[First Impression] Ghost Doctor

We’re only two weeks into 2022 and it has been a TOUGH year. How do people get productive when Christmas just left and Chinese New Year is right around the corner?! My last two brain cells are exhausted for doing nothing and eating everything. JTTW.

When productivity level goes down, where do we turn to? Dramas. Netflix options were boring. Hence, I signed up for an iQiyi account to watch Ghost Doctor. I’ve only seen the pilot episode.

Premise

Professor Cha Yeong Min is thoracic surgeon. Twelve years after he performed a successful operation during his internship, he worked at Eun Sang University Hospital as one of the best surgeons in his field. Go Seung Tak is a carefree, textbook-smart chaebol doctor and the heir to the hospital where Yeong Min works. Entangled in the inevitable company politics, Yeong Min was forced to mentor Seung Tak. Upon finding out that Seung Tak doesn’t measure up to his expectations in the operating room, Yeong Min went out of his way to give Seung Tak a hard time at work.

After overworking himself in the operating room, Yeong Min got into a car accident. His unconscious body was taken to Eun Sang University Hospital. Yeong Min’s spirit followed his body the whole time and realized he needed a surgery. He was aware that people do not see him. Yet, he yelled instructions on what to do, anyway. Upon finding out the only doctor who can operate on him was Seung Tak, Yeong Min was hysterical.

Yeong Min’s spirit accidentally possessed Seung Tak’s body in the operating room.

First Impression

Acting

• Rain played Cha Yeong Min. He seemed to have a bad temper in every drama I’ve seen him in. I’ve only seen him in romcoms but I’m not surprised when he portrayed the role well. Also, side note, he aged so well. YASSS!
  
• Kim Beom played Seung Tak. I’ve seen a few of his dramas throughout the years. I don’t remember the titles now except for Boys Over Flowers. I watched him as a villain, a student and now, a doctor. His cheeky persona in the drama suited him well. I’m impressed at the variety of roles he played and his versatility as an actor. He does it so well.

Accidentally possessing a body isn’t really something out of the ordinary. However, Rain and Kim Beom made the characters compelling. Am I biased? Obviously! They’re great actors and have chemistry on-screen.

Characters

While there is already a glimpse of the villains in the story, I’m going to skip that as there were insufficient screen times of them for me to review. I’ll just focus on the main leads.

• Cha Yeong Min is a practical person. Everything around him are just numbers. Death doesn’t faze him anymore. If there’s only a little hope of someone surviving or a surgery would lead to a lower quality of life, he’s quick to just accept a patient’s death. At times, it’s borderline heartless. My favorite thing about him was he couldn’t care less about people’s status. He picks people based on competence. I think this is the reason why Seung Tak seemed to have sparked some sort of insecurity in Yeong Min when he found out that Seung Tak has deep knowledge in the field. Yeong Min was hellbent on finding Seung Tak’s weaknesses and was very quick to bring it up and use it against Seung Tak such as practical medical skills and Seung Tak’s grandfather.
  
• Go Seung Tak is carefree. He tries to avoid responsibilities when he can and acts like the world is his oyster but that doesn’t mean he’s incompetent. In fact, he’s textbook smart. Based on brief flashbacks, he was traumatized for some reason. I like that he shows compassion to the sick and doesn’t seem to hold grudges. Despite being humiliated in front of the interns for his performance in the operating table by Yeong Min, he wasn’t malicious towards Yeong Min or anybody. In fact, he tries to charm people with all those smiles. He does use gifts to gain people’s favor, though. Kinda gross. Seung Tak knew Cha Yeong Min would be a tough person to deal with, so he did his assignment and looked him up. He tried and failed to flatter Yeong Min on their first meeting.

Cha Yeong Min and Go Seung Tak have so much room for character development.

Overall

This is a supernatural version of Detective Conan. Obviously, Cha Yeong Min’s spirit will possess Go Seung Tak’s body a couple more times to perform a surgery.

I’m very curious at the direction of the story. I have to say sometimes I find it difficult to follow the subtitles because of the medical terms I don’t understand. Nevertheless, I’m willing to overlook that as it has caught my attention and raised many questions.

Will Cha Yeong Min be in a coma? For how long? Does he eventually die? When Yeong Min did an operation as an intern, was he also possessed? How does he slowly warm up to Go Seung Tak? Obviously, he would at some point.

What is Go Seung Tak’s real motivation in life? Why in the world is he smiling all the time? It makes me curious what he’s hiding. It doesn’t necessarily mean he’s a bad person. For instance, he does seem to be scared of his grandfather. And then, what else? Does he eventually become a great surgeon or does he pursue another career?

It does seem like Seung Tak could hear Yeong Min. Everytime Yeong Min says stop or yells, Seung Tak stops. Plus, Seung Tak parrots things Yeong Min says.

I like that this made me ask questions and my mind has several branches of what-ifs. I kinda regret writing this down before going to bed. Now, my mind is awake. UGH.

Am I gonna watch this series? Absolutely. I’m looking forward to watching the plot unfold and the main characters’ development.