Sweet Home Series Thoughts
Oct. 4th, 2021 10:45 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
iariaI really liked it. It took about half the series but once I got invested in the characters and their relationships I was in. Slowly building bonds between the characters was something that the show did well. I also thought it did well in exploring the themes of survival, humanity, sacrifice and of humans being worse/scarier than monsters.
+ I thought the acting was really good.
+ I was surprised that there weren't more deaths spread out over the series. There was very little of it among the main group and then suddenly the last couple episodes were death after death.
+ I found the ending a little disappointing. I think if there was a second season I'd feel differently. I figured, especially as we neared the end, that we would get a fairly open ending but as it was it was too open an ending and left me more frustrated than considering.
+ Was Hyun-su's ending with Sang-wook him dying and going into the light? (maybe?) Did Sang-wook survive and somehow ended up in the military's payroll? (unlikely) Is Eui-myung, who escaped in his liquid form, inhabiting Sang-wook's body? That wouldn't explain how he ended up in that vehicle with Hyun-su... did he steal him? (How??) Or was he always working with the military? (unlikely also)
+ I really loved how everyone started coming together as a cohesive group towards the latter half of the series. It was so nice to see them all fighting together and acting as one - one team to go into the garage to save Hyun-su, the others (even if they had to be guilted a little by the girls) to save Du-sik. I liked that all were concerned about Hyun-su and then was a shared disappointment when it looked like he was going to retreat back into the isolation room. I loved them working together for Ji-soo's surgery. I loved them working together to take out the marauders. I feel like if it hadn't been for the other humans this group would have solidified pretty well into a good working community. I'm a little sad we didn't get to see that happen.
+ I loved Hyun-su's evolved monster spikey feather wing arm situation. That was great.
+ Du-sik stepping between out of control Hyun-su and the others was great, I loved him gentle reassuring Hyun-su that it wasn't his fault and he wasn't himself, and Hyun-su's confused grief and breaking-heart afterwards was deeply sad.
+ I was not a fan of Hyun-su's maybe kind of amnesia after waking up. It allowed him to let out some of his grief for Du-sik in a believable way which I appreciate but it kind of flattened him leaving the apartments to save the others.
+ Du-Sik dragging himself back to his apartment to share a drink with 'Myung-sook' and confess how scared he was in not knowing what he'd turn into was a great little scene. Except then it cuts away as he starts to lose it and Myung-sook's weird egg-cocoon hatches off screen and when we next see him he's somehow walked between Hyun-su and the others, completely back to normal but not an evolved monster like Hyun-su. And of Myung-sook nothing. What did she turn into!?
+ Yi-kyung was great. I loved her. She was a badass. I loved the vent crawling scene. The later reveal that she was ex-Special Forces (with a neck snap!) made it all make sense. One of my favourite scenes for her was with Seon-yeong when she started changing into a monster and Yi-kyung took her hand instead of leaving - and it worked! She stopped changing. I loved that moment so much. Another thing I loved was the fact that she didn't push the button.
+ I loved Gil-seob. What a wonderful man. Another favourite scene: him dealing with awkward Hyun-su and Sang-wook during their first dinner with the group (well avoiding the group.) He totally went out there on purpose, right? I loved his brisk bossing them around and giving advice. I loved this line: "Everyone is uncomfortable around you, at least be comfortable alone." I also loved his relationship with Yeong-su.
+ I ended up loving Eun-yu. She was so abrasive at first and felt try hard in her following of Sang-wook. I love that she doesn't get considerably less abrasive but that we get to see more of her and of her care for others. The first moment I really loved was her signing "fuck bastards like you" at Suk-hyun. It was delightful (I loved Ji-soo's grin.) I also loved her moment of self-awareness when she said "whining won't change anything. Trust me."
As with most of the characters where they really shone was in their relationships with the others. My favourite relationships for her:
- Eun-yu and Ji-soo. The (pre-series) rivalry felt so petty with everything happening around them that I kind of enjoyed it and I liked when we saw the break in that. Eun-yu's freak-out when Ji-soo collapsed was caused by genuine worry. They had one of my favourite scenes: I was really hoping that when Ji-soo started sobbing alone after Jae-heon’s death that Eun-yu would show up. I loved Eun-yu refusing to leave her. I loved the chocolates. I loved her opening up about her own sad past. I loved especially her bringing Ji-soo Jae-heon's broken sword. Her mix of considerateness with tough love was excellent and her telling her 'not to make herself miserable because things were bad enough' was good advice. Love: "I’m going to survive with you until the end. I have nothing else to do anyway." And then she did!
- Eun-yu and Eun-hyuk, I liked where things went and ended with them. Eun-yu's cold attitude towards him being entirely because of her own guilt over blaming herself for their parents death, of him dropping out of med school to support her and her dream only for her to hurt her ankle and be unable to dance, made me feel really bad for both of them. I loved the little moment when he wraps her ankle and she fixes his glasses by taping them. I loved him later refusing a better fix because he 'liked them this way'. The way she stopped him from going after Hyun-su and that little shake of her head was subtle but wonderful. Eun-yu screaming break-down when she realised he lied and wasn't coming back and how she had to be pulled away by Yi-kyung got to me.
- Eun-yu and Hyun-su was the first relationship that showed us a different side of her. I loved her starting to at least try and look out for him in her own abrasive way. I liked her telling him to make it obvious to the others that he was hurting. I liked her calling them out for what they were doing to him. I loved how protective she became of him. The scene on the steps was great. I loved the secret promise she made him make (and knew it was for him to survive.) Also her yelling at him for not doing the 'ba' thing at her brother and the guys reactions was wonderful. She got a freaking smile out of Hyun-su and Eun-hyuk! I'm impressed.
+ I loved Sang-wook's character arc of beginning to care about others and learning to want to live with others, and be a part of a community. It was great to watch. Especially the further in as we got wonderful moments of character growth - asking for help, eating with people, apologising for hitting someone. Stopping Jae-heon from drinking and asking what was wrong. Caring. His friendship with Jae-heon was lovely.
+ I loved Sang-wook getting to save Yoo-ri from a fire the way he wasn't able to save his family. Even the way he kept trying to save her worked for me. Their exchange of "I killed someone." / "It's okay. He wasn't a person." was excellent. I loved his understanding and compassion. I loved his franticness to save her after her inhaler went out. Them dying together, holding hands so they weren't thinking of the horrible things as they died, was sad but lovely. Even though them dying at all made me :( Ui-myeong shooting them in the back was really upsetting. I didn't see it coming.
+ I loved Ji-Soo and Yoo-ri working together to murder the rapist. A+ ladies.
+ Early on Byeong-il accused Eun-hyuk of being heartless but I agreed with Suk-hyun (and that never happened again) that what he did was save his life. Trying to save Jin-ok's daughter or leaving to take their chances elsewhere were both suicidal choices. What was 'heartless', aka cold and ruthless, was sending Yi-kyong into the basement without telling her about the monster he knew was down there. Also stupid because having a full set of information is a far better strategy. I had issues with some of his choices (but not shooting Jae-heon, or pretending to join the marauders) and certainly with how he approached others (basically - everything, maybe he should have tried being a little nicer or actually reasoned with them) but overall not a problem with how he approached the situation. As with others I liked his slow character arc over the series with coldly calculating how best to protect the group as a whole to starting to consider people as individuals as important.
+ I went on a journey with Seon-yeong and Suk-hyun. He was horrible and when Hye-in told Bom "Bite him. Bite him hard" I was so with her. At first I found myself hoping that when Seon-yeong inevitably became a monster (because I was sure that would happen) she would eat him. Then when she approached him with the knife, because she wanted to kill him before he turned, I was all for that. She had a much better idea! I was cheering for it, for her.
But then: "Please kill me. I'm sorry." Ugh, Suk-hyun truly is the worst. Only he could take something that should feel freeing and even darkly satisfying and righteous and turn it into something so sad and upsetting. That dick. I loved everything about that scene. God, I felt so bad for Seon-yeong.
+ Seon-yeong's death actually hit me the hardest. She wasn't my favourite character of the deaths nor did she have the most... upsetting/saddest in the moment (Jae-heon's whole extended fight and self-sacrifice and drawn out death was a lot.) But hers was the bitterest for me. She told herself: "I already endured 30 hard years, five days is nothing for me." and, oh, I hoped. I believed in her. I wanted her to survive, to finally have some chance at a happy-ish ending. Instead she was shot in the head by a selfish and cruel man, taking her life after living for 30 years of living with a different self and cruel man, and it was so sad.
+ We mostly saw the dangerous monsters who hunted the humans but I wanted to see more of the friendlier ones. Hyun-su, Myung-sook, the unknown green goo monster. It would have been nice if the show had delved more into what makes the difference there? Having a goal outside of themselves to counteract that inner desire that caused them to go monster in the first place? Hyun-su thinks it's the desire to live but I don't know that I buy that. Also who was that green goo and why did it save Yeong-su? Was it his dad?
+ I was so sad when they murdered the friendly green goo monster. I understood to a point where they were coming from – they’ve trained to kill monsters and this is their training at work – and they learned to be sympathetic to humans they knew who turned to monsters but this wasn’t one of those – but all the same I was disappointed in them. Although I was also disappointed in Hyun-su because he did in fact have time to physically stop them from murdering it instead of standing there in horror. Do something, Hyun-su!
+ I liked the monster designs for the most part. The tongue guy was deeply creepy. On the other side Suk-hyun's Cousin It impression was not so great.
+ Byeong-il's kind of offended "Come on, now" - LOLOL. Here he was being all brave and saving Yi-kyung and getting to be the hero, and then she goes and shoots the marauder and saves them. He was so disappointed and I was amused. Him later taking a bullet and saving Hye-in tied back into this desire of his to be the hero, the lead, for once really well. Hye-in's devastated reaction, and her begging the other "what do I do" as she tried to stem the blood was great little moment.
+ I'm choosing to believe that Gil-seob died before learning that Yoo-ri was killed because it's too sad the other way.
+ I was deeply annoyed when Ji-soo was the one falling down and not seeming to pull her/weight manage as well as the guys during the garage rescue of Hyun-su so I loved the reveal the next episode that she had appendicitis. Made me think better of the series, tbh.
+ I was also very confused about why the hell Eun-hyuk didn't try to escape the apartment - until it was revealed he was changing and thus didn't want to risk the others.
+ I loved seeing Jin-ok throw down the pipes and demand everyone help defend their home. It was a great character moment for her.
+ The repeated Imagine Dragons music in moments of badassery was very silly.
+ I like that after disappearing Bom the dog survived and helped everyone else survive by leading them out of the tunnels.
+ Hyun-su's backstory was horrifying and sad.
+ Normal people are really not that difficult to kill. If you hit someone in the head with a hammer a couple times they really should be dead.
+ Was it the security guard who locked everyone into the apartment building? And if so was it so he could personally kill them all or one last moment of clarity and him trying to protect them from the monsters outside?
+ I thought the acting was really good.
+ I was surprised that there weren't more deaths spread out over the series. There was very little of it among the main group and then suddenly the last couple episodes were death after death.
+ I found the ending a little disappointing. I think if there was a second season I'd feel differently. I figured, especially as we neared the end, that we would get a fairly open ending but as it was it was too open an ending and left me more frustrated than considering.
+ Was Hyun-su's ending with Sang-wook him dying and going into the light? (maybe?) Did Sang-wook survive and somehow ended up in the military's payroll? (unlikely) Is Eui-myung, who escaped in his liquid form, inhabiting Sang-wook's body? That wouldn't explain how he ended up in that vehicle with Hyun-su... did he steal him? (How??) Or was he always working with the military? (unlikely also)
+ I really loved how everyone started coming together as a cohesive group towards the latter half of the series. It was so nice to see them all fighting together and acting as one - one team to go into the garage to save Hyun-su, the others (even if they had to be guilted a little by the girls) to save Du-sik. I liked that all were concerned about Hyun-su and then was a shared disappointment when it looked like he was going to retreat back into the isolation room. I loved them working together for Ji-soo's surgery. I loved them working together to take out the marauders. I feel like if it hadn't been for the other humans this group would have solidified pretty well into a good working community. I'm a little sad we didn't get to see that happen.
+ I loved Hyun-su's evolved monster spikey feather wing arm situation. That was great.
+ Du-sik stepping between out of control Hyun-su and the others was great, I loved him gentle reassuring Hyun-su that it wasn't his fault and he wasn't himself, and Hyun-su's confused grief and breaking-heart afterwards was deeply sad.
+ I was not a fan of Hyun-su's maybe kind of amnesia after waking up. It allowed him to let out some of his grief for Du-sik in a believable way which I appreciate but it kind of flattened him leaving the apartments to save the others.
+ Du-Sik dragging himself back to his apartment to share a drink with 'Myung-sook' and confess how scared he was in not knowing what he'd turn into was a great little scene. Except then it cuts away as he starts to lose it and Myung-sook's weird egg-cocoon hatches off screen and when we next see him he's somehow walked between Hyun-su and the others, completely back to normal but not an evolved monster like Hyun-su. And of Myung-sook nothing. What did she turn into!?
+ Yi-kyung was great. I loved her. She was a badass. I loved the vent crawling scene. The later reveal that she was ex-Special Forces (with a neck snap!) made it all make sense. One of my favourite scenes for her was with Seon-yeong when she started changing into a monster and Yi-kyung took her hand instead of leaving - and it worked! She stopped changing. I loved that moment so much. Another thing I loved was the fact that she didn't push the button.
+ I loved Gil-seob. What a wonderful man. Another favourite scene: him dealing with awkward Hyun-su and Sang-wook during their first dinner with the group (well avoiding the group.) He totally went out there on purpose, right? I loved his brisk bossing them around and giving advice. I loved this line: "Everyone is uncomfortable around you, at least be comfortable alone." I also loved his relationship with Yeong-su.
+ I ended up loving Eun-yu. She was so abrasive at first and felt try hard in her following of Sang-wook. I love that she doesn't get considerably less abrasive but that we get to see more of her and of her care for others. The first moment I really loved was her signing "fuck bastards like you" at Suk-hyun. It was delightful (I loved Ji-soo's grin.) I also loved her moment of self-awareness when she said "whining won't change anything. Trust me."
As with most of the characters where they really shone was in their relationships with the others. My favourite relationships for her:
- Eun-yu and Ji-soo. The (pre-series) rivalry felt so petty with everything happening around them that I kind of enjoyed it and I liked when we saw the break in that. Eun-yu's freak-out when Ji-soo collapsed was caused by genuine worry. They had one of my favourite scenes: I was really hoping that when Ji-soo started sobbing alone after Jae-heon’s death that Eun-yu would show up. I loved Eun-yu refusing to leave her. I loved the chocolates. I loved her opening up about her own sad past. I loved especially her bringing Ji-soo Jae-heon's broken sword. Her mix of considerateness with tough love was excellent and her telling her 'not to make herself miserable because things were bad enough' was good advice. Love: "I’m going to survive with you until the end. I have nothing else to do anyway." And then she did!
- Eun-yu and Eun-hyuk, I liked where things went and ended with them. Eun-yu's cold attitude towards him being entirely because of her own guilt over blaming herself for their parents death, of him dropping out of med school to support her and her dream only for her to hurt her ankle and be unable to dance, made me feel really bad for both of them. I loved the little moment when he wraps her ankle and she fixes his glasses by taping them. I loved him later refusing a better fix because he 'liked them this way'. The way she stopped him from going after Hyun-su and that little shake of her head was subtle but wonderful. Eun-yu screaming break-down when she realised he lied and wasn't coming back and how she had to be pulled away by Yi-kyung got to me.
- Eun-yu and Hyun-su was the first relationship that showed us a different side of her. I loved her starting to at least try and look out for him in her own abrasive way. I liked her telling him to make it obvious to the others that he was hurting. I liked her calling them out for what they were doing to him. I loved how protective she became of him. The scene on the steps was great. I loved the secret promise she made him make (and knew it was for him to survive.) Also her yelling at him for not doing the 'ba' thing at her brother and the guys reactions was wonderful. She got a freaking smile out of Hyun-su and Eun-hyuk! I'm impressed.
+ I loved Sang-wook's character arc of beginning to care about others and learning to want to live with others, and be a part of a community. It was great to watch. Especially the further in as we got wonderful moments of character growth - asking for help, eating with people, apologising for hitting someone. Stopping Jae-heon from drinking and asking what was wrong. Caring. His friendship with Jae-heon was lovely.
+ I loved Sang-wook getting to save Yoo-ri from a fire the way he wasn't able to save his family. Even the way he kept trying to save her worked for me. Their exchange of "I killed someone." / "It's okay. He wasn't a person." was excellent. I loved his understanding and compassion. I loved his franticness to save her after her inhaler went out. Them dying together, holding hands so they weren't thinking of the horrible things as they died, was sad but lovely. Even though them dying at all made me :( Ui-myeong shooting them in the back was really upsetting. I didn't see it coming.
+ I loved Ji-Soo and Yoo-ri working together to murder the rapist. A+ ladies.
+ Early on Byeong-il accused Eun-hyuk of being heartless but I agreed with Suk-hyun (and that never happened again) that what he did was save his life. Trying to save Jin-ok's daughter or leaving to take their chances elsewhere were both suicidal choices. What was 'heartless', aka cold and ruthless, was sending Yi-kyong into the basement without telling her about the monster he knew was down there. Also stupid because having a full set of information is a far better strategy. I had issues with some of his choices (but not shooting Jae-heon, or pretending to join the marauders) and certainly with how he approached others (basically - everything, maybe he should have tried being a little nicer or actually reasoned with them) but overall not a problem with how he approached the situation. As with others I liked his slow character arc over the series with coldly calculating how best to protect the group as a whole to starting to consider people as individuals as important.
+ I went on a journey with Seon-yeong and Suk-hyun. He was horrible and when Hye-in told Bom "Bite him. Bite him hard" I was so with her. At first I found myself hoping that when Seon-yeong inevitably became a monster (because I was sure that would happen) she would eat him. Then when she approached him with the knife, because she wanted to kill him before he turned, I was all for that. She had a much better idea! I was cheering for it, for her.
But then: "Please kill me. I'm sorry." Ugh, Suk-hyun truly is the worst. Only he could take something that should feel freeing and even darkly satisfying and righteous and turn it into something so sad and upsetting. That dick. I loved everything about that scene. God, I felt so bad for Seon-yeong.
+ Seon-yeong's death actually hit me the hardest. She wasn't my favourite character of the deaths nor did she have the most... upsetting/saddest in the moment (Jae-heon's whole extended fight and self-sacrifice and drawn out death was a lot.) But hers was the bitterest for me. She told herself: "I already endured 30 hard years, five days is nothing for me." and, oh, I hoped. I believed in her. I wanted her to survive, to finally have some chance at a happy-ish ending. Instead she was shot in the head by a selfish and cruel man, taking her life after living for 30 years of living with a different self and cruel man, and it was so sad.
+ We mostly saw the dangerous monsters who hunted the humans but I wanted to see more of the friendlier ones. Hyun-su, Myung-sook, the unknown green goo monster. It would have been nice if the show had delved more into what makes the difference there? Having a goal outside of themselves to counteract that inner desire that caused them to go monster in the first place? Hyun-su thinks it's the desire to live but I don't know that I buy that. Also who was that green goo and why did it save Yeong-su? Was it his dad?
+ I was so sad when they murdered the friendly green goo monster. I understood to a point where they were coming from – they’ve trained to kill monsters and this is their training at work – and they learned to be sympathetic to humans they knew who turned to monsters but this wasn’t one of those – but all the same I was disappointed in them. Although I was also disappointed in Hyun-su because he did in fact have time to physically stop them from murdering it instead of standing there in horror. Do something, Hyun-su!
+ I liked the monster designs for the most part. The tongue guy was deeply creepy. On the other side Suk-hyun's Cousin It impression was not so great.
+ Byeong-il's kind of offended "Come on, now" - LOLOL. Here he was being all brave and saving Yi-kyung and getting to be the hero, and then she goes and shoots the marauder and saves them. He was so disappointed and I was amused. Him later taking a bullet and saving Hye-in tied back into this desire of his to be the hero, the lead, for once really well. Hye-in's devastated reaction, and her begging the other "what do I do" as she tried to stem the blood was great little moment.
+ I'm choosing to believe that Gil-seob died before learning that Yoo-ri was killed because it's too sad the other way.
+ I was deeply annoyed when Ji-soo was the one falling down and not seeming to pull her/weight manage as well as the guys during the garage rescue of Hyun-su so I loved the reveal the next episode that she had appendicitis. Made me think better of the series, tbh.
+ I was also very confused about why the hell Eun-hyuk didn't try to escape the apartment - until it was revealed he was changing and thus didn't want to risk the others.
+ I loved seeing Jin-ok throw down the pipes and demand everyone help defend their home. It was a great character moment for her.
+ The repeated Imagine Dragons music in moments of badassery was very silly.
+ I like that after disappearing Bom the dog survived and helped everyone else survive by leading them out of the tunnels.
+ Hyun-su's backstory was horrifying and sad.
+ Normal people are really not that difficult to kill. If you hit someone in the head with a hammer a couple times they really should be dead.
+ Was it the security guard who locked everyone into the apartment building? And if so was it so he could personally kill them all or one last moment of clarity and him trying to protect them from the monsters outside?
