Sweet Home Season 2 Review: Sequel That Will Keep You Entertained From Beginning To End
Cast: Song Kang, Lee Jin-uk, Lee Si-young, Ko Min-si, Park Gyu-young, Yoo Oh-seon, Oh Jung-se, Kim Mu-yeol and Jin-young
Created By: Hong So-ri, Kim Hyung-min, Park So-jeong
Streaming Platform: Netflix
Filmyhype.com Ratings: 4/5 (four stars)
Sweet Home Season 2, the Korean drama-horror series based on the popular webtoon, is available on Netflix from December 1st. We offer you the review of Sweet Home Season 2, underlining how, in this case, compared to the first season, the action comes into play, a lot of action. Three years later (the first season was made available on the platform in 2020), Sweet Home Season 2 finally arrives on Netflix, the Korean horror series based on one of the most famous webtoons created by Kim Carnby and Hwang Young-chan. The TV series written by Hong So-ri, Kim Hyung-min, and Park So-jeong, as we will see in this review of Sweet Home Season 2, starts again and reinvents itself, taking up what the success of the first tranche of episodes had done but adding elements new, avoiding the risk of boring the viewer by repeating the same dynamics. There is no shortage of gore and extreme violence in this case too, the action component is even more marked than in the previous season, and the change of location, as we will see, allows us to focus everything on the most adrenaline-filled moments, dragging the viewer into a story that is still extremely engaging and well developed.
Sweet Home Season 2 Review: The Story Plot
The second season picks up exactly where the first one ended, and our characters abandon the dilapidated apartment building in which they had until then barricaded themselves to begin a completely different journey, towards salvation or towards horrors greater than those faced up to that point. On the one hand, we have Sang-wook (Lee Jin-Wook) and Hyun-soo (Song Kang), headed – for different reasons – to the Bamseom military base, where the government is looking for a vaccine for the disease that transforms human beings into monsters, on the other the rest of the survivors who loaded onto a pick-up by the army, are taken to the nearest shelter. Things will soon take an unexpected turn for the group, forcing them to fight again to survive.
What happens to Bamseom will then be the watershed for the season, which is narratively divided into two parts: the first is dedicated to what happens immediately after the escape from the condominium (therefore focused on the period immediately after the outbreak of the “epidemic”), the second instead it takes us a year after the events, in which we find many of the protagonists in a shelter organized inside a stadium. The temporal change allows the series, as well as introducing new characters, to address different themes, recalibrating the needs of the protagonists who now find themselves living in a world that has been devastated for much longer.
Cha Hyun-soo, compared to the first season, in which he was the character closed in his inner world, and who, in some way, regained sociality, precisely as a function of the apocalypse, now finds himself a prisoner. His special power is at the center of a real struggle for the eventual future of mankind. Will he be able to save himself and save? At the same time, his companions on the journey from the first season are put to the test by new clashes with monsters, but, in the new episodes, the condominium in the popular area of Seoul will no longer be at the center of the story, but rather the path towards presumed refuges and safety zones, which, in reality, hide something different and dramatic.
The mood of the story in Sweet Home Season 2 has changed. The first season had a slow start, which may have alienated some viewers, while fans of the webtoon will not have been put off by the pace of the first episodes. In this second season, with the precedent of ten previous episodes for season 1, we get straight to the point. The action is fast-paced and well-orchestrated. Cha Hyun-soo’s character is put even more at the center, even if he appears less on the screen, at least in the first episodes. But what is interesting is seeing everything that moves around his figure. We find ourselves in a story that, in some ways, recalls The Last of Us, but the Korean setting, and the fact that it is a story taken from a manga, highlights how we are playing in a field a little differently.
Sweet Home Season 2 Review and Analysis
The idea that Sweet Home could be a cross between The Last of Us and The Walking Dead isn’t enough. In this case, we must take into consideration a whole series of oriental references, such as Tokyo Ghoul, Devilman, or even Death Note, in some ways. The attention paid to the characters is high, as Robert Kirkman also did with his The Walking Dead, but in this case, it is the comparison with the dramas and fears of a different society such as the Korean one that is characterizing. The comparison with the aesthetics of individuals and with their own fears has produced Sweet Home which is a variant of the zombie apocalypse. In this case, the threatening protagonists of the series are the internal monsters of each individual, which contaminate in different ways, depending on the fears and insecurities of the person. This is a very interesting metaphor, and one that until now had not been proposed in apocalyptic and contagion stories.
In addition to the classic zombies, born from the brilliant mind of George A. Romero, in other narratives contagion has always been the result of a biological issue. While with Sweet Home there is a strong influence of manga like Devilman, and of stories based on the presence of monsters that are nothing more than an extension of the personality. For this reason, the reference is made to Death Note, and with shinigami. In Sweet Home, one has the impression that there are shinigami within each of us, capable of coming out, showing something of ourselves that, visually, we have never seen before, and which would be nothing more than an emanation of our personality.
Sweet Home Season 2, from this point of view, tries to go beyond the more existentialist and philosophical question and begins to propose a lot of action, and classic apocalyptic war situations. Everything is peppered with military sieges, political intrigues, and a city under siege. In some ways it seems like we are in 1997: Escape from New York by John Carpenter. But the Seoul that is presented in Sweet Home Season 2 is much more populated, perhaps more similar to the dynamics of The War of the Worlds. Above all, the migration of the surviving population, and the protagonists of the first season, led by Lee Eun-yoo, bring the imagination back to the version of The War of the Worlds with Tom Cruise as the protagonist. The directorial references seem to be there. And even the special effects, considering the high presence of monsters, appear to have improved compared to the first season.
Sweet Home Season 2 takes you straight to the meat of the story, and this time the pace is truly fast-paced. Not all types of action stories can have the right pace and be engaging. Sweet Home Season 2 manages to do this thanks to all the scaffolding of personalities and narrative plots introduced in the first season. We conclude this review of Sweet Home Season 2 by recommending watching these new episodes, which get to the heart of the narrative. And proposing, to those who have never heard of this Korean production until now, to approach the webtoon and the TV series, discovering an intriguing way of proposing an apocalyptic and contagious story. The Korean cinematographic, serial, and editorial genre is shining a new light on themes already seen and revisited in Western stories. And this cannot fail to be a way to move forward, also remembering where it all started.
Sweet Home is a series that exploits in its premises some of the most typical elements of zombie stories (even though it is not strictly a story of this type) but evolves into something unique and original. The first reference that comes to mind after watching this second season is the recent The Last of Us, in which mankind faces similar problems and is looking for a cure. What is striking about this story, however, is the characterization of the “zombies”, the bloodthirsty monsters that populate Korea: each of them is different and their characteristics depend in part on what happened to them in life, on the traumas and difficulties that he faced (which allows us to address issues such as bullying and depression in younger people). It is the ” lore ” created around the creatures that makes this product interesting and captures the viewer, the hope is that in the next season, it will be given even more space.
Sweet Home Season 2 perhaps disappoints a little in its ending, which seems to be set exclusively according to the next tranche of episodes: there are still many unanswered questions, and the viewer is more confused than satisfied with what has unfolded before him throughout the eight episodes this season. The biggest conflict will probably happen in Sweet Home 3, the season we leave behind, however, does not work on its own as much as it should, ending in a rather anticlimactic way. The hope is that we won’t have to wait another three years to find out how this story continues.
Sweet Home Season 2 Review: The Last Words
Sweet Home Season 2 focuses entirely on the action component, dragging the viewer into a bloody adventure. Too bad for a decidedly anticlimactic ending and a slightly fluctuating pace. Sweet Home Season 2 is a second season that gets straight into the action and tries to make dynamic all the psychological insights done on the characters in the first season. The season is full of action and suspense, and it will keep you on the edge of your seat. The monsters are terrifying, and the action sequences are well-choreographed. The special effects are also impressive, and they help to bring the monsters to life. Overall, Sweet Home Season 2 is a thrilling and suspenseful sequel that will keep you entertained from beginning to end.
Sweet Home Season 2 Review: Sequel That Will Keep You Entertained From Beginning To End - Filmyhype
Director: Hong So-ri, Kim Hyung-min, Park So-jeong
Date Created: 2023-12-01 16:04
4
Pros
- The action sequences are well-choreographed and exciting.
- The special effects are impressive and help to bring the monsters to life.
- The characters are well-developed and relatable.
- The season explores themes of survival, hope, and humanity.
Cons
- The pacing can be a bit slow at times.
- The ending is a bit ambiguous.
