My Name (2021)
Review of My Name / 마이 네임 (2021)
People were touting this as the next big Korean drama hit after Squid Game, as it was just released after Squid Game came out, and so when I saw this at the top of my Netflix account, I looked into it.
The trailer intrigued me because of the revenge vibes I was getting from the plot, as well as the divine aesthetics and choreography when it came to the fight scenes. And then I saw Han So-hee was in it and Ahn Bo-hyun. I will admit, I have a bias against both of these actors.
I had last seen Han So-hee in Nevertheless with Song Kang, and I just wasn’t a fan of Ahn Bo-hyun’s character in Itaewon Class because he looked like a ghost the majority of the show. But I still sat down and watched this because I was like, well, it’s only eight episodes, it can’t be that painful.
Something I found highly entertaining in this drama was how similar it is to the Korean film The Villainess. There’s a lot of action and fights in this drama, and the plot is literally copied and pasted with some modifications from The Villainess. I’m all here for women revenge films and shows, but it would be nice if they could be distinguished from each other.
I’ve said a lot—let’s start this review. Please note that this review contains major spoilers.
After her father’s death, his daughter is driven by revenge to kill her murderer.
Our main character in this drama goes by two names: Yoon Ji-woo and Oh Hye-jin. Yoon Ji-woo dies when her father dies. She is a troubled high schooler bullied by her fellow students because they all know that her father is a gangster.
We start the show on her birthday, when she is still in high school, and her fellow classmates dump white powder on her to mimic drugs, beat her up, and verbally abuse her. At home, distraught, she is left alone. Her father calls to say he bought her a tablet for her birthday, and she ignores him.
Well that turns out to be a major regret, because as he’s coming home, her father is shot dead in at his front door, and the only face that Ji-woo can see eventually is the face of the captain of the narcotics team at the local police station: Cha Gi-ho.
Years later, Ji-woo has now become Oh Hye-jin. We see her journey as she joins the gang that her father was a part of, and we begin to see the head gangster behind all of this: Choi Mu-jin.
He runs one of the biggest drug rings in the country, and because he was best friends with Hye-jin’s father, he has taken her under his wing and taught her to fight and live on the streets.
After a rogue gangster, Gang-jae, tries to rape her, Choi mauls the guy’s face and that turns out to be a mistake, since Gang-jae comes back later in the show full-on insane and ready for his own revenge against Hye-jin.
Hye-jin joins the narcotics division of the police, while still working for the mobster, and basically becomes a mole. Instantly her partner, Jeon Pil-do (Ahn Bo-hyun) doesn’t like her because she ruins his sting operation.
They come to enjoy each other’s company by the end, however, when they’re on the run from the cops and Choi’s gang, since there’s a really awkward sex scene in the last episode.
I found that sex scene to be so unnecessary because it was completely out of tune with the rest of the show and was just so awkward. There was zero chemistry between the two of them and it was honestly kind of embarrassing. Would’ve worked better as a friendship to me.
By the end, as Cha Gi-ho is nearly killed and Hye-jin is found out by the mole, the plot becomes really predictable. I compare this show to The Villainess because of how predictable and similar it is.
We have a female character driven by revenge in both to the point of major violence, and they’re both taken in by a majorly suspicious organization. In both, the love interest is brutally murdered as they are forced to watch in some capacity. Then we find out the truth from the organization that our main character distrusts in both of them that the real murderer is the one who raised them.
At the end, though, Hye-jin is implied to have a new beginning. I doubt she’s using either of her names, and she has dyed her hair.
This implies to me that she can start a new life, leaving behind all the pain and suffering she’s had, even if she’s visiting the graves of her parents of Pil-do. Her father, too, has redemption—we see him as an absent father in the beginning who’s the cause of her pain, but he was actually doing something noble being an undercover cop. But it’s his daughter who became the monster; there’s no more turning back from this path after Pil-do is shot dead by Mu-jin.
Plot, plot, plot—all unoriginal. But there’s absolutely stunning blocking and cinematography.
Which, to be honest, I figured from the very first episode that it was Mu-jin that killed the father. The plot of this one, as you can tell from my comparison, has been hashed out again and again to the point where it’s predictable.
Since this is only eight episodes, there’s some plot-holes left unexplained (what was the secretary of Mu-jin doing with Captain Cha? How the hell did Hye-jin’s father be undercover in a gang for eleven years, become the guy’s best friend, and managed to do absolutely nothing in his job??), but I think they did a decent job covering so much content in such a short amount of time.
Why did I keep watching, you may ask, if I’m complaining so much? The cinematography is absolutely beautiful in this show. My eyes were absolutely glued to the screen in how beautiful some of these shots were. There was this one where someone was lighting a cigarette and it was juxtaposed against the blurry lights of the city in the distant and I thought it was absolutely so beautiful.
Now, if we’re continuing The Villainess comparisons, I think the fights were absolutely better in The Villainess. Nothing can match the moving camera being incorporated into the fight to give the POV of the main character beating up some guy.
But My Name did a good job of this as well, which was making it quite an enjoyable experience. I thought it was well-done for a drama because they didn’t do cut-away shots and actually kept us on the scene and the camera simply moved with the action.
Acting has a strong performance overall in My Name.
I was complaining before about Han So-hee and Ahn Bo-hyun. Ahn has had a redeemable year in 2021, since I’ve heard he’s been in some really good dramas nowadays. I’ll get to those eventually.
But I was honestly traumatized by Nevertheless since it was so bad and depicted a toxic relationship that was absolutely horrible, so I was weary of Han. Oh my god she stole the show in this one.
I never ever would’ve thought she was playing the same girl in Nevertheless because of how drastically different this performance was. I do think Hye-jin should’ve died in the drama way before the ending (spoiler, she does not die) because in some of these scenes she would’ve been heavily wounded to the point it was surprising how she was still fighting so hard.
There was also that scene where Gang-jae traps her and Pil-do in a car that’s slowly being crushed (what a masochist) and I legitimately wonder how they got out of the handcuffs in time and then how they didn’t get crushed (Pil-do was still in the car).
Overall Thoughts
Man, I kind of wish this one was longer. I know I roasted this a bit for its plot and for that random sex scene, but it’s a good show. We need more action-crime thrillers in which the female lead is driven by bloodthirsty revenge.I think it hits different when it’s a woman.
We see how hesitant she is to kill, how Gang-jae taunts her about how she’ll never be able to kill him. Even if she had the chance to kill Captain Cha, when she was convinced he killed her father, I doubt she could’ve actually done it, especially after having spent time with him.
There’s something so much more tender when it’s a woman’s tale because of how women handle situations different. Still, that doesn’t excuse who Hye-jin becomes: she still becomes a monster and gives up salvation when she comes to kill Mu-jin at his penthouse.
I’d call this one tough love, just because of how hard I’m going at it. It’s not perfect. If they spent more time with the script then maybe they would’ve been able to flesh it out better, or if it wasn’t eight episodes. Maybe two more with flashbacks to her father’s time as an undercover agent would’ve been perfect.
