Kevin C. Wong

Light Shop (2024) [/]

Light Shop is a South Korean horror drama running eight hour-long episodes on Disney+.

The first few episodes introduces these characters who are quite different and the commonality is they end up in this spooky lightless and long alley that they have to traverse in the dark of night. But in the middle is a light shop — a shop that sells light bulbs and I suppose lamps of alls sorts — and its lights shine brightly and draw in these people.

But strange things start happening to these characters. They meet other characters that turn out to be damaged or strange or perhaps demons. By mid-series you realize that all these are dead or on the brink of death — mostly because of a bus accident — and haven't moved on to the other side — stuck haunting the Earth until they resolve some issue, even if that issue is admitting they're dead. And the light shop owner is perhaps a guide for the way forward…

Actors

  • Ju Ji-hoon as the light shop owner (who has his own story of how he became the current owner)
  • Park Bo-young as a nurse who can see the spirits because she was once in a coma
  • Kim Seol-hyun as a deaf woman who committed suicide, now she can talk and she's trying to save her husband who is a spirit
  • Kim Min-ha as a writer in a lesbian relationship (which I'm not sure I've ever seen in a K-Drama)
  • Shin Eun-soo as a teen school girl Hyun-joo who's always buying new light bulbs for her grandmother; turns out grandma is trying to get Hyun-joo to pick the light bulb that will return Hyun-joo back to the real world.

Fairly interesting story and it's nice that it's short and doesn't drag it out too long. More like "spooky" horror than "jump scare" horror.