The Webcomics Weekly is back in your life and back to look at the final section of “Dr. Frost.” After years of coverage and even more years as a regular reader, it’s time to say a final farewell and take one last look at the themes. If you want a topline answer to whether you should read the comic or not…yes. The answer is yes. It does tackle some very difficult topics though. Many of which appear in these final arcs too!
Dr. Frost
‘Stray’ – ‘Afterward’
Updates: Finished
By Jongbeom Lee
Reviewed by Elias Rosner
After ten years of circulation, and eight and a half here in the US, “Dr. Frost” has come to an end. I haven’t been reviewing this comic for quite that long but it’s certainly been a while. It’s strange to see something you’ve been with for years finally reach its destination. Why, it only feels like yesterday I was reviewing ‘Ouroboros,’ possibly the longest and best arc of “Dr. Frost,” though that was nearly eight months ago.
‘Stray’ picks up where we left off in the present, armed now with the knowledge of Seonghyun Moon’s past, caps off Frost’s trip to his hometown, and rounds out the act’s focus on backstory with the completion of his own. While ‘Ouroboros’ felt like the end of something big, ‘Stray’ is the true end of Act 2 (or perhaps Act 4, depending on how one sees the structure of Season 4,) leading us into the climax of the story and “Dr. Frost’s” last three arcs: ‘The Beginning of the End,’ ‘Décalcomanie’ & ‘The Guiding Light.’
I was riveted throughout these final 30 or so chapters. Because Moon’s plans have been kept a secret from even us, the readers, Lee can build the same sense of unease and dread the characters are feeling. Yes, we have slightly more insight into the behind the scene tensions and machinations than Frost, Seonga, Changgyu, Manny, Jinhan and the Chief do. However, Lee’s masterful control of information means that what we see doesn’t always lead to the events or actions we expect. More than once I was caught off-guard by a swerve from a character, only to realize in hindsight that their actions were consistent with who they were and the situations they were in.
For fans of Seonga, we can also rejoice because much of ‘The Beginning of the End’ is centered around her and her growth (or lack thereof.) This is the culmination of a season’s worth of decisions, actions, and proving grounds. While Frost’s lack of presence is felt in the arc, it doesn’t loom over it like it would in another story. Seonga has shown herself to be a competent character and the co-lead of this season. And as co-lead, she’s also got a major, unresolved, and unseen character flaw that must be explored.
‘The Beginning of the End’ is about trying to stop a terrorist attack, sure, but it’s also about how even “admirable” qualities have a dark side that can be exploited. It’s another exploration of how good people can be made to hate but also how one can grow to resist that hatred. Not on one’s own, but thanks to those who love them and support them.
I know it seems sappy, and I’ve said it before, but it’s true – one of the throughlines in this final season of “Dr. Frost,” that loneliness and isolation in the modern world is a major factor in the ease by which people become radicalized against others. I do think he skirts the line of equivocation between the grievances and actions of marginalized groups vs dominant groups while trying to distinguish between the feeling of hatred and the manipulation and use of hatred.
Of course, that’s just one aspect of this season’s exploration of why people hate, what makes them act on that hatred, and whether or not some hatred is justified. After all, he’s quite unflinching in his portrayal of South Korean society’s failures, especially towards immigrants, a critique that is sadly universalizable.
This is why he shows so much empathy towards Saiyed and Jiseong; both are regular people who were isolated by their society’s inequalities and structural barriers – many built from hate, most built from neglect – and thus made vulnerable to appeals for violence against each other’s identifying group. They were not bigots, they were not evil terrorists, but they were people pushed to the psychological brink and then told that they (immigrants, the elderly, the young, the homeless, DIFFERENT immigrant groups from the one they were in, your family) were the problem. THEY were the reason YOU could not get a job, be treated better, be loved, be cared for. Look how much hate THEY hold. Shouldn’t they be taught a permanent lesson?
Continued belowLee doesn’t create easy answers or appeals to rigid righteousness. He does, however, make the appeal for empathy and love. With ‘Décalcomanie’ and ‘The Guiding Light,’ this appeal is formalized and embedded into the final conflict between Moon & Frost. Both are thinking about the roots of hate. One wants to weaponize and fuel it. The other wants to defuse it and reduce it. The arcs play out as a battle between the two ideas and, of course, the latter comes out on top, not through the usual “people are better than this” approach. Instead, it’s through creating the recognition that “the man with the face of a monster…is none other than myself.”
Because for Lee, hate is natural; as in, everyone has it and everyone feels it at some point or another. It is not the same as anger, which is also natural but comes from a different place. Hate, however, is corrosive and destructive and feeds on our worst natures. It is easily fed once embedded in one’s heart, and it is that intentional feeding, which Moon does, that Lee has the utmost contempt for.
See, this is what I love about “Dr. Frost” and why it’s always stood out for me among the many Webtoons I’ve read. It’s not always the most dynamic in terms of settings or impressive in terms of visuals but it is always and consistently great at building well-researched, compelling stories rooted in the character’s flaws, foibles, and convictions. It tells its stories with empathy and care so that even when it stumbles, it can remain insightful and impactful. The author acknowledges as much in the afterword, which you should all read, if only just to see the myriad of fan works from other Webtoon creators.
Obviously if you’re reading a review of the last chunk of a webtoon, you’ve probably read the chapters already. If you haven’t though, I hope I’ve convinced you to give it a read. Truly, this is a special comic. It’s sad to see “Dr. Frost” go and even sadder we didn’t get to see more of the kinds of cases we got in seasons 1 & 2. At the same time, the shift from the personal, clinical setting to the wider, societal setting allowed for a different kind of exploration, one which hit just as hard. I wish I had the time or space to really dig into each of these arcs because this was just scratching the surface. Let me leave you, then, with one last thought on ‘Wherever (Case Closed,)’ the final episode.
At the end, after the personal scenes are done, we return to Bar Mirror. Frost is no longer behind the bar but at it. He is no longer passive but active. He is direct still but caring with his words, rather than careless. He wants to help, not for himself, but for the person who approaches him, yet he is self-aware enough that he does not have all the answers. It is a marked change from who he was in episode 1.
It is growth, mirrored, finally, in the last lines of the comic proper, the reflection of the opening quote from Gordon Exner: “It is unlikely…that I can provide a solution to your problem. But first…let’s hear it. Because in the grand scheme of things…within each one of us is a unique story, waiting to be told.”
