Beyond the Bar: Episode 1 (First Impressions)

by SailorJumun

In JTBC’s latest legal drama Beyond the Bar, an ambitious rookie lawyer steps out of her mock trials and into the real world, where it isn’t so kind. Right off the bat, she’s got a cold, unforgiving boss glaring her down — but she loves a good challenge and, as we’ll learn, she’s not afraid to challenge others either.

Editor’s note: This is an opening review only.

EPISODE 1

Just going off the synopsis, this seems like it’s going to be your run-of-the-mill procedural drama. I usually prefer my procedurals with some kind of added aspect, like an overall mystery or romance, but I also recognize that they don’t always need it. I’m definitely interested in seeing what Beyond the Bar has to offer, romance or not.

We’re dropped into a busy day in Seoul, with a young woman getting on the subway. The woman KANG HYO-MIN (Jung Chae-yeon) is eager to get to her job interview, but she ends up missing her stop and having to rush over to her destination: Yullim Law Firm. She gets there a few minutes too late, bursting into the interview room with her shirt untucked. Most of the interviewers are amused by this, except for one. The head of litigation YOON SEOK-HOON (Lee Jin-wook) chides her for being tardy and orders her to get out. Yeesh.

Though Hyo-min is taken aback, she doesn’t back down. She insists that she’ll wait outside in case they change their minds. Eventually, as other interviews go on, the department heads do reconsider. After all, Hyo-min was the winner of the national law school mock trials and was even scouted by their competitor Lee & Seo Law Firm.

To Seok-hoon’s annoyance, the department heads invite Hyo-min back in. And despite her clunky entrance and disheveled appearance, she makes a great second impression. She answers each question with confidence, showcasing just how knowledgeable and passionate she is about law.

Later, at home, Hyo-min is sure that she bombed her interview, seeing that she also bombed her chance with Lee & Seo (again, for tardiness). But not too long after, she finds out that she passed — she officially made it into Yullim.

On induction day, all the new hires are introduced to the various teams. Everyone from corporate law to financial law tries their best to lure the fresh-faced newbies over to their team… while Seok-hoon keeps it very real and states that working for litigation is going to be exceptionally hard, as it should be. His poor teammates cringe at how unappealing his sell is, heh.

When it comes time to choose, the newbies all scurry to their desired teams, while Hyo-min notably stays back. Once everyone is in place, she gets up and makes her epic slow-mo strut to litigation’s empty section. The department heads are disappointed, as they wanted her for themselves. And Seok-hoon, ever consistent, is disappointed to have to work with her.

I’m not sure what I expected, but I’m surprisingly digging this setup with Seok-hoon and Hyo-min. They’re giving the stereotypical mentor/mentee vibes, with one being stoic and strict while the other is bright and spunky, and yet… it doesn’t feel tropey. The actors are going for something more nuanced, and it’s really working for me.

Making up our litigation team, we have Seok-hoon as head honcho, KIM YUL-SEONG (Hong Seo-joon) as division head, and LEE JIN-WOO (Lee Hak-joo) and HEO MIN-JUNG (Jeon Hye-bin) as associates. Joining them, we have Hyo-min, her former SNU classmate JI GUK-HYEON (Kim Kang-min), CHOI HO-YEON (Lee Joo-yeon), and OH SANG-CHUL (Pyo Jae-gyeom). The last three aren’t too thrilled they got stuck with litigation, but they’re determined nonetheless.

The newbies get their first assignments, Hyo-min’s being the Gangdong City Gas advisory case. She’s instructed to sit in on a shareholders’ meeting, mostly to observe, and she notices that there’s something off in a jjimjilbang business’s data. She goes off to investigate the business, and she gets so caught up in it that she ends up missing a few days of work. By the time she returns to the office, Seok-hoon is ready to have her dismissed from the team.

I think Seok-hoon’s character could easily be viewed as an asshole, but the show does a good job of humanizing him through his morals. To him, failing to show up and failing to do the work means failing their clients, which he will not tolerate. While Hyo-min understands, she argues that he should hear her out before he makes a verdict.

Hyo-min elaborates on what she’s been working on, having found that the jjimjilbang business has been manipulating gas usage amounts. Seok-hoon sees that her findings are accurate, but he warns her that being right doesn’t excuse her absences — she can’t let this happen again.

The Gangdong City Gas case goes to trial, and Hyo-min actually gets her say in court. She’s a little too passionate, and the judge has to tell her (more than once, lol) to stop shouting. But she does make a good point about how the jjimjilbang business affected many other workers. Afterwards, Seok-hoon watches Hyo-min get approached by other gas companies who’d like to work with her.

We see a bit more of Hyo-min’s personal life, as she has dinner with her boyfriend HAN SUNG-CHAN (Kang Sang-joon). They run into some of Sung-chan’s colleagues from work (he’s with Lee & Seo), and Sung-chan is quick to suck up. He introduces Hyo-min as the daughter of a chief judge and bigtime SNU law professor — as well as the girl he’s going to marry.

Hyo-min is clearly uncomfortable with what Sung-chun said, later asking him why he likes her. He admits that her background is a big reason for his feelings, but that he’s not ashamed for it. After all, he says, he wants to pass along elite genes to his kids. Ew. Ew, ew, ew. That is a giant red flag, and Hyo-min definitely sees it.

Meanwhile, Seok-hoon lounges in his lonely apartment, watching a home video of a much happier version of himself with a girlfriend. That very girlfriend sits beside him on the couch and asks if he misses her, which he flatly denies. After a beat of silence, the girlfriend disappears, having never been there at all.

The ending has me a little worried, because it looks like Seok-hoon is single and like Hyo-min is, well, about to be single. I love romance, and I would love to have some of it sprinkled in… but not between these characters. They have the potential to have a strong arc as colleagues, and it’d be nice to see that play out. (Plus, I just don’t see Lee Jin-wook and Jung Chae-yeon as a couple.)

Other than that, this was a pretty solid premiere. I think a lot of legal dramas lean into being either super dark or super silly, and this one just… is. It’s just life. Similarly with the characters, they’re just people. I’m glad they’re not overdoing it, because it actually makes them more relatable from the get-go. The story itself is relatively simple, so I’m really counting on these characters and their complicated relationships to keep me invested the rest of the way.

 
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