Nice Guy: Who's at fault?

I am quite a fan of korean dramas, with romance or comedy as their genres -- as long as they're not colossal, and not more than 24 episodes. I also enjoy korean dramas more when the actors/actresses are good, inside and outside (face wise-skill wise). The story line  characters, plots, and conflicts play important part to make a good korean drama too. 

For your information, I've recently finished watching Nice Guy aka The Innocent Man. The main role is Song Joong Ki. I'm quite familiar with this pretty boy because of Running Man, and Sungkyungkwan Scandal. When I heard that he landed a main role in Nice Guy, I couldn't wait to see how it turned out.

Nice Guy consists of 20 episodes, with many good-looking casts. By only these 2 factors, I was hooked. I then started googling about it, read some synopsis, and got even more curious. Song Joong Ki, the flower boy, actually played such a dark, seemingly gloomy character? This, I knew back then, I couldn't miss out.

So I started watching the drama online. Before I let you know my judgmental and overly subjective views on the Nice Guy, let me spill a little bit of the summary of the drama:

Nice Guy tells a story about 2 childhood friends and lovers, Kang Maru and Han Jae Hee. Long story short, Kang Maru, a medical student then, pleaded guilty for a murder that Han Jae Hee committed, with a thought that he could save his noona (Jae Hee)'s future of being a reporter. Therefore, he's sentenced to 5 years of prison. Once he was released, he has completely lost contact with Jae Hee, has lost interest in continuing education in medical world, and consciously waiting for his noona to return. Little did he know that his beloved noona got married with a business tycoon, and now has 1 son, and 1 stepdaughter. She has betrayed her promise to wait for Maru and be by his side forever. When Maru found out, he, of course, was mad, wanted revenge. On the other hand, another woman named Seo Eun Gi, the stepdaughter of Jae Hee, came into his life. He saw the perfect opportunity to get even, but ended up tangled in the complicated life of the family. So the drama starts..

There are a lot more than what I've written above, but since I have insufficient skills of words and vocabs, I unfortunately will ask you to read a more appropriate summary of the drama on wikipedia or something similar. Through this post, I wanna share my dissatisfaction, frustration, and also enjoyment while watching the series.

The overall theme of the series is revenge. But we get to see how tiring revenge can be, and how once you started it, somehow you can't stop without falling down in the end. It's like a road with no turning back, and heading straight to hell. When love interferes, everything you've planned crumbles down like they were nothing to begin with. Just like Ma Ru said, once we've taken the wrong decision, we don't know good from bad anymore, we just accelerate and can't seem to stop. 

I gotta say that Nice Guy is not a romantic comedy. Nice Guy is a dark romance, seasoned with corporate feuds, inheritance, and the likes, all in the name of greed, love, and revenge. Thank goodness for Lee Kwang Soo, who has successfully brightened up the mood of the drama when needed with his bubbly, slightly stupid but adorable character as Kang Maru's best friend.

One thing that makes me love the series is the fact that you can't even decide who is the bad or the good guy. Who's the protagonists and the antagonists. Because almost all the vital characters (excluding Jae Gil and Choco), are both good and bad. It's nice to see that there aren't any angels in this series. Even Maru, the main lead, who's supposed to be the innocent man who was at fault, is also a jerk. What I eventually learned is everyone played a part that lead to somebody else's destruction (or salvation). Maru, for example, was initially ruined by Jae Hee. Jae Hee, too, was ruined by Maru. Both took the wrong decision that lead to separation. 

It's unfortunate that Ma Ru in the end didn't die, because I think it would be the perfect way to make him a hero for everyone, to finally be proven of innocence and victim. But again, victims, in the Nice Guy, aren't actually the victims. Sometimes the victims acted like one, when they actually are the culprits who began the spit fire. Take Seo Eun Gi, for example. It's not her faults that she grew up as a cold-hearted sinister who have doubts on everyone except for her biological mother, but it was her fault that Jae Hee finally decided to try taking everything away from her stepdaughter, since she saw how ungrateful and foul mouthed Eun Gi was. Jae Hee's plans to take over her too-wealthy husband's corporations are originally Eun Gi's crazy ideas, thanks to her wild imagination, where she easily pointed her dirty fingers on Jae Hee and started talking bull shits. Well, I know that Jae Hee herself is greedy, but she was fine with what she already has (money, wealthy-soon-to-be-dead husband, a son), till Eun Gi woke up the worse and darker part  of her, resulting a monster in the making.

So when the director made the decision to create a happy ending for Eun Gi and Ma Ru, I was utterly disappointed though I knew all along it was meant to happen, no matter what. It's like there are some unwritten rules that every K-Drama has to have a happy ending everyone expected. The hero will end up with the heroine, no matter how typical that is. The evil guys will go to jail for some time,  and get out with nothing but a purified heart and a decision to start anew. 

Throughout the time I spent watching Nice Guy, I couldn't help but questioning and analyzing who's at fault for all the mess and the craziness. I blamed the greedy Jae Hee, I blamed Lawyer Ahn (who's truly the best badass in the series), I blamed Ma Ru (for foolishly falling for Eun Gi and complicates everything), I even went out as far as blaming Eun Gi's father (who has created a monster as a daughter), and couldn't help but blaming everything on Eun Gi for almost everything that happened in between. Maybe that's why I'm dissatisfied with the ending. I found myself screaming "Stop hurting my poor Ma Ru, stop toying with his already-bleeding heart!" while watching, resulting in my selfish need in seeing Ma Ru disappeared in the end, so that noone would have him, even Choco. There were times I wish for a happy ending of Ma Ru and Jae Hee, for I found their past as lovers so deeply moving, and genuine. All are destroyed by cruel so called fate, destiny, whatever, and Seo Eun Gi (again. HAHA). I know I'm being totally unfair to the poor Eun Gi, but whatever, I dislike her from her very first scene. It's such a rare occasion that I hate on the female lead, but it is what it is with Nice Guy.

All in all, Nice guy is one drama I recommend watching in the midst of our thirst and longing for good K-dramas this year. I have to say, Song Joong Ki did a great job in playing Ma Ru. I didn't expect him to be so good as a player and womanizer. It surprises me that he turns out to be a good kisser too! Lee Kwang Soo deserves a credit too, as he never fail to bring laughter to me every time he appears on my laptop's screen. Regardless all my disappointments, I'll still say I'm hooked with the Nice Guy, and will totally give this series a 4 stars out of 5. :) After all, it's not everyday that I see such strong characters on K-Dramas that are so well-portrayed, and a melodrama that's depressing enough but not too much to make you wanna leave.