Mantis

The Architecture of Chaos

When *Kill Boksoon* arrived in 2023, it presented the assassin’s world as a corporate ladder—a sleek, suffocating bureaucracy where murder was just another KPI. Lee Tae-sung’s directorial debut, *Mantis*, returns to this blood-soaked universe, but the glass ceiling has shattered. The monolithic MK Entertainment has crumbled, leaving a vacuum that demands not just violence, but reinvention. If *Boksoon* was about the heavy burden of legacy, *Mantis* is about the terrifying, exhilarating anarchy of the gig economy. It is a film less concerned with the "why" of killing than the "how" of surviving when the old gods are dead.



Visually, Lee steps out from the shadow of his mentor (Byun Sung-hyun) with a style that feels both familiar and distinctly restless. The cinematography abandons the polished, metallic sheen of the corporate era for something grimier and more kinetic. The camera doesn't just observe; it participates, swinging wildly during the close-quarters combat as if it, too, is fighting for breath. The use of color is particularly striking—neon reds and bruised purples wash over the scenes, suggesting a world that is perpetually recovering from a black eye. Yet, there is a playfulness here. The brutality is punctuated by a rhythmic editing style that turns gruesome encounters into a macabre dance, reminding us that for these characters, violence is the only language that doesn't require translation.



At the center of this storm is Han-ul (Yim Si-wan), the titular Mantis. Yim, often cast for his delicate features and unnerving stillness, weaponizes his boyish charm here. He plays Han-ul not as a stoic warrior, but as a bored prodigy—a man who treats assassination with the casual indifference of a start-up founder looking for his next venture. However, the emotional gravity of the film rests on the shoulders of Jae-yi (Park Gyu-young). Her performance is the counterweight to Han-ul’s detachment. While he views the power vacuum as a playground, she experiences it as a cage fight. Their dynamic is not a simple romance or a buddy-cop cliché; it is a portrait of shared trauma, two orphans of a fallen system trying to build a home on a foundation of corpses.



Ultimately, *Mantis* struggles slightly under the weight of its own kinetic energy. The narrative occasionally swerves into convoluted territory, introducing "investors" and rival factions that feel more like plot devices than flesh-and-blood threats. Yet, it succeeds where many spin-offs fail: it justifies its existence. It does not merely retread the ground of *Kill Boksoon*; it expands the map. It argues that when the structures of control collapse, what remains is not freedom, but a more primal, desperate form of competition. It is a stylish, frantic, and surprisingly funny meditation on the hustle—a reminder that in this industry, unemployment is the only thing deadlier than the job itself.