‘Hello Monster’ was a ratings underdog. It aired against heavy hitters and struggled to gain a massive live audience. How did ‘Remember You’ do differently?
What Was The Original Plot?
Genius profiler Lee Hyun returns home to Korea after something from a case triggers a memory he thought he had lost forever.
One of his team members, Detective Cha Ji-an, has been investigating him for some time.
She is aware that his father was murdered and his brother disappeared under mysterious circumstances involving a criminal named Lee Joon Young, whom they both want found and incarcerated.
Each seeks to unravel the other, unaware that they’ve been drawn into a dangerous game of cat and mouse. Both truth and evil are closer and far more twisted than they think.
The Modifications on Tanwa
Remember You, has modified the story slightly to generate more suspicions about the genius profiler Tanwa. He graduated in criminology and displays traits similar to the murderer. While Hello Monster is more clear-cut about his motives and his background story when he was young, Remember You is more focused on the suspense and mystery elements of the crime drama.
It makes the introduction to the story and characters a little hazy, making the audience stand in the shoes of the police, who harbour doubts about the trustworthiness of the profiler. This is not necessarily bad. On one side, the audience feels as engaged as the police officers in the drama, while on the other, it makes the drama less appealing than the original Hello Monster.
The Colour Palette and Tone of Remember You
Hello Monster is more bubbly with occasional humour. Remember You seems to have completely stripped off the funny scenes. Instead, the whole story becomes more like a serious crime investigation drama, which reflects the severity of the serial murders.
The sombre tone is especially apparent in the colour grading of the drama. ‘Remember you’ is given a blue colour grading treatment. It symbolises cold and isolation. Hello Monster has an orange-yellow colour grading treatment, which symbolises warmth and joy. As a result, most of the scenes in Remember You look relatively more solemn and sinister.
Dialogues and Ideas
Remember You, has kept the key scenes of the drama. Not the key lines in the original script that convey the drama’s charm. One of these key lines in Hello Monster was said by a murderer, Joon-young (Pathomkarn in Remember You). It was about how others’ perception of someone can shape the development of that person. Another key line was Lee Hyun’s father (Tanwa’s father in Remember You). He blurts out that he wanted to protect him from the world, and also the world from him.
Without key lines like these, Remember You is unable to build up how Pathomkarn sows the seeds of distrust between young Tanwa and his father, who has taken extreme actions to “save” his son. This ultimately results in a weak foundation for the drama.
Is Remember You A Bad Drama?
Certainly not. It may be a bad adaptation of Hello Monster, but not a bad drama itself. It caters better to fans of the serious mystery crime genre. I definitely recommend watching the drama!
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