Welcome to my weekly blog post where I give thoughts on whatever dramas I’m watching, whether I’m at the beginning, middle or end. I give my thoughts on dramas.
This week I recapped episodes 3-4 of the Japanese Anime A Sign of Affection, which is a much prettier anime than I gave it credit for. As a bonus, you can learn some JSL (“snow”, “like”, “thank you”) if you watch it along with Silent and On A Starry Night.
I also recapped episodes 7-8 of Thai vampire BL 1000 Years Old. I’m afraid I’m in the minority here, but I’m still in love with this little show where nothing happens. In these episodes, our vampire tries to be an alien so his human will like him, while his human gives into his growing interest in vampires. There were also good BL tropes like one character bathing the other and drying his hair. What’s not to love?
This week I binged through a show I might not recommend as a binge:
Flex X Cop – 재벌X형사 – 2024
Recently aired Korean cop drama with 16 episodes.
A chaebol heir gets to be a cop, much to the horror of the cops. Hijinks ensue.
If you don’t know what a chaebol is, click here.
Korean cops have to be the worst on TV. Even when they’re the good guys they constantly let suspects get away (Flower of Evil) or take them to Coffee Bay for traumatizing interviews (Signal). (Both shows I recommend despite police ineptitude.)
The cops here are no exception. They start this series by making massive assumptions about our chaebol. Their feelings about a situation seem more important than saving lives and getting justice.
Which is to say, it’s best you not take this show too seriously. Probably, I consume too much True Crime and it colors my view of things.
Our chaebol is a chaebol-with-a-heart-of-gold who has some growing up to do. Once we get past the initial plot-mandated friction and the characters start warming up to each other, things get good. Our team isn’t working on one overarching mystery but several smaller ones and the “learning to be a team” and then “being a team” sections are good fun.
The mysteries aren’t brilliant, it’s more about the characters. Our chaebol is bold and charismatic but has hidden depths. We get to know our lead detective’s family along with their delightfully quirky habits and interests. Even the secondary and tertiary characters had interesting backstories and personalities that were hinted at enough to bring the characters to life. It’s the rare show where even if every character isn’t likable, they’re all interesting.
And where the mysteries lacked believability they were often fun instead, which is more than a fair trade for me. Also, there were some good action scenes.
Where the show lost me a little, and where I would tend to recommend against binging, was the last quarter. It was high-angst compared to the madcap-mix-of-tones in the first three quarters. Worse than that for me, we didn’t see our team working together in the fun way we had earlier.
Probably, if I hadn’t watched all 4 episodes in one day, it wouldn’t have felt so heavy.
When it was good it was very good though, and the ending didn’t ruin any characters or destroy my goodwill. There’s a rumor about a second season and I’d be up for seeing our characters solving crime together again, so that’s a definite recommendation from me.
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