Yongpal is a 2015 spectacular melodrama that fits into the genre of crime,suspense and family drama which is set in a hospital. The main actors involved in this show are: Ju Won, Kim Tae Hee, Jo Hyun Jae and Chae Jung An.

The general premise of this story goes like this. Han Yeo Jin (Kim Tae Hee) is the heiress of the conglomerate and she is the daughter of Hanshin Group but everything becomes very messy for her because of her brother by the name Han Do Jun (Jo Hyun Jae). Yeo Jin is in a state of coma and is trapped in this fancy hospital room on top of the 12th floor. Yeo Jin’s situation seems pretty dire until a highly skilled quack surgeon comes into the scene and he is called Yongpal by many, although his actual name is Kim Tae Hyun (Ju Won).

Kim Tae Hyun is a humanitarian that tries to see good in others. He has a younger sister that is very ill and is hospitalized and he is willing to do anything to have his sister to be cured. However, he runs into money problems, so he has to do something that is sort of illegal to get the extra cash to help his beloved sister. At first he goes around the city and he plays the role of a surgeon for gangsters or whomever that are not able to go to the hospital due to their illegal activities.

I think that Kim Tae Hyun is a good guy and he seems to always want to do good even if he is being chased by the police for operating on some local street thugs. Tae Hyun’s nickname is Yongpal because he is such a highly skilled surgeon and he is able to operate on patients effectively and efficiently while getting it done in a timely fashion.This guy is  also there for Han Yeo Jin. Han Yeo Jin is the heiress of Hanshin group but is confined up on top of the 12th floor because of her older brother and she lays there in the state of coma but nobody comes to save her. However, Yongpal is the only person that is willing to help her out. So therefore, if it weren’t for Tae Hyun, most likely, Yeo Jin would be trapped in that fancy glassed room for even a longer amount of time.

Kim Tae Hyun  is a great guy and he is well written in my opinion but the only thing that is bad about this character is the person that played him. I feel like Kim Tae Hyun is pretty  lifeless. I am able to understand the lifelessness because this drama is a bit on the heavy side but Yongpal looks so dull and has no energy to him whatsoever. The guy that plays him is Ju Won and he just can’t seem to  bring the character to life. Kim Tae Hyun or should we say Yongpal is a character that’s well written but the actor is not able to  portray him very well. I think the main reason for this is Ju Won’s face that looks as if it’s glued together.The actor Ju Won looks like he’s got  a bad plastic surgery or even a bad facelift using Botox, because this guy looks like he can’t seem to  make normal facial expressions. Since the character itself is likeable so, as the show progressed, I disliked Ju Won less and less but I was barely tolerating him.

Han Yeo Jin is  an heiress to the the big company by the name Hanshin Group and she has an older brother. They used to get along very well when they were kids but as they got older things changed for them. Yeo Jin is in the state of coma for three years, so she isn’t able to really do anything in that situation. Yeo Jin’s older brother; Han Do Jun really didn’t care what happened to her so she ended up being in that circumstance for three years. Yeo Jin really wants to get out but nobody is there to take her out of that place except for Kim Tae Hyun.  

Kim Tae Hee is just like Ju Won, her acting is just so unintersting. Honestly, I haven’t seen much of this woman in action. I think the only drama I have seen with her was probably ‘The Nine Tailed Fox’ with Jo Hyun Jae but even then she didn’t charm me into liking her. Besides, the only reason I watched that show was because of Jo Hyun Jae. Anyways, that’s besides the point. The character, Han Yeo Jin really isn’t  all that interesting and to make it worse, Kim Tae Hee makes it even more boring. I hate to say this but I was distracted by Kim Tae Hee’s plastic face more than her acting. I’m pretty lenient about celebrities getting plastic surgery since that’s their business, and if they want to look pretty to keep themselves in business why not? But her acting was just so mediocre at best that I couldn’t help but to focus on her face instead.

Now, we will get to the meat of this review. Let me introduce, Mr. Han Do Jun. This character is very complex and has many layers and it’s not because of the way the character was written initially. Most likely,if you were to read the script just by itself then , there’s not much going on but it’s the person that played him that spiced it up. I will get to that actor in a bit, just sit tight and enjoy the ride until I finish describing this character. He was the half brother of Han Yeo Jin and this man is responsible for some of the bad things and that includes Yeo Jin being confined in the nice hospital room. On the surface, this Do Jun character seems evil and he is, since he commits all kinds of evil deeds but this guy has a back story. He grew up being abandoned a lot as a child and even as an adult. His father didn’t treat him well because he was  an illegitimate child from another woman.

Han Do Jun is more or less a character that needs the sympathy of the viewers. All this man wants is love from those around him. He goes through inferiority complex because he lacks in many areas and love is the main thing that he doesn’t seem to have in his life. As a child, he did get along with Yeo Jin, his little sister, but things got bad when his father treated him like an outcast.The father even blamed him if Yeo Jin got hurt, although, he did everything to protect his younger sister. I don’t know if I can legitimize Han Do Jun  doing terrible things to those around him but at the same time I am able to  totally understand where he is coming from. While watching Do Jun in action, I realized that people do need love, if they are hungry for that very thing then they can grow so cold and this possibly can turn them into monsters.

I feel so proud of Jo Hyun Jae. I been a fangirl for this man for a long while now. I said previously, that Han Do Jun’s character was spiced up compared to the writing itself. The actor that made it possible was none other than Jo Hyun Jae. This actor put so much into this character by putting a lot of time into researching the character. According to his many interviews that I have read, he talks about how the script was kind of bare bones at the beginning of the production and he couldn’t understand the character that he was playing since there was not enough explanation regarding the role. Jo Hyun Jae took this job very seriously since  it’s his first villain role ever since his debut back in 2000.

Jo Hyun Jae was so eager to perfect this Han Do Jun character, so he even went to the screenwriter for additional information, because he wanted to give 120% to this role. I don’t blame him because he justs wanted to make things satisfactory since it’s his first villain role and all. I was so proud, I totally bought his character. There were some scenes with Han Do Jun that made me feel frightened and I couldn’t even look at him in the eyes because I felt this aggressiveness from him. I guess I’m so used to Jo Hyun Jae playing a nice guy and also very sweet for that matter but I have never seen him become so cruel to the point where he looked like a psychopath or just inhuman. There was this scene where he throws a glass cup at his personal assistant and boy, it was terrifying. I heard Jo Hyun Jae yell in other dramas but it wasn’t the same in this show. In Yongpal, he means business, it’s not the petty kind of yelling like his previous dramas.

His facial expressions,the way he looks with his eyes,his tone of voice, body language and just about everything makes him look so evil but yet there is this deep yearning in the character. All Han Do Jun wanted was love, it’s that simple. He wasn’t born a murderer or an evil doer of any kind. He looked after his half sister, Yeo Jin, and tried to be good to his dad. He got worse and worse as he grew older. His wife, Lee Chae Young (Chae Jung An) that he loves so much never returns his love. I guess it’s a wrong way to love somebody since you can’t really force anybody to feel the same way for you but Han Do Jun is so hungry for love that he is willing to get down and dirty for it and this is why I pity the character and Jo Hyun Jae did an awesome job in portraying this tragic persona. Also, I need to mention that the people around him,like his personal secretary and another person that does business with him are just there to use him for his wealth. I can totally see why Han Do Jun goes all crazy as the drama progressed.

Jo Hyun Jae was so good in bringing the character to life. I can’t stress this enough and this is why I am talking more about him than the two main actors/characters of this show. Jo Hyun Jae usually plays the lead in most of his dramas but in this Yongpal, he is the main character/actor but a 2nd rather than the first. However, I was more interested in the schemes of this 2nd lead than the first lead. I had mixed feelings about Jo Hyun Jae’s character Han Do Jun because at the beginning and maybe even in the midway point, I wanted this character to be punished, I didn’t know any better then but as the story unfolds bit by bit I couldn’t help but to feel sorry for the character and I think the main reason I was able to feel sympathy was because of Jo Hyun Jae’s eyes. He made this character look scary and even frightening but when you look at it closely and long enough there is this little boy that wants to be rescued through love.

I want to wrap up Jo Hyun Jae and his character Han Do Jun. Usually, even second lead actors/characters get quantity of scenes but unfortunately the amount of the scenes for Jo Hyun Jae isn’t much and this is the reason why the actor was concerned when he first ran into the script but with his diligent research he was able to make a strong impact and he really did make an impression that’s carved into our minds even after the drama was over. A lot of fans and just regular viewers were surprised that Jo Hyun Jae was able to pull off such a villainous but yet pitiful character. All I can say is WOW! And I’m pretty sure a lot of fans and others are congratulating Jo Hyun Jae for proving himself as a real actor.

Lee Chae Young is the wife of Han Do Jun. This lady had a past too but probably not as bad as Han Do Jun. She does not return the love of her husband and she more or less flirts with Yongpal/Kim Tae Hyun. She is not such a bad woman but I can’t say that she is good either. Lee Chae Young certainly has her own ulterior motives but she is not as bad as some of the people around Han Do Jun. Her husband really loves her, although, he is not very good at expressing it but his feelings are  true nonetheless,despite how desperate he looks. However, Chae Young doesn’t feel the same way, she pretty much does her own thing while leaving Do Jun behind to fend for himself emotionally.

Chae Jung An plays the wife of Han Do Jun but even she is also dull. What’s with most of the main actors of this show? They just cannot seem to spice up their characters. However, Chae Jung An isn’t as boring as Kim Tae Hee. This actress didn’t really have me engaged so I also focused on her cosmetic surgery instead. It’s really bad when you are more into their plastic surgery rather than their performance. It was a little uncomfortable for me to look at this actress because she was obviously trying very hard to make facial expressions but with all that botox, the face just looks frozen no matter what she tries to do.

Moving on to some side characters. I had fun with the side characters because with a lot of them I was able to play the who’s who game. The most important actor that made me chuckle is the man that plays Chief Lee (Jeong Woong In) in the show. This guy plays villains in most dramas I have seen with him in it, but in this show he is a slightly more upright villain. I think Chief Lee was my second favorite character after Han Do jun that was played by Jo Hyun Jae. Jeong Woong In specializes in playing villains but in this show I feel that he’s a little  different as a  villain. When I first saw him, I felt happy. I am not a fangirl for this man but I have seen him in numerous of other dramas and he was quite good in those and on top of that he was in some dramas with my favorite actor Yoo Seung Ho!  Jeong Woong In’s characters in other shows make me want to label him as a slimy weasel but him as  Chief Lee, I felt some kind of sympathy or even empathy, which I didn’t feel for this man’s other roles.

Another noteworthy side character from this who’s who game is the person that plays the head Nurse (Kim Mi jung). This lady seems to be in just about all the dramas that I watch. She usually is someone’s mother,a cleaning lady, and even a deep sea diver. I really liked the head nurse since she helped the story move forward in a way and I am kind of glad that it’s played by this veteran actress. In some one of the recent shows I’ve watched with her in it was I Miss You and there she was a cleaning lady, her character was very different from this Yongpal. This is why I really liked this actress in Yongpal because she played somewhat of a different character.

There are few more little side characters that I was glad to see. This man that plays  the Boss for  one of the local gangs that Yongpal cured was another actor that I was glad to see. He was a side character but not a cameo. However, there are these two actors that just had cameo appearances. The gentleman that played Yeo Jin and Do Jun’s father (Jeon Guk Hwan) and one of the surgeons that appeared briefly and he is played by an actor named  Jung Seok Yong. These guys didn’t get a whole lot of scenes  in the drama but I was happy to see them because they made impressions in other dramas I have watched in the past. I thought the Boss from the local gang is pretty funny and I loved his banter with one of the inexperienced nurses and also with Yongpal himself.

The man that plays the father of Yeo Jin is also typecasted here. He always tends to play a mean father or some cruel authority figure.

I would like to bring up one more character. I am not really familiar with this actress but she is the woman that played Nurse Hwang. She had this creepy element to her. I had mixed feelings about her because I didn’t like her, since she was like one of those crazy characters from psycho-horror films but she had a charm to her unlike Kim Tae Hee, Ju Won and Chae Jung An.She kind of reminded me of those strange characters from some Japanese Horror flicks.

She comes off as a weirdo for sure but kind of charming. At first I didn’t know what to think of this person  but the more I watched her I had a lot of fun with her,despite her creepiness and all.

The theme of this drama…Hmmm…Let me think, I would like to say that this drama is more or less talking about abandonment issues. Well, this is not such a new theme or subject matter in Korean dramas,it’s talked about quite a lot. However, it’s how you bring the story about that could either make it or break it as far as getting people to relate to it. The whole madness with Han Do Jun began because he was treated like an outcast growing up and this leads him to doing bad things as he becomes an adult. If the father didn’t treat him that way in the first place, most likely Han Do Jun and his sister would have had a normal life together.

Also, its not just abandonment, I think it’s also talking about forgiveness instead of trying to revenge someone that has wronged you. Once revenge begins, it’s almost like an endless cycle.

Revenge will give birth revenge in some form or another. Vengeance isn’t the answer but these characters that were hurt in the past go and take the matters into their own hands but it ends up having to meet their demise while other people around them have to suffer as well. Forgiveness is not the easiest thing in the world, we humans are constantly going through this all the time, it’s kind of like putting everything on repeat.

One last thing that I thought about theme wise was the people that were outcasts in society. I am not just talking about local thugs but also immigrants or should I say, undocumented immigrants. There is this scene where this one immigrant couple couldn’t give birth to their baby because they’re afraid that they might get deported. However, Yongpal doesn’t refuse them, even though he can’t really make the extra money off of them. Since Yongpal or Tae Hyun is such a humanitarian that he wouldn’t turn down anybody as long as they need medical attention.

At the end of the day, that’s what doctors should be. It shouldn’t be about just making a lot of money but it’s about curing people without any bias. Local thugs, immigrants or whoever it is, a doctor’s job is to take care of their medical needs and it doesn’t matter who it is. Yongpal is a humanitarian doctor so he wants to be able to help them. I think that this drama hints at the fact that Korean’s hospitals and doctors shouldn’t turn anybody for medical attention just because they don’t have legal status in the country. This makes sense since Korea has been seeing a lot more immigrants from other countries in the last 5 years. A lot of people from certain countries, especially south east asian countries to chase after the so called, THE KOREAN DREAM. So, I think this drama is talking about being able to not turn anybody away  as long as they need some kind of urgent medical attention.

I thought the cinematography was great, it almost felt movie like. I think that most Korean dramas are well made on the surface but there aren’t too many that have cinema like feel to it. I don’t know too much about the effects of the way professional cameras work but I still am able to sense a good quality when I’m watching something. The thing that I really liked about the cinematography was the first episode of the show. I thought car chase scene was memorable, it really did remind me of those super action-y type of Hollywood films. The images did look glossy, but it was not the tacky kind of glossy. The way the camera moved while the chase scene was happening got me all pumped, despite the fact that I wasn’t quite sure how the drama was going to turn out. The car chasing scene made me think about THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS MOVIES.

Music wasn’t bad. However, it was trying to sound like the music from the Director Christopher Nolan Film; The Dark Knight. I am used to this sound and I like it a lot so it didn’t bother me at all, but I couldn’t help but to chuckle because sometimes it felt like they were trying too hard. However, this is way better than Korean dramas that repeat theme songs, especially those really sappy kinds. That was one my pet peeves with Korean dramas and that is them repeating the songs from OST( Original Soundtrack) over and over again. At least, this drama didn’t do that. Although it did have a theme song that they would play here and there in the background, also, they play the song at the end of each episode.

Oh boy, now it’s time to talk about the writing. Jang Hyuk Rin is the person that wrote the script and by the name of this person, I am not quite sure if it’s a man or a woman but I can tell you that this person needs to work on his or her writing skills. Overall writing skills of this screenwriter is not that good but I did like one thing and that was the way Ju Won’s character was written. It’s strange since Ju Won’s character is the main person, the protagonist. All the other characters were pretty dull or not enough depth. Kim Tae Hee and Chae Jung An’s characters were very dull while the actresses made it worse. However, Jo Hyun Jae’s characters just lacked on paper but it turned out well because the actor put so much effort into it. Ju Won on the other hand, his character was actually written nicely ironically enough but the actor just couldn’t pull it off.

Everybody looked so white in the drama. I wonder if it’s the magic of botox for all the actors that are involved or if it’s some kind of camera tricks, but the more I think about it, they probably wore tons of makeup to look so white. It’s not just the  females looking so white but also men are super paled too.

In conclusion, this drama is okay. It’s not the best and it’s not so horrible but you have to have some patience to finish it all. Like I mentioned above, the writing is not so good but somehow tolerable and that is because, certain actors make it enjoyable for you to continue with the show instead of discarding it out of frustration. I can’t blame the fact that the writing is bad because of the person that is responsible for the script, completely. I think one of the main reasons why we run into writing and editing or even performance problems with the actors is because of the way these dramas are made. I always tend to defend the people that are involved in these dramas even though it could be bad quality to a degree, because they only have so much budget and time to work with.

These dramas are not pre-produced so the scripts come out by based on the episodes. On top of that the unfortunate thing is, these dramas depend on high viewership ratings so they change the script at the last minute depending on the reactions of the viewers. For instance: Even if the script is already written by the scriptwriter but if the viewers have certain comments written on the official site, things can change and they would have to completely rewrite the script over again, this is very time consuming and it puts a lot of stress on to the writers,actors and even the directors. Heck, even the whole staff gets affected by this mess. So this is why, I can’t blame everything on the writer since they got so much time to work with. However, when it comes to the overall concept the writers themselves are responsible for it.

Honestly, I was very nervous about this drama when I first heard about it. I wasn’t going to even watch it because I was very concerned about this show for some reason. When I read about it, didn’t capture me right away, but I decided to watch it because I really like Jo Hyun Jae and I was curious to how he would play a villain. I wanted to support his first villain role so despite all the worries I just went for it. I don’t think this drama is all that good but Jo Hyun Jae made it worthwhile and I am being very objective about this. I am not saying this in a fangirl point of view. As a matter of fact, I made up my mind to watch it with a different set of eyes. I watched as a normal viewer instead of a fan.

Would I recommend this drama to you? Well, I have a mixed feelings about it. However, I would recommended it just so you can see what this actor Jo Hyun Jae could do. He is able to show you what magic is all about. He can make a tasteless cookie the best thing you have ever eaten. Maybe,that’s bit of an exaggeration but he does make the drama really worth watching, even, if the amount he appears in is not much as we all hoped for. I used to rate the dramas I reviewed but I don’t think that’s really fair so I abolished that policy. So, all I can say is this, just gives this drama a try and see what the actor Jo Hyun Jae can do with this drama that has so many problems. I think he is the main ingredient that makes this not so tasty soup, pretty good.