The main lead in this story is Eun-Pyo, a woman with two sons (8 and 4) married to a detective inspector. She is an educated woman, a professor of arts with a lackadaisical approach to her children's education, believing that they should have a happy and carefree childhood without any interference from her. Her stance is: if they're clever, then they will do well regardless. Her mother in law is concerned that the grand kids are going to miss out on a decent education, so she buys them an apartment in an Uber competitive borough and bullies her into moving.
The parents of the primary school her older son attends each have their own dark secrets and they all live in the same catchment area, ie a group of tall apartment blocks.
All the mums conspire against each other ditto the children, to get into elite study groups and "gifted child programs" via endless competitions and tests.
Jealousy, envy, greed, infidelity, backstabbing, harmful gossip, domestic violence, murder, pathological liars, child abuse, bullying, just about every nasty thing you can think of is woven into the story.
Reminded me so much of Desperate Housewives.
My only beef is with the Eun-Pyo character ( IMO undiagnosed ASD) who is eternally resentful and sullen. She is capable of just staring at someone for minutes at a time without saying a word or responding. Throughout the series, we never see her smile. Her behaviour was extremely irrational and irritating (to me and every other character on the show) especially during the last 4 episodes when I was wishing someone would give her a resounding kick up the backside or just kill her.
Main takeaway: Aside from having to fast forward every time I saw Eun-Pyo's ugly mug mooning and staring, I found the storyline quite entertaining.
