Extracurricular (2020)

The price of being normal..

Being normal or ordinary might be a bore to most of us but for somebody who has no one and has nothing it’s quite a challenge.
The ML had a very simply dream to be normal and be like everyone else but given the circumstances it was hard for him. Making ends meet is difficult and it becomes doubly hard when your alone that is probably why others tend to take an easy way out doing something illegal or immoral to make easy money. But there is no such thing as easy money it requires hard work, sacrifice, persistence, and probably a little luck.
Sooner or later you just become unlucky.
This is a sad drama.

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-> The story a.k.a the strongest point of this serie from my opinion.

The story evolves around "poverty", "psychology", "money", "teenagers/minors", "trafficking, sextrafficking, gangs".
At first, it sounds old and common but, the way the story is told makes this drama unique in its genre. The story telling of this drama is a work of art. I am not exagerrating, it is brilliant. The episode 1 is echoing the last episode (ep 10). The first episode set the atmostphere since the first scene and that scene is directly connected to the last scene of the last episode which resumes everything. The introduction is also the conclusion. It is very brilliant. Also the sentences that the professor told him are all so important to understand the psychology of the main characters especially Jinsoo. For example in the first episode, he told him if he endure everything now he will face the consequences all at once at the end. The professor is such an important character. Also there are many details which are very important as well, they seems like "nothing" but they are crucial like the animal that Jinsoo take care of and the cap Minhee has brought.
I truly appreciate how unique this drama is, how uncommon it is, how unpredictable and predictable it is at the same time, how it makes sense but doesn't makes sense at the same as well.

The four main characters were to blame, they were not saint and not evil either, they have taken the wrong path to achieve their goals and the consequences were tragic (Even MrLee is to blame). The two main characters especially are to blame, they are anti heroes. The story tellins is great because the way it is told will makes you want to support them even if they are wrong.

In addition, I also like a lot the fact that they truly portrays two kind of trafficking : the "old" kind of making money through illegal trafficking and the "modern" way to make money through illegal trafficking with modern technologies (smartphones, by distance). With mordern techologies, a lot more people with different backgrounds can dive into this illegal world "more easily".

If you like the movie "Parasite" you will love this drama. "Extracurricular" truly follows the same "concept", the same unique, new genre. I was really not into "Parasite" but with "Extracurricular" it is different. So if you haven't enjoyed "Parasite", this drama "Extracurriclar" can reconcile you with the concept.

-> The cast
The cast is very good, the acting very great. I'll not say I was complety amazed by their acting to be very honest but they are very good especially the main actor who is portraying Jinsoo.

-> The music a.k.a the only weak point
From my opinion, my personal tastes, the choice of the osts were not always good but that's my personal tastes who is speaking because I am aware the choice of some songs for some scenes were intentional to makes this drama "unique". But imo it is was unecessary "unique". The osts are good to listen, but they doesn't fit with this drama particularly. I only like a lot the "opening theme", it was the only ost that fit the drama. The others musics doesn't fit.

-> The rewatch value
I found myself wanting to rewatch again this drama because the story telling once again is brilliant.

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A VERY addicting drama that'll make you finish it the same day.

I was bored scrolling looking for some kdramas the other day and I stumbled upon this one. It was in twitter where literally everyone was recommending it. The tweet was something like, "What are some really good kdramas to watch?" So I just looked in the comments under it. To my surprise, the name of this drama was said in multiple people's comments. The story is really good, but at the same time very ANNOYING.

I loved the whole drama except for Gyu-Ri literally annoying the heck out of me. It was really interesting but also infuriating. LOL. Anyways definitely recommend watching. 9.47/10!!

I'm not gonna lie about the title either, I myself really DID finish it the same day. ㅋㅋㅋ I still have a lot of time these days. Anyways if you still haven't watched it, what are you doing? Goooo!! ;)

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Enjoy the Downward Spiral

My 4 categories are Acting/Cast, Writing, Direction/SFX/Music, Entertainment Value.

After reading the synopsis, I was hesitant to watch this drama because I didn't want to see minors in sexual situations and engaged in very serious criminal activity. I was worried it may glamorize these kinds of lifestyles. Once I finally decided to give it a try, I almost dropped the drama after the 1st episode. It just didn't grab my attention and I felt the male lead's character and his motivations were boring and typical. Eventually, I gave it another shot and watched episode 2 and from then on, I was hooked.

Acting/Cast: I think this is my 1st time seeing most of these actors... at least in major roles (except for 남윤수 Nam Yoon Su). They all did a great job. Watching the male lead's personality unfold, stood out to me the most. I also liked watching the interactions between the female lead and her mother. 9.5/10

Writing: This category can be broken into 2 parts - character writing/dialogue and story writing. I feel that the character development was the strongest aspect of this drama. The psychological genre is my favorite when it comes to Korean dramas because of their ability to write compelling characters that grow or change in realistic ways during the course of their experiences. This drama is great example of that, especially in regards to the male lead's character. Unfortunately, with how great the character writing is, I felt the actual story writing was lacking in comparison. There were storylines that I was really interested in learning more about (mainly more about the female lead's mom and that industry and about Mr. Lee's background), but they were left unexplored. The ending was also done in a way that seems as though they were setting it up for a 2nd season, which would make sense as to why some major details of the story felt unfinished. Regardless, I'm typically not a fan of endings like that. It feels incomplete and I'm left wanting more. If they're not doing a 2nd season, then 10 episodes weren't enough to really flesh out this story. On a positive note, the things that I was worried about before even beginning the drama, turned out not to be an issue. However, I could see some potential for criminal activity/prostitution being glamorized (for instance, prostitution didn't seem like a big deal until it was an underage girl doing it.) But every time the characters started to seem "cool" or too much like protagonists, something horrible would happen that would put everyone back where they belong. That reminds me, It was difficult watching a drama with no real protagonist. I felt bad rooting for anyone. I would just feel resigned and I would say "well...that's what you get for engaging in criminal activity." I'm not going to feel bad rooting for Mr. Lee though. 7/10

Direction/SFX/Music: The production was great; it felt very high quality. There were some clever dream sequence scenes that I really enjoyed. They didn't feel like your typical dream sequence. I usually can't stand them. The music really added to these strange scenes, as well. I don't care about music so much, but I do take notice when it heightens the experience for me (or worsens it). I think the OST played a huge part in giving this drama a very captivating vibe. 8/10

Entertainment Value: After I got past that 1st episode, it was a crazy ride. It was like watching a train wreck (but in a good way?) So much anxiety...very unpredictable. A fun but scary, stress-inducing ride. I don't want to say anything more about it because I don't want to give anything away. 8/10

It was difficult to give a final rating for this drama - it's either an 8/10 or an 8.5/10. I chose 8 more for personal preferences, which I don't want to expand on because it may be a bit of a spoiler.

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It was fine

I think it's really good, however certain characters really got on my nerves which made it a little harder to get through. The acting was amazing, the plot was really interesting and the cinematography was good, which I definitely appreciate but I just couldn't get beyond the way the plot relied on one specific thing which ultimately was somewhat flimsy. It is still a good show but I personally prefer shows that rely a little less on one specific thing but rather a lot more things so that even if one falls flat the plot still stands, aside from that one personal preference thing, it was ultimately good overall!

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Unlike every other drama coming out of Korea with same repeat stories this drama was totally different, both leads of the drama were worst ever criminal possible. Leads were pimps who sold men and women of all ages including minors for sexual favors. They didn't stop even when things got complicated like attempted murder, police getting involved later on murder. Worst part both the leads were minors.
This drama is depiction of how extreme circumstances bring out worst in humans even worse when persons are genius and are very difficult to be suspected. They manipulate every circumstance in their favor but you can't even blame them because they had no other choice.
Best part of Drama
Acting by male lead- I have watched all 3-4 of his drama and this guy took me buy surpsrise he acted so well that he desreve daesang for the drama. If he can conti nue this acting he will end up as one of the best actors ever produced by South Korea.

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Unique Premise Fumbled by Mediocre Writing

I expected a lot more out of this show considering its high reviews, and after finishing I have to wonder if I even watched the same show others did.

While I did mark my review as having spoilers, again, please do not read if you strongly plan on watching the show and care about spoiling of any degree.

The premise of the story is good (or could have been), the acting is as good as most other decent kdramas, and the direction is good. However, most of the characters are terribly unlikable and inconsistent in role, and the biggest, gleaming issue is that the story is full of nonsensical plot holes which ruin its delivery. That said, I did not hate it, it just felt painfully average when it could have fared far better and I would not have bothered had I known.

Jisoo is smart enough to start a secret business and run it for nearly 2 years, but simultaneously is an insufferable coward and idiot at nearly every encounter that would test his intelligence (are we to believe there were no issues ever leading up to this point that would require high IQ to resolve?). His phone is openly marked with his business logo, he leaves sound-based notifications on that are tied to said business/logo, he's nonchalant with how he treats his second phone (not even caring enough to keep it on his person, the entire reason why he got himself into this situation), and he didn't even bother to give his phone a decent password (or have a second password on his security app) even though it's somehow his only connection to the business [despite it being implied that he made the security app, and would therefore have full backdoor rights].

For those unfamiliar, with a decent password it could take the FBI or similar agencies weeks to months to unlock the phone if you/the manufacturer refused to do it for them; for an average person/solo person without extensive IT background it would take far longer, if possible at all. Certainly nobody is going to casually guess their way in unless the password is on a post-it note pasted on the fridge like in your grandmother's house. Furthermore, had he encrypted the app/messages, as any person that's capable of operating as he did prior to the start of the show would know how to do, then it could take years of efforts to get in, and that's assuming he didn't also select for disappearing logs or other security backups preventing forced entry. Hell, he couldn't even manage to find the power off button on a telephone he took that had self-compromising information regarding his illegality activities, not to mention willingly letting a bully into his home that would capitalize on this. It's as if even if he messed up early on he had ZERO learning-curve capability. Based on how he's written by the end of the show, it's difficult to believe that he manages to tie his own laces or wipe his own arse in the correct direction, let alone do anything he built up in the prelude.

Not going to bother addressing the other characters since the lead was frustrating enough, but the pure negligence of how technology is treated, such as everyone's phone being immediately, magically accessible and apps usable by people without use privileges is a significant oversight (as well as the aforementioned in the above). I would accept the argument that some people are dumb enough to not use passwords, or to use something like '1234', but when the average IQ in S Korea is 105+ and the entire premise is based on the main character being intelligent/top of his class while still working (so theoretically 130+) it comes off as lazy, amateurish writing that took a chance at too few people noticing/caring about the flaws--based on average reviews being very different from my own, looks like it paid off.

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WATCH AT YOUR OWN RISK

I was stuck in quarantine and started watching this out of boredom. Would've appreciated it if the producers added a trigger warning at the beginning of the drama T_T I had 2 mental breakdowns in the span of watching this lmao.

Overall plot is super f'd up and no one's a good guy in this drama. Every character frustrates you in their own charming way. Obviously am not satisfied with the ending and looking forward to season 2 if there even is one *sigh* Honestly if you're mentally unstable and is planning to watch this then good luck haha. yes it's good , no doubt it is, but it is rather triggering.

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WOOW es un dorama incrible.

Si bien no es un dorama perfecto creo que es de lo mejor de Netflix, ya que los doramas escolares generalmente se centran en el romance con una subhistoria. En algunas ocasiones nos traen algo diferente pero no tan bien logrado.

La historia te deja pidiendo mas, a mi parecer tiene un muy buen ritmo, y aunque algunos episodios no fueron tan intensos como otros creo que esta bien eso fue perfecto ya que necesitamos digerir y tratar de sacar nuestras propias conclusiones sobre este. Lo que mas me gusto es que generalmente uno puede llegar a predecir como va a ir la historia y si bien no me equivoque como salia algunas cosas, me sorprendió en como se llega a estas conclusiones. Definitivamente un final que te deja esperando mas.

Los actores sin duda hicieron un gran trabajo ya que ellos rondan en sus 20 y actúan muy bien sus personajes para creer que son adolescentes. Aunque no todo es tan bueno, falto algo mas de desarrollo en algunos personajes para saber el porque de sus acciones espero que halla 2da. temporada y esos huecos se puedan resolver. No se puede hablar mucho sobre la música ya que no hubo mucha pero en general no estuvo mal. La fotografía en general es buena, sobre todo la paleta de colores manejada siempre tuvo esa vibra que te introduce un poco mas a el dorama.

Sin duda uno se puede disfrutar este dorama y mas por su historia innovadora ya que es refrescante.

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Not Your Average Drama

The minute I began watching this drama I knew this would not be like any of the others I'd watched so far. Similar in tone to Parasite and many other Korean movies, this drama portrays a very realistic and gritty take on life and what it takes to survive.

The strongest point of this drama is its plot. Void of stereotypical cliches, it leaves you on the edge of your seat guessing what will happen next. Although high schoolers running a prostitution business seems extremely out-there and unrealistic, the genius-level writing of this drama has made me realize that this may very well be reality for people living not only in Korea, but other developed countries too. I'm glad that this drama is a Netflix Original, because it would not have been as dark nor as great had it been picked up by Korean networks that have to abide to the KCC's laws. I have never felt the way I've felt over the course of this drama, from developing a strong attachment to Oh Jisoo in the first few episodes to being disgusted with myself & his actions in the last one. The characters are all extremely well written and I enjoyed watching them struggle to conform to the rapidly changing circumstances. The actions & motivations of the four leads are such that you can never truly root for any of them despite either having begun as a favorable character, or become one through their character development. While there are some questions that remain unanswered, the open ending of this drama has me believing that the story is not complete and we will get a 2nd season in which those questions will be answered. In all, the plot will have your brain running a mile a minute, thinking of theories and motivations for days after completing it.

I have never been good at telling good & bad acting apart, but judging by the way the lead four, especially Gyuri & Jisoo made me feel, I think their acting is nothing short of amazing, especially Kim Dong-hees's. He portrayed such strong emotion, especially anxiety, that I felt my stomach bunch up into knots while watching him.

The only reason I have given a less than stellar rating to the soundtrack is because, while it was good, it wasn't all that memorable. I watched this drama a few months ago and yet when listening to the soundtrack I fail to place what scenes the songs were used for. On top of that, I felt like the theme song was kind of cliche. To me it felt like the stereotypical theme song for a dark, crime drama rather than being one that really mirrored this story. To be honest though, this drama was so good that even a less than perfect soundtrack did not detract from it. Like I said before, the plot is so entrancing that you will barely register the soundtrack. Perhaps that's what happened with me.

Rewatch value-wise, I gave it a lower score not because I would not enjoy rewatching, but because this is the type of drama you can only truly experience once. It is riddled with plot-twists that leave you gasping for air, akin to Parasite, and I just do not feel like you can re-experience the same feelings while rewatching it because you know what will happen next which is absolutely essential for this drama. With that being said, if there was ever a device invented that let you wipe shows from your memory, I would be first in line so that I could watch this for the first time again. I am planning to rewatch it with my friend soon, so who knows, I might feel different about it then.

TL;DR: Absolutely amazing drama, will have your emotions running high. Must Watch.

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From the trailer I assumed it would be a typical drama about genius main protagonist who develops an amazing app and together with his friends he is trying to make money from it. It was so much more different from my expectations. The first episode left in shocked and I have binged watched the whole series in about 2 days. This drama follows four high school students and their struggles. Our main protagonist who seems to be a goody-shoe from the beginning turns out to have a complex personality. Despite receiving a large amount of hate due to his acting in Itaewon class when his character turned to be a "villain" Kim Donghee has shown us, that he is a very capable of playing a villain.
Throughout the drama I have loved and hated every character. From the beginning I truly rooted for Oh Jisoo despite the fact that he was actually a "pimp". Through his background I could see where he was coming from and why he chose to be involved in such unethical business. However as I continued watching, I found it more difficult to understand his choices and couldn't of his actions.
Bae Gyuri's struggles come from her parents who hold high expectations therefore they pressure her into being an ideal daughter. Her stress and unwillingness to live is invisible to her parents. She joined hands with Oh Jisoo thinking that she could escape for her life. In my opinion those two are very toxic for each other, but at the same time they both rely on each other to make it through another day.
The remaining two characters who were a couple - Seo Minhee and Kwak Kitae I found the most annoying and least relatable. With Seo Minhee I found her at certain point a pitiful character. Despite being surrounded by her friends and having a boyfriend, she is very lonely. No one actually cares about her. This is why she was so attached to Mr. Lee, because in her mind he was the only one who actually cared about her. However I found it very ridiculous that she sold herself to buy her boyfriend expensive gifts. Her boyfriend was even bigger trash for playing dumb even though he knew about it. I felt very frustrated to see her and her boyfriend being angry at Oh Jisoo after finding out that he was the "pimp". The business was all consensual and it wasn't like he forced her to do anything, so why getting angry. The boyfriend knew about it but he chose to stay silent and enjoy the expensive gifts from his girlfriend. Obviously in the end Jisoo's behavior when Minhee found out was unnecessary and at that point I didn't root for anyone anymore.

The drama is very dark and not suitable for those who are looking for lighthearted school drama with romance. It shows the dark side of the students and their shady businesses. This drama makes it very hard for you to root for a certain character because each character has flaws. A lot of people are expecting a season 2 for Extracurricular, but honestly I don't want it. I am content with such open ending and I don't think it is necessary to have another season. However if there is a second season I will definitely watch it.

ps: I'm deducting one point from the ost because it doesn't have an official release. I love the opening song and I wish the production team would release it.

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