By: Hannah Zhang

The art of fighting is so terribly majestic, allowing people to kill people, and is so incredibly dangerous, especially when those trained in it become corrupt. Knowing how to fight can directly change someone’s life, as shown in a webtoon (comics, but on a screen) written by Pak Taejun and illustrated by Kim Junghyun.

The webtoon uses this to explore the morally gray areas of using violence to get what we need. Viral Hit, a webtoon serialized via Naver Webtoon and boasting millions of views worldwide, is centered around the life of a Korean high schooler Yoo Hobin. He is considered a loser, often bullied by classmates on top of having to earn money to support himself and his sick mother. With the help of an anonymous fighting YouTube channel, though, Hobin learns to take down bullies who are both larger and more experienced in street fights than he is. Eventually, he starts taking down small gangs and, with the help of the friends he makes along the way, succeeds in stopping what would have been the largest gang threat to South Korea of the century.

It’s a compelling tale of someone with extreme physical disadvantage making his way to the top through pure hard work. Yoo Hobin’s journey shows him knocking down opponent after opponent until he finally becomes known as someone who shouldn’t be messed with. The story is a staggering 218 episodes long, through which Pak Taejun never fails to deliver with interesting story arcs and his ability to focus on developing many different characters at once.

There are a few flaws to this splendid masterpiece that make it much less practical, however. Many fans have questioned plot holes in the comment sections of the comic platform Naver Webtoon, like how the user ‘mica mica’ puts it: “It would really end quick if Hansu and Samdak (two dads of story’s deuteragonists) intervened…” So, to sum up the concerns, why are the police allowing literal high schoolers to chase down the leader of the most dangerous gang of South Korea when the parents of these children are clearly more capable? What they’re asking here is entirely reasonable: The dads of Taehun and Gaeul (both friends of our protagonist, Hobin) are known to be able to single-handedly put entire gangs six feet underground, and are shown explicitly to be more than capable of putting our main antagonist away in a drawer with ease. The two fathers were probably created as mentor figures to our main character, to make the story feel more safe, but were not-so-smoothly integrated into the story.

Another major problem that interferes with the overall flow of the story is its length.
Despite the perfect execution of suspense and the blending of the different story arcs, much of the main conflict feels dragged out, and there was more than one point in the story that would make an amazing place to end.

Nevertheless, Pak Taejun’s story writing paired with Kim Junghyun’s breathtaking art will sweep you off your feet as you get to know the charming main characters and cheer for them on their journey to put an end to the worst gang of South Korea.