The Scene D.P. Won't Let You See

I need to tell you about a memory first.

Foggy autumn morning. A dirt road winding up a mountain near the ceasefire line. I was maybe ten or eleven, picking chestnuts with my grandmother.

Her house was ridiculously close to North Korea—close enough that from the front yard, you could see the barbed wire fences slicing through the landscape like stitches holding two countries apart.

My grandparents ran a tiny convenience store right next to a military base. The atmosphere? 쓸쓸하고 을씨년스러운—desolate and eerie. That's the only way to describe it.

That morning, while I was bent over looking for chestnuts, I heard this rumble. A military truck, coming down that dirt road. In the back, soldiers in full combat gear, fully armed, loaded like cargo.

And their faces—looking back now, they had such young faces. So impossibly young.

Years later, when I watched D.P. Season 2, Episode 4, I saw that truck again. And in it, Choi Hyun-wook's Shin A-hwi—same truck, same young face, same feeling.

It was like the episode had reached into my childhood and pulled it onto the screen.

Before we go deeper, let me tell you about Choi Hyun-wook himself—because understanding the actor helps you understand why his A-hwi cuts so deep.

Hyun-wook was a baseball prospect. From fourth grade through his first year of high school—nearly ten years dedicated to the sport. He was apparently so good that his high school team was fielding scouting offers.

Then, at seventeen, an elbow injury ended it all.

But instead of getting stuck in his feelings about an injury that wouldn't heal, Hyun-wook quickly pivoted to Plan B. He talks about what he calls his "kkang(GUT)"—this Korean slang that hits different from basic courage. Kkang carries this vibe of mental steel, unbreakable grit.

Directors on every set tell him he's got "good eyes"—sharp, alert eyes that just draw people in. Whether I'm watching Hyun-wook as the bright guardian angel Suho in Weak Hero or as the mysterious, damaged A-hwi in D.P., the first thing that grabs me are those razor-sharp, captivating eyes.

That's where the kkang lives—forged through athletics.

There's this behind-the-scenes story from D.P. that I can't stop thinking about.

In Episode 4, there's a scene where Shin A-hwi smokes a cigarette—super quick, you could totally miss it. But Hyun-wook had this specific idea about how to make the smoking scene more stylish.

The problem? He's a newbie on this massive Netflix production. How do you pitch an idea to Director Han Jun-hee without looking like you're overstepping?

So he did something clever.

He started playing with the lighter near the director—just like how A-hwi plays with it on that military truck, flicking it on and off, provocatively. Making it look natural.

And Director Han caught on. He used Hyun-wook's idea in the scene.

I love this story because it shows you what kind of actor Hyun-wook is. He thinks about the tiny details. Even how to light a cigarette. Even as a rookie, he had the kkang to quietly advocate for his character.

And then there's the other story—after filming that insane confrontation scene between Son Seok-gu's Ji-seop and Hyun-wook's A-hwi on that isolated GP island. Son Seok-gu found Hyun-wook outside in the night air, looking relieved, and asked:

"Why are you so damn good at acting?"

He was asking how this young guy, barely into his early twenties, could act this instinctively good.

Now, about that episode.

If you're not Korean or didn't serve in the Korean military, you're probably wondering: what the hell is a "bulgogi ghost story"?

Bulgogi literally means Korean-style grilled meat. But in this context? Way darker.

"Bulgogi Goedam" (불고기괴담) is one of the most infamous Korean military urban legends. The story goes like this: decades ago, at a GP (guard post) near the ceasefire line, North Korean soldiers infiltrated in the middle of the night. Killed the South Korean soldiers. Set their bodies on fire.

By the time anyone found them, the bodies were so badly burned they looked like charred meat.

Bulgogi. Charred meat.

Most Korean military horror stories? Soldiers tell them to scare each other. But "Bulgogi Goedam"? Officers tell this to their soldiers to emphasize night watch duty. "Stay alert. Don't fall asleep. This really happened."

Did it actually happen? Nobody knows.

But if you're a soldier at a GP, there's no way you wouldn't know this story. And every night, standing guard in pitch-black darkness, staring at North Korea right across the wire—they think about it.

That's what Episode 4 brings in.

People keep asking about this episode: "Was it Na Joong-seok or Shin A-hwi? Who was the aggressor?"

And honestly? That's not the point.

A-hwi himself tells us this. There's this line I absolutely love:

That line is everything.

Based on what fans figured out and what the episode hints at, here's probably what happened: Na Joong-seok was bullying Shin A-hwi in an area with landmines. Joong-seok tried to assault A-hwi. A-hwi pushed him back. As Joong-seok got up, he stepped on a landmine.

Explosion. Fire. Death.

So A-hwi was the victim. The trauma from that day—watching someone burn alive right in front of him—that's why he flinches at sounds. Why fire terrifies him.

And here's the tragic part: Shin A-hwi, who was the victim, has transformed to become like Sergeant Na Joong-seok due to that day's trauma.

Remember what A-hwi says to Ji-seop when Ji-seop's beating him?

"GP 온지 얼마 안됐는데 벌써 변하셨네요."

"You haven't been at the GP long, but you've already changed."

With this sneer, right?

That line destroys me because A-hwi's speaking from experience. He knows. Because he changed too. The victim became like the abuser.

In Episode 5, Jun-ho steals a USB with all the covered-up truths. We watch him go through the files, uncovering incident after incident. The camera shows us everything.

But when he gets to the A-hwi and Joong-seok incident—the camera deliberately zooms in on Jun-ho's face. Shocked, eyes wide, confused.

The screen never shows us what's on that USB.

Why?

This is where their style really shows. They don't clearly separate aggressor and victim. Anyone within the system repeatedly becomes an aggressor, becomes a victim, and the victim becomes an aggressor.

“정황이라는 건 겪은 사람마다 다 다른 거야.”

If you go on Korean forums, you'll see some complaints.

"Season 2 is too unrealistic." "GP portrayal is exaggerated." "Jun-ho fighting almost ten people? Come on, that's fantasy."

And you know what? They're not wrong about the facts.

But I think people are missing the point.

Director Han said something important:

Season 1 was realistic. Documentary-like. Raw. Season 2 does something different. It uses metaphor. Visualization. Exaggeration—but not to be unrealistic. To show us something realism alone can't capture.

Jun-ho's hallucinations? They're not trying to show you medical symptoms. It's not literal. It's visualization—showing what's happening inside Jun-ho's mind as the system breaks him.

The hallucinations are metaphors.

And that train fight in Episode 5—Jun-ho fighting almost ten people. People complain: "Impossible."

But that's exactly the point.

Throughout the series, Jun-ho keeps hearing: "What can you even do?" Individual versus the state. Individual versus the system.

That train fight? That's his answer. It's 바위로 계단치기—hitting stairs with a rock. You know it won't work. Like Sisyphus pushing that boulder. The will to try something—anything. Nevertheless.

Can he realistically fight ten people? No.

But that's what they're showing—the absurdity. The absurdity of one person against an entire system. If it looked realistic, we wouldn't feel the absurdity.

Season 2 isn't trying to be Season 1. It's using heightened reality—metaphor, visualization, exaggeration—not to escape reality, but to show us something about reality that straight realism can't.