This review may contain spoilers
Gambler knows That the secret to survivin' Is knowin' what to throw away And knowin' what to keep
Beyond the inevitable connections with the literary roots of Laclos’s epistolary novel, “The Scandal” captivates through its ability to bring together different languages, eras and sensibilities without being reduced to a mere transposition of a pre-existing model. It is a multifaceted work, in which the subject matter of the eighteenth-century narrative meets Korean melodrama, the rigour of Joseon-era social conventions and a contemporary sensibility towards desire, repression and appearances.
This ongoing dialogue between seemingly disparate elements manages to make the whole thing interesting: even as codes, cultures and even the way in which eroticism is portrayed change, certain dynamics remain surprisingly recognisable. The respectable façade, the obligatory conventions, what is permissible to desire and what must instead be concealed – these belong to a specific era, but not necessarily to that era alone. In this way, “The Scandal” uses the ‘classic’ not to look back nostalgically at the past, but almost to observe ourselves through it.
The literary inspiration would inevitably lead the viewer to draw constant comparisons with Laclos’s original work and its most famous film adaptations, but “The Scandal” gradually establishes its own identity by refusing to become trapped in a mere transposition of the source material. Rather than simply reproducing its plot developments, the drama retains certain fundamental mechanisms and reworks them within a structure in which seduction, manipulation and desire become the true driving forces of the narrative.
The wager lies at the heart of this plot: it begins almost as a game, a challenge between two people who know each other all too well, but ends up turning into something far more serious when its consequences gradually slip beyond the control of those who conceived it. Surrounding it are seduction – exercised as much through the body as through words – and manipulation, which finds one of its preferred tools in the written form of letters. In short, the game works as long as its architects can consider themselves masters of the rules; but when feelings, desires and consequences begin to elude their control, even the story’s architects discover they can no longer govern what they have set in motion.
It is above all in the letters that the connection with Laclos becomes most evident, but also most interesting, because the drama manages to transform them gradually, along with the relationships between the characters.
They are not merely a tribute to the epistolary form of the original novel, but become the very driving force behind the story: they preserve memories, shape identities, fuel seduction, reveal feelings and, when they fall into the wrong hands, can become weapons. It is through their correspondence that Cho-won and Lady Cho get to know one another as young people, finding in writing a space of freedom that social conventions deny, particularly to her; Those same letters then become a record of a feeling which, stifled by an arranged marriage and family rules, turns into distance and resentment.
Years later, Cho-won once again uses the written word as a tool of seduction, this time to win over Hui-yeon: the letters allow him to gradually enter her most intimate space, where gestures and the body cannot yet reach. Here, however, the mechanism begins to slip beyond the control of its architects. Hui-yeon, now imbued with a new sense of self, puts her feelings into writing, and that letter takes on two opposing meanings at once: whilst for Lady Cho it may be seen as tangible proof of a wager now almost fulfilled, for Hui-yeon it represents a genuine confession, the most sincere declaration of love ever made. For Cho-won, now wavering, those words can no longer be reduced to the simple logic of the game.
Writing, which began as a tool of manipulation, has given rise to a genuine emotion that can no longer be controlled by those who brought it about.
From that moment on, letters gradually cease to belong to those who write them.
Even on an erotic level, the written word thus takes on a significance that is anything but secondary. Although it is a series intended for an adult audience, “The Scandal” does not rely solely on imagery to convey its sensuality: certain nude scenes form part of a much broader construction of desire, in which the gaze, the gesture and, above all, the spoken word contribute to gradually revealing what the characters have long repressed. Indeed, it is certain letters – with their sometimes surprisingly explicit language – together with the conversations of the village women and the drawings used to tarnish Cho-won’s reputation, that introduce an erotic element which the imagery then merely serves to complement. In short, sensuality is often first imagined and articulated, and only subsequently embodied.
Gradually, “The Scandal” seems to move further away from the simple mechanics of seduction. Desire arises not only from physical proximity, but from what the characters imagine about one another: from the words they receive, the glances they interpret, the expectations and the images they construct in their own minds. To seduce, then, means – even before winning over a body – to construct a presence in the imagination of others. And when that construction begins to coincide with a genuine feeling, the game loses its original nature.
This mental construct – passion constrained by social norms, and the body language that shines through the words and letters – probably defines the erotic and sensual nature of the story better than any image, in keeping with the body’s gradual liberation from the social roles that have long held it captive. Desire arises in the mind, is fuelled by words, takes shape in the imagination, and only then becomes reality.
From this perspective, Hui-yeon proves to be the drama’s surprisingly most multifaceted character, capable of developing a fully realised narrative arc: a woman who is already ‘dead inside’, a virtuous and chaste widow, driven by extreme resolve to be reunited with her deceased husband, whose identity is built entirely around her grief. She longs to die in order to be reunited with a man she never truly had the chance to know.
The paradox arises from a desire rooted in absence—that of her dead husband—but through Cho-won’s letters she ends up confronting a presence that speaks to her, provokes her and seduces her. In that exchange of letters, the presence initially imagined through words gradually becomes a real, tangible desire: the very possibility of imagining herself in a relationship with a man. It is this element of vitality which, through desire, gradually restores her sense of her own existence. The erotic discovery thus becomes the transition through which Hui-yeon comes to perceive herself once more as a living person.
Hui-yeon’s transformation is also achieved through a performance built primarily by subtraction. Nana explores sensuality without making it immediately visible: the mourning clothes, the composure, the subtle gestures, the glances and the hesitations gradually construct a body that seems almost to disappear behind the social role that governs it. When the femininity that this role had repressed finally emerges, it does not therefore appear to be a sudden transformation of the character, but rather the revelation of something that had always been there beneath the surface. The body that is finally revealed is almost the visible consequence of a sensuality that Nana had already established whilst she was still fully clothed.
But the dynamic works precisely because it is a three-way interplay. Son Ye-jin builds the character of Lady Cho through equally rigorous control, often relying more on what she implies than on what she states explicitly: half-finished sentences, intonations, piercing glances with which she seems able to make others confess even before they have decided to speak. Her rhetorical and storytelling skills allow her to continually reweave the threads of the situation, even when the mechanism begins to slip from her grasp. It is significant that she gradually loses some of that composure precisely when she realises she cannot exert the same control over Cho-won: behind the strategist capable of manipulating others, a woman emerges who is deeply dissatisfied with the life she has been assigned, ultimately forced to come to terms with the loss of the one love she had truly desired.
Ji Chang-wook, by contrast, begins with an almost playful seduction, portraying a Valmont-like Cho-won who seems to take particular pleasure in exercising his skills: a smooth talker, a libertine, perfectly aware of the ease with which he manages to win over the women he meets. All of them, that is, except Lady Cho. But even this confidence gradually shifts as the game produces consequences that can no longer be attributed to the logic of the wager. His demeanour changes in tandem with the character’s growing realisation, right up to the finale, where that seemingly absolute freedom proves to be far more fragile than it appeared.
In short, the three actors must carry a complex and largely static story, in which the conflict plays out primarily through words, letters, glances and power dynamics: Son Ye-jin is almost always confined to domestic spaces, and even the visual style often eschews the most immediate glamour. It is the sort of narrative that could easily have become theatrical in the least interesting sense of the word. Yet if it manages to maintain tension, it is also because the three protagonists succeed in shouldering much of the narrative burden, transforming control, seduction and the gradual loss of control into a form of action that requires no grand external gestures.
At the end of the day, what remains is the fate of three people who have each, in their own way, sought to control the desires and circumstances of their own lives, only to find themselves trapped by the consequences of their choices. It is perhaps precisely in their different outcomes that “The Scandal” reveals its most bitter aspect: none of the three truly returns to the life they had imagined, because what has been repressed, sacrificed or pursued for too long inevitably comes back to haunt them.
In conclusion, “The Scandal” seems to succeed on several fronts: it draws on Laclos’s literary legacy without becoming bound by it, making the letters not merely a tribute to the epistolary form, but one of the story’s true driving forces; it constructs a self-aware sensuality, relying more on words, glances and the gradual discovery of the body than on exhibitionism for its own sake; it finds in Nana, Son Ye-jin and Ji Chang-wook a cast capable of carrying a narrative that is anything but straightforward, transforming even the stillness of the settings and relationships into dramatic tension.
But perhaps its greatest merit lies precisely in its ability to bring culture and entertainment together without one having to be sacrificed for the other; In the end, Cho-won and Lady Cho’s gamble becomes the drama’s own. A gamble which, on balance, paid off.
8 ½
This ongoing dialogue between seemingly disparate elements manages to make the whole thing interesting: even as codes, cultures and even the way in which eroticism is portrayed change, certain dynamics remain surprisingly recognisable. The respectable façade, the obligatory conventions, what is permissible to desire and what must instead be concealed – these belong to a specific era, but not necessarily to that era alone. In this way, “The Scandal” uses the ‘classic’ not to look back nostalgically at the past, but almost to observe ourselves through it.
The literary inspiration would inevitably lead the viewer to draw constant comparisons with Laclos’s original work and its most famous film adaptations, but “The Scandal” gradually establishes its own identity by refusing to become trapped in a mere transposition of the source material. Rather than simply reproducing its plot developments, the drama retains certain fundamental mechanisms and reworks them within a structure in which seduction, manipulation and desire become the true driving forces of the narrative.
The wager lies at the heart of this plot: it begins almost as a game, a challenge between two people who know each other all too well, but ends up turning into something far more serious when its consequences gradually slip beyond the control of those who conceived it. Surrounding it are seduction – exercised as much through the body as through words – and manipulation, which finds one of its preferred tools in the written form of letters. In short, the game works as long as its architects can consider themselves masters of the rules; but when feelings, desires and consequences begin to elude their control, even the story’s architects discover they can no longer govern what they have set in motion.
It is above all in the letters that the connection with Laclos becomes most evident, but also most interesting, because the drama manages to transform them gradually, along with the relationships between the characters.
They are not merely a tribute to the epistolary form of the original novel, but become the very driving force behind the story: they preserve memories, shape identities, fuel seduction, reveal feelings and, when they fall into the wrong hands, can become weapons. It is through their correspondence that Cho-won and Lady Cho get to know one another as young people, finding in writing a space of freedom that social conventions deny, particularly to her; Those same letters then become a record of a feeling which, stifled by an arranged marriage and family rules, turns into distance and resentment.
Years later, Cho-won once again uses the written word as a tool of seduction, this time to win over Hui-yeon: the letters allow him to gradually enter her most intimate space, where gestures and the body cannot yet reach. Here, however, the mechanism begins to slip beyond the control of its architects. Hui-yeon, now imbued with a new sense of self, puts her feelings into writing, and that letter takes on two opposing meanings at once: whilst for Lady Cho it may be seen as tangible proof of a wager now almost fulfilled, for Hui-yeon it represents a genuine confession, the most sincere declaration of love ever made. For Cho-won, now wavering, those words can no longer be reduced to the simple logic of the game.
Writing, which began as a tool of manipulation, has given rise to a genuine emotion that can no longer be controlled by those who brought it about.
From that moment on, letters gradually cease to belong to those who write them.
Even on an erotic level, the written word thus takes on a significance that is anything but secondary. Although it is a series intended for an adult audience, “The Scandal” does not rely solely on imagery to convey its sensuality: certain nude scenes form part of a much broader construction of desire, in which the gaze, the gesture and, above all, the spoken word contribute to gradually revealing what the characters have long repressed. Indeed, it is certain letters – with their sometimes surprisingly explicit language – together with the conversations of the village women and the drawings used to tarnish Cho-won’s reputation, that introduce an erotic element which the imagery then merely serves to complement. In short, sensuality is often first imagined and articulated, and only subsequently embodied.
Gradually, “The Scandal” seems to move further away from the simple mechanics of seduction. Desire arises not only from physical proximity, but from what the characters imagine about one another: from the words they receive, the glances they interpret, the expectations and the images they construct in their own minds. To seduce, then, means – even before winning over a body – to construct a presence in the imagination of others. And when that construction begins to coincide with a genuine feeling, the game loses its original nature.
This mental construct – passion constrained by social norms, and the body language that shines through the words and letters – probably defines the erotic and sensual nature of the story better than any image, in keeping with the body’s gradual liberation from the social roles that have long held it captive. Desire arises in the mind, is fuelled by words, takes shape in the imagination, and only then becomes reality.
From this perspective, Hui-yeon proves to be the drama’s surprisingly most multifaceted character, capable of developing a fully realised narrative arc: a woman who is already ‘dead inside’, a virtuous and chaste widow, driven by extreme resolve to be reunited with her deceased husband, whose identity is built entirely around her grief. She longs to die in order to be reunited with a man she never truly had the chance to know.
The paradox arises from a desire rooted in absence—that of her dead husband—but through Cho-won’s letters she ends up confronting a presence that speaks to her, provokes her and seduces her. In that exchange of letters, the presence initially imagined through words gradually becomes a real, tangible desire: the very possibility of imagining herself in a relationship with a man. It is this element of vitality which, through desire, gradually restores her sense of her own existence. The erotic discovery thus becomes the transition through which Hui-yeon comes to perceive herself once more as a living person.
Hui-yeon’s transformation is also achieved through a performance built primarily by subtraction. Nana explores sensuality without making it immediately visible: the mourning clothes, the composure, the subtle gestures, the glances and the hesitations gradually construct a body that seems almost to disappear behind the social role that governs it. When the femininity that this role had repressed finally emerges, it does not therefore appear to be a sudden transformation of the character, but rather the revelation of something that had always been there beneath the surface. The body that is finally revealed is almost the visible consequence of a sensuality that Nana had already established whilst she was still fully clothed.
But the dynamic works precisely because it is a three-way interplay. Son Ye-jin builds the character of Lady Cho through equally rigorous control, often relying more on what she implies than on what she states explicitly: half-finished sentences, intonations, piercing glances with which she seems able to make others confess even before they have decided to speak. Her rhetorical and storytelling skills allow her to continually reweave the threads of the situation, even when the mechanism begins to slip from her grasp. It is significant that she gradually loses some of that composure precisely when she realises she cannot exert the same control over Cho-won: behind the strategist capable of manipulating others, a woman emerges who is deeply dissatisfied with the life she has been assigned, ultimately forced to come to terms with the loss of the one love she had truly desired.
Ji Chang-wook, by contrast, begins with an almost playful seduction, portraying a Valmont-like Cho-won who seems to take particular pleasure in exercising his skills: a smooth talker, a libertine, perfectly aware of the ease with which he manages to win over the women he meets. All of them, that is, except Lady Cho. But even this confidence gradually shifts as the game produces consequences that can no longer be attributed to the logic of the wager. His demeanour changes in tandem with the character’s growing realisation, right up to the finale, where that seemingly absolute freedom proves to be far more fragile than it appeared.
In short, the three actors must carry a complex and largely static story, in which the conflict plays out primarily through words, letters, glances and power dynamics: Son Ye-jin is almost always confined to domestic spaces, and even the visual style often eschews the most immediate glamour. It is the sort of narrative that could easily have become theatrical in the least interesting sense of the word. Yet if it manages to maintain tension, it is also because the three protagonists succeed in shouldering much of the narrative burden, transforming control, seduction and the gradual loss of control into a form of action that requires no grand external gestures.
At the end of the day, what remains is the fate of three people who have each, in their own way, sought to control the desires and circumstances of their own lives, only to find themselves trapped by the consequences of their choices. It is perhaps precisely in their different outcomes that “The Scandal” reveals its most bitter aspect: none of the three truly returns to the life they had imagined, because what has been repressed, sacrificed or pursued for too long inevitably comes back to haunt them.
In conclusion, “The Scandal” seems to succeed on several fronts: it draws on Laclos’s literary legacy without becoming bound by it, making the letters not merely a tribute to the epistolary form, but one of the story’s true driving forces; it constructs a self-aware sensuality, relying more on words, glances and the gradual discovery of the body than on exhibitionism for its own sake; it finds in Nana, Son Ye-jin and Ji Chang-wook a cast capable of carrying a narrative that is anything but straightforward, transforming even the stillness of the settings and relationships into dramatic tension.
But perhaps its greatest merit lies precisely in its ability to bring culture and entertainment together without one having to be sacrificed for the other; In the end, Cho-won and Lady Cho’s gamble becomes the drama’s own. A gamble which, on balance, paid off.
8 ½
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