The Hidden Angle | 'The King: Eternal Monarch' is a fine blend of science with secrets of the Manpasikjeok
In the first honest conversation between King Lee Gon (Lee Min-ho) and Detective Tae-eul (Kim Go-eun) in 'The King: Eternal Monarch', Lee Gon tries to explain that he is from a parallel world. However, Tae-eul is not ready to believe his words. The fact that she spotted him riding a beautiful white horse whom he adoringly refers to as Maximus in the middle of Seoul, South Korea's traffic, led to her conclusion that this man was nothing but an eccentric hack. In fact, when Lee Gon tries to refer to scientific theories to support his claims, Tae-eul stops him and tells him that she finds it hard to believe that the world is round in the first place, so to have her believe that he is from a different world, Lee Gon will have to take her along with him the next time.
Lee Gon -- having known Tae-eul and the mention of Seoul Police Department from Tae-eul's identity card which was left behind at the scene of his father's death and his attempted murder many years ago -- is more relieved and less surprised to find himself in a parallel universe. After all, he has finally got to meet the woman he had been in search of all this while. To borrow an expression from 'Alice in Wonderland', "The best way to explain it is to do it." So everything that Lee Gon found hard to explain to Tae-eul, he shows her. In these initial moments, both Lee Gon and Tae-eul are each rabbit that the other followed down a hole to find a whole new world.
The science of how traversing through parallel worlds in the show doesn't take center stage, except when King Lee Gon -- who also happens to be a Mathematician among other things -- begins to explore the relationship between the time freeze that he experiences in relation to Manpasikjeok, the powerful flute.
When Lee Gon begins to experience time stopping -- initially for seconds and as days pass, it increases to hours -- he begins to research on the relation between the time freeze and assumption of humans crossing over to parallel worlds at a given point in time. So essentially, because the power to traverse worlds lies with Lee Lim and himself as each of them holds a piece of the Manpasikjeok, Lee Gon is able to calibrate how many times it would take for the two of them to traverse between the worlds before time stops completely for both the worlds.
What Lee Gon tells Tae-eul when he tries to explain the repercussions of traversing between the two worlds might sound a tad bit like gibberish but once you pay close attention, it is not hard to follow his logic and calculations. In fact, Redditors, who follow the show have come up with a detailed unofficial timeline that would help one understand which prime (in context of parallel worlds) both Lee Gon and Tae-eul are at in different episodes and how the eye for detail -- both in fans and creators of the show -- especially when it comes to logically explaining the plausibility of time travel begs attention.
In the first view, 'The King: Eternal Monarch' seems as if it is any other garden variety 'melo' K-Drama with a splash of fantasy-science fiction. But then, you begin to pay attention to King Lee Gon's constructs about the time-space continuum and realize that a lot more thought has gone into building the worlds of Kingdom of Corea and Republic of Korea. King Lee Gon and Detective Tae-eul's respective worlds.
While the arc about time travel adds the element of science fiction to the show, the source of all of it is the very powerful and ancient flute that is addressed as Manpasikjeok in the show. This flute holds an important place in Korean folk tales and the element of fantasy that the show adapts is borrowed from their cultural history, imbibed in the show. The story is dated back to the time when Korea was Silla Dynasty and was ruled by its 30th King Munmu of Silla. The tale is about a devoted son Sinmun who helped his father's dish wish come true and in return was rewarded with an instrument that was powerful enough to bring peace to the country when played. The details of the tale apparently symbolize the king's hopes about bringing together displaced people from two other kingdoms that the king had brought together in peace and harmony. In fact, parts of this tale were even narrated at the opening of the show. It is this flute that gives both Lee Lim and Lee Gon the ability to travel back and forth between two worlds.
There are so many details in each episode that one might miss on first viewing, but fans have found interesting easter eggs in the show on repeat watch and that is what has drummed up a huge excitement for the show in its later period. For instance, the show is huge on allusions. The first part of the episode or the end of the previous episode hints at what it is to come in the future in forms of easter eggs that one would catch on hindsight. For instance, when Court lady Noh tells the royal palace employees that any traitor and their family will be punished for their betrayal for three generations -- this is a common form of punishment in North Korea, which is where Court Lady Noh later confesses she is originally from during a conversation with Tae-eul.
Or say the scene of Prince Buyeong's death. One of the things that many viewers had wondered was how Prince Buyeong's guards did not have any defensive wounds and how Lee Lim had managed to get beyond the royal security force. Once we realized that the time freeze has increased from just a few seconds to more than a couple of hours, this also explains how the security placed in Prince Buyeong's residence were all sitting ducks and so was the prince himself. The mastery of weaving such fine details into a grand picture that forms the puzzle is great fun to watch, with new secrets getting spilled every week.
'The King: Eternal Monarch' is originally aired in South Korea on SBS at 10 pm on Fridays and Saturdays. The show can be streamed on Netflix in the US.
‘The Hidden Angle’ is a weekly column examining narratives, frames and sounds that add value to movies and shows but are not part of conversations surrounding their success or failure. The column will be published Fridays.