Lookism anime is based on the famous Korean manhwa of the same name, written and illustrated by Park Tae Jun. It was first published in Naver Webtoon in November 2014 and given its popularity and teen relatable themes, it finally made its debut as an anime on Netflix in December 2022.
As a manhwa ( Korean equivalent to a manga) it became an extremely popular webtoon garnering over 8.7 billion views worldwide. It touches the various social issues such as bullying, harassment, body image, and low self-esteem & self-worth and their psychological impact on its victims.
Plot
The plot revolves around a high school kid Park Hyung Seok facing severe bullying and harassment due to his appearance. Although Hyung Seok is pretty smart but all gets overlooked by others as his looks don’t fit their beauty standards. As a result, he develops a timid personality and low self-esteem. His bullying is witnessed by his mother, who insisted him to transfer to another school.
In the hope of a change, he transferred to another city and rented a shabby room where he discovered that someone was already lying there. Soon to his surprise, that someone turned out to be a shell body and as he touches it, his consciousness gets swapped up with it, leaving his real body into a deep sleep.
The shell body that fits up with the overall high standard of society whether it’s looks, smartness, or more importantly fighting skills, the new body seems to adapts very quickly.
This new body gives Park Hyung Seok a much-needed confidence boost as people’s perspective of him now changes thanks to his new handsome appearance. Soon he learns to use his new body and we see him juggling his two lives i.e. handsome school boy in day and old self during the night as a part-time worker.
S1 of Lookism
S1 follows Lee Tae Sung’s journey from a timid nobody to a confident popular kid who soon becomes the new ace of his new school. It also shows how his personality changes over the course. With his new self, he also gives others the confidence to pursue their dreams. But along the lines, we also witness his true nature and his thoughts about his own body and realised that he’s just hiding behind the aura of his Shell body.
Would he able to get over this? The anime doesn’t answer this question but the webtoon does. So, do check it out.
Lookism Universe from Manhwa to series and anime adaptation
Lookism, as described :
Short notes from Merriam-Webster
- prejudice or discrimination based on physical appearance and especially physical appearance believed to fall short of societal notions of beauty.
- occurs in everyday life and affects people and society as a whole.
- Overly beautiful/handsome
The prejudice Park Hyung Seok faces in earlier episodes shows the lookism phenomenon. We also see it and face it in our everyday life and this was the theme used by the author to depict how one’s great looks can benefits them in overall areas of their life. This theme resonated with most of its readers that lead to the success of this webtoon series.
The success became evident when it’s got its adaptation as a Chinese drama series in 2019 starring Park Soloman and anime adaptation by Netflix in 2022.
Netflix’s adaptation
Although Netflix halted its release for more than a month, due to the Seoul Stampede incident in October 2022 – the unfortunate event that took 159 beautiful lives, but it didn’t disappoint with its adaptation. Although the anime adaptation doesn’t follow the webtoon strictly but still manages to run along the lines with it.
Produced by Studio Mir( The Legend of Korra, Dota: Dragon’s Blood) – Lookism anime adaptation is visually stunning, bright and much more colorful. The animation style is also sleek and fits with the tone of the webtoon.
The compact plot is complemented by an equally amazing OST by ATEEZ, turning Lookism into a whole fun package.
Overall take on Lookism Anime
I have read Lookism way back in 2018 and it’s still on going with more than 400 episode. Due to long stretch I left it in between but I can say that anime is still is light & bright as compared to the Webtoon.
Anime progresses very fast and introduces lots of characters in short span of time. As the nature of webtoon, it hard to shrink it into just 8 episode of 25 minute each and this episode. It mostly covers the Park Hyung Seok and that too up to 27 chapters of webtoon.
There is so many other important characters. So, in story arc sense, it barels touches the tip of iceberg. There is more to come from this masterpiece.
Currently, Netflix anime adaptation follows – ‘heartfelt & emotional’ words to describe the theme of the anime and it does justice to it by showing how Park Hyung Seok arc as he goes through his miserable life as a high schooler and other kids who goes through similar situation becoming victims of this lookism phenomena, the viewers would definitely feel connected to them.
The final episode shows two contrasting characters one who accepts himself and doesn’t let lookism define his whole personality and the other one still struggling to accept himself and hiding behind the illusion.
Overall, Looksim anime is worth a watch. It’s funny, and smart with its execution and the plot is interesting. Every character feels like a protagonist and their story is yet to reveal. There is so much more to explore and given the reputation of Studio Mir and fan response to the series, there is hope that Netflix may drop its S2 soon.
Animexon 