Itaewon Class

I love Park Seojun and I have watched all the series he’s been in and Itaewon Class was released this year so I knew I would binge watch once all the episodes were released.  IC is originally a Manhwa (Korean equivalent of a Manga). I had read this comic in parts and then as luck would have it the app I was using was removed from the play store. (Yes, I read pirated comics online. If there was a paid source that had the comics I want to read believe me I would pay and read. If anybody so much as suggests Crunchyroll I will find you and punch you in the face. I hate Crunchyroll it has such a yucky selection of comics. Even if I am a girl I need my fair share of violence because some experience I like having vicariously).

I don’t know if I have mentioned about my love for revenge previously on this blog. I love the Count of Monte Cristo so much!!! I read it for the first time in school and I understood what “Kalaje main thandak” meant.  I have reread that book so many times since and when I am angry I quote some snarky dialogues from that book. The Shawshank Redemption was also inspired by TCMC as was, A prisoner of birth by Jeffery Archer.

IC also is a story of revenge. Park Seroy has a very strong sense of right and wrong. When his and his class bully’s paths cross, things take a twisted turn and Seroy is expelled from school and events in a short span after that lead to his imprisonment.

Jang Geun Won, the class bully is a chaebol aka rich dad’s spoilt son. He enjoys beating people up because he can. Lee Ho Jin is his favourite target. Seroy on his first day in the new high-school lands a punch on Jang Geun Won for bullying Lee Ho Jin which results in our protagonist and the bully being called to the principal’s chambers along with their fathers. Jang Dae Hee, the father of the bully (and the CEO of Jangga Co. which is the numero uno food company in South Korea) wants Seroy to kneel before his son and apologise. In Korean culture making someone kneel is the highest form of humiliation (submission), just as it is the highest form of respect when done voluntarily. Seroy refuses to kneel before the bully and that’s why he gets suspended.

Things escalate when Seroy’s father Park Sung Yol is in a fatal hit and run accident. When Seroy finds the person responsible for his father’s death he decides to take matters in his own hands and that leads to him ending up in prison. The circumstances of his father’s death are covered up thanks to the cops who get paid off.

This summarises the first episode of the series. The action takes off from the second episode which fast forwards to Seroy being released from the prison, which sets the tempo for the series. It then again takes a seven year leap during which time Seroy has worked in factories, shipping yards and done other laborious jobs to sustain himself and save.

He decides to open a small pub called DanBam in South Korea’s cosmopolitan neighbourhood - Itaewon. His first employees are his friends –

Choi Seung Kwon(Cellmate) who gives up his gangster life to join Seroy. He has anger issues and can beat anyody up when he sees red. Working with Seroy calms him down. His boss becomes the 'calm balm' that helps him turn the tide in his own life. Often very blunt and forthcoming in his opinions he doesn’t understand the art of subtlety.

Ma Hyeon Yi/Ma Hyun Yi (friend from his time working in a factory), is a transgender woman who is the chef at DanBam. While working together at the factory Seroy eats a meal cooked by her and decides to ask her to work with him. A part of her story also discusses South Korea’s narrow outlook towards the LGBTQA+ community.

Jo Yi Seo the manager of DanBam starts on the wrong foot with Seroy when she goes to his pub with her friend and sidekick Jang Geun Soo and gets caught for underage drinking. Yi Seo is a power blogger with a large following on her social handles (which she sometimes uses to expose bullies in her school and around town), smart kid with an IQ of 162, the temperament of a teenager with a very big chip on her shoulder.

Jang Geun Soo apart from being Yi Seo’s sidekick is also Jang Dae Hee’s illegitimate son and a waiter at DanBam. To him Seroy is the ideal adult but genes take over and he decides to test his mean side walking the path his step brother and father have taken before him.

Kim Toni is a black man from Guinea. He is in South Korea looking for his Korean father. Toni by chance responds to DanBam’s ad looking for waiters. As soon as he walks in, Yi Seo greets him in English and he responds back in Korean and insists he is a Korean and gets scoffed at. Yet he gets hired because Yi Seo presumes he knows English which he doesn’t. His story deals with SK’s obnoxious behaviour towards foreigners, how much skin colour is still a predominant sign of clean/dirty, beautiful/ugly.

The story is about how these characters help Seroy in his quest for revenge, how DanBam grows to Itaewon Class, how they grow as a team and how Seroy’s nemesis grounds them in all their success.

I enjoyed this series because I love a good story about people sticking up for who they are, not confirming to societal norms. Stories about second chances and twisted, power hungry morons give me a thrill because we all need second chances and it is always such a joy to punch the bad guy in the face.

This story portrays the five principal characters well. Nobody seems out of place. The way the story progresses is seamless. You’ll find yourself cheering for the protagonist and alternatively waiting to see what the bad guy has to say. The way the characters play out at times is hilarious, sad, funny and also real.

The amount of liberty that mangakas take are not easily taken by show makers because what you put out there for people to read is a private choice but to put a series that goes around poking societal biases has not been heard of in SK, which is what makes this show so much more refreshing. Also the characters are not made out to be “caricatures” but are portrayed wonderfully.

None of the characters are complicated. Everybody is just a normal person brought together by circumstances to give us this lovely 16 episode series. What I love about Japan and South Korea is how they go out of their way to make the live action characters look like the ones in the Manga/Manhwa.

Apart from the story the sound track of this series is amazing - my favourites are Start Over by Gaho, Diamond by HaHyun Woo and No break by The Vane.

Recommendation: Watch it if you like revenge stories and a good soundtrack.

Where can you watch it? Netflix.

Rating: 3.5/5 only because I thought the last two episodes were rushed.

If this is your first K series then I hope you watch it with an open mind and if you enjoyed it you might want to check out some more series reviewed by us - Reply Series.