Sisyphus: The Myth (2021) The end in sight

Somewhere in this hodge podge of romance, action adventure sci-fi and politics is a plot in search of a better script. Judging from all that I've seen in the past 7 episodes the potential for greatness was always there. The drama makes big claims, it wants to be weighty, it has tried to be mysterious keeping us all intrigued with a trail of breadcrumbs but there's little doubt that it is flawed project from the start. The stakes, we are constantly reminded, are high but the show using non-linear storytelling and an overabundance of flashbacks undermines its earth-shattering claims and diminishes any sense of urgency that the audience should be feeling. Instead the pacing is all over the place and the narration is weighed down by familiar tropes that often don't really enhance the way the package is delivered.

I don't think there's really anything that complex about the time travel side of things. From beginning to end it has been consistently about the problems associated with a temporal loop complicated by the possibility of temporal displacement if the past, present or future selves intersect. To my mind the confusion comes primarily because of the heavy-handed use of flashbacks. Flashbacks are used here for all kinds of reasons. Some provide glimpses of the leads' past while others give insight into the wartorn dystopian future. I'm not convinced that we needed that many scenes showing how Seo-hae and dad were living and surviving post-apocalyptic Korea. I don't see the point of us seeing her training regime after all this time. This is the sort of thing that would have been better shown at the start or not at all. But I suppose they needed some way of filling 16 episodes.

Certainly the show has to deal with some element of character. That's to be expected. But for one reason or another it feels clunky and not well integrated into the overall storyline. For me Tae-sul's character arc is better written and there's a sense of journey and growth. It's not that I think Park Shin-hye does badly as Seo-hae but her character isn't as well served here. It almost feels that her entire role in all of this is to be Tae-sul's bodyguard love interest. At least her training regime and skill set points to that. That said, I'm okay with the romance even if the leads don't have sizzling chemistry because it is quite an important feature of Tae-sul's evolution and it feeds his determination to do better than previous failed attempts at thwarting Sigma's foul plans.

Episode 14 offered some hope that Tae-sul is starting to think and act out of the box. It's obvious that some kind of sacrifice is expected especially when the story via Sigma has been sledgehammering us with a zero sum game all throughout. How many times has "is it the girl or the world" been thrown at our faces? Far too many I'd say. However, the question now is whether the show will be true to itself. I fear a cop out resolution. Of course that's just me bracing myself for the worst. Who knows the show might just surprise me a tad with some consistency.

Search (2020) A review and some thoughts

The weekend saw the wrap up of OCN's latest crime offering set in the DMZ (demilitarized zone between North and South Korea). I'd only been following it for three weeks after I'd noticed some chatter about it around the web. All in all, it was a relatively short series (10 episodes) that I found much to enjoy. 

As with most of the network's productions, this one grabbed me almost immediately. I was quickly reminded of 1980s and 90s blockbusters like Predator or Alien although this drama certainly doesn't have the same kind of budget to match. A mysterious and dangerous threat has emerged in the DMZ and a team comprising of military specialists is tasked with finding answers and eliminating the threat with the use of force. If I were asked to give this show a label, I would probably struggle to give a short answer. It is certainly a crime show in the broader sense. A crime was committed. Crimes continue to be committed. Like many K dramas there is also a corruption angle to this... of course. Then there are times especially the earlier episodes, when it has the feel of a schlocky sci-fi horror. When I mentioned  that this had sci-fi elements, to a fellow K drama viewer from Janghaven, she was surprised. I don't want to give too much away obviously because if you have a stomach for things that go bump in the dark, this is quite a fun watch provided you don't think too hard. But yes, I would add sci-fi to the mix because the unknown threat has much more in common with the X-men than with 1917 if we're thinking along military lines.

Jang Dong-yoon plays a cocky military dog handler, Yoon Dong-jin. Expecting to be discharge in a matter of weeks, he is co-opted to be part of the search team because he is the man with the search dog. Complicating things for him is the appearance of a former flame Son Ye-rim (Krystal) who is a member of the military's research arm. Their relationship is fairly typical of two drama exs who didn't go their separate ways in amicable fashion. When the two aren't flashing heavy artillery around large stretches of forest or abandoned buildings, acerbic bickering with indirect references to their checkered past fall from their lips like second nature. Obviously there's really no time for romance in a scenario like this but it's clear that these two still harbour feelings for each other. Romance here is largely relegated to the sidelines.

Helming the team is Capt Song Min-kyu who is an ambitious career officer who eagerly jumps at the chance at redeeming himself and gaining a promotion in this classified mission. His second-in-command is Lt Lee Joon-sung, who is his opposite in almost every way. The two knock heads repeatedly regarding how the mission should be conducted. Joon-sung prioritizes the welfare of the team over successful, speedy completion. However, it should be said as well that Joon-sung also has other reasons for being on this team. Other members include Joo Moon-cheol (the drones and tech guy) and Park Ki-hyung, the sniper.

As if the team hasn't got enough to worry about, political interference rears its ugly head all the way from Seoul in the form of a presidential candidate with his own agenda. Let's face it, it wouldn't be a Korean drama without corrupt politicians with hair-raising secrets. The current mission seems to be tied up with an incident that occurred in the DMZ in 1997 that included a couple of North Korean defectors and their one-year-old daughter. The show opens with a N. Korean scientist seeking asylum in the south. Not long afterwards her pursuers catch up to her and threatens to create a fracas. The leader of the South Korean contingent agrees to let her go for safety's sake. In the heat of the moment, someone pulls the trigger and all hell breaks loose. As the story unfolds it becomes increasingly obvious that this fiasco has long-term reverberations that touch the team members and the neighbouring village.

Meanwhile the doings of the military operation arouses the curiosity of DMZ museum guide and leader of the local community, Kim Da-jung (Moon Jeong-hee). As a former soldier, her keen military senses tells her that there's something afoot and that the so-called mine disposal team is not really looking for mines or wild dogs. Soon, she, her daughter and the rest of the village are inadvertently drawn into the inexplicably odd occurrences around town.

As a whole, I found the show entertaining as well as exciting in parts even if the plot does hinge on some implausibilities. And I don't mean the sci-fi side of things either. When a camcorder that's been exposed to the elements for the last 23 years finally surfaces at just the right moment for an expose... we're not really talking about science but miracles. Or fate. While it's definitely good advertising for the recorder's manufacturer, it might be a stretch of incredulity for some.

I do think that the first half of the drama is the superior half. Not that the second half is bad but it does get weighed down by multiple agendas and emotional arcs. I certainly think that they have their place but the show does rely heavily on the notion of fated encounters and cosmic justice. Moreover, the show seems to have something to say about fathers and sons. There are varying paternal dynamics at play here. Some healthy, some much less so. But the show rejects the notion that all necessarily follow in their father's footsteps even if a father's influence on his son is palpable even from a distance. 

I'm not a particular fan of any of the actors although I recognized Jang Dong-yoon from A Poem a Day and Krystal from Prison Playbook. The acting's not bad for the most part and certainly adequate to the task. The actor who plays Lee Joon-sung (Lee Hyun-wook) caught my eye and I hope to see more of him down the track. While it's not a deal breaker for me, I liked seeing comparable female roles in a rather dominated cast. 

Bad Guys (2014) A Review

It doesn’t seem all that long ago when I caught this high octane, no holds barred blood and guts fest from OCN. Since then it seems to have developed something of a cult following not so much because of the whodunit side of things (which is entertaining enough) but because of the character dynamics. Detective Oh Goo-tak, a known maverick in the force, nicknamed “Mad Dog”, is tasked with grabbing the scummiest of criminal scum after the police chief loses his son to the murderous whims of a serial killer. Much to the chagrin of his “babysitter”, Inspector Yoo Mi-young, Oh Goo-tak scours the local prison(s) for his motley crew: Park Woong-cheol, a former gangbanger; Lee Jung-moon, a genius level psychopath; Jung Tae-su, a slippery ex-contract killer who, for unknown reasons, turned himself in. The cast as a whole is fantastic. It boasts the likes of Kim Sang-joong, Ma Dong-seok, Park Hae-jin, Jo Dong-hyuk and Kang Shin-il who are perfectly cast in their roles. Less impressive is the expressionless Gang Ye-won as the only female crime fighter on the team’s roster.

Read the rest of it at JangHaven Forums