'Japs are bad, Yanks are good, kinda'
Japanese imperial Army Sgt. Tsuda, played by Lee Jung-hyun, captures the stereotype image of Japanese. Courtesy of tvN
By Oh Young-jin
The period drama "Mr. Sunshine" on tvN has many elements for success _ a stellar cast and an intriguing plot and exquisite props, all made possible by a large budget.
But I have a bad taste in my mouth watching one episode after another, wondering what causes it.
It didn't take long to find it out.
It was the stereotypes hidden in plain sight: "Japanese are bad _ cruel, ruthless, crafty and backbiting _ while Americans are good _brave, honest, compassionate and challenging, well sunshine.” This typeset is camouflaged by bit of qualification that serves as a fig leaf to our collective sense of shame.
This dramatic banality is reinforced by the cast of characters. Because the drama is set in the turn-of-the-century Joseon Kingdom that fell to imperial Japan, it is to a degree inevitable that its Japanese characters are portrayed as vicious, crafty, warmongering villains, but it brands all Japanese as such, with no exception.
Japanese Imperial Army Sgt. Tsuda, played by young method actor Lee Jung-hyun, represents the thread.
The squint-eyed Tsuda, with a shaved head, lacks discipline when he goes after the protagonist, U.S. Marine Capt. Eugene Choi, played by top-dollar actor Lee Byung-hun, without gaining permission from his superiors.
Lee is cold-hearted when he rummages through the pockets of a fellow soldier _ who dies on his behalf _ for wage envelope.
With his face smeared by splashes of his colleague's blood, he makes a dark statement: "Wage day was yesterday. I know where he put his money."
Then, holding the hilt of the sword is Japanese Consul Hayashi. It can only be guessed that that dirty name is part of Hayashi Gonsuke, a real Japanese diplomat who played a key role in Japan's absorption of Joseon. The makers of the program declare it is a mixture of fiction and history.
There are two cases of “He who touches pitch will be defiled therewith.”
One is Lee Wan-ik _ played by veteran actor Kim Eui-sung _ who reminds one of Yi Wan-yong, a Korean Benedict Arnold.
In one of the first scenes in “Sunshine,” Lee goes to Ito Hirobumi, promising to hand over Korea to him. Hirobumi was Japan's prime minister and first resident-governor in occupied Korea, who was killed by Korean independence fighter An Jung-geun.
In reality, Yi helped Japan's takeover of Joseon. In the drama, Yi shows up clothed in tailcoat and high hat, which means to be a hint of disdain for the Joseon of that time, corrupt, rudderless and clueless.
The second is Goo Dong-mae, played by heartthrob Yoo Yeon-seok, who is born as a Korean untouchable and is a kind of master-less samurai or ronin who preys on people in the Japanese district. He suffers from a constant conflict of identity but would work for the highest bidder.
U.S. Marine Capt. Eugene Choi represents Koreans' stereotype good about America. Courtesy of tvN
In contrast, Capt. Choi is as good as all Japanese characters are bad.
He is the son of slaves who escapes to the United States thanks to a combination of sacrifice and good luck _ sacrifice from his mother, who threatens to kill the master's daughter-in-law to buy him time to get away, and good luck from a good-hearted carpet beggar who wants Korean porcelain.
In the opening scene, Choi is complimented by President Theodore Roosevelt for his outstanding contribution in the Spain-U.S. War.
When he returns home, he is an instant hero who also captures the mind of an upper-class lady, his opposite Go Ae-shin, played by a charming Kim Tae-ri. Choi and Go, who secretly trains to be a patriotic markswoman, meet for the first time as the two assassinate the same pro-Japanese American.
Then, Choi helps her get away. The two slowly fall in love as Go becomes interested in Choi and an America that this American with brown eyes represents.
One memorable scene has it that Choi stares down an entire Japanese platoon and humiliates its leader Sgt. Tsuda., saying, “Touch you and it would be tantamount to declaring war against the United States.”
Go tries to learn English, an effort representing her yearning for independence. At one point, she offers to propose "love" with Choi, not knowing its meaning but Choi takes up her challenge.
Their tryst and pull-push maneuver can remind one: first of a Korea that asked for U.S. help in staving off Japan's takeover and second, of a Korea that was abandoned by the U.S. just before the 1950-1953 Korean War.
In the first, the U.S. turned its back on Joseon as it cut a secret deal called the Taft-Katsura Memorandum, under which the U.S. conceded Korea to Japan in return for recognizing its influence over the Philippines. In the second, the Acheson Line was declared to exclude Korea from the U.S. defense perimeter, inviting the North to invade the South less than six months later in 1950.
The drama relies on selective memory in favor of the fact Americans vanquished the Japanese and liberated Korea at the end of World War II and then helped fight back the communists.
One pivotal twist is Choi being a Korean who becomes an American by the combination of circumstances and choice. Perhaps the writer or director of “Sunshine” may have worried that Koreans couldn't stomach seeing a foreigner take the hand of the yangban lady. Antidote of kind is David Mclinnis, an American major and Choi's superior officer, who plays a goofy part to help highlight the American side of Choi.
The Japanese are more open to mixed love with Americans or people of other nationalities in movies, with one of the many examples being "The Last Samurai" starring Tom Cruise, although it is a Hollywood movie.
It is food for thought as to why we obviously are so steeped in the concept that "Americans are good and Japanese, bad." Is it because Americans are less evil than the Japanese? Or is it because the U.S. is stronger than Japan? Either way, surely, this stereotyping is limiting our imagination.