(K-drama) White Christmas

This is one of the K-dramas I actually watched and finished, instead of just zooming by recaps and catching an episode or two before going back to reading the caps. It might be because it is short (only eight episodes), but I also feel that it's a rare gem and it makes me curious what will happen next.

White Christmas is a tale of eight students of Shushin High, a secluded school in a mountain area. These eight students each receives a black-enveloped letter, naming eight sins that supposedly belong to each of them. Receiving the letter without knowing who the sender is, and the threat that someone will die on Christmas day, makes them stay in the school building instead of going home for the holidays. We have Eun Sung, the only girl out of the bunch, Moo Yul, her ex boyfriend, Ji Hoon, the best student in school, Kang Mo, a bullied student with a hearing disability, Young Jae, the big bully who's really just a coward, Yoon Soo, a nonchalant antisocial person with earphones permanently plugged in, Jae Kyu, a new student and friend to Moo Yul, and Mi Reu, a smart, wild, red-haired boy who dropped out of the school. Inside the school are the gym teacher and a doctor who had just had a car accident in the snow.

White Christmas is a taut psychological thriller, filled with poignant moments of humanity, friendship, tests of loyalty, cowardice versus bravery, logic, and love. It is twisted, and that makes it difficult to guess what's going to happen next. In eight episodes, we get into a cat and mouse chase of who's going to be the monster, and a big question raised in the drama is: are monsters born or made?

I wouldn't say this is my favorite K-drama of all time, and I wouldn't say I understood the whole thing about the drama or loved every single bit, but it is certainly different from all the fluffy rom-coms I was used to watching, or even the dramatic makjang dramas or the wonderful action or period dramas. It's a breath of fresh air, and with relatively fresh faces, each of the actors brought in a wonderful performance that often hit close to home.

I would recommend it to people who love a good pyschology thriller, or just someone who just wants to be along for the ride, just the way I was that Sunday afternoon, deciding to watch all episodes and hoping I would be pleasantly surprised.

Oh, and this drama also wins the best soundtrack, in my opinion. It's modern, and has a bit of rock, but perfect just the way it is.