‘Pachinko’ Is a Gorgeous Epic of Love and Struggle - The New York Times

‘Pachinko’ Is a Gorgeous Epic of Love and Struggle - The New York Times




‘Pachinko’ Is a Gorgeous Epic of Love and Struggle

Based on the novel by Min Jin Lee, this thoughtful series about a Korean family across generations returns to Apple TV+ for a second season.

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Minha Kim as the younger version of Sunja in the generational epic “Pachinko.”Credit...Apple TV+


By Esther Zuckerman
Aug. 22, 2024



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Adapted from the acclaimed novel by Min Jin Lee, the Apple TV+ drama “Pachinko” spans decades in the life of a Korean family, beginning first in 1915 under Japanese colonial rule in Korea and later in Japan, where the family’s ambitions bump up against ingrained prejudice.

“Pachinko,” Season 2 of which premieres on Friday, hits on multiple emotional levels. The high drama of the many romantic entanglements melds with the thoughtful historical fiction about how a strange mixture of trauma and love reverberates through generations. It makes for a gem of a show about a family’s will not only to survive but also to thrive.

At the center of the sprawling epic is Sunja, played as a young woman by Minha Kim and as a grandmother by Yuh-jung Youn, an Oscar winner for “Minari.” Season 1 charts Sunja’s childhood, her first romance and betrayal, and then her move to Osaka, Japan, with Isak (Steve Sanghyun Noh), a young pastor who marries her while she is already pregnant. In the later timeline, which begins in New York City in 1989, Sunja’s American-educated grandson, Solomon (Jin Ha), heads to Tokyo with aims of ascending in the business world. He assumes at first that he can use his Koreanness to an advantage.

Season 2 continues the 1989 story line, but jumps ahead in the other timeline to 1945, as the American bombing of Osaka looms. Sunja is now keeping herself afloat selling kimchi, though supplies are scarce. Her eldest son (Kang Hoon Kim) is studious but tormented by his classmates, while her youngest (Eunseong Kwon) is an adorable firecracker, whose presence enlivens the otherwise grim circumstances. (The wonderful opening credits sequence, which has the cast dancing to the 1969 Grass Roots tune “Wait a Million Years,” is also a burst of joy.)

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