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[HanCinema's Drama Review] "Who Are You - School 2015" Episode 7

The cliffhanger this episode and the cliffhanger from last episode are more-or-less the same. But "Who Are You - School 2015" doesn't quite fall into repetition because these repeated plot points establish something very important- that the drama's conceit isn't really sustainable. Even if So-yeong appears to have been subdued, the fact that Eun-bi can't recover Eun-byeon's memories means that this ruse can't go on forever however much Eun-bi and her new mother want it to.

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Prosecutor Kang (played by Jo Duk-hyun) makes an important appearance. He's pretty low on the character priority chart- Kang is only involved in the story at all because he's So-yeong's father. His attitude quickly proves of interest, though, because he's not the typical over-indulgent parent of a bully. It's made very clear that Kang considers the entire situation revolving around Eun-bi's suicide to be So-yeong's own fault. Whatever his agenda is, Kang is unlikely to directly assist So-yeong in any way.

The mystery also makes decent progress. We get some essential context regarding the last scene where we saw Eun-byeon engage in dialogue, and the implication appears to be that Eun-byeon was fighting the demons of her own imagination more than a direct persecutor. This is, of course, rather difficult to reconcile with the tangible text messages, particularly since we see here that Eun-byeon wasn't the only person who was aware of their existence.

By and large the plot doesn't really move that much though. I-an and Tae-kwang are still the generally mutually ambivalent young men they always are, looking for a fight even though there's not really much for them to fight about. This episode is a fairly slow one that focuses more on the general atmosphere then giving us any particularly quick answers right away. Of course, there's nothing wrong with this kind of story structure- it just provokes me at times to being a tad impatient.

The strong points are still strong enough to prevent much in the way of serious complaint. I particularly like the bumpers, which always seem to pop up at right the minute when a character (normally Eun-bi) is forced to ask herself that all-important question- who are they really? And what do they want to be? Does Eun-bi really want to be Eun-byeon, or does she just want to be loved? And in the long run, isn't the desire for love really what motivates all of the characters here? Again, the story's too vague right now to say for sure but...the drama's definitely been promising enough so far.

Review by William Schwartz

"Who Are You - School 2015" is directed by Baek Sang-hoon and Kim Seong-yoon, written by Kim Hyeon-jeong-II and Kim Min-jeong-II, and features Kim So-hyun, Nam Joo-hyuk, Yook Sung-jae, Lee Pil-mo, Lee David, Kim Hee-jung-I and more.

 

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