oppa_

After rewatching *Extraordinary Attorney Woo*, I started noticing flaws and moral problems that genuinely disturbed me. The first time around, the drama's charm, humor, and lovable characters made these issues easier to overlook. But on a rewatch, some of its storytelling choices feel much more uncomfortable.

## Jung Myeong Seok: The Drama's Tragic Corporate Slave

The first character I want to talk about is Jung Myeong Seok.

To me, he is presented as a sympathetic character, but when I look at his life more critically, he feels like the ultimate corporate slave. He has spent his entire career defending whoever his powerful law firm assigns him to defend—rich people, criminals, murderers, thieves, and other morally questionable clients. His personal conscience appears almost irrelevant. The company decides who deserves his professional skills, and his job is simply to protect them.

The drama presents this as professionalism, but I find it deeply depressing.

He seems to have sacrificed his entire personal life for his career. He neglected his marriage, emotionally distanced himself from his wife, and ultimately drove her away. He ends up divorced and seemingly has almost no meaningful personal life outside his work.

Then, near the end, the drama gives him a serious illness, seemingly expecting the audience to feel enormous sympathy for him.

Of course, illness is tragic, and I am not saying anyone deserves to become sick. But narratively, I find it frustrating that the drama suddenly turns him into someone we are supposed to pity without seriously confronting how he voluntarily chose to live his life. He chose his career over his marriage and personal happiness for years.

Then there is the storyline involving his ex-wife.

She left him because he never gave her enough attention, respect, or priority. They have no children together. So why would she remain emotionally available to him for years afterward? The drama makes it feel as though she never truly moved on and is still waiting for him to ask her back. She immediately comes running whenever he calls.

To me, this makes her character feel less like an independent person and more like someone waiting around to emotionally rescue a man who repeatedly chose his corporate career over her.

The entire storyline feels designed to reward Jung Myeong Seok with sympathy and a second chance without sufficiently examining his responsibility for destroying his own marriage.

## Episode 10: The Most Disturbing Episode for Me

The episode that bothered me the most was Episode 10.

This episode involves an autistic woman and a man accused of sexually abusing her. What makes the episode especially disturbing is that the drama itself establishes that the accused has been involved with multiple vulnerable autistic women.

Yet our protagonists are placed in the position of defending him and trying to discredit or blame the mother who is attempting to protect her daughter.

That was absolutely baffling to me.

Earlier in the drama, Episode 3 emphasizes that autistic people are not all the same. But in Episode 10, the victim is portrayed very differently from Woo Young Woo. She has significantly different intellectual abilities and vulnerabilities.

The courtroom testimony is especially uncomfortable. The victim explains that she felt uncomfortable during sexual intercourse and did not genuinely want to continue. The man allegedly pressured her emotionally by telling her that, if she loved him, she should allow him to have sex with her.

She was uncomfortable, unwilling, and traumatized by the experience.

Yet the episode seems determined to complicate or soften the man's responsibility rather than focusing on the enormous power imbalance and the victim's vulnerability.

That is what I find so disturbing about the storytelling.

A vulnerable person expressing discomfort and unwillingness should not suddenly become a romantic misunderstanding simply because the accused claims there was love involved. Emotional manipulation—especially involving someone with significant cognitive vulnerabilities—should not be romanticized.

The drama repeatedly tells us that autistic people are individuals and should not be treated as children. I completely agree with that. But recognizing someone's adulthood does not mean ignoring intellectual limitations, vulnerability, or their ability to give meaningful consent in a particular situation.

Episode 10 felt as though the drama wanted to create moral ambiguity and a complicated legal case, but instead it came dangerously close to romanticizing a situation that should have been treated with much greater seriousness.

## Episode 12: When Discrimination Is Treated as a Legal Debate

Another episode that deeply bothered me was Episode 12.

The case involving workplace discrimination against women was frustrating because the drama presents an obviously discriminatory policy as something that can simply be justified through legal technicalities.

For me, the bigger problem is the contradiction between Woo Young Woo's supposedly strong moral character and the kind of legal career she chooses to pursue.

The drama presents her as honest, principled, and upright. But she works for Hanbada, a powerful corporate law firm whose job frequently involves defending wealthy and powerful clients.

Earlier, she even considers leaving Hanbada when she discovers that her father has a personal connection to the firm's CEO and believes that her employment may not have been completely independent.

But when she receives an opportunity to work somewhere smaller and potentially dedicate her legal skills to helping ordinary people and pursuing cases aligned with her supposed moral values, she never seriously seems to consider that path.

Why?

Because, from my perspective, the drama's morality becomes selective whenever career prestige and money are involved.

Woo Young Woo can question whether she was hired because of connections, but she does not seriously question the larger system she is participating in: a corporate law firm using brilliant lawyers to protect whoever can afford its services.

That creates a major contradiction for me.

The drama wants us to see Woo Young Woo as an unusually honest and morally upright person. But she is perfectly comfortable remaining inside a system where wealthy clients can hire the best legal talent to protect their interests—even when those interests conflict with ordinary people, victims, or workers.

## My Biggest Problem With the Drama's Overall Concept

Ultimately, this is my biggest issue with *Extraordinary Attorney Woo* after rewatching it.

The drama often presents itself as morally progressive and compassionate. It talks about autism, discrimination, justice, vulnerable people, and social prejudice.

But at the same time, its protagonists work for a powerful corporate law firm whose fundamental purpose is to represent whoever pays them.

The drama repeatedly asks us to admire lawyers for being brilliant and professional while avoiding a deeper question:

**What does professionalism mean when your professional skills are being used to protect powerful people from the consequences of harmful actions?**

A lawyer has the right to defend a client and everyone deserves legal representation. My problem is not simply that lawyers defend unpopular people.

My problem is that the drama often wants the audience to admire corporate lawyers as morally righteous while refusing to seriously examine the moral compromises involved in choosing that career.

Woo Young Woo is presented as someone with extraordinary intelligence and supposedly strong principles. But in the end, she still chooses the prestige, money, and power of corporate law.

That is why, after rewatching the drama, I find it much harder to see *Extraordinary Attorney Woo* as the purely wholesome and progressive series I initially thought it was.

Its characters talk about justice—but many of them are ultimately still serving whoever has enough money and power to hire Hanbada.