North Korean Scenes Deleted From Chinese Film Version Of 'Doctor Stranger'

The SBS drama "Doctor Stranger" was such a big hit in China that it will also be released there as a movie. The medical espionage drama is being edited to film length, but despite its popularity when previously shown, central elements of the plot and the ending are being changed.

The 20-episode drama, totaling around 1,400 minutes, is being cut down to 120 minutes. But at the same time that the drama's footage was being cut, additional footage was also being shot. The additional footage was shot because essential parts of the original plot were deleted and the existing ending no longer made sense without the deleted scenes.

Those deleted parts had to do with the time Lee Jong Suk's character genius doctor Park Hoon spent in North Korea. Some of the most vivid parts of the drama were the scenes where Park Hoon was forced to perform monstrous surgeries while he was held captive by the North Korean regime. He felt like a monster because he committed crimes that no ethical doctor should ever consider. The knowledge of his own monstrosity shaped his character, making him reckless and unafraid of authority. He also had experiences that most doctors never have and that ironically made him a better surgeon.

But he would have preferred to skip those experiences. Park Hoon longed to escape North Korea with his lover, played by Jin Se Yeon because their life was so intolerable. His father died so he could escape.

The monstrously cartoonish scenes in the North Korean operating rooms not only helped compel the plot but they helped create multi-layered characters. Both Park Hoon and Han Seung Hee may have looked like ordinary doctors but their past was so tortured their actions in the present could not be predicted. And without the scenes in North Korea, it will be interesting to see how the film explains Han Seung Hee's motivations for taking part in a plot to harm the South Korean president.

But since China is closely allied with the North Korean regime, the parts of the story that negatively portrayed North Korea had to be deleted. Such deletion also affected the drama's original ending.

The film's new plotline focuses more strongly on the love story and emphasizes the rivalry between Lee Jong Suk and Park Hae Jin's rivaling doctors. Without the espionage element it will easily become another medical drama.

The actor's voices will also be dubbed. The additional filming ended on July 14.