Ok, so I know this is a controversial drop, because by and large, drama fans seem to love this show. Which is why I’d like to state upfront, that my decision to drop this one, has nothing to do with Show’s quality, per se.
In fact, I can see why lots of people would enjoy this one. I, however, only managed to watch one episode of this one, before eventually making the decision to call it quits.
It’s just.. not for me, personally. This is absolutely a case of, “It’s not you, Show. It’s me.” 😅
MY MAIN STRUGGLE WITH THIS SHOW: THOUGHTS FROM EPISODE 1
Mainly, the bad stuff that the bad guys do, is so awful, that I find it hard to stomach. Given that Show’s structure is such that we get multiple cycles of bad stuff followed by rogue justice, I immediately felt daunted by the idea of watching lots of different bad things happening to innocent people, particularly since Show is known to be inspired by real events. Ack.
Somehow, knowing that these terrible things had happened to real people, makes it even harder to bear, for me.
I know Vincenzo also used the idea of rogue justice, but that had felt easier to digest because, 1, Vincenzo’s tone is a lot more farcical, and 2, we have one set of baddies in Vincenzo, compared to multiple sets in Taxi Driver.
A comic book lens helps with this show, but I think the disconnect for me, is that Show uses cases inspired by real life events. Those two ideas feel at odds with each other; it’s hard to use the comic book lens effectively, when Show keeps reminding us that the stuff on our screens is more real than average.
This is the biggest hurdle, for me personally.
This first episode, it was so very hard to watch the awful factory owner torture his intellectually disabled employees. Ugh. To make it worse, even the police officer is in cahoots with the factory owner. And even worse than that, is the fact that the police officer seems very familiar with the torture methods being used, and even participates, to a degree. 🤮 That made me want to gag, honestly.
MY THOUGHTS ON EVERYTHING ELSE IN EPISODE 1
Otherwise, the rest of Show works pretty fine, especially with a comic book lens on. Because then it doesn’t matter so much that this episode’s client goes from falling off the bridge after seeing the revenge call service number, to magically sitting in Do Ki’s (Lee Je Hoon) taxi, relating her story.
Logically, that doesn’t make any sense. Logically, that whole thing where she has to make her decision via a dinky little token-operated arcade type game machine, also doesn’t make sense. But with a comic book lens on, it’s fine.
The whole Batman flavor of our revenge set-up and crew is pretty fun, even if it’s not realistic. Again, comic book lens. I kinda love that the deluxe taxi is pretty much a Batmobile, and there’s even a Bat-cave, where everything gets prepared and where the Batmobile gets serviced.
On that note, Lee Je Hoon’s pretty badass, with his ability to singlehandedly take down a bunch of bad people, with his bare hands. This is arguably the most badass I’ve seen Lee Je Hoon, and that is most definitely a plus.
We don’t yet see how Esom’s character Kang Ha Na fits in with the Rainbow Taxi Revenge Service, so I don’t really have anything to say about her outing in this, based on just this one episode.
SAYING GOODBYE
I’d contemplated giving this show another try, but conversations with some of you (hey, Sean!) led me to conclude that if I’d struggled this much with the bad stuff in episode 1, I would essentially continue to struggle even more, with all the rest of the bad stuff, in all the other episodes, as Show introduces more cases.
This sounded like it would require a lot more fortitude than I feel able to muster, which is why I decided, in the interest of closure, to officially drop this one.
I’m sorry Lee Je Hoon-sshi, that I’m too much of a wuss to enjoy your badassery in this show. 🙈😅 But at least on the upside, everyone else loves this show, and you in it?
