Letter #133: Ultimate Weapon Alice

Good morning, Erin.

Last weekend, my grandmother wanted me to go through my late grandfather’s bookshelf and take any books I thought I might be interested in. My grandfather was an avid reader with a pretty varied range of interests, though I think she asked me because so many of his books were action-packed crime novels—or, as she would describe them, “man books”—and, being more or less the only gent in our group, and I was obviously the first thought for who might want to give them a new home. 

Now, to what I’m sure is your great surprise, action-y/crime-y stuff isn’t my go-to genre (though I certainly don’t not enjoy a action-packed crime story), so I didn’t wind up taking any of those novels, but I certainly did take some others: four volumes of a pictorial history of World War II, a novella about 1960s Korea, an academic paper my grandfather was apparently using to help him take a run at decrypting the Voynich manuscript (including his handwritten notes), and, most significantly, his softcover copy of A Confederacy of Dunces—which is literally the copy I read, having borrowed it from him, when I was about 14…and which was like being reunited with an old friend. 

I mention this because A Confederacy of Dunces is not only one of my favorite books but also potentially the most influential on me as a writer—at least, insofar as my time trying to write longer stories goes: multiple perspectives, seemingly disconnected except by physical proximity, ultimately all necessary as they are brought together for the eventual conclusion to the tale. I’ve essentially been trying to escape my subconscious (...or arguably very conscious) desire to simply write that same book as though for the first time. It’s a wondrous novel, and there’s so much about it I’d like to share with you.

…but, even so, that’s not why I bought it up. No, I mentioned it and how important it is to me because I’m trying to make a broader point: sometimes things just seem made for you, y’know? Watch a movie, see a painting, hear a song—and you’re like, “I UNDERSTAND THIS.” It resonates with you—literally, vibrates at the same frequency you do. The connection is primal, inherent to who you are. 

Ultimate Weapon Alice didn’t do that for me…but I’d be lying if I didn’t say that, in some ways, it kind of did, as its tone, pacing, and general storytelling sensibility spoke very much to my own particular palette—perhaps not unsurprisingly because Ultimate Weapon Alice was written and directed by the guy who made the movie Dream, which I have fawned over for you on two separate occasions. 

But what does that mean? Was it good or not? And why is this still not one of the many shows from the list you last gave me?

Well, funny you should ask—because I just so happen to have a letter addressing exactly those questions! 

1. I think it’s only fair to start off any discussion of Ultimate Weapon Alice by making clear that the subtitles I had for this series were pretty bad. Not totally awful, but almost certainly lacking in localization what it clearly had in spades with near-literal translation. And I’m not sure if you’re aware of this or not, but Korean and English are not structured quite the same way—which was an issue not so much in terms of sentence structure but in sentence content. Translation is a skill. And whoever fansubbed this series…had the best of intentions. And I appreciate their efforts. But also, I did have to do a fair bit of rewriting in my head as I followed along to make the dialogue a little more natural. 

1A. Point being: there may have been some nuance missing from my understanding of what was being said. And, if that affected how certain things hit me, then some of my comments should be considered asterisked as not yet finalized. 

1B. Less about the translations being good or bad (but still very much about the translations), there’s the decision about the protagonists’ names: the main girl is Gyeo-ul and the man guy is Yeo-reum—that is, they are name (perhaps literally, or perhaps coincidentally) “Winter” and “Summer,” respectively. It’s clearly deliberate on the part of the writer, and the two characters comment about how they shouldn’t get along because nominal determinism has clearly set them up to be antagonists. The subber(s) decided the best way to get this across was to consistently refer to the characters by their translated names; so we got a girl named Han Summer and a guy named Seo Summer. Which looked silly, to me. I would have called them Gyeo-ul and Yeo-reum, found a way to work in early on that that they were “winter” and “summer,” and then, whenever someone was clearly making a point of referring to them by their seasons, I’d have called them “Winter” and “Summer” in quotes. For my money, that would have felt more correct. But no one asked me. And I guess it doesn’t really matter. I just…found it weird. 

2. Speaking of weird, this is an offbeat show. Which is not surprising, given the creative forces behind it, but I was struck by how I spent most of this series comparing it to Chicken Nugget. They feel like companion pieces, spiritual twins, and I could clearly see the one in the other as I watched it. But where Chicken Nugget had been a head-scratcher, Alice seems to be much more focused and recognizable, with its weird elements being more reflective of the characters than the progression of events, helping to ground the story and make it feel occasionally zany rather than lapsing into Chicken Nugget’s incomprehensible surrealism. The offbeat elements sometimes steer the show into an auteurist pretension, particularly when they repeat too frequently or last a beat too long, but it never takes you too far from where you want to be—which is especially effective for those times when the writer/director dips into his patented “and now things are deadly serious” at a moment’s notice. (Which I love. But I love this guy’s whole storytelling style.)

3. Of course, the real kicker is that the shows are linked: two of the characters from Ultimate Weapon Alice appear in Chicken Nugget. Seriously—not just the actors, but their actual characters. I mean, just about all the actors appear in both (because this director loves to use the same actors), though as entirely different characters. But, yeah, I guess both sets of events canonically happen to them. Which is crazy. 

4. Speaking of knowing the actors:

• Not-Quite-Brazilian Girl from Doona! as “Winter” (the titular “Alice”)

• the sleazy book reviewer from It’s Okay to Not be Okay as “Summer’s”…guardian? Maybe?

• the Angry Man’s servant from The Matchmakers as a bullied student

• the girl who first notices Yellow Pants from Chicken Nugget as…well, the same character

• the gym owner brother from Frankly Speaking as a bully…as he was in Chicken Nugget

• the evil not-brother from My Demon as Alice’s psychopathic trainer

• the real estate assistant from A Korean Odyssey as “Winter’s” guardian

• the maybe-gangster homeless guy from Dream as…I dunno, an intelligence broker? 

• Stewardess Bully from The Glory as the sexy hacker assistant lady or whatever the hell she was

• the coach from Dream as a teacher

5. I can’t say for certain that I particularly like our leads (as characters), but there is something unmistakably charming about the performances—which is no mean feat, considering the stylized manner in which all the characters are written. 

5A. Similarly, I think the standout is probably the guy playing Alice’s psychotic trainer, who plays the unhinged character in a surprising, but very effective, way: he’s just…really happy—all the time. He’s not trying to be intimidating nor is he an over-the-top cackling madman. Rather, he is simply excited and amused, quietly chuckling to himself in a way that is menacing for how wrong it seems, for how obviously abnormal the man’s behavior is and, as such, how dangerous he could be by implication. (The actor was a standout in Chicken Nugget, as well, I recall, which makes it that much more of a downer that my witting introduction to him was his turn in My Demon, which was so bad that nearly everyone came out of it at a loss.)

6. There’s a fairly extensive foot chase towards the end of the second act of the series, and the director wants to get a quick steadicam shot (y’know,  where the camera is locked onto an actor’s face while the scenery rushes around him) of both “Winter” and “Summer” as they sprint through a hallway. Thing is, unless I’m mistaken, the shots in question were not done with the standard(?) vest-mounted camera that we always see in behind-the-scenes footage. Rather, I think the actors were holding the cameras at arm's length as they ran. It’s something about both the angle of the shot and how the shoulder closest to the camera doesn’t seem to indicate the rapid swings the other arm does as the actor runs. I’m not an expert by any means, so maybe I’m wrong…but, quick as it was, something about the shot caught my attention and, fleetingly, took me out of the action. 

7. At the beginning of the story, “Summer’s” guardian explains to him that falling in love is not some calculable thing he can anticipate, likening it to the involuntary bounce your leg gives when you get hit on the knee. Brilliantly, the show has the moment “Summer” realizes he’s smitten with “Winter” come after she’s kicked him in the knee to make him leave her alone.

7A. Less brilliantly, the show then specifically calls out the reference to what his guardian told him so the slow people at the back of the room understand what’s going on. And I had such a frown on my face when that happened. 

8. Lots of Hyundai logos. You know I like that.

9. …but not as much as I liked the decision to have so much of “Winter” and “Summer’s” dialogue with each other be done via voiceover as they look at each other. It’s never quite clear if this is simply a stylistic representation of their conversations, a basically literal expression of how they are so in tune with each other that they can communicate without speaking, or dialogue they’ve exchanged previously (or will soon after). Maybe it’s all three—or none. And, frankly, I don’t need to know. I thought it was an awesome decision, and I loved it. 

10. …but not as much as I loved “Winter’s” roommate Rose.

10A. Hooooooooly cow, did I love Rose. She’s mean, she’s nuts, and she’s a slightly less pretty (and I do mean slightly) Yoojung from Weki Meki. I already felt like a lot of this show was made for me, but Rose was the clearest indication that the director specifically hoped I would enjoy this series. 

11. Oh—but did I enjoy the show? Yeah, mostly. I thought it was pretty good, and I would say it’s definitely worth a watch, if anyone is interested. It sort of doesn’t feel as focused or cohesive as I would want it to be—that is, I don’t think it has as much of a point as I think it needs, so it ends up being artsier than most people would probably like—but it’s a nice change-of-pace kind of show, a good palate cleanser. The strengths are pretty strong, and the weaknesses aren’t all that weak. But it never made me rant at the screen in anger, which too many shows have lately made me do, regardless of their overall quality. So…yeah, I’d mostly recommend it. I mean, it’s only eight 30-minute episodes. It’s not that much of a drain on your time. 

12. Speaking drains on your time, though: the climactic confrontation of the story takes place at the abandoned building used for the climax of A Time Called You.

13. I have seen the actress who plays “Winter” in two shows, now. In the first, she desperately wanted to be called noona. In this second one, she is furious at being called noona.

14. There’s A LOT of violence in this series, and it, like so much else, is used far more to stylized effect than literally. Beatings only do as much damage as the story moment requires, the injuries lasting only as long as necessary before the next scene begins. Knives are plunged into and pulled out of people with abandon, at times, frequently in what should be fatal areas, only for characters to willpower their ways through so a fight can continue. But the most…I’ll call it “stylized” element of the violence is far and away gunshots. You’d think guns were little more than Nerf slingshots for how often people are shot and not only don’t die but continue to be active participants in the scene. And I don’t mean a lot of people get shot once and keep going—I mean that a handful of people get shot repeatedly in any number of body parts from their arms to THEIR TORSOS only to pick themselves up and limp away…often to be shot multiple more times before being taken out by a zombie movie-esque headshot. Absurd. 

14A. Now, I don’t doubt I’d get a “well, technically, a person could survive any number of—” in response to my complaint, but I don’t buy it—if only because of how frequently this unreality is deployed. 

14B. Relatedly: have I already asked if you’ve heard the Chumbawamba song “El Fusilado” before? 

15. Really enjoyed the music for this show. Including “Winter’s” brief humming of “Scarborough Fair” in Episode 3. Which is not on the soundtrack. To my great dismay. 

16. In Episode 8, “Summer” drives a car, and the show really doesn't want you to question whether or not he should logically be able to do so. 

17. His childhood flashbacks are in blue; her childhood flashbacks are in red. 

18. The final scene of the series is…artsy. I really like it, but it’s a little artsy. Maybe too artsy for the way the show plays out. (Though, again, I quite liked it.)

18A. However…the way they shot the scene changing from driving in the falling snow to driving in the falling cherry blossoms and then back to the falling snow as the main duo discusses how they think the story should end was fantastic.

And that’s all I have to say about Ultimate Weapon Alice. Or possibly Alice, the Final Weapon. I dunno. The translation was a trip, like I said. 

Y’know, for eight 30-minute episodes, it took me a long time to get you this letter. But I suppose that’s the price of trying to keep up with five separate weeklies. (Plus a whole slew of new ones that started in the last few days! What’s a boy to do?) 

However you’re keeping busy, these days, I hope you’re having a wonderful time. And not just staring at the wall, waiting for news of when Single’s Inferno 4 will start.

…

Look, it’s been MONTHS since I last watched a Korean dating show—I could well be dying. 

More soon.

—Daryl