South Korea has been a force to be reckoned with in recent years when it comes to producing high-quality films and television shows. The Oscar-winning film Parasite and, of course, the hugely popular Netflix program Squid Game are two of the most well-known examples. Today, we have another wonderful creation from Seoul, and this program is full of angels, demons, and cults, and it will undoubtedly make you binge-watch it all in one sitting. The show is only 6 episodes long, so it is perfect for a weekend binge!
Because of the cruelty, blood, gore, and violence that is entangled in 6 hours of content, I would not recommend this series to the faint of heart. The series is written and directed by Yeon Sang-ho, who is most known for directing the legendary film Train to Busan. Yang Ik-June, Yoo Ah-in, Park Jung-min, and Kim Hyun-Joo also make important appearances.
Choi Kyu-sok also contributed to the script. Let us take a closer look at this one-of-a-kind tale that flawlessly blends the supernatural with fundamental questions of faith, conflict, belief, and self-identity. Given that South Korea has a lengthy history of religious cults with apocalyptic predictions and foretellings, the plot here is extremely intriguing and keeps you hooked until the very end.
Hellbound series – A Plot Summary
The entire series revolves around the sudden appearance of angels who begin passing judgments to people and giving them decrees of when they would die and be sent to hell and how one cult call the New Truth interprets that and capitalizes off of it, causing fear and paranoia and obedience until one baby is born that shakes up their entire foundation.
The first episode introduces us to these otherworldly heralds of death and the way they deliver judgment is nothing short of brutal. Three heralds of death arrive on the scene at the precise time given by the angel in the decree and beat the victim to a pulp before burning them with a bright shining light, leaving only the burnt skeletal remains behind.
This is something that seems rather unbelievable but people have no choice but to believe it because it happens right in the middle of Seoul and in front of hundreds of commuters. Because we live in the age of the smartphone, the video also goes viral and in comes, a religious sect also referred to as a cult in the series, The New Truth.
Turns out that the chairman of this group, Jung Jinsu had been warning about this doomsday and what would happen to humanity if they didn’t head God’s message and were the first to recognize this phenomenon as God punishing mankind for increased transgressions.
Fear begins to develop among the people because they had seen it and didn’t know what to do and as often happens with fear, people turn radical and we learn of a fringe faction of The New Truth, The Arrowheads who are a violent group that believes in beating up people to make them pay for their sins. Amongst all of these supernatural happenings and religious people, we have the police force and an officer named Jin Kyeong-hoon, dedicated to finding out the truth.
They investigate the first incident as a murder case but it slowly becomes more apparent that something bigger is at play and things come to a head when a single mother, Park Jeong-ja gets the decree and agrees to have a live demonstration in exchange for money for her children, paid by The New Truth.
Kyeong-hoon teams up with a lawyer named Min Hye-jin who usually represents the victims of those murdered or beaten up by The New Truth and The Arrowheads, to protect Park and her children. The demonstration takes place and like clockwork, the three gorilla-like monsters show up and beat the frail woman to a pulp before incinerating her.
During this process, Kyeong-hoon tries to save the woman by shooting one of the monsters but to no avail. A large crowd also consisting of VIPs had gathered and the demonstration was being broadcasted live having seen this, people bowed down and accepted that this was indeed divine intervention. Min Hye-jin and her colleague did not bend down, simply in pure shock and they, along with Kyeong-hoon became public enemy number one because he had dared to shoot God’s messengers.
The series often focuses on the public’s reaction to something as bizarre as this and the understanding of this new phenomenon was shaped by Jung Jinsu and The New Truth. They proclaimed that if everyone were to live righteously, they would be safe from being condemned to hell and people followed their teachings.
We also see that chairman of The New Truth has no trust in the modern justice system and believes that only God’s divine justice will make it all right and he abuses his power and takes advantage of the supernatural phenomenon’s when he takes detective Kyeong-hoon’s daughter and maker her kidnap and then incinerate the man that killed her mother (Kyeong’s wife) to make it look like the monsters had done it.
The series then gets its most interesting twist in the form of a crazy revelation that I did not see coming and that was, one can get sentenced to hell even if they have never done anything wrong in their whole lives. This would turn everything that Jung Jinsu and The New Truth had taught right on its head.
We watch as Jung Jinsu himself dies at the hands of these monsters right after he reveals to Kyeong-hoon that he had received the decree 20 years ago, when he was just a teenager, and had since tried to understand why it was given to him since he was always righteous. However, living with that hanging over his head for 20 years had clearly driven him past sanity as he rambled on about how it helped him be more righteous and a better person and that is a world he envisioned.
Lawyer Min Hye-jin stumbles upon evidence that leads her to a pastor called Jeongchil who had evidence of Jung Jinsu admitting that he had received a decree 20 years ago which would help her convince people that this was not just God’s will to punish sinners. However, it turns out to be a trap as she is beaten and left for dead as jeongchil becomes the new Chairman of the cult after the death of Jung Jinsu.
After this, there is a time leap and we are then introduced to a society that has given in to the teachings of The New Truth which have become a large, established religion under the leadership of jeongchil and his committee. They humiliate people who get the decree and drag their families through the mud.
It is a world where The Arrowhead runs unchecked and they can beat up whoever they feel like without any consequences. However, all hope is not lost as we also see an underground organization has developed to counter the ill effects of The New Truth.
They protect the condemned and allow them to die in isolation and not in front of a live broadcast, as is mandated, and also protect their families from shame. In a world such as this, we see a young man named Bae Yeong-Jae who is against the beliefs and methods of The New Truth but unfortunately, his own newborn son receives a decree that he will die in a few days’ time.
This sparks tension as he contacts the underground movement for help and is told that the demonstration of his son could help people see how The New Truth were lying and fooling people. At first, Bae refuses but realizes that he has no other option.
In the meanwhile, The New Truth Committee gets wind of the underground organization and begins hunting them down and we realize that lawyer Min Hye-jin was alive and leading the movement against The New Truth. The New Truth also learns about the existence of the baby and realizes that the demonstration would be terrible for their religion and they try to take the baby away from Bae’s wife.
However, Bae manages to escape with his wife and son and Min takes them to a safe house of a man that was earlier a New Truth Follower but had become disillusioned. Turns out, this man was the biggest spokesperson of the Arrowhead and had gotten scared once he received a decree. In a last-ditch effort to stop Min from broadcasting the baby’s demonstration, Chairman Jeongchil plants the idea in his head that he was the Messiah and that God had made a mistake by condemning the baby.
This drives him into a manic state and he decides that he will kill the baby before the demonstration can ever take place. However, he does not succeed and Bae and his wife put the baby between them, tie themselves and make a protective shield around him once the monsters burn them with their light, the parents die but the little baby miraculously stays alive. The entire incident gets live-streamed and The new Truth loses their control over people. And in the end, we see Park Jeong-JA’s burnt body regenerate and come back to life, signaling a second season.
What are angels and monsters?
One of the central questions that remain in this series is who are the angels and what are the monsters that beat people up and burn them to a crisp? The angels in this series aren’t exactly how we have been told angels look like. There are no flowy white dresses or halos or wings, in fact, these angels are rather horrifying as they appear as gigantic disembodies faces with hollow eyes that pronounce the time and date of your death before promptly vanishing.
There is no reason behind their appearance is as revealed at the end of the series and they somewhat arbitrarily dish out condemnations to whomever they feel like and whenever they feel like. What happens of them, if they are CGI or holograms or if they are actually Godsend, will only be clear in the second season.
When it comes to the monsters, we first see them chase a man down the streets of Seoul and murder him brutally before burning him to a crisp. They always show up in threes and look like giant black humanoid Gorillas that would remind the average viewer of the Yeti or Bigfoot and they also bear an eerie resemblance to King Kong. They are insanely powerful and one push can send humans flying.
They can also emit some sort of light which burns the human body, leaving behind only skeletal remains. The definitely keeps a supernatural element and people largely accept that these monsters are the heralds of death.
They also disappear into thin air after carrying out the demonstration as if going through some sort of portal. We don’t know where they come from or who has sent them, all we know is that their purpose is to carry out the decree as set by the angels. Season 2 has many questions to answer and could also possibly give us an explanation as to what these monsters actually are.
The Baby Lives – Ending explained
The last episode of season 1 leaves us with a lot to explore. Firstly, the baby is saved miraculously and becomes the first person to survive a demonstration ever. Sohyun had intended to accept her baby’s death, but she changes her mind at the last minute. She leaps in front of one of the approaching demon monsters, snatching her infant from its grasp.
While Kim Dongwook’s neighbors watch with their eyes and iPhones, she, her husband Youngjae, and lawyer/badass Min Hyejin manage to stave off the three monsters for a few minutes. Young-Jae and his wife, as well as Min Hye-jin, form a team to combat the creatures. They succeed for a time, but it becomes clear that they can’t prevail, so the parent’s band together in a last-ditch effort to save their child from the creatures Hellfire.
It works, as the baby is discovered to be safe and well between her deceased parents. Everything was being videotaped and televised live, which implies the public’s perception of the situation has shifted. Now that someone has survived the demonstration, it begs the question of who makes the decisions and why.
After witnessing Toughie’s survival, the public appears to be ready to accept the fact that the New Truth Society is a group of power-hungry bullies, as they almost immediately turn against the deacons of the New Truth. After all, if the concept of “original sin” doesn’t exist, how could a newborn be capable of sin?
And how did monsters kill two people who were not sentenced to death while leaving a third alive? This shift in belief is almost immediate as two of The New Truth Committee who were pursuing the baby along with members of the Arrowhead were stopped by the people of the building as Min took the baby away safely after the demonstration.
An old man even spoke up against the committee members and when he was beaten unconscious, for the first time in a long time, he was arrested for battery and taken away by the police, showing that the faith that the people had put in The New Truth when it came to dealing with something strange and unknown was eroded.
However, this was not the only twist that episode 6 had to offer us. We also see that Park Jeong-JU’s skeletal remains regenerate and she comes fully back to life. Park Jungja’s death at the hands of the enigmatic supernatural monsters was the first demonstration broadcast for the New Truth, making it a unique location. It’s where we return for the last scene of Hellbound, in which Jungja’s burnt body is re-formed into life.
Park Jungja wakes up naked and alone, possibly for the first time in four years, inhaling oxygen into her lungs. Was she in Hell or some other place, and why has she returned? The other, more intriguing aspect is if the other demonstrators are still alive. This could indicate that a large number of people have returned from the dead with answers to life’s most pressing questions.
It’s possible that Chairman Jung Jinsu and Dongwook will return. This raises many questions that need to be answered in season 2 – Is it true that everyone or anyone went to Hell, or that some people went to Heaven? Was the baby’s parents’ sacrifice the catalyst for this change? If that’s the case, it could mean that not only can you survive your demonstration, but the planet as a whole could be saved by acts of grace.
Finally, as Min Hye-Jin escapes with the baby, the cab driver helping her says “I don’t know much about God, and I don’t even care, but there’s one thing I do know: and that is that this world belongs to humans. And we should settle our matters ourselves.” The show leaves us with the message about religious fanaticism and cults which has been a massive issue in South Korea in the past and continues to be and urges people to be good for the sake of being good and not because of some higher entity will condemn to damnation.
Should you watch Hellbound?
The answer to this question is a resounding, YES. Make some popcorn or gather some sweets and sit down to binge this six-episode TV show on Netflix that will transport you to this world of cults, decrees of damnation, monsters, and magical babies. Hellbound is the kind of horror series that gets better with each episode, revealing how much the creators have thought about the situation in a very practical way.
They grapple with the ensuing media frenzy, the embarrassment people would feel if they received a decree, the organizations that would try to profit from it, and more. It becomes an intriguing entrée into faith stories, without being self-serious in its concepts. The three wrath monsters may be supernatural, but the panic and emotions in Hellbound are quite real. It is an absolute must-watch.