Kdrama Review: Kingdom (Seasons 1 and 2)

Drama: Kingdom (Seasons 1 and 2) (Netflix)
Genre: Historical horror fantasy thriller
Starring: Ju Ji Hoon, Jeon Seok Ho, Bae Doo Na
Rating: ❤ ❤ ❤


People have been raving about this for like a year. The first season (6 episodes) came out last year, and then recently 6 more episodes in a Season 2. (Netflix is having a great time messing with the kdrama system and breaking things into "seasons" which is really annoying.) I didn't have much desire to watch this one despite the huge amount of buzz it was getting. But when the stay at home thing started, I thought it would be a fun one to check out.

We started it out as a family watch, but that didn't last long. It was not a good one for the anxiety of a quarantine after all. So I put it on hold and then have finished it on my own.

So this one is a zombie show... set in the historical time period of the Josen Dynasty in Korea. So they are running around killing zombies in their beautiful long silk robes. So crazy. (Well, the peasants are a little more practically dressed, but still.)

The king is sick and died, but his evil subordinates have found out about a plant that can revive a person from the dead. So they use this on him. But there's a drawback... it turns them into a zombie! So now they are keeping this a secret from the people, just telling everyone he is sick. Alive, but sick. And meanwhile they have him tied up so he won't kill them all, and they feed him damsels.

Well, the infection gets loose and pretty soon we have a full on plague, with many many people turning. Our heroic prince goes out and about to try and find a solution to this problem and ends up mixed up in the whole gruesome fight. With the help of a few other heroic others, they try to save people and try to kill all the zombies. It's pretty impossible.

Meanwhile, we are getting word of even more corruption at the palace thanks to the wicked evil queen. Sheesh, she is a trip.

Anyway. I was frustrated with the first half because it was mostly all action and fighting and slashing and killing and blood, and not so much about character development. That improved in the second half and I was finally feeling invested in our characters and genuinely worried about them. Things got very crazy that second half and the whole mess ended up BACK at the palace.

Well, and so I compared this one a lot to The Walking Dead in my head. It was just as violent and gruesome as that show, maybe even more so. But these zombies RUN... they the fast kind! It's very hard to get away from a RUNNING zombie! Anyway, so much blood and guts in this show! So much! It's exhausting!

But if you are into that kind of thing and enjoy a massive production (I can't even imagine what goes into making something of this scale) then you'll enjoy this one! So many people have loved it, but for me it was just okay. Not one of my favorite dramas by far.

However, the freaking second season also ends in a cliffhanger, so now when more episodes are released, I will have to watch! I need to know what happens next of course!

Here is the trailer for the first season:




Let me know if you watch it! I'd love to know what you think! This one is sort of more "main stream Netflix" so maybe you might be more inclined to check it out? Especially if you are a zombie fan.