Nothing is going right for Yoon Seo-ha (Hellbound’s Kim Hyun-joo). At work, she’s hoping to be given her own full-time teaching role but is instead stuck ghostwriting books for the professor she assists while her colleagues get promoted ahead of her. At home, she has to deal with her husband’s cheating, which she’s discovered via the use of a private investigator. When she gets a call out of the blue from the police telling her an uncle she didn’t know existed had died, it doesn’t seem like things could get much worse.
Unfortunately, The Bequeathed – the latest K-drama from Train To Busan and Hellbound creator Yeon Sang-ho – is far from a fairytale. Much like Yeon’s previous work, this is a dark story that merges supernatural elements with the everyday to create something horrific. In this new limited series’ case, that means using the occult and shamanism to build terror while the characters seemingly try and match that ominousness with their own actions.
Seo-ha’s discovery of a previously unknown relative opens the floodgates for a bundle of revelations about her family to come out. As the sole living kin of the deceased man, she is now the inheritor of a burial ground that’s been handed down for generations, but, as is often the case, there are some who want to contest this move – like her half-brother Kim Yeong-ho (Ryu Kyung-soo), a jittery loner who crawls out of the woodwork looking like a nailed-on culprit for a series of grisly murders that start picking off people in Seo-ha’s life.
Of course, what seems obvious in episode one is slowly revealed to be far from the case, as you’d expect from a thriller series. The Bequeathed, though, doesn’t give you all that you’d be hoping for. After setting up an interesting, spooky premise, it fails to live up to its potential, quickly dropping into a very slow burn. A side plot that explores the working relationship between police officers Park Sang-min (Park Byung-eun) and Choi Seong-joon (Park Hee-soon) could be used to add more tension to the script but feels forgotten about until a very rushed resolution in the series’ final episode.
The main focus of the show, meanwhile, is let down by muddy and convoluted storytelling that rips away the power from the eerie scene-setting in the first episode. Save for one shocking twist, everything is largely predictable, which leaves the horror being played out on screen feeling more like a balloon slowly, sadly leaking out air than one commanding your attention (and fear) with a sudden pop. Neither do the motivations of the characters feel like they’ve been developed enough – when Seo-ha is at the peak of her desperation, it’s hard to sympathise fully because of how quickly and illogically things have accelerated.
Yeon’s previous track record speaks for itself, and the concept behind this new series – which is based on the webtoon by Kang Tae-kyung – had all the promise of another success. Despite some strong performances from Park Hee-soon and Ryu Kyung-soo, though, The Bequeathed doesn’t come close to living up to the expectations around it.
The Bequeathed is available to stream exclusively on Netflix.
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