The Eighth Sense Korean BL Review

Drama: The Eighth Sense (여덟 번째 감각)

Director and Screenwriter: Werner du Plessis and Baek Inu

Executive Producer: Moon Jeong-hyeok

Cast:- Lim Ji-sub, Oh Jun-taek, Lee Mi-ra, Park Hae-in, Bang Jin-won, Jang Young-joon, Seo Ji-an, Chae Soo-ah, Jung So-in and others.

Trigger Warning:- This show talks about depression, darkness, suicide, near death experiences and also death. These topics may cause triggers and affect your mental health. Please read the review and watch the show only if your mind and heart can handle it.

About the Show:-

Ji-hyun starts his University life in Seoul after moving from the countryside. He coincidentally meets his senior, Jae-won who has just completed his mandatory military service at the restaurant where he works part-time. They both experience a mutual attraction on the first meeting itself but brush it off and move on. When he finds a notice at the University about a surf club led by Jae-won, Ji-hyun grabs the opportunity to get close to his senior and also to let go of his fears of water and fears of the new changes in his life.

This opportunity allows Jae-won and Ji-hyun to get closer and soon they develop feelings for each other. But a dark past of Jae-won is acting as an obstacle to their new found love and life. His fears and inhibitions are not allowing him to explore the beautiful opportunities that lie ahead of him. Will Jae-won heal the past wounds and allow himself to take the plunge into the bright future that Ji-hyun is ready to offer him? Will the light and colour that Ji-hyun has brought along be able to dissipate the darkness that surrounds Jae-won?

(*This review may contain spoilers. If you have already watched the show, please continue reading. If you haven’t watched the show yet, you can still continue reading or you can come back to the review later.)

Don’t miss out on something great just because it could also be difficult.

Different topics from the show:-

1) Darkness and Light:-

The world of today is filled with darkness. And when one experiences hurt, heartbreak and disturbances, our worlds are filled with more darkness.

I am reminded of the movie ‘Inside Out’ and the concepts of sadness and happiness in it. Happiness holds the most important place in our life. We are all running after it and we are all craving it. In the movie when sadness tries to touch the happy memories, it has the power to turn those memories into sad ones. Sadness and darkness have the power the take over our hearts and minds.

But no matter how difficult it is, no matter how dark the world is, how sad life is, happiness is always stronger. It may feel like you are completely engulfed in darkness, but a single ray of light is enough to fill your life with brightness. It's enough to drive away the darkness. The biggest and strongest memories are the happy ones. Hold on to them and manifest for more in the future. A few minutes of darkness cannot win over a lifetime of happiness.

Acknowledge your sadness, your darkness and your depression. But do not give it the power to pull you down. The world and our mind are in a dark place right now but there is light within us. Enough light to fight the darkness.
Let the dark phase pass so that we can experience the best phase that was promised to us by God. There is hope, light and brightness in this world and within us and we all should get to experience that.
We need to go inwards. We need to fight every dark moment that is around us. We feel like the walls are closing in on us. That's when we need to open our hearts and minds to light and to God.

We surrender and give God the power to give us life, light, hope, belief and a beautiful tomorrow.

Jae-won is surrounded by darkness and Ji-hyun comes into his life to fill it with the colour that he has brought along.

Ji-hyun is the light in Jae-won's dark world. He could drive away every bitter memory from Jae-won's life and fill it upto the brim with sweetness. Jae-won just needs to open his heart to that colour and light.

2) The Colours and their meaning:-

The Creators have used colours to display the emotions and situations of the characters. It is such a brilliant approach to explain what the characters are feeling and emoting.

Blue - The colour blue is known to be versatile and has various deep meanings. Its versatility explains most situations and sentiments. Blue can mean trust, loyalty, calmness, honesty, commitment and serenity. But it can also mean fragility, depression and coldness. Ji-hyun is the calm and serene side of blue and Jae-won is the fragile side of blue.

Pink - The colour Pink means unconditional love for someone. Pink is the colour of Romance. It describes innocence, compassion, sympathy and playfulness. The colour Pink is extremely positive and signifies hope, empathy and calmness. Ji-hyun and Jae-won’s innocent romance and affection is perfectly expressed with the help of this colour.

Black and Gray – The colour Black has positive meanings too but from the show’s point of view it represents fear, loss, depression, sadness and pessimism. The colour Gray represents isolation, sadness and indifference. It has mysterious emotions attached to it. Jae-won’s personality after his loss in his childhood is expressed in detail through these two colours.

Jae-won is mostly always dressed in black or gray clothing. It indicates the darkness that he has positioned himself in.  
Ji-hyun is always dressed in bright colourful clothing. It shows the vibrant and cheerful life that he is leading.

The contrast in the colours in the metro -
Jae-won with the Greyscale demonstrating his sadness that he is engulfed in.

Ji-hyun with the pretty pink and blue colours demonstrate the brightness in him and his life. He remains untouched by the darkness of the world.

The reunion of Ji-hyun and Jae-won in Episode 9 has a display of blue, green, red and pink with an inclusion of a little purple and orange as well.

The Blue signifies the relaxed nature of the characters. It expresses the calmness and the peace that the Ji-hyun and Jae-won are feeling on being back together. The blue denotes their commitment and responsibility towards each other.

The Green is the colour of life which describes their growth, prosperity and renewal. It represents their hope for a bright and better future. It signifies the safety they feel in each other’s presence.

The Red represents the passion and excitement that the two feel when they are with each other.

The Pink represents their rekindled love and romance.

The Purple and the Orange represent compassion, optimism and warmth in their relationship and also the emotions that they feel for each other.

3) Traumas:-

Most of the people in today’s world grow up with troubled childhood and if not healed, they can turn into traumas and mental health conditions. Some kids grow up with financial troubles, some with dysfunctional family troubles or other childhood troubles. These troubles need to be acknowledged and accepted and then we need to work on healing ourselves and our traumas.

There is a saying that goes like this – “If you do not heal what hurt you then you’ll bleed on people who did not cut you”.

If we do not take time to heal the past traumas and troubles then they will be carried to our present and our future and we will end up hurting both ourselves and the people around us (the ones who love us and want to help us).

I know we all want to heal but we don’t know how. We can always find help for the things that we don’t know or understand. Asking for help is not a sign of weakness but a sign of strength. We are stronger for asking for help to be better.

Let us all make this world a place where we can lean on each other, find comfort and strength in each other, shower each other with love and light and be a safe space for each other to heal, recuperate and rebuild ourselves.

Ji-hyun and Jae-won are each other’s safe spaces. They found that with each other they could be themselves and shed the mask of pretence. They could heal their traumas and move forward in their life and make a new beginning full of hope, love and kindness.

4) Protection (Different kinds of Protection):-

Jae-won wants to protect Ji-hyun from the sadness and the darkness that he is already in and thus tries to keep away and ignore. But what he hasn't realised is the moments that he considers would scar Ji-hyun and torment him for life are the exact moments that Ji-hyun cherishes the most (not the accident but the moments they spent together before).

Meanwhile, Ji-hyun wants to protect Jae-won from the evils of the world. He wants to heal him, cherish him and shower him with the all the love he has for him. He wants to protect Jae-won from the darkness that he is submerged in.

Jae-won makes Ji-hyun happy. No matter how hard Jae-won is trying to push Ji-hyun away, Ji-hyun has etched himself in Jae-won's heart.

Ji-hyun is ready to fight for his love, even if it means that he needs to pull back a little and give Jae-won a little space to realise how deep in love he is with Ji-hyun. They need each other’s protection to grow in love.

5) Fears:-

Jae-won is afraid of getting hurt and also hurting others. His past and its unhealed traumas are affecting his present relationships and friendships. The only solution he knows is to push people away and maintain a distance so as not to hurt himself and his loved ones. His fear is causing more harm than he can imagine. Ji-hyun assures Jae-won by saying that no matter how many times he pushes him away, no matter how many steps he takes back, he will be waiting for his hyung to return to him.

Ji-hyun is afraid of the big world. He fears what the big city has in store. He fears the change, the enormity of the world and everything new. His fears of the unknown cause him to remain in the shell. But watching Jae-won makes him want to fight his fears and face the world boldly.

6) Friendships:-

The different kinds of people in Jae-won and Ji-hyun’s life-

I am glad the makers of the drama showed how there are good and kind people in this world. The world may seem dark and hopeless but there are people out there who make us believe in the beauty that God has poured into this world. There is kindness, love and warmth in the world and we are witness to it in the form of the people around Ji-hyun and Jae-won.

The kind of people surrounding Ji-hyun are hopeful, joyful and full of life. They bring colour into Ji-hyun life. Ae-ri, Joon-pyo and his Boss from the restaurant give us the hope that there are beautiful people out there in the world. They are full of love and affection and their friendship is delightful to watch.

I am grateful that Jae-won always has Yoon-won by his side and vice versa. They are understanding, comforting and loving and always strive to uplift one another. They cheer for each other and are never judgemental.

7) Other elements:-

a) With Ji-hyun and Jae-won, it is the initial inclination towards each other. There is tension right from the beginning. You can see it exuding from them both. It was heart fluttering to see the strong chemistry.

b) The casual meet ups and flowing conversations between university students in the restaurants near the University. The cheerful conversations and the panic stricken conversations. These scenes are realistic. The inexpensive tiny restaurants turning into student hotspots is also highly relatable.

c) The dark ambience during the therapy sessions makes the conversations and the scenes more effective. It was beautifully incorporated.

d) There is change in Ji-hyun's personality after the near death experience. He becomes more confident. When you experience the worst in your life and are given a new chance at life, some people tend to become more optimistic in life. This change is necessary to show how when the dark phase passes, the bright life ahead makes you happy, lively, confident and cheerful.

e) The opening credits with the 8 turning into infinity. The underwater and surfing moments that appear on the screen through the names of the lead actors and the creators is my favourite. The opening credits along with the theme song is just perfection.

f) I love the OST and background score as well. The Indie rock genre music by Wetter has a retro feel to it.

The Characters and the Actors:-

Jae-won (Lim Ji-sub): Jae-won’s character is complicated. He is a bright boy stuck in the shackles of the past. He is kind, caring and loving. But the traumas of his past, the agony of his loss and the darkness in his mind and heart because of those troubles are not allowing him to accept the love that he deserves. He doesn’t want to pull his loved ones into the darkness he already is in. He doesn’t realise that instead he could be pulled into the brighter world. He needs to heal but he doesn’t have to do that alone. Ji-hyun is the support that Jae-won needs. Lim Ji-sub is remarkable in his portrayal of Jae-won. He has nailed every emotion and his performance is spectacular. I am in awe of Lim Ji-sub and his talent.

Ji-hyun (Oh Jun-taek): Ji-hyun is a boy next door. His personality is reserved and introverted but you can sense how lively and cheerful he is with how quickly he develops a bond with everyone he meets. He has fears but he also has the zeal to overcome them. The darkness of the world hasn’t touched him. He is full of love and he is ready to shower it on Jae-won. He is not the one to give up both in life and love. He is a fighter and is ready to fight to win his love back from Eun-ji and to win his life back after the accident. Oh-Jun-taek was born to be an actor. I still can’t wrap my head around the fact that he was cast from the streets. His acting feels like he’s been in the industry forever now. He is a natural talent. His dedication towards his character and the show is visible throughout and every scene he is in is pure magic.

Yoon-won (Lee Mi-ra): Lee Mi-ra and her portrayal of Yoon-won is special. Her personality is like a breath of fresh air. She is very kind and simple. The way she accepts the freshers right from the beginning and how caring she is towards them all, especially Ji-hyun, is heartwarming to watch and experience. Her breakdown scene in episode 7 is unbelievable. The way she holds back her tears and tries to assure herself to be positive but ultimately breaks down in Jae-won’s arms is very moving. It’s the mark of an exceptional actor.

Ae-ri and Joon-pyo: Ae-ri and Joon-pyo are the most beautiful human beings and friends. Their love for Ji-hyun is limitless and they are always full of energy and life. They have no secrets and are always ready to help each other. They are selfless, caring and kind towards Ji-hyun, which is everything the boy deserves. The trio and their bonding touch your heart. They give you friendship goals.

Ji-hyun’s Boss at the Restaurant (Jung Seo-in): The boss is one of the most positive characters of the show. She is giving and nurturing. She always wishes the best for Ji-hyun and has a lot of love for him. Ji-hyun is new to the big city of Seoul, but having someone like the boss take care of him and give him advice was like a blessing. She stands up for him in times of trouble and stands by him in times of need. Jung Seo-in proves with her performance that experience is incomparable. She is like water. She just seamlessly fit into her character and the show and her presence is the binding force.

Jang Young-joon and Park Hae-in are impressive in their roles as Tae-hyung and Eun-ji. Portraying characters with negative traits requires a lot of skill and courage. The two actors proved their worth with the terrific portrayal of their characters.

The Directors and Writers:-

Werner du Plessis and Baek Inu have done a splendid job with this drama. The Eighth Sense is probably one of the best Korean BL dramas that I have watched. They have worked so hard on everything and it shows. The cinematography, writing, concept, casting, editing, dialogues, locations, the message, meaning, lessons and the surfing and beach scenes are just out of this world. I am looking forward to more The Eighth Sense content and more projects from the Creators.

If I know what love is, it is because of you – Hermann Hesse.