K-drama review: 'Doctor Lawyer' is anything but straightforward. There's evil everywhere

So Ji-Sub plays Dr Han, a brilliant heart surgeon turned lawyer, in 'Doctor Lawyer'.

Every time I start to watch a K-drama that seems boringly straightforward, the writers flummox me with a twist in the tale. So on the face of it, this is a revenge drama because a really great cardiothoracic surgeon loses his licence to practice because he’s set up and made responsible for a botched surgery.

If you are like me, and have no stomach for blood, then you will need to look away a lot. But dang! They know you will look away so they have a seemingly innocuous dialogue during surgery - ‘let me suture it’ - to be used later. And if you miss it, then you end up being part of the evil that’s setting up the good doctor to fail.

I am amazed at how much evil these writers can cook up. We’ve seen a straightforward ‘Make my son the next king’ trope - which feels like Ramayan where Kaikeyi has the king send Ram off into vanvas (exile in a forest) - but the story has the Korean king turn into a people eating monster and the son is sent off to a remote corner of the ‘Kingdom’ where people have turned into zombies.

Now, we have seen a kid who loses his hard working dad to injustice at a food company grow up to be a restaurateur and avenge that injustice in Itaewon Class. So after the two episodes dropped on Disney + Hotstar, some reviewers dismissed the show as too straightforward. I knew I had to dig my heels in, and see where the simple story of a doctor-turned lawyer led. After all, So Ji-Sub, the model turned actor - who has a string of successes behind him - would not choose a show which is boringly straightforward.

So Ji-Sub is an award winning actor (his role in the romantic comedy Oh My Venus on Netflix, and his debut show Sorry I Love You) who has sizzled on the big screen as well (Sophie’s Revenge with Fan BingBing and Zhang ZhiYi, and yes, Kim Ki-Duk’s Rough Cut). His tattoos have been the subject of great speculation since his modelling days (he modelled for STORM clothing) and only recently did this introvert open up about the meaning of his tattoos. In this show, too, he lets his silences act for him.

So Ji-Sub plays Dr Han Yi-Han, a brilliant heart surgeon who has saved many lives. So naturally he is bound to have many enemies, starting with an incompetent surgeon who just happens to be the son of the director of the big healthcare company that runs the hospital. The people who obviously hate the hero are just pawns in the big conspiracy that will slowly reveal itself. Even his ex-girlfriend, prosecutor Geum Seok-Young (played by the sweet Lim Soo-Hyang), hates him because the patient whom Dr Han is supposed to have killed at the hospital is her brother.

Funnily enough, you take an immediate liking to the doctor and believe him when he protests his innocence. But if you watch as many K-Dramas as everyone else, you also know that he shouldn’t be accepting gifts from anyone because it’s going to backfire. Blame that on the title of the drama! You feel angry when he loses everything he loves because he’s been framed so brilliantly. Talk about fair weather friends and colleagues who think you’re godlike because you never fail at surgeries!

I want to yell out and say Dharmendra style, ‘Ek ek ko chun chun ke marunga!’ (Will pick you off one by one and kill you!). The vindication is there, but Dr Han is doing it differently. He has a plan: inundate the hospital with so many cases, they won’t have time to breathe and frame some other innocent doctor for malpractice that is systemic to the institution…

I love the associates who help him begin his revenge saga. It’s four episodes down and he’s lost everything he took for granted: The status of the hero doc who could do no wrong, a good life at home with a loving mother, a girlfriend who loved him, respect from her brother who had been saved by a heart transplant, his licence to practice… that’s a lot packed in.

Now we see him as a saviour of people who have been framed just as he was. And now he has a degree in law, and he’s not going down without fighting the good fight.

The fun begins when we realise that the Banseok Medical Foundation has other challenges. The coolest being a man who has invested in the Foundation. He looks rakish and is perhaps evil. Shin Sung-Rok plays Jayden Lee who makes a dramatic entry in the series on a flight. He continues to play the devil’s advocate and his smile remains with you, giving you goosebumps. When Dr Han signs up to represent him, you want to say, ‘No! Don’t sign the papers! This might be a trap!’

Doctor Lawyer plays on Disney+Hotstar and new episodes are released every Friday and Saturday. I’m hooked. And you will be too!