Review | K-drama review: Voice 4 – disappointing procedural drama loses sight of its characters

The big problem with Voice 4 is that although the investigations kept moving at a full clip throughout, character development came to a complete standstill

After 14 hours of breathless investigations and lots of dubious split personality psychology, insightful revelations were few and far between

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Lee Ha-na plays the lead role in disappointing procedural K-drama Voice 4.

Published: 2:45pm, 3 Aug 2021Updated: 2:54pm, 3 Aug 2021

This article contains spoilers.

1.5/5 stars

Few things are as satisfying as a well-crafted investigative thriller, whether in the pages of a book, within the dark surroundings of a theatre, or broadcasting to your TV screen every week. A few things hold true for the ones that capture the imagination.

Chief among those elements are the investigators through whose eyes we experience the story and the investigations themselves. Ideally, they are interesting stories that are cleverly revealed to viewers as the investigators uncover plot layers, bit by bit. However, these two elements are mutually dependent – without one, the other will not work.

Season four of the procedural series Voice has been plagued by a variety of issues, but its most glaring flaw has been its inability to make us connect with its protagonists. It didn’t start that way, as the first few episodes of the season showed us Kang Kwon-joo (Lee Ha-na) and her Golden Time Team enjoying a brief respite to bask in their achievements and also introduced us to the gruff LAPD detective Derek Joo (Song Seung-heon).