Stream It Or Skip It: ‘The Sound of Magic’ on Netflix, a Korean Series That’s a Clever Blend of Romance, Fantasy and Musicals

Teen K-drama meets neo-gothic romance in The Sound of Magic, a new musical series on Netflix. Director Kim Seong-yoon follows up his award-winning series Itaewon Class and Love in the Moonlight with this kind of nutty, kind of endearing fairy tale-ish story of a teenager who’s not only struggling to raise her younger sister on her own, but also, thanks to a mysterious manchildish weirdo, is confronted with the idea that magic is not just a figment and actually exists. Let’s watch an episode and see how far she gets with that one.

THE SOUND OF MAGIC: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

Opening Shot: Fade in on three schoolgirls in near-blackness talking about the weird abandoned theme park on the edge of town. “Rumor has it that a very good-looking magician lives there,” one says.

The Gist: The conversation continues: This attractive magician guy apparently actually saws people in half and puts them back together, and makes people disappear possibly forever. Then everyone in the show breaks out into song, because, as the title implies, this is a musical! The whole high school sings and dances as if possessed by the spirit of spontaneous tuneful storytelling! And then there’s an animated credits sequence with Tim Burtonesque imagery and Danny Elfmannish music, as if this magician fella might be a scissorhands without the scissors, or something along those lines.

Then the less-crazy stuff kicks in. Yoon Ah-yi (Choi Sung-eun) is late for the first day of school. Dash dash scamper. She crashes into Na Il-deung (Hwang In-youp) and falls down and rips her tights and skins her knee. She’s scolded by her homeroom teacher for being tardy; ends up sitting next to star student Il-deung, AKA Sensitive Glasses Boy; and is targeted for bullying and ridicule by Baek Ha-na (Ji Hye-won), the resident mean girl. Ah-yi tries to sneak some food home from the cafeteria but Ha-na knocks it on the floor. This. Day. Sucks!

We hear Ah-yi’s inner monologue via messages to her mother. After school, she gets a job at a convenience store and earns some money to buy dinner but a curiously snatchy breeze blasts the cash out of her hands. She chases it to – where do you think? The abandoned theme park? Yes! The abandoned theme park, where the hunky magician, Lee Eul (Ji Chang-wook), is using magic to play keep-away with the money. She goes home empty-handed to a little apartment where she and her younger sister live alone with bare cupboards and a landlady who’s on their case to pay back rent. We learn that their dad abandoned them so bankruptcy creditors can’t catch up to him. Apparently every! Day! Sucks! For Ah-yi.

But she keeps going, and so does this episode, past the one-hour mark. There’s a scene in which Ah-yi steps into a snow globe and starts singing as the scene shows a worry-free life in which her dad is around and there’s plenty to eat and they live in a nice home and her mother is there instead of, one assumes, being dead. Further developments: Sensitive Glasses Boy warms up to her, Ha-na concocts petty schemes to embarrass Ah-yi like a total shit, Ah-yi visits Lee Eul to maybe get her money back and figure out What’s Up With This Guy. There’s a scary incident and Lee Eul rescues her, and even though he used magic to do so, the episode feels the need to be longer and show us another scene in which he tries to convince her that magic is real, but this time, with singing. And finally, at this point, I think she’s convinced.

What Shows Will It Remind You Of? The Sound of Magic is High School Musical crossed with The Magicians crossed with whimsical Tim Burton (think Edward Scissorhands) crossed with Harry Potter.

Our Take: In a reality where people erupt into song with little warning (not all the time, but a couple-three times per episode), it’s pretty easy to swallow the idea that abra-cadabra/alakazam magic exists. The opening 68 minutes of The Sound of Magic is goofy and enjoyable, visually inspired, and driven by the OK-what-now-ness of its core mystery. You know, who is this guy, where’d he learn his magic, does he eat, why is he so Johnny Deppish, what happened to the carnival, is it real or is everyone in the show insane, stuff like that.

The teen drama that orbits around the guy with the cape is typical fodder – social awkwardness, enraging cliqueiness, petty cruelty, etc. If I’m not mistaken, Kim Seong-yoon is setting up a love triangle where Ah-yi has to decide whether she loves Lee Eul or Il-deong, although maybe the former is just going to teach her how to pull rabbits out of hats? Il-deong is more her speed, and I like that kid, he seems to have a good solid head on his shoulders and knows how to navigate the speedbumps and potholes of High School Highway. You’ll root for Ah-yi as a vulnerable protagonist who’s at a compelling crossroads: She has to function as an adult to keep her and her sister afloat, but believing in magic is total kid stuff. Looks like a good, solid metaphor for one of the primary conflicts of adulthood, you know, being mature and responsible, but not losing your sense of wonder for the world. The struggle is real.

Sex and Skin: None so far.

Parting Shot: Ah-yi, looking incredibly cute wearing Lee Eul’s top hat, looks around in wonder at all the magical things he’s perpetrated in front of her very eyes.

Sleeper Star: Hwang In-youp plays it close to the vest, giving one the impression that Il-deung’s going to be a crucial dramatic catalyst for our poor protagonist – and the most viable love interest. (Peeking ahead at the next episode, Il-deung is DEFINITELY a strumming-an-acoustic-guitar-in-a-green-field kind of guy.)

Most Pilot-y Line: “Do you (dramatic pause) believe (another dramatic pause) in magic?” – Lee Eul’s catchprase

Our Call: STREAM IT. The overlong episodes could be nipped and tucked here and there, but The Sound of Magic offers a fine balance of smart and silly. Fans of K-stuff will probably love it.

John Serba is a freelance writer and film critic based in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Read more of his work at johnserbaatlarge.com.