drama-insomnia

Law and the City took everything that people like about legal dramas and threw it all out the door. The leads have no personality, the romance was boring, and they chose the blandest cases. I really thought this show would be more of a commentary on the Korean legal system and while there is a little bit of that, they largely picked incredibly dull civil cases to focus on. This choice was baffling and created such boring episodes with almost no stakes. Spending entire episodes on building materials, real estate contracts, or a watch that maybe was stolen was bizarre and they could’ve gone in a much more interesting direction.

Lee Jong Suk’s character didn’t have a personality at all. They gave him nothing to do and he brought nothing to the role. The romance might as well not have existed, for how little impact it had on the show. Two incredibly beautiful actors with zero chemistry did not make for a compelling romance. Their romance was mostly shown in flashbacks and it never really made sense when they had fallen in love again. Once they get together, almost nothing is shown of their relationship. It felt like the show kept almost making a commentary on aspects of the legal system or workplace, but they never quite covered them enough, so everything felt very surface level.

The main reason I kept watching was that I did enjoy the friendships and the friends were much more interesting than the leads. Their friendship felt very deep when they were working on more personal cases and I think the fact that they all worked for different partners gave them too much separation and didn’t allow us to get enough of their relationships. I found the legal advisor to be such an afterthought and a character that had no purpose. I know that she is a great actress, so I’m not sure why they gave her nothing to do. I kept expecting the show to tackle her backstory to give more insight into her motivations and personal life, but there was just nothing.

This is such a nitpick, but the fact that they didn’t release this show at the end of the year is crazy. Everyone is bundled up in a wool coats for the whole show and that combined with the slow pace made this such an odd choice to be released in the heart of summer.

I would have rated this a lot lower except there were a few episodes in the middle I did really enjoy. Overall this just felt like such a missed opportunity and I really struggled to finish it.