I considered if I should post a review today or not. I decided to post one, not because I’m insensitive towards what happened in the kpop world today, but more because I hope that for those who might read this review, this might help them feel a little bit better (well, it helped me feel a little bit better writing it). What happened today was horrible, and as a multi-fandom (and, by the occasion, a shawol), I feel like shit. But... It happened, now we should all grow from such event and make sure this won’t happen again. I think I won’t say more about this situation. I’ll wait a little bit until the official reports come out. Speculations hurt more than facts.
Well, in the months of October and November I was really in heaven when it came to dramas. Mad Dog was probably the only reason why I looked forward to Wednesday and Thursday who were both the worst day at school. I’ll be honest. I absolutely adored the drama, but I’ll try to be a little bit critic towards it.
Mad Dog is a crime drama. Choi Kang-Woo was a police officer turned into an investigator at Taeyang assurance. After a traumatic event that happened to his family, he decides to form a small group named “Mad Dog” that’s going after assurance fraud.
As always, I tried to put the less spoilers it was possible in the review, but some might have escaped me, so please stay careful as you read.
I think Mad Dog is one of those dramas you don’t know what’s in store for you, but strangely gets addicted when you start watching it. I thought that the story was quite awesome. Sure, the second episode is a little bit dull (after the amazing episode that was the first one) because they decided to put a long-ass flashback of sixty minutes. I have nothing against being aware of the back story, but I thought it was too much too early. The first two episodes play a capital role in keeping the viewer attention, so I, personally, became a little bit uninterested after the second episode. But after this very long flashback, the drama took its pace back. The story becomes quickly really interesting as to the main intrigue drama is added. Yes… Sometimes it goes right to the feels and it’s a little bit painful. I have to admit that even though I thought that the plot was awesome, there were a few things that I didn’t like in this drama. First of all, there were a lot of tentative of murder or dead people who weren’t really dead, which is, sometimes, a little bit annoying. Second, there’s way too much push and pull between the two leads. I mean, after a point, they have no reason to still give a cold shoulder to each other, but, eventually, it gets better (around the episode 7 if you want to know). Third, the manipulation is so frustrating… Even though I have to admit that it’s, at the same time, quite good. It helps the story looks a little bit more realistic because nothing seems easy to solve. But, even if there’s some positive, the manipulation makes the story a little bit drags every now and then because the characters have so much difficulty to solve the cases. The negative aside, I have to say that the plot was genial in my opinion. The progression was quite good and mildly realistic. There was a nice tension constantly present in the story that helped to make the story addictive. There are a few hints of romance and quite a lot of bromance. The plot twists are absolutely amazing. You can predict a few of them, even though, for me, the vast majority of the progression was completely unpredictable. Even though it had a few shortcomings, overall, the story was nicely developed, and the intrigue was well-thought.
I think I’ll only talk about the Mad Dog members because I’m fearful that writing about any other characters would be a major spoiler in the progression. Choi Kang-Woo is probably the lead of the drama, but I have to admit that he was easily overshadowed by some other characters. His personality is quite typical. He’s the last surviving member of his family and because of the traumatic events that happened to them, he decided to fight against crime. I think that what annoyed me about him was more how rigid he was towards the other characters. At the opposite of many characters in the drama, he was the one who was causing a lot of the push and pull. He was a little bit frustrating, but overall, he gave some sweet bromance with Kim Min-Joon (I’ll admit it, I wish so badly for them to form a family, like, I wish Kang-Woo to become a big brother to Min-Joo and supports him no matter what in the long term, which is what the ending seems to hint) and his interactions with the rest of the Mad Dog members are absolutely adorable. Min-Joo is probably the character I liked the most in the drama. Sure, he’s a little bit typical, but he’s well-thought and evolves well through the drama. He stays loyal to his initial personality, even though he learns how to trust the others and, eventually, becomes a part of the Mad Dog family. For what it is of the three remaining member of the team, I have to admit that they were quite typical. On Noo-Ri is the genius that’s in-between the two camps. Jang Ha-Ri is the woman who relies on her charm, but at the same time is quite bold, intelligent and is quite rigid in her position. Park Soon-Jung is the warm-hearted ex-convict that only wants the best for those around him. For what it is of the bad guys, they are absolutely despicable because they were fully aware of what they were doing, and they still did it, but they were so well-done. As all the character of this drama, they had a good evolution. But what was probably the greatest was that the main bad guys didn’t repent at the end, which allowed them to finally face the consequences of their actions and clear everything up.
I’ll conclude there before I spoil too much. The plot would be worth a 8/10 mostly because of the lengths that were here and there. The characters would be a 3.5/5. And the tearjerker factor would be a 2/5 because…oh damn… sometimes it hits you right in the feels…
