This review may contain spoilers
A Good Thriller That Gets Lost in Its Own Story
“It was really a roller coaster of emotions and thoughts, but I still think the script could have been handled in a more consistent way. The story is very confusing at the beginning — up until episode 3 I was seriously thinking about dropping it, but after that it got a lot better.***SPOILER ALERT***
CWK’s storyline didn’t make sense to me. Why would the father hide his own daughter’s death, protect his murderous wife, and still swap the other girl for his own? That’s a lot of villainy, and at no point is the father (who barely appears) portrayed as abusive or cruel. And the whole memory loss thing felt extremely forced.
To me, the only plausible reason for the father and stepmother to go along with something like that would be if CWK herself had killed her sister. Maybe while they were playing. Maybe the girl hid in the fireplace and died in an accident. Then they would have done everything they did to protect her. In the end, that would have been her real hell. But the way it was explained in the show just doesn’t hold up.
The whole brothers storyline could also have been handled better. The ending felt rushed and Red Cry was caught in a very silly way. On top of that, we never really understand why he became a killer. Was he abused too? Did he even try to look for his brother when he came back? And why did he come back in the first place?
Which brings me to the next problem: the script drags on with repetitive flashbacks of CWK and her sister. The poor use of the 16 episodes makes CWK the only character with real depth, which becomes frustrating at times because the other protagonists seem to have motivations driving their actions, but we never actually get to see them.
The relationship between detective KJH and his girlfriend? Did she lose a child? Why did he react that way when he found out she was pregnant? I thought he had also been abused as a child… but apparently his life was good, like Eun Ho said. So where did that abnormal fixation on “every life matters” come from?
And what about the last-minute drama with the police officer? And the little boy Shi Wan?
Final verdict: The story is good. I’d recommend it to anyone who enjoys a good thriller, but the lack of focus in the writing really holds it back.
PS: A lot of people excuse Eun Ho because he had a sad life, but not everyone who has a sad life becomes a murderer. That’s not a justification.
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