Series / The Good Detective

The Good Detective is a South Korean television series. The first 16-episode season ran in July and August of 2020, and the second one ran two years later.

In 2015, a man named Lee Dae-chul is arrested for the murder of a young woman, Yoon Ji-sun. He protests his innocence, but is convicted and sentenced to death, leaving his daughter Lee Eun-hye alone.

Cut forward five years. Kang Do-chang, the detective who caught Dae-chul, is now an 18-year veteran of the police force, a steady if not brilliant investigator who is frustrated because he hasn't gotten a promotion. He is partnered up with a new arrival at the station, Oh Ji-hyuk. Oh is a fiery young hotshot who contrasts vividly with the phlegmatic Kang. He is also is keeping some secrets, like the mystery of how he can afford an $800,000 watch.

South Korea still practices the death penalty and the execution of Dae-chul is now imminent. The cops get weird reports of bodies that are said to be dumped in locations that actually match the Lee Dae-chul crime scenes. Then they get a missing person report: it seems that Dae-chul's daughter Lee Eun-hye is missing. That is followed by a strange man, Park Gun-ho, who walks into the squad room and says that he killed Eun-hye.

Gun-ho is being taken away to face a murder charge when Kang and Oh show up with Eun-hye, who is very much alive. It turns out that the two of them committed a hoax in order to focus public attention on Eun-hye's father, whom they claim is innocent.

Meanwhile, a reporter, Jin Seo-kyung, interviews the prosecutor in the Lee case, who is in prison thanks largely to her reporting. The prosecutor tells her a secret: that Lee Dae-chul actually is innocent, that he was framed, and the killer is still out there. Oh Ji-hyuk for his part has a strong hunch as to who the killer really is: his own cousin, crooked businessman Oh Jong-tae.

A second season ran in 2022. Do-chang and Ji-hyuk are still partners in the Violent Crimes Unit of the Incheon police. Ji-hyuk investigates the case of a woman, Kim Min-ji, who was beaten severely. However, higher-ups end his investigation and cover up the crime, because the suspect is Cheon Sang-woo, Vice President of business conglomerate TJ Group. Two years pass, and the big case in Korea is the White Gown Serial Murder case, in which a serial killer is murdering women who dress in white. Dressed in white, like Min-ji was when she was beaten within an inch of her life two years ago. Is Sang-woo the killer? Or does his sister Cheon Na-na know more than she's telling? Or maybe Na-na's husband Woo Tae-ho, who helped his brother-in-law get away with brutalizing Min-ji, has secrets of his own. And who killed Hee-joo, a member of the legal department at TJ Group? Was she one of the White Gown killer's victims?

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Tropes:

• Abandoned Area: An unfinished apartment building that is nothing but an empty concrete frame. Gun-ho is murdered there in episode 1.3, and several episodes later, Ji-hyuk is ambushed and nearly murdered there by Jong-tae.
• And the Adventure Continues: The first season ends with the cops chasing after a VIP baddie, after musing how they're going to get in trouble with the high command just like Kang always does.
• Blood-Splattered Wedding Dress: They aren't wedding dresses, but the same effect is produced whenever the White Gown serial killer dumps a blood-spattered corpse.
• Briefcase Full of Money: In episode 2.13, Ki-jin finds his payoff from Na-na: a briefcase full of money in the trunk of his car, instead of the bank transfer he was expecting. The briefcase full of money was caught by all the CCTV cameras. Na-na did this deliberately, so she would have leverage over him and he would be beholden to her.
• Buddy Cop Show: Kang and Oh, two detectives who re-investigate the Lee Dae-chul murders.
• The Bus Came Back: Oh Jong-tae, the main villain from Season 1, pops back up in episode 2.8. Na-na visits him in prison in hopes of getting incriminating information on Jong-tae's cousin, Ji-hyuk.
• The Butcher: Gi Dong-jae, a gangster and murderer in Season 2, who does criminal work for Sang-woo, who is called the Butcher" because among other things he's an actual butcher. When Dong-jae isn't assaulting women or flicking out a Sinister Switchblade, he's a caterer who arranges the meat for TJ Group functions.
• By the Hair: The second season opens with Cheon Sang-woo hitting a woman and then dragging her by the hair.
• Call-Back:
  • Early in the series Ji-hyuk found Jang Yu-na, a teenaged hooker acquaintance of Eun-hye, and put her up in a hotel in exchange for information. Seven episodes later corrupt Capt. Nam uses this incident to arrest Ji-hyuk on trumped-up rape charges.
  • In Season 2 Yu-na pops up again, still making bad life choices and still harassing Eun-hye and getting her in trouble. Her pimp returns as well, and hassles Eun-hye for money.
• Can't Hold His Liquor: Oh Ji-hyuk, who will pass out if he has so much as a single glass of alcohol. In a Season 1 episode he takes one drink and has to be whisked to the hospital. In episode 2.6 he visits Na-na in an attempt to get in her good graces. He winds up having to down a single whiskey shot. Bo-kyung brings him back to the police station, passed out cold.
• Contrived Coincidence: The whole business with Hee-joo's bloodstained clothing, which carries incriminating evidence, only happens because Grandpa Jung In-beom happens to be in the chicken restaurant when two hoodlums come in. The two hoodlums helpfully have a chat about how Dong-Jae did not kill Hee-joo, but he left evidence as to who did at his brother's place.
• Corrupt Corporate Executive: In the first episode of Season 2, Cheong Sung-dae of TJ Group is sentenced to seven years for bribery, corruption, and other examples of corporate malfeasance.
• Dirty Cop:
  • In Season 1, the cover-up and frame-up of Lee Dae-chul goes deep within the police force. Kang's rival, Captain Nam, rules the murder of Gun-ho a suicide despite the fact that Gun-ho also had a stab wound in the leg. (The official story is that Gun-ho somehow managed to spike himself on a piece of metal at the unfinished apartment building, before supposedly jumping to his death.). Then there's Chief Moon, who saw the video giving Lee an alibi back during the initial investigation, and kept it a secret.
  • Season 2 has Ki-jin, the Seoul cop who as it turns out is in the pocket of TJ Group and obstructs our heroes as they investigate the crimes of Sang-woo and Na-na.
• Distant Prologue:
  • The first few scenes of the first season show the Yoon investigation and Lee Dae-chul's arrest and conviction in 2015-2016, before jumping forward to 2020 to find Lee facing imminent execution.
  • The first scenes of the second season show higher-ups intervening to end Ji-hyuk's investigation of a beating. Then the action skips two years to the main story of the serial killer.
• Dramatic Drop: Jung Hui-joo's grandfather does this in episode 2.2, dropping his bag when Oh and Kang take him to the scene of her murder, and they find a brand-new corpse in the same spot.
• Dramatic Gun Cock: Detective Oh does this in episode 1.15, when Capt. Nam has wrestled away another detective's gun and is holding that detective hostage. Ji-hyuk dramatically cocks his revolver while telling Nam to drop his weapon. It works.
• Driven to Suicide:
  • A Season 1 flashback reveals that Ji-hyuk's mother, unable to bear the grief after Ji-hyuk's father was murdered, killed herself via an overdose of pills.
  • In Season 2 the same happens, as a flashback reveals that Na-na's mother, who evidently didn't enjoy life in the Cheon family very much, killed herself via an overdose of pills.
• Gilligan Cut: Seo-kyung is at a bar drowning her sorrows. Ji-hyuk joins her, and she teases him about his claim that if he has one drink of liquor, he'll die. He promptly smiles at her and downs a shot of her whiskey, and she says "It's a lie that you will die if you drink, isn't it? You seem fine." Cut to a shot of Ji-hyuk in an ambulance as Seo-kyung panics beside him. (Actually, he's just passed out.)
• Glasses Pull: Yoo Jung-seok, Jin's editor at the paper, has been conspiring with his brother the politician and Oh Jong-tae. After Jong-tae stabs and nearly kills his cousin Ji-hyuk, Jung-Seon calls him to bawl him out for being reckless. Jong-tae promises not to make "any more mistakes", but he doesn't promise not to kill his cousin. Jung-seok angrily whips his glasses off before hanging up the phone.
• Go-Karting with Bowser: Na-na and Ji-hyuk wind up meeting semi-regularly in Season 2, as she tries to pump him for info while he tries to provoke her into confessing. A couple of times they meet in a convenience store, and Na-na remarks on how much she's come to like convenience store ramen noodles.
• Good Cop/Bad Cop: In episode 1.2 Kang and Oh try this, with Kang breathing fire and murder if Gun-ho doesn't tell what happened to Eun-hye, while Oh restrains him. He gets a little carried away, and after they both leave the interview room Oh says "I can't believe you hit me."
• Gratuitous English: Michael Cha from TJ's rival McQueen has a habit of lapsing into English at random—or maybe it isn't random. In episode 2.14 Na-na calls him out, noting that he starts speaking in English when he's lying.
• Flashback: Many. In episode 1.4 Kang, who by now is convinced that Dae-chul didn't do it, remembers with shame how he bullied Dae-chul in interrogation back in 2015.
• Food Slap: In episode 2.4 Sung-gon, the killer, fakes amnesia during the interrogation. A disgusted Kang throws his water in Sung-gon's face.
• Hauled Before A Senate Subcommittee: Yoo Jeong-ryeol and Oh Jong-tae are both hauled before a government committee where they are grilled over the former granting the latter a lucrative real estate contract.
• Heel–Face Turn: Unlike Capt. Nam, Chief Moon has a conscience that's bothering him. After a confrontation with Eun-hee in which Moon drops to his knees to plead forgiveness about the frame-up that led to her father's execution, he switches sides and starts helping the good guys.
• Hidden in Plain Sight: One of the junior detectives has a "Eureka!" Moment and figures out that the areas where the White Gown victims disappeared all are close to stops on a particular bus route. However, the gang has looked through all the CCTV cameras of the buses and no one has stood out as being on the same buses as the murdered women. Finally, Ji-hyuk realizes that there's one person on all the camera footage that they weren't looking at: the bus driver. He's the killer.
• Internal Affairs:
  • In Season 1, Yoon Sang-mi from IA is investigating Kang, who may have played fast and loose with some cash. That situation is complicated by the fact that Sang-mi and Kang apparently once dated. Later it's shown that Sang-mi is part of the cover-up and is trying to stop Kang's re-investigation.
  • Later in that season, another IA team operating independently starts trying to nail Kang on trumped-up corruption charges. They get smacked down by a repentant Chief Moon.
• Intrepid Reporter: Jin, who put a prosecutor in jail and now has dedicated herself to discovering the real killer.
• Jack the Ripoff: Ki-jin has been under heavy pressure from his bosses in the Seoul PD to declare the White Gown case solved and Kim Hyung-bok the killer. So when a new body is discovered in episode 2.2 at the exact same spot where the White Gown killer dumped body #4, Ki-jin decides to run with the idea that it's a copycat, in an effort to save face. The media (summoned there by Detective Oh) isn't buying—but as it turns out he's right. Hee-joo's body was dumped there to make it look like she was a victim of the White Gown killer, but that gets short-circuited when the White Gown killer is caught and confesses to the other murders but denies killing Hee-joo.
• Jurisdiction Friction: A major plotline in Season 2 involves the Seoul CID, which had been investigating the White Gown case, butting heads with our heroes after the Incheon police find a new victim.
• Justice by Other Legal Means: Discussed Trope in the last episode of the first season, as Jong-tae is going to prison for the murder of Jung-seok. Ji-hyuk wonders if maybe Jong-tae didn't do it, if Jung-seok actually jumped off the bridge like Jong-tae claimed. Kang and Seo-kyung both say that they don't care, that Jong-tae killed Ji-sun five years ago and that's good enough for them. Ji-hyuk remains troubled but there's no evidence to contradict the guilty verdict. (In fact Ji-hyuk is right; Jung-seok jumped from the bridge after setting up Jong-tae to be arrested in a Thanatos Gambit.)
• Lady Drunk: Eun-hee, Kang's younger sister, who got out of a bad marriage and is desperately trying to reclaim her daughter from her ex-husband's custody. She is drunk all the time in Season 1, and in one scene, after an unsatisfactory meeting with a lawyer, Kang begs her not to get drunk during the day.
• Look Both Ways: Episode 2.1 ends with Ji-hyuk and Do-chang chasing Hyung-bok, a suspect in the White Gown killings. Hyung-bok seems to have evaded them when he's able to jump on his scooter, but he loses control and takes a spill in the street. He gets up in the middle of the intersection, looks back at the detectives in defiance, and is hit and killed by an oncoming truck.
• Miscarriage of Justice: Lee Dae-chul does in fact wind up being executed, in episode 1.8, for two murders that he didn't commit.
• Monochrome Past: The terrifying flashback in episode 2.5, where we see Sung-gon's father slit Laura's mother's throat while the two horrified children watch, is shown in black and white. See also Splash of Color below.
• Mood Whiplash: A moment of high comedy in episode 2.1 has the gang attempting to nab a ginseng thief, Kim Hyeong-bok, only for both suspect and police to wind up running for their lives from a rampaging wild boar. Finally the wild boar goes barreling into a stack of firewood, and the cops finally grab Hyeong-bok and subdue him—and the camera pans to show the dead body of another victim of the serial killer, mere feet away behind a bush, unseen.
• Murder by Inaction: Episode 2.13 finally reveals the truth of Na-na's mother's suicide. Na-na was not on a plane when it happened. In fact, she was right there, and she watched her mother down an overdose of pills and did nothing. Why? Because Na-na wanted to be part of the Cheon family and TJ Group, and her mother was an obstacle.
• No Romantic Resolution: The attraction between Seo-kyung and Ji-hyuk is a running theme throughout the show, but the series ends with them not becoming a couple, even though they're still flirting. And as it turns out the romance is never resolved, since Seo-kyung does not appear in Season 2.
• Not My Driver: The driver supposedly from the prosecution who takes Jin to and from the prison in episode 1.3, turns out to be the guy who just murdered Gun-ho.
• Old Cop, Young Cop: Kang the calm, quiet veteran detective, and Oh, his young, energetic new partner.
• Pixellation: Korean censorship rules don't allow unobscured shots of knives. So in scenes like the one in episode 1.3 where a killer is stalking Gun-ho, or when that same killer is using his knife to intimidate Jin, the knife is rendered blurry by pixellation.
• Post-Stress Overeating: Played for Drama. In episode 2.5 Na-na finds out that she will in fact be passed over for leadership of TJ, in favor of her brother. Tae-ho comes home to find his wife in near-hysterics, literally stuffing cakes into her mouth—and she is a diabetic.
• Power Hair: Na-na is an Ice Queen who is gunning for control of her family's enormous conglomerate, after her father was put in prison. She has the typical power hair short bob with sharp edges and ends.
• Punctuated! For! Emphasis!: In episode 1.15 Ji-hyuk stares down Capt. Nam when Nam has a gun to another detective's head. Ji-hyuk points his own weapon and says "Drop. The Gun." Capt. Nam drops the gun and surrenders.
• The Reveal:
  • Episode 1.8 reveals that Oh Jong-tae did in fact kill Yoon Ji-sun five years ago, but he did not kill Jang Jin-su, the detective.
  • The final episode of Season 1 reveals that Jung-seok actually did not kill Jin-su five years ago. Jin-su survived being whacked on the head by Jung-seok's rock, and he was regaining consciousness when his partner, Nam, strangled him to death. Nam realizes that there's no way out after he took a bribe to frame Lee Dae-chul, so he killed Jin-su to protect his own secret.
• Rooftop Confrontation: A non-violent version of this in Season 1, as Jin goes to the roof of the newspaper's building to yell at her boss, Editor Yoo, for spiking her story. Yoo is involved in the cover-up and is protecting his brother's political career.
• Secretly Wealthy: Oh is working as a detective but can afford a watch that costs eight hundred million won (about $800K). Episode 1.3 reveals that he comes from money and inherited a lot ("a lot more than the lottery") from his father.
• Sequel Non-Entity: Jin Seo-kyung the Intrepid Reporter, a major character in Season 1 who investigates the central mystery and who also has a flirty Will They or Won't They? relationship with Oh, does not appear in Season 2.
• Serial Killer: The second season deals with the White Gown serial killer case, that being a killer that only kills women dressed in white.
• Splash of Color: Episode 2.5 has a flashback scene in black-and-white. Sung-gon's maniacally jealous father comes in to find his wife putting on red lipstick—the lipstick is shown in color. The red lipstick is a Berserk Button for Sung-gon's father, who thinks his wife is cheating on him, and promptly slits her throat. The blood is also shown in red.
• Split Screen: Seen in episode 1.2 in a sequence where Kang and Oh, who have figured out that someone is using Gun-ho's credit card and believe that person to be Eun-hye, trace her to a bookstore and an Amusement Park and other locations.
• Split-Screen Phone Call: In episode 2.8, when Na-na is unsuccessfully pumping Ji-hyuk for information on the Hee-joo murder investigation.
• Thanatos Gambit: At the end of Season 1. Yoo Jung-seok knows that Oh Jong-tae got away with murder, and that there's nothing that can be done about it as Lee Dae-cheol has already been executed for that crime. Yoo himself has killed two people and is riddled with guilt. So he frames Jong-tae for his own death, attacking Jong-tae and then throwing himself off a bridge, after calling the police to the scene in advance. It works, as Jong-tae is arrested and convicted of Yoo's murder.
• Time-Passes Montage: In episode 2.3 as the six cops on the team watch over ten days worth of CCTV footage. Many noodles are eaten.
• Villain Opening Scene:
  • The first scene of the first season shows the killer throwing the body of Yoon Ji-sun into a river.
  • The first scene of the second season shows Cheon Sang-woo striking a woman and then dragging her by the hair. When his brother-in-law Woo Tae-ho shows up, the woman has been beaten half to death.
• Wham Episode: Episode 2.8, which throws a huge curveball by having Na-na kill her husband, Tae-ho, a major character, halfway through the season.
• What You Are in the Dark: Jung In-beom, Hee-joo's grieving grandfather, notes that Do-chang could have easily have written off Hee-joo as one of Seong-gon's victims, but instead chose to keep investigating the case.