Daebak K-Rambles

Re-watch value: 2.5 out of 5 stars

Synopsis

*partially taken from Dramafever*

A historical drama about a man who wages a lone war against an evil larger than anything the dynasty has faced.

The stage is the 18th-century Korea. The Joseon Dynasty has been going strong for four centuries, but in name only, there is a monarchy. The king should be the ruler of everything. But he isn’t. In reality, the Pyunsoo Hwe pull the strings. The Pyunsoo Hwe aren’t just an organization with money; they are the de facto rulers of the country. Even the Crown Prince cannot openly fight them. By privatizing the water supply in Joseon, they have accumulated massive amounts of wealth, power and political clout.

• Crown Prince Lee Seon (Yoo Seung Ho from Remember) is a strong and just man. When he realizes that his people are suffering at the hands of an organization even he can’t stop, he takes a stand and destroys them from the shadows. Lee Seon is the last hope of the people suffering under the dark hand of the Pyunsoo Hwe. And he isn’t planning on backing down. And while he struggles to destroy the Pyunsoo Hwe, the Crown Prince also has a personal mystery to solve. When he was young, he was given a strange mask. He has lived behind that mask forever. What is the secret behind the mask?

• Han Ga Eun (Kim So Hyun from Goblin: The Great and Lonely God, Let’s Fight Ghost) is the woman the Crown Prince loves. The daughter of a military family, Han Ga Eun is extremely intelligent. She also has a strong sense of justice and is super unladylike. She also wants to take revenge on the Crown Prince for beheading her father. Instead, she falls in love with him, helps him grow as a ruler, and serves as his confidant in a world filled with betrayal.

• Lee Seon (L from Kim Myung Soo from INFINITE andSly and Single Again) is a commoner and the son of a butcher. Oddly enough, he is also somewhat the new king. He once used to believe that his life was worth nothing. In spite of his massive intelligence, he drifted away and lived a meaningless existence. Until Han Ga Eun taught him to read. Now, he is a stand-in for the king. A faker designed to distract from what the real king is doing in the shadows. And while he is incredibly intelligent and passionate, even he has a tough time being the target of the Crown Prince’s many enemies.

• Kim Hwa Goon (Yoon So Hee from Bong Soon – A Cyborg in Love) is the granddaughter of the head of the Pyunsoo Hwe. She is used to getting whatever she wants and thinks the prince is a weak man who lives behind a mask. She has lived a tragic life, and she is supposed to be the Crown Prince’s most dangerous opponent—until she falls in love with him. Now, she must either fight for her family, or throw away everything and betray them to love the Prince.

• Dae Mok (Heo Joon Ho from Beautiful Mind), the villanous leader of Pyunsoo Hwe, a seemingly warm and kind man who harbors evil beyond most people’s wildest imaginations.

• Woo Bo (Park Chul Min from Moonlight Drawn by Clouds), an old teacher of the prince’s. He now lives as an exiled noble, and holds the key to the prince’s childhood dilemma.

Rambling

*beware of spoilers*

I will start by saying this drama is not new. We come across this plot line all the time in sageuk dramas: the king is up against some organization that plots treason or otherwise causes anarchy and he has to fight them from inside and outside the palace. The king falls in love with a woman that is not Queen material. As far as a similar drama in tone, I’d say Hwarang, or maybe The Princess’s Man match well.

That being said, I liked it. A lot. Seung-ho’s stellar performance stood out and I thought the whole government-being-controlled-by-a-drug-cartel-gang was pretty cool. Also, the amount of angry lip-quivering in his drama was high-key giving me life.

Kim So Hyun playing our Crown Prince’s (CP) love interest was not bad either. She did seem to take a more stoic route in later episodes. You know, Lee Seon is manipulating her to her face, spouting lies, and telling her she’s going to become his Queen—all with some serious psychotic crazy eyes—and she just sort of takes it in stride, no emotional response to match his intensity. I couldn’t tell if she was bad at acting in those parts or if her character just had a great poker face. Nonetheless, she really shined whenever someone died or she got riled up in some way. I was riveted to the screen when CP died in her arms. That whole scene got me shook. x_x

One thing sticks in my mind though: In episode 8, why was Ga-eun delivered to CP’s mom instead of the king? The king specifically said to grant her an immediate audience with him. Did CP’s mom intercept? Did the king hand her over to CP’s mom because he knew shit was about to go down?

I quite enjoyed CP and Ga-eun’s romance. I totally melted when CP and Ga-eun hugged and kissed after she saves him from drowning. I totally melted when CP and Ga-eun reunite after he effectively “died” in her arms at the Pyunsoo Hwe initiation. And I totally and completely—hearts in eyes, hand over mouth—melted when he proposed to her at the end of the show. I literally said out loud, “OMG, this is a proposal.”

Probably the only complaint I have is that Kim So Hyun legit looks like a child. I mean, she’s perpetually 12 years old, so Seung-ho’s manly CP just seemed too old for her.

I didn’t know L from INFINITE could play such a complex character. I remember him being super moody in Shut Up Flower Boy Band and his douchey character from Netflix’s One Last Time (a Groundhog Day-esque K-drama). But I’d never seen him blow through emotional states like a bipolar honey badger with rabies (don’t ask why I did this comparison, just take it). He was giving a death stare one second then smiling slyly the next; he was pointing fingers eyes wide open one scene and then screaming his head off and wailing the next. Obviously, I already mentioned this, but L happens to have an unnerving crazy eye that he can just summon upon his countenance whenever. Although I always predicted his character would have to return the throne to CP and die heroically, I didn’t know he would go ballistic and lose his shit, and I didn’t know he would die trying to save Ga-eun. Touching.

Pyunsoo Hwe. I spent 33 episodes thinking the organization was a dictatorship with Dae Mok as the one true leader. Except in episode 34, Dae Mok is seen in the initiation cave being scolded by some a-holes in masked garb? Who are these dudes and why do they have the authority to grill Dae Mok? I didn’t know the Pyunsoo Hwe had a board of directors. Also, were all these masked individuals caught, killed, or punished during the big crack-down at the end or…? Furthermore, in episode 39, Dae Mok says the Pyunsoo Hwe have been around for 1,000 years, and in an even earlier episode Hwa Goon says it’s older than Joseon. Huh? I thought Dae Mok founded the organization in his lifetime? Am I missing something here?

Let’s talk about Hwa Goon. She was our second female lead, part of our love square (or pentagon if you add in Gon, the detached assassin guard who loved Hwa Goon!), and she had a fantastic character arc. She changes so much from when she first visited the palace and stomped into CP’s greenhouse demanding some sort of flower from CP, whom she thought was a servant. I like how she was a petulant, fierce, spoiled child but softened by her love for CP. I guessed that she would die early on, but her death was so beautiful. In episode 32, she believes the CP to be dead, and in her quiet devastation, she heads over to the poison flower field (the source of Pyunsoo Hwe’s dominion) and says, “I will burn this entire field of flowers to the ground.” FUCK. What a renegade. She proceeds to find the CP alive and well, helps him escape with all the enslaved girls working the fields, and then sets the flowers ablaze. A woman of her word. She destroyed the one thing her grandfather cherished above all else, just like he ruthlessly killed her CP, the one person she cherished above all else. Dae Mok kills her in cold blood, but she dies happy. She dies redeemed. [Sidenote: Yoon So Hee also played Jin-yi from Let’s Eat!]

There is a strong overarching theme of mercy and forgiveness, of redemption from your heinous sins. Lee Seon was redeemed when he sacrificed himself to save Ga-eun. He even asked CP for forgiveness, which CP gave; it wasn’t even an issue. The same goes for Hwa Goon, who died a martyr. In episode 35, CP visits the Dowager Queen in her pitiful reduced state, and he basically tells her he wants to save her, despite the fact that she’s tried to kill him twice. She is the only family he’s got left, even if she was not his biological mother. The power of reconciliation is strong with this one.

In the last episode, we finally get our royal wedding. A year after the fall of Pyunsoo Hwe, CP (now King) marries Ga-eun, bestowing her the title of Queen, “mother of the country” blah blah. It was cute up until CP looks out into the sea of government officials and sees a few familiar faces lost in the course of freeing the country of tyranny. Ga-eun’s father stands out against the rows of officials, beaming as he looks at his daughter and his new son-in-law. Hwa-goon appears out of a doorway, content that her CP has found happiness. Finally, Lee Seon walks up behind his mother and sister, restored back to his old self. The road to freedom and the throne was costly, but CP will never forget. SUPER, SUPER emotional and a profound way to end the show.

So much crying. So much weeping. Much drama.

Did you see Ruler: Master of the Mask? Tell me your thoughts in the comments below!