O Diabo (2023)

Blown Away. Those were my only words I can think of as the last few episodes played out. While it was a drama about a demon possession, I found myself deeply thinking about the messages they were portraying throughout. A huge one being: live life for yourself and not be envious of what others have and get. It spent a large portion of the drama speaking on the weaknesses we humans have, usually being that we want wealth, good jobs, and how some people will do anything to obtain those.

Another message that was given that I really loved was how often we start feeling complete despair and how much we might not want to exist anymore, but those are just dark thoughts at that moment. We always deep down want to live and survive for ourselves.

The mystery is amazing and does a great job at keeping the flow with how all of the secrets unravel. It feels like you're also trying to solve the mystery alongside the 3 leads. I'm sure it's not an original ghost story, but I felt that it was interesting and every episode had me glued to the screen.

Another reason for that is the acting. Especially the FL. She does an incredible job of switching between the evil spirit and herself. The way you can tell with just her eyes when the spirit has taken over is amazing. I also loved seeing Oh Jung Se again. I loved him in It's Okay, and I loved his character in this drama as well. Hong Kyung also does an amazing job. I do wish we could've gotten his character doing more actual investigating or profiling. There is one scene towards the end when he joins their side and his character is so good at profiling and detecting how people are. I wish we could've gotten more of that throughout the story.

Definitely a favorite that has come out this year.

Leia Mais

Before getting into the review, I would first like to commend Kim Taeri's acting. She is simply phenomenal in portraying essentially 2 different characters. This is my first time watching her (have been meaning to get around to watching The handmaiden...) and I'm simply blown away.

Now on to the plot, I would say it's pretty innovative of the writer to craft a horror story based on traditional Korean folklore. I'm not Korean, and I found it quite educational to learn about the different traditions and how they compare with the traditions from my culture. With that being said, I'm not quite a fan of how plot-driven this show is - it resulted in a lack of character development for everyone except the FL and ML. This series is only 12 episodes; 4 less than the usual length of a standard Kdrama but the showrunners still decided to be ambitious and squeezed in other minor sub plots in the first few episodes. Some of them ended up being rushed through and inadequately explained (the case involving parents abusing and keeping the existence of their daughter for no reason). it also resulted in the minor characters being severely under-developed. For instance, it was never explained why haesang's grandma was so obsessed with becoming rich. She was never shown using her money and spent her days reading books. And godd, don't get me started on Hongsae. He had a RBF throughout the show and an attitude worse than a teenager going through puberty. I would have rather he died instead of Munchun. Oh, and Sanyeong's mother as well. I guessed she was supposed to be portrayed as a weakling so the audience would feel more for Sanyeong's suffering but lord it was overdone. I ended up hoping she would just kick the bucket because she was not helping at all. It was never really explained why she ended up the way she is - only briefly implied that she might have been traumatised from having a miscarriage and then finding out her mother died right after. But I wished she would have been written in a more sympathetic way.

Honestly, I would have given this series a 9 if not for the ending. The acting is great all around (even for the poorly developed side characters, their actors did all they could) and the cinematography, directing and sound design were great. But the ending... to me it came on too strongly as some anti-suicide PSA peppered with cliches of how important it is to love yourself. With the context of Korea's high suicide rate, I guess this makes sense but I can't help but feel like korean audiences would see through the hypocrisy. The only reason why Sanyeong was able to "love herself" and "want to live" was because she was finally free of her capitalistic burdens. With her huge inheritance from her dead grandma and father, she was free to finally do whatever she wanted to do in life. And all of this would not have been possible without the help of the ghost, who gave her the riches through exploiting her weakness and killing those she hated. Without the ghost, she would have still been stuck doing manual labour part time jobs! In fact, she would be blind, poor, and stuck with her lousy-ass mother. Hell, without the ghost, she would not even have known of the existence of her father and grandmother, and criminals such as Haesang's grandma and the voice phishing guys would still be alive. So that whole spiel about preventing the ghost from exploiting her weakness seems through loving herself more while trying to kill the very thing that enabled you to remove the weakness from your life seems very ungrateful and hypocritical.

The other reviews for this show are quite positive and I think I'm the only who gets the "ick" from the cheery ass ending. Oh well, but its on par of the course for kdramas which usually start off strong but end poorly. I do still think this is worth a watch though, especially if you're a Kim Taeri fan.

Leia Mais

I’d recommend

I really liked this and was invested from beginning to end. The overall story was very intriguing, the folk horror that was introduced made it richer. It might have been more interesting if they delved deeper into the folklore and traditions surrounding the mystery. The ending wrapped things up nicely though.

Revenant’s horror has an arthouse feel to me. The production (which was soo good) focused a lot on atmosphere and the use of light and shadows to create a decent feeling of dread. The psychological aspect of feeling out of control and helpless hits home, too. Also, what we’re willing to do or accept in the name of survival, and what it means to live.

Heads up: suicide is heavily used throughout the series. It didn’t bother me here because it was in the context of murder and not stemming from the despair of wanting to unalive oneself.

KTR convincingly portrayed a capricious ghost and a terrified host. However, the hyperventilating and wheezing was a bit much for me.

Now, onto the not so great parts. There are two investigation teams, and it gets repetitive with the overlapping efforts. But also, at some point the information we’re being presented with becomes convoluted to the point where I wanted my own detective investigation white board.

The communication between our leads was often frustrating. There were so many instances of thoughtless exchanges that led to dire consequences. And just didn’t make sense.

All in all, a solid horror show.

Leia Mais

Bonne surprise !

Je ne fondait pas trop d'espoir sur cette série (je ne suis pas fan des histoire de revenants), mais je me trompais !
REVENANT a été une bonne surprise, vraiment.
Le scénario est intéressant (je me suis totalement laissé piéger). Et le rythme est parfait : les révélations n'arrivent pas trop rapidement, nous maintenant en allène ; et sont suffisamment percutantes pour déstabiliser un peu.
Le jeu des acteurs est vraiment bon. Un vrai coup de cœur pour Kim Tae Ri (qui interprète Ku San Young), je ne connaissais pas cette actrice mais je vais suivre son travail.
Bref, même si vous n'êtes pas fan du genre, c'est une série qui mérite d'être vue.

Leia Mais

give them all the awards

This drama deserves the good reviews it has gotten because the acting is phenomenal and also the storyline is exciting.
We mainly follow Sanyeong(FL) and Haesang(ML). She is a hardworking girl and seems to be unhappy.... He is a folklore professor and notices that FL has a shadow - the shadow of a ghost, she is possesed by an evil one!
They work together to get rid of it and you are going to need to click on the next episode to see what will happen.
Be aware this drama shows a lot of TRIGGER WARNING
suicide but it is no S. but murder!!
I would not say that the genre is horror but mystery and thriller! :)
9.5/10 from me

PS: the drama will show how trashy humans are wbk

Leia Mais

Almost gave up on this...

Was struggling with this one for a bit and put it on hiatus twice. Only managed to finish it 2 mths after i started watching it. In the beginning this gave me "The Guest" vibes, which i disliked because that storyline just went around in circles for me. And things were a little draggy and predictable with the entire "main characters with parent issues" theme, which i must say seems to be a recurring theme in a lot of Asian dramas.

It wasn't until episode 7 where things got more interesting with the plot. What seemed predictable wasn't, and while i disliked some parts which were over-dramatic (too much screaming...) overall i liked the message that this drama was trying to put across. Which was to make the audience rethink whether it is better to be dead than alive in suffering.

The ending scene was perfect imo and i thoroughly enjoyed the acting from the three main characters. Although I do wish the Professor's character was written to be a bit more eccentric and less whiney rich boy laden with the guilt of his forefathers. His relationship with Ujin could've been expanded a lot more.

I would recommend watching this if you are someone with quite a bit of patience and can get all the way to ep 7...

Leia Mais

"귀신보다 더 무서운 건 사람이에요."

What could be better than Kim Tae Ri fighting demons? Kim Tae Ri, Oh Jeong Se and Hong Gyeong fighting demons. A truly stellar invincible cast.

🔸I feel the beginning could be much more exciting. The story could play with the viewer's expectations regarding the existence of supernatural powers. You could throw in evidence for both humans' and spirits' involvement in a felony, and let the detectives battle with professor Yeom. The middle part is also pretty monotonous and doesn't bear much significance. There is no cat-and-mouse play, no riddles either.

🔸Yet I still appreciate the emotionally and visually beautiful ending. A sneak into the ancient Korean rituals and beliefs made me understand better why many elders believe in spirits and what traditions do they follow.

If you are about to watch Revenant, you might've picked it because of the cast, but be prepared for the thick layer of folklore and many grafic suicides as well.

Leia Mais

Good Enough

Korean Drama " Revenant" is a horror mystery thriller with some folklore elements.

The movie is a psychological thriller with a mystery that is slowly unfold and an intriguing story. And though the start of the drama is slow and kind of boring, the drama picks up later on and the story gets more and more dark as it progress.

The performances were pretty great and the chemistry between the three main ones was enjoyable. The characters were pretty intriguing as well and kept things interesting even when the main plot got druggy.

Finally, the CGI was pretty great and enjoyable enough. The ending was also masterfully handled and just right for the story.

So, overall, seven out of ten.

Leia Mais

It's not justs a horror drama.

I didn't plan to watch this. But ended up completing all episode. It is a good drama. The story was also great though they ending was rushed. I watched both Twenty Five Twenty One (Kim Tae-Ri) and It's Okay to not be Okay (Oh Jung Se). They were good in both dramas. In ' Revenant ' their acting is outstanding. Specially Tae-Ri portrayed her character very well. In this drama the writer give us the message that human are more scary than the ghost. The committed horrible crime to fulfill their greedness. It also give us gerat message that live your life for your own sake not for others. I'm sorry. I can't write review perfectly. I'm expressing my own opinion.

Leia Mais

Very well written horror story but dark and a little bit depressing

If you're anxious or you suffer from a mental illness or disorder. Please don't watch it.

Don't binge watching either for the emotional stable people out there.

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Leia Mais

Great tv series from start to finish!

Yet to get to the end, but with this one I am sure I won't be disappointed or set up to be let down.

It is more or less about a Professor and young woman being brought together because of her father and a hair accessory that attaches an evil spirit to her. In turn, they are trying to work out the when, why, what and who from the present to past.

I am really enjoying this drama series - just as much as The Glory and Bloodhounds as it is quick paced and well written.

Have to say I really like the OS music in this, like some of the upbeat R&B/Pop songs that just hit the spot for me when it comes to sound, rhythm and melody.

It took me a little while to recognise the actor that acted in It's Okay Not To Be Okay (?)- he is that good! All the cast are great, actually.

I would rewatch this again no problem!

Leia Mais