earlier episodes it’s not that the acting was bad, it was that their acting was much too layered for characters we know nothing about and can’t sympathise with because we just don’t know them like that. It’s funny because I have a tendency to think longer historical dramas can be quite boring, but there was so much room to show everyone’s backstory in more than just a few high school snapshots. Like for the evil queen instead of them saying “she comes from 3 generations of queens,” they could have shown us the generational pressure on both Inpyong (aka Jin Mu) and the Queen Mother to upkeep their own family honor and the greed it birthed within them. That would have been so cool to see, and then it would have made the Queen Mother’s devolvement into wickedness so much more conflicting for the audience. That kind of storytelling would have been incredible.

I do think the little snapshots are cute, but they had so much potential to actually be potent, not just cute.

I know the drama is trying to follow fluff trends and that in regular dramas we complain because we don’t usually get enough time spent on fluff between the leads. I do think that the drama delivers on the fluff the audience enjoys; however, again, it took me 10 episodes before I was able to intellectually peel back the acting-tone layers of the first 5-8 episodes. There is so much material for the story to work with but instead it hops right over excavating the real depth that is fundamental to the series’ premises, in favour of just delivering fluff. I think this actually ends up confusing the audience on the main lead’s acting performances.

The queen mother has been delivering at a high level; however, if you think about it it is easier to understand the angst behind her rage and evil because we are so used to evil mother characters and especially evil queen mother characters from other dramas (let’s be real, almost all queen mother/mother in law characters are evil in historical dramas). So we RELATE to her performance because she is the mother of a young king and her power depends on a child. Who wouldn’t be a little crazy under that circumstance?

Even the Prime Minister…the actor is a great actor, but all we really get in the earlier episodes from his acting is a numbness that is supposed to be validated by “his religion” but we have no idea what that religion means to him. If we had been given more backstory as to why he fell in love with Hui-Ju and what his religion means to him and why he interpreted his faith as meaning he needed to have restrained himself for literally decades from confessing to his love? Like how are we as the audience supposed to relate to that? That’s why:


.........SP0ILER: the later episodes where the gloves come off with the PM, the actor is doing such a phenomenal job because we now understand his anger and the darkness it entails…but it took 10 episodes to get there

On the Main Lead’s Chemistry:
I think “chemistry” is a subjective consideration; however, typically in dramas there is buildup between the main leads through the story and their meet-cute story that delivers a sense of angst between them, only to be relieved when they finally get together. Instead, the chemistry of Perfect Crown’s main leads is characterised by restraint and ***consent. Prince IAN wouldn’t make and moves on Hui-Joo without her consent, and Hui-Joo has a tendency to build up a personality armour to protect herself and “isn’t supposed to” allow herself to fall for a guy she has a business contract with that’s supposed to lead her to the perfectionism that is supposed to gain her the love and approval of her father— this leads to a relationship characterised by restraint. So even though the series delivers on their marriage fairly early, we don’t get the satisfaction of angst and buildup BECAUSE they already knew each other AND have to cordially respect each other. That’s why I feel like episode 10 really delivered…because.

.........SP0ILER: After all her attempts to have done everything to gain the love of her father, she kneels before her father to protect the guy she loves…meaning she has abandoned her desire to be loved by her father to instead serve her partner by giving him love instead.

Anyways I haven’t watched the last 2 episodes yet but I don’t think my take will change. I think it’s a neat little show but the earlier episodes are surprisingly shallow (story) and deep (acting). I personally think both IU & BWS did a great job overall and encapsulated the true nature of both characters. I also think that ironically, if they had actually had less layered performances (meaning technically worse acting), that might have actually gone over better with the audiences, but only because we have no ida what the story is trying to do until we get to the latter episodes.


But who knows, maybe i’m just giving preferential treatment!!! 🤪

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Riveting to Watch, but Intentionally Amoral (Morally Grey)

I stayed up to watch part 2 of The Glory the moment the clock hit 3:00 am and boy, was it a Journey.

The Glory (pt. 2) is meant to be a completely satisfying revenge story between a victim against her abuser and we somewhat know the story’s end from its beginning. From part 1 we know of our female lead’s tenacity and dedication towards getting her resolute end, we just aren’t quite sure how things will unravel.

The Glory in many ways feels like sort of a revenge expose to its audience as well. I got this feeling that any audience member who had ever bullied a person in the past would think of their own victims while watching it. It felt like it was pointing a finger to the audience saying, “I know what you’ve done, and I’m coming for you.”

Ultimately, The Glory pt. 2 continues from its first part to serve as an extremely slow burn revenge story. It was like Dong Eun was metaphorically thrusting a knife very slowly into her abusers, perhaps paralleling the slow torture she faced as a child by these abusers. Like the game of “Go,” She takes territory from her enemies little by little. They are aware of her plays yet completely helpless against her overall strategy.

What is interesting is that even as we witness this metaphorical knife penetrate deeper and deeper, we aren’t given a very clear sense of what revenge looks like “in real life.” What does it look like to “win” in revenge? The police system was portrayed as incompetent at best and corrupt at average. Every opportunity to rectify the violence inflicted upon victims through “formal” channels was obsolete. The worst thing about this concept of ineffective justice pipelines is that they are inconsistently applied and often feel as though the greatest effort of “the law” doesn’t truly bring justice for those whom need it the most.


My Thoughts on The Glory’s Philosophy:
I personally don’t particularly agree with The Glory’s philosophy of direct retribution carefully planned out in a way that consumes one’s own existence. I also found it difficult to stomach that revenge was Dong Eun’s entire heart. What is most unfortunate of all, though, is the fact that if Dong Eun did not become the executor of revenge, there is little clear path as to how any form of legal justice would be served against said abusers. Again, the Glory left me with the question “what does true revenge look like?”



SPOILERS FROM HERE ON BELOW:

My Thoughts on the State of the Abusers Pre-Revenge:
Something I thought was particularly significant about the set-up of the story is in how Dong Eun views Yeon Jin by way of her brand image rather than her reality. Yeon Jin appears to have things set out pretty well for her, but in reality: Yeon Jin appears to have a college degree yet no knowledge on a field she actually enjoys working in. She’s so incompetent that she has to have her husband pay multiple times her salary to keep her job—she isn’t good at her job because she didn’t study hard, which is entirely her own fault. She supposedly has a pretty decent husband yet cheats on him. She would literally be nothing without the looks and money she inherited from her parents, but on her own she has nothing.

What’s worst is that I think Yeon Jin is aware of her own pathetic-ness, but chooses to hide behind money and a pitifully mean personality. If others don’t bow down to her she can’t distinguish herself as being at the top because she knows that without money and fake-pride, she is nothing. Yeon Jin’s only real pride and joy is her daughter, yet she fails at this, too, by literally falsifying circumstances surrounding her birth father. She seeks atonement through her daughters eyes, not through actually atoning in her actions. Most of all, she fails her daughter almost automatically by way of being an inherently unrepentant person.

Even though the reality is that all Dong Eun’s abusers are pitiful people at best, how could this thought be of “comfort” to her in the midst of exceptionally deep longstanding pain. This kept bringing up the question for me as to “what does true revenge look like?” And “could there have been another way?”



On Repentance and Forgiveness:
I think The Glory did a decent job at acknowledging that revenge didn’t fulfil any life meaning for Dong Eun, yet it also somewhat backtracked on this premise by rededicating her life to a new purpose— which is helping her BAE to get revenge, too. To me, this journey of healing in Dong Eun’s life still feels incomplete and especially incomplete without her love interest, which I find dangerous in their specific dependance on one another rooted in revenge. I don’t think revenge is all there is to their relationship, yet it almost feels like their love is majorly sidelined because revenge is the priority. It's the concept that revenge is meaningful enough, but not love on it own. This feels like a dangerous concept.

Most of all forgiveness, which is usually more about the victims inner healing rather than the abusers, was completely absent from the Glory. This made our protagonists journeys feel even more incomplete because inner healing was deemed as impossible without revenge. This facet of the story felt pretty one dimensional for me, but then again, I am a Christian and therefore believe in the fruits that forgiveness and repentance bears. It appears as though Dong Eun was 'merely' matching up evils against evils, but in reality she took on the role of a wicked person herself in order to gain physical justice she could bear witness to. I thought of this in particular when she "tempts" Hye Jeong with the opportunity to permanently blind Jae Joon. Yes Hye Jeong took the "temptation" but Dong Eun was the tempter to begin with. This was a theme constantly repeated throughout the show.


Vengeance Fulfilled? (story ending spoiler):
One scene that I thought was particularly revealing was when both Yeon Jin and her mother were in prison they cross each other’s paths. It felt like the truth of the revenge story became exacerbated in that scene— Yeon Jin’s mother wasn’t actually sorry for committing murder and neither was Yeon Jin sorry for committing two murders. Yeon Jin’s mother hardly even glanced in her direction, offered her no apologies or desire to restore their relationship. Yeon Jin’s abandonment was made complete in that scene, but so was Yeon Jin’s mother’s formal abandonment of her rights as a mother. Rather than that scene having anything to do with Dong Eun, however, it felt clarifying to see the effect that amoral parenting can have on replicating amorality in children. It also felt like a powerful testimony in making different choices than our environments sometimes negatively influence.

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