Cubical Horse @cubicalhorse - Tumblr Blog

Song Joong Ki mentioned that Vincenzo’s genre reminded him of the movie Kung Fu Hustle.

He finds the blend of comedy with strong pathos attractive. It’s the biggest reason why he challenged Vincenzo.

It sounds pretty fun. I’ll give this one a go in the wake of still missing Vincenzo.

After some more time to process the ending, I'm starting to understand why the ending of the show left me so strangely agitated.

Ultimately, I think I had whiplash from the show going back in forth between outstandingly funny comedy and outstandingly dark noir scenes. Both the comedy and the noir stand out to me in this drama.

The light-hearted, comedic scenes at the Plaza and the dark, brutal Mafia scenes were quite distinct from each other. For me, the show didn't have black humour per se. The comedy was quite light and situational, and didn’t really exist during the darker scenes.

As the main character, Vincenzo participated in both types of scenes. He was part of the funniest scenes at the Plaza, and part of the most barbaric scenes during the tortures. And both were executed so well.

Throughout, the comedy of the show completely swayed me. It was so easy to forget who Vincenzo really was, and that he was a brutal Mafia member. The better the interaction and camaraderie progressed between Vincenzo and all the Plaza tenants, the bigger this light-hearted bubble surrounding the characters grew.

For me, this bubble completely burst when Vincenzo started torturing his enemies. I found the scenes genuinely disturbing, and when Vincenzo walked out of the warehouses, I was legitimately scared of him. Suddenly, my brain could no longer combine the adorable and lovable side of Vincenzo with his Mafia identity. So, I ended up feeling quite agitated by this dissonance.

The bubble didn't even burst at the end of episode sixteen yet. The main difference for me was that during the torture, Vincenzo was calculated and cold-blooded. He didn't kill and torture them because he was furious about his mother's death, but simply because he wanted to.

In hindsight, I should've seen it coming. There were constant hints throughout the show about who Vincenzo is and what he is capable of. I just got swayed by all the comedy, which at times provided such a stark and also convincing counterpart to the rest of Vincenzo's character.

I don't know whether this mainly has to do with me and the way I watched the show. It's very possibly that I attached myself to the comedic scenes a lot more and conveniently forgot about Vincenzo's dark character because of my own life situation at the time... I'm not sure, though. I do think that the contrast between light and dark was quite stark. And so, even as I think about the last scene between Vincenzo and Cha-young, my heart feels heavy because I'm now aware of how dark Vincenzo truly is, and always has been. And I still struggle combining the light and dark now.

#vincenzo

I accept the ending as it is, but I did re-edit the last scenes in my head:

- VC leaves for the airport - cut to one month later, HCY visits the vineyard - cut to HCY entering the delegation event at the gallery and reuniting with VC - VC & HCY say goodbye - cut to one year later, HCY and Geumga Plaza still fighting the good fight - HCY enters the office after her successful trial, looks at the latest postcard on her desk - NJS gives her the invitation to the delegation event this year - HCY smiles at the invitation card - camera slowly zooms in on the Malta postcard - the end

#vincenzo

I do have a feeling that some of the decisions the writer made in the last two episodes in particular was influenced by restrictions the production faced. For example, I assume that even if the writer wanted to include scenes of VC in Italy or Malta in the end, they simply didn’t have the time to shoot and create elaborate CGI scenes, in addition to the other scenes. As far as I understand, they started shooting the drama including the CGI scenes in Italy months before the first episode aired. And we all know that they postponed the last episodes because the schedule was tight. Understandably, they would’ve chosen to invest the limited time they had in the pinnacle scenes like the tortures rather than the epilogue. Perhaps that’s even the reason why we didn’t see Inzaghi again.

Also, regarding the bittersweet and sad ending in general... I wouldn’t be surprised if the rewrite included VC’s promise to return to Korea and VC&HCY’s reunion/farewell at the gallery. I think the writer went at lengths in the end to make the ending sweeter this way, as a type of fan service. Because, no matter how I look at it, I don’t think that the writer’s alternative ending would’ve been sweeter than this. It might have just been the camera panning to HCY’s clipboard with the post cards, hinting at VC still being alive. Instead, we were shown two ways in which VC&HCY might possibly see each other again in the future. And, of course, we got closure for their feelings towards each other, since they did have a chance to show and declare their love. Even if that was the last time they saw each other, I think they will forever cherish that moment - indeed, precisely if it was the last time. The ending scene between them established that if they don’t see each other again, it won’t be because they gave up on their relationship or because they stopped loving each other - but because the circumstances simply didn’t allow them to.

#vincenzo

Vincenzo flicking his lighter

#vincenzo #song joong ki #빈센조 #송중기

Vincenzo doing things

To be continued...

#vincenzo #song joong ki #빈센조 #송중기