Wow, an amazing drama! But wait, not one without glaring flaws.

I'm so glad that this was the first law/prosecutor drama I watched that based its storyline entirely around the main villain who kills people and framed an innocent person, instead of corruption cases about government contracts and business dealings like in Stranger and Confession (I have reviewed both dramas). The first episode and Park Jung Woo's profession as a homicide prosecutor in the Seoul Prosecution Office already gave away the direction of the story, but what made the story stands out the most is definitely the masterful execution by the lead actors.

There are multiple plot holes that you can identify while watching the story where convenient incidences are thrown in to ensure that the bad guy keeps winning for so many episodes. While this gives a lot of room for villain's character development and makes us invest more in his character, it also makes the story repetitive and tired in a sense, especially in the first half of the show running.

I also did say in the beginning that the director already give away the direction of the rest of the story from the first episode, but the story did take a more interesting turn in the second half (in a sense, I am saying this was not necessarily a plot twist, rather a deviation from what the audience may have speculated from watching the drama - which made it much more interesting than a typical revenge drama). Imagine an innocent person who was framed for the death of his wife and daughter, you'd expect that he would get freed from a re-trial. You'd have to watch this drama to find out, but the second half was definitely better than the first half for this very reason.

I also find the conclusion a bit lacking, but giving away information about it would be a spoiler, so I would settle with saying that the punishment for the main villain was brushed off quite quickly. You'd imagine that after spending so many episodes (YES, MANY) to make the viewers root for his final downfall, they would invest a bit more screen time for his execution trial. Yet they only showed small bits of this part which felt very unsatisfactory. In a sense, this is also another way of saying that there's some real identifiable problem with the pacing of this drama.

There are five main characters listed on this drama page, but I can say in earnest that only two actors truly deserved its place and owned this drama rightfully, 1) Ji Sung (the main protagonist) and 2) Uhm Ki Joon (the main antagonist). Although I am here completely unreserved of my praises for Uhm Ki Joon's flawless portrayal of the main antagonist, his character is at best a villain who's only middle-range interesting. I would imagine that the most memorable villains are the ones who are cunning, hands-on and really smart, but here his character is only borderline psychopath, but more of a loser who is downright boring if not for the great acting. There are only two scenarios I could remember in the whole drama where he himself physically tried to take Jung Woo down with his own wits. Either way, the writing is sloppy in parts because the writers had the opportunity to refine/develop his character a lot more given the screen time they dedicated for him, but I believe they really wasted it.

That being said, there are two more support characters that really stand out to me in their emotional portrayal, 1) Shin Rin Ah who plays Ji Sung's daughter as well as 2) Kim Min Seok who plays Lee Sung Kyu. The prison cellmates are all interesting characters you would root for too, and they are really great comedic reliefs especially when the plot gets repetitive in the first half.

There are some nice BGM played in this drama that really enhances the mood of the story especially in the bonding scenes of father-daughter that are always an absolute tear-jerker. Rewatch value is also very high, considering any drama with Ji Sung is incredibly rewatchable.

Could have been a masterpiece, but not quite in my book. Definitely deserves its spot as a top-tier law/prosecution/revenge drama for Ji Sung's immaculate acting as well as the thrill that greatly ensues the second half of the story.

Final words: watch Doctor Prisoner if you want to know how a revenge thriller and main antagonists can be so uniquely and tastefully done! I truly can't praise and recommend it enough.