Set in the city of Gyeongseong in 1945, Gyeongseong Creature tells the story of Jang Tae-sang and Yoon Chae-ok as they fight both humans and a dangerous creature for their survival. The first part of the series is now streaming on Netflix.
Warning: This article contains heavy spoilers
Plot summary
In 1945, the city of Gyeongseong, as well as the rest of Joseon, is ruled by Imperial Japan. The people of Joseon are treated like second-class citizens in their own country.
Jang Tae-sang, well known as Master Jang by the people of Gyeongseong, is a rich man who acts like a self-centered person but has a heart of gold.
The atrocities committed by the Japanese have led to the formation of rebel groups, such as the Joseon Patriotic Society, but Tae-sang refuses to join them, as he does not want to lose his hard-earned wealth and status.
As Tae-sang always has information about everything and everyone, the Japanese police commissioner, Ishikawa, asks him to find his missing mistress, Myeong-ja, who is pregnant with his child.
If Tae-sang fails, he will lose his pawn shop, the House of the Golden Treasure, which is the largest and finest establishment in Gyeongseong, to Ishikawa.
Apart from that, Ishikawa will also send him to war against his wishes. Tae-sang has wealth and connections, even with the Japanese, yet he fails to find Myeong-ja.
Since people always come to Tae-sang for all sorts of information, he is followed by a woman, Yoon Chae-ok, who wants to find a Japanese artist named Sachimoto.
Chae-ok and her father are sleuths who are experts at finding missing people. Tae-sang promises to help them find Sachimoto. In return, they will find Myeong-ja.
Myeong-ja was sent to the Ongseong Hospital, a place where secret human experiments are conducted in the basement, by Lady Maeda, Ishikawa’s influential wife.
As there is a military ward behind the hospital, it is hard to find a way in. Political prisoners and abducted people are kept as prisoners in the hospital’s basement.
A high-ranking soldier, Kato, has been experimenting on these innocent citizens of Joseon. After several failed attempts, he succeeds in turning a prisoner into a dangerous creature.
This creature cannot be killed by bullets; burning it is the only way to kill it. Nitrogen is used to put it to sleep, but even then, the creature releases spores that kill humans.
After the success of Kato’s experiments, the hospital is closed to outsiders, and Chae-ok and her father, who had gone there to look for Myeong-ja, get trapped inside.
Chae-ok and her father send a message to Tae-sang to let him know that they have found Myeong-ja.
They get help from people who are working against the Japanese. One of these new allies is a soldier named Yeong-gwan.
Meanwhile, Tae-sang finds Sachimoto, who has been working at the hospital for the past year. His job is to observe the experiments and make sketches.
With Sachimoto’s help, Tae-sang and his friend, Kwon Jun-taek, who is a rebel, sneak into the hospital. Tae-sang wants to rescue Chae-ok, whereas Jun-taek wants to find fellow rebels who were captured.
Chae-ok rescues a few children who were prisoners at the hospital, and she convinces Tae-sang to save them instead of prioritizing Myeong-ja’s rescue.
Chae-ok was looking for Sachimoto because he had recently met her mother, who had gone missing 10 years ago. She finally meets Sachimoto, but he does not know about her mother’s whereabouts.
Lady Maeda knows that Tae-sang has broken into the hospital, and she warns the hospital’s director, Ichiro, about it.
Jun-taek finds his comrades, but he ends up getting captured. Tae-sang and Chae-ok come across the creature. They are then arrested and separated.
Tae-sang makes a deal with the soldier, Soma, who is holding him captive. He will give him a huge sum of money and a house, as the soldier intends to stay here even after the war is over.
In exchange, the soldier helps him execute his plan. He contacts Tae-sang’s loyal employees, Mrs. Nawol and Mr. Gu, and informs them of Tae-sang’s plan.
On the other hand, Chae-ok finds out that her mother was a prisoner at the hospital, so when Tae-sang finds her, she asks him to free all the prisoners while she searches for her mother.
Chae-ok questions Kato, who reveals that the creature that Chae-ok encountered is her mother, Seishin.
Najin, a tiny organism that takes control of the human brain, was mixed in her food. Humans undergo a mutation after Najin enters their bodies, and most of them do not survive.
As per Tae-sang’s plan, Tae-sang’s employees join hands with Jun-taek’s father, and Jun-taek’s father gets Ishikawa to work with them.
Tae-sang risks his life to save all the prisoners. After asking Chae-ok’s father to keep them safe, he goes to find Chae-ok.
The Japanese soldiers capture Chae-ok again. Kato wants the creature to kill her, but when Chae-ok calls it mother, instead of killing her, the creature protects her.
Tae-sang then rescues Chae-ok and comforts her when she tells him about what her mother has become.
The soldiers are looking for Chae-ok and Tae-sang everywhere, so Tae-sang persuades her to focus on getting out of the hospital for the time being.
Tae-sang takes Chae-ok to the room where her father is hiding with the prisoners. Soma, who plans to escape with them, brings Myeong-ja there, as Tae-sang cannot leave without her.
Ending explained:
Tae-sang’s sacrifice
Ishikawa follows Tae-sang’s rescue plan and comes to the hospital with the police force under the guise of looking for a missing woman.
Ishikawa needs special permission to search the hospital grounds, as the hospital is under military jurisdiction.
However, Ishikawa convinces Ichiro to let him stay in his office for ten minutes, claiming that he will lose face in front of his men if he leaves just like that.
This gives Tae-sang ten minutes to get everyone into one of Ishikawa’s trucks that Mr. Gu has driven there disguised as a police truck.
While the prisoners climb out of the window one by one, Tae-sang, Chae-ok, and Yeong-gwan hold back the soldiers who come to capture them.
Yeong-gwan ends up losing his life, but by then, all the prisoners have climbed out of the window, leaving only Tae-sang, Chae-ok, and one of Jun-taek’s comrades, Lee.
Tae-sang makes Chae-ok leave first without telling her that he intends to stay to hold back the soldiers because he knows that she will not leave without him.
By the time Lee comes out and tells Chae-ok that Tae-sang is sacrificing himself, it is too late to save him.
Chae-ok and Tae-sang have developed feelings for each other, so it is hard for Chae-ok to leave without Tae-sang, but she has no other choice because there are several other lives at risk.
While Chae-ok makes it out of the hospital with the prisoners, Tae-sang fights the Japanese soldiers till he runs out of ammunition.
Safe at last
Ishikawa leaves the hospital once his ten minutes are up. Mr. Gu drives the truck that has the prisoners in it.
Ishikawa orders his men to kill all the prisoners once they get Myeong-ja. After Ishikawa reunites with Myeong-ja, his men pursue the truck carrying the prisoners.
However, Tae-sang expected this to happen and had planned ahead. His allies manage to get the prisoners to safety, but Mr. Gu is arrested by Ishikawa’s men.
The rescued people find out that Tae-sang went to great lengths to save them because he always helps his people. While leaving town, Chae-ok wonders whether Tae-sang is alive.
Meanwhile, Jun-taek’s father bribes Ichiro and gets his son released. Although Jun-taek is safe now, he is extremely scared and guilty.
When held captive at the hospital and faced with the threat of torture, he provided the Japanese with the names of all the rebels he knows, as well as those of his friends who came to the hospital with him.
The Japanese find out that Soma helped the prisoners and escaped with them. Soma is then seen leaving the town with his family.
Danger looms ahead
Tae-sang attempts to evade the soldiers by climbing into the air vents. However, when the soldiers pursue him into the vents, he accidentally falls through a hole.
He finds himself on top of a mound of human bones. A soldier finds him, and Tae-sang makes it out alive by killing him, but not without sustaining a number of injuries.
When Lady Maeda discovers that Myeong-ja escaped, she asks Ichiro to resign. To convince her to let him continue working as the hospital’s director, he tells her about the creature.
Kato had earlier tried to turn Chae-ok into a creature like her mother by mixing Najin in her glass of water, but Chae-ok never drank that.
After the escape of the prisoners, Kato comes to know that someone drank that glass of water. It turns out that Myeong-ja consumed it. She is with Ishikawa when Najin starts taking control of her brain.
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