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Pierce Conran

This article contains mild spoilers.
Lead cast: Shin Ha-kyun, Lee Jeong-ha, Jin Goo
Latest Nielsen rating: 6.7 per cent
With poisoned dining halls, corrupt contractors, unfair hiring practices and corporate espionage to deal with, JU Construction has been experiencing one setback after another.


Thankfully for the Korean company, they have the world’s busiest audit team to rely on, led by the unshakeable Shin Cha-il (Shin Ha-kyun, Beyond Evil).
Despite everything that Cha-il has done to keep the company out of trouble, he keeps butting heads with executive-level power players who would like nothing more than to boot him out of the job.
Cha-il was hired at the beginning of the season by JU Construction chairman Hwang Se-woong (Jung Moon-sung, Divorce Attorney Shin), who is sitting in the big chair while his older brother lies in a coma.
From the outset Se-woong has fully supported Cha-il, while his brash younger brother Dae-woong (Jin Goo, Descendants of the Sun) has been dead set against him.

While the show has featured Cha-il and his team triumphing against the odds in a series of interesting intra-company cases, there has been a subtle but steady change in the upper echelons of the company.
With his cocky swagger and bad habit of swinging golf clubs at subordinates, Dae-woong, who is gunning for his brother’s position, was initially presented as the villain of the piece.
As the show has unfolded, it has afforded him moments of humanity thanks to his relationship with his beloved niece Yoon Seo-jin (Jo A-ram, Doctor Cha), who works diligently in the audit team while keeping her family ties a secret.
Despite it conflicting with her views on fairness in the workplace, Seo-jin has allowed herself to be used as a source of information by her uncle, occasionally feeding him bits and pieces about Cha-il’s investigations.

Dae-woong outwardly maintains his opposition to Cha-il and is even preparing to release some damning information on him to get rid of the troublesome auditor once and for all, but his swagger has cooled and he now appears to be experiencing a change of heart.
Given how instrumental Cha-il has been to the company, this stands to reason. Whatever personal grievances he had earlier in the season have been more than counterbalanced by the benefits Cha-il has obtained for JU and by extension Dae-woong.
On the flip side, Se-woong has been showing signs of wavering in his support. He has grown frustrated with Cha-il’s habit of keeping him in the dark – which, given how much of a leaky ship JU is, seems a wise tactic for Cha-il to adopt.

Moreover, when he receives news of his older brother’s imminent recovery, Se-woong has an interesting reaction – perhaps he is not all too keen to give up the chief executive’s office.
For his part, Cha-il has stuck to his rigid, corruption-fighting ideals. The only major shift for him has been his change of heart regarding Goo Han-soo (Lee Jeong-ha, Moving), the chipper junior member of the team.
Cha-il initially wanted to transfer him out of his department, but Goo’s indefatigable enthusiasm has gradually worn him down.
That said, when Han-soo becomes a question mark in an investigation into unfair hiring practices, Cha-il has to approach him as a suspect with the same professionalism he accords everyone else – among them a former college classmate he investigates in another episode.

Han-soo’s name is cleared – not that Cha-il shows any visible signs of relief.
With four episodes to go, Seo-jin’s family ties look set to be revealed, while the return of Se-woong and Dae-woong’s older brother will surely turn the audit team’s focus squarely on the company’s top brass during what may be an explosive power struggle.
Shin continues to do great work as the magnetic anchor of this thoroughly enjoyable mash-up of workplace and investigative drama.
The Auditors is streaming on Viu.


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Tensions escalate as the K-drama reaches its midway point, with characters experiencing changes of hearts and secrets threatening to spill


Shin Ha-kyun’s upstanding, corruption-fighting corporate auditor clashes with executive-level power players in the company he works for as this Korean drama series nears its end.
