(no subject)
So I have not been booklogging at all this week because I've been using like all my free time to zoom through Healer, a kdrama about POLITICAL CORRUPTION AND THE POWER OF THE PRESS.
(Our heroine's dad is probably right to have concerns.)
Healer has its roots in 1980, with five friends -- Myung Hee, Moon Shik, Young Jae, Kil Ahn, and Joon Seok -- who start a PIRATE RADIO STATION when the government puts the media under heavy censorship and state control. This is already basically the coolest thing about the show as far as I'm concerned, like, as much as I enjoy the show it actually is, I'm a bit disappointed that it's not just all about pirate radio.
Fast-forward to present-day Myung Hee reporting live from the Department of Backstory!
Most of the show actually takes place in 2015, and centers around the next generation of people whose lives are variously impacted by the fallout from that group:
Kim Moon Ho, the younger brother of one of the five musketeers, now a star reporter struggling against censorship to expose the corruption inherent in the system!
Chae Young Shin, a plucky young tabloid reporter with dreams of making it big!
... and then there's a socially maladjusted cyber-criminal/night courier by the code name of Healer who spends his time transporting secret information, bouncing off rooftops, beating people up and otherwise action movie-ing his way through a COMPLETELY DIFFERENT kind of story.
However when Healer is hired to investigate and then protect Young Shin for mysterious reasons emanating from the Department of Backstory, he has to go undercover, which means --
-- yes, you guessed it --
-- HILARIOUS UNDERCOVER REPORTER CLARK KENTING.
Hijinks, of course, ensue! Also conspiracy, corporate and media espionage, attempted murder, and the imminent collapse of the poor IT guy at Young Shin's suddenly-relevant tabloid newspaper. Their corporate infrastructure was not built to deal with breaking news of this caliber!! IT CAN'T HANDLE THE TRUTH.
In addition to the Backstory Five and the Main Three, there are a bunch of other characters of whom I am tremendously fond, including:
Jo Min Ja, Healer's partner, a genius criminal hacker with no time for his shenanigans!
Min Ja is MY FAVORITE, an unglamorous and brilliant middle-aged woman (played by Kim Mi Kyung, who plays all the most amazing middle-aged woman in kdramas.) After the main three, she might be the most important character in the show! She has her own dramatic backstory and a cyber-detective who's hopelessly in love with her criminal brilliance and everything!
(Also, OK, I said unglamorous, but even though she spends most of her time onscreen hanging out in her PJs, she is absolutely capable of being ~*~fabulous~*~ when she wants to. The best part is there is no explanation for why she is all glammed up in this scene and it never happens again.)
Healer's apprentice/second-in-command Dae Yong is also great, a motorcycle-riding delinquent teen girl who is capable of leading a swarm of attack hooligans to disrupt any villainous plans on a moment's notice.
Then there's Yun Yi, an aspiring actress who kicks off a big chunk of the plot -- Young Shin talks her down from the verge of suicide, and she promptly turns around and convinces Young Shin to use her tabloid to help her bring down the men who abused their positions of power to rape and abuse her.
Yun Yi is HARDCORE. The show is pretty unflinching about the kind of response that rape charges against powerful figures are likely to get, and in fact devotes several episodes to dealing with the fallout --
-- but she is equally unflinching in response.
I am not the only person who's impressed by this.
Sadly, Yun Yi gets put on a bus and disappears from the show after her part of the plotline is done, but the four-episode arc in which she and Young Shin are roommates is PRETTY GREAT.
On the media side of things, there's also Min Jae, Moon Ho's producer and ex-girlfriend. She fills the role that in most kdramas would be the villainous ex, so I very much appreciate the show has a lot of respect for her as a professional who's worked hard to get where she is, and who is QUITE JUSTIFIED in being tired of the antics of her (rich, male, well-connected) star reporter, which will probably not cost him his job, and could easily cost her hers.
(Relatedly, the show at first seems like it's trying to set up a love quadrangle with Moon Ho, Min Jae, Young Shin and Healer. However, my favorite thing about Kim Moon Ho is that he is not a love interest for Young Shin at all, he is a former babysitter who's all BABYSITTER INSTINCTS ACTIVATE, THESE TROUBLESOME CHILDREN NEED TO BE HAPPY AND SAFE! Well done, Moon Ho, as a former babysitter this is a great way to get me to empathize with you.)
Finally I would like to give a shout-out to Young Shin's adorable adopted dads -- one of whom is the criminal-lawyer-slash-cafe-owner who actually adopted of her, and the other is his favorite ex-con-barista who lives with them and to whom he appears to be married? I mean, this is not stated, but he lives in their house and they co-interview Young Shin's prospective boyfriends.
Also, I genuinely love that the show treats her adopted family as supportive and important, and they don't in any way lessen in importance as her secret biological family backstory becomes prominent.
I also love all the ETHICAL AND ENTHUSIASTIC JOURNALISM, and all the plucky tabloid reporters at Young Shin's workplace who get really involved in doing REAL INVESTIGATIVE REPORTING, and every time the solution to a problem isn't Healer jumping in and doing some action movie-ing but the reporters coming in with a camera and broadcasting everything live to the public. I actually love that Young Shin can't deal with violence and has panic attacks during physical fights -- her weapons are her interviewing skills and her camera.
And I also really like that everything is not fixed at the end! They're able to right some wrongs and take out some players, and it's not a depressing ending by any means, but it's very clear that endemic corruption is not going away and there's lots more work to do.
(Things I don't like mostly boil down to 'how often people keep things from Young Shin and Myung Hee for their own good, can we please stop that already' and 'why did Yun Yi leave after six episodes, COME BACK YUN YI!')
Anyway, as much as I liked Healer, I think I would probably like this imaginary sequel series even better. I am extremely sad that I am too late to nominate and request it for Yuletide.
This entry is cross-posted at Livejournal from http://skygiants.dreamwidth.org/423125.html. Please feel free to comment here or there! There are currently
comments on Dreamwidth.
(Our heroine's dad is probably right to have concerns.)
Healer has its roots in 1980, with five friends -- Myung Hee, Moon Shik, Young Jae, Kil Ahn, and Joon Seok -- who start a PIRATE RADIO STATION when the government puts the media under heavy censorship and state control. This is already basically the coolest thing about the show as far as I'm concerned, like, as much as I enjoy the show it actually is, I'm a bit disappointed that it's not just all about pirate radio.
Fast-forward to present-day Myung Hee reporting live from the Department of Backstory!
Most of the show actually takes place in 2015, and centers around the next generation of people whose lives are variously impacted by the fallout from that group:
Kim Moon Ho, the younger brother of one of the five musketeers, now a star reporter struggling against censorship to expose the corruption inherent in the system!
Chae Young Shin, a plucky young tabloid reporter with dreams of making it big!
... and then there's a socially maladjusted cyber-criminal/night courier by the code name of Healer who spends his time transporting secret information, bouncing off rooftops, beating people up and otherwise action movie-ing his way through a COMPLETELY DIFFERENT kind of story.
However when Healer is hired to investigate and then protect Young Shin for mysterious reasons emanating from the Department of Backstory, he has to go undercover, which means --
-- yes, you guessed it --
-- HILARIOUS UNDERCOVER REPORTER CLARK KENTING.
Hijinks, of course, ensue! Also conspiracy, corporate and media espionage, attempted murder, and the imminent collapse of the poor IT guy at Young Shin's suddenly-relevant tabloid newspaper. Their corporate infrastructure was not built to deal with breaking news of this caliber!! IT CAN'T HANDLE THE TRUTH.
In addition to the Backstory Five and the Main Three, there are a bunch of other characters of whom I am tremendously fond, including:
Jo Min Ja, Healer's partner, a genius criminal hacker with no time for his shenanigans!
Min Ja is MY FAVORITE, an unglamorous and brilliant middle-aged woman (played by Kim Mi Kyung, who plays all the most amazing middle-aged woman in kdramas.) After the main three, she might be the most important character in the show! She has her own dramatic backstory and a cyber-detective who's hopelessly in love with her criminal brilliance and everything!
(Also, OK, I said unglamorous, but even though she spends most of her time onscreen hanging out in her PJs, she is absolutely capable of being ~*~fabulous~*~ when she wants to. The best part is there is no explanation for why she is all glammed up in this scene and it never happens again.)
Healer's apprentice/second-in-command Dae Yong is also great, a motorcycle-riding delinquent teen girl who is capable of leading a swarm of attack hooligans to disrupt any villainous plans on a moment's notice.
Then there's Yun Yi, an aspiring actress who kicks off a big chunk of the plot -- Young Shin talks her down from the verge of suicide, and she promptly turns around and convinces Young Shin to use her tabloid to help her bring down the men who abused their positions of power to rape and abuse her.
Yun Yi is HARDCORE. The show is pretty unflinching about the kind of response that rape charges against powerful figures are likely to get, and in fact devotes several episodes to dealing with the fallout --
-- but she is equally unflinching in response.
I am not the only person who's impressed by this.
Sadly, Yun Yi gets put on a bus and disappears from the show after her part of the plotline is done, but the four-episode arc in which she and Young Shin are roommates is PRETTY GREAT.
On the media side of things, there's also Min Jae, Moon Ho's producer and ex-girlfriend. She fills the role that in most kdramas would be the villainous ex, so I very much appreciate the show has a lot of respect for her as a professional who's worked hard to get where she is, and who is QUITE JUSTIFIED in being tired of the antics of her (rich, male, well-connected) star reporter, which will probably not cost him his job, and could easily cost her hers.
(Relatedly, the show at first seems like it's trying to set up a love quadrangle with Moon Ho, Min Jae, Young Shin and Healer. However, my favorite thing about Kim Moon Ho is that he is not a love interest for Young Shin at all, he is a former babysitter who's all BABYSITTER INSTINCTS ACTIVATE, THESE TROUBLESOME CHILDREN NEED TO BE HAPPY AND SAFE! Well done, Moon Ho, as a former babysitter this is a great way to get me to empathize with you.)
Finally I would like to give a shout-out to Young Shin's adorable adopted dads -- one of whom is the criminal-lawyer-slash-cafe-owner who actually adopted of her, and the other is his favorite ex-con-barista who lives with them and to whom he appears to be married? I mean, this is not stated, but he lives in their house and they co-interview Young Shin's prospective boyfriends.
Also, I genuinely love that the show treats her adopted family as supportive and important, and they don't in any way lessen in importance as her secret biological family backstory becomes prominent.
I also love all the ETHICAL AND ENTHUSIASTIC JOURNALISM, and all the plucky tabloid reporters at Young Shin's workplace who get really involved in doing REAL INVESTIGATIVE REPORTING, and every time the solution to a problem isn't Healer jumping in and doing some action movie-ing but the reporters coming in with a camera and broadcasting everything live to the public. I actually love that Young Shin can't deal with violence and has panic attacks during physical fights -- her weapons are her interviewing skills and her camera.
And I also really like that everything is not fixed at the end! They're able to right some wrongs and take out some players, and it's not a depressing ending by any means, but it's very clear that endemic corruption is not going away and there's lots more work to do.
(Things I don't like mostly boil down to 'how often people keep things from Young Shin and Myung Hee for their own good, can we please stop that already' and 'why did Yun Yi leave after six episodes, COME BACK YUN YI!')
Anyway, as much as I liked Healer, I think I would probably like this imaginary sequel series even better. I am extremely sad that I am too late to nominate and request it for Yuletide.
This entry is cross-posted at Livejournal from http://skygiants.dreamwidth.org/423125.html. Please feel free to comment here or there! There are currently
comments on Dreamwidth.