Reaction to The Glory Ep. 15 out now!
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This isn't necessarily a rebuttal, but I want to offer some gentle push-back against the idea that The Glory is about "grey" characters, because I feel pretty strongly about its "black or white" morality being the source of its strength; its explanatory power. When we describe Yeon-jin and Jae-joon, and the other bullies, as tragic or "grey", I think we need to pay close attention to the fact that every person's actions are constrained by the environment they live in, but also how constraints are definitely less numerous the more you fit in with the ruling order that structures society. I think this is something that lot of television gets wrong, whether out of 'the West' or not: think about how often the constraints put on rich and poor people are portrayed as equivalent to make a romance work, for instance, to create artificial symmetries of power where they do not exist in real life. This is obviously not to say that your bank account determined whether you can feel emotions or anything like that. Yeon-jin's love for her daughter does not exonerate her or make her more sympathetic, because we can see that her actions have consequences for her daughter, and she made the decision to continue being the person she is; the show is fairly firm on that one, even if Dong-eun has reservations. She understands that in order to get justice, she needs to inflict harm, and people who do not deserve it will get caught in her path . But it must be done, because otherwise the narrative would make a statement about victims having to lie down and take it without being able to ever strike back. This is why I'd push back against the idea that her being a good person is threatened by her doing, well, a lot of murder. I'd call it postponed self-defense. It is vengeance. But it is also justice, because it isn't merely for her sake, nor for the sake of the dead, but also for other, living people. And since this is fiction, it's also a larger metaphor: Yeon-jin and her clique represent violent structures that need to be opposed or they will continue to exist. It's absolutely correct to say that trauma moves across generations and violence often gets transported along the same avenues, but I think The Glory does what hardly any other show about vengeance does: it does not spare the perpetrators for some silly notion of "saving the soul of the victim", nor does it condemn Dong-eun inflicting violence. It knows her violence is not equivalent to what was done to her. That's something really special.
Regenherz
2023-10-25 21:14:12 +0000 UTCUsually, really good written characters are never black or white and this show illustrates that a lot. I know you said you want to find out once the show is over, but this is NOT a spoiler. Just a breakdown. Basically, we 'sometimes' feel bad for the worst people in the show, because they're not PURELY bad. Yeonjin is EVIL but we also know she loves her child and that she was raised with wrong values by her mom to feel entitled by their wealth and status. Jaejoon is a bastard but we know he also did not receive attention as a child growing up with parents always being away (episode 1) and that he's always felt insecure about his disability (colorblind). Sara is the same as the two, but also that she feels she needs to fit in with the other two by behaving the same way growing up. Hyejeong and Myeong-o were not as well off as the other three, and has always been trapped by the power imbalance of their group. In a sense, they were bullied by the other three for being poor. We root for Dong-eun's revenge because we know her struggles the most - being bullied and burned and abandoned by her mom - but we can also argue that ruining people's lives is "not good". She's a good person with good intentions but not-so-good actions like getting old teacher, Myeong-o, and the abusive husband killed INDIRECTLY (although deserved).
D
2023-10-24 10:54:18 +0000 UTC
