*Contains spoilers.
4.4/5 Stars (So far!)
South Korea has struck again with a humorous, cute, quirky new lawyer drama Extraordinary Lawyer Woo! The Netflix and ENA series premiered on June 29 and June 30 with relatively low viewership ratings, but bounced back to 1.805% nationally, good for 4th place, according to Nielsen Korea.
Extraordinary Lawyer Woo tells a story about a young woman, Woo Young Woo (Park Eun Bin The King's Affection 2021), diagnosed with autistic spectrum disorder (ASD). Woo Young Woo is a genius and never forgets what she sees, but lacks social skills and empathy. She braves the prejudice and irrationality due to her disorder as a new trainee lawyer at a top law firm. As she navigates office politics, she befriends co-workers and gains their trust with her own unique style as she works on solving her own cases from a unique perspective.
Our Perspective
We find this drama to be very entertaining and at times, emotional, as we experience the discrimination and trials of a working professional who is mentally handicapped. Park Eun Bin has done an incredible amount of research and practice as she prepared for this role as an autistic person! The cute and quirky scenes in this drama are hilarious, most notably, the revolving door scene at Woo Young Woo's office building!
We want to bring to light South Korea's battle with the physically and mentally disabled marginalized community. In such a highly competitive country with few natural resources, like South Korea, personal development and skill are necessary to get an edge over the competition and to survive. South Koreans place extreme importance on education and technical skills. Along with social standing and family background, this is what gives a person an advantage in society. Therefore, when the disabled are often overlooked, it causes a rift in a society that respects the elderly but looks the other way in the treatment of those born less fortunate. The Koreans times recently made a very informative documentary about this very issue.
Our team at Dojeon Media is so excited that this drama gives power and understanding to those with disabilities and shines a light on how people should treat and accept those who are different from themselves!
Let us know your thoughts about this drama! How do you feel about the treatment of the disabled in South Korea?
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