Letter #104: Doctor Slump

Good morning, Erin.

I’m sure you remember that I, in my last letter, mentioned I was now watching My Sibling’s Romance. Well, I’ve finally caught up with the rest of the audience, now that I’ve seen Episode 9—and…well, whatever else I could say, I am certainly invested. 

But that’s not why I bring it up: this week featured the sibling pairs having to sing duets for…well, a prize. It was basically a karaoke contest for the cast. And if social media has not thrown the one pair’s performance of “Twenty-Five, Twenty-One” in your feed—FIND IT IMMEDIATELY. Maybe it won’t mean as much without knowing the people who are singing, but…well, I mean, you could watch the 20 hours of the show that come before this performance. That would help. Just bang it out over a weekend. Totally worth it just for that song.

ANYWAY—as much as I know you’re always keen to know what I’m currently obsessed with, we’re here to talk about Doctor Slump, a show that you probably think is not at all in line with my Phase IV theme but which I absolutely skipped a week of, near the end, having to watch those episodes the weekend of the finale, so…it totally counts as being something I needed to catch up on. Woo! 

And…huh. I only have three pages of notes for this? Really? Hmm. Now I’m kind of curious about what I thought was worth writing. I remember the show pretty well, but not my notes. So, I guess this will be an adventure for both of us!

1. For a show about two broken people finding each other and connecting over their brokenness, it took me a good long while to decide to watch this. I mean, I watched it pretty much as soon as it debuted and then every weekend when new episodes came out, but I pretty much shrugged it off until just about the weekend it came out. But, hey, it’s one of my favorite premises, so it’s almost silly that I thought I wouldn’t end up giving it a shot. 

2. But is it good? Um…sort of. Like, a lot of it is. The romantic stuff is easily my favorite part, both for the leads and the support cast (particularly for the support cast). The “lowest point in my life” stuff is all right, but they don’t get into it very deeply. It’s frequently very funny, and I looked forward to it every week—though not necessarily as I was watching each episode. Because, enjoyable as it was, it’s also an occasional tonal nightmare (alternately too serious or too goofy) and can drift into a festival of contrivances at a moment’s notice. (To say nothing of the ridiculous, late-stage-manga filler plots, once we get past a certain point.) So, I’d say it’s worth your time, if you were interested—particularly if you were interested in either of the leads. I felt more believable post-relationship sparks in the last 20 minutes of Episode 2 than in the whole of both Welcome to Samdal-ri and Our Beloved Summer.

3. …that said, there is absolutely a thriller/murder mystery playing throughout this silly, fluffy romance series—and you can bet I have a note that reads: “Erin will be furious.”

3A. See?

4. Heh…I mentioned that the show can be quite contrived, at times, but my notes emphatically state that I was happy to gobble up all the tropey moments that the contrivances resulted in, no matter how little sense any of the journey to those moments made. (Though I do also complain about the contrivances.)

5. As I’m sure you have guessed, I recognized a couple of cast members:

• the lead actress from #Alive and The Call as Ha-neul, our female lead

• the mom from True Beauty as Ha-neul’s mother

• the ghillie suit survivalist guy from Sweet Home 2 as Ha-neul’s uncle

• Young Stewardess Bully from The Glory as Nurse Do

• Bok-joo from Weightlifting Fairy as the two leads’ needlessly hot former classmate

5A. That last point is very reflective of my thought process as I realized who was playing this former classmate of theirs. I was like, “Whoa—I know they want this character to be pretty, but they didn’t need to get someone who was that prettWAAAAAAAIT A MINUTE…!!!” Of course, I later learned that the reason she was there was because she and the actress playing Ha-neul played rivals(?) in Doctors, which is why they brought her in as a guest here. Which means that, given I now have a crush on the actress who played Ha-neul, I will have to add Doctors to my ever-growing list, as well. 

5B. …also: I have a crush on the actress who played Ha-neul. She’s like Jung So-min had a baby with Bae Suzy. Of course I have a crush on her.

5C. But Nurse Do is #bestgirl. It’s a slightly strange performance (though one the show clearly wanted), but it’s also consistently funny. And, yes, she’s quite pretty, which doesn’t hurt. 

5D. Though, for the record, #bestgirl could just as easily have been Ha-neul or Ha-neul’s best friend. 

5E. Oh! I’m pretty sure the location for the bro-chat between the male lead and the second male lead in Episode 9 is where My Sweet Angel and Sweatervest went for their “date” on Pink Lie. Though I did not put much effort into confirming this. Despite leaving myself a big note to “LOOK THIS UP.”

5F. And…the hospital where she works might be the same one in Fix You. Or not. A lot of these hospitals seem to have the same setup: mezzanines, centrally-located glass-enclosed elevators. I didn’t see the life-sized statue of Jesus sitting in the waiting area that so amused me in Fix You, but we also never got a shot of the waiting area, so…it’s anyone’s guess.

6. The inciting incidents for our leads are not in any way equivalent, and the show tries to sidestep this fact as often as possible, presumably because they know it’s not the most narratively satisfying way to have done that. Or maybe I’m the only one who was bothered by this disparity. 

7. It’s a recurring plot device that Ha-neul’s family leaves the front door to their home open so that anyone walking by can conveniently hear them talking about information that person isn’t supposed to hear. Of course, if you pay attention to the inside of the house, you know that there are two sets of front doors: the front door proper and another that separates the living room from the foyer. So, for someone to overhear something through the open front door, the interior door would also need to be open. Which, logically, it could be if the front door is open to let in a breeze (and would therefore need the interior door to be open, as well, if it’s going to let in the breeze)—except we never see any instance where the inner door to the home is ever left open. Which, of course, proves nothing because the front door was also closed in those shots, but…I dunno, I just thought the second door was a funny detail they probably thought we’d overlook. [shrug] The burden of being the world’s greatest detective, I guess.

8. No fake relationship trope in this one, but we do get a “suddenly discover they’re neighbors!” trope, which I'm also quite fond of. 

9. I love that the most ardent defender of the male lead after he runs into trouble is the one character we’ve established was on bad terms with him prior to the trouble.

10. At one point, Ha-neul’s mom is wearing a shirt that says “walk of shame.”

11. The little-kid version of the male lead tries desperately not to stare at the bosom of the actress playing his teacher, and he doesn’t really succeed.

12. One of the my favorite parts of the early episodes of the series is how strongly the main duo deny having any kind of fondness for each other, despite very obviously wanting the other to make a move so they can then have an excuse to admit their own feelings. What’s particularly fun about this is how easily both will interpret something the other says as a love confession when it is very much not. BUT…there is a moment like this in Episode 6 that only works if we assume the Ha-neul doesn’t know how songs work. Because, when he starts to sing a song about love, she assumes he’s just made up lyrics specifically to confess to her. To be clear: she’s not shocked that he’s chosen to sing a love confession song, she’s taken aback that lyrics to a song could possibly be about confessing and thinks he’s made them up just to confess.

12A. Now, to play devil’s advocate, the show does previously establish that the only song she seems to actually know is “My Darling Clementine,” so maybe this isn’t quite as silly as I’m suggesting. Maybe she really does have no idea how straightforward the lyrics to love songs can be, and so she just assumes the seeming bluntness of what he’s singing can only have been concocted by him on the spot, rather than after much consideration and drafting by a musician. I doubt that’s what it is, but…maybe.

13. The lead actor seriously overplays most of his comedy beats. I suppose it’s possible the character is supposed to be doing it, but…I think it’s him. 

14. The voiceover narration for every episode is terrible. Like, the writing itself for these sections of the story aren’t good, and they just don’t fit with the tone of the storytelling. They’re meant to give us insight into what’s happening with the characters, but it’s used as a crutch instead of just telling the story and having the audience glean what’s up from, I dunno, watching the characters interact. 

15. To the writer’s credit, though, Ha-neul’s idiot younger brother is used pretty effectively in his role as the guy who never shuts up when he’s supposed to. They let him go on and on just enough to clearly be annoying but not so much that he actually annoys the audience.

16. All the shows I watched at the time this was airing featured people drinking soju out of light blue bottles, not the green ones I’d gotten used to seeing. And I don’t know how I feel about that.

17. But I do know how I feel about that coffee candies product placement! (Which is to say: I like it! Obviously. I gave a little cheer and everything.)

18. My favorite gag of the season is one involving a love triangle. Apart from it coming during the filler nonsense part of the story (though not filler for the arc of the folks involved), it’s great. 

19. My second favorite gag involves the great pains to which the show goes to let the audience know that, after subtly hinting that two characters had an overnight sexytime adventure, the two characters did in fact not have an overnight sexytime adventure. Hilarious. It’s not really supposed to be, but I found the over-deliberate clarification quite funny. 

20. A detail that you know I appreciated: the text message history between characters doesn’t suddenly disappear every time they go to send a new one. 

21. And, in what I can only assume is black magic from the Joseon era, it looks like you are able to deselect an already pressed elevator button so that the elevator doesn’t stop on that floor. Like, in case it was hit by accident or the person who selected it changes his mind or if you really hate someone and want him to have to walk down some stairs because the elevator skipped his floor. Such power—both awesome and terrifying. 

Which rounds out everything non-spoiler-y I have to say about Doctor Slump. It’s an enjoyable show, but, despite its interesting subject matter, it’s also sort of a let-down, frequently detouring into generic substanceless “TV show” beats rather than glorious storytelling cliches. (Would my opinion have changed if there was a fake relationship subplot? Yes. Though not dramatically.)

And now that that’s resolved—back to fangirling over Jae-hyung and Se-seung’s cover of “Twenty-Five, Twenty-One” as though I were Ju-yeon. 

…which is a reference you would totally get IF YOU WATCHED MY SIBLING’S ROMANCE. 

More soon, dear seonbae.

–Daryl