"Unless it's something bad, it's better to be weird than ordinary"

To write a review on the School Nurse files is to imply I have somehow grasped what the School Nurse files is all about. The show's glorious acid trip weirdness defies analysis and yet feels deliberate. After all - as our male lead says as we head into the plot's explosive denouement - "it's better to be weird than ordinary". And the School Nurse Files definitely walks its own talk.

At a Korean highschool where the kids recite cult-like verses on happiness every morning, an emotional whale floats overhead and ducks follow the leader through the school randomly. The children *appear* happy, according to our school nurse, Ahn Eun-young (Jung Yoo-mi). But when it comes to life - and especially to adolescence - it's what's under the surface that matters more.

Since birth Eun-young has seen 'jellies', a kind of supernatural human residue that grows and forms into different shapes. Armed with a toy gun and rainbow toy sword she fights the jellies that have grown so big as to be a threat to the humans around them. In this she is aided by Hong In-pyo (a Nam Joo-hyuk who is finally living up to his potential), the grandson of the school's founder who has a disability following a motorcycle accident when he was young. In-Pyo has a powerful aura that acts as a supernatural shield and Ahn Eun-young is able to recharge by holding his hand.

But this school is no ordinary school, it was built on a pond of emotional residue that a cult hopes to harness for its own advantage.

The School Nurse Files is a crazy ride of symbolism and metaphor and I'm not sure to what extent we're supposed to take it literally. But the show is unconventional and original and flat out weird. A celebration of weird where everyone is encouraged to let their freak flag fly. The show's aesthetic leans deliberately away from kdrama gloss. The kids have acne. The adults look real. Nam Joo-hyuk's model looks and height are transformed into a gawky, clumsy awkwardness that is 1000 times sexier than the usual sanitised gloss..

The only reason it's a 9 - and the only real issue I took with it - is that it's packed into six episodes like a pocket rocket ready to explode and it really needed at least one or two extra episodes to make the whole thing feel less rushed. But in the final estimation that's not a huge problem. I'll happily take another season - hell another three seasons - if I can see Eun-young fight evil while holding her adorable boyfriend's hand.