BLISS RATING: ★★
“Instead of being happy alone, I’d rather be miserable with you. This is my choice.” – Quote from The Prosecutor’s Proposal
This genre of BLs for me is getting weary and tiresome. Frankly, I am sick of watching ‘shocking’ stories that in essence are not shocking at all. In fact, the thing I found ‘shocking was the fact that HE did not know. Of course, if you did not yet watch the series, you have no idea what I am talking about. For those that did, I thought HE knew from the very beginning. Let me try and put the pieces of this silly puzzle together.
Lee-ith Chae Ha (Park Si Woo) is a son of a murderer who has worked over the past 15 years to create himself in his own image. Yet, unfortunately, the fact that his father was accused and supposedly identified as a murderer has had to live with that reputation over the fact of who he is. He had worked hard to become a police officer, apparently over the consternation of many in the police department. EVERYONE including all the pencil sharpers in the department, knew who he was. Yet for some reason, he is picked to become the leader investigator for the top prosecutor by the name of Ju Tae Seon (Kim Yoon Sik). Everybody knows that he is the son of the murdered man who happened to be killed by Chae Ha’s father. Everyone except, of course, Chae Ha himself.
When Chae Ha comes into the prosecutor’s office, he is tormented and belittled and made to feel like he himself is a murderer by Tae Seon. Frankly, Chae Ha is used and abused in the office and privately by Tae Seon as a pawn and almost as a vendetta. He wanted to humiliate and intimate him. Even to the point, Tae Seon sexually attacked him as if he was a toy to be played with.
The story goes out of its way to try and convince the audience that while initially Tae Seon wanted to get his revenge, he found himself falling deeper and deeper in love with Chae Ha. All that makes for a great story; but it just is not genuine.
First of all, Chae Ha is honestly as dumb as a box of rocks. I thought all along he knew who Tae Seon was. How could he not know? He had followed his father’s case and knew every detail and aspect of the crime, including all the individuals involved. At one point, he even said that he wanted to apologize to the victim’s son. How could he have not known at least what he looked like and where he worked?
Therefore, how could he NOT know from the beginning who Tae Seon was. Everybody knows every detail in the police department about each other and supposedly Chae Ha was a good investigator. This had to have been common knowledge within the department. That is just not a believable or plausible premise.
I get weary of dichotomy pairings where you have one smart person and the other pretending to be ignorant, naïve, dense, timid, wishy-washy, and demur to the other. Almost acting like a punching bag but all along falling in love with him. Again, the victim falling for the abuser. The same classic storyline with the same outcome. Eventually. Someone will get drunk and regret it and make sexual overtures. Then the next time, it is more candid and the two, who have always acted like they have never had a sexual relationship or encounter, then romp around like they are professional porn stars. Then get up, go to work and act like nothing happened. Both falling madly in love and yet pretending not to and acting all innocent. Meanwhile displaying eroticism at work when no one is around. We have seen this scenario before.
Of course, there is a story behind their lustful encounters. But frankly, it is unimportant and weirdly convoluted and honestly hard to follow. Or maybe, I just did not care. That obviously became predictable because of the way some of the supporting characters were choregraphed. It became obvious who Song Ha Neul (Cho Min Kyu) was as soon as it was identified that there was a ‘son’ who helped cover up the murder and had inside information. Obvious to everyone except Chae Ha and Tae Seon. That is how badly this story is written. This story telegraphed the characters so obviously you did not need much if anything to figure out what was going on even if you did not follow the plot, which I did not, because I got bored.
Who really S.T.O.L.E. this series? There is one character in this story who is so deliciously evil and sinister that I loved her part so much. Seo HanGyeol played O Ja Hyeon with complete gusto. Head of the gambling establishment, she has a Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde personality and does so with beautiful emotional swings. I just loved watching her go from a sweet demure female to a raging manic wanting to rip the vocal cords from someone. In addition, she played Chae Ha and Tae Seon like a complete fiddle. She was a masterful puppeteer and manipulated and toyed with their emotions and nearly destroyed their relationship. I loved every minute she was on the screen. She projected wickedness and manipulative skills par excellence. Some performers find their stride and Seo HanGyeol found hers in this role. She gave this dull story some life and pizzazz.
I loathe stories like this. Any attempt at rape or non-consenting sex is morally reprehensible to me and how anyone can then still fall in love with that same individual is beyond-the-pale. And not only that, Chae Ha not just once but twice got stabbed for Tae Seon and lived to tell the tale. All that was so implausible and laughable. I do wish they would stop making stories where violence against each other is a theme. These are supposed to be ‘love’ stories, right?
The ending is very disappointing and cheap. It was obvious they were not even near a beach as they projected their eternal and undying love to one another. The minimum the production could do is make it at least look like a beach. That was awful AI.
This is a story where they tried to make a BL out of a detective story that just did not work. The premise was interesting; if they had done something to make it creative. They did not. They took an angry young man resentful towards the son of the murderer and tried to make him feel guilty for what his father supposedly did. Meanwhile the son of the murdered man, bumbling his way through life emotionally yet always trying to live down how his father had died by being superior to everyone else.
Those parts of their lives that made them who they are were not addressed as having any impact on their romance. Instead, they cheapened the narrative by taking the easy way out and concentrating on the obvious rather than going into the profundity of what they truly had. Raw emotions of two young boys who grew up under the shadow of what happened outside of their control but both having to live with the consequences of the destiny of it. I think that would have been itself an intriguing storyline and a rather innate emotional journey for both as they explored those feelings and brought them out into the open.
Unfortunately, this series missed on multiple levels to really have an impact.
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