As a lover of foreign film and dramas, I’ve previously been keeping you abreast of what I watch, but this time I don’t want to focus on the show itself (The Great Queen Seon Deok), but a character. If I focused on the show this would turn into a dissertation.

Allow me to introduce Bidam Rang.

Oh, the blood? He just killed about… 30 people over some chicken.

Historically, Bidam was LORD Bidam of Silla, one of the great three countries of Ancient Korea. Word on the street he was a fat ass mysoginistic old man politician…martial arts expert. They really don’t know. So all we really have to go by is THIS version of Bidam; a member of the Royal Family (he doesn’t know this yet) who was trained by the GOD MC Hwarang Master Fighting Super Ninja Munno, and becomes the eventual lover of the Great Queen Seon Deok.

Couple of things about Bidam before I get into what it most likely the illest, yet most heartbreaking badass endings I’ve ever seen.

1. As mentioned before he is portrayed as a member of nobility. That member of nobility being an exiled King and the baddest Hwarang Wonwha to ever exist Mishil.( I could probably do a post on Mishil because I promise you’ve never met a character like that woman)
2. Munno was the best fighter Hwarang in all of Shilla. He personally trained Bidam for 20 years which made Bidam the SECOND greatest fighter in all of Shilla. When Munno dies…guess who an unstoppable killing machine? That guy.
3. Mishil, his mother abandoned him and Munno didn’t raise him with love. That happened after the kid (10 years old at the time) murdered a whole gang and their family over a book. So Bidam is needs some love.

NOW. Bidam of old meet Bidam 10 years after he’s meet Princess Deokman, Yushin, Alcheon and everybody else (there are like 5011 characters don’t about the names).

If you don’t move out of my way, I’m going to kill the shit outta you.

Now Princess Deokman is Queen Seon Deok, the first Woman King of Shilla, Yushin is the Chief General, Alcheon is the Chief Royal Guard and Bidam is the Sunggyu Chief. All important people right? Here is the set up for one of THE GREATEST drama endings of all time.

Bidam is royalty, and this has spread FAR AND WIDE. After Mishil’s THIRD coup d’etat (the first two were successful; she was getting Kings the fuck outta there) and her eventual death, Mishil’s faction tries to make Bidam, her son, the next King (never mind there is a Woman King already on the throne). Here’s were it goes from what to huh to what the hell is going on? Bidam has no interest in being king. NONE. He ONLY WANTS DEOKMAN. He’s loved her for YEARS (bone deep in love), and has done everything in his power to stay at her side. In an effort to serve her, he begins to amass power and ends up becoming the most powerful man in all of Shilla( all to be worthy of being Deokman’s love and her hand in marriage).

The thing with Kings and thrones is….power fucks up everything. The effort for MiShil’s people to get Bidam on the thrones in turn makes THEM powerful, more powerful that Deokman, Yushin, Chunchu and let alone Bidam can control. They start doing IGNANT shit to make Bidam submit to their wishes and goals. When Bidam promises Deokman that should they get married, he will step down from politics once she is dead, Mishil’s people go apeshit. It all boils down to them staging their own Coup d’etat (that would be the fourth one in less than 25 years mind you) and in order to get Bidam to comply, they send one of their OWN assasians after Bidam to make him think the Queen wants him gone.

Dude. I’ve never seen shit go from bad to fucking worse so fast in my life.

So they are staging this coup d’etat, and because Bidam is leading this (under the impression his woman tried to have him killed AND because if he wins this war he can name Deokman his Queen) The Queen is forced to name him an Enemy of The State, and if anyone sees him, kill him. Neither of them find out about Mishil’s people trickery until it’s WAAAAAAAAAAAAAY too late.

Bam. That’s the set-up. Okay. Coup d’etat has failed. Bidam knowing that he has fucked up, is walking towards Deokman’s camp to tell her something.

He is accosted by a clan of Hwarangs where he calmly states “Whoever strikes me down will go down in history.)

That’s a thug ass threat, if you think about it. I’m so dangerous and powerful that killing me will make YOU famous.

You wanna know WHY its a thug ass threat? Because not a damn one of them was able to do it. Bidam commences to hack his way through an ENTIRE PLATOON of 200+ people, like a hot knife through butter

He tied his sword around his belt and whooped they ass with it like a yo-yo.

No one in the camp could bring him down. Here is where it gets angsty as hell. What is Bidam’s goal? He counts his steps. He is exactly seventy steps away from Queen Deokman. He is fighting through an entire fucking camp of trained soldiers, generals and Hwarangs to get to her. 70 Steps Away.

30 steps away, the only thing powerful enough to bring Bidam down is an host of archers and their crossbows. And I’ll tell you this. He avoided 97% of the arrows (Do the math. If they shot 100 arrows, he avoided 97 fucking arrows aim directly at him.)

Eventually Yushin and Alcheon are able to land blows on him but STILL he is trying to get to Deokman. Why? WHY? Stutter stepping and bleeding all over the place, he looks at Yushin like “Please” but Yushin can’t, despite knowing Bidam’s feelings for Deokman, everyone is watching and technically Bidam is still an Enemy of The State.

He whispers out, too weak to actually say what he wants, as Yushin run his blade through him. Queen Deokman never hears it.

Things that make this infinitely SADDER

1. Queen Deokman is dying. Her final wish was to abdicate the throne and live the rest of her life with Bidam.
2. They both realized they’d gone too far to end up together and there was nothing they could do about it.
3. Deokman faints moments after Bidam dies, looking into his eyes one last time. She stays unconscious for three days from her heartbreak. She wakes after the three days and the first question out of her mouth was what did Bidam say before he died. She DIES hours after hearing it.
4. He died whispering her name. THAT’S what he came to the camp for. As a Queen, Deokman lost her name and became just “Your Majesty”. Anyone caught saying her name would be guilty of treason. He’d promised her the night they decided to be together that he would call her by her name, regardless. AT that point, he was already guilty of treason, he didn’t care, the only thing that mattered to him, that EVER matter to him was Deokman and in his dying breath he whispered her name.

Dog.

___________________________________________

Most of these pictures came from this post, a more condense, unemotionally involved version of the final events

This is my perfect drama ending. Good-bye, oh angsty Asian Legolas, good-bye! 🙂

It is a priceless post by dangermousie.