In Defense of The Heirs: The Defense Series

In Defense of 

The Heirs: The Defense Series.

I, Picky McPickleton start by defending The Heirs. There will be mild spoilers.

For some, this was dropped in the early stages, for some, you stuck it out as an addictive mess. However, ladies and gentlemen, I am here to convince you today that the drama The Heirs is really not as bad as you think.

I will simplify the plot in two sentences. A rich guy, poor girl tale (let's be fair, almost all rom-coms have this setup) set in high school with two very uninteresting leads. The female lead is the envy of every potato sack as she is dragged around very easily and the male lead is just as uninteresting. That's it, I'm not even going to crack a joke about it, he does not deserve it. They are also both devoid of motivation, which can only come from being privileged, and do not let the "poor girl" portion fool you because truly poor people do not book plane tickets to America. These are just poor people due to shitty priorities. Look, that ticket is 1600 bucks.

Now The Heirs by all means has a lot of flaws. With two dull leads, it's in general a very first world problem tale that could be very easily solved. It does not warrant 90% of the drama that it has and I could have used less scenes of Kim Tan (Lee Min Ho) creepily watching Eun Sang (Park Shin Hye) sleep. However, there are some very minor things that make The Heirs quite addictive and even decent. I'm convinced this relationship in real life might end with one of them psychotically stabbing the other... However, here's my obligatory gif to fool you into thinking they are cute.

1.) The supporting cast (mainly Yeoung Do and friends) – 

The supporting cast may provide drama but they also simply provide addictive humor that help to nurse this stereotypical tale. Kim Woo Bin is there to give everyone mega second lead syndrome even though he's borderline abusive and quite the bully, but we're going to let that slide cause he's a hot bad boy, right guys? To be honest though, he is actually quite a refreshing character as he's very much aware of what he is. He pretty much knows he's an arsehole and it's almost like despite knowing that, he can't help himself. In a way it makes him a very realistic character. That is when the writers aren't being lazy about giving a character realistic traits.

Allow me a somewhat poetic moment to describe his character. He's in some ways a creature that was injured at his most vulnerable and open state and even though time has put a bandage over his cuts, it hasn't healed the wounds. In a childish way his best defense is to ensure he's not injured again. Hence, he pushes away even the person who accepted him the most which is Kim Tan. On that note, these two would have made a better and deeper love story. 

Okay, quite frankly almost every couple in this story would have made a better love story than having to watch Park Shin Hye kiss like a dead fish. Okay, that's a lie, even dead fish have open mouths. 

Apologies to all vegans.

2.) However, I come here to defend The Heirs based on the three last episodes that feature really good scenes and shows that whoever is behind this may actually have some potential.

There's a drawing of a fake corpse by one of the buildings. It's a drawing that really for most of the series, you notice but also don't particularly pay attention to. Towards the end of this drama, you see that different characters are actually the ones drawing that fake body. These moments in the drama adopt a slice of life aspect that reveals something deeper about the characters. Eun Sang is the one narrating this portion and she reveals that today it was Young Do who drew the corpse. In a foreshadowing sense, during this episode you see Young Do challenging and facing up to the past.

The scene that stuck with me the most though was the scene where the father is standing in the living room gaping at the empty house. The door opens and a young Kim Won enters wearing a high school uniform. He announces he's home. A young Kim Tan runs in chasing after Kim Won asking how his day at school was, the child then turns and notices the father standing there. He calls him father affectionately before running up with his open arms ready to hug him. You see the dad smile and stretch his arms but just as he's about to hug the young Kim Tan, he sees Won staring at the scene and immediately drops his hands. The flashback fades and the dad realizes he's all alone.

If The Heirs had been written with the same gusto as the last three episodes it might be up there in the ranks as ultimately, the conclusion is pointless. The two leads still decide to love each other making you wonder why didn't they just harbor that same attitude initially and spare us. Nonetheless, on account of the supporting cast and the scenes above, we hereby defend The Heirs as a drama that showed whoever wrote it, while creating quite the nonsense tale, also has the potential to do better.