This review may contain spoilers
Garbage last half
I read a few reviews and what I came away with is that people that have the same issues that I had with the show are WAY nicer than I am giving it a 7. This is a solid 4 out of 10. The first 7 episodes are great fun. It's an interesting plot, great characters, oozing with charisma. It reminds me of the best parts of Lethal Weapon in terms of characters and plot... and then the last 5 episodes happen.They ditch the entire premise of an anticorruption unit and suddenly they are homicide detectives? What? Why was the main character even on this case? The main bad guy has mesmerizing eyes that somehow controls people into doing his bidding? What the hell is going on? The last half of this show makes zero sense. They had a great setup, amazing first two arcs and then the 3rd arc just shits the bed. It's seriously horrible. It's like there were two different production teams in charge of the show which is weird because somehow it's the same writer and director throughout but you wouldn't be able to guess that with how sloppy the plot and character coherency is in the 2nd half. The characters whiplash back and forth with motivations, they drop a drug plot that was setup for the first half by having the 1st big bad just kind of... give up (Boss Yong), it's no longer about anti-corruption... I mean it's so weird.
I get that people like the main actors - and they DID do great here with what they were given, but the last half of this show is some of the worst writing that I've seen on screen. Weirdly it reminded me of Season 2 of The Uncanny Counter where season 1 was super tight and all of the themes and plots were wrapped up compared to the silly nonsense of season 2... welp, it turns out IT'S THE SAME WRITER!
Lesson learned. This person cannot write a satisfying conclusion apparently. I guess they are the JJ Abrams of the K-Drama world. I would HIGHLY recommend watching the first 7 episodes and just turning if off forever. You will love it. Don't go past that point though because you are in store for a tedious mess of incoherency. Garbage writing.
Was this review helpful to you?
What happened!
I'll keep this short, but the essence of this review is that the show is for morons now.Everything that I liked about season 1 is just missing. S1 was smartly written, it had interesting characters trying to one up each other, great set pieces with decent action, thrilling drama with moments of levity. One of the best shows that I've seen.
I cannot watch past episode 2 of season 2. It's like the writers and director forgot what made their show good. It has a completely different tone than s1. Now it's goofy, hammy, corny, overacted, and boring. The characters no long act like their s1 counterparts and they mostly sit around and talk. When they aren't talking they are hamming it up to the camera making dumb expressions like a bad comedy.
Everything is wrong. I cannot understand how anyone that loved s1 could even watch this. It's one of the biggest drops in quality in TV history. I would compare it to Game of Thrones after s4 and the K-Drama show The Uncanny Counter s2. Both of those shows had amazing starts and just like those show this one drops the ball by changing the way the show works (almost on all levels of production).
If you want specifics, just go read the other low reviews because others have pointed out the inconsistency in quality between the two seasons. I'm here to basically rant because I LOVED s1. Not only is it one of the best Chinese dramas that I've ever seen, but I would put it up against most great shows across the globe. I wouldn't suggest anyone waste their time watching s2 because it turned into a hot garbage, low quality soap opera. What a joke.
Was this review helpful to you?
