LEE JOON GI
SOUTH KOREA'S
NUMERO UNO ACTOR
MLSHR: EPISODE 4
LEE JOON GI: GLOBAL RECOGNITION
Lee Joon Gi has proven himself to be South Korea's Numero Uno actor in his drama Moon
Lovers - Scarlet Heart: Ryeo. He
has conquered the hearts and minds of the international audience and garnered
global recognition for his acting prowess and versatility.
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His current drama, Moon Lovers – Scarlet Heart: Ryeo, is an instant success
overseas. The drama would not be the same without Lee Joon Gi as the leading
character. He has these characteristics that continue to transfix all his
fans: inexplicable charisma, endearing charm, enormous talent and expressive,
gorgeous Phoenix Eyes.
Lee, a living legend, proves that he is more
than just a gorgeous face by his excellent portrayal of the savage prince Wang So who, fortunately, has many likeable and redeeming qualities.
In Episode 4 of his current saguek drama, Lee inhabits his role
as Prince Wang So and brings the tormented Fourth Prince to life.
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THE BACKGROUND
THE ASSASSINATION ATTEMPT ON THE CROWN PRINCE
THE BUDDHIST TEMPLE
IS RAZED TO THE GROUND
(Episode 3)
In Episode 2, Empress Dowager Yoo, the
mother of Prince Wang Yo, Prince Wang So and Prince Wang Jung has been
planning with several others including her eldest son, Wang Yo, to depose of
the Crown Prince, Wang Mu.
Wang Yo
She wants Wang Yo to assume the mantle of
the Goryeo Crown Prince. The murder attempt is carried out during the Narye
Cleasing ritual, a Shamanistic dance rite. The bid for the Crown Prince
position turns out to be a blunder and is quashed.
Wang So suspects that the assailants are
mute monks from a Buddhist Temple, whose patroness is Empress Dowager Yoo.
Their existence is shrouded in secrecy and mystery. He has yet to know what
has transpired between his royal mother and the monks.
The warrior-monks are mute as their tongues
had been sliced because of their unforgivable sins. Though they could not utter
a word, they could still be a threat to the queen were they linked to her.
Moreover, the powerful abbott of the temple who has brought the monks under
his wings, is not a mute and could prove to be a Sword of Damocles hanging
over her head. For Empress Dowager Yoo, it is an uneasy alliance.
Wang So, the Fourth Prince, a hostage held
at Shinju for umpteen years, has just returned home. From a very young age,
he had been deprived of parental love, care and protection.
In Episode 3, knowing of his mother’s
involvement in the assassination attempt, he shudders to think of what might
happen to his mother should her involvement in the murder attempt be
discovered.
Being obsessed with his mother and
desperately craving maternal love, Wang So is in a moral dilemma, mulling
over his plans to exterminate his mother’s allies.
He is not going to bring the temple
residents to heel but to completely vanquish the mute monks and raze their
temple to the ground.
Without his mother’s knowledge, the Fourth
Prince takes matters into his own hands. He moves quickly to silence the
temple residents.
The challenge of annihilating the temple of
the mute monks is a test of Wang So’s martial arts skills. It is the survival
of the fittest and the sneakiest.
When he strides stealthily into the silent
temple, he knows the monks are not ready for him. But when they surrounded
him with their gleaming swords in hand, he knows it is a death match.
He is a single warrior pitted against the
entire swarm of warrior monks, and when they charge at him, he races into the
thick of it.
Now and then, as they swing their gleaming
blades in his direction, he leaps out of their reach. There are many of them
but fleeing is never a option.
With the speed and strength of a wolfdog, he
mows the temple residents down singlehandedly with his amazing fighting
skills. He whips out mega blows and throws them off balance.
It is a world of kill or be killed, and Wang
So has the ferocity of a raging wolfdog. He inflicts heavy damage. Blood
sprays everywhere and flavours the air. All, including the abbot, are killed.
When the temple burns to ashes, the threat
dangling over his mother’s head is removed.
It seems as if the monks deserve death because they are a
threat to his royal mother. He has effectively erased all traces and
connections which tie her to the assassination conspiracy.
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LEE JOON GI
THE NUMERO UNO ACTOR
EPISODE 4
WANG SO
THE MAKING OF
THE RUTHLESS FOURTH PRINCE
OST: Forgetting
You by Davichi
Fresh from his killing spree at the temple, Wang So strode with
silent determination towards his mother’s bed.
It was a security breach but it was not clear how Wang So was
able to gain access to his mother’s private chambers. Being able to walk
unopposed into the queen’s chamber clearly exposed the weakness of the security
system of Empress Dowager Yoo’s quarters.
Awakened by his presence, the startled queen demanded to know his
identity.
‘It’s me, Mother,’ he revealed himself.
Being fearful of his ill-intentions, his horrified and greatly
incensed mother admonished him.
‘How dare you come in here!
Emerging from the shadows, he inched his way forward to reveal his
blood-soaked body and sword. He was covered with congealed blood. His glazed
eyes and firm lips clearly laid bare his determination.
She asked him to clarify his motives. ‘Why’re you here?’
‘Do you know what I’ve done for
you? One
cannot but recognise the flush of pleasure in Wang So’s voice.
When he boastfully hissed, ‘I’ve
made sure none can kill you,’ his confidence and joy revealed his warped
sense of his own importance.
Wang So’s teeth gleamed in the dark like that of a wolfdog’s. His
face looked ghoulish and sinister, and so did his eyes. Grinning gleefully,
he bragged with unflagging gusto about having successfully erased any links
of the Cown Prince’s murder attempt to her.
He did not narrate his murderous encounter to his royal mother but
the viewers are familiar with his savagery which he had demonstrated Episode 3.
There was no moral reason for the horrendous killing of the mute
monks but he did it for her sake, and he was not, in the least, remorseful.
He harboured a burning desire for her maternal love and craved
his mother’s acceptance of him.
The viewers shudder at his joyful expression which turns out to
be as scary as that of a growling beast.
‘You didn’t kill them all,
did you?’
It was just a rhetorical question. His mother already knew that
he had killed all of them but she would learn later that he had razed the
temple to the ground.
She was fortunate to have gotten away with treason against the
Crown Prince but she was unimpressed with Wang So’s utter devotion to her.
Her son had been desperately trying to find some common ground
between them so as to mend their relationship but it did not take him long to
figure out that it was futile.
She cawed, ‘Do you think
I’d tell you that you’ve done a marvellous job?’
His refrigerator mother had no intention of thanking him. She
continued to berate him in a voice that cracked like a whip. ‘Do you expect me to ask if you’ve injured
yourself?’
In her searing rebuke, she demolished any shred of confidence he
might have by comparing him to an animal. The savage imagery dehumanised him
and reduced him to the level of a beast. Fingers of ice could have trailed
down his spine as his body stiffened slightly.
Her frosty implication that she did not care a hoot about his
physical wounds served further to deflate his ego. She had emerged from the
assassination attempt with her reputation intact but he had sullied his own with
the blood of the mute monks and yet, he had gone unrewarded.
He must have flinched but his face underwent only a slight
transformation when his smile left his face. Any hope he had nursed of being
on the receiving end of his mother’s love was short-lived. It was made
crystal clear that he would never savour her love.
Then, coloured by her prejudice, she callously bellowed at him to
leave her presence. He dropped his gaze for only a second.
She told him in no uncertain terms that he stank of the pungent,
acrid smell of blood which was preventing her from sleeping. She was
transparent in her remarks - she could not wait to distance herself from him.
It was self-evident that she was unable to accept her son’s deed
of the devotion and loyalty. Could her deeply embedded guilt of abandoning
him many years before make her even more resolute in pushing him away?
Shocked by his mother’s cruel response, he swallowed hard. Tears
welled up in Wang So’s eyes.
It seemed then that the wretched little boy in him had emerged. Overwhelmed
by his mother’s cruelty, he cried pitifully and pathetically, ‘It was for you, Mother!’
He, in his childlike way, was hungry for her love. His childhood
had probably disappeared too early when he was with the Kang clan. His body
quaked, his childish feelings spilling over.
The Dowager Empress promptly disclaimed being his mother. Her
voice dripped with malice as she shrieked. ‘Mother, Mother, Mother. Hearing you call me ‘Mother’ makes my skin
crawl!’
How would one describe Wang So at that very moment when she
revealed her utter disgust for him? Broken, bitter, troubled, mentally
tortured, screwed and confused. His blood must have turned cold. That pretty
summed up his ‘motherless’ life.
‘I do not wish to see you, so go!
Go now!’ She looked away swiftly.
But Wang So was such a sucker for punishment. Unintimidated by
his mother’s harsh words, he stayed put.
‘I’ve always been curious about
your feelings, Mother. Why is it that you don’t have any sympathy for me?’ ‘If you
are my mother, you would care if I were injured. Why is it, Mother, that you
avoid my eyes? Not even once have you looked at me in the eye!’ Wang So
sounded pathetic and forlorn.
It was precisely those questions that hit the nail on the head. He
was ashen. After being involved in a deadly match against the monks, he must
have suffered from bleeding wounds, however sluggish they may be then. Any
normal woman would have shown some pity but his mother had not.
In reality, the Empress Dowager had long ago callously cut off
her mother-son ties. Only Wang So had not realised it. She was probably fearful
of looking him in the eye because if she did so, she would be racked with her
terrible guilt. And the rising tidal wave of pain and anguish would be
reflected in those accusing eyes.
Then, she spat out her bottled-up feelings. ‘You’re not my son! You are the son of the Kangs in Shinju.’
The air stood still for a moment. Then, in an accusatory tone, he
spelt out the cause of her prejudice and iciness and gave vent to his
feelings.
 
‘You sent me, instead of my older
brother, Wang Yo, to the Kang clan to be adopted. But, you continue to ignore
my existence. It is because of my scar!’
   
What Wang So did not expect was when the emotional bombshell
exploded, he was completely compelled to excavate his feelings and in the
process, he had also dragged his mother’s buried feelings into the open.
Pain swept across his face. Wang So tried to hold his tears in
check. Distraught and exhausted by his conversation with his mother that was
leading nowhere, he dropped helplessly to the floor.
He swallowed hard and his jaws twitched.
 
Viewers might not be
able to see his eyes clearly in the dark but they could feel and empathise with
his frustration and mental torment.
‘Do you know what my life was like with the Kangs?’
Then he confided in her
his appalling and harrowing experience at the hands of the barbaric Kang
family.
Wang So had been sent to be the adoptive son of Concubine
Kang, King Taejo’s 22nd consort in Shinju. Her own son had died and
Wang So was sent as a replacement son. The reality was, he was held there as a
hostage.
On one occasion, the Shinju men had thrown him into
a den of wolves expecting him to be mauled to death. He spent the whole night fighting and wrestling with the wild
beasts whose teeth gnashed hungrily at him.
    In his insane rage, he slaughtered them and burnt down the entire mountain. His reputation preceded him. It was alleged that he had also burnt those who had conspired against him.  At the instance when he shook the words from his lips, ‘The revolting stench of burning flesh surrounded my body’, Wang So seemed possessed. He was more bestial than human.   
One could imagine the physical strength of a man-beast when
driven over the edge. A bitter, coarse laugh escaped his lips.
Wang So also narrated an incident concerning his mentally-disturbed
adoptive mother, Concubine Kang, who had beaten him and locked him up as she
could not face the reality of having lost her own son. He had been condemned as an ugly monster and abused.
He almost broke down sobbing as he relived his traumatic and toxic experiences. 
In this scene, viewers could sense that Wang So had tried to appeal
to Empress Dowager Yoo’s maternal instincts. He seemed emotionally and
psychologically vulnerable and he was literally begging her to love him as
her son. The abominable hurt that he had suffered at the hands of the diabolical
Kang family during his formative years had reduced him to the standing of a mere
beast. What his very soul craved was his own mother’s love and respect which,
so far, had been denied him.
But, Empress Dowager Yoo, a deeply flawed, prejudiced and
icy-cold mother, would have none of it. She had never pretended to love him
and, once and for all, she had decided to shatter any illusions that he might
have entertained of savouring her love.
‘A mother would only acknowledge a
son who would make her shine. You’re my shame, disgrace and flaw. That’s why
I sent you away.’ Her icy-cold voice struck him like an ice
pick to his brain.
 
It was a poignant moment suffused with unbounded sadness.
The Empress Dowager’s cruelty was beyond understanding and belief.
It was self-evident that she was an unstable mother, probably suffering from
a borderline personality disorder.
She needed no urging to spell out her cruel feelings and her
priorities clearly to him. Every word that spilled from her lips speaks volumes
about her.
He had stepped on an emotional landmine and it had exploded in
his face. His mother did not love him and never would. He had no place in her
heart and neither was she moved by his feelings of dejection and wretchedness.
The sounds of silence must have been very loud. Tears coursed
down Wang So’s cheeks unchecked.
Empress Dowager Yoo had implied that she was a perfect person and
she only wanted physically perfect children. But, in actuality, she was
imperfect. Perfection is an illusion. She could not face up to her flaws and
her guilt over the scarring of Wang So’s face by her own hands so she had sent
him away.
The queen had browbeaten her least favoured son. There was no
mincing of words. There was also no gratitude nor appreciation on her part
for what he had done for her. She had effectively ground him emotionally to
dust.
Knowing that she held emotional sway over him, the Empress Dowager
had raked through his feelings with scathing words. She had systematically
ripped his world apart by her caustic words. His eyes were glassy with pain.
Having awakened from his mother’s unwavering hostility towards
him, Wang So steeled himself to recover quickly from his emotional weakness. His nostrils flared and he drew his feet up.
The Fourth Prince had suffered an emotional reverse. Darkness
slithered through his eyes and his mouth curved in silent fury. Then, his
eyes blazed like fire.
Before the volatile Fourth Prince departed, with a voice that
resembled the ragged edges of a knife, he warned her with chilling censure, ‘Today is a day you’ll remember. You’ve
severed the ties between us. But I won’t leave. You’ll be forced to look at
me!’
A devilish light gleamed in his eyes. At that very moment,
outcast or not, he was determined that he would claw his way back into the Goryeo
palace if he had too.
Does it mean that the psychologically-twisted queen would live to
regret it? This remains an open question.
But, he implied that he was not going to disappear as easily as
she had wished. He would remain in Songak as a thorn in her side and haunt
her with his presence.
It dawns on the viewers that Empress Dowager Yoo was incapable of
love and compassion for her own son, Wang So. Later, viewers would witness
her constantly and mercilessly waging a brutal emotional war against him.
What has Lee Joon Gi done to the audience? Undeniably, Lee has
made a lasting impression and stamped his mark in the hearts and minds of the
viewers with his remarkable performance in this chilling scene between mother
and son.
His ability to showcase a whole range of emotions especially, his
raw emotions and even subtle ones in the demanding role is astonishing. It is
difficult not to sympathise with Wang So as he openly struggles with his
demons and tries to adjust himself to the reality of his mother’s hatred for
him. Lee Joon Gi has brought to life the mentally and psychologically tormented
Fourth Prince and he has effortlessly stolen the show in this episode.
Park Ji-young who plays the cruel, ambitious and manipulative Empress
Dowager Yoo has managed to shock the audience with her acting. They must
have shuddered to feel the cruelty of the Goryeon queen.
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