I came to this short, suspenseful drama on Netflix a year and a half after it premiered, but for the saddest of reasons. Bloodhounds (2023) turned out to be the last Korean drama of the leading lady, Kim Sae Ron, whom I had watched in dramas and films since her childhood years; I was very fond of her and when I saw the recent news of her tragic death at only twenty-four years of age I sincerely grieved for her and her family.

I wanted to watch her last drama, which I had put off previously because action / gangster type stories are usually not my favorite narratives in K-Dramaland. However, I was determined to put aside my reservations and watch this drama and I am so glad I did: it was extremely addictive (especially the first six episodes!) and the chemistry between all the cast members was intense. There is going to be a season two later in 2025 and I will probably check that out, too, even though I am sure I will still be missing Kim Sae Ron's fascinating character in the sequel. RIP. What a fantastic, natural actress she was. So many fellow Korean actors loved her.

The Story:

In the year 2020, during the height of the COVID-19 worldwide epidemic, two young men in their twenties meet at a local boxing training school, soon becoming fast friends, as well as affectionate rivals in the practice ring and during local matches. They both have a great sense of humor and enjoy laughing together when they meet socially.

Student Kim Gun Woo (Woo Do Hwan, My Country: The New Age, Shut Up Flower Boy Band) lives with his widowed Mom, Yoon So Yeon (Yun Yoo Sun, Love Scout, Spring Waltz, Love Letter), who runs her own small cafe in the city to support them. However, her business is failing because of the pandemic; she resorts to dealing with a loan shark money-laundering outfit, ironically named Smile Capital, to help pay off her debts.

Smile Capital is run by an unethical, conniving CEO named Kim Myeong Gil (Park Sung Woong, Remember, Snowdrop). He sends his goons to threaten Gun Woo's Mom, including the notorious monster Kang In Bum (Tae Won Seock). Gun Woo defends his Mom very well because of his expert boxing skills and the goons run off in fear. Of course that raises the ire of the CEO Myeong Gil and he sets in motion plans to exact revenge.

Meanwhile Gun Woo's boxing friend, Hong Woo Jin (Lee Sang Ye, Youth Of May, Crash Course In Romance, To: Jenny), is under a lot of financial pressure too because of debts and so both friends decide to begin working for a kindly private financier named Choi Tae Ho (Heo Jun Ho, All In, Beautiful Mind, Hotelier) to make money quickly to pay off their debts. They hope that paying off the debts as quickly as possible will keep the notorious loan shark Myeong Gil off their backs permanently.

The good-hearted Tae Ho is impressed with the young men's athletic skills and knows those skills will likely come in handy in the work that he does, an ethical money loaning company which borders on charity, helping hurting people pay off debts in upright ways. He tries to help restore the people hurt by the evil loan shark Myeong Gil. He has a young daughter in her twenties named Kim Hyeon Ju (Kim Sae Ron, High School Love On, Can You Hear My Heart?, Heaven's Garden, The Queen's Classroom, classic Korean films A Brand New Life and The Man From Nowhere) who does a lot of the office work and also has rather sublime martial art skills too. The two boxing friends become quite impressed by Hyeon Ju the longer they work with her! They are all excellent at continuing to scare off Myeong Gil's goons. (All the fight scenes are amazing to watch; they must have used the best cameramen in the business for this drama!).

A partner in Smile Capital, who wants to keep his hands in the (often dirty) action, is Lee Du Yeong (long time favorite actor Ryu Soo Young in a supporting role). Part of Smile Capital's business is real estate ventures, and its success during the pandemic is aided and abetted in these financial real estate schemes by wealthy businessman Hong Min Beom (favorite cutie pie actor Choi Siwon in a cameo appearance) of a company called Lil Group. With so many businesses going bankrupt because of the pandemic there seems to be no end of desperate victims Smile Capital can rip off. In contrast the charitable Choi Tae Ho, through his own loan company and his dedicated workers, seeks to help Myeong Gil's many victims. Will his own life be at risk for helping them?

So in essence we have a good versus evil story in Bloodhounds. One man wants to destroy his victims by lending them money he knows they will not be able to pay back in any timely manner, and another man wants to help them recover from the harm his adversary inflicted on them. One man serves Satan and the other man serves God. Who will win in the end?

Watch the drama on Netflix and discover for yourself the intricacies of this suspenseful, well acted story. I will definitely miss Kim Sae Ron in the sequel. She was a fantastic actress!   

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