“I'm Sorry That I Forgot... Everything That You Taught Me. How Great It Is To Have Friends. How Nice

i love sieun so much as a main character because he tries so hard not to be one.

in the beginning of the season, all he wanted was to sit quietly in the background, exist in peace, and yearn for suho without the world clawing at him. but he’s a gravitational force. he doesn’t seek the world, the world seeks him. the good, the bad, all of it. and even though he never seeks human connection, insists that he doesn’t need friends, he loves having them. he loves loving them.

he’s not loud about it, he doesn’t know how to be, but his loyalty is violent, bone-deep, unwavering. he’ll fight for his friends, kill for them, stand up to their dads without blinking. he’ll set himself on fire to keep them warm.

and the most tragic part? he could’ve stayed invisible. he could've stayed out of it all. the bad guys didn’t even want him, they wanted baku. but sieun’s heart won't let him walk away. his instinct to protect always wins. always. something he learnt from suho.

he shows up (all four feet of him); no real fighting skills, no actual strength, just this terrifying cocktail of rage, stubbornness, desperation, and whatever object he can get his hands on to stab someone with.

but beneath all of that, he’s just a kid. a scared, tired, broken kid. he flinched when seongje first cornered him in the bathroom. he cried when his friends told him it wasn’t his fault. he carries the kind of guilt that rots you from the inside out, and he’s still trying to make sense of it. still trying to believe he deserves good things.

he’s just a teenage boy who’s been handed too much pain too early and still, still, he chooses to love.

gaon as a character genuinely gets so little true agency of his own through the entire show, and it's something that he's clearly aware of and frustrated by. he's constantly presented with choices and ultimatums by those around him, his agency is continuously shot down and overruled by others, and despite how much he cares about each of them, every time it happens he ultimately demonstrates - intentionally or not - how much he hates that by immediately pushing back on whoever poses such limitation to him in the first place (re: soohyun telling him to stay back and let her handle digging into yohan's past -> gaon sneaking around yohan's house; min jungho pressing gaon to make his decision -> gaon siding with yohan; yohan telling him not to see soohyun if he wants to stay on his side -> gaon leaving the kangs).

in the end, all of those people are no longer actively in his life. he is alone and he must be independent, and it must make him feel so confllcted - that his having agency and free will is grounded in how those he cared for are unable to influence him anymore.

the only bright side of this is in kang yohan, who makes it clear through his actions in the end that he's consciously made the choice to give the agency back to gaon, to put the ball into his court. yohan chooses to take a step back, take his hands off, and let gaon choose what he does in rebuilding the system; he demonstrates his trust and faith that gaon will do it all well, teasing that he - a man "known" to be dead - will come back into the fray if gaon doesn't do a good job.

it must be so bittersweet to be kim gaon.

Kim Gaon as a character is so important to me.

This poor boy, whose parents committed suicide when he was so young, ends up being manipulated by almost everyone in his life who think they know what's best for him.

His mentor, who he saw as a father ends up manipulating him to further his own agendas and goals all while giving him the illusion of choice. Ga On has never truly had a choice.

And Soohyun too. Yes, she only ever wanted to keep him safe, and that is a nice sentiment, but in acting the way she did towards him she caged him in.

Maybe it's the Gemini in me, but if someone tries to limit my freedom of choice or influence my judgement in any way, I start to get suffocated. No matter what the sentiment behind their actions are. She didn't deserve the end she got, and she genuinely cared about Gaon but at the same time she ended up trying to influence him because she thought she knew what was best for him.

And then comes Yohan. Yohan is complicated (as morally grey characters tend to be), because for a good while in the beginning, he too tries to use (or at least wants to use) Gaon for his own ends.

But also, after he sees who Gaon truly is: a kind and caring and a firecracker of a soul, he is the first in Gaon's life to offer him a choice. And not the Min Jungho type of choice where it's just an illusion; but an actual choice.

And Gaon. Gaon only ever tried to do what he thought was right even while being pulled in a thousand different directions by different people. He tried so hard to make the right choices. He finally found the family he lost when he was young in Yohan and Elijah and Ms Ji. Lord knows I wouldn't survive if I found out that the fucker who drove my parents to suicide was living alive and well somewhere else with nothing on his conscience, and that I had been lied to for so long. And then, Soohyun, the last person who he has left from his past tied to his parents, his best friend, dies.

And then he loses his found family as well.

Kim Gaon, at the end of the show has absolutely no one left from his past; the Kangs, Soohyun, his parents and Min Jung ho are all gone.

All he has left is himself and a herculean task of rebuilding the justice system.

And how miserable must that be?

gaon choosing to return to yohan again and again even though he fundamentally disagrees with him while everyone is convinced (including the man himself) that yohan is just an unchangeable Monster is peak “i can fix him” but also it’s so painfully beautiful. a taste of true unconditional love for two men who probably only ever really felt loved as a condition to behaving for the people they cared for.

Monstrous Things will befall the writer for this

not to start problems on purpose but the scene where yohan throws gaon out of the room when he says he’d die with him in the explosion is SO!!!!! like knowing the ending it just adds so much to yohans reaction like HE knows he’s getting out of this alive and truly has no intention to kill himself but GAON doesn’t know that and still says ‘I am willing to die with you/for you’ like imagine yohans reaction to that in his head, not only realizing that gaon is actually that much in pain that he is actually willing to die, to kill himself, and that much devoted to him that he is willing to die WITH yohan. It makes him throwing him out all that much more meaningful, like he’s so determined to ensure he lives, telling him ‘you might not think your life is worth anything but it is you idiot and I won’t let you throw it away’ like he could’ve easily just told gaon that he was gonna get out of the explosion alive, but I feel like he wanted to ensure that gaon knew he wanted him to live, regardless of whether yohan was gonna survive or not. Anyway. Much To Think About. Sorry for bringing this up randomly lol just needed to vent it to someone

start all the problems on purpose, babe. be the yohan you need to be in your life!!!!!!! lmao

but i feel the same!!!!!!!!!!! that whole entire scene is just so gut-wrenching and full of emotions, especially when you realize that yohan is upset and tearing up just after he throws gaon out. he literally doesn’t want to but he’s doing it because gaon cannot die with him if he doesn’t actually live.

but with that said, also god i know…. yohan’s never really had anyone choose him, and this man comes to find him during a moment where it’s truthfully, a 50/50 shot whether yohan makes it out alive. gaon literally telling him i’m going with you, and yohan turns quickly but then schools his facial expression because obviously, he knows the plan, and he can’t say anything.

and i think that’s also why it’s another reason yohan kept it from gaon because if he’d told him and yohan actually died, then what, you know? imagine having that false hope that he’d make it out and yohan doesn’t keep that promise. plus, i’m pretty sure yohan was thinking of elijah in that moment, too, but gaon certainly wasn’t. yohan absolutely wanted gaon to live and to do it in a way that wasn’t interfered by yohan or the elite. yohan was clearing the stage whether he lived or died, and him being upset at gaon’s words just shows you how much he realized what gaon was promising.

as you said, it’s not gaon willing to die for yohan. he was willing to die WITH him, beside him, partners til the very end. and that is so damn profound.

recently watched the devil judge (2021) for the first time and i truly can’t get enough of this guy. and also: his devil

The Atlantic

The Trump Administration Accidentally Texted Me Its War Plans

U.S. national-security leaders included me in a group chat about upcoming military strikes in Yemen. I didn’t think it could be real. Then t

This is possibly the most insane national security story in the last 50 years. Includes a massive text chain between senior members of the Trump admin gaming out foreign policy and war plans on Signal, and they accidentally added a reporter to the group chat.

just here to confess that i am The overanalyzer. professionally. personally. academically. lovingly. in every way possible, even

yohan is Designed to be a morally questionable character. and if the audience is thinking about the context that gaon is given going into his position on the live court show, it makes complete sense that he holds a constant baseline of skepticism for yohan’s morality. from the very beginning, even when unprompted by min jungho, he questions why kang yohan would do things the way he does. the answer he’s given is “politics,” and honestly, if you think about the politicians yohan is surrounded by, the tactics they use, and the willingness yohan consistently shows regarding going to extremes to achieve his ends, it’s no wonder gaon never gains complete trust for yohan. the two of them start off from a place where gaon inherently distrusts yohan. while we can infer that yohan wants gaon’s approval deep down, he doesn’t necessarily prove to gaon that he’s totally trustworthy, nor does he really try or succeed at convincing gaon that there are lines he will not cross, and exceptions where he won’t do the extreme but potentially useful thing for his own benefit.

in any case, gaon does not blindly trust yohan, and this is as much the foundation for the initial success of their relationship (with yohan feeling uncomfortably seen and understood through gaon challenging his words), as it builds up for its ultimate deterioration (gaon suspecting yohan of killing soohyun and accidentally helping in framing him for her death). it’s a very real and human point of conflict between two individuals who obviously care for each other very deeply, but are unsure if they are totally aligned in their morals, values, goals. if anything, it’s a testament to the depth of their frankly-toxic relationship: they want so much to be able to trust each other / be trusted by the other, but being unable to reach that, in the context of surrounding limitations, leads them to (extreme?) behavior that they really don’t exhibit anywhere else. gaon — who has not only heard from others, but also seen first hand, how manipulative yohan can be — is trying very hard to not let himself be fooled, and so he holds extra paranoia and disbelief towards yohan that ends up skewing his judgment. gaon’s not perfect, but he is truly trying his best — especially with the consideration that he’s had it drilled into him by his long-time mentor and father figure that, in this position, he’s got the world on his shoulders.

The reason some people tend to find Gaon's reactions annoying, is because we as the audience always have information that Gaon doesn't.

Granted, we don't always know everything, but even what little what we do know, Gaon does not. Gaon is practically fumbling around in the dark throughout the show.

And when Gaon tries to find out anything, Yohan immediately shuts him down , Soohyun practically babies Gaon and tells him to stay out of trouble and Min Jungho is just a piece of shit.

What are obviously right choices to us is confusing to Gaon because the poor guy does not have all or even a little bit of any information at any point. And if he does, then someone manipulates or emotionally blackmails him into doing what benefits them.

If you look at it from Gaon's perspective the whole show is practically a horror tragedy instead of a thriller (with maybe a few days of peace in between before shit hits the fan. Again.)

no thoughts, head empty, only the devil judge ost playing in the background

I am a WHORE for “the love is requited, they’re both just idiots”

I really am a sucker for dual male lead media where they appear as complete opposites only to end up being eachothers foils and somehow also ending up being completely depended on eachother despite of (because of) their differences