Goblin (Korean drama) : Korean fantasy romance drama about Dokkaebi

It is about the 'Dokkaebi' which was recently shown in Korea. The Dokkaebi is a Korean fantasy drama depicting the lonely and great god-Dokkaebi who has been through his sword for over a thousand years. In the English language, the ‘Dokkaebi’ is called the ‘goblin’, so I put the title of this article like that. But, in fact, the ‘goblin’ is a lot of wrong translations. This is because Dokkaebi are not monsters like goblins or evil objects, but almost like gods. They are portrayed as human beings with the ability to see the future of man, have special powers, and be big, powerful and handsome male human beings. In some provinces, Dokkaebi believes and worships as a god bringing riches. From this point of view, Dokkaebi can be defined as ‘demigod’.

The 'Dokkaebi' is a romance genre for the bride of Dokkaebi and Dokkaebi which is a combination of the elements of Korean demigod like above. The plot is as follows. The main character, Eun-tak, was listed on the list of the ‘Jeoseung Saja’ who manages the soul of the dead under the command of God and was destined to die when she was a baby, but fortunately she saved her life by Dokkaebi his name is Sin. In the aftermath of that, however, she will see the soul of the dead from that day and live a hard life. So a few years later, she meets again with Sin and by chance she finds out that she is a bride of Dokkaebi. Also, Sin realizes that Eun-tak, who is the bride of Dokkaebi can pull a sword through his breast and free himself from his immortal life. But he loves her and she loves him, He is worried about achieving what he has ever wanted to give up his immortal life and leaving him without a sword to live with her. On the other hand, Sin accidentally realizes that Jeoseung Saja who was living with him was a person who had a bad connection with him during his days as a human being before he became a Dokkaebi. Because of this, various events and conflicts will continue to evolve.

The 'Dokkaebi' crosses the past(Goryeo Dynasty, 918-1392), the time when he was not Dokkaebi, and the present(2016), the past 1000 years. Through this, viewers will be able to know, or guess, that Jeoseung Saja was the King of Goryeo, Sunny was the lover of the Jeoseung Saja and was the sister of Sin.

This drama introduces not only the existence of 'Dokkaebi' but also various unreal characters such as ‘Jeoseung Saja', 'Samsin', and ‘Creator deity’. For reference, 'Samsin' is a god who presides the children to be born and controls the fate, and ‘Jeoseung Saja' is a creature created by God to manage human death. Also, the God who comes out of the drama is the setting of monotheism, and according to the religions in the world, each name is different, but eventually it is set as one existence.

In addition, it also has a Buddhist element. This is the idea of Buddhism's reincarnation. In the drama, Jeoseung Saja takes the dead soul and gives the water of oblivion to describe the setting that the soul can reincarnate to live the next life and get the chance to live four lives in total. There is a soul in the first life, and there is a soul already in the past. For reference, Eun-tak was the first life, and another character, Sunny, lives the third life.

In the latter part of the drama, the villain that was opposed to Dokkaebi in the Goryeo Dynasty is revealed to the modern world again, causing a bigger conflict in the story and the story will be excited. The ending was bittersweet, but I enjoyed it because of the acting that causes the actors to laugh and the fantasy elements of the 'Dokkaebi’ only.

In this drama, actors such as Gong-yoo (Dokkaebi, Sin Kim), Go-eun Kim (Eun-tak Ji), Dong-wook Lee (Jeoseung Saja, Yeo Wang) and In-na Yoo (Sunny) participated.