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Don’t let the Sweet Home title fool you. Netflix’s new Korean suspense series will leave you on the edge of your seat.
The highly anticipated series tells the story of a high school student named Hyun-soo (Song Kang) who moves into an old apartment complex called Green Home, after the death of his relatives.
Hyun-soo’s plans for his own death are interrupted by the arrival of monsters from all over South Korea.
As long-hidden desires in humans turn them into monsters, Hyun-soo and other residents of Green Home find themselves trapped in the building, trying to survive while making sure they don’t turn into monsters themselves.
It’s a race against time and the group has to decide who can stay alive.
Sweet Home features young rising stars such as Song Kang, Lee Do-hyun, Kim Nam-hee, Go Min-si, Park Gyu-young, and Go Yoon-jung as residents of Green Home, as well as seasoned actors Lee Jin- wook. Lee Si-young, Kim Kap-soo, and Kim Sang-ho.
Descendants of the Sun director is back
Director Lee Eung-bok, who is behind hit Korean dramas like Mr Sunshine, Guardian: The Lonely and Great God, and Descendants of the Sun, is excited for his first major collaboration with Netflix.
“I made sure the series stayed as loyal as possible to the monsters of the webtoon,” the 51-year-old told a virtual press conference on Wednesday (December 16).
The series is an adaptation of the massively popular webtoon of the same name that has accumulated more than 500 million views on the Korean portal Naver.
In sharing why he decided to make a live action remake of the webtoon, the director highlighted the irony of a suicidal child becoming a reluctant hero to save others while dealing with his own ‘monsterization’.
Also, working in a new genre allowed me to try new forms of expression, “he added.
His previous work has revolved around the romance genre, and while Sweet Home is definitely not his usual romantic story, the director claims that Sweet Home explores themes of the human condition.
“For Sweet Home, it’s mainly between humans and monsters, it’s still a person-person element, instead of focusing on it being a thriller, I focus on how the relationship between people evolved,” he explained.
Stunning visuals and CGI
Such a thriller cannot do without terrifying monsters, and world-class visual and visual effects teams from around the world bring these creatures to life.
Legacy Effects, an American SFX studio that has worked on Hollywood films such as the Avenger series, the X-Men series and Avatar, worked on the images of the lotus root monster.
Spectral Motion, a global SFX company known for its work on Stranger Things, was in charge of visualizing the muscle monster, spider monster, and others.
Meanwhile, Westworld, a visual effects team in Korea, contributed to the series by creating elaborate computer graphics and spectacular visual effects.
Actors personally handle physical stunts
Fighting a horde of monsters is certainly not an easy task.
While you would expect the show to rely on stunt actors, you’d be surprised to learn that the physical stunts in Sweet Home were primarily performed by the cast members themselves.
Lee Si-young, who plays firefighter and former Special Forces soldier Seo I-kyung, shared her grueling exercise program. “I built a fit physique, I worked hard, I did push-ups, pull-ups, winding tires, rope activities (climbing),” Si-young said at the virtual press conference.
The 38-year-old actress added that she began learning her action tricks six months before filming began.
“In the series, some parts of my body were exposed, sometimes I’m just wearing my underwear,” revealed the former amateur boxer. His efforts seemed to pay off, as seen by defining the back muscles in the show’s trailer.
His co-star Lee Do-hyun, 25, who plays the smart and cool medical student Lee Eun-hyuk, also described his experience of a particular scene (spoiler alert!) In an underground parking lot, where had to withstand the cold of winter, battling multiple monsters in a confined space with fellow cast members doing their action sequences simultaneously.
“It was extremely difficult but definitely enjoyable,” he recalled.
Challenging the conventional image of actors
The overall dark theme of the series isn’t just a gender shift for the director.
This is also Song Kang’s first time acting in a thriller and he shared that he felt some pressure after accepting this role.
However, the 26-year-old Love Alarm star wasn’t overly concerned about this change. “[This role] it allows me to build an enriching experience in my acting career playing roles that involve many emotions ”.
For Si-young, known for playing the delicate Oh Min-ji in the hit 2009 drama Boys Over Flowers, she is excited for viewers to see her embrace another side of herself.
“In some ways, when a female character is very strong, very powerful and has power through a disaster, I feel like this is something that can resonate with a lot of audience, as my character plays the role of leader and protects the characters. women who are otherwise marginalized, “he said.
When 39-year-old actor Lee Jin-wook, who plays the lonely former detective Pyun Sang-wook, was asked if there is a message that audiences should take from the series, he summed up with a thought-provoking statement.
“There are some people who look human but are worse than monsters, and some monsters who are better than some human beings.”
In a world where many things no longer seem to make much sense, his words never ring truer.
Sweet Home will launch on Netflix in Singapore and around the world on Friday (December 18).
