This review may contain spoilers
More propaganda to excuse male violence: But he said sorry and cried!
The good - The wardrobe and stage production quality, Shi-wok's hairstyle, and the soundtrack. The story had a lot of intriguing parts.
The bad - More propaganda to excuse male violence towards others, particularly women. Saying sorry and crying shouldn't be treated like some pivotal moment that redeems a male suspect. The initially promising story became disappointing in certain ways. There were so many disturbing parts that didn't add to the plot and were unnecessary;
- The psychological manipulation of the audience with these backstories aimed at creating sympathy for male characters and their depraved actions was insulting. Three examples;
1. The scene of Yoon Se-won tearfully apologizing to Park kyung-wan with the sad music was ridiculous. It's like he only forced himself to do so, because it was a man affected, who lost another man (his dad). Why didn't he apologize to Ga-Young too (not saying it would make what he did to her okay)? He even excused his actions of abducting and torturing a schoolgirl (Ga-young), saying she's just as bad as the corrupt men. He worded it as her "using her body", but in reality, it was her being used for her body. As if she victimized anybody, when in reality, she was the victim. Yoon's warped perception wasn't corrected at all in the show, which Yeo-jin could've done as a woman's advocate (or at least, she should be in that role). The complete disregard for women's lives really shines through here. Someone who did what Yoon did would be an actual psychopath, devoid of empathy, so these tearful moments that some audience members fell for is just conditioning to allow evil men to get away with even more crimes against women.
2. Why did the show portray sad and regretful reactions about the pathetic slap on the wrist sentence that kim woo-kyun got, as if it was too harsh? These guys acted like they shouldn't have done their jobs to protect trafficking victims who were minors. As if saying sorry and looking sad makes woo-kyun a good guy who should be let go.
3. The part when Lee Chang-Joon was shown in a patriotic light in the last episode, about the poet, as if he's some good guy gone bad because of "the corrupt system" that he couldn't help but partake in. Yet he even said he only regrets introducing Park Moo-sung to Hanjo Distribution, not about his role in anything that resulted in people dying or being tortured. Again, this backstory creates conditioning for "well maybe he wasn't that bad/maybe he had a good reason" coddling.
Yet this kind of dedication towards including a sympathetic backstory was denied to Ga-Young, who for some reason was portrayed as an ungrateful brat in the end. All this, despite:
- The inappropriate treatment toward Ga-young during her hospitalization. Her right to privacy wasn't respected, with all these investigators in her room, questioning her, sticking psychologically triggering images in her face. This could be viewed as further torment. Even then, she was still not even safe, and was shuffled around in some sort of switcheroo show on a rooftop to catch a suspect. It's unclear if Yoon Tae In was actually in on her attempted abduction, or he was playing along to catch the main suspect ordering this.
- The last episode's scene with Ga-young, her mom, and Yeo-jin. Why was Ga-Young's mom telling her to say nothing, and she wasn't questioned for this? Why was Ga-young even being interrogated, at this stage?
- Yeo-jin's psychologically abusive behavior toward Ga-young in the last episode, despite her being an under aged victim of s- trafficking, abduction, and torture. To nearly hit her like that, berate her, and tell her to be grateful that the culprit didn't murder her (as if abduction and torture is fine!), was disgraceful. For this, Yeo-jin should've been fired, not promoted.
- Anyone who went through what Ga-young did, esp at that age, would have severe psychological trauma and PTSD. Yet she's treated like an object or a means to an end in this series. Yeo-jin was never this aggressive toward the male interrogation suspects, many of whom did horrible things. When you think of it, Ga-young's mom wasn't there to protect her when she suffered those horrific things, so resentment of her mom's overbearing nature is understandable. All of Yeo-jin's berating was psychological abuse disguised as tough love, IMO. Why make it a point to shame Ga-young for wanting space from her questionable mom, when having boundaries keeps girls and women safe? Her mom's feelings aren't something she should feel guilty for. What about what Ga-Young went through? Any respect I had for Yeo-jin was lost. To add insult to injury, Ga-Young's mom shames her for what she's wearing, when it was literally just a t-shirt and jeans.
Also;
- Seo Dong-jae ended up being promoted by Shi-Wok, just so that an evil man could have his wish fulfilled right before he died by suicide. This, despite:
- Shi-Wok just stood by and watched Eun-Soo get strangled/almost killed, and didn't intervene, despite that being a crime (assault, attempted murder). It was almost implied like Seo Dong-jae stopped and look regretful, as if that made it fine for him to get away with it. It was also made out to be an uncontrollable fit of rage, a classic excuse that male abusers and murderers use (yet he's perfectly in control of himself towards his male colleagues, somehow). When in reality, it's still a choice he made, that should've been punished appropriately. Further, the writers had Eun-Soo apologize to Seo Dong-jae, after Seo guilted her, saying he couldn't get sleep that night he strangled her. If that wasn't an attempt to display what a narcissist or manipulative abuser is like, then is the message that women victims of male violence should apologize to their abusers, if the abusers were in any way disturbed by their own choice of actions? How wrong and insulting to normalize that garbage.
- The completely wrong conclusion of Eun-Soo that Seo Dong-jae must not be a murderer if he didn't also murder her (and if he did, she couldn't do anything about it, so why was that situation even part of the story?). At first I thought she was just saying that out of a survival mechanism, but no, it appears the show portrays her as actually believing that. I think it was irresponsible on the part of the writers/producers to not make a big deal about how wrong this conclusion is, given that DV and male violence against women is bad in Korea and exists in every country. Viewers should be informed that men who strangle women statistically have an extremely high chance of murdering, "Prior non-fatal strangulation was associated with greater than six-fold odds...of becoming an attempted homicide, and over seven-fold odds...of becoming a completed homicide. These results show non-fatal strangulation as an important risk factor for homicide of women, underscoring the need to screen for non-fatal strangulation when assessing abused women in emergency department settings." (Non-fatal strangulation is an important risk factor for homicide of women, NIH study 2009).
- Soon after Eun-soo was murdered, a male character said sorry that this happened so soon after his male boss' promotion. Woman murdered - man and his promotion most affected!
- It was so odd how Eun-soo was treated with coldness, contempt, and an odd suspicion about the motive behind her trying to catch the culprit. The attempt to portray a young woman as emotionally driven and less capable is so misogynist, because to even get her job, she would require certain qualifications and experience. Yet Seo dong-jae is emotionally driven (see: strangulation), but is not portrayed as lesser for this, and in fact gets promoted.
- Park Kyung-wan is a creep, who stalked and took pics of Ga-Young without her knowledge, then tried to delete the evidence, which is a crime. Due to this, the ones who "interrogated" him did nothing wrong and shouldn't have apologized. Him losing his dad is no excuse, either.
- Yoon Tae In's treatment of girls when he's interrogating them. He loses his temper, berates them, and threatens to hit them. This happened after the incident at the house where there were a bunch of "punks" hanging out, yet this treatment didn't happen to the male "punks" there. He even went to hit her, which is disgusting and cowardly. That would only make it more stressful and difficult for witnesses to recollect what happened. This behavior should've resulted in him being fired, not trusted to continue hampering interrogations.
- The slight pickme-ification of Yeo-jin was sad to see. It's like a strong female lead can't exist unless she gets turned into a pickme, is protective of a man, or in some cases, is stereotyped as a lesbian. If Yeo-jin was known as a woman who didn't wear makeup, it's weird that she put on lipstick after the creepy manlet Kim Jung-bon got her a gift, unprompted, disguised as congratulating her on her promotion. (Same thing applies if she hypothetically did wear makeup from the start, and he negged her to stop, then she stopped). I'm glad the male coworker pointed out that he didn't receive such a gift - a hint that this "gift" was just a way to get something from Yeo-jin. Subtly changing a woman over time is a male fantasy, it's like breaking her down, or having control over her identity. Why is Yeo-jin wasting time teaching a grown man (Shi-wok), who can't feel empathy and is a psychopath, things like how to smile? Does she want him to be better at fooling people, so he can manipulate them better? Why catch feelings for a psychopath that constantly disrespects her?
- Shi-wok lacking empathy or emotions is portrayed as a strength in solving cases, such as not bending to pressure. While this applies, it could also make him ruthlessly corrupt. The entire plot hinges on Shi-wok somehow having morals, despite technically being a psychopath, even if he didn't do anything heinous.
Shame on these writers/producers.
The bad - More propaganda to excuse male violence towards others, particularly women. Saying sorry and crying shouldn't be treated like some pivotal moment that redeems a male suspect. The initially promising story became disappointing in certain ways. There were so many disturbing parts that didn't add to the plot and were unnecessary;
- The psychological manipulation of the audience with these backstories aimed at creating sympathy for male characters and their depraved actions was insulting. Three examples;
1. The scene of Yoon Se-won tearfully apologizing to Park kyung-wan with the sad music was ridiculous. It's like he only forced himself to do so, because it was a man affected, who lost another man (his dad). Why didn't he apologize to Ga-Young too (not saying it would make what he did to her okay)? He even excused his actions of abducting and torturing a schoolgirl (Ga-young), saying she's just as bad as the corrupt men. He worded it as her "using her body", but in reality, it was her being used for her body. As if she victimized anybody, when in reality, she was the victim. Yoon's warped perception wasn't corrected at all in the show, which Yeo-jin could've done as a woman's advocate (or at least, she should be in that role). The complete disregard for women's lives really shines through here. Someone who did what Yoon did would be an actual psychopath, devoid of empathy, so these tearful moments that some audience members fell for is just conditioning to allow evil men to get away with even more crimes against women.
2. Why did the show portray sad and regretful reactions about the pathetic slap on the wrist sentence that kim woo-kyun got, as if it was too harsh? These guys acted like they shouldn't have done their jobs to protect trafficking victims who were minors. As if saying sorry and looking sad makes woo-kyun a good guy who should be let go.
3. The part when Lee Chang-Joon was shown in a patriotic light in the last episode, about the poet, as if he's some good guy gone bad because of "the corrupt system" that he couldn't help but partake in. Yet he even said he only regrets introducing Park Moo-sung to Hanjo Distribution, not about his role in anything that resulted in people dying or being tortured. Again, this backstory creates conditioning for "well maybe he wasn't that bad/maybe he had a good reason" coddling.
Yet this kind of dedication towards including a sympathetic backstory was denied to Ga-Young, who for some reason was portrayed as an ungrateful brat in the end. All this, despite:
- The inappropriate treatment toward Ga-young during her hospitalization. Her right to privacy wasn't respected, with all these investigators in her room, questioning her, sticking psychologically triggering images in her face. This could be viewed as further torment. Even then, she was still not even safe, and was shuffled around in some sort of switcheroo show on a rooftop to catch a suspect. It's unclear if Yoon Tae In was actually in on her attempted abduction, or he was playing along to catch the main suspect ordering this.
- The last episode's scene with Ga-young, her mom, and Yeo-jin. Why was Ga-Young's mom telling her to say nothing, and she wasn't questioned for this? Why was Ga-young even being interrogated, at this stage?
- Yeo-jin's psychologically abusive behavior toward Ga-young in the last episode, despite her being an under aged victim of s- trafficking, abduction, and torture. To nearly hit her like that, berate her, and tell her to be grateful that the culprit didn't murder her (as if abduction and torture is fine!), was disgraceful. For this, Yeo-jin should've been fired, not promoted.
- Anyone who went through what Ga-young did, esp at that age, would have severe psychological trauma and PTSD. Yet she's treated like an object or a means to an end in this series. Yeo-jin was never this aggressive toward the male interrogation suspects, many of whom did horrible things. When you think of it, Ga-young's mom wasn't there to protect her when she suffered those horrific things, so resentment of her mom's overbearing nature is understandable. All of Yeo-jin's berating was psychological abuse disguised as tough love, IMO. Why make it a point to shame Ga-young for wanting space from her questionable mom, when having boundaries keeps girls and women safe? Her mom's feelings aren't something she should feel guilty for. What about what Ga-Young went through? Any respect I had for Yeo-jin was lost. To add insult to injury, Ga-Young's mom shames her for what she's wearing, when it was literally just a t-shirt and jeans.
Also;
- Seo Dong-jae ended up being promoted by Shi-Wok, just so that an evil man could have his wish fulfilled right before he died by suicide. This, despite:
- Shi-Wok just stood by and watched Eun-Soo get strangled/almost killed, and didn't intervene, despite that being a crime (assault, attempted murder). It was almost implied like Seo Dong-jae stopped and look regretful, as if that made it fine for him to get away with it. It was also made out to be an uncontrollable fit of rage, a classic excuse that male abusers and murderers use (yet he's perfectly in control of himself towards his male colleagues, somehow). When in reality, it's still a choice he made, that should've been punished appropriately. Further, the writers had Eun-Soo apologize to Seo Dong-jae, after Seo guilted her, saying he couldn't get sleep that night he strangled her. If that wasn't an attempt to display what a narcissist or manipulative abuser is like, then is the message that women victims of male violence should apologize to their abusers, if the abusers were in any way disturbed by their own choice of actions? How wrong and insulting to normalize that garbage.
- The completely wrong conclusion of Eun-Soo that Seo Dong-jae must not be a murderer if he didn't also murder her (and if he did, she couldn't do anything about it, so why was that situation even part of the story?). At first I thought she was just saying that out of a survival mechanism, but no, it appears the show portrays her as actually believing that. I think it was irresponsible on the part of the writers/producers to not make a big deal about how wrong this conclusion is, given that DV and male violence against women is bad in Korea and exists in every country. Viewers should be informed that men who strangle women statistically have an extremely high chance of murdering, "Prior non-fatal strangulation was associated with greater than six-fold odds...of becoming an attempted homicide, and over seven-fold odds...of becoming a completed homicide. These results show non-fatal strangulation as an important risk factor for homicide of women, underscoring the need to screen for non-fatal strangulation when assessing abused women in emergency department settings." (Non-fatal strangulation is an important risk factor for homicide of women, NIH study 2009).
- Soon after Eun-soo was murdered, a male character said sorry that this happened so soon after his male boss' promotion. Woman murdered - man and his promotion most affected!
- It was so odd how Eun-soo was treated with coldness, contempt, and an odd suspicion about the motive behind her trying to catch the culprit. The attempt to portray a young woman as emotionally driven and less capable is so misogynist, because to even get her job, she would require certain qualifications and experience. Yet Seo dong-jae is emotionally driven (see: strangulation), but is not portrayed as lesser for this, and in fact gets promoted.
- Park Kyung-wan is a creep, who stalked and took pics of Ga-Young without her knowledge, then tried to delete the evidence, which is a crime. Due to this, the ones who "interrogated" him did nothing wrong and shouldn't have apologized. Him losing his dad is no excuse, either.
- Yoon Tae In's treatment of girls when he's interrogating them. He loses his temper, berates them, and threatens to hit them. This happened after the incident at the house where there were a bunch of "punks" hanging out, yet this treatment didn't happen to the male "punks" there. He even went to hit her, which is disgusting and cowardly. That would only make it more stressful and difficult for witnesses to recollect what happened. This behavior should've resulted in him being fired, not trusted to continue hampering interrogations.
- The slight pickme-ification of Yeo-jin was sad to see. It's like a strong female lead can't exist unless she gets turned into a pickme, is protective of a man, or in some cases, is stereotyped as a lesbian. If Yeo-jin was known as a woman who didn't wear makeup, it's weird that she put on lipstick after the creepy manlet Kim Jung-bon got her a gift, unprompted, disguised as congratulating her on her promotion. (Same thing applies if she hypothetically did wear makeup from the start, and he negged her to stop, then she stopped). I'm glad the male coworker pointed out that he didn't receive such a gift - a hint that this "gift" was just a way to get something from Yeo-jin. Subtly changing a woman over time is a male fantasy, it's like breaking her down, or having control over her identity. Why is Yeo-jin wasting time teaching a grown man (Shi-wok), who can't feel empathy and is a psychopath, things like how to smile? Does she want him to be better at fooling people, so he can manipulate them better? Why catch feelings for a psychopath that constantly disrespects her?
- Shi-wok lacking empathy or emotions is portrayed as a strength in solving cases, such as not bending to pressure. While this applies, it could also make him ruthlessly corrupt. The entire plot hinges on Shi-wok somehow having morals, despite technically being a psychopath, even if he didn't do anything heinous.
Shame on these writers/producers.
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