When I read that this kdrama was canceled after two episodes, my instant reaction was:

I felt sorry for the cast members. They worked hard. And I’m sure these kdramas are more exhausting, tedious, and expensive to produce because of the COVID safety protocols.

But I say that for the writer Park Gye-Ok, it was about time. He had it coming. He’s the same writer who adapted that trashy Chinese drama, “Go Princess Go” and wrote an even trashier screenplay “Mr. Queen.” If you remember I objected to the original Chinese story chiefly for its latent misogyny: a male soul usurped a female body and soul, and lived happily ever after with his male lover. Many wouldn’t see anything wrong with that. But to me, it was this writer’s ploy to bypass the Chinese government censorship of homosexual content in media.

Now, I don’t care if the writer wants to write about BL (Boys Love) romance and couch it as a body swap affair to circumvent the censors. But – damnit – viewers should feel a dissonance in their views when they turn a blind eye to the theft of heroine’s body, and the suppression of her agency and voice, while they fetishize the heroes’ relationship.

Seriously, anybody who can’t see the problem there needs to get her/his vision checked. 

Now, as dreadful as this original Chinese drama was, this Kdrama writer made it even worse. I didn’t find it funny that the male character, BongHwan, was too drunk to consent to sex with the King. It’s abhorrent that this writer used the sexual assault of a drunk man as a plot device to level up the relationship. BongHwan rightly felt violated the following morning. But this neanderthal of a writer swept the issue of rape under the rug by depicting Bonghwan’s emotional turmoil as nothing more than his homophobia showing.

Facepalm! This feeds exactly into the false narrative that a drunk person shouldn’t complain about rape because she/he “deserved” it, and that a rape victim “secretly” wanted the sex anyway.

Never mind the fact that had the King known of the Queen’s body swap with BongHwan, he too would have been grossed out about their encounter, like BongHwan. lol. That’s the inconvenient truth that fangirls of this drama ignore.

🙄

I’m not Korean; I don’t have Korean sensitivities. But I don’t need to be Korean, or Asian for that matter, to feel outrage at this writer’s —

a. trivialization of rape under the influence of alcohol,
b. mockery of the life of — not one, but two — historical figures.

Remove the time travel, the food porn, and the palace intrigue, and all you get is a fantasy tale of a nonconsensual relationship between two royalties for the main purpose of titillating the audience with homoeroticism. It’s tawdry, and rather insulting to the LGTB movement.

Sooooo…

When I discovered that this writer also wrote “Joseon Exorcist,” I understood why the first episode was problematic to me.

Unlike the netizens, it had nothing to do with the Chinese props used for the dinner scene. I wouldn’t know that the food served to the Vatican priest and his interpreter wasn’t traditional Korean cuisine, but Chinese fare.

My impression here was that the Prince was being extremely hospitable to his guests by providing them with food that they’d requested. As the Prince’s aide explained, they were unfamiliar with the ways of these foreigners. He expected them to be abstemious like Buddhist monks, when, on the contrary, they were gluttonous.

Thus, the Chinese food props didn’t set off warning bells for me. Instead what I found disturbing were these five issues, in the first 30 minutes of the Episode 1.

1. King Taejong single-handedly massacred a village of innocent people.

After he and his troop succeeded in killing an army of zombies, the villagers came out to give him thanks. In the middle of this homage, he began hallucinating that his dead father, the former King, stood among the villagers.

His father was accusing him of killing his younger brother, so in a fit of rage, King Taejong charged at his vision of his father and slashed it to death. He realized too late that he had killed one of the village folks.

His hallucination didn’t end there. The image of father kept reappearing in the crowd. So, again and again, he chased after his vision to kill it with his sword. Eventually, he slaughtered the whole village.

Now, do you see why I found the script and the visuals problematic? Mind you, this was the opening scene. By the end of his rampage, the director gave us this shot, here:

You couldn’t see King Taejong’s face since it was covered in blood. His words, too, were chilling. He claimed that he killed the “undead” when in reality, he slaughtered the living.

And this overhead shot. This was a tableau of the King’s madness.

This wasn’t Monet’s “Garden at Givenchy.”

Now, given the king’s violence, and the combined optics of his blood-covered face, and the dead bodies littering the field, it’s REASONABLE for non-Korean viewers to conclude that this Joseon King was an incarnation of evil himself. Why? He was supposed to kill zombies. But in the end, he killed as many innocent citizens as he had zombies.

That’s why I get the Koreans’ uproar about this kdrama. If I were Korean, I too would get annoyed with the liberties that this writer took with their historical character. It’s NOT the depiction of King Taejong as zombie-fighter that angered his descendants, but the characterization that he was a madman and a lunatic killer, which the Koreans found bothersome.

Now, before international fans dismiss this as mere hypersensitivity of Koreans, they should think of their own historical and religious leaders that they believe should be off-limits to caricature, comedy, farce, insults, misrepresentation, and gasp! cartoons. Should I remind people of Charlie Hebdo or Winnie-the-Pooh-Xi? We can go on all day with this. 🙂

2. Prince Chungnyung (who’d later become King Sejong) couldn’t get down from his horse.

This small incident happened in the beginning of the drama, but it left me with a bad impression. Prince Chungnyung’s boot got stuck in the stirrup of the horse and his aide had to help him down.

Then, he and his aide both fell on the ground.

Questions: Why was this slapstick included? What was the point of showing that Prince Chungnyang couldn’t get off a horse on his own? Was it to draw the viewers’ attention to his clumsiness? His ineptness?

It’s noteworthy too that this brief moment was shot from different angles, indicating that this wasn’t accidental moment. It was supposed to show us something about his character.

But…but…but this Prince was destined to become King Sejong, THE GREAT. He created the Korean alphabet; and his face is on the  ₩10,000.

To me, the writer shot himself in the foot here. Although he was bound to redeem Prince Chungnyung’s character later in the story, and depict him as thoughtful and wise young hero, his introduction of the Prince as a klutz was remarkably stupid, considering that he already received flak in “Mr Queen.”

In “Mr. Queen,” BongHwan disparaged the “The Annals of the Joseon Dynasty” as “merely jirachi” or tabloids. Here’s the explanation of the controversy about “Mr Queen” from soompi:

… Another controversy has surrounded a line in episode 2 in which a character referred to The Annals of the Joseon Dynasty as “merely jirashi.” The Annals of the Joseon Dynasty are the annual records of the dynasty and are designated as the 151st national treasure of Korea. The annals, which consist of a total of 1,893 volumes, are also listed on UNESCO’s Memory of the World registry. Jirashi is a form of newsletter that contains unconfirmed private information, which may include rumors and speculation.

source: soompi

Just saying. 

3. The Crown Prince Yangnyung was a womanizer.

The scene with concubine was unnecessarily lewd.

Concubine: …a stroke to the word “sky” and it turns into the word, “husband.” Today, I’m your husband so you can be the one lying down.
CP: (flips her over and disrobes himself)

Okay, for the innocent ones here: she was talking about a sexual position here, and the submissive role she wanted him to play. She was the husband = she was the dominant one. I’m guessing that the black paint she dabbed on her chin was meant to copy a husband’s beard. Like his beard under his bottom lip. 😂

When I discovered that this kdrama was written by the same writer of “Mr. Queen,” it all made sense.

Although I’m no prude, I dislike the sexual innuendo in this opening scene. Not only was it gratuitous, but it failed to communicate the main point here. The point here was the Crown Prince was directly responsible for the zombie attack on his younger brother. Because he was womanizing, he failed to guard the fortress and a zombie slipped through.

But this connection wouldn’t get across the viewers until the King castigated the Crown Prince. That’s why I consider the bed scene a distraction. When viewers watched it, all they’d see was “sex” and not “dereliction of duty.” They’d see a couple engaging in sex, and not a man who was neglecting his job.

I wish this writer would stop pushing these provocative scenes. For one, I believe that that he incorporated them to generate a buzz. As we all know, “sex sells.” For another, I don’t appreciate him trying to force voyeurism of me. If I want to view sex scenes, I’ll watch Hollywood movies on Netflix. The actors are more convincing.

4. The young Prince Kangnyung stood frozen as the zombie attacked his entourage.

This was like a scene from a bad horror movie.

He was told by his eunuchs to run for safety but he just stood there and watched all of his guards, court ladies, and finally his eunuchs get killed one by one by zombie. How ludicrous was that? Only when he was the last one standing did it occur to him to flee from the zombie. Then, of course, he just had to stumble so the zombie got him.

I could understand young Prince’s immobility if the zombie had ambushed them, and the young Prince was caught off-guard. But in this scene, he watched at least 6 of his people die before it dawned on him to start running.

That’s when I realize that this writer and director were showing graphic details of the gruesome killings for the heck of it. This writer-director duo wasn’t satisfied with gratuitous sex. They were also serving the viewers gratuitous gore.

Bravo! (sarcasm bot activated)

5. The Catholic Church and exorcism

I already told you why I thought the exorcism scene in “L.U.C.A.: The Beginning” was dumb, didn’t I? Well, there’s dumb, and there’s DUMBER. This kdrama constituted the dumber version.

For a show that intended to incorporate the Catholic Church and its rite of exorcism in the drama, this writer simultaneously offended both:

a. the non-Catholics netizens who objected to the writer’s historical revisionism, and
b. Catholics like me who objected to the writer’s depiction of priests as consenting to murder.

Here’s the controversy regarding the citizens’ objection to the Catholic representation in the drama. Source: allkpop

As a matter of fact, numerous netizens have voiced opinions accusing the scriptwriter Park Kye Ok of this “mocking intention”.

Netizens believe that even before the drama began airing, the plot line of ‘Joseon Exorcist’ premised that “Lee Sung Kye (later King Taejo), the founder of Joseon, was too weak to overthrow the ancient monarchy.”

A fictional drama incorporating fantasy into a traditional Joseon era timeline, the story of ‘Joseon Exorcist’ claims that Lee Sung Kye “sought help from the Roman Catholic Church to overthrow the monarchy of Goryeo.” (This is historically false.)

The story of ‘Joseon Exorcist’, however, goes on to imagine that “The Roman Catholic Church decided to aid Lee Sung Kye to overthrow the ‘Buddhist’ country of Goryeo and to convert the new nation to Catholicism. The church thus sent exorcists who wielded power over the undead, who helped Lee Sung Kye claim the crown and establish Joseon. But afterward, Lee Sung Kye betrayed and murdered all those who aided him. Some years later, during the reign of Lee Bang Won (later King Taejeong), the undead who were disposed of by Lee Sung Kye return and wreak havoc on Joseon.”

 

Many netizens found it problematic that several foreign streaming platforms mirrored this summary very closely. (The comment that “this is a drama based on the historical facts of the founding of Joseon” are false.)

Furthermore, according to insider reports on March 25, more of the script for ‘Joseon Exorcist’ has been completed since the drama’s premiere. Insiders say that the story goes on to further fabricate a Joseon dynasty “that ultimately survives by forming a contract with the undead”. In the end, Prince Choong Nyeong (who later becomes King Sejong) “learns exorcism from the exorcists of the Roman Catholic Church and becomes an exorcist himself.”

source: allkpop

Personally, I don’t find issue with the historicity (or the historical authencity) of the drama because I don’t know much about Joseon kings and Catholics in Korea to raise a big stink. Everything I know  about those two subjects could fill up a thimble — or can be summed up in 9 points:

1. King Taejo ruled from 1392 to 1398. Founder and first king of the dynasty. He retired because he was dismayed by his sons’ in-fighting over the kingship.
2. King Jeongjong ruled from 1398 to 1400. Abdicated for King Taejong.
3. King Taejong ruled from 1400 to 1418. Killed his brothers to become King. Strengthened and stabilized the monarch. (He’s the “mad” king in the drama.)
4. King Sejong the Great ruled from 1418 to 1450. He was 21 when he became King. He’s Prince Chungnyung, the character played by Jang Dongyoon.
5. Pope Gregory XII, pope from 1406 to 1415. He was the pope during the “Great Schism” of the Catholic Church when the church had two popes. He abdicated to end the schism. (In the drama, he was the one who sent the exorcist(s) to Joseon. This is fictional, of course. It’s unlikely that he’d deal with devils in some faraway land when he was bedeviled with problems at home.)
6. Catholicism was introduced in Korea around the 18th century.
7. Catholicism was spread in Korea, NOT directly by European missionaries, but by European (or “Western”) BOOKS on science and technology which were translated into Chinese by the Catholic missionaries living in China at that time.
8. Essentially, the Korean Catholics “converted” themselves into the faith when they steeped themselves in these Christian discourses and scientific books. They weren’t converted through baptism because there wasn’t any Catholic priest in Korea to do baptisms. Note: the first Korean Catholics came from the educated aristocracy.
9. In fact, the first Catholic Korean (I’ll google his name and put in here) was a man who went to China after reading these books, in search of a priest to baptize him. He went back to Korea and began the church there.

That’s my thimbleful of knowledge on Joseon Kings and Catholics in Korea.

So….

Even if the Korean netizens wanted to “cancel” the program because of the Chinese food props, they can’t cancel the fact that Catholicism entered Korea by way of China.  🙂

Now, since this drama was supposed to be a fantasy genre, I gave the writer some leeway to tweak history *a bit.* But I do get why netizens are angry. It’s one thing to adapt “Pride and Prejudice,” and write, “Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.”

Ugh!

But it’s another thing to write about Jane Austen herself, and portray her as a nymphomaniac, who secretly married the coachman’s son, aborted her baby, and killed her family.

Do you get the difference?

One is about fictional characters, and the other one is about a historical character. One is an entertaining adaptation or a derivative work, and the other one is a sensationalized work, meant to generate a buzz and push people’s buttons, at the expense of authenticity and accuracy.

Hmmm… Is “Joseon Exorcist” “merely jirachi” then? lol.

To me, if this writer hadn’t used historical characters, and if this was his first offense, then the netizens would have likely been generous with him, and looked the other way.

Now, since I’m not Korean, here’s what I do find objectionable about the characterization of the priests in Episode 1: their indifference to murder. No priest is going to stand by and recite the “Our Father” while a whole village is being slaughtered by a madman.

No. Duh.

I’m paraphrasing the Church when I say that the “legitimate defense” against an unjust aggressor “is a grave duty for whoever is responsible for lives of others or the common good.”  The priest(s) should have acted to render the king unable to inflict harm onto others until the king regained his sanity back.

Praying over the king as he slayed his people would be like blessing evil and proclaiming it as pleasing to God. Prayer, without action to stop the evil, is just mumbo-jumbo.

That’s my “quick take” on this brouhaha, and this writer. He’s trashy.