This review may contain spoilers
Here we go again!??
Geon Woo and Woo Jin are back! I binge-watched the second season in just 2 days, I literally couldn’t tear myself away from this series. Incredibly suspenseful, with no moment to breathe. Of course there were some humorous elements, but this season was definitely darker than season 1. I kind of missed the brightness and humor here, Lee Sang Yi is made for that kind of role.
A beautiful relationship between the boys, very brother-like, which is also visible in how Geon Woo’s mother treats his friend like her own adopted son. The fight choreography is excellent — I don’t really know much about boxing, but as an amateur it all looked very convincing to me. Especially the highway fight scene with Yun Tae Geom — absolute banger!
The main characters are amazing. I can only imagine how much work they had to put in to build that physique and learn all those movements — impressive. I keep wondering how long the training must have taken to achieve something like that. The actor playing the gang leader was terrifying 😀 Honestly, I really wanted them to take him down in the end, he was awful 😀 but performed phenomenally.
Now the negatives: 😳
First of all — why pull a guy out of prison and then do absolutely nothing with him for several episodes? So much effort to extract a dangerous person just to actually use him at the very end of the series? 🤔
Second thing, more of a personal preference: too much gore. Some scenes I had to skip — ears, bathtub, torture… I get that it amps up the thriller vibe, but for me it was too much. I’m here for action and fight scenes, gore is just too much.
Another issue — not enough light and humorous breaks. The balance in season 1 was better. Here I was constantly stressed out 😀 maybe that was the intention of the writers though.
And one more thing: is the life of professional boxers really like that? That they constantly have to run from people, being chased by organizers of illegal fights? Geon Woo is a world champion, so I understand raising the stakes around him, but there are plenty of other fighters who would agree for money… why are they so fixated on him? And all that trouble just to get one fighter. Just a small digression — I get that the story needs a trigger for everything to happen.
Overall: highly recommend, but for sensitive viewers — sometimes hand on the mouse ready to skip 😄
A beautiful relationship between the boys, very brother-like, which is also visible in how Geon Woo’s mother treats his friend like her own adopted son. The fight choreography is excellent — I don’t really know much about boxing, but as an amateur it all looked very convincing to me. Especially the highway fight scene with Yun Tae Geom — absolute banger!
The main characters are amazing. I can only imagine how much work they had to put in to build that physique and learn all those movements — impressive. I keep wondering how long the training must have taken to achieve something like that. The actor playing the gang leader was terrifying 😀 Honestly, I really wanted them to take him down in the end, he was awful 😀 but performed phenomenally.
Now the negatives: 😳
First of all — why pull a guy out of prison and then do absolutely nothing with him for several episodes? So much effort to extract a dangerous person just to actually use him at the very end of the series? 🤔
Second thing, more of a personal preference: too much gore. Some scenes I had to skip — ears, bathtub, torture… I get that it amps up the thriller vibe, but for me it was too much. I’m here for action and fight scenes, gore is just too much.
Another issue — not enough light and humorous breaks. The balance in season 1 was better. Here I was constantly stressed out 😀 maybe that was the intention of the writers though.
And one more thing: is the life of professional boxers really like that? That they constantly have to run from people, being chased by organizers of illegal fights? Geon Woo is a world champion, so I understand raising the stakes around him, but there are plenty of other fighters who would agree for money… why are they so fixated on him? And all that trouble just to get one fighter. Just a small digression — I get that the story needs a trigger for everything to happen.
Overall: highly recommend, but for sensitive viewers — sometimes hand on the mouse ready to skip 😄
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