Lookism

Hey everyone. This is about the Korean manhwa/webtoon Lookism, which can be read here. I'm assuming that you've read the comic if you're here to discuss it; if not, I highly, highly, highly, recommend it. It's a comic that satirizes k-pop culture specifically, and fandom in general, mixed in with some absolutely pants-soiling moments of Psychological Horror. It's one of the few comics that can effectively Jump Scare the reader, which is amazing given the still, non-moving nature of comic art. It's not without problems though, taking a somewhat conservative stance on gender relations and a somewhat privileged stance in suggesting that the oppressed are misguided in blaming society for their oppression, although it's generally part of a larger "personal responsibility" moral lesson so it's not as bad as I'm making it sound.

Artwork is very nice to look at too, although occasionally it's obviously economical in places and obviously traced or posterized from photos in others. And while it criticizes "lookism", or judging people based on appearance, it still has a Cast Full of Pretty Boys, which, quite frankly, no one is complaining about.

Thoughts? Feelings? Ships?

Jae Yeol/ Hyungsok for life!

Lookism started out good with a unique setting and with a good intent but as it went on and on it failed to become anything other than generic teen gangster story with underage teens fighting, drinking, smoking etc. They even have 4 "crews" that are basically sugar coated criminal organisations.

Most of it's readers, based on the korean page's statistics, are teens. And it's quite obvious this will be bad influence since readers might think fighting and spending money on clothes are normal.

Moving on to the series itself, the manhwa Lookism claims to criticize lookism but if you look closely that's not really the case, as all the good looking characters are good and all ugly characters are cowardly losers. The first few chapters had an interesting concept with "How will Hyungsuk overcome the society that treats people based on appearances?" but as story progresses we don't see fat hyungsuk overcome the situation but rather; simply give in and use his good looking clone for personal interests. And fat hyungsuk is often forgotten in some chapters as we only see good looking hyungsuk doing daily stuff. The series also has a tendency to blame the victim by showing bullied characters to be assholes themselves or that attempted rape victim as an attention whore.

The series is also inconsistent and has a lot of errors. To name a few;The time/season is inconsistent with characters wearing summer and winter clothes over and over again which would mean at least 4 years has passed in the series, Vasco used to be a regular guy with scenes showing him thinking like a normal person but later turns out to be mentally handicapped, explanations on boxing, jujitsu as well as other martial art are completely wrong, as well as other minor errors like grammar and spelling(in the original korean version).

Also, the series has been around for years with ~170 chapters but the characters have barely any development, and the story doesn't seem to progress and all the unnecessary filler episodes make it worse.

Lookism had potential but it's just a bad series in my opinion. I think this is the writer's first attempt at making a manhwa so mistakes are to be expected. But he seems to be happy with how it's doing currently so I doubt it will get better anytime soon.

Edited by Libs on Jul 17th 2018 at 8:50:27 AM