The show combines the well-worn codes of the Korean revenge thriller and the high-school bullying drama, and attempts to heighten them with extreme melodrama. So why does it feel like a potluck dinner made from all of last week’s warmed up leftovers?

The set-up is pretty decent. Ok Chan-mi (Shin), an orphan and ace high school sharpshooter in southern Korean port city of Busan, is having a video call with her twin brother, Park Won-seok (Kang Yeol), who was adopted from their orphanage when they were younger and now lives with a new family in Seoul.

She chides him in a sibling way and he promises to come down and visit her. He says he has something he wants to tell her. But he is suddenly interrupted when someone enters the classroom he’s in. Chan-mi hears a commotion but doesn’t see what’s going on. The line goes dead.

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The audience does get to see what happens. Won-seok is pushed off the ledge he was sitting on and sails down in slow motion to the snow-covered ground below, which he stains crimson.

Not hearing from Won-seok for three days, Chan-mi decides to go up to see him instead. There, she learns of his death just in time to make it to the very end of the funeral process.

Beside herself with grief, she corners his adoptive parents outside a columbarium, asking for Won-seok’s phone. The God-fearing parents, who are ashamed of Won-seok’s apparent suicide, are not happy to see her.

She briefly returns to Busan but she can’t let her brother’s death go and decides to transfer to his school in Seoul, incognito.

Attending the same school is Ji Soo-heon (Lomon), a handsome and popular student who works several jobs and diligently looks after his ailing mother, who lives in a nursing home, the bills for which are piling up.

Chan-mi and Soo-heon have their obligatory confrontational meet-cute when he rocks up to her just after she’s bought a second-hand scooter.

She doesn’t know the scooter belongs to him – it was stolen after he collapsed in the street a few days ago – and he doesn’t know that she isn’t the thief.

They soon work past this misunderstanding, but a few more follow, making things tricky for Chan-mi when she transfers into the school, where she’s viewed with suspicion. Chan-mi tries to investigate Won-seok’s death and keeps crossing paths with Soo-heon.

She doesn’t make much headway, but soon learns about rampant bullying in the school, which includes sexual abuse. She also learns about Soo-heon’s brain tumour – yes, that was them in the hospital scene.

Revenge of Others makes sure to tick all the boxes in the cliché handbook.

There’s rich kid Seo Jae-beom (Seo Ji-hoon), who re-enrols after an accident that has wiped his memory. There’s also the pouty pretty girl Kook Ji-hyun (Lee Soo-min), who mistakenly assumes there’s something going on between Chan-mi and Soo-heon.

The revenge element takes a little time to get started, but when it does it comes from every side.

Soo-heon has occasionally been acting as a sort of vigilante on behalf of bullying victims, and when he does so again after his diagnosis, he lashes out far more violently – his doctor warned him that he might experience changes to his personality.

Chan-mi has a way to go to find a target for her rage, but once she does, she’ll have her trusty athletics pistol to rely on.

Chan-mi is also reminiscent of Han Hye-jin’s professional sharpshooter vigilante in the Gwangju massacre-inspired revenge thriller 26 Years.

Perhaps Revenge of Others will liven up when Chan-mi turns her sporting prowess into a tool for retribution. But given the lack of charisma and good sense displayed so far, it’s likely to face an uphill climb.

Revenge of Others is streaming on Disney+.