“Man to Man” (맨투맨)

By Jae-Ha Kim
jaehakim.com
June 6, 2021

Kim Seol-Woo (played by Park Hae-Jin)
Cha Do-Ha (played by Kim Min-Jung)
↑Note: Korean names denote the surname followed by the given name.

An espionage thriller with comedy and romance, “Man to Man” is a fun K-Drama with great action scenes and a warm bromance. But the romance between a skilled ghost agent and the manager of a top Korean action star is tepid and forced.

Park Hae-Jin is charming and handsome as Seol-Woo — an elite undercover agent known as K in South Korea’s National Intelligence Service (NIS). His latest mission is to work covertly as a movie star’s bodyguard, so that he can infiltrate a party and steal a valuable small statue that the NIS needs to close a case. The job should take a couple weeks tops. But thanks to mishaps beyond his control, he is tasked with staying undercover for longer.

The problem is that tackling missions while working for a high-profile client puts his anonymity in jeopardy. It’s difficult to be an invisible ghost agent when so many people have commented on his celebrity-caliber looks.

Kim Min-Jung portrays Do-Ha, a plain Jane manager who’s also her client’s No. 1 fangirl. Of course, Do-Ha will fall in love with Seol-Woo, who can be cold in real life, but charming when he pretends. Unfortunately, as their romance turns real, viewers are left wondering why he’s attracted to her. I’m not talking about looks. It’s clear the stylists were ordered to make Kim appear as ordinary as they could. But her character is annoying more than anything else. And it’s a shame, because Kim is a superb actress (watch her in “Mr. Sunshine” and see how versatile and talented she is when given a meaty role).

The heart of the story is the camaraderie between Seol-Woo and Woon-Gwang (Park Sung-Woong), whose Dark Death character made him a burgeoning superstar in Hollywood, as well as a national hero Korea. The way he refers to Seol-Woo as brother and looks out for him — even using his former stuntman skills to fight foes with him — added warm moments that were fun to watch. Their scenes were authentic, even in the most ludicrous situations, and I always looked forward to watching them bicker.

There are some subplots that didn’t go the way I had hoped. A former NIS agent with ties to both Woon-Gwang and a murderous chaebol had a storyline that went one way and then ended in an extremely unsatisfactory way.

As for the ending, it was hopefully ambiguous. In other words, it ended the way many K-Dramas do.

Airdates: Sixteen hour-long episodes aired from April 21 to June 10, 2017 on JTBC.

Family Night K-Dramas: During this pandemic, my family began watching Korean dramas together every night after dinner. Of course, I had been enjoying them by myself for years. #SonOfJae never really showed an interest in Korean dramas … until this year. It was interesting to see how quickly both my husband and our son got hooked once they started. There are a few restrictions: our middle schooler prefers K-Dramas full of taekwondo and fights. So, that limited our options.

FYI: Back in the days of the late-great DramaFever, I loved watching their programming on our television. Viki used to allow this as well, but they’ve since removed their app from Samsung televisions, which is a bummer.

So, for our family viewing, I started them off on K-Dramas I liked that were on Netflix, since we wanted to watch the shows on TV and not hover over a small tablet. “The Uncanny Counter” was a big hit all around. We all loved the plot and the action! Next up were “Itaewon Class,” “K2,” “Vagabond” “Vincenzo,” “Memories of the Alhambra” and then “Man to Man.” Up next? “Healer” on KOCOWA. I know my child is going to love this one.

Spoiler Alert: Chae Jung-An plays Mi-Eun — Woon-Gwang’s ex-girlfriend who broke up with him after he suffered a near-death car accident while filming a movie. Shortly afterwards, the former Miss Korea married Mo Seung-Jae (Yeon Jung-Hoon), the power-hungry grandson of one of Korea’s richest men. I was expecting some kind of backstory as to why she abruptly left Woon-Gwang for Seung-Jae. I had hypothesized that she broken off the relationship because Seung-Jae — who had ordered the hit on Woon-Gwang — would leave him alone if he had her all to himself. Nope. Turns out she had been recruited by the NIS and her assignment was to seduce Seung-Jae. Since she spends most of the series helping the NIS find ways to bring her husband down, I thought she hated him. But at the end of the series when he acquiesces to her request for a divorce, she ends up tearing up the papers. And it’s clear they do love each other … for real.

I had also assumed that Jae-Young — her young son — had been fathered by Woon-Gwang, who seemed to be especially protective of the child. But, apparently not? I don’t know. The whole thing was confusing.

The ending showed Agent K sipping an espresso at a quaint cafe in Hungary. Do-Ha was able to track him through a GPS-enhanced spy coin he had left for her. When it stops blipping his location, she smiles. I took this to mean that he was coming back home to her. But my husband and son theorized that this meant his new mission had started and he was going off the grid for a while (i.e. he didn’t want her to track him and potentially endanger her).

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