Initially, I was thrilled to enter the almost entirely Asian American space of “Beef.” Getting to watch two Asian American leads channel their repressed second-generation anger into an escalating road rage incident? It was the show I never knew I wanted.
I also deeply appreciated how “Beef” effortlessly incorporated Korean American specificities: Steven Yeun’s character, Danny, pausing a rant to answer his parents’ KakaoTalk video call in a saccharine tone, the two cousins catching up at a sullungtang restaurant, the Korean evangelical church with a wailing praise team. I marveled at them all.
Full of inside jokes for Korean American communities, “Beef” felt refreshingly free of white-pandering tropes. It felt like an onscreen experience that was made for Korean American viewers like me. That’s why, a few episodes in, I was especially devastated to learn about David Choe, the actor portraying Danny’s bullying, volatile older cousin Isaac.
In 2014, on a taped podcast Choe co-hosted with Asa Akira, he bragged about forcing oral sex onto a Black masseuse in Los Angeles. Despite Akira repeatedly chiding him — calling his confessional conquests rape — Choe barreled on, partially admitting to “rapey behavior.” When outlets started to cover Choe’s graphic account, he later retracted his statement by excusing his podcast as a work of fictional art.
As a Korean American sexual assault survivor, I found it almost impossible to separate the art from the artist. This question looming over “Beef” — whether Choe was or was not in fact a rapist — distorted my entire experience of watching the show. Instead of being able to enjoy its cathartic portrayals of Asian American rage, I found myself disturbed every time Isaac appeared onscreen, wondering how much of the character’s aggression was a performance and how much of it was channeled from Choe’s documented misogynoir. The toxicity of Cousin Isaac hit uncomfortably close to home.
“Even…
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