Ophanin

With friends like that, who needs enemies ?

Friends who betray each other for money, what a basic plot… and yet devilishly well executed, with every episode managing to surprise. With friends like that, who needs enemies ?

A dark comedy whose nastiness makes it particularly gripping. The main couple find themselves at the center of it all, despite themselves, and get through it only by making serious compromises. In the end, they are merely pawns of the rich, and they know it, so they act accordingly. You might think you’ll find a little empathy in the heiress, but that’s quickly taken away from you. What happens to her is horrific, but her reaction is just as unacceptable, and she never takes her friends’ financial problems seriously ; to her, three million is nothing, but to them it makes all the difference. The epilogue offers a bitter conclusion, a somewhat unsatisfying resolution, but at least all the pretences have been laid bare.

In the midst of it all, poor Da Rae, the unfortunate girl, suffers greatly. She is the one who has truly been betrayed in this story. And she is used as an excuse to justify the worst possible acts, even though she asks for nothing.

Shim Eun Kyung/Yo Na comes across as rather creepy and cold-hearted at first. You never quite know where you stand with her. A really, really good character, played brilliantly to make her believable.

And finally, well done to Ha Jung Woo/Ki Su Jong for that free latte. At last ! However, those four scenes where he imagines or dreams up things that aren’t actually happening : I declare them illegal and refuse to put up with them.

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If I hear one more note of Clair de Lune, I'll make a killing. There are composers for your series, you know ? The same three truncated excerpts from Bach, Mozart and Debussy are a no-no. I know the pieces, I listen to them myself if I want : in their entirety ! It's almost less annoying than scenes and flashbacks repeated three or more times because we're obviously stupid... And the plot only progresses by deliberately not giving us the info, an artificial way of creating interest. 4 episodes of seeing the same scene without ever adding anything to the story ? I didn't get to the end without skipping scenes. Sorry about that. (it may be disrespectful of me but respect goes both ways)

Otherwise, the story begins a bit like Pasolini's Teorema. Except that here it's an unbearable character, Su Yeon, who yells at everyone and breaks your face but... becomes your friend ?! I've seen Weak Hero too, and I solemnly ask : are Korean schoolchildren all right ?

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So this series was the first milestone in Jin Ki-Joo's “I'm an adult pretending to be a student” universe.

I too wish my mother had never met my father. And that she'd live a better life than she had. (Look, I didn't cry at the end, okay ? I'll sue you for libel)

It takes place in 1987, and it's good to have brought in this political dimension. We were expecting it, and it arrives in a rather intelligent way. It's one element among others.
Having said that, the local cops are portrayed as good guys who are a bit dim-witted, especially the uncle inspector ; but he lets his colleagues beat up his nephew. This dirty cop blames himself ? you can blame yourself, scumbag.
And let's never forget that everyone hates the police.

(ps: surprising presence of a small bust of Lenin in episode 11. Nothing escapes me. yep. I saw it)

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It's very, very hard to see the injustice suffered by some of the characters. Even if the aim of the series is to show situations of harassment and abuse in the workplace and then seek redress, it's still hard to watch (although the solidarity between the workers in the warehouse was great to see, despite the grim fate that awaited them). To say that it's a comedy series... I'm having my emotions played with here. The humour helps to get the message across, of course. A series that's both useful and entertaining.

The three of them are great. And the lawyer is flawed, a bit lost, but he's also gifted with a relentless and unconditional empathy that's all Christian. And when we learn more about his life, it's hard not to shed a tear...

It's high time we abolished work, comrades. And it looks like Buddha is on our side. Long live the strike and down with the cops and the bosses!

(We're hoping for a season 2)

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At first, the hero is very insistent with his colleague and she thinks it's cute. They both agree to play this little game, so I guess it's all right. Still, it's a weird relationship. Anyway. And he's got an inhuman metabolism, he gets hit, beaten up, drugged but everything's fine, he gets back up.
"Not dead yet"... obviously, the scenarium armour works well.

The pace of this series is prodigious, there's not a second to get bored (apart from episode 10 when nothing happens. Why?) Everything follows on super fast with humour, action, suspense and you really want the [redacted] of [redacted] rotten to get caught, him and his henchmen. It has its over-the-top moments with improbable situations but we accept it, that's what we're here for. I mean, the synopsis alone... haha

All the villains are foreign Koreans, from places where the Japanese deported them. I don't know what to make of that. There must be a reason.
And lastly, Drug Monster, she starts off super badass and then the series goes on to belittle and destroy her. I didn't like the way she was treated at all.

PS: rarely have product placements been so unsubtle !

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Shin Ye-eun, the more series I see with her, the more captivating I find her acting style. She exudes real authority and a particular determination in all her roles ; there's something both naturalistic and elegant about it.

In this series, there are situations of profound injustice, manipulative characters very happy to be untouchable, beatings at 10 against 1 and bullying that the perpetrators openly brag about without suffering the consequences, so some moments really hurt. In the first half, it's impossible to get a second's breathing space.

The plots all move forward at the same speed, and in the final episodes the pace suddenly picks up, so even though we had absolutely no way of finding the culprit, we don't feel cheated. We see the same scenes several times from different angles, going back to the end of some of them to go back before and give a new context. Not a bad idea. These young gentlemen are evil geniuses. I don't want to boast, it's not a contest, but here goes : I guessed about the brother and his love affair. Yep.

However, these people don't know how to respect other's privacy and personal space, they go through their friends' things a bit too easily. That said, these young people know how to talk to the cops. They lie to them, telling them only what they need to hear. Nobody respects them.

However... I wonder about the need for a minor female character who turns out to be pregnant and says she wants to keep the child because she has "no other choice". What are they trying to tell us with this ? I have my own idea. Does anyone have a problem with the fact that she's in a relationship with an older guy who's apparently a star (it's thrown out there in a second and we move on) ? yuck... Or was it to denounce a real star ? It's disturbing this narrative arc that adds nothing to the plot and leads to no conclusion.

Ps: Well done to this schoolgirl who, by changing her wig, gets +100 in camouflage, so no one can spot her. A prodigy.

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First episode, the only female characters : a nurse is insulted, a woman hangs herself, a technician narrowly avoids being sexually assaulted (saved by a man), a girlfriend in the middle of lovemaking is shot with a machine gun.
And it doesn't get any better after that. It's just guys, real tough guys, because we're real virile males, yeah.

Yet another series glorifying the police (and their video surveillance service, apparently ?). In fact, we are told that bureaucracy prevents brave cops from saving lives. And journalists ? they do nothing but annoy the police who protect us at the risk of their lives. If that's true, it's very serious !

There are lots of little visual effects that fuel a dynamic montage, even if the plot doesn't advance much. (The villain's motivations... a bit light, shall we say) For example : the strategy of showing the same scene from a different angle from one episode to the next, classic and effective. It's not necessarily the most subtle approach, but the extreme situations that follow one another without any downtime, the villain who is having a good time, and people's cowardice in the face of harassment make this series compelling. Simple but engaging.

To be honest, I watched it to unwind after When Life Gives You Tangerine.

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The Koreans still have an open wound when it comes to the adoption and so : theft of children. The Japanese and American evangelists ‘helped themselves’ and profited in an inhumane way. No reparations are planned in this regard. So it's understandable that a series like this would be released in this country.
Well, here we are swimming in eugenics, as a bonus. How horrible. Unfortunately, no one will be surprised to see this kind of thing happening soon. We are going to have eugenic laws on births, I am sure of it. We already have them on assisted suicide instead of care.

The four over-trained young people sometimes mess up and act impulsively. They avoid confrontation several times and covering for each other. I like their dynamic.
With relatively little character development, we can still distinguish different personalities, which is all we need, really. They work well together. Less is more.
Everything moves quickly, and the series flows smoothly as we move from one traumatic story to the next.

The only concern is the main villain. She changes her behavior too abruptly from one scene to another. It becomes tiring after a while. How can we trust someone so unreliable ?

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Go Min-si can play both a cold-blooded killer and sociopath in The Frog, and an adorable, funny, and kind chef in Tastefully Yours. She can also paint strange but colourful pictures and cook delicious spaghetti. Don't eat it !
A very good thriller that keeps you on the edge of your seat without being sleazy. It shows the consequences of events on the characters' lives. And the fact that there are two timelines without us realising it for quite a while is so clever.
The only annoying thing is those few scenes that are imagined and only take place in the mind of one of the protagonists. My time is precious, you know ? I have to look outside with a nostalgic air, and that's not going to happen on its own.

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