#e.e.c. watches the devil judge

[driftbending]

i keep thinking about the dinner yohan and gaon attended.

the evening was already starting to frustrate gaon, who believes there should be an ethical divide between their judicial work and the politicians and businessmen. of course that divide is quite slim. almost non-existent. these are the people that helped create the live court show in the first place. it doesn’t stop gaon from caring, from wanting to keep that separation, from trying to be ethical.

then the conversation turns to the chaos yohan is causing. they are starting to realize he is quite independent, not just capable but willing to go after them. the leash they thought they had on him is not as tight as they thought it was. they decide to tug on it. remind him if this goes awry, if the public starts getting ideas of justice, equality, etc., that someone is going to have to take responsibility for it, and it will be yohan.

although yohan takes this conversation in stride, he knows their game, he knows his own power, gaon doesn’t. the lines between their needs and actual justice almost completely erased at this point. it’s not right.

yohan reins him in. whatever ideas gaon had about telling these people to respect those ethical lines were going to be wasted. these people know those lines don’t exist. the entire night they spent laughing about it was already proof enough. gaon would’ve just made an even bigger fool of himself if he had tried.

yohan, who knows that despite that blurring of lines, despite the fear gaon has of these lawless folk running their judicial court, despite what facade of power these wealthy people have—yohan knows he’s the one with the true power here.

after all, these people were just trying to control him. trying to remind him who he is supposed to answer to—not the people, not the law, but rather the foundation’s directors. yohan knows better. he figured these out when he was a child, saw how quickly, how easily these people could turn on one another.

so, he decides to have fun. the same kind of fun he had in a small classroom years ago. the same kind of fun he’s been having in his courtroom. he decides to pull back the curtain for gaon and let him finally see the truth these people have been hiding about themselves. gaon had caught a glimpse of it earlier, but yohan wanted him to see everything clearly. (and maybe get some power back himself, because he doesn’t like having his power threatened any more than they do.)

so, yohan turns it on them using the one they’re all concerned about: minister cha kyunghee.

she’s supposed to be powerful, but here yohan is going after her son. we know he offered her a deal—either she tells the truth about the father of one of yohan’s employees, a politician kyunghee painted as corrupt years ago, OR kyunghee sacrifices her son, who deserves to be punished but, should kyunghee wish it, would be spared. we see how that turns out.

the only one at dinner that knows about the deal, however, is yohan. everyone else thinks kyunghee’s kid is in hot water. they think kyunghee can be spared if they remind yohan who he’s supposed to answer to. but that’s not the case at all. kyunghee and her son will only be spared if yohan wishes it. they know this to some extent, otherwise why even bring it up? why try to get yohan to stop?

but yohan mentions kyunghee, not to play on their fears, because this isn’t about getting them to submit to him (though, in a way, they do). this is about them turning on each other. and they do. one moment they’re concerned about kyunghee (which really is only a concern about themselves) and the next they’re plotting what they can do without her. no, kyunghee doesn’t matter. yes, yohan can go after her. who cares? we’ll just find someone else that’s better suited.

(it doesn’t escape me that the conversation about the presidency indicates that yohan might be a good fit. he’s popular with the people. he’s got the tragic backstory. he just needs to get them, the people at the dinner, to think so, too. and because he thinks like them, better than them, yohan could, if he wanted, get these people to make him their next president.)

it’s an infuriating, truthful scene.

it’s a scene yohan laid out for gaon.

it’s a scene that says: this is what they are. this is the truth. they’re aren’t turning on me—on us, on our work—specifically. they can be made to turn against anyone. i could’ve said anyone’s name, but kyunghee is the one on their mind. and look how quickly they turned on her. look how quickly they forgot about what i was doing. they’re not powerful, terrifying, intelligent leaders. they’re less than that. they’re simple. greedy. selfish. so long as it’s not one of them in trouble, it doesn’t matter. so long as you know what they truly care about (themselves), you can make make them do anything.

look, beloved, this is all they are.

[driftbending]

(cw: animal death mention, blood)

i keep thinking about the story of yohan as told by the priest.

about the way they presented innocence in a small white bird that flew into their classroom and caused chaos.

and how yohan taking away that innocence for the sake of ending a girl’s fear caused an uproar in class. yes, they were all afraid of the bird, but no one thought to kill it. yohan’s action was abnormal, his reaction too harsh, too swift. the kids ostracize, bully him. he’s alone, losing the classmate he was partnered up with, because in the eden they had in that small catholic classroom, he had ruined it by spilling blood.

yohan, however, is cunning enough to turn them on each other. he’s able to see how weak the glue that holds together that eden is, how fragile. yes, the rich and poor exist side by side, but they do so at his expense. by mocking him. tormenting him.

so, he turns the tables on them. he pits them against each other by playing into their assumptions of one another. he steals from the rich children and frames the poor children sitting next to them. he lets their distrust of each other brew before helping it finally push over. and when it does, chaos ensues.

and amidst all the chaos, he smiles because they had left him in peace, because he’s the one on top, the one with all the power.

at first, i thought the priest was being dramatic because he said the child was a devil. after all, they were okay with the other children tormenting yohan, letting him be called a monster. this chaos, the revenge plan he concocted for his classmates was the least they deserved for being so cruel. but then i understood. what kind of child is capable of that level of understanding and that level of planning? who is happy causing exactly that much chaos just to get back at those that hurt him? he could’ve just beat them up, gotten into fights. but he chose to bring all the kids in that classroom into it. to make them all pay. and he did it by understanding that even though they thought they were friends, the rich kids eyed the poor kids with suspicion and were quick to blame the poor kids even though they were innocent. he understood that. and he played into it and they fell for it.

that truly makes me wonder what he has in store for everyone now that’s he a beloved judge with the power to turn against even those that helped him rise to the top.

[driftbending]

i loved the way yohan broke gaon down by challenging him.

all throughout their interactions, yohan had been on guard with gaon, because gaon was constantly questioning and challenging yohan. is this the right way to get justice? shouldn't we follow the law? do the ends truly justify the means?

but that's not all he does. not all he tries to do. gaon tries to learn what it is that is driving yohan to act corruptly. he doesn't believe in evil with no motive. he sets out to find about yohan's past and learns a lot about the pain yohan lives with. yet it's not the pain he understands (gaon has his own pain and he probably knows that no one in the world quite understands anyone else's individual pain, not really), but rather yohan's anger. because that's easier to understand: that someone can be angry because they suffered an injustice.

yohan, of course, knows about gaon's past from the start. he has gaon's file on his desk, along with the news article about his parents' deaths. the people yohan surrounds himself with, who work to tilt the scales in yohan’s favor, are people he knows are suffering from the same anger he and gaon suffer. yohan could've accepted gaon's line, "even if nobody else in the world understands, i do,” but he needed gaon’s trust and, more importantly, he needed gaon to believe in their fight.

but he decides to do what gaon has been doing. gaon, who has challenging the monster narrative yohan created around himself by asking him if he was truly a monster he wouldn't be running from his own pain, wouldn't be isolating himself, being angry with those closest to him when they've clearly done yohan no wrong. gaon, who was deconstructing the narrative yohan built up about himself. gaon, who was bringing yohan back to gaon’s level by getting him in touch with his humanity again.

yohan decides to challenge the narrative of understanding and acceptance gaon created as a shield years ago. so you say that you understand my anger? let's see if that's true. so you say that the law and the justice system's punishment for the one that hurt you and your family was fair? that it was enough for you? let's see if that's true.

so, yohan takes gaon to the prison where gaon expects to see the man who hurt his family, but where gaon finds something else entirely. the man sitting behind bars suffering for the pain he caused gaon was not the one that was meant to be there. someone had ferried him away, set him free, put someone else to suffer in that man's stead. (i wonder, if gaon had found the man sitting there, in luxury but the right man, if he would’ve gone into as much despair, if he would’ve abandoned his morals and joined yohan at all.)

the things soohyun and jungho told him about how justice works, how even if it feels unfair if they (the people, the police, the judges, the system) are impartial, if they stick to the law, if they're ethical, then it's true justice—they're gone, replaced by this consuming, burning anger that makes him wail and scream and cry. there was no justice. none.

he turns against yohan, at first, angry because he believed yohan had been the one behind it, that he was just manipulating gaon again. he turned toward soohyung, looking for comfort, for someone to validate his concerns that this was all yohan's doing, that there was something worth investigating, that it was all too perfect to be true. (it’s interesting how big of a risk yohan took here. if he had been wrong in his understanding of gaon’s anger and need for justice, gaon might have easily turned against him and become more firmly fixed in the need for a neutral and ethical legal system. if they had one, no one would’ve helped free youngchoon, after all.)

when gaon investigates and finds out the truth, however, soohyun's support, jungho's guidance turn out to not be enough. he needs more. he needs justice.

yohan took a risk and shoved gaon all the way to the edge, pushing him to the point where gaon felt he was losing his mind. that he was unraveling.

and he was. but what was unraveling inside him were the things he used to comfort himself from the pain that never really left him. and to go from this place of painful acceptance (and it had to be painful, for how can anyone content themselves when their need for justice outweighs what society and the law gives them?) to this raw state, the state he was in when he saw the man walk off the bus, the state he was in when he pulled out the knife and ran toward the man with murderous intent. and that made him realize just how hollow everything he had filled his life with was. how he needed something more. 

yohan's challenging of gaon, yohan's questioning of gaon's beliefs, caused gaon to realize that he was lying to himself about how satisfied he had been with the legal system he is a part of, and realize that he was telling the truth to yohan when he said, "the anger, i understand that. [...] even if nobody else in the world understands you, i do."

and yohan, at last, managed to get gaon to stand beside him instead of in his way. and not only did he get gaon on his side, but he got gaon to tap into an anger he had long since suppressed and who now needs his own kind of justice instead of that of the game-like system he had before.

[driftbending]

i know i just made a post about this whole scene, but i just realized the way they framed the transition from “yohan is protecting the rich and powerful by putting gaon in his place” to “yohan is on gaon’s side and choosing to manipulate the rich and powerful on gaon’s behalf” is by having yohan stand almost protectively in front of whoever he’s defending.

[driftbending]

can’t wait to have gaon and his first love jaehee come face to face properly.

edit: it was pointed out the "is jaehee doing well" was a mistranslation and soohyun is actually who was mentioned. this post is moot now lmao

[driftbending]

not me listening to masquerade and thinking of an au w/gaon going to that fashion show party and being pulled into a dance by yohan where they keep needling each other for information, gaon trying to get something out of yohan and yohan expertly tip-toeing around the truth, playing with gaon as he spins him, dips him, pulls him flush against him, gaon not remotely flustered but merely more determined to get to the truth yohan is trying to keep from everyone and yohan enjoying the rush of challenge gaon provides.

[driftbending]

in that moment, i thought sunah and jinjoo were going to dance together.

[driftbending]

this sequence where two corrupt power-hungry women that tilt the scales of power in whatever direction they need talking about who is serving the country only to have us pan over to soohyun, a police detective that the narrative shows us genuinely caring about justice.

[driftbending]

jungho sent gaon into hell, and instead of vanquishing the devil, gaon chose to fight beside him.

[driftbending]

two of my favorite things about the devil judge thus far:

yohan vs sunah, the parallels between them, the similarities in their motivations, the acknowledgment (on sunah’s part) that they could easily co-exist if they stayed out of each other’s way, the way that won’t be possible because they each threaten each other’s existence and are the only ones cunning enough to rival each other.

how many gothic tropes the story plays with, w/one of my favorite elements being gaon who embodies the gothic heroine who loses parts of himself the longer he stays at yohan’s side in yohan’s house while he tries to desperately to uncover yohan’s secrets and save yohan from himself

[driftbending]

[driftbending]

god the opening song they played for the devil judge is so fucking sexy i’m in love

[driftbending]

the moment i fell in love with judge yohan.