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dangermousieThese are just some random thoughts I keep having about Bad Guy. Pardon me as I ramble.
Whoever tried to advertise BG as a revenge story did it a disservice. At its heart, it's a family story/melodrama. It is best at showcasing interactions/connections between its damaged characters - the revenge plot is not only not tightly done at all, it's not even a driver of the story or takes too much space. Let me put it this way, if you are a revenge story junkie, you are better off with Green Rose or Resurrection or (the best drama ever made, IMO) The Devil (I am lazy and will from now on refer to it as Mawang).
Revenge stories in kdrama are often a conduit for other themes - forgiveness and change and one's own culpability in Mawang and Resurrection, passionate dysfunctional love in A Love to Kill and Queen of the Game, the suffering motivating such vengeful behavior - Green Rose, Dog/Wolf etc. But still, the revenge and its effects are the main driver in these stories. Bad Guy uses Gun Wook's plans almost as a mcguffin to create its emotional interractions and connections. Its vibe reminds me much more of classic melodramas like Something Happened in Bali and I'm Sorry, I Love You (MiSa). Nobody can claim that the revenge plan in MiSa is in any way anything but an excuse to have So Ji Sub's character meet the girl he loves and slowly become a human being. It's not a revenge drama at all - very little time is occupied with any revenge. And Bali, which is the drama BG reminds me most, has never been described as a revenge drama.
Actually Bali and BG have eerie similarity. We have the prevailing, corrosive power of wealth. We have a powerful, soulless rich family which ends up being brought down by a combo of a smart, poor man who has a grudge (after he realizes he will never be accepted and always used). There is a whole subplot between the poor man and an icy rich woman (though unlike the vulnerable Taera of BG, Young Joo of Bali really does have ice water in her veins). The heroine is a warm-hearted, conflicted gold-digger who draws both of the damaged male protagonists to her through her sheer humanity in contrast with what they normally deal with. The other male protagonist is a horribly damaged rich boy who is emotionally very open and very unstable. Etcetcetc. I could really be here all day but I believe I made my point - Bad Guy, like Bali, is IMO a melodrama and just as I had little interest in seeing So Ji Sub's financial machinations to bring Jangs down, I don't really care about the details of Gun Wook's plans to bring down Hongs in the end - I just like seeing the situations as they develop. Interestingly, just as in Bali, I am all about the damaged rich boy in Bad Guy and the smart poor man leaves me rather cold. Bali is what made me a Jo In Sung fangirl for life - I guess I am drawn to off-kilter vulnerability.
Ironically, I find the protagonist of BG the story's biggest weakness. Even though Kim Nam Gil is a great actor, Gun Wook himself is rather a cypher and not a fascinating one. If you compare BG to Mawang the differences are stark and not just because Mawang is the epitome of the revenge drama. Mawang is a story which really shows the damage and the cost of revenge and what sort of damaged person would be consumed by it. Joo Ji Hoon's avenger in Mawang is arguably even more self-contained than Gun Wook but he is a dynamic, interesting character anyway and as the story goes on you quickly see that this tight control hides a destroyed little child within. Reserved and restrained doesn't have to mean so controlled as not to show anything more than the controlled mastermind facade but that is a problem with BG - so far, after 6+ episodes, that is how Gun Wook comes across to me. He is not an interesting character because the feelings of anger and his background causing his desire for revenge come across fine on paper (i.e. I don't think it's illogical he wants to bring down Hong family) but they lack any emotional connection to me as shown and do not feel dramatic.
One does not need to spend episodes showing the hell that the avenger was put through in order to decide to become an avenger (Green Rose goes that route but something like Mawang reveals the truth stingily, slowly, in scattered flashbacks that probably take 5 minutes combined). But there has to be some sort of an emotional connection and I do not feel any. In part it's because Gun Wook's story is made so bizarrely evil and OTT it makes me roll my eyes at kdrama melodrama - sure, his evil adoptive parents realized they made a mistake and he wasn't the illegitimate son so they dumped the little kid in the rain, he hurt his back badly through being shoved, his parents died trying to pick him up, even his dog got run over. I mean - what???? It all seems a bit silly. Contrast it with e.g. Green Rose, where protagonist is a collateral damage for a corporate murder gone wrong and ends up having his family destroyed as a result and see himself convicted for life for a murder he did not commit , and then, when he goes on the run, almost starves to death in China - it's not just Go Soo's amazing anguished acting that sells this, it's just the story is explained in a number of eps, it immerses you. No crazy brief OTT flashback. One can get away with a brief flashback if it's something fairly simple (like in Resurrection - bad guys killed hero's father to hide their corruption and later his brother. Not much explanation is needed) but if the story is crazy OTT, you better spend more time on it.
But ultimately, what fails to sell me on any sympathy with Gun Wook is not the inadequate background stuff, it's his present-day demeanor. I could overlook a backstory that is lacking if the present-day revenge stuff is interesting either in being clever so the viewer is piecing together a puzzle or emotionally connecting because you are invested in the protagonist, or both. (All the best revenge dramas have both). But here, Gun Wook is so self-contained and so well-put-together and functional, I have little patience or sympathy with him and want to tell him to move on and do something productive - the drama fails to show that whatever happened to him in the past truly screwed him up enough to make him want to go all-out for revenge. The protagonists of Mawang or Dog/Wolf or A Love to Kill - they are all wrecked people and if not for revenge there would be no meaning to their lives. Alternatively, in Resurrection or Green Rose, you see how revenge slowly destroys the protagonist. It all makes for a sympathetic, emotionally grabbing story that has dramatic tension. But neither is the case here. Gun Wook is not particularly symathetic because he is not damaged nor does he become damaged by his vengeful actions. Let me put it this way, if Gun Wook walked away, I can see him living a perfectly fine life - I have not been sold on such a dysfunction which would make revenge necessary. And so the tension in the story is gone.
I cannot identify, sympathize, or get interested in emotions of the protagonist when he has so little of them.
The above is not a bash of Bad Guy or even Gun Wook. It is all a very long way of saying that BG does not work as a revenge story, but what it does work brilliantly as, is a melodrama. Gun Wook is boring as dirt in most vengeance-related stuff or by himself, but his scenes with Taera which sparkle with desperate sexual chemistry and her desires or his scenes with Jae In when he shows vulnerability (i.e. melodrama scenes) work beautifully. And I find the family dynamics of the Hongs and the Hong siblings themselves a lot more interesting than Gun Wook anyway. Taera's cold loveless marriage and her desperation for some genuine warmth and love before it's too late. Mone's spoiled sheltered self-centeredness. Tae Sung's self-loathing and childlike craving for love. Jae In's pressing her nose against the window of the rich people's lifestyles. Madame Shin's cold, socially-calculated scheming. This is what I find really interesting. Gun Wook is interesting to me only insofar as he is a catalyst for any of these people. If Gun Wook randomly fell of a bridge, provided the rest of these characters would remain 'stirred up', I could be just fine. To be honest, I think I would love BG even more if it was a Tae Sung show, instead of Gun Wook show (yes, Bali all over again).
One last quick comment - I have a problem with GW's choice of revenge. He can extract all the revenge he wants from the Hong Parents who wronged him and are monsters. But he is purposely hurting Taera (he is wrecking her life), Tae Sung and Mone, and they have never done anything to him. Tae Sung got torn from his family just as Gun Wook was - he did not choose to come into cold abusive household at 8 on his own. Mone was a baby when all the bad stuff was going down. And Taera was a teen with not much agency either. Leave them alone!
Phew, this was long.
Whoever tried to advertise BG as a revenge story did it a disservice. At its heart, it's a family story/melodrama. It is best at showcasing interactions/connections between its damaged characters - the revenge plot is not only not tightly done at all, it's not even a driver of the story or takes too much space. Let me put it this way, if you are a revenge story junkie, you are better off with Green Rose or Resurrection or (the best drama ever made, IMO) The Devil (I am lazy and will from now on refer to it as Mawang).
Revenge stories in kdrama are often a conduit for other themes - forgiveness and change and one's own culpability in Mawang and Resurrection, passionate dysfunctional love in A Love to Kill and Queen of the Game, the suffering motivating such vengeful behavior - Green Rose, Dog/Wolf etc. But still, the revenge and its effects are the main driver in these stories. Bad Guy uses Gun Wook's plans almost as a mcguffin to create its emotional interractions and connections. Its vibe reminds me much more of classic melodramas like Something Happened in Bali and I'm Sorry, I Love You (MiSa). Nobody can claim that the revenge plan in MiSa is in any way anything but an excuse to have So Ji Sub's character meet the girl he loves and slowly become a human being. It's not a revenge drama at all - very little time is occupied with any revenge. And Bali, which is the drama BG reminds me most, has never been described as a revenge drama.
Actually Bali and BG have eerie similarity. We have the prevailing, corrosive power of wealth. We have a powerful, soulless rich family which ends up being brought down by a combo of a smart, poor man who has a grudge (after he realizes he will never be accepted and always used). There is a whole subplot between the poor man and an icy rich woman (though unlike the vulnerable Taera of BG, Young Joo of Bali really does have ice water in her veins). The heroine is a warm-hearted, conflicted gold-digger who draws both of the damaged male protagonists to her through her sheer humanity in contrast with what they normally deal with. The other male protagonist is a horribly damaged rich boy who is emotionally very open and very unstable. Etcetcetc. I could really be here all day but I believe I made my point - Bad Guy, like Bali, is IMO a melodrama and just as I had little interest in seeing So Ji Sub's financial machinations to bring Jangs down, I don't really care about the details of Gun Wook's plans to bring down Hongs in the end - I just like seeing the situations as they develop. Interestingly, just as in Bali, I am all about the damaged rich boy in Bad Guy and the smart poor man leaves me rather cold. Bali is what made me a Jo In Sung fangirl for life - I guess I am drawn to off-kilter vulnerability.
Ironically, I find the protagonist of BG the story's biggest weakness. Even though Kim Nam Gil is a great actor, Gun Wook himself is rather a cypher and not a fascinating one. If you compare BG to Mawang the differences are stark and not just because Mawang is the epitome of the revenge drama. Mawang is a story which really shows the damage and the cost of revenge and what sort of damaged person would be consumed by it. Joo Ji Hoon's avenger in Mawang is arguably even more self-contained than Gun Wook but he is a dynamic, interesting character anyway and as the story goes on you quickly see that this tight control hides a destroyed little child within. Reserved and restrained doesn't have to mean so controlled as not to show anything more than the controlled mastermind facade but that is a problem with BG - so far, after 6+ episodes, that is how Gun Wook comes across to me. He is not an interesting character because the feelings of anger and his background causing his desire for revenge come across fine on paper (i.e. I don't think it's illogical he wants to bring down Hong family) but they lack any emotional connection to me as shown and do not feel dramatic.
One does not need to spend episodes showing the hell that the avenger was put through in order to decide to become an avenger (Green Rose goes that route but something like Mawang reveals the truth stingily, slowly, in scattered flashbacks that probably take 5 minutes combined). But there has to be some sort of an emotional connection and I do not feel any. In part it's because Gun Wook's story is made so bizarrely evil and OTT it makes me roll my eyes at kdrama melodrama - sure, his evil adoptive parents realized they made a mistake and he wasn't the illegitimate son so they dumped the little kid in the rain, he hurt his back badly through being shoved, his parents died trying to pick him up, even his dog got run over. I mean - what???? It all seems a bit silly. Contrast it with e.g. Green Rose, where protagonist is a collateral damage for a corporate murder gone wrong and ends up having his family destroyed as a result and see himself convicted for life for a murder he did not commit , and then, when he goes on the run, almost starves to death in China - it's not just Go Soo's amazing anguished acting that sells this, it's just the story is explained in a number of eps, it immerses you. No crazy brief OTT flashback. One can get away with a brief flashback if it's something fairly simple (like in Resurrection - bad guys killed hero's father to hide their corruption and later his brother. Not much explanation is needed) but if the story is crazy OTT, you better spend more time on it.
But ultimately, what fails to sell me on any sympathy with Gun Wook is not the inadequate background stuff, it's his present-day demeanor. I could overlook a backstory that is lacking if the present-day revenge stuff is interesting either in being clever so the viewer is piecing together a puzzle or emotionally connecting because you are invested in the protagonist, or both. (All the best revenge dramas have both). But here, Gun Wook is so self-contained and so well-put-together and functional, I have little patience or sympathy with him and want to tell him to move on and do something productive - the drama fails to show that whatever happened to him in the past truly screwed him up enough to make him want to go all-out for revenge. The protagonists of Mawang or Dog/Wolf or A Love to Kill - they are all wrecked people and if not for revenge there would be no meaning to their lives. Alternatively, in Resurrection or Green Rose, you see how revenge slowly destroys the protagonist. It all makes for a sympathetic, emotionally grabbing story that has dramatic tension. But neither is the case here. Gun Wook is not particularly symathetic because he is not damaged nor does he become damaged by his vengeful actions. Let me put it this way, if Gun Wook walked away, I can see him living a perfectly fine life - I have not been sold on such a dysfunction which would make revenge necessary. And so the tension in the story is gone.
I cannot identify, sympathize, or get interested in emotions of the protagonist when he has so little of them.
The above is not a bash of Bad Guy or even Gun Wook. It is all a very long way of saying that BG does not work as a revenge story, but what it does work brilliantly as, is a melodrama. Gun Wook is boring as dirt in most vengeance-related stuff or by himself, but his scenes with Taera which sparkle with desperate sexual chemistry and her desires or his scenes with Jae In when he shows vulnerability (i.e. melodrama scenes) work beautifully. And I find the family dynamics of the Hongs and the Hong siblings themselves a lot more interesting than Gun Wook anyway. Taera's cold loveless marriage and her desperation for some genuine warmth and love before it's too late. Mone's spoiled sheltered self-centeredness. Tae Sung's self-loathing and childlike craving for love. Jae In's pressing her nose against the window of the rich people's lifestyles. Madame Shin's cold, socially-calculated scheming. This is what I find really interesting. Gun Wook is interesting to me only insofar as he is a catalyst for any of these people. If Gun Wook randomly fell of a bridge, provided the rest of these characters would remain 'stirred up', I could be just fine. To be honest, I think I would love BG even more if it was a Tae Sung show, instead of Gun Wook show (yes, Bali all over again).
One last quick comment - I have a problem with GW's choice of revenge. He can extract all the revenge he wants from the Hong Parents who wronged him and are monsters. But he is purposely hurting Taera (he is wrecking her life), Tae Sung and Mone, and they have never done anything to him. Tae Sung got torn from his family just as Gun Wook was - he did not choose to come into cold abusive household at 8 on his own. Mone was a baby when all the bad stuff was going down. And Taera was a teen with not much agency either. Leave them alone!
Phew, this was long.
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no subject
Date: 2010-07-25 05:05 pm (UTC)Now? I'll probably still watch it if just for the subplot of Tae Sung, but I wish it could've been a straight-up revenge drama instead of a melodrama.
I need to watch Mawang, too. I doubt I"ll ever watch Green Rose as Go Soo does ZILCH for me, but Mawang I could get behind (what's Joo Ji-hoon up to, these days, anyway? is he on military duty, or still in disgrace from the scandal?)
no subject
Date: 2010-07-25 06:07 pm (UTC)I don't have a problem with BG being a melodrama instead of a revenge drama (in fact, I may even prefer it) but that is bad marketing on their part - people thought they were tuning in for a revenge drama, not a melodrama with some revenge aspect. A lot of people who love melo never tuned in, and I bet plenty revenge drama lovers were disappointed and tuned out. (Though honestly, SBS killedf this drama. It yanked around its air date, it preempted it for weeks. It had good ratings before).
I very much wish it was a Tae Sung show, with Gun Wook being a supporting character but I think that is a minority opinion if you go to soompi (or even my small poll where GW was the favorite character more than all the other characters combined). The thing is, I would still love the drama to bits if Tae Sung did not exist but it would be a very different love. Without TS and his story and the emotional connection I feel, BG would basically be, for me, another La Dolce Vita - a drama that I did like a lot because it was so beautifully filmed and well acted, but where I felt no emotional connection to the story, a purely cerebral exercise. I actually care for TS a lot and am concerned about outcome for him, and I need the emotional connection to truly love a drama.
Re: JJH. Yup, he's in the army and he's apparently starring in some army play which is to be performed at the national theater of something, with Lee Junki (I wanna go see!) Hopefully this means he's putting the drug thing behind him and will have a career when he gets out.
Mawang is amazing. Smart and emotional and you'll love the love story, I promise.
Have a MV:
no subject
Date: 2010-07-25 07:32 pm (UTC)I just watched episode 8 and, as far as I can tell, Gun Wook has not actively done one single thing. He just goes with the flow in every scene. Someone thinks he's Hong Tae-sung? He lets them think he is. Mo-ne wants to be his girlfriend? He lets her think she is. President Hong tells him to go to Japan and be Tae-sung's gofer? He does. I don't understand how a revenge plot is supposed to work when all you do is passively react to your environment. Not to mention that a main character who does nothing except passively react to his environment is just not interesting.
I just recently watched Story of a Man, which is a great Ocean's Eleven type of revenge drama where I was on the edge of my seat the whole time to find out what happens next. In Bad Guy... nothing really happens, period. Everyone just kind of swans around while atmospheric music plays. I was actually really happy when I heard the drama had to be shortened for Kim Nam-gil because I'm praying with some of the filler cut out it'll be more interesting.
Meh, it's kind of annoying to me what a misfire the writers had with regard to Gun Wook's character and storyline. Kim Nam-gil is the whole reason I'm watching this drama, but even he can't do much with what he's given. It's disappointing. :/
(lol I'll still watch it til the end tho)
no subject
Date: 2010-07-25 08:00 pm (UTC)TS takes a backseat and it's more of a GW show now, on all fronts: romance and revenge. There are some huge twists coming up that I did not see coming at all. The drama has really a darker tone now. The soundtrack and the camera work has changed to reflect this. It's masterfully done.
I'm starting to get a bit scared that we're headed toward a Mawang ending. As could be predicted from the start (so it's not really a spoiler), GW starts struggling with his conscience about hurting people who did nothing to him (Mo Ne, So-Dam etc...). He's being high-handed and curt in his dealings with his accomplice who's also in it for revenge against HS group. That's what's giving me vibes of Mawang (in addition to other things actually). Please, no. I love Mawang but don't want to watch a Mawang 2. Bad Guy should be able to stand on its on two feet without having to borrow elements from other dramas.
Have you been watching more episodes? And, if yes, are you slowly being converted in a GW/JI shipper or do you still root for TS/JI? I'm a GW/JI shipepr all the way but I really like the man that TS has become in episode 13. I wouldn't mind JI ending up with him at the end. But it would be kind of an unequal relationship when it comes to feelings with TS needing JI more than she needs him. But it could work: TS would have JI to lean on, support him and not treat him like glass and JI would have a man who adores her and financial security for her and her sister. Yes, it definitely could work but only if GW died (which isn't that unlikely considering the tone of the drama)and if they never see that awful Madam Shin.
no subject
Date: 2010-07-25 09:22 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-07-26 04:19 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-07-26 04:21 am (UTC)SOAM was not my type of drama (for various reasons too long to go into) but it was very tightly written.
KNG is amazing in this though, even with the character's limitations.
no subject
Date: 2010-07-26 04:23 am (UTC)I am liking GW/JI more and more though overall still on TS/JI train. I basically ship whoever she is with atm which I suppose guarantees I'll be happy whichever way it turns out as long as one of the guys is still standing at the end.
I think JI could fall for TS for real as time goes on. Tbh, I think she is attracted to both GW and TS quite a lot, though likely more to the former (HGI and KJW have lovely lovely chemistry together).
no subject
Date: 2010-07-26 10:47 am (UTC)To me, being betrayed by your associate when you were trying to stop what you were doing is more tragic than, say, two heroes killing each others. To have reached the end of the tunnel and to be prepared to finally get out into the light and then just being shot down like that.....fate is a bitch.
About people who are likely to be left standing at the end, I can see TR and TS being better people and more powerful than they were at the start. Everyone is saying how awful it is for GW to use TR that way but I personally think that in the end, he would have done her a favor. He definitely "woke her up" and made her more aware of what she wanted as a woman and as a person. I can see her ditching her husband and being a great head of HS group with a mature TS at her side.
Regarding JI, it's more and more difficult for me to see her falling for TS at some point in the future after episodes 11-13. If GW were to die, I can see her falling in love again in the future because she is very resilient (I don't understand all the character hate she gets. That lady rocks) but not with someone so closely associated with the tragedy she found herself embroiled in.
What episode did you stop at?
no subject
Date: 2010-07-26 12:50 pm (UTC)My big problem with Gun Wook walking off into the sunset with or without Jae In is that I think he deserves to be severely punished. I am not nearly as sympathetic to him as I was to Mawang's Seung Ha (who I believe should have been punished too, not for his revenge targets necessarily, but for using innocent people to inflict harm). Unlike almost any other revenge drama, in BG, Gun Wook isn't going just after the guilty parties. In Mawang, even if not everyone Seung Ha went after was a murderer, all of them were guilty of various things. I fail to see what the three kids are guilty of in this case and it just makes me not sympathetic to his revenge plan to see him use them.
Haven't seen eps 11-13 and cannot comment on them :)
no subject
Date: 2010-07-26 01:32 pm (UTC)I do remember about that relative from one of the victims now. Yes, I remember thinking it was brilliantly tragic at the time.
There had been far too much bloodshed for Seung Ha to have any kind of happy ending. Bad Guy doesn't have such a high body count so far so I think that, in that way, GW could more believably have a HEA.
Not that I believe he'll get one. He said himself several times that he'll go all the way and then will await his punishment. I wonder what kind of punishment he is seeking. Being arrested by the police seems kind of sterile considering how personal his revenge is. Does he expect to be killed by one of the Hongs? Or a more metaphorical form of punishment (that of having sacrificed his own happiness and living his life as an empty shell)?
When you get to episodes 11-13, you get more details about GW's motivations and the first signs of clear remorse. He hates himself but cannot stop yet. There's one scene in one of those episodes (can't remember which) in which he takes a picture of So-dam from his board and compares it to the old family picture he has, zooming in on Mo-Ne who was an infant at the time. He does acknowledge that Mo-Ne wasn't part of what happened 20 years ago. He seems to be hoping for her to go abroad to study and grow up.
It's funny because I can't predict how everything will get resolved. In Mawang we're plundged in bloodshed and murder from the start so a gory ending wasn't difficult to envision but that's not the case here. The drama does start with a death but it was a suicide.
There's one touching scene where GW's associate asks he he had ever wished for the death of one of the Hongs. GW's answer is very interesting. I'll let you discover it without spoiling it.
I'm very curious as to how it will end.