I get why a doctor may want to avoid this medical drama.

Straight out of the gate, there’s a scene in Episode 1 when a group of physicians are gathered at a swanky restaurant to congratulate one of their own for being elected as mayor. Everybody – except one – is excited because finally, they have a politician in their corner who will advocate for them and protect their interests.

This scene gives viewers the impression that there’s a cabal of doctors out to sabotage their patients because of their nefarious self-interest. It’s an “us versus them” false dichotomy.

To belabor this point, that one doctor who was looking grimly on his colleagues as they fawned over the chairman of the political action committee, walks out of the room muttering, “The patients are who we need to worry for, you sons of bitches. And I hope you all get gout from stuffing your faces with all that meat. God, at this point, in there even a doctor left worth seeing?”

Oh dear. There’s nothing wrong with painting all doctors with the same broad brush, right?

Later in the episode, two doctors are shown abandoning their patient on the operating table. They’re in a panic because their esteemed hospital director who was performing the operation just collapsed in mid-surgery. [facepalm emoji] They rush out the room, leaving behind an intern, nurse, and anesthesiologist.

Well, what are viewers supposed to derive from this scene but that hospital doctors are grossly incompetent, stupidly subservient, and shockingly callous?

So, if I were a physician, I would recuse myself from watching this drama to avoid unnecessary aggravation.

However, since I’m not connected with the medical field, I can treat this kdrama like a social commentary. I won’t make the mistake of viewing it as a documentary, so I’ll analyze it like an urban legend. In any case, that’s how this kdrama is presented by the omniscient narrator. She frames the story like it’s a legend of a present-day heroine dealing with our modern-day anxieties about healthcare. However, instead of the usual fairy tale beginning, “Once upon a time there lived a princess…” the narrator starts with:

“A freelance doctor unaffiliated with any medical institution, also known as a mercenary doctor. This story, at its deepest point, is the story of the wolf. A solitary figure who emerged in the era of the mafia in white, in which medicine, where life hangs in the balance, is driven by money and power. The person that you see before you flies in the face of authority and refuses to be bound to anyone. The only weapons she keeps in her arsenal are her medical license and the surgical skills she sharpened from bare metal. Gye SuJeong, general surgeon. Also known as Doctor X.”

And her core promise? In Episode 2, she tells the sick child, “I never fail. I’ll save you. No matter what it takes.” If this show was about Greek mythology, then I’d worry about hubris. Her overconfidence (or dare I say arrogance?) will no doubt elicit divine ire and consequently, her punitive downfall. But as this show merely tries to build up SJ as an urban legend, then I don’t have to worry about her conceit.

1. Which “Doctor X” do I like?

We all know that this kdrama is a remake of a dorama. Some viewers may prefer the original drama because:

a) It’s campy (the “so bad, it’s good” excuse). It’s intentionally flamboyant.
b) The female lead, Michiko Daimon, has a devil-may-care attitude. Note: her last name “Daimon” is a pun on both the guardian spirit in Greek mythology and the evil spirit we associate with the devil.

From what little I’ve seen of the dorama, Michiko interacts with other folks like an adult. Unlike the female lead in the kdrama, she neither appears autistic nor behave with childlike habits at odd times.

I also like the dorama because:

c) Picture inserts are included to explain the surgical procedures.
d) I’m spared from seeing too much “realism” in the operating room (e.g., no blood on the garments, sanitized specimens, etc.)
e) Less moralizing than the kdrama version.

However, from what I’ve seen so far, the kdrama version is more to my liking for two reasons:

a) We’re given hints of a backstory to Gye SuJeong’s career path.

In the beginning of Episode 1, we see SuJeong (SJ) in a flashback. She’s holding hands with a little girl while watching the building called White Wings Medical Corps consumed by fire. Then, in Episode 2, we see SJ’s nightmare: she runs into the burning building to save the little girl’s brother. SJ then wakes up and stares at a singed teddy bear, presumably rescued from the fire.

Note the symbolism here: the burned teddy bear means the loss of innocence. It tells me that SJ didn’t start off “angry” at the world, but something happened to change her mood and general outlook in life.

I like this additional layer to SJ’s character.

b) Gye SuJeong (SJ) isn’t sexualized like Michiko.

I don’t get why Michiko wears skimpy shorts, high heels, and/or hooker attire for work, unless it’s a way to emphasize that she’s “liberated” and “rebelling” from patriarchy/hierarchy/whatever. I consider her work outfit unprofessional.

An aside: If I were one of her male junior coworkers, I’d file a complaint to HR for sexual harassment because she makes me feel uncomfortable whenever she flashes me with her decolletage and long legs. Ha!

In contrast, SJ wears a black leather jacket, loose cargo pants, and combat boots. Though she looks rugged and anti-establishment, her attire isn’t distracting like Michiko’s.

Note on her last name: “Gye” sounds like “gae.” It means “dog,” but when it’s paired with “saekki” – like “gaesaekki” – it then becomes a profanity, i.e., “son of a bitch.” In slang, however, “gae” means “very” or “freaking.” So, if you add it to another adjective, like pretty or awesome, it becomes an intensifier, e.g., “very pretty” and “freaking awesome.”

2. The meaning of the “X”

I can come up with a list of 10 explanations. Why 10? Because “X” is the roman numeral for 10. 🙂

i. SJ is an “ace.” Lol. In Korean, the letter “X” (or “ex” or “ekss”) can come out like “eyss.”

ii. She’s extraordinary or X-traordinary.

iii. “X” signifies “no” or “can’t be done.”

She informs her coworkers that there are many things she simply refuses to do at work. She won’t do any job that doesn’t require a medical license; she won’t do menial tasks; she won’t assist attending doctors with research projects; she won’t join director’s rounds; she won’t attend company dinners, talent shows, and social events; she won’t take part in pleasantries.

Those are all X’s for her. (So much for coexistence in the workplace, right?)

iv. “X” means she doesn’t fail any surgeries.

All her operations will be completed successfully. With a check mark, instead of an “X”.

v. X” denotes a mystery.

SJ’s real identity is secret. She has an unknown backstory. Also, as her boss, Dr. Do, points out, her motivation for working at that hospital – given her credentials – is a mystery.

It’s noteworthy that the Intern is slowly uncovering her mystery. So far, he’s discovered that food is SJ’s kryptonite. In Episode 2, he ferrets information from her by bribing her with desserts. He even makes her answer their colleagues’ questions about the patient with Meniere’s disease by waving banana milk in front of her.

vi. “X” in math means an independent variable.

SJ is a freelancer, an independent doctor unaffiliated with any medical establishment. She’s a “lone wolf.”

vii. She has the “X” factor or that special quality that makes her rare and unique.

Her colleagues are left amazed by the speed she performs her operations. They’ve never seen anything like it. Moreover, they’re surprised how she foresees and prepares for catastrophes in the OR, like the anaphylactic shock of a patient and the ischemic stroke of their director.

viii. According to her manager, she’s the “ace” of the first ever “locum tenens” agency in Korea.

“Locum tenens” means “to hold the place of” or “to substitute for”. Like the variable “X” in math, she can fill in for any surgical work needed and fix a crisis.

ix. “X” marks the spot.

In a culture where everyone is a yes-man and gives the boss a virtual check mark, she’s the only one to voice her objection. She calls out the error in a diagnosis/treatment that everybody else misses.

x. Last but not least, she’s an unknown variable.

Meaning, she can either be the heroine or villainess to the new Director’s plan for the hospital. She can be his most powerful tool/asset or his most dangerous liability in his scheme.

At the end of Episode 1, the Director and his second-in-command, Dr. Do speak about the impact of hiring SJ as a temporary doctor in the hospital.

Do: There’s a strong possibility she’ll stop our whole structure in its tracks completely.
Director: She can be easily gotten rid of if she no longer meets our needs. We can just put her in the can with all the other issues this hospital has.

Meaning, they can dispose of her when the time comes. I don’t think highly of a character who views a relationship, be it personal or professional, as merely transactional. For one, a transactional relationship can easily cross over to an exploitative one. For another, it shows a lack of empathy.

Then, at the end of Episode 2, Director encounters her sitting in a hallway because she has no desk of her own in the General Surgery room. They talk for a brief moment, then he tells her, “You can’t avoid failure forever.” She studies his face, then replies, “It seems like you’ve already failed, Director.”

This sounds all cryptic, but if I were to take a guess here, I think she’s referring to his hidden intention to allow the patient Park to die on the operating table. She sees through him.

You see, patient Park is a corrupt man but because he’s a huge donor at the hospital, the hospital is obliged to treat him like a VIP and cater to all his whims. Park has been known to feign an illness, first to escape audit and then to delay his trial, but now that his cancer diagnosis is real, he wants surgery, rather than preemptive chemotherapy. He desperately wants to live in order to fend off his accusers, so he demands the more aggressive form of treatment: surgery.

Despite being aware of Park’s desire to live, the Director chooses his second-in-command, Dr. Do, to perform the surgery on Park. To me, this is strange because he knows full well that Dr. Do’s forte is academic research, and not surgery. Even Dr. Do himself isn’t confident about his ability to operate on Park. Both Dr. Do’s colleagues, Drs Ma and Bae, know he isn’t a very good surgeon, so why doesn’t the Director know, too?

But when SJ, the most capable surgeon they have on board, offers to do the surgery in Dr. Do’s place and outlines her methodology, the Director steps in and blocks her. He forces her to take another one of Dr. Do’s surgeries instead, while Dr. Do is operating on Park.

To me, this looks like the Director is tying her hands, literally. It would make sense for SJ and Dr. Do to simply switch surgeries and perform the operations that matched their respective skills. But the Director stubbornly insists on them staying in their lanes, that is, their “wrong” lanes. He assigns them to work simultaneously on different patients in different operating rooms.

Fortunately, SJ is quick enough to finish her case without any hitches and take over Dr. Do’s surgery when complications arise. She manages to avoid failures in both operations.

And that’s why the Director’s words, “You can’t avoid failures forever” sounds ominous to me. It’s as if he was hoping that she blotched Park’s surgery or that Park died on the operating table under her scalpel or Dr. Do’s. He was expecting Park to die and was willing to throw either one of them under the bus.

The fact that Park lived means the Director’s plan failed.

3. Social Commentaries on Bad Doctors

In Episode 1, there are two kinds of bad doctors according to the script.

First, the Dinosaurs like outgoing Director Kim.

They don’t study to improve their knowledge. They lack drive or curiosity to keep up to date with new discoveries and innovation. They resist new methods and insist that their way is the best way. Their expertise and skills have become stagnant. Because they prefer to rest on their laurels, these doctors deliver substandard care.

What to do in real life? I say get second or even third opinion

Second, “stupid” doctors like Dr. Ma et al.

Here’s the soapbox of the screenwriters delivered by SJ in the loooongest monologue in Episode 1. Lol.

SJ: It’s people like you that I don’t like at all. People who did nothing but study just to make good money and get ahead. You’re intelligent in the stupidest way, with no convictions or ethics of your own. You grovel in front of attendings but hold your heads high in front of patients. You flatter your attendings but treat nurses like shit. You ignore corruption above you, but say the system is why you’re corrupt. You only care about your own convenience, you’re fine entrusting a patient’s surgery to that dinosaur who can barely manage his own health or keep his surgical skills up to date, you’d be lucky if he kept a steady hand. [Dr. Ma tries to interrupt her] You complacent people, who despite knowing the suffering the patient will undertake that a life is at stake, turn a blind eye, all you think of is how you get off easy. You people, who think it’s normal for patients, even elderly patients, to beg for a life-or-death surgery, while thanking you for doing what you should. People that aren’t anything more than doctors. Yah! You guys are the lowest of the low.

Brava, Kim JiWon! I wonder how long it took her to memorize everything.

In Episode 2, there are again two kinds of bad doctors according to SJ:

First, theorists like Dr. Do.

Dr. Do likes to conduct research and produce research papers for conferences. That’s where he gilds his resume. That’s all well and good, but as a surgeon, his main priority should have been honing his surgical skills. Drs. Bae and Ma, don’t trust his abilities so they have to tiptoe around the issue in order not to hurt Dr. Do’s feelings.

With that said, Dr. Do’s bigger fault is his complacency. While he’s aware of his weakness, he doesn’t do anything to mitigate it, e.g., prepare himself or ask for help.

Take for instance the eve of the Park surgery. The show gives us two contrasting pictures of doctors.

On one side, there’s Dr. Do who eats his bento box of sashimi in his office. From the looks of it, he’s working late at night on some research paper he’s doing. He momentarily gets upset as he remembers a) SJ taunting him that he doesn’t have the skills to do Park operation, and b) the Director giving SJ “his” patient JuHui whom he needs for his case study. But while he’s miffed about losing his “case” patient JuHui, he doesn’t prepare for the Park’s surgery.

On the other side, there’s SJ who skips dinner. Her manager leaves a tray of home-cooked banchan outside her room because it’s unusual for her to miss food. While SJ studied Park’s medical records all day, she’s visualizing the surgery while she’s in bed.

The difference between the two doctors couldn’t be clearer.

Second, ambitious doctors who give preferential treatment to rich patients.

Again, it’s easy to spot the soapbox. Just listen to how cringe-y the dialogue sounds.

Intern: Dr. Gye! Are you giving up on JuHui’s surgery?
SJ: Out of the way.
Intern: Why would you do that? Because she’s not a VIP? Because she’s from a poor family with a disabled mother?
SJ: Priority.
Intern: So, by priority, do you mean getting ahead? Is that the kind of doctor you are?
SJ: (sighing) I said get out of the way.
Intern: Whenever the other doctors would bad-mouth you for chasing money and success, I said I never believed it. But now…(shouting) How could you do this?
SJ: (pushing him aside)
Intern: You’re a doctor! You should look after your patient until the end!!! You promised her a hundred years!!!!!!!!! You said you’d save her no matter what it takes.

Three things:

a. Yuck. This is as bad as those airport scenes in last century’s kdramas when the guy yells “Hajimmmmma!” or “Don’t go! Don’t leave me! You promised to stay with me foreverrrrrr.”

b. Would it have hurt SJ to explain to the Intern that she already finished the important part of the surgery before she supposedly “abandoned” her patient? His angst is so unnecessary. But yeahhh, the social commentary had to be delivered by the script.

c. Very Important. When it comes to an emergency, there’s no such thing as preferential treatment either for the poor or for the rich. The intern is wrong here. All emergencies must be evaluated based simply on the severity of the injury and/or condition of the patient.

🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸

That’s it for me. Those are my notes. Enjoy.

I don’t know how long I’ll continue with this kdrama. I still have other shows on my plate. Ciao!