[HanCinema's Drama Review] "My Secret Hotel" Episode 3

...And it's right back to the present, where we're stuck with the aftershock of murder. On first glance the two episode flashback doesn't seem to have accomplished that much. We really don't know all that much about the main characters. This is at least partially by design, since for all we know Sang-hyo and Hae-yeong were responsible for the killing. About the only character we can clear as a suspect right now is Soo-ah, because she's the only person publically upset about the fact that a dead man fell from the ceiling into the wedding reception.

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This is why the first two episodes are important, looking in retrospect. Remember how everyone was completely stoic and unreacting in the face of an obviously upset Sang-hyo? They're displaying the exact same lack of emotion now that there's a murder investigation going on. Consequently, everybody in this hotel just comes as really, incredibly weird and inhuman. The fact that they're so on top of damage control in itself appears to be a clue that they were expecting something like this to happen.

Literally or just generally prepared for disaster..? Who knows. The point is, the entire situation is incredibly suspicious, and even if "My Secret Hotel" still isn't really laugh-out-loud funny, the weird incongruence of the overall situation is certainly odd enough to demand attention. Resident cop Geum-ho (played by the ever versatile Ahn Kil-kang) throws all of this into sharp relief with his own brand of eccentricity, which while inappropriate, still feels more natural than anything anyone else is doing.

To some extent I wonder whether this effect is mostly just being enforced by the spooky music that keeps showing up. "My Secret Hotel" is clearly a drama where ghosts aren't real, and yet...well, it's difficult to say. Sang-hyo has gone from agonizing about her ex-husband to being haunted by the dead man's ghost, and it's hard to tell whether this is because she's just reacting like a normal person in a traumatic situation or if there's an actual substantial guilt underlying these fears.

In any event, the drama has definitely set the right circumstances for an engaging mystery. There's just enough clues lying around to beg more questions, and new ones are showing up at the right pace to keep everything unclear. For the moment the odd sense of ambience is the main interesting thing keeping the drama engaging, and for now at least, this level of mystery is good enough for me.

Review by William Schwartz

"My Secret Hotel" is directed by Hong Jong-chan, written by Kim Do-hyeon and Kim Ye-ri-II and features Yoo In-na, Jin Yi-han, Namkoong Min and Lee Young-eun.

 

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