[9][10] The trilogy is considered a revision of the European revenge tradition set amid the 21st century globalization traumas in South Korea.

[11] The first installment in Park's trilogy was the 2002 film, Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance, a bleak and violent tale of revenge gone wrong.

It tells the story of a deaf-mute man who kidnaps a young girl to pay for his sister's much-needed kidney transplant.

It covered less than half its production costs in both domestic and international box office gates, where in the U.S. it garnered gross revenues of $45,243.

[13] Kim Se Young explained the trilogy's violence as "an allegorical tool which serves to convey social commentary pointed at the processes of democratization and capitalism in South Korea".