Flower of Evil (2020)
Review of Flower of Evil / 악의 꽃 (2020)
I’d heard so much of this drama before I’d even watched it. I heard it was contender for many people along with one of the best dramas about crime in 2020, and that it was right up there with Beyond Evil. And, if you haven’t read my review for Beyond Evil, you wouldn’t know that I absolutely LOVED that show.
That was one of the best K-dramas I’ve ever seen to be honest. In regards to the actors that were in this drama, I’ve never actually seen a drama with Lee Joon-gi or Moon Chae-won before. So with the buzz going around this drama, it seemed like the perfect intro to their work.
And boy was this a time. I will be upfront, I think I liked Beyond Evil more for characters and story, but this drama was also insanely good as I was watching it.
You really get sucked into this world and its characters, and begin to hope for an ending that works well for our male lead. The acting was also insanely good!
Let’s dive into this review!
Content
Flower of Evil starts off very innocently. We see a happy family, consisting of Baek Hee-sung, a metal welder who owns a shop, his wife Cha Ji-won, who is a detective, and their daughter.
They seem like the perfect portrait of what a model family should be, with parents doting on their daughter. But then things begin to take a turn when we begin to realize that Baek Hee-sung isn’t Baek Hee-sung.
He has had a dark past in which he was now forced to change his identity, but we also learn that he’s an emotionless psychopath who has had to practice smiling in the mirror way too many times.
The real conflict begins to escalate when his wife, Ji-won, takes on an old serial case that has major connections to her husband. And when she starts putting together the dots, things get real ugly.
One could say the start of this drama can be kind of slow, since we gradually get to the mystery behind Hee-sung’s past.
The first couple of episodes tend to set the scene, which some may find frustrating if they’re impatient, but trust me it’s worth it.
You need to look past the crack’s in this perfect, idyllic life that’s been created with this couple and learn to live with the characters for a bit because you’ll understand why things are in the future.
For example, we may label Hee-sung as an emotionless psychopath, but with all of what we learn in this drama, you have to learn that he’s gone through so much trauma and pain in his life.
He goes through so much to hide his past from his wife, but she’s digging and also hiding her own suspicion from him. It’s heartbreaking to see both sides of this, because he does genuinely love her, but why he chose to hide this is also very valid.
I think my biggest qualm about the drama was the ending; it felt like it threw away everything we went through with the male lead and discard it for a new life.
And perhaps that’s symbolic in the way that he can forget his father’s conditioning, but it feels like a cop-out because of how we went through this entire journey of realizing he genuinely loves his wife and that he can be a good husband, that it all truly wasn’t pretend.
The perfect life may be destroyed, but they were still two people in love with each other regardless of the circumstances.
But wow, what a drama regardless. It’s a crime drama at the end of the day with plenty of action and suspenseful moments. You’re not too sure if the wife is just going to lose her facade, or if Hee-sung is going to slowly succumb to the pressure of upholding the life he has lived. It’s a story about devotion, family, and what lengths you will go to in order to create a better life for yourself.
Overall Thoughts
Overall, it was one of the best 2020 dramas I’ve seen. I highly recommend this if you’re into detective or crime stories. Even if you’re not, I feel like this drama manages to create something that will appeal to anyone.
There’s a good mix of action, the OSTs are good, there’s some romance elements thrown in here, and the actual need to solve the crime and get the job done—without the wife personally being involved, as it’s her husband being investigated. All in all, what a great drama.
