Extraordinary Attorney Woo review

Extraordinary Attorney Woo is a warm, clever legal drama for ten episodes and a looser one after that. Park Eun Bin plays Woo Young Woo, an autistic rookie at a big Seoul firm with a near perfect memory for the law, a lifelong love of whales and a running battle with revolving doors. Each episode builds around a new case, and the best ones are small, odd and a little funny: a runaway bride, a feud between three brothers, a village that wants to keep its tree. Kang Ki Young is a delight as her senior, Jung Myeong Seok, a decent boss learning to be a better one, and her best friend steals every scene she is in. Kang Tae Oh plays Lee Jun Ho, the paralegal who falls for her, and the romance is gentle and slow, built on small gestures rather than speeches. Park Eun Bin holds all of it together, and the performance deserved every award it got. The costs sit in the back half. After the midpoint the cases thin out, the Jeju trip plays like filler, a rival lawyer's change of heart arrives with no work done to earn it, and a storyline that drove the first half gets settled quickly and quietly. Jun Ho never gets a life of his own beyond her, and too many cases turn on a last minute brainwave. The show's take on autism is affectionate and specific, but it leans hard on the genius angle and sometimes treats her as younger than she is. The finale pulls most of it back together. Watch it for Park Eun Bin, the whales and an office full of people trying to be kind. Treat the first ten episodes as the main event and stay for the people after that. Skip it if procedurals bore you or you want a romance at the centre.