There’s a payoff between pace and depth, and here pace predominates. It skips along like a Y-wing starfighter over a planet, just kissing the surface before flying to the next bombing target. Skimming through multiple scenarios with the barest of detail; something that could occupy half a drama is dispatched in half an episode. It’s a fill-in-the-gaps-yourself style that reflects its origins in manga.

There are also two ways of creating complexity: character depth or plot lines. After a fairly slow establishment, Episode 4 explodes sub-plots like a baradium thermal detonator, with an ever increasing cast of characters and no sign of any depth. From this point on the ML bounces between plot lines and the numerous character relationships float, sink or swim in the two seconds it takes for Lee Joon Gi’s lop-sided smile to fade. You need to keep up, as characters zip in and out like X-wing starfighters.

The drama is a no-holds barred attack on every form of corruption imaginable and some that you never even dreamed of in your nightmares. It features the master manipulator, Assemblyman Cho Tae Seob (come over to the dark side Kim, you know you want to) and his nemesis, Prosecutor Kim Hee Woo (may the force be with me, no I’m not a monster). However, for most of the drama, it’s all too easy for the Rebel Alliance to knock down the Galactic Empire with convenient information that just seems to materialise out of thin air, almost on the scale of “and here’s one we prepared earlier…” It’s all just far too convenient.

To really develop a proper struggle between the two sides you need time, and there is no spare second here, all of it is taken up churning through the multiple scenarios that seem a large price to pay to move things forward. Not that there is anything intrinsically wrong with this, it’s a choice that’s been made. The question is, having made the choice, do the writers and director deliver on it?

No they don’t. At the start there is a lot of wince-making stuff (more about that later) but as it progresses this mellows a bit (or I surrendered and ceased to notice it so much) and the script and direction create a drama that, for the first half, kept me interested and racing headlong into the next twist. But pacing and complexity are a tricky thing and for this drama, like many others, trouble really kicks in around two thirds of the way through, when the pace drops to establish the run-up to the finale. There is simply too much going on to be able to fully exploit every angle. Having manufactured twists in abundance, they are then left hanging for ages before being conveniently picked up again to serve some random purpose. Obstacles thrown in the way are about as troublesome as C-3PO on a good day and in the end there is very little bite. So much time is spent explaining the tangled threads and maneuvering heavy furniture into place (and believe it or not, introducing yet more characters and plot threads) that the tension gently leaks away and I was left sitting well back in my seat, drumming my fingers on the arm.

What do I mean by wince-making stuff? Well the melo at the start was badly handled, cliché, and painful to watch in all the wrong ways. Just because Lee Joon Gi can cry easily, and look pretty doing it, doesn’t mean he should be asked to do it at every available opportunity. LJG going back to being a teenager simply doesn’t work for me. He’s thinking like an adult, acting like an adult, looking like an adult. Just weird. Then there’s the continuous stating-the-obvious spoken thoughts (mainly by the ML but not exclusively) that are condescending and irritating in the extreme. Unfortunately this insult to intelligence continues to happen throughout the show. Lastly, a basic rule of writing: if you “show” do not also “tell”, which happens far too frequently and particularly involving the patronising asides just mentioned.

There might however be some excuse for the amateurish aspects of the writing as we appear to have two rookie writers overseen by the more experienced Lee Byung Hun (I have not seen any of the dramas he has penned).

Another cost to the cast of thousands/multiple scenarios choice is that time for the character development of the leads is minimal (if there is any at all) and we are left with meh, generic characters, indistinguishable from many that have come before them, and the thousands that will follow after them. And in the cast of thousands there were a number of supporting roles that did not contribute much to the plot and with a bit of imagination could have been omitted. In a fast paced, streamlined thriller, superfluity is a luxury.

Lee Joon Gi has said he wants to continue to do action dramas whilst physically he still can, and let’s face it he’s pretty bloody good at it. In the first half there are fights in every episode and they look pretty good to me but hey, I’m really not qualified to judge. It must have been why he chose this drama, because it sure wasn’t for the challenge of the main character who had little to distinguish him from the average. But, as “Flower of Evil” proved, LJG is an accomplished actor who can pull out a great performance when assisted to do so. Isn’t there someone out there who can write an intelligent action drama for him to star in, where his character possesses more than the emotional range of a teaspoon.

Lee Kyun Young did yet another repeat of Lee Kyun Young under another pseudonym. (Yawn) I don’t know why they don’t just film him with a generic name and part so that whenever a scriptwriter needs a corrupt politician/businessman they can just save time by slotting it in, because whatever they write, it will come out as the LKY stock character. Kim Chul Ki was slightly more subtle as Jeon Seok Gyu and could no doubt have given a vastly better performance as Cho Tae Seob than LKY.

There’s a peculiar touch of irony in my mind about the use of Gustav Holst’s music for “I vow to thee my country”. Holst arranged the theme from the “Planets Suite: Jupiter, The Bringer of Jollity” to suit the lyrics of a poem by Cecil Spring-Rice and created a hymn often sung on remembrance days. Although Jupiter is the primary god the Romans and takes care of society and its laws, I don’t think that the reference is intended for Jolly Jupiter, but rather the hymn about sacrificing everything, including one’s life, for your country. “I vow to thee my country” was written before the first world war and revised in the aftermath of it. Spring-Rice was a moustachioed paragon of a British Empire that espoused an attitude of paternal tyranny that pretty much aligns with the villain in the drama, Cho Tae Seob. Yet the music is the theme tune for the Rebel Alliance and usually pops up when Kim Hee Woo (Lee Joon Gi) is doing something magnanimous and honourable. (Lyrics and video here: http://www.songlyrics.com/choir-of-westminster-abbey/i-vow-to-thee-my-country-lyrics/)

As for the other music, even the Carmina Burana-esque flourish that occupied a slot in Ep 1 (at 8’ 35”) was forgiven when I heard the smokey tones of U Sung Eun on “Till the End” which was the only thing about the whole show that totally blew me away. Oh, except for the gorgeous valve amplifier (Ep 7) Jo Tae Seob uses to play the first movement of Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata. My heart skipped a beat. I have a 1983 Pioneer SX-450 that I refuse to part with, it’s so damn sweet.

What my rating means: 5+ Meh! Don't bother, it's full of platitudes and clichés with boring characters and plots.