Well, this is an interesting development! According to the latest reports, not only are we to get a Romeo-Juliet love story between a human woman and a grim reaper in OCN’s upcoming supernatural thriller Black, they will also work together in an unusual alliance to save people’s lives. Pretty sure the heavens won’t be too happy about one of their own meddling in the fates of mortals.
Song Seung-heon (Saimdang, Light’s Diary) will star as the titular grim reaper Black, who is cold-blooded and collected in the face of death. On the other hand, Go Ara’s (Hwarang) character, Kang Ha-ram, is a clairvoyant who can visualize the impending deaths of the people around her. Her premonitions manifest as shadows, so Ha-ram hides behind her sunglasses in order to avoid constantly witnessing gruesome scenes of people’s deaths. What a terrifying predicament; I feel for her already.
The most recent teaser gives us some brief shots of our two leads separate and then together. We first see a solitary Black walking through a field on what has to be the cloudiest day ever recorded, and then Ha-ram witnessing (fore-witnessing?) a homicide on a bridge. In a sequence of split-second scenes, Ha-ram is seen breaking down in a plane and having to be escorted off. Damn, does that whole plane go down? She narrates that she can see death in the shadows, and then an angry Black, in a hospital gown and head bandages, holds her down as he demands to know who she is.
Hmm, is the reaper going to be an amnesiac for a little while? ‘Cause, I know of a fellow grim reaper who might be able to help with that. Jokes aside, I’m actually not too worried about this show drawing comparisons with Goblin, since Black’s tone is very OCN in terms of style—dark and gritty. It’ll be interesting to see how procedural the show will get, though, since initial reports only included a love story between the two leads, and now there’s an additional element of the grim reaper and human woman working together to rescue people from their fate.
OCN’s Black will follow Rescue Me on Saturdays and Sundays, premiering on October 14.
