Persistent Superpower
'No need to hang yourself over something you can't solve.'
I'd learned that lesson during my long years as an unknown actor.
You had to analyze why you failed an audition, but obsessing over the mere fact of failure made new challenges terrifying.
Sometimes, you just had to let it roll off your back with thick skin.
In that sense, I'd handled the sudden emergence of my superpower pretty resiliently.
I had plenty of questions, but obsessing wouldn't help.
Things around Gongbeomche were getting busier by the day anyway.
But now it was time to face the questions I'd shelved.
Things were different now that I had more than one sample.
I thought for a moment, then picked up my pen.
1. Persistence
The part I was most curious about—and the one that's now clearly resolved. The superpower isn't limited to Gongbeomche. It keeps activating.
2. Precursors
The moment I touch a planning document or script, the precursor symptoms of the superpower appear. No need to even read the content. As soon as I flipped the first page of the Gongbeomche planning doc, I heard the chirping of grasshoppers. The instant I got At Your Fingertips, crowd cheers hit me. Crucially, nothing like this has ever happened in all my time at SSK. Even after the Gongbeomche possession, I touched every script and plan I could think of, just in case. That means the superpower fully controls which scripts get selected. Could the precursors be a message saying, "Pay attention to this script"?
3. State During Precursors
Hearing and smell. Just those two. For Gongbeomche, grasshopper chirps and the scent of grass. For At Your Fingertips, massive cheers and angry shouts, plus the smell of sweat. Nothing else.
4. Script Possession Conditions
Precursors and possession are separate. With Gongbeomche, nothing happened for a while after the precursors, even though I'd agonized over the script. Possession triggered only when I heard Joo Young-hoon senior and thought of "time loop" as the answer. In other words, possession activates when you find the answer that unlocks the script's potential.
— Precursors present possibilities.
— Possession rewards finding the answer.
Sounds like a solid summary?
5. Casting Recommendations
I stared at this header for a good while. If Jang Manager had stayed out of it, what would Gongbeomche's results have been? As I told the actors, I was dead certain it wouldn't flop. But hitting this level of success? Doubtful. Jang Manager blew it up huge, and I went even bigger. Guess I'll need more experience to know.
Looking at my neatly organized notes, I let out a hollow chuckle.
"What a total lunatic..."
Anyone else seeing this would peg me as a textbook delusional patient.
Sung Tae-hyung might drop by, so better rip it up and toss it.
Anyway, the current situation was simple.
The superpower recommended At Your Fingertips, but I couldn't possess it without the answer.
I was dying to know what it was.
Where the hell was the potential hiding in this obvious script?
Of course, I wasn't about to get lost in the superpower.
Even if I found the answer, if it didn't charm me personally, I'd scrap production.
But knowing and rejecting it is different from missing it out of ignorance, right?
"At Your Fingertips..."
I fiddled with the script and flipped the first page.
The content wasn't complicated.
Protagonist Park Seong-hwa.
A former volleyball star player at the top of his game in Korea, but a total mess off the court.
Failed husband, failed dad.
His marriage barely lasted a few years, and he's more distant from his daughter than a stranger.
Not successful as a coach either.
He won titles as a coach, but the moment he became head director, it all went to hell.
Two straight years of second-to-last place.
With the last-place team facing disbandment, he was basically dead last.
If this year didn't turn around, dismissal was certain.
In this mess, Park Seong-hwa blamed the players for his failures.
"Why the hell can't you do this?!"
He pushed the players hard with iron control, but it sparked conflict with the franchise star.
"Director, you project yourself onto the players."
"What can I do? I don't want to be anything like the person Park Seong-hwa, even if I admired the player."
Furious, Park Seong-hwa slapped the franchise star's face, and that was the end.
The violence scandal blew up, leading to his disgraceful dismissal.
Having given up everything, Park Seong-hwa decides to leave volleyball for good...
—Will you become Director Park Seong-hwa?
An offer comes to helm the perennial last-place team no one wants—the one slated for disbandment.
Honestly, it was so clichéd it threw me off.
I could predict the rest from the setup alone.
Ragtag team conflicts, redemption, family reconciliation, miraculous victory.
The growth story of Park Seong-hwa the man, not the player.
No production company would greenlight this in 2028—especially with a similar volleyball movie from a few years back. Details differ, but the ex-player coach taking over a last-place team? Same deal. High risk of "Hey, this is just like that other one" backlash.
Of course, it wasn't without merits.
If you could immerse, it was surprisingly fun.
Incredible that individual scenes hooked you despite zero plot curiosity.
The details of the last-place team's gradual improvement screamed deep thought.
Even visualizing with eyes closed, nothing clashed.
Judged purely on the script, it was good...
'Am I too biased against clichés?'
Let's open my mind.
Gongbeomche lacked fun, so I added it.
At Your Fingertips has fun but is clichéd.
So, add freshness.
But like Gongbeomche, don't remove anything.
Add something to create novelty...
'Future sight?'
'Mind reading?'
'Emotional colors for players?'
I jotted ideas in my notebook alone, then sighed.
Maybe Gongbeomche's success had me fixated—everything superpower-related.
No good.
Slapping fantasy onto a gritty, sweat-soaked sports story would just kill its strengths.
'Start from scratch.'
What are sports stories' strengths?
Volleyball's unique edges among sports?
Sequences only a director role can show?
I analyzed the script, filled idea notes, tore apart other sports films and dramas until dawn...
"Is there even an answer?"
Zero gains.
Wednesday and Thursday rolled back around.
Gongbeomche episodes 5 and 6 dropped.
With only two left till the end, it rode a clear upward wave—regrettably so.
People called it "a work with an entrance but no exit."
Even at episode 6, the narrative density hadn't dipped.
No, it got tighter.
Monitoring communities lately, it was hard to tell if they were drama forums or Gongbeomche ones.
...What the hell was that last one.
Should I click it?
Anyway, the writer, director, actors, Tvic, SSK—everyone was grinning ear to ear.
Surprisingly, even CL Team 3 was thrilled.
Gongbeomche was F.E.M, but since I was Team 3, it'd count toward annual performance.
Maybe that's why Joo Young-hoon senior's attitude had softened lately.
But for every yang, there's yin.
Yeongperal's data was crumbling.
The reason was obvious.
With dramas dropping same day, same time, people chose Gongbeomche.
Especially teens to 30s.
So Jang Manager was wrong.
He claimed Gongbeomche's rise was hype, not the work.
I won't deny hype helped.
Without the 0% Algorithm rivalry, no initial surge.
But hype alone couldn't sustain the climb.
Art won in the end.
Grandiose to say aloud, but Korean dramas now divide into pre- and post-Gongbeomche.
Artists would reference its success, tackling bold new works.
And maybe casting unknowns would get a bit easier?