Review – Along With the Gods: Two Worlds

This Korean fantasy drama pulls no punches and leaves plenty of food for thought.

Foreign films are taking over ground ceded by Hollywood, and in this case, that is a good thing. Hollywood would never do this film justice. Starring South Korean actors Ha Jung-woo, Cha Tae-hyun, Ju Ji-hoon, and Kim Hyang-gi, Along With the Gods: Two Worlds is based on a Korean Webtoon series by Joo Ho-min. There were supposed to be four films in the works, but thanks to the lockdowns and a subsequent scandal in Korea, those were put on hold. Apparently, the third movie is in production and the fourth will be released as a TV series rather than as a film. We will have to wait and see how both go and that means more waiting. Darn.

Along With the Gods: Two Worlds is for a Mature Audience, so do not show it to the little kids, as even though it is not gory it may “weird” them out a bit. You can certainly watch the film without being worried about gore, but there are some background monsters and icky implications that children won’t like. More than a few of the items that the film touches on are not child-friendly, either.

The film begins with firefighter Kim Ja-hong (Cha Tae-hyun) dying as he saves a little girl trapped in a building that has caught fire in Korea. He is met almost immediately upon his death by two “Grim Reapers” – Hae Won-maek (Ju Ji-hoon) and Lee Deok-choon (Kim Hyang-gi), who shepherd his startled soul to the Afterlife. This is the Buddhist afterlife, not the Christian one, and it means the two Grim Reapers and their boss, Gang-rim (Ha Jung-woo), need to get Kim Ja-hong through seven literal Hells to get him reincarnated.

Both Hae Won-maek and Lee Deok-choon are eager to get Ja-hong through the seven Hells so he can reincarnate once they realize he is a paragon – that is, he is a Paladin. An upright, upstanding citizen who never did anything so wrong in his life that he can be condemned to any of the Hells. They have been told by Yeomra, king of the gods, that they and Gang-rim need to escort 49 paragons to their reincarnation to get reincarnated themselves. Kim Ja-hong will be their 48^th paragon, meaning they only need to escort one more through the Hells and they are gold!

For his part, Gang-rim’s about as excited as a block of stone. New paragon, new case, same old story about sums up his attitude toward Ja-hong. They have 49 days to get Kim Ja-hong through the afterlife to reincarnation. No dawdling, just enough time to move along and get this done….

Only problem is that Kim Ja-hong is still somewhat shell-shocked from realizing that he is dead, and he is not so sure he wants to be reincarnated. It makes Gang-rim and the others’ arguments for his defense a little difficult when the defendant speaks to one of the judges specifically after he was told not to by Gang-rim. Although he is not particularly eager to reincarnate like his subordinates, Gang-rim makes it very clear he wants Ja-hong to behave from this point forward. Or else.

Things become even more complicated when Hell starts rearranging itself and demons begin pursuing Ja-hong. By rights, as a paragon, this type of thing shouldn’t be happening. Ja-hong has no feud with anyone in the living world and he didn’t kill anyone. So why are the underworld’s demons trying to destroy his soul, threatening the Grim Reapers personally in the process, and putting all four souls’ shot at reincarnation in jeopardy?

Gang-rim leaves the underworld to seek answers, telling his assistants to protect Ja-hong while he is away. What Gang-rim finds will shed light not only on Ja-hong’s life, it will hint at his own past life as well. And that’s a past life Gang-rim does not like remembering even though, as Lee Deok-choon reveals later, he is the only one of the three Reapers to recall his past life. She and Hae Won-maek have no memories from their past lives.

While the story takes a bit of time to get going (it is a two-hour film), one of the things to jump out to a film viewer going in cold is the craftsmanship that went into this movie. Yes, there is wirework for several of the stunts, and the CGI is not seamless. Nevertheless, it is far more realistic than the big blockbusters that Hollywood has been churning out of late. The outlandish CGI monsters and battles are kept to the Afterlife while the more realistic CG is reserved for scenes in the real or living world. It makes suspending disbelief far easier for this film than for most present-day Hollywood movies.

Another gut-punch for starving Western audiences that the movie delivers is in the acting. Every last one of the principle actors brings their A-game to the movie, putting the vast majority of present Hollywood actors (who, it must be admitted, are not allowed to really act these days) to shame. Ha Jung-woo (Gang-rim) in particular manages to steal the majority of the scenes he is in, maintaining his straight-man behavior while showing the genuine cracks that come from a man dealing with millennia-old bad memories. The scenes where he gives just a few tempting glimpses into the man behind the lawyer tantalize viewers and make them want to see what made him the person he is in this film.

Despite spending a large portion of the movie gaping like a lost fish, Cha Tae-hyun (Ja-hong) absolutely nails the heart of gold heroic paragon archetype. The little moments, such as the time he pauses and then shoves one of his guardians out of the way to protect them from the fate trying to claim his soul, sing loudly in an entertainment landscape that claims such “perfect” behavior is impossible. Cha proves it isn’t impossible – and that “perfect” does not necessarily entail perfection.

This is where Along With the Gods: Two Worlds really shines – it shows that there is no such thing as perfection in this life. Even paragons have sins that could claim their souls if they had no one to argue their case for them. Granted, for a much-burned Christian audience, in this case Ja-hong is not being escorted to Heaven. His journey, while it has some echoes of the Purgatorio of Dante, is definitely very Oriental in this respect. Reincarnation becomes his end goal by the finale of the movie.

Nevertheless, a Christian can gain a great perspective on sin and just how imperfectible man is, both in the micro and in the macro. Ja-hong’s position as a paragon does not mean he has not sinned. In fact, as the film progresses, we learn he was tempted to a terrible sin and seriously committed to doing it. He changed his mind in the end but he did commit to doing it. That is enough to make it a sin by Buddhist and Christian standards.

Furthermore, this sin isn’t something his Reapers can argue around. While they are able to convincingly argue him past several trials, there are a couple that require they seek help from the living world. Even a paragon can sin, and sin gravely enough to go to Hell, because no human is actually perfect this side of the veil.

The film gives viewers a lot of food for thought. As the friend who recommended this film to me said, the East tends to remember well how the effects of sin ripple outward and then rebound on the sinner. Ja-hong’s biggest sins have ripple effects that affect his family in the living world, his own soul, and the well-being as well as the hopes of his Grim Reaper guardians.

Rarely, if ever, does media in the West touch on this. Most of this is due to the past 70 years of watered-down “empathetic” tales doing their best to make evil seem misunderstood, or even a much-abused good. The trend exploded within the last decade but rest assured that it goes back much, much further in Western entertainment of the prior century. Oriental media usually avoids this and Along With the Gods is no exception, making it a worthy viewing for anyone.

Along With the Gods: Two Worlds takes a good, hard look at sin. It also takes a good, hard look at “perfection” and points out that the most perfect of humans – paragons – still fall short. This does not make them bad or evil….

But it does make them human.

With the West still struggling to pierce through the excuses to avoid the “perfection” of paragons and various entertainment leaders trying to hide evil choices under the guise of “realism,” Along With the Gods: Two Worlds is a refreshing yet somewhat bracing blast of fresh air. The Grim Reapers are all human with their own flaws and foibles, while Ja-hong proves you don’t need to be “perfect” to be good. No one is fully evil unless they choose to be evil, but everyone sins.

Making amends to heal the sins while you are alive is generally a good idea. Ja-hong’s trials would have gone more easily if he had done that before his death, but he didn’t expect to die when he did. This makes the film is a very good memento mori and worth watching for that reason as well.

Be sure to grab a box of tissues when you do view it. The finale is a tear-jerker. It is good, but it will likely make many a viewer sniffle. This is a film which will, indeed, make a viewer a better person so don’t let it slip by you now that you know of it. Grab it today - you won’t regret it!