Well this is much darker than I expected, but I’ve never been one to turn down a mystery—and a high school mystery at that. The second teaser for KBS’s School 2017 does a complete 180 from the first, which teased a light coming-of-age drama with fresh faces and bright smiles. But now it looks like we’re in for an interesting mystery at this high school, which is being terrorized by a delinquent known only as Suspect X.
The newest teaser opens with an introduction to Suspect X, a student in a black hoodie who roams the halls at night, and is responsible for setting off sprinklers in the middle of class and lighting class rankings on fire. The principal and teachers are fed up, and the students are told that this is their final warning. Webtoon artist Se-jung looks nervous about something, while troublemaker Kim Jung-hyun (Rebel: Thief Who Stole the People) looks rather bored by it all.
Han Sun-hwa (Radiant Office) plays a police detective assigned to the case, and she says in the teaser that the crimes are surprisingly elaborate and exacting. But we learn that there’s a flip side, and from the students’ perspective, Suspect X is considered a hero. We see class president Jang Dong-yoon (Solomon’s Perjury) looking mighty suspicious, and as other boys meet secretly in dark stairwells, someone says in voiceover, “It may be a vast underground organization.” As everyone wonders who the suspect/hero is, Suspect X watches all of them on a CCTV feed from his secret lair.
It’s an unexpected twist, but I’m excited by the possibility of getting something akin to Solomon’s Perjury, perhaps with less murder and more vigilante justice. I like the idea that Suspect X is morally gray and seen as a criminal by adults and a hero by peers, which is already an interesting premise. I’m hoping that the drama can still balance slice-of-life stories for its large cast with this overarching mystery; as long we take time to flesh out their characters and their personal problems, which is the backbone of the School franchise, I’m fine with everyone being a suspect. Let the games begin!
School 2017 airs on Mondays and Tuesdays following Fight My Way and premieres July 17.
