Series / The Glory

"I want you to wilt away slowly, over a long period of time. Let's slowly wilt and die together, Yeon-jin."

— Moon Dong-eun

The Glory (더 글로리) is a 2022 Korean Drama. Part 1 was released on Netflix on December 30, 2022. Part 2 released on March 10, 2023. It stars Song Hye-kyo as Moon Dong-eun.

18 years ago, Moon Dong-eun was horrifically bullied by a group of her classmates. After dropping out of high school, she decided to attain revenge against them, becoming the elementary school homeroom teacher of the bullies' leader's daughter. Recruiting Joo Yeo-jeong, a plastic surgeon, and Kang Hyeon-nam, a housekeeper, she puts her elaborate plan into motion by targeting her bullies' weaknesses.

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The Glory contains examples of:

• Achey Scars: Dong-eun's burn scars often itch when she is thinking about her revenge.
• Act of True Love: In the Finale, Dong-eun at long last tells Yeo-jeong the reason she ghosted him seven years ago. She knew his parents run the hospital where So-hee's body is being kept, and orchestrated their second meeting intending to befriend him and use him as another pawn in her revenge. After getting to know Yeo-jeong, however, Dong-eun began to like and empathize with him, so she couldn't bear to treat him as callously as she treats everyone else. This is why she suddenly broke off their friendship and disappeared from his life, even though doing so would leave a loose end in her otherwise carefully planned revenge. Yeo-jeong is smart enough to read between the lines and understand what this truly means.
• Aloof Dark-Haired Girl: Moon Dong-eun has become a beautiful woman as an adult with Yeo-jeong falling for her at first sight and even her former bullies acknowledging how pretty she is now. However, due to the terrible school violence she endured and living only for absolute revenge, she's quiet, distant, and reserved.
• And the Adventure Continues: The story ends with Dong-eun having achieved her revenge, studying architecture, and in a relationship with Yeo-jeong, with the couple having arranged Yeong-cheon to be transferred to a different prison and infiltrating it for Yeo-jeong to achieve his vengeance against Yeong-cheon with Dong-eun once again asking for Hyeon-nam's help.
• Best Served Cold: Dong-eun had no choice but to drop out of school at the age of 18 after her bullies horribly tormented her, burning her with a curling and clothes iron amongst other terrible things. She begins taking her revenge when she's 36, almost two decades later, having gotten her GED and went to study education to become a teacher in hopes that she would one day become Yeon-jin's child's teacher as part of her revenge.
• Bittersweet Ending: Though more sweet than bitter. All five of Dong-eun's former bullies see retribution: Sa-ra and Yeon-jin (and her mother) are in jail, Jae-joon and Myeong-o are dead, and Hye-jeong's voice has been permanently damaged. Dong-eun's mother has been committed to a mental facility, and thus won't be able to track Dong-eun down any longer. Do-yeon leaves for the UK with Ye-sol, giving a chance for the young girl to be raised in a healthier environment, and Hyeon-nam is now free of her abusive husband—although she has yet to reunite with her daughter. Dong-eun seems to be making good strides in moving on from her traumatic past, and is now helping Yeo-jeong get his revenge on his father's killer. However, it is never confirmed if Yeon-jin has been convicted of So-hee's murder as well, and with Jae-joon (her rapist) dead, it may mean that justice may not come for So-hee.
• Black-and-Grey Morality: The protagonists of the story are very willing to get their hands dirty to get revenge, doing things such as planting evidence, leaking slanderous information, and manipulating others to do their bidding. However, considering the fact that the antagonists are self-serving sociopathic bullies, they look like pure saints by sheer comparison.
• Blackmail Backfire: Invoked, this is how Hyeon-nam's husband is set up to be killed, Hyeon-nam gives him information to blackmail Yeon-jin's mother, knowing it'll likely end with his death.
• Broken Bird: Moon Dong-eun. A victim of severe school violence that physically and mentally scarred her and led her to live solely for revenge for the following seventeen years:
  Moon Dong-eun: (in response to Yeon-jin's threat) I'm so curious. What's going to happen? You've already broken my body and crushed my soul. So, what more can you do?
• Broken Pedestal: Ye-sol wanted to grow up to be a weathercaster like her mother Yeon-jin. When she learns of her mother's horrific crimes and bullying, she's rightfully furious and disgusted.
  Ye-sol: Go away. I don't want to be a weathercaster when I grow up.
• Cliffhanger: Part 1 ends with Episode 8, which at the end has Yeo-jeong find that So-hee's body is now missing and Do-yeong find Yeon-jin in Dong-eun's apartment.
• Colorblind Confusion: An unusual example of this trope. Yeon-jin's daughter Yi-seol is color blind, a fact that Yeon-jin is desperately trying to hide because it would reveal that Yeon-jin's husband Do-yeong isn't Yi-seol's biological father, Jae-joon is. (The show gets this right; any color-blind female must have a color-blind father, and Jae-joon is also color blind.)
• Covered with Scars: Dong-eun's arms and legs are covered in burn scars from the bullies burning her with a curling iron and clothing iron, causing her to wear clothing that covers most of her skin as an adult. She strips down to her underwear and shows Yeo-jeong them when disclosing to him why she wants revenge.
• Darker and Edgier: Writer Kim Eun-sook is more well-known for her fantastical romance stories, which feature plenty of humorous and heartfelt moments and pure-hearted or Jerk with a Heart of Gold protagonists. The Glory trades much of the romance for exploring the effects of corruption and abuse, all the while unraveling a complex revenge plot courtesy of its main protagonist. The characters are either antiheroic or unrepentant sociopaths, and there's plenty of violence, sexual content, swearing, and drug use to go along with the grittier tone.
• The Dog Bites Back: Once it's clear that Corrupt Cop Shin is no longer in a position of power, he's killed by his henchman who are fed up with his abuse and insults.
• Driven to Suicide: Dong-eun, having completed her revenge in the finale, attempts to jump off the roof. Thankfully, Yeo-jeong's mother talks her out of it and begs her to help her son exact his own revenge.
• Everyone Went to School Together: Justified, since the premise involves Dong-eun getting revenge on her school bullies. Even the boutique worker that we see in later episodes it's later revealed to be the girl that the bullies went after once Dong-eun drop out of school.
• Foreshadowing: Dong-eun learns that, in addition to being murdered by Yeon-jin, So-hee was pregnant (unquestionably by rape) when she was murdered. She decides that Myeong-o is the culprit, for good reason: he's forcefully kissed Dong-eun herself in the past, and is an all-around leery pervert. In one of their last phone calls together, Dong-eun says that he should be "torn limb from limb" for what he did. Myeong-o responds with confusion, which at first seems to be either due to her vague threat. Later, Dong-eun pieces together that it was actually Jae-joon, so Myeong-o's confusion was legitimate.
• For the Evulz: Yeo-jeong's father was killed by a serial killer mid-operation, despite being the only doctor who was willing to help him. Years later, he finally gets the killer to confess why: Yeo-jeong's father had told someone to let Yeo-jeong know to cancel their dinner together, which the killer found to be disrespectul. He murdered Yeo-jeong's father just to get Yeo-jeong there to see him.
• Framing the Guilty Party: Yeon-jin has Myeong-o's murder scene cleaned up and even has her skin under his fingernails removed. However Yeo-jeong takes a sample of skin from Yeon-jin and plants it on the corpse. It's taken to another level when it's revealed that he was still alive after Yeon-jin had attacked him and it was actually Gyeong-ran who killed him.
• Genre Mashup: The series is primarily a Revenge Thriller with elements of romance, Teen Drama, and domestic Melodrama. Part 2 adds Mystery Fiction and Conspiracy Thriller to its repertoire, as protagonists investigate the murders of Yoon So-hee and Son Myeong-Oh, while Yeon-jin tries to cover it up.
• Good Parents: In a universe where parents are at best uninvolved in their children’s life or at worst throw them under the bus, there are a few shining example of good parents in the series.
  • Yeo-jeong’s parents: Considering his determination to get revenge on his father's murder, and the way his father was described, he can be considered this along with his mom. Seeing her enjoyable interactions with her son and how supportive of his decisions she is, it's not surprising that compared to most of the wealthy characters, Yeo-jeong isn't as problematic as the wealthy bullies.
  • So-hee's mother: Downplayed in that their interactions aren’t shown. But considering her belief that So-hee couldn’t have committed suicide and how she continues to get justice for her death, it's implied that they had a healthy and loving mother-daughter relationship.
  • Hyeon-nam: Not only does she try to protect her daughter from her abusive husband, but she's willing to work with Dong-eun to send her daughter to the USA out of safety and for a better life, even if it means not being able to her ever again or at least for a long time. She even went as far as to buy time for her daughter’s escape.
  • Do-young: Before and after knowing Ye-sol isn’t his biological daughter, he's always prioritized Ye-sol's well-being, even moving to another country to help her recover from the trauma caused by Yeon-jin and her biological father. From going to her soccer games to attending her class observation, his love for her is strong.
• The Heavy: Dong-eun's deranged mother is a major enemy for most of the series, causing the most trouble and interference in her plans and even allowing the bullies to get one over her once more. Once Dong-eun checks her into mental facility, her revenge goes off practically without a hitch.
• Hotter and Sexier: A sex scene, a brief fellatio scene, a brief masturbation scene, Toplessness from the Back, and toplessness from the front. The Glory is far more sexually explicit than most Korean dramas, mainly because it was produced by Netflix instead of a Korean television channel.
• A House Divided: The bullies are rather too quick to turn on each other to save their own skin once it's clear Dong-eun will not stop in her revenge.
• Implied Rape: While Dong-eun was sexually abused by Jae-joon and Myeong-oh in the past, the latter force kissing her and the two forcing her to stand in the rain to ogle her, it is ambiguous if they went any further then that. Especially since the two are rapists.
• Lady and Knight: Dong-eun becomes the Dark Lady to Yeo-jeong's Dark Knight when she tells him about her revenge and he decides to become her headsman and join her in her sword dance, asking her who he should kill first. The finale reverses the roles, with Dong-eun becoming the Dark Knight to Yeo-jeong's Dark Lord, helping him exact his own revenge.
• Laser-Guided Karma: The fates for all the bullies:
  • Myeong-oh, whose brutish nature caused him to bully those under him as he was the lowest in the hierarchy of the bullies, was actually killed not by Yeon-jin when he tried to blackmail her, but Gyeong-ran, who he had sexually assaulted and bullied for years after Dong-eun.
  • Sa-ra, who used her hands for her art and to do drugs, uses her hand to stab Hye-jeong in the neck with a pencil in her hair in a fit of rage, leading her to go to prison for aggravated assault and attempted murder at the top of suffering the painful effects of drug withdrawal. Her parents effectively abandoned her as well.
  • Hye-jeong, who often laughed at Dong-eun's misfortune and sought to marry into a rich family, loses her voice after Sa-ra stabs her in the neck for also laughing at her, irreparably damaging her vocal cords, and rendering her as damaged goods.
  • Jae-joon, whose color blindness is a deep insecurity for himself, goes blind from Hye-jeong switching his glaucoma eye drops for cleaner fluid while driving and has his car crashed into by a truck, shortly before being pushed to his death by Do-yeon, the father of Jae-joon's biological daughter who he repeatedly tried to undermine.
  • And finally Yeon-jin, who arrogantly saw Dong-eun as being beneath her and mocked her, is reduced to spending the rest of her life in prison with her status lost, estranged from her daughter who now rightfully despises her, her mother in the same prison as her but their relationship destroyed due of her mother throwing her off the bus, pathetically doing weather forecasts for her fellow inmates, and never knowing that she was imprisoned for a crime she technically didn't commit with Dong-eun having the last laugh.
• Luke, I Am Your Father: Ye-sol's color blindness, which Yeon-jin has been hiding from Do-yeong, clues Dong-eun into the possibility that Ye-sol's biological father is Jae-joon, who violently hated whenever his color blindness was brought up. A DNA test using Ye-sol's toothbrush and Jae-joon's hair she gets through Myeong-oh confirms it, with Dong-eun sending Jae-joon the test results.
• Mama Bear:
  • Yeon-jin is a zigzagged example. Upon finding out Dong-eun is her daughter's homeroom teacher she threatens to kill her if she so much as touches a hair on Ye-sol's head, which obviously doesn't work. However, there are times when she clearly cares more about herself than her daughter, such as when she has the nerve to complain about Do-yeon arguing with her rather than the fact that Ye-sol was just exposed to Jae-joon's barbaric violence.
  • Hyeon-nam is a much more straightforward example, who does everything she can to keep her daughter far away from her abusive husband, and when Yeon-jin tries to threaten her, Hyeon-nam has none of it and slaps the bitch twice.
• Meet Cute: Happens with Dong-eun and Yeo-jeong when their hands meet. It leads to Yeo-jeong awkwardly trying to treat Dong-eun’s injury. Despite Dong-eun leaving after Yeo-jeong saw her scars, it left an impression on him.
• Mood-Swinger: Yeo-jeong goes through a veritable rollercoaster of emotions when Dong-eun, the love of his life who ghosted him seven years ago, sends him a text message out of the blue. It's only after he's completely freaked out that he actually reads her message.
  Yeo-jeong: (sees the text notification; goes wide-eyed) Whoah! Whoah!!
  (Yeo-jeong tosses his phone in surprise and jumps off his chair, startling everyone present; the phone is caught by his colleague)
  Doctor: (catches phone) What the...?
  Yeo-jeong: (freaking out) I think my phone's broken! There's no way she texted back after seven, eight years!
  (starts pacing back-and-forth) We did ran into each other once, yeah. But still, she replied?
  (gets a grip) Maybe I looked cool that day. (smugly) Oh, I see. That's right. I did. (laughs gleefully)
  Doctor: Is Dong-eun married or not?
  Yeo-jeong: (snaps at him) Hey, don't read that!
  (beat, grows worried as he realizes what was asked) Why? What did she say? (in full-blown panic) Is it a wedding invitation? Is she getting married? To whom?!
  (cheers up and triumphantly claps his hands) She's getting a divorce, right?
  (face falls in despair) Or is it a remarriage?
  Doctor: (stares at Yeo-jeong, nonplussed) Is it? She wants to know what Cialis is.
  Yeo-jeong: (stares blankly, then grabs his phone to finally read the message)
• Mistreatment-Induced Betrayal: Sick of being little more than slaves to Yeon-jin, Jae-joon, and Sa-ra; Myeong-oh and Hye-jeong are the first to turn on the former three.
• Never Suicide: Before Dong-eun, there was this girl named So-hee who was a victim of Yeon-jin and her gang before apparently jumping of the school building . Her mother never believed it was a actually suicide and she was indeed right: turns out So-hee was pushed after being set on fire by Yeon-jin.
• Revenge is Sweet: Dong-eun makes no bones at how she absolutely relishes in making her bullies' lives pure hell.
• Scars Are Forever: Dong-eun's burn scars throughout her body are still noticeable almost two decades later, with them sometimes burning or itching during moments of emotional distress.
• Sexy Soaked Shirt: Extremely unsexy and played for Fan Disservice. One flashback shows the boys that abused Dong-eun forcing her to stand outside in the pouring rain, wearing her white cotton school uniform shirt. Once the shirt soaks through, they make crass comments about how big her breasts are.
• Shut Up, Hannibal!: Dong-eun doesn't even flinch at the threats thrown her way. When Sa-ra claims she's forgiven by God for her acts and will go to heaven after death, Dong-eun's fine with that... because she plans on making Sa-ra's time on the mortal plane hell.
• Too Good for This Sinful Earth: Considering how traumatized Yeo-jeong was with his death, to his mom describing how he was willing to treat a criminal who committed the worst crimes, Yeo-jeong’s father ended up dying unfortunately. He was described as dedicated to his oath to help others, but ended up paying an unfortunate price. Considering how he was remembered by his loved ones, and how far Yeo-jeong is willing to go to commit revenge is enough for his dad to fit this trope.
• Villains Want Mercy: When Hye-jeong finds out Dong-eun knows her future mother-in-law she kneels and begs her to spare her, pleading with her to not contact her. When it doesn't work and Dong-eun tells her that she had her phone all along, she blackmails Hye-jeong into reporting Myeong-o as a missing person.
• Weaponized Allergy: The first victim of Dong-eun's plot, the homeroom teacher who ignored the bullying she suffered and abused her himself, is killed by filling a room with flowers that give him an asthma attack.
• Would Hit a Girl:
  • Myung-oh would do harm to Dong-eun as much as the girls, to the point of sexually assaulting her.
  • As a adult, Jae-joon is very abusive to the women he is involved with, such as when he aggressively pulls the hair of one of his flings and when he attacks Yeon-jin.