episode 157

[ajk]

So this one had a theme: Kyun-hwon becomes a huge dick!

(click for full size)

“It’s been a long time. I left this city over forty years ago.” Nice opening. Quiet, contemplative, KH reflecting on his journey.

Choi was “one of Shilla’s three prodigies”? Who were the other two? Couldn’t find anything in English about this online. Hard to believe there are two more out there of his caliber.

■ Surabul is modern-day Kyungju. It was a city as grand and glamourous as its long history. Records indicate there were 178,936 households within the fortress, so the population is estimated at 800,000. Made up of a network of 1,360 roads, its size was nothing short of breathtaking. But now, this majestic capital of Shilla was being raided by Bekjae. It was a day of ultimate disgrace in its thousand-year history.

That is amazing. It must have been an incredible place.

KH made that comment about “General Shin is too soft” and it seemed awfully unkind. But then he started talking about looting the kingdom of “all goods and materials useful for our cultural and academic advancement” and you had the feeling that this might not be pretty…Still, taking some valuables from the palace isn’t entirely unexpected…

“I saw great failure and many deaths.” That Jimong guy is always SO annoying.

So Yaesul leads the troops in, and good heavens that was a staggering amount of killing. Most of those people weren’t resisting, they were just running for their lives in fear. And they were palace workers, hardly a threat to the big tough soldiers. Undoubtedly this is what happened in real history but at this point it starts to get surprising that KH is okay with it.

Wonderful scene at the king’s party, the bad news gradually filtering in and they try to make sense of it all. Very effective, the pace of it.

…And now KH is fine with the palace burning down? “You must burn down the old to rebuild the new.” Wow.

“Men, remove that screen!” Gee what a terrific hiding place. That’s all they could figure out to do for their king? No wonder the country fell apart.

“How could such a pathetic man be a king?” My thought exactly--it was disappointing, to see Shilla come to such a weak end. I wonder if any of this was dramatic license, or maybe a Bekjae-tinged historical record. History is written by the victor, that kind of thing. You would have hoped to see the king have a little bit of pride and spine at least. Personally I’d have loved it if the king told him to go back to his old barracks and return to his soldier duties. Too bad.

And now KH has him crawling on the floor, and then spits on him? Really? Early in the episode he said he isn’t the mercy/compassion type like WG is, and that’s believable…but this is seriously ugly stuff. We’ve never really seen him in this kind of situation before, fair enough…Maybe it’s driven by his disgust over his past and what’s happened to the country, like it’s become intensely personal…but still, he’s shown himself consistently to be a reasonably classy person, at least showing respect for adversaries.

But whatever, he sure had he glare working in this one.

[sageuk]

It’s not surprising the Silla king is making a pathetic display. For one thing, out of all the kings in the Later Three Kingdoms, he never went out in the battlefield and probably spent most of his life sheltered in the palace, so no wonder. Also, I would expect such behavior from what is basically a dying dynasty.

[ajk]

Oh I think you're absolutely right. It's not implausible at all considering who the king was. Plus, if I understand the story correctly he wasn't from the traditional ruling family, so he probably didn't have the king mindset drilled into him from childhood. Like the idea that the king goes down with the ship.

And I don't think the writers would just make this up. Have to think that it's mentioned somewhere in the historical record. Maybe it's true, maybe it's just embellishment by whowever wrote the record, but it's not the kind of thing that this series would just create and toss into the story. The series have been good about that.

But it could have been set up a lot better. Have been thinking about this over the past few days--as nice as the opening was, with KH being so calm and reflective, it should have gone in the complete opposite direction and have KH talk about how angry he was to see how his former country was so devastated by incompetent rule. The character we've gotten to know, he's no softie but the way he treated the king seemed out of character. Show us how angry he was and how personally he took it all, and then it's still a shocking scene but it makes a lot more sense.

[sageuk]

Excerpt from the Silla Annals:

Autumn, tenth month. As Kyonhwon attacked our army at Koulbu, the King (Kyongmyong) asked Taejo (Wang Geon) for help and he ordered his officers 10,000 to assist. Because the relief army had not yet arrived, Kyonhwon in the eleventh month suddenly invaded the capital. The king, queen, and relatives were on a excursion to Posok-Chong and unaware the enemy invaded, they were startled and did not know where to go and hide. The king and queen fled to the rear palace and royal relatives, officials and men and women fled in all directions to hide. Among those captured, regardless of whether they’re humble or noble, all were frightened with sweat flowing down, groveling and even when begging to be enslaved, could not escape.

Kyonhwon set his troops free to plunder public and private property, seizing everything. He entered the palace and ordered officials to look for the king. The king, his consort, and several concubines were in the rear palace and were dragged out and sent to the military camps.

There’s more, but that might spoil the next episode. Only thing I can say is that it gets ugly.

[ajk]

Very nice, thanks for digging this up!

I can believe it will get ugly. Along with whatever else, sending royal concubines to the enemy military camp, we undoubtedly won't see the aftermath of that but you can just imagine.