This review may contain spoilers
While it does veer into cliches at times, I'm someone who does enjoy a good cliche every once in a while, when done correctly. I feel like watching this after seeing Unmasked with similar themes from a different perspective puts into mind what works here and what doesn't work there. Obviously both have great leads, but while the side characters were mostly mediocre here and things were way too male-centred, this shines in giving the two female leads most of the screentime. I was pleasantly surprised that Dongjoo was barely a factor here since they usually like to have characters like him left front and centre, even in female-centric dramas. Again, see Unmasked.Villains are a mixed bag. I think Baek Jaemin is believably awful, and I have to say I really liked all the screen time we got of Eun Chaeryung, but the rest vary. Chairwoman Son I felt was a character that had potential but slowly became more boring over time, which can be said doubly so for Carl Yoon, who I was deeply excited for since Lee Kyungyoung is a known quantity when it comes to giving good villain performances. I wouldn't say his performance is the issue, but the writing for his character is mostly terrible after his first episode. The show would've been better without him.
Seojin sucks but in a normal way that makes her look better than her family, so of course she got the redemption arc. Even if it was tiny and felt shoehorned in. I do not like her still. Nobody is going to remember Seo Minjung after watching this, but wow she's awful. In a good way though, her writing was a little cliched for a "corrupt lying politician" but Jin Kyung elevates the material in a way that looks a little embarassing for the also cliched role that Lee Kyungyoung had to play. Women are truly left front and centre here, I like that.
Like a lot of the time with a certain genre of drama, this is a show that won't stop ending. There is so much fat that could've been trimmed off the finale that you could probably fry an entire field of potatoes in it. I could've also done without the teaser for the Queenmaker Initiative or whatever unless they're actually going to give us a second season where Dohee and Kyungsook actually finally fucking kiss instead of holding eachothers hands and staring at eachother longingly. I heard this show was lesbian coded and people were not lying.
Feminist themes from a male showrunner can often feel a little hollow, and I can't say that they don't feel hollow at times. At times Kyungsook especially feels like she's written as a caricature of a righteous but misguided feminist and she's a little frustrating at times. Not wrong, just frustrating, but I appreciate how the victims here are by no means perfect and yet aren't villainised for also having done "wrong" that by no means erases what's been done to them. It feels like a slightly more honest depiction of assault and abuse that often goes unportrayed, even in the modern day, even if it has work to do and things are often played seemingly for shock value and tension.
Is the shock value and tension for other plotlines horrible though? I definitely wouldn't say so. You certainly have to suspend your disbelief at times, most times really, but I can't say I was ever bored. The show toes a fine line between going full makjang and actually caring about the themes it portrays and yet somehow comes out the other side mostly unscathed on both fronts, which is impressive.
More over, I really do love the story of redemption and revenge that Dohee has throughout this. I truly hated her guts at the end of the first episode and I was wondering how she'd redeem herself, and while the show never strays from it being at least partially in her self interest, it also doesn't condemn her for her self interest either, it's right to experience something awful and decide that things need to change. It doesn't make you a hypocrite, we're all meant to grow and evolve, no matter what. The Christian allegories here feel sometimes so unsubtle that it feels like Garth Marenghi wrote him, ESPECIALLY the scene at the mausoleum. I'm very much not a Christian at this point in my life, and I feel like having those themes without acknowledging that organised religion produces about a thousand Jaemins a day, but I do agree in the value of penance and repentance which is something often forgotten about yet repeated by the followers of religion. Even if you don't believe in a higher power, you can't be living with the burden on your shoulders of evil for your entire life.
This at the end of the day is a show not about politics, capitalism, or feminism. It's about two women who needed each other, and after all is said and done, love each other and improve each other through one another. I usually don't mind seeing a sequel to a drama announced but, really, even with the tease at the end, I fail to see what you'd do with a second season because this sets out to do something and accomplishes it. No need for more.
Was this review helpful to you?
But overall not great when all the men in this drama sort of float between "take or leave it" performances, really hammy villain performances that feel like tonal whiplash considering the often extremely dark ripped from the headlines plots, or Giho who I started out disliking and outright ended up hating. Han Do starts out slightly annoying, gets okay in the middle, but man his character reverts back to being annoying in the last few episodes. I'm sure Jung Sungil is a perfectly competent actor and I'm really not here to shade any of the cast but his character ends up being one of the most generic leads ever. None of the personality quirks he's shown to have end up mattering and he just dissolves into this Ken doll of a man who has a conscious apparently but never really does anything useful for anyone, and the lack of chemistry between him and KHS is apparent. I don't think either of these actors thought a romantic subplot was a good idea here.
Maybe this deserves a season 2, maybe more so if they elaborate on the final scene, but I'd honestly rather the talent here just did something else. Or, at the very least, we get something more focused in what it wants to be. More importantly, less men acting as the saviours of the plot despite not really doing anything and taking out all the oxygen in the room when any female characters try to take up space. We had a good thing going in that middle third and clearly that was too much to ask to continue.
Was this review helpful to you?
Geumbokhee forever
I was worried this would spoil some of the magic at the end, like a lot of series can, but nope. Geumbokhee is canon, and you can't prove otherwise. Period setting is really fun and while I was worried it would be just slightly too quirky and manic, it strikes a really good balance between comedy and drama without feeling jarring in either sense, even if the comedy is really screwball and the plot can get quite surprisingly serious (though not too melodramatic) at times. It's all very natural feeling.Love the performances from all the women, and this might be the first time a random kid has sprung up in a show's plot and not just not ruined things, but actually improved things. The Korean birth rate propaganda works if the child is being raised by two lesbian couples living together it turns out. I will admit to not liking Nora at first, and I never quite fully came around on her much sillier and less developed character, even if she has way more screen time than Mi-sook, I feel Mi-sook was just a better character and we just saw more of her. I did end up liking more than I disliked her at the end though, she just feels like a character from something a little more focused on pure comedy than a comedy-drama. I'm also going to be real, the Risk Management guys and Cha Jung-il are the only interesting men. Shin Jung-woo and President Kang are devastatingly boring, thankfully Song Ju-ran is a much better secondary villain to Kang. Also love Choi In-ja and the way she mirrors characters like Bok-hee. So many fun to watch female characters to more than make up for the boring men, and yet CERTAIN PEOPLE have spent the entire drama's run speculating about M/F relationships instead.
More importantly, there's several Hong Kong cinema references here that aren't obscure or anything but I just find it really funny that Google translates Hong Geum-bo's name to Sammo Hung, and then you start to realise that was a totally on purpose similarity. The A Better Tomorrow reference here isn't as good as Extreme Job's though, the gold standard for jarringly random HK cinema references in Korean entertainment. Speaking of, I love Director Yun so much.
I want a season 2 but I also think they captured lightning in a bottle with the cast chemistry among the women of Room 301 and I'm not sure they can do it a second time without something being missing or having them come together as a group and have it not feel forced. I will at the very least take Geumbokhee as a FSS agent/PI buddy cop duo though.
Was this review helpful to you?
So much stronger of a show when it's about the rise to power Sarah Kim had and all the enemies she made along the way, a really well written character played magnificently.
Sometimes you ought to just know when to stop when writing a script and I'm not sure this knew when to stop, especially when you only have eight episodes at your disposal. Basically a far better drama about fashion and the desire to be viewed as wealthy, even among the wealthy, and a really whatever detective procedural. I can suspend my disbelief if I think it's a fun time to watch, and there are moments where I'm willing to do so even as things get a little too ridiculous, but overall it's just not enough of a balance. Especially since Sarah Kim becomes a little too passive in the closing act, rather a contrast considering her role in the first and second acts of the drama.
Also wish the yuribait wasn't confined to just episode one but maybe that's just me, or blamed on people posting clips of the first episode online to draw me in.
Was this review helpful to you?
Really, these characters deserved a better plot overall, obviously Chun Woohee is a real treat to watch no matter if she's a con artist or a vulnerable girl who never really got the chance to either grow up or have a childhood, but the side characters on the protagonist's side are also quite well defined and feel like actual people, which isn't always something that's easy to achieve. I really like the way characters like Nasa and Dajung are developed, Lee Yeon specifically needs a lot more roles, she definitely brings out a vulnerable and sympathetic side to a character that so easily could've just been some awful one note cool girl hacker. I can't say I liked Ringgo though, he starts annoying, he remains annoying. I do wish, however, despite liking how his character ending up, that Mooyoung started in a less wooden place. Kim Dongwook is a good actor and brings a lot of nuance, but it's brought eventually, and the character just isn't interesting enough to care about his scenes at first, which is a stark contrast to Ro Um.
Definitely echo the criticisms though specifically about pacing and product placement, the two most glaring flaws in the drama. Like, you just got done with one of the most emotionally resonant scenes and it just cuts to a Chilsung ad with absolutely no self awareness. It gets really bad in the otherwise really good finale, I'm guessing because they knew that people would be paying attention to other things. There's probably about a dozen worthwhile episodes of content stretched out into sixteen, given my criticisms about some of the villains, you can probably infer what parts I thought were worth keeping and which were worth getting of.
The romance is a surprisingly tender slow burn, which I appreciated. It's in the background the whole time and it doesn't feel rushed like it sometimes can, like they just shoehorned it in because audiences want two characters to get together. "Turn your brain off" is such a dumb thing to say about any media but the sentiment is probably there when I recommend this to others, though not literally, because you definitely need to pay attention at basically every moment. It's an okay to mediocre drama elevated by good performances and honestly some pretty fun plot beats here and there. Worth a watch if you like that sort of thing, but not worth your absolute love and devotion, unless you do love it in which case throw away everything I've said.
Was this review helpful to you?
