A giant tree fell in the forest, and no one was around to hear it. Did it still make a sound?
That’s the question The Frog poses at the beginning of each episode. The Frog is an eight-episode Korean thriller starring Go Min-si as a mysterious woman who upends landlord Jeon Yeong-ha’s (Kim Yoon-seok) life after a brief yet memorable visit. Why was it so memorable, I hear you ask? Well, when she arrived at his rental, her son was with her.
When she departed, he was not.
What could have happened to the boy? Should Jeon Yeong-ha call the police with no evidence, or should he pretend nothing happened in the hope he was mistaken to keep his rental business intact? Choices, choices.
The Frog is named after a Korean saying. A man throws a stone carelessly, and it unintentionally hits a frog. The frog says, “Why me? What did I do wrong?” However, the frog didn’t do anything wrong. It was just in the way of the waywardly thrown stone. The moral is that sometimes actions can hurt people, even if those effects are not meant by the perpetrator.
This series explores this concept in two separate storylines. The first is with the woman and the landlord. Yeong-ha’s life is turned upside down when the woman leaves his rental sans son, yet, oddly, thoroughly cleaning the bathroom. That surely raises some eyebrows, right? When the woman returns to the rental one year later, it becomes a battle of wits and strength of will. You see, the woman is a psychopath who wants the rental for herself. He suspects her of murder, so he thinks he knows what she is capable of. Will he be able to keep her in check… or maybe sane enough to leave anyone he loves alone?
The second storyline is about motel owner Koo Sang-jun (Yoon Kyesang) and the after-effects of a grisly murder being committed on his property. Being a serial killer tourist spot can do wonders for business, or it can kill it stone dead. Guilt riddles Sang-jun’s family, and we journey with them as those events take their toll. At first, this storyline seems isolated from the landlord’s story, only acting as a mirror to show how things could progress if Yeong-ha goes to the police, but there is more connective tissue than you’d think..
Either way, Yeong-ha and Sang-jun are two frogs in the wrong place at the wrong time.
None of the main characters are completely good, and even the mostly evil characters have something that makes them interesting.
Go Min-si’s character is a psychopath. She takes pleasure in making Jeon Yeong-ha’s (the landlord) life a living hell, and she does it in a way that ingratiates herself with his friends and family. She’s sadistically clever. Just knowing about his daughter and friends makes her dangerous, and she knows it. However, it’s when Yeong-ha briefly gets the upper hand when Go Min-si turns up her performance a notch. She’s excellent.
Yeong-ha’s character, on the other hand, is desperate. You don’t know whether he’s going to break down and cry, or erupt with a fit of rage. Kim Yoon-seok’s performance as the landlord straddles the line so perfectly that you can’t help but wait in anticipation of what he’ll do next. When anger becomes steely resolve, you know it’s about to go down. Seriously, he has that T-1000 thousand-yard stare-down!
The story focusing on the murder motel is perhaps the most tragic, and Sang-jun’s character progression is astounding. He begins the series as an optimistic happy-go-lucky family man, but by the end, Yoon Kyesang has to bring out some serious acting chops. The consequences of letting a serial killer stay at his motel are brutal but enthralling.
There are so many great supporting characters, too. I can’t go through all of them, though, because otherwise we’ll be here all day! And you should be watching The Frog instead.
Aside from the characters, it’s the twisty-turny plot that keeps you coming back for more. It’s a thriller at heart, keeping the audience in suspense as much as possible. The unpredictability is driven by the characters, but they affect the story in captivating ways. Will the woman’s cool demeanor slip, and will she explode in a fit of rage? What will happen to Sang-jun’s family? And, will the guilt everybody is feeling (except the woman) get too much for them?
Most of these questions can be asked from the beginning of the series through to the end. However, the situations evolve, the suspense ramps up, and the stakes become treacherous. Simultaneously, the watchful eye of brilliant police captain Yoon Bo-min (Lee Jeong-eun) zeroes in on the situation, threatening an already combustible situation.
It’s so damn good.
I loved The Frog. It appeared on my recommended list because I watched Sweet Home, also starring Go Min-si. She is as accomplished in this as she was as the ballerina in that show, but as good as she was, that’s not why I kept watching. I binged this series in a week (yes, that’s a binge for me) because it was so moreish. Once I popped, I just could not stop.
The cat-and-mouse game between the woman and Yeong-ha was transfixing, and I wanted to see how it was going to end. That conclusion was unpredictable and exciting, and I wanted more, although, in my heart, I knew the eight-episode length was perfect.
If I were to have one complaint, it would be that sometimes it wasn’t clear which story I was watching out of the two main threads. It could have been done with a subtle color gradient on one plot line to distinguish them from one another.
However, that’s just a nitpick. The Frog is an enjoyable TV series with terrific characters and a suspenseful story. A giant tree fell in the forest, and nobody was around to hear it. Did it make a sound? Yes, yes it did. It was a cacophony of awesomeness. Don’t let this series be a giant tree falling in the forest you didn’t hear.
All eight episodes of The Frog are available to stream on Netflix, and you should.
