By WILLIAM J. WRIGHT
Streaming service Apple TV+ has brought on two heavyweights of Asian cinema for its first Korean-language show, DR. BRAIN. Written and directed by Kim Jee-woon, best known to horror fans for 2009’s A Tale of Two Sisters, the sci-fi thriller stars Parasite‘s Lee Sun-kyun as Sewon Koh, a brilliant neuroscientist who discovers a method of syncing brains with the recently deceased. When Sewon’s family is ripped apart by what seems to be a tragic accident, he turns to hacking the brains of the dead whose memories unlock clues pointing to a sinister and deadly conspiracy. Sewon’s brain syncs, however, lead only to more disturbing questions as his subjects’ memories and personalities begin to manifest in his own life.
Based on the popular South Korean webtoon of the same name, DR. BRAIN premiered globally on November 4th and is currently enjoying a six-part run to much acclaim from both critics and fans. We recently sat down with writer/director Kim Jee-Woon and star Lee Sun-kyun to talk about this exciting new series.
Courtesy of Apple
According to writer/director Kim Jee-woon, he immediately saw cinematic potential in DR. BRAIN’s web-based source material.
“I saw the original DR. BRAIN webtoon, and I was very impressed by the graphics,” writer/director Kim explains. “It seemed like a film noir-esque graphic novel with a lot of mesmerizing contouring and contrast between the light and the dark.”
Kim also saw the webtoon as the perfect springboard to tell a deeper, more complex story.
“I was also very intrigued by the plot where the main character could explore other people’s memories and their brains to solve a murder mystery,” Kim says. “I thought that I could take that initial motif and expand it to a deeper and more extensive narrative. So, even though the original webtoon is just a simple murder mystery, I thought it would give me more room to add more context to that and develop the story further by adding more layers, and I also tried to add more characters and more intricately connected relationships between the protagonist and the other characters. This way, I thought I could create a deeper, richer, more interesting, and touching experience. I was very confident that I could achieve just that so that’s why I decided to adapt for the screen.”
As for adapting DR. BRAIN as a multipart TV show, a new format for Kim, the director welcomed the opportunity to dive deep into both character and plot.
“I wanted to expand the story and there were a lot of things that I wanted to talk about,” says Kim. “Like I said, I was hooked by the plot where Sewon explores other people’s brains to solve this case, and I thought that, possibly, during that process, he would have learned about himself more by looking at how he’s remembered by other people. This would lead him to discover his flaws, and he would be able to address these flaws as he is trying to get closer to the truth. Once he faces his flaws, he can finally restore his previously destroyed relationships and reconnect with society. I thought that if I could adapt this to a longer series, I could elaborate on Sewon’s journey. That’s why I decided to go for a six-episode series as opposed to a two-hour-long film.”
Although Kim is a veteran feature film director, the medium of episodic TV still presented challenges.
“Since it was my first time doing serialized TV, I thought a lot about which techniques were necessary to lay out the plot,” says Kim. “I felt that each and every episode had to have a complete story of its own while baiting the audience into watching the next episode by using a gripping device or a hook at the very end of each installment. . .”
The episodic format also allowed Kim to develop the internal logic of the show’s reality-bending sci-fi tech in accordance with Sewon’s motivations.
“It was very important for me to make sure that this experiment with the brain synchronization logically made sense to the audience,” the director explains. “I had to answer why this person was interested in brain science and whether this experiment was actually plausible in real life. To make this story convincing, there has to be a certain build-up phase before we really go into the full-fledged narrative. For it to be convincing to the audience, I needed more time. I thought maybe if I did it as a two-hour film, the first hour would be taken up by exposition. So I thought a six-part series would establish a better pace and allow me to deliver all the stories I wanted to tell.”
In the role of DR. BRAIN’s brilliant but emotionally-muted Dr. Sewon Koh is actor Lee Sun-kyun. Lee, known to North American audiences for his role as Mr. Park in Bong Joon-ho’s Oscar-winning 2019 hit Parasite, is a familiar face to South Korean audiences with numerous credits in TV and film. With an Academy Award-winning picture on his resume, one might wonder why an actor of Kim’s caliber would choose to do a TV project.
“I have been a big fan of director Kim from when I was young,” says Lee. “That is probably the biggest reason why I chose to work on the show. On top of that, this is his first go at a TV series, and I couldn’t miss out on that opportunity!”
Courtesy of Apple
Still, the role of Sewon has proven to be a challenge for Lee who finds himself in unfamiliar territory.
“Sewon is a character that I’ve never encountered before in my career,” Lee says. “This kind of genre is also something new to me. That was very attractive to me. Sewon doesn’t seem to have any emotions at the beginning, but through the events of the story, he develops feelings and his growth arc is really high. I really enjoyed that, and that was the part that really appealed to me the most.”
As Sewon, Lee faces the unique task of playing a character who is a scientific genius and on the autism spectrum, requiring a degree of sensitivity and nuance that has put the actor’s skills to the test.
“I didn’t dive too deeply into the research into Asperger’s. I did research brain science and Asperger’s a bit on YouTube to pick up the terminology and learn some about the aspects of people with Asperger’s,” Lee says. “I didn’t want the focus to be on the spectrum. I wanted it to be more on this character who can lead this whole story. Director Kim and I talked about this and we decided that Sewon would have learned about his emotions to some extent with social cues so he would be able to function in society, but he would still be very lonely and very dry and understated.”
Despite Sewon’s emotionally-distant traits, Lee feels that audiences will have no problem relating to the character.
“He’s very curious about why this tragedy happened to his family and the mystery around it. I think people can relate to that—being curious about why things happen,” Lee says. “The side effect of brain syncs is that he also learns the emotions of the person he syncs with. So he kind of sees himself through the brains of others, almost like a mirror.”
Although the show touches on socially relevant topics and ethical questions, Lee hopes audiences go into DR. BRAIN looking for a satisfying entertainment experience full of unexpected twists and turns rather than heavy social commentary.
“DR. BRAIN doesn’t really focus on trying to convey a certain message. We focus more on the entertaining aspects and the cinematic fun of the story. With one episode released per week, I hope the audience is filled with curiosity about what’s coming next. We really hope we can keep viewers on the edge of their seats!”
DR. BRAIN is airing now exclusively on Apple TV+
