From her gripping stellar performance as Eva Polastri in Killing Eva to the different blessings she gave in Grey's Anatomy as Cristina Yang, the prowess of Sandra Oh as a talented, solid, and remarkable actor is one that many are testament to and cannot be underemphasized. When a closer eye is taken at most of these known projects she has been on, it's vivid to see her shine, depicting unconventional and unique characters. Her ways of bringing out the funny, twisted, and, most importantly, untapped parts of being human have gone on to grace her with several accolades. I know you might be wondering already, but this isn't another boring article about a famous actor, is it? No, it isn't. It's about her latest body of work, The Chair. With themes exploring power, relationships and everyday emotions, this TV show explores an uncommon side of life through several expressions. 

As much as I have witnessed a lot of intriguing performances by Sandra, her role as Professor Kim Ji-Yoon in The Chair made me question so many nuances the recent world has struggled with for a long time. Alongside other stellar characters who I couldn't stop being entertained by, swimming in this 6-episodial body of work took me on a journey of education, humor, self-discovery, and just pure fun, to mention a few. Join me as I take you through my reflection of this series, and hope it'll be half as funny and even a quarter insightful. 

To begin with, seeing Ji-Yoon become the first woman of color to assume The Chair position of that department, I couldn't help but notice how she drowned in the sea of so many responsibilities and pressure that came with different sides of her life, which showed me that sometimes, you have no idea how hard wearing some shoes can be until you're tying the laces yourself. Her circumstances being Asian, a woman and even more subtly showed opened my eyes to see the struggles minorities, as a group of people have to deal with, to prove themselves worthy of a particular place or position. 

From Ji-Yoon's fashion sense, her personal and work life to her different roles, it can be inferred that she is just one complicated yet simple person who just wants to live life on her own terms and find fulfilment and happiness from what she enjoys doing. Seeing such an uncommon representation of a person and watching myself find some sort of relation in how she went about her life was one of the things I love about the show. 

I also enjoyed how diverse this series was in terms of characters. I can say that my attention was drawn to a lot of people apart from Ji-Yoon who happens to be the main character. From the carefree sometimes reckless attitude of Bill, more than her age qualities of Ju-Ju, the unique and effective methods Yaz employs in teaching her classes and even down to the adventurous and expressive exploits of Professor Joan, each major character was an interesting discovery and sight to see. And this, I believe, set The Chair apart from several comedy series I've seen and made it more enjoyable and easy to relate to. There was that tendency to find in one character, a mirror, a side of them really close to you, as a person. 

Furthermore, my interests also peaked at how they didn't exclude Ji-Yoon's heritage as a Korean. Watching the series explore that side of her in different scenes got me. It gave us a broader perspective and made us understand a significant number of things about her. Her relationships with Ju-Ju as a mother and Bill as a friend she was attracted to were ones I couldn't help but be in awe of. The imperfect essence of it helped me connect more to the show, in totality and witnessing how her relationship blossomed, through different odds is one I'll also refer to as a highlight of the whole show. In that light, too, seeing the show explore different scenes with themes of race paved the way for questions and their answers, which were provided in exciting ways.

In all, The Chair explored the struggles of an everyday person and their life in respect to a particular place, which is teaching in this sense. How sometimes, you don't have to be at the top to find happiness and just exploring the simple things of life is enough to make you feel whole was one of the lessons I took from this series. In addition, seeing Ji-Yoon let out certain emotions and acknowledge parts of herself many might see as below standard was another thing about The Chair that stuck. Sandra Oh has once again proven that she can deliver performances enough to leave watchers with large sprinkles of humor and larger dashes of emotions, too. That perhaps, there's more in the mundane than we give it credit for. 

Rating: 9/10.