First Impressions: Zombie Detective

*Disclaimer: If you haven’t watched the first two episodes of this drama, there will be spoilers for those in this review. Also understand that my opinions can change of characters and plots as the show progresses forward. This is just a first impression, not the end all be all opinion of the full series.

Native Title: 좀비탐정
Release Date: September 21, 2020 (airs Mondays/Tuesdays)
Episode #: 
24 (half-hour)
Platform: Viki/KBS2
Director: Shim Jae Hyun

Writer: Baek Eun Jin
Genre: Comedy/Romance/Drama
Starring: Choi Jin Hyuk, Park Joo Hyun, Tae Hang Ho. Rest of the cast can be found here.

Going into this drama I was kind of wary. I was interested, but I didn’t know if the comedy would deter me. I’m sorry, most comedies just aren’t for me and can really hinder my enjoyment of a drama. I’m still on the fence about this one, but it does some things that are sort of interesting and had some unexpected moments.

Zombie Detective is about… a zombie private investigator. The promos and the official synopsis on other sites hint towards it maybe leaning into a case of the week type set up with the one over arching plot. Unfortunately, none of that is really confirmed in the first two episodes so I still have no clue if that will actually be a thing. The first two episodes center mostly on Moo Young (Choi Jin Hyuk) coming to life, figuring out he’s a zombie, and then deciding that the zombie life is not for him and wants to be able to integrate into society and not hurt people. He ends up witnessing the murder of a private detective while he was out trying to find food and ends up assuming his identity.

Gong Sun Ji is the female lead, a reporter/writer always wanting to get the story and catch whatever bad guy is out there because…police don’t do things? Although her best friend/second male lead is one and seems to be fine at his job? I don’t know. She spends most of the first two episodes focusing on the “Santa Case” a killer who abducted and murdered a child. He’s still at large and she’s been trying to find clues and connect with some witnesses to get a good story to be able to catch him. She fails at this in almost every aspect. She’s…not that great. She’s over the top, doesn’t stop to think, resorts to violence before anything, and sabotages herself constantly. I’ll talk more about her in a bit, I do have some feelings about her character and the way the drama handles her.

This drama is a little odd. Ok, it’s a lot odd and I don’t know how to describe it. If you aren’t into zombies, it doesn’t matter. He barely does anything zombie-like and this really isn’t that much of a horror drama. At best it’s an on-again off-again crime thriller. They have a whole training sequence to show how he stops doing things like walking slowly and not being able to communicate. Anytime he has to eat something, it’s usually animal and they don’t show the actual kill. Even when they show the carcass it’s blurred out so you don’t see anything. Really, the Zombie aspects are pretty much pushed aside (except for his ability to do superhuman type things like not die). Honestly, the darkest part of the entire drama was the death of the original private detective, and the random clip from the very beginning of the first episode with a bloody. It feels like a tiny bit of a bait, since those are the few points we get in the entire episode, but I do have a feeling the drama might be building up the darkness as they uncover more about the main killer. I know I’m not the person to go to if something is scary or not (it’ll always be not for me), but there are Buffy episodes creepier than anything that happened in the first two episodes.

This is a comedy, but it does seem like it leans out of the usual Asian humor. A lot of the time the comedy is very self-aware and other times it kind of more Western humor. It also doesn’t keep up the comedy consistently. There are parts in this drama (not referring to the dark aspects listed above) that you would assume would be comedic, but played out as not. Any time Moo Young talks it’s in monologues in his head, and they are more like philosophical soliloquies, and most of the time it’s not actually written as a comedy. Yes, objectively it is comedic because it’s a zombie overthinking everything that is happening and that’s just a weird premise, but the drama does separate a lot of the times when the actual intended comedic moments happen, and a lot of the comedy comes from the others around him.

But, then they also did this Last Empress and was glad they did.

Side note: There was a brief moment when the original investigator died that I thought it was him. I don’t know if the drama wanted me to think that, or if it was just me reaching. But we had just came off of the training sequence for a year and it was dark and I thought they were going to do the switch there.

As I said before, I wanted to spend a bit more time with Sun Ji. I’m not going to lie to you, she’s hard to deal with. I don’t need likable characters to be able to enjoy a drama, however I can’t have an unlikeable character AND have the drama just brush off everything they do as “quirks” or excuse every behavior. This drama miraculously didn’t do that. She’s abrupt, she doesn’t think but thinks she’s right constantly. She also really likes the “get mad at the other person because I was wrong” narrative. And somehow, despite it being such a common trope, the drama actually constantly knocks her down. She has consequences with her actions. More than one.

I really appreciated the moments where she would be shown she was wrong to reinforce that what she did was actually not okay, and there were moments she had to actually pay for what she did. The biggest turn in this was when something she did for her own gain led to real consequences for someone else. She was shown that despite her constantly telling herself that she was in the right for the justice of others (when it really was for her own personal gain) and that she didn’t think about the outcome besides what it meant for her, another person was hurt in the process. It makes me hopeful for growth, and not just create the growth at the end with nothing to back it up.

An unexpected thing with this drama was the cinematography…it’s really pretty. I was surprised how good, and not expecting from this drama. The long shots are set up really well.

Look at the scene where we first (and last) see the original private investigator, it’s creepy and dark and eerie and beautiful. I made it my laptop background because I loved it so much.

Final verdict: Will I continue? Honestly, I’m on the fence. I didn’t hate the first two episodes, and the comedy didn’t get on my nerves much but I wouldn’t say that I loved it. Maybe a neutral like? It’s also has a shorter run which is a positive point for the drama. Shorter length usually means a lot of unnecessary filler that would be in the other episodes won’t be there. I also kind of hope that it will dive deeper into the darkness that it gave a taste of. I have a lot of drama and movie watching planned for October (plus will be participating in a readathon) so this might be sidelined at any point, but I’m at least intrigued to continue for another couple of episodes.

Also, the A.C.E cameos are an added bonus.

+++