- Kill Me, Heal Me certainly didn't disappoint. At times it did feel like it was being dragged out from the characters almost discovering something important but being interrupted by a phone call or someone walking in on them. Ri Jin being the victim of child abuse and Do Hyun being the only friend she had as a child and always tried to take blame for what she did so he could get hit instead of her.
- Ri Jin was the daughter of Do Hyun's wife, from an affair, which is why Do Hyun's father despised Ri Jin and wanted nothing to do with her. Yet, Do Hyun is also the product of an affair, which makes Ri Jin and Do Hyun not blood related.
- Ri Jin and Do Hyun did have their happy ending, where both of them remembered their forgotten childhood memories. They come to accept their dark past together and no longer dwell on what was their childhood, but decide to live in the current. Do Hyun especially is starting a new life, free from all the voices and personalities in his head.
- Like the name of this drama insinuates, their not so happy past and demons have been killed and they've been healed.
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| This is Ri Jin and Do Hyun as children in the basement. Ri Jin was locked in the basement the whole day and Do Hyun would come and visit her every night at 10pm. |
- Do Hyun is able to get rid of personalities, by taking over of his own mind and becoming a stronger person and coping with his own traumas without the need of his personalities to that for him. His personalities were a way of coping and masking himself from remembering his own memories, because he wasn't ready to face them.
This drama really pulled heart strings, with the very good acting of Ji Sung and Hwang Jung-eum. I always caught myself being so intrigued and moved by their acting.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UyYRLzyZP_w
- This is a link to one of my favorite scenes, where Ri Jin goes to visit the house she was abused in as a child and her memories are triggered. She realizes that her nightmares actually her child hood and that she knew Do Hyun as a child. (The two children you see are Ri Jin and Do Hyun, and the man is Do Hyun's father.)
- Here you see how she is overwhelmed with fear and emotion of her traumatic childhood and even gets afraid of Do Hyun, confusing him to be his father.
- This scene is where you see one of Do Hyun's personalities, which is supposed to be Ri Jin as a child. Here you see Ri Jin, essentially, talking to herself as a child. She tells her that it's not her fault that she got abused and that she goes on to live a life surrounded with people she loves, and works as someone who helps people.
Enough with the emotional talk!
Is Kill Me, Heal a good example of an epic love story?
- Physical appearance? Yes, Hwang Jung-eum and Ji sung are very beautiful people.
- Male protagonist smile? Yes, he looks like a puppy when she smiles.
- Female protagonist sad/nostalgic beauty? Yes, the actress was very good at conveying sadness through her characters memories.
- Talent? YES, especially from Ji sung, who probably has does the best job at crying that I've seen.
- Romantic elements of the story? Yes, they started as personal doctor and patient, but the romance developed very naturally.
- The size of the obstacles? This whole show from episode one was full of obstacles. His disorder and the uncovering of dark memories between both Ri Jin and Do Hyun.
- What they make the audience feel? I did not expect to be so emotionally invested into this show, it was a very emotional show with very touchy topics.
I would give Kill Me, Heal Me a 100% on the epic love story scale.
In class we talked about how music plays a key roles in telenovelas. One of the things that can make or break a Korean drama is having a good theme song, also called OST (original soundtrack). These songs are made specifically for the series and if you translate the lyrics, it goes with the theme of the plot. I personally fell in love with the OST of Kill Me, Heal Me.
The link above is the link to the main song of Kill Me, Heal Me (with English translations). It is described that the rapping part is the "killing" part while the women singing is the "healing" part, which does make sense if you read the translations of the song.
This song is called " I am Cha Do Hyun", which by the title you can get an idea of what moments this song would be put in the background.
This song is called " I am Shin Se Gi". Se Gi was his evil and brutal personality. The whole tone of the song is suspenseful and drastically different than that of Do Hyun's song.
This song is called "Childhood". This song would be put whenever Ri Jin's or Do Hyun's childhood memories would be shown or thought about.
(This is the link to a playlist of the soundtrack)
I'm so sad this class is over, I'm really interesting in taking the longer class Spring 2020. I hope it fits in my schedule. I enjoyed my time learning about just how complex these shows that I grew up with are. I will probably never look at a telenovela the same, but in a very good way. I'm more keen on analyzing them now and seeing how the story's play out.
Thank you,
Suley Rostro
Lo que no me gusta de las telenovelas es que todas son muy machistas. No lo soporto.
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