1
SKITC
Probably within reach of a coffee
Terrific scenario spoiled by slipshod storytelling, a problematic protagonist & uneven cast
This should have been an easy slam dunk hit. Lee Dong Wook as a corrupt investigator with a redemption arc, Wi Ha Joon as a looney vigilante and Han Ji Eun as a narcotics detective is a great setup. Layer on the relationship between Soo Yeol and K is all in Soo Yeol's head and there's endless potential for entertainment.
It's potential mostly unrealized unfortunately.
It begins with another corrupt cop as the primary villain. He's all but twirling a handlebar mustache and exclaiming "You'll never catch me! HAHAHA!!!" Sure enough, the initial attempt to bring him to justice fails and he continues his nefarious deeds. But in relatively quick order, he is brought down only to be replaced by a corrupt politician who repeats the mustache twirling, threats of being above the law, failed initial attempts to bring him down and then somewhat surprisingly quick reversal where his malfeasance is brought to an abrupt end. After that, it's another corrupt cop. Or it might be the drug gang enforcer. Or the wild-eyed assassin that works for one of or both of those two. It's difficult to piece together how quickly the show burns through the lineup of villains each of which momentarily appears to The Big Bad only to be sidelined almost as quickly as he had appeared.
Then there's a mind-controlling REAL Big Bad that takes an agonizingly long time to be revealed by which time there's not a lot of time to build to a satisfying climax. It's a frenetic series of arcs through the first half of "Bad & Crazy" that is then swapped for a tedious one.
If the dialogue and character development had perhaps been better fleshed out, perhaps the wonkiness of the plot might have been worth overlooking, but it isn't.
Lee Dong Wook's Soo Yeol flip flops back and forth between spastically fighting with K to pathetically groveling for mercy to scheming for a promotion during all of which the volume is set to 10. It's a disappointing approach as Lee Dong Wook is a masterful thespian at a more dialed down level. But honestly, with the tediously generic and repetitive dialogue ("You crazy psycho!" "You crazy jerk" "You crazy punk" "You psycho"), Soo Yeol was a mess of a character to portray.
Wi Ha Joon was vastly more entertaining as the wildly grinning and mischievous K. Had he been as prominently featured as Soo Yeol, particularly after the first few episodes, this review would likely have been significantly more positive. Alas, Wi Ha Joon is a distant second in screen time.
As for the remaining cast, there's a cornucopia of less than stellar castings (Lee Hwa Ryong), generic characters (Sung Ji Ru, Shin Joo Hwan, Jo Dong In) or promising appearances that turn out to be limited (Park Se Joon, Lee Seo An, Kim Si Ha). On a brighter note, some of the legion of Briefly Appearing as the Big Bad characters (Lee Sang Hon, Won Hyun Joon and espeically Im Ki Hong) are terrifically fun. And Kang Ae Shim and Kim Dae Gon alternate between delivering the most emotional and most comical scenes.
Overall, though, the production fails to realize what could have been and labors to build sustainable intrigue. Not recommended.
It's potential mostly unrealized unfortunately.
It begins with another corrupt cop as the primary villain. He's all but twirling a handlebar mustache and exclaiming "You'll never catch me! HAHAHA!!!" Sure enough, the initial attempt to bring him to justice fails and he continues his nefarious deeds. But in relatively quick order, he is brought down only to be replaced by a corrupt politician who repeats the mustache twirling, threats of being above the law, failed initial attempts to bring him down and then somewhat surprisingly quick reversal where his malfeasance is brought to an abrupt end. After that, it's another corrupt cop. Or it might be the drug gang enforcer. Or the wild-eyed assassin that works for one of or both of those two. It's difficult to piece together how quickly the show burns through the lineup of villains each of which momentarily appears to The Big Bad only to be sidelined almost as quickly as he had appeared.
Then there's a mind-controlling REAL Big Bad that takes an agonizingly long time to be revealed by which time there's not a lot of time to build to a satisfying climax. It's a frenetic series of arcs through the first half of "Bad & Crazy" that is then swapped for a tedious one.
If the dialogue and character development had perhaps been better fleshed out, perhaps the wonkiness of the plot might have been worth overlooking, but it isn't.
Lee Dong Wook's Soo Yeol flip flops back and forth between spastically fighting with K to pathetically groveling for mercy to scheming for a promotion during all of which the volume is set to 10. It's a disappointing approach as Lee Dong Wook is a masterful thespian at a more dialed down level. But honestly, with the tediously generic and repetitive dialogue ("You crazy psycho!" "You crazy jerk" "You crazy punk" "You psycho"), Soo Yeol was a mess of a character to portray.
Wi Ha Joon was vastly more entertaining as the wildly grinning and mischievous K. Had he been as prominently featured as Soo Yeol, particularly after the first few episodes, this review would likely have been significantly more positive. Alas, Wi Ha Joon is a distant second in screen time.
As for the remaining cast, there's a cornucopia of less than stellar castings (Lee Hwa Ryong), generic characters (Sung Ji Ru, Shin Joo Hwan, Jo Dong In) or promising appearances that turn out to be limited (Park Se Joon, Lee Seo An, Kim Si Ha). On a brighter note, some of the legion of Briefly Appearing as the Big Bad characters (Lee Sang Hon, Won Hyun Joon and espeically Im Ki Hong) are terrifically fun. And Kang Ae Shim and Kim Dae Gon alternate between delivering the most emotional and most comical scenes.
Overall, though, the production fails to realize what could have been and labors to build sustainable intrigue. Not recommended.
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