The Devil's Plan: The Ultimate Korean Brainpower Reality Show
I love to spend my free time watching Korean reality shows and dramas in recent years. This is one of my ways to release stress in daily life. One day, I found this reality game show called “ The Devil’s Plan” on Netflix, and I still clearly remembered the feeling after watching the first episode. My brain totally exploded...
This show gathered 12 intelligent people, and made them compete for the final prize, which can be 5 hundred million Korean won(about 10 million NT dollars) to the maximum! We have professional poker player, Esports gamers, actors, doctor, lawyer, and even the idol(SEUNGKWAN from Seventeen) as contestants! They lived together for one weeks, playing social games, chess, board games, and card games. Everyone tried to survive and kill each other until there was only one remaining winner.
I think the most disgusting part of this show is that after the cruel competition during daytime, the survivors must cooperate at night for the “prize games.” If they pass the game or solve the puzzle, the final cash will increase 50 million or one hundred million dollars. It means that even someone betray you or kill your friends, you still need to cooperate with that person. It’s so interesting because it shows the reality of human’s mental struggle.
There are two contestants I admire the most. They both played against the devil face to face. The first one is the Korean inventor and actress, Lee Si-won. She’s smart, iron-willed and also emotional. She had been an “attacker” in the entire game, which is the aggressive game style I love the most. She formed an alliance with the strong players at the beginning and analyzed the situation quickly. When facing difficulty, she didn’t shrink back and chose to fight back every time. I thought she’s too crafty initially, as she sometimes deceive the enemies too well(cuz she’s an actress). But when the game continued, I found she never betrayed her allies and could even sacrifice a little to save them. And then I also started to be inspired by her courage and ultimate passion toward the game. Talking about emotional personality, she cried so hard every time her friends got eliminated, and it’s always a heartbroken moment for me.
My second favorite player is Ha Seok-jin. He’s a Korean actor who had been on the other brainpower show before. I think he might be the most intelligent and calmest man I have ever seen. He’s more like an “individualist” player. He considers the alliance is not that important and can be separated in different games, meaning there are no forever enemies or allies. I totally agree with his view because staying cool and hiding emotion is the way to win. Nevertheless, he still cried so hard after one of his closed allies died, showing the cruelness of this game.
At the end of the show, I finally understand what devil’s plan really is. It’s to make every palyers become devil. Force them to betray and lie to win the prize. But I think he failed. Everyone in this show tried their best to support each other through the hard time, and they forgave the allies who betrayed or beat them. When the players said, “It’s just a game. There must be a final winner. Don’t feel sorry about that,” I feel truly touched and warm. Yes, there must be a final survivor, but I believe when they hugged each other, showing their respect and love to the opponents, they beat the devil together.
My biggest character impression of Seok-jin is Ri Jeong-hyeok's brother in Crash Landing on You.
