Two Weeks Korean Drama Review

What can I say about my dear Lee Jun Ki. He is a god, prettier than a girl and major kick ass. In short, he's perfection. Fortunately, so was this drama (in some parts). 

Lee Jun Ki stars in Two Weeks playing the role of Jang Tae San,  a gangster's lackey running a pawn shop who discovers he has an eight year old daughter, Soo Jin (Lee Chae Mi), and she's in desperate need of some blood marrow to cure her cancer or she will die. 

Soo Jin's mother, Seo in Hye (Park Ha Sun), was rejected by Jang Tae San eight years ago when he pushed her into a room so she could get an abortion. Obviously since he's a hero he did it because the gangster he worked for, Moon Il Seok (Jo Min Ki), told him he would kill anyone he loved were he not to go to jail in his place. 

Since Tae San knew he had to go to jail and his girlfriend's life was in danger, he pushed her away. However, now it's eight years later and a lifeless Tae San comes to life after seeing his daughter. He's even happier to find out his bone marrow can save her and the surgery is scheduled for two weeks from now. 

After Tae San gets the good news he skips off to his pawn shop when a panicked Oh Mi Sook (Im Se Mi) comes running to pawn a camera. He's in a hurry to leave, but she makes him take the camera. Tae San lends the camera to his best friend and he skips off with it. What he doesn't know is that the camera contains the evidence of Moon Il Seok's connection with the mayoral candidate Jo Seo Hee. Mi Sook was taking advantage of her position as  Il Seok's woman and working with prosecutor Park Jae Kyung to catch the two meeting. This would proof that Jo Seo Hee is corrupt and will also help Jae Kyung finally catch her father's killer: Il Seok. 

Jo Seo Hee is a psychotic character that pretends to be poor and lives in what seems like a humble house, but the house is connected to a mansion next door where she actually lives. Her dirty dealings with Il Seok allow her to  live her secret, luxurious life....and pay for her autistic son's bills and accommodation in Cyprus. 

Awww, right? Not at all, she's willing to kill anyone and step over everyone for that autistic son. She even wants to build him a small compound for himself.  In short, she's delusional.  

Anyway, Jo Seo Hee and Il Seok are planning an auction on the 26th, the date of Soo Jin's surgery. Meanwhile, they learn of Mi Sook running around after Tae San and Il Seok decides to kill her out of jealousy. Of course, he cannot go to jail so he sends Tae San to her house, drugs him and frames him for her murder. A bewildered Tae San wakes up next to the blood and with the knife in his hands. 

He gets arrested and denies the accusation. The doctor warned him that he must not get an infection or his blood will be no use to Soo Jin. Desperate,  he tries to make detective Im Seung Woo see reason, but detectives in dramas are not interested in investigating for a guy with a past offense. Coincidentally, he is also In Hye's fiancee. 

After one of Il Seok's goons tries to kill him while he's in jail, Tae San escapes and thus begins the two most hellish weeks  of his life. 

In these Two Weeks he escapes an assassin (Song Jae Rim) sent by Il Seok as well as the police, all while trying to get to the camera that can clear his name. 

Can I say how happy I am to see Jae Rim again? Woonie is looking hot in this one. For more of him see him in the Moon that Embraces the Sun as a kick ass palace guard. 

Opinion

The bad

Throughout the drama Seo Hee and Il Seok kept talking about an auction and how they're going to make 200 Billion Won and how Seo Hee is gonna leave the country afterwards. Yet, it was never clear what the hell the auction was about until the very end. 

I think it would have had a little bit more impact if we knew what was at stake from the beginning. It seemed that the only character being explored was Jang Tae San and that all the characters served only as people who helped him or hindered him or in the case of Soo Jin, cheered for him. 

I would have liked for the character of Jo Seo Hee to have been explored more. Here was a psychopath disguised as a devoted mother to an autistic son. She was willing to make dirty deals with Il Seok and make 200 Billion Won through drugs to escape with her son to his own compound that she's building for him and her to live in. All because she thinks Korea is corrupt and is hell for a place to live in. Yeah lady, because of people like you. 

This lady was ridiculously bold and fearless. I honestly thought she was the true villain of this drama. Unlike Il Seok, she wasn't ruled by her emotions and didn't give in to manic episodes of rage. She was composed, cold and utterly heartless as she thought about her son and the life she had planned for them. Unfortunately, she made the mistake of trusting the unreliable Il Seok, whose emotional decisions caused his own destruction thereby dragging her down with him. 

On a side note, what happened to the romance? I thought Tae San would fall in love with the prosecutor since she's the first one who believed in him or at least that's what the synopsis led me to believe. But we could all see that the one he loved was In Hye and that she loves him back, but as usual Korean Dramas are only good until the last episode and this unfortunately is also true for Two Weeks. 

Wae, oh WAE?!!!!

The good

Honestly, I loved this drama because it showed exceptional character development, which I have never seen in any other drama. 

Eight years ago, Jang Tae San was a man without dreams or hopes working for a gangster, but still a good and innocent man. I loved how they showed his relationship with In Hye and how his heart beat so fast for her even while he pretended to be hard and cold hearted on the outside. How despite being allergic to shrimp, he ate them in order to spend time with her. 

It's these little things that made us all feel how his life could have been had he had the courage he has at the end of the drama, eight years ago. 

But now is eight years later and Jang Tae San lived a cowardly life as a doormat for Il Seok. This is why Il Seok told him, "I chose you because you're a person that does as he's told. A person who didn't care if he lost his life." 

However, as Tae San fights for his life and for that of his daughter he grows wiser, stronger and more bad ass as the drama progresses. It seems to be a common Korean drama theme that people will only make things happen when they have someone to make it happen for them instead of just being able to do it for themselves. 

This is what we see with Jang Tae San.  In the first few episodes he just plays into Il Seok's plans and runs blindly around while trying to figure out what is going on. As the days pass by he learns to make his own plays against Il Seok and trap him and I LOVED that. As much as I love Jang Tae San when he's punching and kicking, I love him more when he's playing Il Seok like a pawn in a chess board. I love him when he's being cunning and is two, three steps ahead of everyone. 

Most of all, I love how much he grew. How saving his daughter made him desperate to live like he never wanted to before. How he learned to work with the prosecutor and the cops and how he stopped being scared and stopped waiting for things to happen to him instead of making them happen. Because my love doesn't get angry, he gets even. 

Stray observations:

Can I say how much I loved that when he was in a dangerous situation he would hallucinate seeing his daughter and they would talk and she would give him strength?

I also loved his numerous disguises, but I think these two are my favorite ones:

How come he's so pretty, ya'll?  

Also, please stay tuned for my review of Master's Sun, which ends next Thursday!