Starring Doona Bae (Cloud Atlas), Ji-Hoon Ju, Greg Chun, Sang-ho Kim. Netflix orignal series Kingdom is set in the medieval period of Korea. A mysterious plague sweeps the land that brings the dead back to life. The Crown Prince sets out to investigate while being marked as a traitor by his own kingdom for going against the crown’s demands.
Anybody that’s been following my articles for a while knows I’m a massive horror fan. It’s probably my next favourite genre after martial arts so when a martial arts horror Kingdom, pops up on Netflix. I couldn’t click the button fast enough. After watching all season 1, a total of 6 episodes. I was left yearning for season 2.
Set in medieval Korea. Kingdom starts with a doctor and his assistant going to the king’s chambers to help with his sickness. Hidden behind a screen, some strange noises start coming from the other side of the screen. Suddenly the assistant is pulled in.
The Crown Prince Lee Chang (Ji-Hoon Ju) is trying to gain access to his father the King. Being denied every step of the way by the pregnant queen and her father the governor.
Lee Chang is apparently next in line to the throne but he’s just a bastard son to the King and a concubine. The governor and the queen wants her child when born to be the legitimate heir. The Crown Prince senses something is up. He tells his personal bodyguard Muyeong (Sang-ho Kim) to find the kings medical journal while he tries to sneak in to see his father. Upon hiding in a room he sees a silhouette of a hideous creature with a foul smell the other side of the door.
After acquiring the journal, he seeks out the doctor who last saw his father accompanied by Muyeong. The very same doctor we see in the opening scene. They both set out for a very long journey to the doctor’s small medical village Jiyulheon.
Cut to Jiyulheon where everyone is injured or sick. The only problem is there is no food and everyone is starving. Seobi (Doona Bae) is trying her best with her medical staff. Yeong-shin (Kim Sung-kyu) is another injured soldier. He states to the nurse they are all going to starve to death. The doctor arrives back with his now-dead assistant who everyone mourns. While Seobi is out finding herbs, she returns to everyone feasting on meat With Yeong-shin doing the cooking. He tells her he hunted a deer but turns out desperate times calls for desperate measures and he cooked and fed everyone the doctors dead assistant. This causes everyone to choke, die and resurrect as the undead, hungry for more human flesh.
This is where the series starts to kick off. The crown prince now marked for treason for leaving the kingdom and trying to undermine the king as they don’t want him to find out the truth arrives in the village to find it empty, blood everywhere and spiked defenses all around. He finds hundreds of bodies under the houses. Calling the local authorities. They pull out the body’s, and take them back to a nearby village Dongnae and lay them all out in the courtyard. Upon discovering this Yeong-shin goes charging in and tells everyone they are not dead and tries to burn them. They all think he’s mad but as the sun sets, he is proven right. The bodies start to twitch and rise.
The undead are very fast and nightmarish looking, amongst the worst zombies I’ve ever seen. Kind of like Train to Busan. Whoever gets bitten usually dies and resurrects as the undead in under a minute to join their ranks. All the while twitching, twisting and cracking their torso’s in a nasty way then rising to their feet like something out of the Exorcist. Turns out the dead rise at night and when the sun rises, they go into hiding under rocks, houses and go back to being corpses. Typically, the nobles and local governors are useless cowards just out to save themselves and its left down to the Crown Prince and his companions to save everyone.
The sets and costume design look amazing, easily on par with Hollywood blockbusters. Combined that with some breathtakingly scenery. Everything looks very realistic for the period it’s set in.
In all honesty, there’s actually not a lot of fighting and swordplay as the undead are usually on everyone before they get a chance to draw their swords. The Crown Prince and his bodyguard are skilled swordsmen. Wielding them like a samurai. Yeong-shin is much more than meet the eye as he’s too skilled to be a simple soldier.
Some of the humour I found a little off-key. With the Lee Chang often telling his bodyguard Muyeong that he will massacre his family unless he does what he’s told then laughing before saying he’s only joking. Obviously, Muyeong doesn’t find this very funny. I was left thinking dude; you don’t joke about that sort of thing.
The end of season 1 ends on a massive cliff-hanger making me yearn of season 2 next year. It can’t come fast enough. You can watch Kingdom on Netflix now. Do it.
Rating: 4.5/5 Belts
