In the next teaser for The Judge from Hell, we finally get a better look at our leads, the murder-y demon judge Park Shin-hye (Doctor Slump) and the passionate detective Kim Jae-young (Love in Contract), as they butt heads over the meaning of justice.
The teaser opens by showing the two philosophies of our two leads. On one side, our devil judge Kang Bit-na (Park Shin-hye) sits in a courtroom and lets us in on why being a criminal judge is her dream job: “because I get to meet lots of bad people.” And given the way she croons to children that justice is dead, we get the impression that Bit-na doesn’t believe that retribution isn’t something you mete out in the courtroom.
In contrast to Bit-na’s cynicism, detective Han Da-on (Kim Jae-young) is a stalwart defender of the law, believing that as long as the law is alive, it will protect people like him.
But as it turns out, what goes on in the courtroom is actually the least interesting part of this teaser, because as the title card tells us, once the human trial ends, the real trial begins. We see as corpses start turning up with mysterious causes of death, and Da-on notices that these are all former defendants from Bit-na’s cases.
Based on the evil glint in her eye and her blase attitude toward the murders (“Who cares about the truth? The important thing is a bad guy disappeared”), it wouldn’t be a stretch to suspect Bit-na as the likely culprit — which is exactly what Da-on does. What follows next is a cat-and-mouse chase between Da-on and Bit-na, each determined to deliver their own version of justice.
After scenes of fighting and murders, we end the teaser on Da-on’s challenge to Bit-na: “Who benefits from your version of justice? All your verdicts do is create a second victim.” And while it looks like those words might strike a chord for our devil lady — we get a glimpse of the two tearfully looking at each other — it looks like she won’t be an easy sell as she retorts in the voiceover: “I don’t need your sappy appeals to sentimentality. I know my judgement is always right.”
Written by Jo Yi-soo and directed by Park Jin-pyo (Brave Citizen, Love Forecast), The Judge from Hell will premiere September 21 on SBS.