If there’s one thing that Rain is going to do these days, he’s going to star in a supernatural drama. From Please Come Back Mister, to Sketch, to Welcome 2 Life, the projects that most seem to draw Rain’s attention lately involve some sort of fantasy or supernatural element. If the trailers for his new drama are any indication, Ghost Doctor is carrying Rain down that same path. Along for this wild-looking ride is actor Kim Bum. Kim Bum is perhaps most well known for his role in the ever popular Boys Over Flowers, but is also no stranger to supernatural dramas. His first drama back after military enlistment had him playing a gumiho in Tale of the Nine-Tailed. Lets take a look at this first episode!

Ghost Doctor: Recap, Episode 1

We start in an ambulance. The paramedic calls around for a hospital willing to take his patient. A woman cries for her unconscious father. As they pull up to a hospital, a mysterious figure is shown as a sort of narrator.

Inside the ER, the attending doctor tells the paramedic again that they have no surgeons available for the patient. He tries to send them away but the paramedic says that the old man has no time. Intern Cha Yeong Min (Rain) watches until he can’t just watch any longer. He stops the stretcher from being rolled out and yells at the attending doctor to do something. The doctor scoffs at the young intern and challenges him to perform the needed surgery himself. Cha Yeong Min looks down in defeat until something rushes into him. He lifts his head, a determined look in his eyes (and also sparkles?)

12 Years Later

A group of children clamour to know what happened next. Did the ghost that possessed the young intern help to save the old man? It is now that we see the full figure of the mysterious narrator. A cleaning lady is telling a story to a group of patients in a hospital. She tells them that a guardian angel ghost doctor watches over all the little patients. The children call her a liar and run off. The old woman looks out the window and sees Dr. Cha Yeong Min walking to work.

Emergency Department

A group of younger doctors admire Dr. Cha as he walks towards them, marvelling that such a handsome man would chose medicine. We learn that the doctor is a professor who also teaches medicine now. An ambulance pulls up and the younger doctors get to work as Professor Cha walks past.

Professor Cha watches for a moment as the doctors try to revive the patient, but continues on his way. In the ER, the doctors are unable to get the man’s heart beating again. The team of specialists has yet to come down to help. Intern Oh Su Jeong runs out to find the professor. She pleads with Professor Cha to come look at the patient. 12 years has made a big difference, and now he is the one looking down on an intern.

Intern Oh grabs onto Professor Cha as he trips off the elevator. She pushes him onto the down escalator. Professor Cha gives a big speech about how he is too important to see emergency patients. Caught up in his own self-importance, Professor Cha once again misses the end of the escalator and trips off it. Angry and embarrassed, Professor Cha tells the young intern to go back to the ER and learn how to pronounce a time of death. She arrives back just in time to see the doctor pronounce death.

Intern Oh learns that Professor Cha is known as the greatest surgeon in the hospital. He once performed a life-saving surgery when he was just an intern himself. Since then, every patient he lays his hands on lives. Some even say that Professor Cha is possessed by ghosts.

Department Meeting

We next see Professor Cha in a department meeting where they are discussing the days scheduled surgeries. We learn that some patients don’t trust the surgical skills of the department Chief. As the Chief and other doctors present their cases, it becomes clear that the reason for all of Professor Cha’s patients living is not just because of his great surgical skills. He also turns down any surgery were the risk outweighs any potential outcome. This cancer patient can live comfortably for a year before dying but the surgery might cause a stroke…. next! The Department Chief comes out of the meeting furious with Professor Cha for looking down on him. He then remembers that there is someone new coming to the hospital today, someone who might put Professor Cha in his place.

Back in the room, Professor Cha commends the doctor from the morning on not wasting any more time or money on a patient who was clearly beyond help. As they leave, a pair of sneakers comes down off the boardroom table and their owner appears to wake up from a nap. A young man in a tracksuit follows the doctors out of the room. Surprised at the sound of the door behind them, the doctors turn to find a stranger with a big smile. He greats the great Professor Cha.

The newcomer rambles on for a bit about the greatness and madness of genius and then greets the youngest of the doctors by calling him Brother. He wanders off leaving his brother to answer the questions of the other doctors. Before they can begin to question their youngest doctor, the newcomer turns back around and introduces himself as Go Seung Tak (Kim Bum).

Professor Cha’s Office

Back in the office, Professor Cha questions the doctor who was called Brother. He says that he was classmates with Go Seung Tak and he knows very little about him. Another doctor recognizes the name. Apparently Go Seung Tak’s intern interview caused quite a stir when he answered the question “why did you become a doctor?”

Professor Cha argues with his department head about being forced to work with an unqualified doctor just because of nepotism. The hospital Vice President arrives and commiserates with Professor Cha about his younger cousin. He makes it clear that Go Seung Tak is the heir to the hospital. Professor Cha is being given no choice but to take him on as an intern.

Professor Cha comes out of his meeting to find Go Seung Tak leaning on the reception desk chatting with the nurses. He has brought them all greeting gifts of expensive perfume. Professor Cha tells him to stop spraying around the scent of money and to get ready to work.

Hospital Rounds

Professor Cha begins his rounds with his group of resident doctors. Believing his new resident to be unworthy of his internship, Professor Cha calls on Go Seung Tak to answer a question about the patient’s problem. Intern Go surprises all the doctors present by answer quickly and competently. He demonstrates that while he might be here because of nepotism, it doesn’t mean that he bought his grades. His former classmate tells them all that Go Seung Tak was famous for being brilliant back in school. He aced all his exams and answered every question. He even asked questions of the professors that they were hard-pressed to answer.

Professor Cha continues to ask Intern Go about each patient’s condition. Upon getting thorough answers from his new intern, Professor Cha puts Intern Go in charge and moves on to the next patient. Intern Go seems to catch on though, and eventually answers his boss with “I don’t know”. As Professor Cha and his residents turn to leave the ward, Intern Go stops at the next bed. He asks if they aren’t going to look at the rest of the patients.

It turns out that the rest of the patients in the ward are meant to have been transferred out before now. Professor Cha has decided that their surgeries are too great a risk. The only reason they remain is that their families have not given up on them. They keep refusing to sign the transfer papers. Professor Cha demands that his residents get the patients transferred out by the end of the week. Intern Oh speaks up in ‘agreement’.

Professor Cha says that these patients are a waste of time and money. There are some patients you can save, and some that you can’t. A good doctor doesn’t waste time and resources that are better spent on those who can be saved. He suggests that these patients’ lives won’t be worth much at this point, even if they are saved.

Instead of agreeing, Intern Go speaks to the unconscious patients. He calls Professor Cha arrogant. Intern Go says that all geniuses are, and that the patients shouldn’t take his words to heart.

Elsewhere in the Hospital

Intern Oh is smiling and chatting with a patient. New Intern Go watches her from the doorway, a goofy smile on his face. When she notices him, she smiles back. The two go outside for a cup of coffee. Go Seung Tak’s grandfather appears to keep changing the goalposts for his heir. First it was finish grad school. Then it was get an internship. Now he wants Go Seung Tak to take the board exams and really become a doctor. We find out that Go Seung Tak chose to focus on heart surgery because it’s a difficult department which will earn him respect in the future. Intern Oh suggests that he might want to actually try hard while he’s here, just for kicks.

The conversation ends when Go Seung Tak gets a call from Professor Cha. He’s been ordered to come join in on the next surgery. Go Seung Tak tries to get out of it but Professor Cha just hangs up.

Surgery

A group of interns, including Intern Oh, sit in the gallery to watch the surgery. Professor Cha doesn’t do surgeries himself very often so it’s a good learning opportunity for them to watch. Go Seung Tak arrives without a surgical gown on and gets sent back out. Intern Oh watches closely as Professor Cha stretches his hands to prepare for the surgery.

Go Seung Tak is called to stand closely behind Professor Cha and watch over his shoulder. The surgery proceeds in a lot of graphic detail. Detail that is being watched on a screen by Go Seung Tak’s cousin the Vice President.

Back in the surgery room, Go Seung Tak gets called on to explain to the watching interns about the valve replacement process. Professor Cha ‘rewards’ his correct answer by telling him that he will be tying off the valve for removal. Everyone present is surprised by this. Turns out that Professor Cha has some insider information about Go Seung Tak’s days back in medical school. He’s intelligent, but physically weak when it comes to bodies.

Go Seung Tak has been set up for failure and humiliation. He is pushed out of the way by another doctor who completes the procedure for him. After the surgery, Professor Cha addresses the watching interns. He tells them that the best students are often the worst at putting their knowledge into practice. Professor Cha very specifically points to Intern Go as an example of a bad doctor. What good is a kind-hearted, smart doctor if he has crap hands?

• 

• 

Professor Cha’s Home

At home, Professor Rain… I mean, Professor Cha sings a song about poop hands and golden hands while shaking his bum for the camera. He peels an apple while talking to a pet that looks like a tiny ferret in a cage. Professor Cha rants to his pet about the upstart intern with the poop hands who came after him at work. Don’t worry though, he tells his pet, I won the fight by stomping him into the ground.

The Next Day

Professor Cha arrives to work in his shiny new car, wearing a nice new suit.

So does Intern Go Seung Tak.

Professor Cha expresses his surprise that Intern Go would come to work after the previous day.

The younger intern keeps pace with his boss as they walk into the hospital. He grins and nods at everyone he sees. They try to step onto the escalator at the same time which causes them both to stumble. Their shoulders (or egos?) are too big to fit side by side on the stair. Professor Cha tells Intern Go to go up first and leaves to buy a cup of coffee in the lobby. Curious, Intern Go follows to see where the professor will go with his coffee.

Rooftop

On the hospital rooftop, which is covered with lovely greenery, a woman stands with a cup of coffee. Professor Cha slows to a stop when he sees her. She turns to see him standing there. The two stare awkwardly at each other as sad, soft music plays in the background.

Arriving at the rooftop a few steps behind Professor Cha, Intern Go witnesses their exchange. It seems it has been a while since the two last saw each other. The woman tells Professor Cha that she’s glad to see him well. He has no words for her. Instead, Professor Cha answers his phone and tells the person on the other end that he’ll be up in a moment. He has no appetite for coffee anymore.

Vice President’s Office

The cancer patient who’s surgery got turned down the previous day because it was too dangerous is being requested again. The patient’s son says that he wants to do everything possible for his father out of love. But the dude looks like a gangster and creepy music is playing, so I suspect what he really wants is for his father to suffer a stroke and die sooner than later. Professor Cha still refuses. It’s not worth the potential blemish on his career.

Coming out of the office, Professor Cha tells Intern Go not to appear before him any more. He won’t work with a slacker who lacks basic skills. He sends the hospital heir to go work in the ER and tells him to complain to his mommy if he doesn’t like it.

Emergency Department

Down in the emergency reception area, Go Seung Tak provides the same expensive yellow packages to the staff in this department that he gave to the surgical staff previously. Intern Oh comes in and asks to be the one in charge of Go Seung Tak’s training. She immediately has his cleaning wounds, which he is very squeamish about. Intern Oh relieves Go Seung Tak from that duty when his whining is bothering the patient.

Surgical Department

Meanwhile, Professor Cha is meeting with the elderly cancer patient who wishes to have the surgery despite the risk. The woman from earlier on the rooftop enters the room and comes to stand at the bedside. The old man introduces her as his youngest daughter, Jang Se Jin. She pretends not to know Professor Cha. Turns out that she is a doctor too and she works in the United States.

Outside in the hallway the two stand and stare at each other in silence. She tries to make small talk but Professor Cha shuts her down. He asks her if she is here to beg him to do the surgery on her dad. Jang Se Jin shuts him down now. She’s a doctor too and she has access to the same files he does. Se Jin knows her father is better off living his remaining days as peacefully as possible.

Now Professor Cha accuses her of only wanting her father to live because maybe he has yet to write a will. Or maybe he’s left her out of the will. He seems to be of the opinion that 12 years earlier, Jang Se Jin left him because she is some sort of gold digger and he was just a poor intern. He wonders what he can do to help her out now.

The Past

Young Intern Cha enters a dark room shaking and breathing heavily. He looks at his hands and opens a locker. Cha Yeong Min sees Se Jin’s picture and remembers that he was supposed to meet her that night. He runs to the meeting place but she is gone. He tries calling her and runs to her home, but she doesn’t answer her phone or her door. The next day at work, their supervisor tells him that she has left for a training opportunity in America. The rumour amongst the other doctors is that she found out her biological father was rich and left for better opportunities. Clearly a poor intern like him is no longer good enough for someone like her.

The Present

Alone in his fancy apartment, Professor Cha remembers the day that Jang Se Jin left him without a word. He recalls the look of disappointment on her face when he offered to kill her dad. Professor Cha decides to show her just how good of a doctor he is now. He calls the hospital to schedule the surgery.

The Next Day

In the office, the younger doctor scheduled to help on the surgery questions Professor Cha’s motives in doing a surgery that has such a small chance of success. Professor Cha tells him that it will be good for both of their careers. In the surgery, we once again get a shot of the hand stretching ritual followed by some graphic surgical shots. The hospital VP watches the lengthy surgery from the gallery. The surgery appears to end successfully.

The scene shifts with the sounds of a car accident and the sight of an ambulance rushing down a highway with its lights blaring. Professor Cha’s head rests on a steering wheel with a broken windshield in front of him. We see a memory of him saying that he will wait to see if the patents wakes up. His phone rings and there’s a message calling him away.

Professor Cha wakes up and exits his car. He sees a man bleeding heavily, laying on the road. Professor Cha runs over to the body. He reaches to check the man’s pulse, but instead his hand passes right through the man’s throat. The crowd ignores him as he tells them to step back. Professor Cha attempts CPR next, but his hands sink into the body.

Stunned, Professor Cha watches as a paramedic runs right through him and calls for a stretcher. The stretcher is for a body in the driver’s seat of his own car. When Professor Cha sees his own body, he begins to seemingly disintegrate into gold sparkly dust.

Back at the Hospital

Go Seung Tak is outside getting a snack. He sees an ambulance pulling up to the bay. The ER team pulls out the man who was bleeding on the road earlier. Another ambulance pulls up and Intern Oh’s team runs to meet it. We see a sparkly Professor Cha sitting in the back as his body gets off-loaded from the ambulance. Intern Oh recognizes his face right away.

Professor Cha follows his body into the ER. He realizes immediately what must be wrong with his body and starts calling out orders that nobody can hear. Go Seung Tak quietly peeks into the room. He is the surgical doctor on call. The other interns drag him into the room to help. Professor Cha screams for someone else to save him.

But to everyone’s surprise, Go Seung Tak knows exactly what to do. He orders the tests needed and reads them correctly. Go Seung Tak sees exactly what type of surgery needs to take place. He makes the exact same assessment that Professor Cha has made, much to the ghost’s surprise.

Surgery

Go Seung Tak orders them to take Professor Cha up to an operating room and to find a surgeon. In the operating room, everything is prepped and ready to go, but there is no surgeon coming. Go Seung Tak looks down at the face of his boss. An alarm begins to sound as Professor Cha’s blood pressure drops. The patient will dies if they don’t do something soon.

Professor Cha’s spirit tries desperately to grab onto the surgical tools that could save his life, but to no avail. Desperate, Intern Go Seung Tak calls for the scalpel. Everyone in the room, including Professor Cha, disagrees but Go Seung Tak stands his ground. If they do nothing, the patient will die. There are no other options right now.

Next to the frightened surgical intern, Professor Cha tries to coach Go Seung Tak through his first time with a scalpel. He speaks calming words to his student. In desperation, Professor Cha grabs onto Intern Go’s hand as he moves to cut in the wrong place.

Professor Cha’s entire body turns to golden dust and seems to rush into the body of Go Seung Tak. Professor Cha realizes that he has control over the intern’s body now. A calm overcomes him as he prepares for surgery. Intern Oh watches curiously as her former classmate Go Seung Tak begins to stretch his hands in the exact same pre-surgery ritual that Professor Cha does.

Final Thoughts:

I really enjoyed most of this first episode. Kim Bum’s character is delightfully cheerful and full of surprises. I think the show would be worth watching for him alone. But he’s not the only person worth watching in this drama. Rain, and Uee, and Son Naeun are all doing great as well. I’m curious to see how this plays out. Will Rain’s character be a coma ghost for most of the show? If so, how will he and Uee’s character be reunited in love? What’s up with the creepy cousin VP?

I expect that this show is going to have a lot of hospital politics plotlines as we go along. We haven’t even met Grandpa and Mom yet. I wonder if they will be key characters, or more cameo roles showing up nearer to the end? The only thing that really might keep me from completing this drama at this point, is the graphic surgery scenes. It’s a lot more detail than I generally enjoy watching. Korean censors block out non-bloody weapons but blood gushing out of a person’s chest in surgery is okay? Yikes 😅

All in all, if you aren’t someone who struggles with gore, and you like a little supernatural edge to your romantic hospital politics, I recommend you check out Ghost Doctor. Will it be for you? Who knows? But sometimes you just have to grab onto that scalpel and take the first cut to find out!

Interested in slightly less graphic medical dramas? Check out my recap reviews for You Raise Me Up and Birthcare Centre

Check out our first episode discussion of Hospital Playlist over on the Certified Noonas podcast