THE SHORT VERDICT:

Show has an interesting concept and a very solid cast; I felt that all of our key actors did very well with what they were given to work with.

Overall, I thought the writing and execution was decent, but personally, I found myself wanting more and better, from this series.

That said, your mileage is likely to vary, as there are many viewers who love this one unreservedly.

One thing that most viewers seem to agree on, however, is that Greg Hsu is quite the scene stealer in this. 😁

THE LONG VERDICT:

Y’know, I do think that it was a stroke of genius for this show to cast Greg Hsu, because I think I am likely not the only one who checked out this show, just for the promise of seeing Greg Hsu in a kdrama.

I mean, this whole “drama worlds colliding across borders” sort of effect, was quite thrilling for me personally. 😉

As many of you likely know, this is not at all my usual preferred genre of drama; I’m not usually one for darkness, grit, and exploring the potential depths of the human psyche.

However, I couldn’t pass up the promise of Greg Hsu on my screen (yes, I have an unreasonable affection for him, based on his role in Someday Or One Day alone 😁), and that is how I ended up watching all of this show.

Let’s just say that if they hadn’t cast Greg Hsu, I would probably have never checked this out – and it honestly wouldn’t have negatively impacted my life in any way. 🤭

But y’know, lots of people really love this one, so you might too?

HOW I’M APPROACHING THIS REVIEW

First I’ll talk about how to manage your expectations going into this one, and what viewing lens would be most helpful.

After that, I talk about stuff I liked and didn’t like so much. I’m opting not to do a separate section on characters and relationships, for this review. Finally, I spend some time talking about my thoughts on the finale episodes.

If you’re interested in my blow-by-blow reactions, &/or all the various Patreon members’ comments during the course of our watch, you might like to check out my episode notes on Patreon here.

MANAGING EXPECTATIONS / THE VIEWING LENS

Here are some things that I think would be helpful to keep in mind, to maximize your enjoyment of your watch:

1. It gets pretty dark

Like I alluded to earlier, this show leans dark, not just in terms of the premise, but also, in terms of how our story digs into the ugly side of the human psyche, like what people are capable of, when greed takes over.

2. Our characters are gray

This probably isn’t surprising, in light of what I just said, but with few exceptions, our characters are morally gray.

Knowing to expect that, helps.

3. Suspension of disbelief is required

There are various things in our drama world that stretch the limits of believability, and I think accepting it instead of fighting it, would help.

I’m thinking that a “death game webtoon” lens would work.

STUFF I LIKED

The concept is interesting

Even though this show isn’t a genre that I would typically reach for, I have to admit that I found the premise quite interesting.

Essentially, to my eyes, this feels like the normal world meets Squid Game (review here!), in a manner of speaking.

The overall tone and feel of this drama world feels like it came from a police procedural, where things are gray and gritty, and far from stylized.

But then you have this mysterious figure wearing a mask and jumpsuit, with a voice distorter, inviting people to kill a specific person over broadcast, for a reward that’s more than what an average person would see in like, 20 lifetimes.

That definitely gives me Squid Game vibes, and it’s a strange mashup, in a sense, because where Squid Game had its own surrealistic sort of world, where the Game was contained in a dedicated arena, this game has a much larger playing field.

It takes place out in the real world, and instead of selected participants, anyone can play. The possibilities are multiplied many times over, which honestly is quite morbidly fascinating, in and of itself.

And yes, “morbid fascination” is pretty much the key that kept me going, even when I wasn’t sure Show was working so well for me. 😅

When Show is thought-provoking

Like I alluded to earlier, Show does seem to want to explore the potential depths of the human psyche. Or at the very least, it gives it the spotlight on a pretty regular basis. 😅

I did find it rather thought-provoking, at least at points, and I counted that as a good thing.

Here are some early examples from episode 1.

[SPOILER ALERT]

E1. One of the first things to hit me, while watching, is the question of just how far people would be willing to go, to satisfy their greed.

In our opening scenes, which I honestly found rather harrowing, we see Yoon Chang Jae (played by Lee Kwang Soo) running for his life, because his friend Ji Hong – his FRIEND! 😱 – is determined to cut off his ear, in order to claim the one billion won that the roulette has pronounced as the price of said appendage.

I mean, it’s possible that it’s more desperation than greed that drives Ji Hong’s actions, because he does talk about how they would never earn this amount of money no matter how hard they worked, but from the looks of it, Ji Hong had a decent roof over his head, and a job that earned him a wage, so it’s not like he was in a truly desperate situation, I think.

When it comes to the question of greed, we see how an average, normal person can quite easily become part of an unhinged crowd, ready to trample down anyone who might be in their way of getting their hands on free money.

In this case, with Masked Guy raining down a billion won from the sky into that stadium, you could logically figure out that even if you got your hands on some of that money, you wouldn’t be getting a significant fortune, since everyone’s rushing to pick up the cash.

And yet, we see people practically losing their minds over getting their hands on as much of the money as possible, and there are people who get quite injured, in the course of this whole exercise.

As a detached bystander, it really makes me wonder whether these people find it worthwhile, after the fact, especially if they got injured in the process. Like, is it still worth it, if you’ve gotten your head bashed in, while rushing for the money..? 🤔

[END SPOILER]

Solid delivery by a solid cast

I’m opting not to do a breakdown of our various characters, but I wanted to say that I found all our main players very solid.

In particular, I thought Lee Kwang Soo did very well as Yoon Chang Jae; there were some scenes where he legit made me wince – he was that convincing. 🙈😅

Also, shout-out to Yoo Jae Myung, whom I found very convincing as Kim Guk Ho, the criminal whose life is suddenly worth 20 billion won.

He managed to make Guk Ho suitably repulsive, while sometimes managing to make him appear almost pitiful. I thought that was well done.

Greg Hsu as Mr. Smile

I couldn’t not include Greg Hsu in this section, since he was such a big part of why I even watched this show in the first place.

To be clear, Greg Hsu doesn’t get a whole lot of screen time, and really only appears in episode 6, but I still couldn’t wipe the grin off my face, when he did finally appear. 😁

Yes, I know that he’s technically playing a bad guy, since he’s an assassin, but I was quite thrilled that he gets to be all badass, in a pretty laidback sort of way, which I found altogether quite mesmerizing. 🤩🤩

Sorry. It’s the fangirl in me. 😁😅

STUFF THAT WAS OK

The gray characters

It made sense to me that just about all of our characters would turn out to be gray, because we are, after all, in a story where we’re exploring (or at least, putting on display) just how ugly the human psyche can be, particularly when faced with just the right combination of factors.

A good amount of the time, I felt like I could at least understand why our characters would make the decisions they did, or behave the way they did, even if I like the decisions or the behaviors.

That said, I did feel a bit perplexed by:

1, the fact that I found myself actively disliking some of our main character’s actions, thus, feeling dissatisfied with him.

[SPOILER ALERT]

E3-4. Honestly, the way Joong Sik (Jo Jin Woong) forced Ju Ho (Heo Dong Won) to lend him his new car, rubbed me the wrong way; I’d feel like my rights were violated, in Ju Ho’s shoes.

And, thanks to Joong Sik promptly using Ju Ho’s car as the new storage place for the case of money, Ju Ho’s car immediately becomes Chang Jae’s (Lee Kwang Soo) new target.

This also annoyed me, because ultimately, this would make Ju Ho an unnecessary target, once the car is returned, no?

I get how this would benefit Joong Sik, but the fact that this action put his friend, who’s none the wiser, at risk, didn’t sit right with me.

[END SPOILER]

2, the fact that it wasn’t long before I ran out of characters whom I felt I could root for.

Overall, though, I’m classifying this all as a neutral thing for me, because I’m pretty convinced that it was Show’s intention to make these characters as gray and as unlikable as they turned out to be.

STUFF I DIDN’T LIKE SO MUCH

The way Show tells its story

This is a case where I liked what Show was doing in concept, but it didn’t really work for me in execution.

Over a few episodes, it soon becomes clear that Show uses different narrative angles with each episode, in order to build the context around our various characters.

I liked the idea of this, because I think context is great, and often makes all the difference, in how we receive and interpret things.

At the same time, I couldn’t help but compare the writing to that in Moving (review here!), which also switched perspectives on a regular basis, for the purpose of building context for the main narrative.

In Moving, the writing had felt more deft, like writer-nim knew exactly what he was doing, and the switches had felt very confident.

I don’t know if it’s just me; I did not get a similar sense of confident deftness, in this show’s switches in perspectives. In fact, I sometimes felt like the switches in perspective actually took away from story momentum.

But perhaps that has to do with Show’s pacing, which I’ll talk about next.

The pacing

Expectation

Because Show focuses on greed and desperation, and what it can do to people, and has a central prize up for grabs, my immediate gut reaction was to put it in a similar bucket as Squid Game.

However, while Squid Game moves along quite quickly, this show moves at a more moderate pace.

While watching, I understood in my head that it’s important to take time to get the full context of each character and that that would, in turn, flesh out the story as a whole.

But at the same time, I also found myself feeling impatient because I felt like I was waiting for excitement to come, but it.. often didn’t really. 😅

Putting aside my instinctive boredom, and tweaking my lens, I trusted that Show was still building its context, and I was sure that, thereafter, there would be a spike in narrative excitement, both from the actual events that take place, as well as the pacing of said events.

Reality

That.. wasn’t quite the case, unfortunately.

Somehow, Show manages to still feel like it’s moving at a measured pace, even during its finale episodes, when things are moving into place for the big finish.

I cannot deny that I found myself feeling rather bored, unfortunately. 🙈

THOUGHTS ON THE ENDING [SPOILERS]

Partway through my watch, I realized that I couldn’t envision a satisfactory or satisfying ending to this story. Was there a way for this to end well? I don’t think so.

I estimated that things were going to get bad, and a lot of people would end up either getting hurt, or dying, and.. I wasn’t wrong. 😅

I understood Joong Sik’s desperation, and why he would go berserk and steal Guk Ho, in episode 7; it’s because as far as he could see, this was the only way to secure his daughter So Mi’s (Choi Myung Bin) safety.

I certainly wasn’t rooting for Chang Jae, but I still winced, because the death that he suffered at Guk Ho’s hands was nothing short of brutal. I definitely had to look away. Eep. 🫣

Oh, and the reveal that “Pastor Sung” was Masked Guy wasn’t surprising, given Kim Sung Chul’s casting. In fact, with the way Show treated him as a character, I would call it more of a confirmation than a reveal, because it was that uneventful. 😅

“Pastor Sung” and his whole deal, of meting out rogue justice to sex offenders because of how vile they are, and how much damage they do to their victims and their families, is pretty dark.

What I mean is, it is tragic that his mother had suffered and died the way she did, but it is quite something else, the way he chooses to punish his targets, by making them suffer a living hell, where they wish they could die, but can’t.

The way he basically has Guk Ho and Dong Ha (Sung Yoo Bin) face off to the death, also feels cruel, because even though Dong Ha says that he wants to kill Guk Ho, is it really a good idea to pit the poor innocent boy against his hardened criminal father??

Because, as we see, Dong Ha isn’t super successful at his attempt to kill Guk Ho, and once Guk Ho turns on Dong Ha, it isn’t long before Dong Ha is in actual danger of getting killed. 😬

I mean, yes, Dong Ha does eventually gain the upper hand, unexpectedly, but there was a very real danger of him dying, yes?

In the end, it seems fitting that Guk Ho gets shot while taking Dong Ha hostage, because this way, at least Show can justify his death.

And it is rather poignant, that his last words to Dong Ha, once he realizes that the jig is up, are to study hard, and be good to his mother. Perhaps he did have some traces of fatherly instinct about him, after all?

That brings Guk Ho’s grisly story to an end, but the point that Show makes, is that this game is far from over.

First, we see Joong Sik receiving that envelope from “Pastor Sung” with information on the 20 billion won deposit in his name, because he’s the one who’d killed Guk Ho in the end, and we see Joong Sik’s expression turn enigmatic; he’s getting sucked into this whole greed thing again, I would say.

Then, we see Masked Dude in a new video, spinning the roulette once more, and announcing a new game round.

And then finally, we have Mr. Smile warning Joong Sik in a video, to give up trying to find Masked Guy – because Masked Guy is his next target.

Some viewers take this to mean that Show’s coming back with a Season 2, but I personally understand this as Show’s way of saying that there is no end, neither to people’s greed, nor this kind of deadly game.

Personally, I find that to be a rather depressing message, but I also think that that’s Show’s whole point.

THE FINAL VERDICT:

Interesting premise; uneven execution. Just ok, in my books.

FINAL GRADE: B

TRAILER:

MR. SMILE: GREG HSU CUT

PATREON UPDATE!

The next drama I’m covering on Patreon, in place of  No Way Out: The Roulette, is Like Flowers in Sand [Korea].

You can check out my episode 1-2 notes on Like Flowers in Sand on Patreon here.

If you’re curious about why I’m picking Like Flowers in Sand instead of a currently airing show, you can check out my poll on Patreon here.

Here’s an overview of what I’m covering on Patreon right now (Tier benefits are cumulative)!

Foundation Tier (US$1): Entertainment Drop (Sundays) + the first set notes of all shows covered on Patreon (that’s 2 episodes for kdramas and 4 episodes for cdramas)

Early Access (US$5): +Cinderella at 2 AM [Korea]

Early Access Plus (US$10): +Love Next Door [Korea]

VIP (US$15): +Your Honor [Korea]