Semantic Error Volume 1 Review
He’s… an error. And not just any error that has a quick fix… but an elusive error that shows up no matter how confident you are that the entire code is flawless. Sangwoo Choo. Jaeyoung Jang is… a semantic error.
Sangwoo Choo (gifted computer science student) feels badly let down when the rest of his team fail to contribute to the end-of-year group presentation and he has to deliver it all by himself. And of course, he informs the course professor that, notably, design major Jaeyoung Jang didn’t even turn up to any of the group meetings. This results in Jaeyoung failing to graduate and having to repeat certain elements of the course to gain a pass, ruining his plans to study abroad.
Jaeyoung, furious, decides to take revenge on the punctilious young IT student. He studies his daily routines (and there are many as Sangwoo likes to live a very disciplined, orderly life) and sets out to disrupt them in many and varied ways. Sangwoo’s favourite coffee, Black Holic, is suddenly unavailable from the cafeteria as ‘someone’ bought up all the stock. Jaeyoung’s favourite seat in the lecture theatre is always occupied before he gets there – by guess who? And that certain someone is always cheerfully dressed in the brightest red (because he’s heard Sangwoo say it’s the colour he hates the most). Battle lines have been drawn… but who will win?
©Ize Press, 2024
Poor Sangwoo Choo! It’s impossible not to sympathize as his well-ordered life is slowly but surely disrupted by Jaeyoung Jang with malicious glee. Sangwoo needs his routines to survive and succeed in college (his behaviour is depicted as neurodivergent but never actually described in terms of high-functioning autism). His strict adherence to the college rules – and his lack of understanding as to why Jaeyoung is so mad with him for telling on him for his failure to participate in the final project – all stem from the same place. So, when Jaeyoung just can’t leave him alone (his revenge for missing out on his career plans) matters quickly get out of hand. Even when Sangwoo helps out a friendly female fellow student Jihye (to be accurate, she asks him to help her and then rewards him with a free meal) the waiter at the restaurant they go to just happens to be none other than Jaeyoung and the conflict escalates.
Semantic Error unfolds by presenting alternating viewpoints. This works brilliantly as we spend the first chapters with Sangwoo, learning how important his daily routine is for him to function effectively and realizing from his awkward interactions with kind-hearted Jihye that he finds social skills baffling. When the viewpoint switches to show us what Jaeyoung is thinking and feeling, it’s a clever and astute piece of story-telling and character development. Seeing Sangwoo from his tormentor’s perspective brings so much more to our understanding of the situation. It draws us deeper into the story. We begin to ask ourselves why can’t Jaeyoung leave Sangwoo alone? (It seems they have met and interacted before but Sangchoo – whose people skills are almost non-existent – doesn’t remember.) Why does Jaeyoung love tormenting him so much? (Interesting parallels for danmei fans here with the way Wei Wuxian can’t resist teasing uptight Lan Zhan in the first flashback chapters when they’re teenagers at Gusu in Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation by Mo Xiang Tong Xiu.)
When the story flips back to Sangwoo’s point of view, he’s realized that in his hitherto neatly organized life, Jaeyoung is a ‘semantic error’. The clashes between the two continue – until in a surprising moment of plain-speaking, Jaeyoung tells him that he had been prepared to overlook the group project incident if Sangwoo had only engaged with him. He’d wanted to be friends. Sangwoo, utterly out of his depth, asks him, “Then will you stop if I apologize?” to which Jaeyoung replies, “If it were that easy to fix, would things have gone this far?” But by the final chapters of this first volume, there are signs of change. Jaeyoung is the T.A. for the Chinese course Sangwoo is taking and one of the course credits depends on the students devising a ‘skit’ and acting it out. Jaeyoung (of course!) is in the drama club and offers to get wigs and costumes for the skit which he and Sangwoo will perform. Is this an activity that will bring them closer together? And can Sangwoo be persuaded to remove his cap to wear a wig for the skit?
I liked Semantic Error from the moment I first read it online as a webtoon and I was delighted when I heard that Ize Press was bringing it out in a physical edition (as well as digital). I particularly like the way we see one viewpoint and then the other as it’s very skilfully done to advance the story. And everything is enhanced by Angy’s wonderfully vibrant drawings; the colours pop on the page (except for Sangwoo who’s always in black and always wearing his cap until…). The sequences based on video games are spot-on (Sangwoo is developing a game in his spare time and maybe Jaeyoung will eventually turn out to be the ideal designer he needs) and there are little touches of wicked graphic humour throughout. The Ize Press edition uses good quality glossy paper which really does justice to Angy’s colourful art. And red, Sangwoo’s most hated colour, dominates throughout, with the splash pages and in-between plain pages a vibrant scarlet.
The translation is credited to MANTA (the original Webtoon publishers) with lettering by Chiho Christie. It’s been adapted to a successful K-drama so readers may well have watched this before seeking out the original manhwa. This edition contains Episodes 1-19 of the original webcomic. There’s one page of helpful translation notes at the end as well as character guides to the two main protagonists and a two-page preview of Volume 2 (currently due out in March 2025).
Is Semantic Error merely a story of unkind and malicious bullying of a neurodivergent yet earnest student by another student who happens to be popular and sociable? Yes; Jaeyoung behaves badly – but we get to see why, even if we don’t condone his behaviour. Sangwoo reacts badly at first to Jaeyoung’s pranks, which is understandable, but slowly he begins to change. (He’s already done his military service, so he’s older than an average undergraduate in the UK. Has this changed him or made him more rigid? It’s not part of the story but you can’t help wondering…) And it’s a really rewarding moment when that change begins to show in the ways he reacts to and interacts with his ‘tormentor’, especially when Jaeyoung displays all the signs of really wanting to get along with him.
Semantic Error is probably my favourite webtoon from Ize Press so far, especially in these early chapters where these two ill-assorted and incompatible young men constantly butt heads but slowly get to know each other. It’s fun to read – but always astute and well-observed. Above all, watching Sangwoo slowly learn to move beyond the limitations he’s placed on himself is a heart-warming experience.
Our review copy from Ize Press was supplied by Diamond Book Distributors UK.
