[HanCinema's Drama Review] "Guardian: The Lonely and Great God" Episode 5

So the absence of names for the lead characters finally becomes an issue. Eun-tak seems to have only just now figured out that "Guardian: The Lonely and Great God" is just a nickname she came up with. I'm not sure he even actually is a goblin, come to think of it. Meanwhile Sunny (played by Yoo In-na) is in the awkward position of being the Grim Reaper's love interest yet they can't have even the most rudimentary of conversations. So naturally, their scenes go nowhere, much as Eun-tak's part-time job as Sunny's sole employee at a chronically empty restaurant also go nowhere.

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It's only through through weird contrivances in the plot that "Guardian: The Lonely and Great God" can ever go forward. Consider how the event that finally propels Eun-tak into the same home as the other lead characters revolves around a rather strange request from a ghost that Eun-tak manages to fulfill in about the least efficient possible way. Poor Deok-hwa, always at a wit's end trying to make sense of problems far beyond his level of perception.

One point of credit I have to grant is that director Lee Eung-bok has somehow managed to make Eun-tak a generally attractive leading lady, even as she is a high school student. In all fairness the adult Eun-tak we get a glimpse of here has pretty much the same personality with just a more refined physical appearance. So in that sense, success. I can see how the Guardian: The Lonely and Great God is slowly becoming bewitched by Eun-tak's sheer sense of...optimism.

The other characters are diametrically opposed to Eun-tak's way of thinking less as a matter of philosophy and more because they're so thoroughly trapped in routine it's a struggle to break out of it. While the Guardian: The Lonely and Great God and the Grim Reaper are the main obvious examples, Deok-hwa lacks purpose. Sunny is just plain bored. Eun-tak is able to light up a room just by entering it and giving commands, which people obey more out of inertia than because they actually have to or want to.

None of this really gives a satisfactory answer to the question of what exactly "Guardian: The Lonely and Great God" is even supposed to be about. Writer Kim Eun-sook has this real talent for creating petty conflicts out of petty nothingness, only to dissolve these into the common squalor of the Guardian: The Lonely and Great God and the Grim Reaper's roommate squabbles. It's hard to to grasp at points how the story is literally about the "Guardian: The Lonely and Great God"'s impending death. Which fits, since he struggles with that too.

Review by William Schwartz

"Guardian: The Lonely and Great God" is directed by Lee Eung-bok, written by Kim Eun-sook and features Gong Yoo, Lee Dong-wook, Kim Go-eun, Yoo In-na, Yook Sung-jae, Lee El,..

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