I recently started reading a comic published on WEBTOON. Its name is “Cheese in the trap”. It started publishing awhile ago but I just recently started reading it and it felt great to be able to read more chapters at once. There are many chapters with massive cliffhangers that I just could not stop reading. Using the word addictive seems appropriate. In less than two weeks I gulped down around 200+ chapters. Suddenly stop and need to wait a week for new chapters to come out has been a terrible torture over the past month.
Cheese in the trap started publishing on the Korean Naver Webtoon website in 2010 and came to an end in 2016, same year a TV Serie inspired by this comic was aired in Korea. The name of the TV Serie is the same as the comic’s.
The first chapter of the English translation on webtoon.com appeared in 2014. The author is soonkki. I have been looking for informations about the author and her past and current works, but the only informations I found out are: it’s a woman born in 1985 and she wasn’t 100% satisfied with the TV Adaption of her comic.
If any of the readers have access to more information about soonkki and likes to share please let me know via comment on this article or privately. Would be very appreciated.
This one is not an action comic. Saying romance does not explain what the comic is about. Probably “slice of life” fits better. But hey, action, college life, work life and romance aren’t missing.
Summarising the story is simple: Seol Hong is a college student who tries hard to always be top of her class, dealing with all the troubles an average not rich family has to deal with, ups and downs from her friendships and unexpected love life.
Seol gives it all in everything she does. She’s got weaknesses but her personality is strong. Such that she even gives off the idea of being stronger than she is.
Somehow, Seol is not that popular. She is more the lone wolf type of girl but she still is well known because of her top grades. The other students have a kind of love-hate relationship with her, probably due to jealousy. These feelings towards her get amplified when the most-wanted-man in her major starts going out with her.
I don’t exactly remember my first feelings about “Cheese in the trap” when I started reading it. After the very first chapter I wasn’t as fascinated as I was after reading the 5th. What got me intrigued was the art. And the storytelling. And how hot Inho is.*
The panels are nicely organised, they are grouped to fit in the screen at once, so that it still gives the idea of pages of a classic comic book. The scheme is followed rigorously in the first chapters, but the art breaks through the schemes as the story flows and a few fighting and action scenes come up.
I found the chapter zero epilogue a bit confusing, and after having read 200+ chapters I still am not sure if the lady was talking about Jung Yu or any other of the crazy and shady guys Seol will encounter from then on. Sure thing is, it summarises the story very well if you read it again after having read a good amount of chapters.
The art is clear and uses fresh lines, almost as sketched and unrefined, but you know every single line has been studied and lays exactly where it should. The first chapters are more detailed and contain a bigger number of lines, while slowly you only see the essentials and a few lines that define the characteristics of the author. The colouring helps keep this idea of sketching, as the colours are very plain and brownish as sketchbook paper often is. I like it because it stands out.
For some reasons I even got a feeling the setting could be in the 90s. Maybe it’s the clothing style that most characters wear, or maybe it’s because of the colouring. Most likely, I identify with the characters so much and even though I was in college during the 2000s, I keep some 90s feeling when I think about studies.
I regret not knowing much about Korea. I think through this comic you have a glimpse about life in Korea nowadays. I so feel it, the setting is so real but at the same time so unknown because it is a country I am not too familiar with.
After the first chapter, numbered zero, shows us the epilogue while Seol has her future read with cards before starting college and the lady warns her to keep distance from men in the next few years and that those years won’t be lucky, the first real chapter goes to the present, which is the middle of the story. The middle of the college story. Seol suddenly finds herself center of the attention of Jung Yu, the most wanted man of her major. Good grades, money, looks and manners, this guy seems to have it all. But several flash backs will show us how shady and manipulative he is. Seol knew from the beginning he is not the bright and nice person he wants everyone to think of him, but at the same time she is fascinated from how gentle and supportive he is for her. Until he asks her to date him. And they start dating. Dating each other will not make old misunderstandings and suspects disappear, and the author does a superb job mixing the present to the past to let the reader understand what was going on in both Seol and Jung’s minds.
Did Jung have a crush on Seol since the very first moment? Or did it grow with the time?
And how could Seol start lean herself on this shady guy who apparently made her college life like hell since the very first encounter?
A love triangle won’t be missing. And all kind of people will try to steal or separate Seol from Jung.
I never know how much I should say and what is best to keep, so that you enjoy reading it yourself.
This comic is definitely a must read if you like to participate emotionally in what you read and you are fine with delicate matters, psychological matters. And violence.
This is the less extreme comic I have read recently, but I will not recommend it if you are looking for a simple and easy reading just to relax. The topics will make you reflect about life and social behaviour, so better avoid if you don’t want to feed your brain at the moment.
Trying to still not ruin any surprise, I am working on a summary of the whole story and chapters, and detailed character files for all characters of the Cheese in the Trap. Also under work is an article comparing different comics who analyse social behaviour and other aspects that appear in Cheese in the Trap too.
You will find them all in a new post on the blog. Thank you for reading this article.
*Inho is a male character that appears not too late in the story, who is pretty hot in my opinion and brings up some important social and moral matters, together with a laugh during awkward situations, funny episodes and humorous moments.
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