Bullet Point Review: Witch’s Court

Spoilers Ahead…

• Witch’s Court starts well and ends well, with a screenplay that handles multiple viewpoints, subplots efficiently and a strong lead character that won’t lose you through the halfway mark, but what starts off as an exclusive look at sexual crimes, turns into a run of the mill story of apprehending a corrupt politician. That’s not a problem at all, considering that the show was still as good, but it felt like ordering a chocolate ice cream, and halfway through realising that it was just vanilla ice cream with a chocolate sauce.
• Why I say this is because the drama does a spin on our expectations right from the beginning. The lead this time is a female prosecutor Ma Yi Deum (played by a spunky Jung Ryeo Won) who is the only woman in her department and naturally feels left out. When she witnesses her boss sexually harassing a reporter, she looks away, pretends she didn’t see anything and refuses to testify the next day when the victim files a complaint. It isn’t any of my business, she says, and it is an honest portrayal of anyone who witnesses such a crime, as nobody would want to jeopardise their career. That being said, even when she does testify it isn’t because she also experiences inappropriate behaviour from her boss, but because she isn’t going to get promoted as promised by him.
  This characterisation is fresh, especially for a female lead, who always is sort of, like a moral compass for our hero. It is also gratifying to watch Yi Deum, walk in with the evidence at the crucial point (which she would have gathered with not so moral means), or deliver a powerful closing statement, especially after seeing a numerous male leads do it, like Lee Jong Suk in While You Were Sleeping, Park Hyung Sik in Suits, and Ji Chang Wook in Suspicious Partner.
• Jung Ryeo Won plays Ma Yi Deum excellently, without making her seem too cocky, but confident and a person of vast experience. It was always fun to watch her come up and save the day, but at times, I wished to see her a little vulnerable or a little scared or a little empathic, especially with some cases, which were gruesome crimes against women.

• Coming back to the spin on our expectations, the first major case that is assigned to ‘Crimes against Girls Unit’ is itself a contradiction to the units name, reminding us that men can also be victims of sexual harassment. And it is Yeo Jin Wook (an understated Yoon Hyun Min), who is the more understanding, calmer version of the duo, who appeals to the emotional aspect of such cases.
• Multiple plot lines run together so smoothly, without being hard to keep track of. I did read some comments on why there was so much focus on Jo Gap Soo (Jeon Kwang Leol doing the most he can with a villain we have seen many times before), but I think it was important to show how these political connections can help bail out the accused and make them walk unharmed, (especially with the ongoing Burning Sun investigations in South Korea). He was a tricky character to dislike, as he did seem to show remorse for some of his crimes, but if the character and his crimes were more fleshed out, he would have been a terrifying villain to go against.