I’ve been trying to complete my Netflix watchlist so that we can cancel it (at least for a few months), but they keep on releasing new seasons of shows I like or brand new series from around the world that draw me in. I am always a sucker for a shiny new K-drama. That said, when Extraordinary Attorney Woo (ENA/Netflix 2022) was advertised at me (because the algorithms know) I initially dismissed it based on the poster and the description.

This is the story of an autistic attorney, Woo Young-woo, in her first job after law school, in a country where there is still less support for and understanding of autism than here in the UK. That itself is of interest to me. But this is not one of those grittier, lower budget K-dramas, it has all the sheen of a typical big-budget production and that worried me – would it have any nuance? Or would it treat its lead character with the cliché-ridden and infantilising approach to the autistic brother in It’s Okay to Not Be Okay?

I recently attended a course on neurodiversity in the workplace, and the trainer (who herself is autistic) recommended this show, saying that it is sometimes clichéd but not inaccurate. I think that was the best way possible for my fears to be allayed.

I mean, it’s still high-budget K-drama – it’s glossy, cheesy, repetitive, often silly and sometimes surreal. But it never makes autism the joke. And it feels like it exists in a more “real” world than most K-dramas – albeit still a shiny version of reality where things always turn out for the best and most people wear designer clothes.

As Woo Young-woo (Park Eun-bin, who played my favourite character in Hello, My Twenties!) is an attorney, the show is structured as a legal drama, with a new case per episode, most of which are never referred to again. These cases are tackled by Young-woo along with her supervisor Jung Myung-seok (Kang Ki-young), her fellow trainee lawyers Choi Su-yeon (Ha Yoon-kyung) and Kwon Min-woo (Joo Jong-hyuk), and legal support staffer Lee Jun-ho (Kang Tae-oh). Attorney Jung is initially resistant to having Young-woo in his team but is persuaded when she proves to be extremely good at her job.

Su-yeon is the character who would usually have been the star of the show – she’s classically beautiful, kind, eager, highly empathetic and unlucky in love. It’s interesting to see that character in the supporting cast, while what could have been the quirky work friend becomes the star. Min-woo is keen to be the best rookie on the team and resents the “special treatment” he perceives Young-woo as receiving. Jun-ho is referred to, in the subtitles at least, as a litigator but seems to conveniently act as legal secretary, client liaison or investigator – whatever lets him be in the same room as the attorneys.

In the first half of the series, we meet a character who has some autistic traits but is able to hide them entirely, and we meet a young man with more severe autistic traits who has very limited communication and high support needs. This serves not only to illustrate the spectrum of autism, but also the differing reactions of people to autism. Young-woo falls between these – she cannot hide that she is autistic as she does have some coping mechanisms that can make her appear odd. But she would get by if no-one made any accommodations for her at all.

As Young-woo herself observes, despite hearing her talk intelligently and knowing she is a lawyer who graduated from Korea’s top university, a lot of people she meets only see her autism and assume it makes her incapable of almost anything. She has agency, romantic feelings, friendships and, importantly, sympathy. She is not a detached robot but, if anything, is sometimes overwhelmed by her emotions – she simply doesn’t express her reactions the way most other people do.

I quite liked this show’s surreal touches and lighthearted romance but I also like that in its world women have successful careers, gay people exist, and few legal cases are black and white. There is interesting discussion around the pros and cons of working for a large law firm. It necessitates sometimes representing clients who are unethical, taking the side of a big company bullying smaller ones or even their own staff. But it also allows Young-woo and co to take on smaller pro bono cases that they can choose for themselves. And of course at this stage of the rookies’ careers, it doesn’t hurt to have one of Korea’s top legal firms on their CVs.

Definitely glad I checked this out. And dare I say it’s ideally set up for a second season?