Latest / Daebak K-Rambles Podcast: K-drama Reviews / It's Okay to Not Be Okay | Full K-drama Review / Ep. 86

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It's Okay to Not Be Okay | Full K-drama Review / Ep. 86 · Daebak K-Rambles Podcast: K-drama Reviews

• 0:19
  I'm Jessica and this is the Teba Ki Rambo's podcast where a
• 0:22
  couple of friends review Korean dramas and we're back.
• 0:25
  We're back for another K drama review.
• 0:27
  We are going to be reviewing It's OK to Not Be OK.
• 0:31
  And for this episode, I am joined by Melissa and Noelise
• 0:34
  Way from the African Soulmates podcast.
• 0:37
  How are you guys? Hi, Jess.
• 0:39
  Thanks so much for having us. I feel like this this meeting
• 0:43
  has been years in the making. We're really excited to be here
• 0:47
  with you today. I am so thrilled.
• 0:50
  Yeah, and we're viewing such a controversial but great drama,
• 0:55
  so really excited about this conversation.
• 0:58
  Yeah, I'm really thrilled to have you guys here.
• 1:00
  It's it's like you said, a long time coming.
• 1:03
  We've been really friendly on the socials for years.
• 1:05
  I've been a fan of you guys for years and been listening for
• 1:08
  years. And I know that you guys have
• 1:10
  covered It's OK to not be OK, but it's been about four years
• 1:14
  since your episode came out. And even though I have listened,
• 1:18
  I don't sadly remember the episode.
• 1:21
  And in talking with you guys, it seems like you guys also are a
• 1:24
  little rusty on the details of what you guys said in that
• 1:27
  episode. So maybe this was a little bit
• 1:30
  needed to refresh all of our memories.
• 1:33
  If you guys can just tell the audience in case they don't
• 1:37
  listen to your podcast, maybe what you guys have been watching
• 1:39
  lately and what you guys have been enjoying.
• 1:42
  Sure. Well, I've just been watching
• 1:45
  Undercover high school, I think it's called, and it's honestly,
• 1:49
  it's been, it's been such a trip because I took a bit of a hiatus
• 1:54
  from K dramas over the holidays because I just needed, I don't
• 1:57
  know, creative rest. And so it's been a fun way to
• 2:00
  sort of ease back into it. And yeah, rewatching it's OK to
• 2:05
  not be OK in preparation for this.
• 2:07
  So that was also a an interesting trip down memory
• 2:11
  lane for sure. Yeah, Mel.
• 2:14
  I actually haven't been watching Korean dramas lately.
• 2:17
  I just watched It's OK Not to Be OK just to kind of remember what
• 2:22
  that was about. But I'm just really in my
• 2:25
  Chinese drama era to be. Girl.
• 2:30
  Well, what seed drama are you watching lately?
• 2:33
  I'm watching Ski into Love and the first snow because they're
• 2:38
  on Netflix, easy to watch. And I'm just like, I don't know,
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  they're just a little bit lighter right now than what's
• 2:46
  going on with K dramas. But I know that there's so many
• 2:49
  shows that are waiting for me like the potato, the Potato Lab
• 2:54
  and Undercover High School. And I'm just like and my list,
• 2:58
  when I'm ready to give get back into K drama, I'm going to get
• 3:01
  on top of that. Yeah, yeah.
• 3:03
  I'm also watching The First Frost on Netflix.
• 3:07
  I'm about halfway through and the podcast schedule has kind of
• 3:10
  overhauled my personal watching schedule and I'm really upset
• 3:15
  that the show has ended. And now I'm kind of getting the
• 3:20
  edits and I'm getting the reactions from people and I'm
• 3:22
  like, no, I have to be pure. I have to be non spoiled on the
• 3:26
  show, even though it's what what plot was that?
• 3:29
  I mean, there's nothing really there to spoil, but I'm like, I
• 3:32
  don't want to see them together yet.
• 3:33
  I know that it's coming. So yeah, I am enjoying C dramas
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  as well. I've been loving C dramas for
• 3:40
  years. So we are going to get into it's
• 3:42
  OK to not be OK. And there is a lot to unpack on
• 3:47
  this show. So bear with us as we kind of
• 3:50
  weave our way through this. And we will be talking a little
• 3:54
  bit about the the Kim SU Kyon scandal that literally just
• 3:59
  broke this week. So I don't think that, I guess
• 4:04
  it goes without saying that we are trying to be as diplomatic
• 4:09
  as possible in our approach to this.
• 4:11
  So as we come to that part of the show, again, bear that in
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  mind. Korea has really strict
• 4:18
  defamation laws, the most strictest in the world.
• 4:22
  So as this thing is developing, we're not going to say that that
• 4:28
  much, but we are available in the social medias for you guys
• 4:33
  to DM us to message us and talk at length about this stuff.
• 4:38
  OK, so without further ado, here's some housekeeping.
• 4:41
  If this is your first time listening, go ahead and
• 4:43
  subscribe on your favorite podcast app or on Apple Podcast,
• 4:46
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• 4:48
  And if you like us, please give us a review on Apple Podcast and
• 4:51
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• 4:58
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• 5:01
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• 5:06
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• 5:10
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• 5:14
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• 5:25
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• 5:29
  All right, so I'm going to go ahead and read the My Drama List
• 5:32
  synopsis for It's OK to Not Be OK, and we're going to get into
• 5:36
  it. We're going to get into it, so
• 5:37
  here we go. Moon Kante is a community health
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  worker at a psychiatric ward who was blessed with everything,
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  including a great body, smarts, ability to sympathize with
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  others, patient's ability to react quickly, stamina, and
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  more. Meanwhile, Komunyong is a
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  popular writer of children's lit who, due to suffering from any
• 5:57
  social personality disorder, seems extremely selfish,
• 6:00
  arrogant, and rude. Moon Kangte denies love and
• 6:04
  Komunyong doesn't know it. The two defy fate and fall in
• 6:08
  love, finding their souls and identities in the process.
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  So, this show aired in June to August 2020.
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  For those keeping track at home, that is pure pandemic.
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  That is the summer of pandemic and it is 16 episodes long.
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  It is directed by Pakshinu and he's directed things like the
• 6:31
  Killing Vote, Love Struck in the City encounter, Don't Dare to
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  Dream, Hide, Jackal, Me, Angel Eyes, Queen of Ambition, and
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  most recently, of course, when the stars gossip from 2025, he
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  also has another drama coming out, Miji's Soul.
• 6:49
  This also coming out this year. Have you guys experienced some
• 6:54
  Pakshinu dramas before? No, actually I haven't.
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  I was listening to to your list and I'm like, I tried to watch
• 7:04
  this new Lehman Ho one that struggled when it came up.
• 7:08
  Yeah, it was, I don't know, it was a bit slow for me.
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  So I'm actually quite shocked because yeah, I don't know if he
• 7:14
  has sort of like a theme through his dramas, but they all seem
• 7:17
  quite, quite different. No Lee's way.
• 7:21
  I haven't watched any of these, but I know I did try Lovestruck
• 7:26
  in the city. But a lot of our listeners, a
• 7:28
  lot of the African soul mates, I mean, it was people had such
• 7:33
  mixed opinions about it and so I was like, you know what, this
• 7:36
  one can wait. It's still on my list, but who
• 7:38
  knows what I will eventually get to it.
• 7:42
  Yeah, I've watched a few of these.
• 7:45
  Angel Eyes in 2014 I believe, was about this blind girl and
• 7:52
  she fell in love with a a boy and then it was like a second
• 7:55
  chance romance. But now her she had like an eye
• 7:59
  transplant or something like that.
• 8:01
  And now she can see, but she doesn't recognize the boy that
• 8:04
  she fell in love with because now she can see.
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  It was so little. I don't think I finished
• 8:11
  watching it, you know. And then I've heard of
• 8:17
  Encounter, heard of Lovestruck in the city.
• 8:19
  Very mixed bag on those two. And then when the stars gossip
• 8:24
  has been universally panned this year.
• 8:28
  Yeah, yeah. Not a.
• 8:31
  Not a, not a one. 100 Good luck. Track record for this director,
• 8:37
  but yeah. So the show though was written
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  by Toe Young and she has only written three things.
• 8:45
  Two of those things are Jugglers from 20/17/2018 and Mr. Plankton
• 8:51
  from last year, 2024. And as soon as I saw Mr.
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  Plankton, I was like, oh, that makes a lot of sense.
• 8:58
  Yes, yeah. Yes, yeah.
• 9:02
  I loved Mr. Plankton. I love Mr. Plankton.
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  And so it totally makes sense to me that it's the same writer
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  because yes, right. Support.
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  Mel, you also watched Mr. Plankton.
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  Yeah, sorry. I love Mr. Plankton and you
• 9:17
  know, like these deep male characters that are just going
• 9:20
  through emotional turmoil. Seems to be her bag.
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  And she's I, I and you know, Mr. Plankton came, was it in
• 9:30
  Christmas or like November at a time when it was also a little
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  bit dry and it was such a good show for that period of time.
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  So yeah, no, she is great. Obviously quality, not quantity,
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  going for her. Yeah, exactly.
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  I haven't watched Strugglers, but I did watch Mr. Plankton
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  from last year, and I thought it was really, really smart.
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  I've really enjoyed it. It was very nuanced and had a
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  lot of depth to it. And there was something about it
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  where it was asking a lot of questions but not providing too
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  many answers. It was trying to let the
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  audience come to these conclusions themselves, right?
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  It's trying to like pose these questions for the audience, even
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  though you can tell the writer has a point of view, right?
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  I just think she's very smart in the that approach and she seems
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  to do some research and I like it.
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  I think it's, it's kind of AI don't know how she makes a
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  living if she's only doing 3 dramas, like done 3 dramas and
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  you know, the last 10 years. But I appreciate the last two of
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  them if that makes any sense, and the show.
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  So the cast, I'm going to read 3 cast members and I'm going to go
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  basically in backwards order if that makes any sense and leave
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  Kim SU Kyun for last. OU Cheng SE, he plays Moon Sante
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  and he's got like 55 movies and 37 dramas to his name.
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  He is a veteran actor. He is the get of this show.
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  When they announced his casting for our Moon Sante, that was the
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  that was the big deal, right? He's been in things like, I
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  mean, there's so many things you throw a rock.
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  He's been in this in the show I miss You from 2013, Missing 9,
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  which was not a great shit. That was one of the worst shows
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  I've ever seen. Touch Your Heart from 2019 When
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  the Cameelia Blooms from 2019, which we've covered on the show.
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  There's an episode on it, Hot Stove League, which we will be
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  covering on the show this season, The Good Detective, GD
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  Son, Little Women, which we've covered, Revenant, which we've
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  covered, Sweet Home 2, Deaths Game, which I reviewed over on
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  TN Soju podcast, So many Queen of Tears.
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  He had a cameo in it. He's Sweet Home 3, Mr. Plankton.
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  So he worked with the writer again.
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  He was also in When the Stars Gossip earlier this year.
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  So he's worked with the director again.
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  You can see he has he likes working with these people, so
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  he's worked with them again. And he should be on your screens
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  right now and When Life Gives You Tangerines, which is
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  currently airing for us at the time of recording on Netflix.
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  So oh Jiang SE, what do you guys think of this guy?
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  Personally, he stays paid. I always have a job and I love
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  it for him, I really do. And I've just seen like his
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  range. He has such range.
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  I remember when I noticed I watch Touch Your Heart and then
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  watch It's OK to not be OK. And then later we reviewed Touch
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  Your Heart and we went back and I was like, normally this is
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  like the same actor. How is he the same?
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  He is? He is so good.
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  I have never watched him in a drama where I felt like I I
• 12:57
  didn't appreciate his contribution to the show.
• 13:00
  So I'm a I'm a, I'm a big fan of his.
• 13:05
  Yeah, yeah. I would echo that.
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  I think he is such a versatile actor.
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  And I mean, clearly, you know, has done so many dramas and
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  movies in his career. I'm just curious, has he played
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  a lead in in any of these or is he?
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  I feel like he always has an important character, but again,
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  not knowing a lot of these movies, has he been, you know,
• 13:32
  the leading, the leading character, like the male lead?
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  To your knowledge I don't recall like any of the ones that I've
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  said. He was not the male lead, but he
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  is a Co lead, if that makes any sense.
• 13:49
  Yeah, which Co lead supporting these are sort of
• 13:54
  interchangeable, at least in the West, especially for award
• 13:57
  season, because there's always category fraud in awards where
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  you put a Co lead, someone who has a lot of screen times, who's
• 14:05
  carrying a lot of weight in a sporting category with somebody
• 14:07
  who's like in there for 7 minutes.
• 14:10
  He does a lot like he's he, we'll do a cameo role, he'll do
• 14:14
  a bit part and then he'll do something where he's in every
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  single episode and he's alongside younger, very popular
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  actors like this show. I think that he's well regarded
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  in the industry and his name holds a lot of weight to the
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  Korean audience and I'm not sure if they're if he has LED maybe
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  in movies although. Maybe.
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  I also can't say for sure, but. I mean, in any case, yeah, in
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  any case, right. Like whether it's 2 minutes or
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  every single episode, he really just comes with that gravitas
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  and leaves an impression. So exactly that's off to him.
• 14:58
  Yeah, so he plays off of Soyaji who was the female lead.
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  She plays Ko Munyong and she's got 8 movies to her name and a
• 15:08
  few TV shows like Mood in School from 2016, Huadong where she
• 15:13
  plays Princess SU Myung, Save Me from 2017, Lawless Lawyer and
• 15:20
  Eve from 2022. What do you guys think of
• 15:24
  Soyaji? That's my girl.
• 15:26
  That's your girl. That's my girl.
• 15:29
  I love Soyaji. And I mean, I say this as
• 15:32
  someone who's only watched her in Eve and it's OK to not be OK,
• 15:37
  but I think, I don't know, she just, whatever stoic kind of
• 15:42
  character she plays, she does it so well.
• 15:45
  She she just has a presence when she comes on screen.
• 15:48
  And I think she acts a lot with her face in a way that not a lot
• 15:54
  of, well, not a lot, but like, I don't see a lot of people doing
• 15:57
  really well. You know, she can just come and
• 15:59
  she's super icy, but there's like there are layers, there's
• 16:02
  some depth there that she can convey.
• 16:05
  And yeah. And I mean fashionista.
• 16:08
  Yeah, yes, fashionista. Yeah.
• 16:11
  The wardrobe in this show is famous, and for good reason.
• 16:16
  It is really unique, It's colorful, it's vibrant and it
• 16:23
  looks amazing on her. She's the the clothes they put
• 16:26
  on her are stunning. It looks couture and I think
• 16:32
  this show is stands out among the K dramas because it is so
• 16:37
  her wardrobe is so whimsical. It looks like runway fashion,
• 16:43
  right? And it totally informs her
• 16:46
  character. Soyaji is not without scandal,
• 16:49
  as we may or may not know. A few years ago, she was accused
• 16:54
  of forcing her ex-boyfriend Jung Hyun into not having any
• 16:58
  physical interaction with his Co star in the 2018 drama Time.
• 17:04
  I don't know if you guys had heard of this weird drama.
• 17:08
  She was like semi cancelled for this.
• 17:11
  It was like really bizarre. I I mean, yeah, you're like
• 17:15
  shaking your head. And then there's just been
• 17:20
  rumors circulating that she's difficult to work with and that
• 17:23
  she's mean to the staff. And I don't, I don't, I don't
• 17:27
  really put stock in such things, especially like mean to the
• 17:31
  staff and like stuff like that, like that's.
• 17:34
  Yeah, yeah. It's giving Meghan Markle.
• 17:37
  I was just like, we don't really like.
• 17:42
  Meghan Markle. The most?
• 17:45
  Controversial like royal OK. In terms of like she's mean to
• 17:51
  the stuff, she's a hard worker or she's like she's really
• 17:55
  domineering and it's like, I don't know.
• 17:59
  I, I feel like some of the controversies are why are we all
• 18:03
  up in this business? Honestly, just just focus on the
• 18:08
  actress and what they bringing to the dramas.
• 18:11
  Obviously stuff that is terrible that people need to know about
• 18:15
  and people need to be accountable, but nothing about
• 18:20
  the Soya G drama put me off her as an actress.
• 18:24
  And I agree with Nodi, I think she's a really good actress.
• 18:28
  She's one of the few that I feel takes takes me to a deeper level
• 18:33
  in the way that she represents the character.
• 18:37
  She has a lot of depth in her acting so I'm really glad that
• 18:41
  she's now without Scandal, but I know some listeners may have
• 18:45
  thought she's she deserved the cancelling but I personally I'm
• 18:50
  happy to see her back. Lily's way.
• 18:54
  I mean, I was just going to say women in general are held to a
• 18:58
  much higher standard. And someone could just be an
• 19:02
  assertive person who sets very clear boundaries and calls out
• 19:07
  BS, you know, very freely, very easily.
• 19:11
  And that can be taken and spun into some narrative about, oh,
• 19:16
  she's so difficult to work with. Oh, she's mean, She's this.
• 19:19
  And I'm like, you know what? OK, we all have our opinions
• 19:23
  about that, but is it worth canceling someone over?
• 19:26
  Again, these are people. I don't know these people from a
• 19:28
  slice of bread. So yes, it could be that she
• 19:31
  really is like that. But when everyone is getting so
• 19:35
  worked up, you know, like you're whipping people up into a frenzy
• 19:38
  over rumors of how she behaved on set.
• 19:40
  I'm just kind of like, we take it with a grain of salt.
• 19:43
  Exactly, exactly. I couldn't have said it better.
• 19:47
  She really blew me away and saved me, which is an OCN drama
• 19:50
  from 2017 about her family getting sucked into a cult.
• 19:55
  And that was a very triggering drama for me.
• 19:59
  And I came out on the other side thinking she's phenomenal.
• 20:03
  And I don't recommend that drama lightly it you have to go into
• 20:07
  it knowing that it's very disturbing.
• 20:10
  So it's an ocean drama that should tell you a lot.
• 20:13
  But the scandal with her doesn't feel to me that I wouldn't call
• 20:18
  that a scandal. You know what I'm saying?
• 20:21
  I'm just like, OK, some text messages got out and it looks a
• 20:25
  little. But to semi blacklisted, like
• 20:31
  she doesn't have that many shows.
• 20:34
  Yeah, right. Like if you look at her for
• 20:36
  omography, I'm like, she's not been working that often.
• 20:39
  Yeah. I'm just going to leave that out
• 20:41
  there. So we're finally at Kim SU Hyun.
• 20:44
  He plays Moon Kante, the male lead, and he's done 4 movies, a
• 20:50
  few TV shows including Dream High from 2011, The Moon,
• 20:53
  Embracing the Sun, My Love from the Star, the Producers, One
• 20:57
  Ordinary Day, Queen of Tears from last year, which did
• 21:00
  gangbusters. Everybody and their mom was
• 21:02
  watching Queen of Tears. It was the number one show
• 21:04
  everywhere. We have reviews on Dream High,
• 21:09
  My Love from the Star, and of course he did a cameo in Crash
• 21:12
  Landing on Youth. And of course there is an
• 21:14
  episode on on Chloe Kim SU Hyun. We have a taker for what's aged
• 21:20
  the worst about this show. We have to as quickly and as
• 21:25
  definitely as we can, unpack the scandal.
• 21:27
  So when I resolved to cover it's OK to not be OK, and I tapped
• 21:32
  you guys to guess on this, I had no earthly idea that all this
• 21:38
  would surface. I see you guys kind of like
• 21:40
  chuckling. Here's what went down, Kim said
• 21:43
  on is a child actor who is most famous for being in the amazing
• 21:49
  movie The Man from Nowhere with Moenbin.
• 21:51
  She'd grown up into a young woman and was booking acting
• 21:55
  gigs like the K drama Bloodhounds before she got
• 21:57
  busted for a DUI. She hit an electricity pole and
• 22:01
  knocked out power to a bunch of buildings.
• 22:03
  She lost everything because of this scandal, dropped from
• 22:07
  projects and endorsements, even though she apologized profusely,
• 22:10
  paid the fines and compensated the stores that were damaged due
• 22:14
  to the malicious online harassment, including these
• 22:18
  Youtubers, these cyber Lucas who make their money off of false
• 22:22
  information and salacious gossip.
• 22:25
  She sadly committed suicide earlier this year.
• 22:27
  February 2025. Now the emerging story has Kim
• 22:33
  Sukhyon at the center of this. There were already dating rumors
• 22:38
  between Kim Seron and Kim SU Hyun stemming from her posting
• 22:42
  this intimate photo of them to her Instagram last year.
• 22:46
  While Queen of Tears was airing, their faces were touching side
• 22:50
  by side. The Korean netizens went wild.
• 22:54
  They were angry with her because how dare she try to take him
• 22:58
  down with her because she was still in the midst of her
• 23:00
  cancellation. But now, according to The Korea
• 23:05
  Times, this controversy reignited when YouTube channel
• 23:09
  Hover Lab, better known as Carocedo Institute, featured Kim
• 23:14
  Seron's aunt who claimed the actress had a six year
• 23:18
  relationship with Kim SU Hyun starting at age 15, and accused
• 23:22
  his agency of financial misconduct and lack of support
• 23:26
  after her 2022 DUI scandal. The allegations, especially
• 23:31
  about the underage relationship, have sparked intense scrutiny,
• 23:34
  with resurfaced photos and videos adding to the debate
• 23:38
  pause. There are now many photos
• 23:41
  circulating of Kim SU Hyon kissing Kim Saton on the cheek.
• 23:44
  There's a screenshot of a text message Kim Saton sent to her
• 23:47
  cousin fully detailing the six year relationship.
• 23:51
  There's a screenshot of a text message Kim Saton sent to Kim
• 23:54
  Saton about paying back the penalties from the drama
• 23:58
  Bloodhounds in the amount of like 700 million, one of which
• 24:01
  is about $500,000 because his agency allegedly demanded she
• 24:06
  pay it all back. They sent her a legal notice
• 24:09
  threatening her with escalating legal action and she could not
• 24:13
  pay this back in a lump sum immediately as she was
• 24:16
  struggling financially. One video is of him doing an
• 24:19
  interview alongside actress Kim Yu Jong, who is also 12 years
• 24:23
  younger than him, where he says she's matured and maybe he'll
• 24:27
  meet her as a partner one day. And another video is of a 2013
• 24:33
  interview he did where he says when he's 41 he wants to marry a
• 24:36
  21 year old, which is gross. It gives credence to him maybe
• 24:41
  seeking out a younger girl, perhaps 112 years his junior and
• 24:45
  only 15. Just mounting evidence.
• 24:48
  Some of it just circumstantial like the ones that I've
• 24:51
  mentioned. Back to the Times article.
• 24:54
  Public interest grew not just from the YouTube channel, but
• 24:57
  from the family's involvement, lending credibility to the
• 25:00
  claims. Gold medallist firmly deny the
• 25:03
  accusations, calling them clearly fabricated and wholly
• 25:06
  unacceptable, and vowed strong legal action against the
• 25:08
  malicious falsehoods. Then dispatch entered the chat
• 25:14
  with receipts confirming the six year relationship and more.
• 25:19
  We were originally going to get a follow up statement in a week
• 25:22
  from gold medalist, that's Kim SU Hyun's agency, the one he
• 25:27
  himself started with his cousin. But we ended up getting one just
• 25:32
  a couple of days ago. Kim SU Hyun is now admitting to
• 25:37
  having a relationship with Kim Seton, but he says it was from
• 25:42
  summer 2019 to fall 2020 when she was firmly legal an adult.
• 25:50
  They're saying Kim SU Hyun is suffering mentally due to the
• 25:54
  accusation that he's to blame for her suicide.
• 25:58
  And the list goes on for refuting the evidence and claims
• 26:01
  based on various technicalities. Here's what we know for sure.
• 26:06
  Korean Youtubers are notorious for telling lies and spreading
• 26:10
  malicious gossip. The media can be bought.
• 26:14
  Dispatch can be silenced. Fans are generally more
• 26:19
  forgiving and biased toward handsome male celebrities and
• 26:22
  female celebrities, often defending problematic
• 26:26
  individuals. Kim Sodon committed suicide on
• 26:29
  Kim SU Hyun's birthday. Kim SU Hyun did not attend her
• 26:34
  funeral despite her being signed to his agency.
• 26:38
  They did 100% date and they do 100% have a 12 year age gap.
• 26:45
  If they dated when he says they dated that would make him 31 and
• 26:50
  her 19. Here's what I know personally.
• 26:55
  The whole thing stinks to high heaven.
• 26:58
  And whether or not any charges have been filed, whether or not
• 27:03
  anyone has been found guilty in a civil or criminal case, Kim SU
• 27:08
  Kyong has been deemed guilty in the court of public opinion and
• 27:12
  that's the only one that counts nowadays.
• 27:14
  One party, the presumed victim, cannot speak for herself
• 27:18
  anymore. I'm not here to sensationalize
• 27:21
  what is and has already been sensationalized and what is
• 27:24
  already a tragedy. To me, the worst has already
• 27:28
  happened, Kim said on took her own life.
• 27:32
  So whatever outrage you feel, whatever happens now, she won't
• 27:38
  receive help. Justice is going to come too
• 27:40
  late. Lots of people spoke to me in my
• 27:44
  DMS. There was a lot of confusion, a
• 27:48
  lot of anger. And I understand.
• 27:51
  This is a beloved actor, someone we've all allowed into our homes
• 27:55
  and lives through the magic of television.
• 27:58
  This is someone we've all fallen head over heels for and some
• 28:01
  drama or another. It feels like Kim SU Hyun has
• 28:04
  betrayed the public's trust. We're upset that he not only did
• 28:09
  something morally wrong, it's that he allegedly is a
• 28:15
  paedophile. He's a predator, he groomed a
• 28:17
  child. It's abhorrent.
• 28:20
  It's echoing really sad stories that we've heard before and this
• 28:24
  list is non exhaustive. So we've got R Kelly and
• 28:28
  Aaliyah, Beyoncé and Jay-Z, Demi Lovato and Wilmer Valderrama,
• 28:33
  Kylie Jenner and Tyga Steven Tyler of Aerosmith, who openly
• 28:38
  admitted in his memoir to having sex with a 16 year old.
• 28:41
  He was 26 at the time, and her parents apparently fell in love
• 28:44
  with him and signed over guardianship to him so he could
• 28:47
  take her on tour. His band has a themed ride at
• 28:50
  Disney World. Aaron Taylor Johnson and his now
• 28:54
  wife who have a 24 year age gap. Milo Ventimiglia and Hayden
• 28:59
  Panettiere. They announced they were dating
• 29:01
  when she was barely 18 and he was 29.
• 29:05
  Johnny Depp and Winona Ryder. He described it as love, his
• 29:08
  first sight. She was 17 and he was 26.
• 29:11
  Joel Madden and Hillary frickin Duff.
• 29:14
  She was 16 and he was in his mid 20s.
• 29:17
  Paul Walker at the time of his death he was dating a 23 year
• 29:21
  old. They had met and started dating
• 29:24
  when she was 16. My least favorite one Céline
• 29:28
  Dion because I love Celine Céline Dion and her freaking old
• 29:33
  bag of a manager, Renee. He was 38, married when he met
• 29:39
  12 year old Celine and they she was the other woman.
• 29:44
  They didn't start dating quotation marks until she was
• 29:47
  19. This isn't to normalize this
• 29:52
  behavior. This is to say that our society
• 29:56
  today is a lot louder about calling out this shit nowadays
• 30:01
  than it has ever been. And a lot of victims in these
• 30:05
  cases will often swear up and down that they're not victims.
• 30:10
  They were not groomed. It's always been and always will
• 30:14
  be morally repugnant, but here's what I want to leave you with.
• 30:19
  I want to encourage everyone to really wrestle with how you view
• 30:25
  celebrities, actors, K pop idols, whoever.
• 30:31
  Because if you see them on your screen in any capacity, they're
• 30:36
  working. Those variety shows that are you
• 30:41
  believe it. They're so good at letting you
• 30:43
  see their true personality. They're working.
• 30:46
  It's a job. Nobody, and I mean nobody, is
• 30:51
  perfect. And yes, the Korean moral
• 30:55
  perfection standard for their celebrities is wrong.
• 30:59
  It can never be achieved. But hear me on this.
• 31:03
  I guarantee you that every single celebrity has done
• 31:07
  something, has said something, even believed something that
• 31:12
  would effectively end their career if it got out.
• 31:16
  We tend to think other people live similar lives to us.
• 31:21
  This is not true. The sooner you believe everyone,
• 31:25
  even your favorite actor, is a freak behind closed doors, the
• 31:29
  better you will be to weather these inevitable scandals.
• 31:33
  You'll be disappointed, but not surprised.
• 31:37
  Here's something else I know. Art in any form, whether it's
• 31:42
  films, television, music, books, drawing, painting, all of it is
• 31:47
  important. It gives us comfort in times of
• 31:50
  need. It helps us make meaning of our
• 31:52
  lives, teaches us new things, brightens our days.
• 31:56
  It entertains us. And a great show or a great
• 31:59
  performance will always be great.
• 32:03
  Two things can be true at the same time.
• 32:05
  A problematic individual can make the most moving art.
• 32:09
  How you view these stories and characters going forward is up
• 32:13
  to you. If you like them, still great.
• 32:17
  If you need some time away, that's fine.
• 32:20
  That's fine too. If you want to boycott because
• 32:23
  you feel disgusted, fine. Now I saw a ton of people
• 32:30
  chewing up commenters on TikTok who we're talking about.
• 32:33
  Separate the art from the artist.
• 32:36
  Do not fucking do that. That's childish to insult and
• 32:40
  bully someone for wanting to compartmentalize.
• 32:43
  So please stop with this virtue signaling and moral superiority.
• 32:48
  In this episode, we will try to unpack and review this show from
• 32:53
  as unbiased a perspective we can muster, and this sort of feels
• 32:58
  like reviewing The Cosby Show the week the Bill Cosby scandal
• 33:00
  hit. This is a little difficult, but
• 33:04
  we're going to do our best. My question to you guys is, do
• 33:10
  you feel the legacy of the show has been tainted?
• 33:17
  Thank you for, you know, just for, for sharing a bit of a
• 33:21
  recap of what's been going on. And just, you know, obviously,
• 33:24
  as you said, this is a it's delicate and controversial.
• 33:29
  It's unfolding as we speak. And so just to echo something
• 33:33
  you said at the beginning of the show, I am happy to tussle with
• 33:38
  anyone in our DMS to really get into it.
• 33:42
  And I will say something that I always grapple with is how to
• 33:48
  separate the art from the artist.
• 33:50
  And I think for me, it may be too soon to say if the legacy of
• 33:55
  the show has been tainted. I think I personally did pause,
• 34:00
  as you know, as I mentioned, I was, I started re watching so I
• 34:03
  could come here. You know, I was excited as you
• 34:05
  said, who who would have known this would happen?
• 34:10
  And I really paused because I was like, I can't, I'm just
• 34:12
  having in the in the last week or so.
• 34:16
  I was just like, I don't know. I don't know that I can watch
• 34:18
  this and fully give it the I don't know.
• 34:24
  Yeah, my, I had a distorted kind of experience for the remaining
• 34:29
  episodes that I still had to watch.
• 34:31
  But then Mama didn't raise no quitter.
• 34:34
  I was like, I'm trying to show up to Jess's podcast because,
• 34:38
  again, we've been wanting to come and connect with you over a
• 34:42
  show like this. And so it's like, OK, can I, for
• 34:45
  the purposes of this episode, do that?
• 34:48
  I think there's a lot that can be said about the the
• 34:52
  characters, which is what I would love to focus on.
• 34:54
  And we'll do our best. I think it's too soon to say
• 34:58
  whether or not the the legacy of the show will be tainted.
• 35:01
  But I can say that when I first watched it, that experience was
• 35:07
  it was a very pure experience, Right.
• 35:10
  And now it's it's different. But I am trying to keep an open
• 35:14
  mind for for our review here. Yeah.
• 35:17
  Yeah. Oh, something, just something
• 35:20
  you said that I wanted to double click on was just about, you
• 35:24
  know, we don't know these people.
• 35:26
  We don't have personal relationships.
• 35:28
  And I think something I always joke about with with Mel and
• 35:31
  some other friends is sometimes when I am excited about an
• 35:37
  artist, I'm like, you know what? Stay embarrassed.
• 35:40
  You'll find out why later. You know what I mean?
• 35:42
  Because literally anything can happen.
• 35:45
  And it's like, you know what? Fair.
• 35:46
  Yeah, not fair, but they're human.
• 35:49
  Things happen, and you just deal with your disappointment.
• 35:53
  And. Yeah.
• 35:55
  And move on. Like, I don't know how to say
• 35:59
  it. Like it sucks, let's move on.
• 36:04
  Yeah, and I cannot underline Double Click Echo enough that
• 36:11
  the age of glorifying and idolizing celebrities is gone.
• 36:16
  Like that was when we were in our early teens and we had our
• 36:21
  posters of Backstreet Boys, and we only got that.
• 36:23
  We only got to know about them in our monthly People magazine
• 36:27
  subscription. But now with all the technology
• 36:31
  that exists and everything that comes out about celebrities,
• 36:36
  that is actually normal. People are great, people are
• 36:41
  gross sometimes. Like then.
• 36:43
  Now we just have access to that information just at our
• 36:46
  fingertips. Every day You go on Twitter and
• 36:49
  you find out that your fave is actually really terrible.
• 36:54
  And for me, I would just encourage us to have a healthy
• 36:59
  relationship with celebrity and make sure that we are aware that
• 37:04
  they are portraying characters. They are portraying a certain
• 37:09
  lifestyle that should appeal to us, but that is not necessarily
• 37:13
  what's real. And I think when these sort of
• 37:17
  scandals come out, it's you don't get sucked into this and,
• 37:23
  you know, think your world has fallen apart because they are
• 37:26
  just, they are just humans. And, you know, they will be
• 37:31
  accountable to who they are accountable to.
• 37:33
  But yeah. And whether that has changed the
• 37:38
  way the legacy of it's OK to not be OK for me personally, it has.
• 37:44
  The way I viewed it after this information came out is a bit
• 37:48
  different than what I did the first time.
• 37:53
  I think I, I was a little more unfortunately, like, oh, I'm so
• 37:59
  sad. I'm so disappointed by this
• 38:02
  actor, but not in a way that would make me cancel it or not
• 38:06
  watch it or not recommend it or just be, you know, writing in
• 38:10
  the blogs about it. It's just like, oh, this is what
• 38:13
  I know about this. This actor is not great.
• 38:18
  Moving on. Like the key headline is moving
• 38:21
  on and just hoping that the powers that be in the circle of
• 38:28
  celebrity deal with it. But it's not for me to be
• 38:32
  sending out any hate tweets or, you know, being all caught up
• 38:38
  about it. Sorry that was all jumbled up,
• 38:41
  but I hope the message came out that let's stop glorifying
• 38:45
  celebrities honestly. Yep, I agree.
• 38:51
  I agree completely. The next question that I have is
• 38:55
  how did you like this show? And I don't know if you want to
• 38:59
  split it up between before Scandal and after Scandal or if
• 39:04
  you just want to kind of give your overall like, is it a good
• 39:08
  show to you or not? I really I think I enjoyed this
• 39:14
  show because it had so many themes that felt when I first
• 39:20
  watched it. This was one of my earlier
• 39:22
  dramas. I'm so new, relatively new when
• 39:25
  I think about you both. I'm relatively new to K dramas
• 39:28
  and I think when I watched it, I was the themes of family
• 39:33
  healing, Oh my gosh. And you know just the cast.
• 39:37
  There's so many things. I think I really, I appreciate
• 39:41
  it, appreciate it so much about this drama and how there are
• 39:45
  some really light moments coupled with obviously the
• 39:49
  heavier parts where it's like these people are walking bags of
• 39:54
  trauma and we need to get to a point where we understand what's
• 39:59
  going on. And, you know, yeah, just sort
• 40:01
  of how are they navigating through life while carrying so
• 40:04
  much baggage, if that makes sense.
• 40:06
  So I think. Just overall, I think it's it's
• 40:10
  such a powerful, I experienced it as a really powerful story
• 40:15
  about family relationships, trauma, healing and yeah.
• 40:20
  Yeah, yeah, no. I I think that it's such a great
• 40:26
  drama. When I watched it, I truly
• 40:28
  enjoyed it and I think retrospectively it feels like
• 40:33
  such a good drama because they've been few that have left
• 40:38
  an impact after. It's OK to not be OK.
• 40:42
  Like very few dramas from that time period that I look back and
• 40:47
  I really can remember most of the story, can remember the
• 40:51
  characters and it just had so many levels of depth to it.
• 40:58
  And I, I particularly remember feeling like Soyaji's character
• 41:05
  Munyang was a little bit different to what we were used
• 41:10
  to. She was, she almost portrayed
• 41:12
  the male stereotype of what K dramas represent.
• 41:17
  She was the one who was cold. She was the one who seemed like
• 41:21
  she was not emotionally available.
• 41:24
  And I remember that being that dynamic being very interesting
• 41:28
  to me and just how the three of them had great chemistry
• 41:31
  together. Yeah, I enjoyed the drama very
• 41:34
  much. Yeah, for me, I also really
• 41:38
  enjoyed the drama and I actually have a time capsule blog review
• 41:42
  up on the blog that I revisited a couple couple weeks ago.
• 41:47
  I like reread it and I was like, Oh my God, like this is perfect
• 41:51
  because I know exactly what I thought.
• 41:53
  And I actually at the beginning was like kind of trying to
• 41:55
  downplay how much I loved it. And then I was like, anyway, I
• 41:58
  really love the show. Sorry about it.
• 42:00
  Like, and I think I ended up giving it like 4 stars out of
• 42:03
  five. What really resonated with me
• 42:06
  was a lot of the novelty of it, right?
• 42:10
  There's a lot of cool puzzle pieces, a lot of novelty puzzle
• 42:13
  pieces. There's the humor and lightness
• 42:16
  and openness throughout the show that's really reminiscent of
• 42:19
  just like a typical K drama. And then there's a lot of
• 42:23
  whimsical and fairy tale in it. And the aesthetics are very
• 42:27
  gothic. It's almost like gothic light.
• 42:29
  And if you've never seen any Tim Burton or Guillermo del Toro,
• 42:34
  then the stop motion animation style in the premiere episode is
• 42:37
  going to really wow you. And these types of elements, her
• 42:41
  wardrobe, all of these things are really novel.
• 42:45
  These are new, right? You might not have seen these in
• 42:48
  other K dramas. And the really big emphasis
• 42:52
  throughout the show on mental health, healing and working
• 42:56
  through mental illness is a big step in the right direction for
• 43:01
  Korean society and for K dramas. It's not quite was not quite as
• 43:06
  prevalent five years ago in K dramas.
• 43:10
  There had been some K dramas that dealt with mental health
• 43:13
  and mental illness, but not like we see today like every other K
• 43:17
  drama might have something to do with somebody struggling and
• 43:21
  they'll put a lot of jargon in there that is psychoanalyzing
• 43:27
  these characters in some way, shape or fashion.
• 43:29
  Mental health jargon is really big nowadays, more so than even
• 43:33
  five years ago when this thing aired.
• 43:36
  And so even I, I just said stuff like triggering, like
• 43:39
  triggering. We're we're saying that now, but
• 43:41
  that's therapy. Language is really normalized
• 43:44
  now. And K dramas like this are kind
• 43:49
  of breaking new ground in Korea. And the portrayal of an autistic
• 43:55
  character like old Jung Sei's character Sante was amazing,
• 44:01
  right? Like you've not seen something
• 44:04
  like that in AK drama. You might have seen it every so
• 44:07
  often, but you know, now you have extraordinary Attorney Wu.
• 44:11
  You have the the kid from Moved to Heaven.
• 44:15
  You have a lot of different representation now than you had
• 44:18
  before, even even before this show.
• 44:22
  So you have a veteran actor, Ojiang SE, playing this brother,
• 44:27
  older brother Ahyung, who's got ASD.
• 44:30
  He's got autism. It comes out during the
• 44:33
  pandemic, maybe people being confined, being away from
• 44:37
  family, isolated, confronting their mortality in ways we'd
• 44:41
  never reckon with before. I feel like it made the
• 44:45
  sentimental parts of the show really hit right, because the
• 44:49
  sentimentality of cage dramas is something very unique to it.
• 44:53
  We don't have such sentimental shows in the West, right?
• 44:58
  Everything is kind of at arm's length.
• 45:00
  Yeah, just just as you said that I remembered how when we watched
• 45:05
  this and reviewed it, there's, I remember talking about how after
• 45:10
  every episode we would just sort of be in each other's DMS just
• 45:14
  trying to like just unpacking everything.
• 45:17
  And one of the things that we talked about was how, you know,
• 45:21
  it was really because we were watching it with our third
• 45:25
  podcast member, Nomsa. I think we were watching it.
• 45:28
  We might have watched it after meal.
• 45:30
  I can't tell. I can't remember.
• 45:31
  But we were watching it together.
• 45:34
  And so there was just that this drama, really, it just brought
• 45:37
  us together. And it's like we're on this
• 45:39
  journey together with these characters.
• 45:42
  And yeah, I I was living in another country, you know,
• 45:48
  isolating by myself. And so really, K dramas were
• 45:51
  such a. Unifying.
• 45:55
  Yeah, yeah. I was just like, Oh my, like
• 45:57
  this makes me feel connected to other people.
• 45:59
  That's when I started watching K dramas.
• 46:01
  And so, yeah, it's, it feels really special because of that,
• 46:05
  that sentimentality that you are that you are talking about.
• 46:08
  Yeah, yeah. I had someone message me and
• 46:11
  say, you know, good luck on the episode because of everything
• 46:14
  going on. And I'm just pissed off because
• 46:17
  it's OK to not be OK. It's such an important drama for
• 46:20
  autistic representation. It's the best autistic character
• 46:23
  I've seen, which reflects my own experience of it.
• 46:26
  And it's so annoying to me that because of Kim, meaning Kim SU
• 46:29
  Hyun, it'll get cancelled as a drama.
• 46:32
  And I wondered how you guys felt about the autistic
• 46:35
  representation And Ochung says performance.
• 46:39
  I thought that it was a great representation, but I remember
• 46:43
  when we were recording this episode as well as it like
• 46:46
  slowly comes back to me, we also struggled just the same way we
• 46:50
  struggled struggled with Extraordinary Attorney Wu
• 46:54
  around. It was great and it felt like it
• 46:57
  was really good representation, but we're not autistic and it
• 47:03
  would be. We were always saying it would
• 47:05
  be great to hear what the autistic community thinks about
• 47:08
  that representation and if they felt that it was genuine and it
• 47:12
  was true and if it was something that they could get behind as
• 47:18
  just objectively speaking, it felt like he did a really good
• 47:22
  job of that. But I would never confidently be
• 47:26
  the the opinion holder of that. Yeah, that's definitely where we
• 47:32
  landed. But sorry, just to veer us off a
• 47:35
  little bit back to the unifying nature of it's OK to not be OK.
• 47:41
  I also thought that every element of the show was so
• 47:45
  intentional from the soundtrack, which was so good.
• 47:50
  That was tea is unassailable. It's amazing.
• 47:53
  So good. And also the fairy tales.
• 47:56
  I remember trying to buy those fairy tale books and how they
• 48:01
  was so well weaved into the stories of the three main
• 48:06
  characters and it really felt like the writers was so
• 48:10
  intentional about everything that they were representing in
• 48:14
  every single episode. I also loved that there was the
• 48:18
  overarching story of the the three leads, but almost every
• 48:23
  other episode there was also like a smaller story about a
• 48:26
  mental health patients and, and what they were going through.
• 48:30
  And that never took away from the broader story.
• 48:34
  It always added and you always you had these guest stars come
• 48:39
  and be the patients and and it was also interesting going into
• 48:44
  that and talking about those specific characters, like the
• 48:47
  one that stands out the most was the son of the politician who
• 48:54
  kept an. Early episode, Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 48:56
  Yeah, who kept on flashing people and just how his story
• 49:01
  was so sad as it unraveled and how Munyang responded to his
• 49:06
  story. First you're like, oh, she's
• 49:08
  cold and she's manipulative. And then you kind of realize
• 49:12
  that she relates to him and she wants to help him, even though
• 49:17
  she may not be, you know, representing that in the best
• 49:21
  way. I really, I really love those
• 49:23
  stories. So I really digress from your
• 49:26
  question. Yes, but just really.
• 49:27
  No it's fine. I'm actually going to recenter
• 49:29
  us now because I'm looking through the questions that I got
• 49:31
  from social media and someone asked a really interesting
• 49:35
  question that I'm not even sure how to answer.
• 49:38
  Someone asked. This might be a hot take, but
• 49:41
  I'd love to get your opinion on whether or not it's time for K
• 49:44
  dramas to take a big step toward disability inclusion on screen.
• 49:49
  O Jiang SE was fantastic as Moon Sante, and we saw a great
• 49:53
  performance in Extraordinary Attorney Wu as well.
• 49:57
  But could it be time for Korea to work on their inclusion
• 50:00
  efforts with actors of various abilities?
• 50:02
  Slash disabilities? Question Mark.
• 50:05
  Yes, yes, yes. And I think this is this is
• 50:10
  actually, this was part of our discussion in our review in 2021
• 50:14
  where we said, you know, great that.
• 50:17
  And sometimes part of the evolution or movement towards
• 50:21
  true representation could start with a really well respected
• 50:26
  actor doing a really great job of that.
• 50:30
  And then we say, OK, but let's actually look at people who
• 50:34
  actually have these lived experiences and have them play
• 50:39
  these these characters because then then the acting is just
• 50:42
  about it's, it's about the acting, but I'm not also acting
• 50:47
  out the disability or whatever the case may be.
• 50:50
  So yeah, definitely. I totally understand.
• 50:53
  I understand where you're coming from in the West.
• 50:56
  It's, and I said this on the Extraordinary Attorney Wu
• 50:58
  episode that we did, it's fallen out of fashion for Hollywood
• 51:04
  stars to play people with disabilities.
• 51:07
  You had so many people coming up and getting awards for playing
• 51:14
  someone with a disability. You had like Leonardo DiCaprio
• 51:17
  and What's eating Gilbert Grape. You had Sean Penn and I am Sam,
• 51:22
  Tom Hanks and Forrest Gump. The list goes on.
• 51:25
  And then all of a sudden, like in the late 90s, early 2000s, we
• 51:28
  were like, you know what? Maybe this isn't a good idea and
• 51:32
  we kind of woke up to it not being such a great idea.
• 51:36
  Maybe it's kind of playing a caricature, a real life
• 51:40
  disability and struggle, and you're not including these
• 51:44
  people in the work, right? I would say Korea is going to be
• 51:49
  really slow on this. Personally, I think this is a
• 51:53
  very conservative society, as we well know, and they quite
• 52:00
  appreciate beautiful people. And not to say that the West
• 52:04
  doesn't, that Hollywood doesn't, but, you know, I was surprised
• 52:09
  they even had an actress with Downs playing the sister with
• 52:13
  Down syndrome in our Blues. And I was like, that's amazing.
• 52:18
  I was like floored that they even had that.
• 52:21
  So, but to have them cast someone with ASD in a drama,
• 52:28
  which is very demanding, if you think of the demands, memorizing
• 52:32
  lines, Start, Stop when I tell you that's very taxing.
• 52:36
  You know, on someone with autism.
• 52:39
  I think it's gonna be very difficult for Korea to be like,
• 52:42
  yeah, let's do it, let alone other disabilities.
• 52:46
  Yeah, when I think about K dramas, I think a lot about the
• 52:50
  CWI don't know if you guys watched a lot of The CW shows,
• 52:54
  but I always used to be like. Girl, you're talking to the
• 52:57
  right person. If you are not, you know, the
• 53:02
  stereotypical standard of beauty, you will not be hired on
• 53:06
  The CW. And that's how I feel about
• 53:09
  Korean dramas. And it also, I thought about
• 53:13
  that as well when referencing only when you're saying, oh,
• 53:16
  John, say, has he ever been a male lead?
• 53:19
  Maybe because he doesn't really fit into that Kim Soo Hoon type
• 53:24
  of beauty that I don't know the TV show producers think the
• 53:29
  audiences want to see. And connecting that back to
• 53:33
  disabilities and to what Jess was saying is that there's just
• 53:37
  a love for beauty that if you don't fit into that, and I say
• 53:41
  beauty in exclamation marks because we all know that it is
• 53:47
  quotation mark because we all know that beauty is defined
• 53:53
  differently. But I definitely think agree,
• 53:56
  just that it might. It might take a while, but I
• 54:00
  hope it doesn't. I hope they surprise us.
• 54:04
  We talked about Soyaji's character and people had a lot
• 54:08
  to say and things that I hadn't even thought of.
• 54:12
  I don't know if you guys want to guess at what people were upset
• 54:16
  about her character about or if you just want me to read the
• 54:19
  comments. What that she was a go getter,
• 54:22
  she said. That's my man, my man, my man,
• 54:25
  or. That she was harassing him.
• 54:28
  Yes, that's exactly it. So that she was sexually
• 54:31
  harassing him for about half the show.
• 54:35
  Someone DM Ed me and said if her character was a male lead,
• 54:38
  feminists of the world would be outraged.
• 54:41
  But she somehow seems to be revered and loved.
• 54:44
  And again, flawed characters are fine as long as the redemption
• 54:48
  arc is good. But I didn't have the patience
• 54:49
  for it and a lot of her behaviors put me off.
• 54:53
  This person dropped the show. Another person said that they
• 54:56
  loved the female lead. She's a bit of an anti hero.
• 54:59
  She's very unapologetically extra and direct.
• 55:02
  I like that. I like soft female leads, but I
• 55:06
  love strong female leads. I think she has a lot of
• 55:08
  character development. It does not take from her being
• 55:12
  very morally Gray, but I think her being jealous is very on
• 55:15
  brand with how Korea usually portrays toxic women.
• 55:19
  At the end of the day, I just like her because she could not
• 55:22
  care less about anyone else but them.
• 55:25
  Even in the beginning when she grabs by the hair of the guy who
• 55:27
  yells at the brother, it's very right even though not in the
• 55:31
  right way. I think when we understand how
• 55:33
  she was raised, we can understand why she is how she is
• 55:37
  and still a good person even though a bit inside.
• 55:40
  So anyway, Long story short, people were screaming sexual
• 55:44
  harassment, calling sexual harassment on Soya G's Moon
• 55:49
  Young. What say you to those
• 55:52
  accusations? Yes, and how many male leads
• 55:57
  have we seen do this? Like I I think the second
• 56:04
  comment you read probably captures or reflects more of my
• 56:08
  stance on so AGI think she is. She is a complex character.
• 56:13
  She's problematic in many ways, but also I'm like, yeah, we're
• 56:18
  used to. We're not used to seeing like, I
• 56:23
  don't know how. To I I triggered you, I didn't
• 56:25
  I. I'm triggered and you know what?
• 56:29
  I support all women's rights and wrongs.
• 56:34
  And so yes, I hear all this. But again, I think she's
• 56:39
  especially at that time for me, it was like, OK, this is a
• 56:41
  different kind of the female character that we're seeing on
• 56:45
  screen. She's so problematic in so many
• 56:48
  ways, but she's also she's she's multi dimensional.
• 56:51
  There's so many layers to it. Yes, we can talk about how she's
• 56:55
  out here grabbing people's hair or you know, she's undressing
• 57:01
  Gante with her eyes or whatever, all those things.
• 57:05
  Yes, yes, yes. And I think it's a yes and for
• 57:08
  me. OK.
• 57:10
  I mean, I did find her a bit annoying, but not for the sexual
• 57:13
  harassment accusations. I was like, oh, OK.
• 57:17
  Yeah, I I I didn't, I thought she was a great character.
• 57:21
  Would she be my friend? I don't know.
• 57:25
  You know, I am, I am one of those people that, you know,
• 57:29
  when you say someone is really great on the inside, well, they
• 57:32
  can be great on the outside too. Oh, so that's that's how I felt.
• 57:38
  What's holding them back from being great on the?
• 57:40
  Outside, Yeah. What's holding them back from
• 57:41
  being kind and, you know, nice on the outside?
• 57:45
  Like why do I have to dig deep? You know what?
• 57:52
  I feel that. I feel that.
• 57:56
  As a character, I thought that she was great, just a little bit
• 57:59
  annoying. The sexual harassment claims, I
• 58:02
  do think she took it far, but I think that was all part of the
• 58:07
  character. Also similar to what that second
• 58:10
  statement said, that she's a flawed character that you know,
• 58:15
  finds redemption in the end. And I don't know if I can
• 58:19
  articulate this well, but I always find it, it's difficult
• 58:24
  when the critique on the show is that this character shouldn't be
• 58:30
  doing this sort of thing. But then it's a representation
• 58:33
  of what characters or people are like in real life.
• 58:37
  And this is, you're supposed to critique that, right?
• 58:41
  But I know some shows are cancelled because they, like, we
• 58:45
  shouldn't be seeing that on TV. But if that's something that
• 58:48
  happens in real life in some of these instances, we should be
• 58:52
  able to critique that and not necessarily say we shouldn't see
• 58:56
  it at all. And I thought that this was I,
• 58:59
  I, I don't know if you guys understand.
• 59:01
  What kind of like PC police? Yeah, this was just a different
• 59:05
  representation of of a female character.
• 59:07
  And I know when I read some of the controversies around that,
• 59:10
  they're like, they should cancel the show.
• 59:13
  Like she's sexually harassing him.
• 59:15
  And I was like, no, let's talk about how this character is a
• 59:18
  little bit messed up. Rather than this cancel, it's
• 59:21
  cancelled. Right, right.
• 59:22
  Let's open a dialogue here. And I think that's what the show
• 59:25
  and the writer wanted, right? That's what they wanted to say.
• 59:29
  They wanted to show us the growth and the healing journey
• 59:33
  for not just her, but every character, right?
• 59:35
  Because no character ends the same way that they started the
• 59:38
  show. That's a sign of great writing,
• 59:40
  right? Yeah, Like, these are things
• 59:42
  that you would expect MU Yong to do, right?
• 59:45
  Like, her character has been written to be this problematic
• 59:49
  person. Like, and again, life has handed
• 59:52
  her all types of lemons. And so it's like, OK, here's how
• 59:56
  she shows up. Here's how she protects herself
• 59:59
  and whatever, right? We can dig into her psyche.
• 1:00:03
  And it's like, as you both have said, this is what is leading.
• 1:00:07
  This is what is setting us up for that character development.
• 1:00:11
  So plus one TU vote. Yeah, she's Moon Young is
• 1:00:16
  severe, she's insulting, she's intimidating, but she's so
• 1:00:20
  fashionable. She's covered in couture and
• 1:00:24
  she's a creature of impulse, but she's also just very lovable.
• 1:00:28
  Like I said, she's out here yanking hair off of people who
• 1:00:31
  stood in line for her own book signing, but she's making kids
• 1:00:35
  cry. She's pushing unethical critics
• 1:00:38
  down the stairs for demeaning her, exploiting her for sex.
• 1:00:42
  She's pulling the wings off of butterflies and flashbacks.
• 1:00:45
  She's bellowing back at deer that block her car.
• 1:00:48
  She is doing a lot of weird, funky, funny things.
• 1:00:56
  And she's going about doing sort of like, a lot of like,
• 1:00:58
  righteous indignation in the wrong way.
• 1:01:02
  You know what I'm saying? Like, yeah, that guy's a Dick.
• 1:01:05
  Actually, these several guys are douchebags and she's handling
• 1:01:10
  it, but in the wrong way, You know what I'm saying?
• 1:01:12
  Like her methods, she can be prosecuted for these things.
• 1:01:17
  Probably not the best, cleanest method to handle this, but you
• 1:01:23
  know, I'm not necessarily mad at her for doing it right, for
• 1:01:27
  pushing someone down the stairs and for pulling, yanking
• 1:01:30
  someone's hair back when they physically assaulted Sante, for
• 1:01:35
  having a, you know, sort of an episode, an autistic episode in
• 1:01:39
  the line of her book signings. So Mel, you mentioned the fairy
• 1:01:43
  tales. Each episode is a different
• 1:01:45
  fairy tale or story with a moral lesson imparted to the
• 1:01:48
  characters and the viewer. She represents a very cynical
• 1:01:53
  viewpoint that there's actually a very dark lesson to learn from
• 1:01:57
  these fairy tales instead of a light, bright, simple one that
• 1:02:00
  might affirm life and love. And gradually the K drama of it
• 1:02:05
  all is that she kind of pivots and she realizes what is love
• 1:02:09
  and what is the light part of the fairy tale that she's been
• 1:02:13
  missing, Like she's been missing the forest for the trees.
• 1:02:16
  And a lot of these fairy tales that she has been teaching these
• 1:02:20
  people throughout the show. I liked it.
• 1:02:23
  It's her recontextualizing all these fairy tales, these these,
• 1:02:28
  you know, parables basically in her own life.
• 1:02:33
  Her this is one that I liked the call back to it, but not
• 1:02:38
  necessarily the first time it happened was when she screams I
• 1:02:40
  love you at him early on in the show.
• 1:02:44
  She's like aggressively screaming I love you at him just
• 1:02:46
  to get his attention because she knows he's fundamentally love
• 1:02:51
  starved and affection deprived. It's a very early episode antic
• 1:02:56
  and it's super iconic, but it's manipulative, right?
• 1:02:59
  Like you can see that it's super manipulative.
• 1:03:02
  She stalked him all the way to this hospital, in the seat at
• 1:03:05
  the seaside hospital. And to me, that's all part of
• 1:03:09
  her mental illness. She has antisocial personality
• 1:03:12
  disorder. And I would say the one thing
• 1:03:16
  that I don't like about the shows, they don't go into this
• 1:03:19
  diagnosis. They don't flesh out like, what
• 1:03:21
  is this look like on her necessarily?
• 1:03:24
  What is antisocial personality disorder?
• 1:03:27
  Does she need more treatment? Does she need more therapy?
• 1:03:29
  Is this like, does she not really have it at the end of the
• 1:03:33
  day? Was it just sort of conditioning
• 1:03:35
  and training and abuse from her mother, like all this stuff?
• 1:03:40
  So that would be my complaint about it.
• 1:03:42
  And I think that goes into the portrayal of mental health and
• 1:03:46
  mental illness in the show, which is upon this rewatch, I
• 1:03:50
  was like, this is good but not great.
• 1:03:53
  And five years ago, I was like, this is really great and, you
• 1:03:55
  know, step in the right direction.
• 1:03:58
  And today, watching it, I'm like, it's good.
• 1:04:02
  Definitely good. I also thought that although the
• 1:04:08
  mental health aspect of the show was great to see, it almost felt
• 1:04:14
  like it was being used as a device, yes to push block
• 1:04:18
  forward rather than exploration of what those mental health
• 1:04:24
  challenges mean for these different characters.
• 1:04:26
  Yes. It was just taking us to the
• 1:04:29
  next step. The show walks a weird line of
• 1:04:32
  being gimmicky and being sincere.
• 1:04:37
  And I think I felt that a lot more this time around because
• 1:04:43
  like just to keep it a buck, these the healthcare errors of
• 1:04:47
  practice are like endless, right?
• 1:04:49
  Like the doctor ditches his patient when he sees Munyong
• 1:04:53
  coming towards them because he fired her from the lit classes.
• 1:04:56
  The doc allows her to do these lit classes despite knowing
• 1:04:59
  she's a loose cannon and very volatile.
• 1:05:02
  There's like several people that escape from the hospital and I
• 1:05:07
  get that they have like this open door policy, but that's
• 1:05:11
  ridiculous. Director O again, just
• 1:05:14
  triggering patients for fun. Like he's I don't understand
• 1:05:19
  that. And then employees just watching
• 1:05:21
  these massive breakdowns, massive meltouts happen.
• 1:05:24
  No attempts at intervening. They just like let it happen for
• 1:05:27
  the plot, right? Like it for for us as viewers,
• 1:05:30
  we know it's for entertainment, but like I'm like this is not
• 1:05:34
  like over and over again, these infractions kind of build up and
• 1:05:38
  it makes me a little bit annoyed nowadays.
• 1:05:41
  I don't know if you guys felt that way.
• 1:05:44
  Yeah. Yeah, yeah.
• 1:05:46
  Plus one to what you both shared.
• 1:05:48
  I think one of my critiques when I rewatched it was actually some
• 1:05:54
  of these characters, some of the patients at the hospital, either
• 1:05:58
  I was like, we either need to go into a little more depth for
• 1:06:01
  some of them, have few of them that we're focusing on or else
• 1:06:04
  just keep them use that use that time to maybe, you know, just to
• 1:06:09
  your point, focus on Coleman Young and her her own, you know,
• 1:06:15
  like anti personality. I'm saying it wrong, right, But
• 1:06:19
  like, you know, anti social personality, antisocial
• 1:06:22
  personality. Yes, that's it.
• 1:06:23
  Thank you. Because it's almost like, yeah,
• 1:06:25
  there's there's all this it's not noise, but these other
• 1:06:28
  little things happening here and there, as Mel said, to drive the
• 1:06:31
  plot forward. But we're we're just kind of
• 1:06:33
  glossing over and it's like, could we not spend a little bit
• 1:06:38
  more time, maybe have a little bit more in depth for one or two
• 1:06:42
  of them, but not like every, yeah.
• 1:06:45
  I don't know, a couple of like stray notes that I just want to
• 1:06:48
  throw in here before we continue.
• 1:06:50
  There's Subway product placement, which I was like,
• 1:06:52
  wow. I think Quiznos has like taken
• 1:06:55
  the place of Subway because recently in a recent drama,
• 1:06:57
  there was a Quiznos product placement and I was like, oh
• 1:07:01
  man, it's nice to see. It was actually nice to see
• 1:07:04
  Subway it from 2020. And Speaking of Komunyong,
• 1:07:10
  Soyaji does not know how to smoke a cigarette, has no clue
• 1:07:14
  whatsoever what to do with a cigarette.
• 1:07:16
  I don't know if you guys are like sticklers for certain
• 1:07:19
  things, but people that don't know how to smoke a cigarette in
• 1:07:21
  a movie or ATV show, I'm like, that takes me straight the fuck
• 1:07:24
  out. Like I'm like, what is she's
• 1:07:27
  like holding it weird And I'm like girl, like get some.
• 1:07:31
  There has to be a smoker on set with you just like have them
• 1:07:33
  coach you for like half an hour because this is ridiculous.
• 1:07:37
  She's holding these like luxurious looking cigarettes the
• 1:07:40
  most awkward way. So I had a problem with her and
• 1:07:43
  they never showed her smoking either.
• 1:07:44
  She's like, she has never smoked a cigarette in her life.
• 1:07:46
  It looks like just from just from how she was portraying this
• 1:07:52
  smoker, I'm like, no, she's not. She's not a smoker.
• 1:07:55
  Sorry to say, I'm going to have to go back.
• 1:08:00
  I'm going to have to go back. And because I'm like, wait.
• 1:08:06
  But can I add a stray note that I'm like, I keep thinking about,
• 1:08:09
  yeah. How unlikable was Jury as a
• 1:08:13
  character? Do you guys remember?
• 1:08:15
  And she, she has gone on to be like such a great actress in all
• 1:08:21
  these shows. And we, that was my first
• 1:08:23
  introduction to her, and I shouldn't know.
• 1:08:25
  And she's gonna be good because I really disliked her character.
• 1:08:31
  I was just like, for half the show I was like, what even What
• 1:08:35
  is her beef? I don't get it.
• 1:08:36
  And then they showed the flashback and I was still like,
• 1:08:39
  gosh, you suck. It was, I don't know.
• 1:08:41
  I had like very little sympathy for her.
• 1:08:44
  So I'm glad you mentioned it because she was like a web
• 1:08:47
  blanket a little bit, even though her relationship with the
• 1:08:50
  manager was getting real cute by the end of the show.
• 1:08:53
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 1:08:54
  I wanted to shake her half the time, like girl, stand up girl.
• 1:08:58
  Said exactly, exactly. Oh my gosh.
• 1:09:03
  She also she lures Kante and Sante to the seaside town.
• 1:09:08
  Also, she's like, I have like an empty room.
• 1:09:10
  You don't have to worry about where you're going to live and
• 1:09:13
  they're you can get double pay at the hospital because you're
• 1:09:17
  certified and whatever. I'm like, girl, you're trapping
• 1:09:20
  this man to go live in this trauma town from when he was a
• 1:09:24
  child. Anyway, thanks.
• 1:09:28
  Thanks for bringing up that character.
• 1:09:29
  I actually had no notes on her, but that was I was just
• 1:09:32
  spitballing. So going back up to some of the
• 1:09:37
  questions that people had, some people and some people are now
• 1:09:42
  calling into question Kim SU Kyun's performance and they're
• 1:09:45
  saying that I honestly thought the female lead and the autistic
• 1:09:48
  brother were standout performances and the male lead
• 1:09:51
  was just blah. How do you feel about these
• 1:09:54
  people? Now?
• 1:09:56
  I'm not sure if this person felt this way always, but I haven't
• 1:10:00
  seen this online that people are like, oh, Kim SU Kyun never
• 1:10:03
  could act, could he, blah blah, blah.
• 1:10:04
  Like, and we'll just keep it to the context of it's OK to not be
• 1:10:09
  OK. What?
• 1:10:10
  What would you say to those claims?
• 1:10:13
  I would say not the revisionist history of getting I'm getting.
• 1:10:17
  That's what I'm saying. I'm kidding.
• 1:10:20
  I'm kidding. I actually I actually did see a
• 1:10:24
  review online somewhere, but this is from like back in 20.
• 1:10:28
  I think it was a 2021 blog where someone did say Kante is sort of
• 1:10:33
  a one note character. And so that that was in 2020,
• 1:10:39
  2020-2021, whatever it was. So I mean, I think there are
• 1:10:42
  probably people out there who from the get go were like, but I
• 1:10:46
  think it was but by design because he does have my
• 1:10:50
  experience of him is that, you know, he is supposed to be this
• 1:10:53
  character who's trying to keep it together.
• 1:10:56
  He's just like, let's keep it even keeled because he
• 1:10:59
  shouldn't. He didn't want to show too much
• 1:11:02
  emotion that might be misinterpreted by by Sante, You
• 1:11:06
  know, whatever it was, right. And so it's like there may be
• 1:11:09
  little moments. There are just some subtle
• 1:11:12
  moments where it's like, OK, you're seeing a little bit more
• 1:11:15
  of what it is he's trying to keep suppressed.
• 1:11:20
  But I don't know, maybe I'm just, maybe it's just me, but I
• 1:11:24
  think it was part of the the character.
• 1:11:26
  Yeah, I mean, please don't take away going to his tears away
• 1:11:29
  from him. Like they didn't affect us.
• 1:11:32
  Like the whole moments where I was tearing up with him.
• 1:11:38
  I think it's exactly what you're saying.
• 1:11:40
  No, he represented the character well and you could feel he.
• 1:11:45
  I remember saying this in our first review is that he had an
• 1:11:50
  underlying sadness to him that I thought Kim SU Hyun really did
• 1:11:55
  well. Like in every scene you felt
• 1:11:58
  like this is someone who is carrying a lot.
• 1:12:01
  He is his shoulders are bred like every he is burdened.
• 1:12:06
  He is going through it and he's just trying to keep it calm,
• 1:12:10
  just trying to get through the day, just trying to, you know,
• 1:12:14
  make sure that his brother is OK.
• 1:12:17
  And I think, yeah, I, I mean, we may have his our issues with him
• 1:12:21
  now, but I thought that he did did well in that.
• 1:12:24
  And that's what made all three characters so great.
• 1:12:28
  They all brought the A game to to the show.
• 1:12:32
  Yeah, that's my perspective. If I can just add to that.
• 1:12:35
  Yeah. Sure.
• 1:12:36
  So Coleman Young calls him the. Is it like the pin and the
• 1:12:42
  grenade or whatever? Like yeah, safety pin or
• 1:12:44
  something. Yeah.
• 1:12:46
  And and yeah, I think performances don't have to be
• 1:12:50
  big and loud for them to be impactful, right?
• 1:12:53
  It's like Munyang and Sante are the way they are because those
• 1:12:58
  are the characters. And and yeah, Kante is like that
• 1:13:03
  balancing element, although he is his own grenade, clearly,
• 1:13:07
  but. Yeah, I agree.
• 1:13:10
  I would say something that I resonated with in 2020 and
• 1:13:13
  something that continues to really resonate with me is the
• 1:13:17
  fact that Kante is a caregiver. He's a full time caregiver and
• 1:13:21
  he's had no support for his entire life.
• 1:13:24
  And that's not something people like to talk about is that
• 1:13:27
  caregivers need care. That's a very unique struggle.
• 1:13:31
  And unfortunately, like I have been in the position where I
• 1:13:35
  have cared for family members and seeing other family members
• 1:13:40
  full time caregive for others. And I completely understood why
• 1:13:46
  he was the way that he was and why he was so suppressed, right?
• 1:13:51
  He wasn't repressed, he was suppressed.
• 1:13:53
  He did it to himself, right? He was constantly choking back
• 1:13:57
  emotions and suppressing happiness and, you know, making
• 1:14:02
  decisions that he thought would benefit his brother.
• 1:14:06
  This is the type of character and this is the type of story
• 1:14:09
  that no one likes to admit happens on a day-to-day.
• 1:14:13
  And if you look around, this happens way more often in real
• 1:14:18
  life, which is why I think the drama is also so special.
• 1:14:21
  Is that it? It's basically the emancipation
• 1:14:25
  of a caregiver. How do you let go of a family
• 1:14:30
  member who maybe is a little more self-sufficient than you
• 1:14:33
  thought? And I thought it was beautiful.
• 1:14:36
  I thought it was very effective. We can get into a little bit
• 1:14:40
  more that journey and that character in spoilers, but I
• 1:14:45
  don't think that Kim Sukiyong performance was lacking in any
• 1:14:51
  way, shape or form. OK, so I'm actually going to go
• 1:14:55
  through some fun facts, some accolades for the show, a little
• 1:14:59
  bit of development notes, and then we are going to give our
• 1:15:02
  score out of five soldier bottles and then we're just
• 1:15:04
  going to get into spoilers. I feel like we talked a lot, but
• 1:15:07
  we haven't talked about the twists in the show.
• 1:15:10
  I had a question come through about the twist in the show, how
• 1:15:13
  we felt about it. So we will get into that in the
• 1:15:14
  spoiler section. So fun facts the viewership
• 1:15:18
  slash popularity. According to Nielsen Korea, the
• 1:15:22
  series recorded an average nationwide TV viewership rating
• 1:15:25
  of 5.4%. It was the most popular show of
• 1:15:28
  2020 in the romance genre on Netflix in South Korea.
• 1:15:33
  It was the most popular K drama series on Netflix in many
• 1:15:36
  countries such as Taiwan, and the most enduring Korean drama
• 1:15:41
  in Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand.
• 1:15:44
  So Asia just ate it up. It was in the top ten list in
• 1:15:48
  Netflix for more than 100 days there, and the series was also
• 1:15:52
  the most popular K drama of 2020 on Netflix in Australia, Hong
• 1:15:56
  Kong, India, Japan and South Africa.
• 1:15:59
  It made the New York Times list of Best International Shows of
• 1:16:04
  2020 and at the 57th Pick Song Awards it received 8 nominations
• 1:16:10
  with two wins for Best Supporting Actor and Best
• 1:16:14
  Technical Achievement for Costume Design.
• 1:16:17
  It received a nomination at the 49th International Emmy Awards
• 1:16:21
  in the Best TV Movie or Miniseries category as well.
• 1:16:26
  So in development, I think you guys mentioned the writer and
• 1:16:30
  how she was so good at portraying a lot of this stuff
• 1:16:33
  and how we really resonated with Mr. Plankton as well.
• 1:16:36
  Who most recent work Toe Young based the drama on her
• 1:16:40
  relationship with a man who had a personality disorder.
• 1:16:43
  She developed Moonsang Tay's character by listening to the
• 1:16:46
  stories of people with autistic brothers and referred to the
• 1:16:49
  books recommended by the CEO of Bear Better, a social enterprise
• 1:16:54
  where people with developmental disabilities work.
• 1:16:57
  Fashion director Cho Sang Kyung managed costumes, while fashion
• 1:17:02
  designer Kim Minju designed some of Komo Young's dresses so she
• 1:17:06
  was dressed in couture. Kim SU Hyun considered It's OK
• 1:17:10
  to not Be OK to be his comeback drama following his obligatory
• 1:17:14
  military enlistment, and at the press conference for the drama,
• 1:17:17
  he said that he joined the project after being drawn to its
• 1:17:19
  title and Moon Kang Te's character.
• 1:17:21
  When asked about his character at the press conference, All
• 1:17:24
  Jung Sei commented that autism isn't an illness but something
• 1:17:29
  you're born with. If you think about Korea and the
• 1:17:31
  way that they're kind of behind, yeah, makes a lot of sense.
• 1:17:35
  So Mel, you mentioned the books. The five children's story books
• 1:17:39
  that appeared in the drama were written by the screenwriter Cho
• 1:17:42
  Young and illustrated by concept artist Cham San.
• 1:17:46
  They were published in Korean in the summer of 2020, same summer
• 1:17:50
  that this aired. And according to Kyobo Book
• 1:17:53
  Center and Yes, 24, all five books were listed in the top 20
• 1:17:56
  best selling books of the month. We talked about sexually
• 1:18:00
  inappropriate scenes. Guess what got flagged for
• 1:18:03
  sexually inappropriate scenes? The series was criticized on
• 1:18:06
  social media, and the Korea Communication Standards
• 1:18:09
  Commission received over 50 formal complaints, largely for a
• 1:18:13
  scene in which Moon Young overtly stares and touches
• 1:18:16
  Khante's body as he gets stressed.
• 1:18:18
  In another scene, a male character who suffers from manic
• 1:18:21
  depression and exhibitionism reveals parts of his body with
• 1:18:25
  his genitals being covered by a drawing of an elephant.
• 1:18:28
  Some viewers defended these scenes as ways of expressing the
• 1:18:31
  characters personalities. On August 26th, 2020, the
• 1:18:35
  broadcast censorship body issued a legal sanction to the
• 1:18:38
  television series for sexually inappropriate scenes in episode
• 1:18:42
  3, judging it to be against the broadcast celebration
• 1:18:47
  regulations, and cited Article 27 on duties of integrity and
• 1:18:52
  Article 30 on gender equality. The subcommission gave the
• 1:18:57
  reasoning, even considering the fact that they were meant to
• 1:19:00
  exaggeratedly express a character's personality.
• 1:19:03
  The scenes in question show how insensitive the drama's
• 1:19:06
  producers are to gender equality in broadcasting content that may
• 1:19:10
  be little a certain gender and hold the possibility to justify
• 1:19:15
  sexual harassment and molestation.
• 1:19:18
  OK. Well, that's a bitch, but.
• 1:19:23
  You guys were like, Oh, no. OK, gender equality.
• 1:19:32
  OK. I was like, oh, Oh no, not
• 1:19:37
  gender equality, because a man's got his.
• 1:19:39
  Shirt off, Listen, men's rights and whatnot.
• 1:19:45
  Oh no, not a man with an elephant covering his genitals.
• 1:19:52
  That's degrading to the man. Oh my gosh.
• 1:19:56
  Oh. Yes, yes.
• 1:20:00
  Well, OK, here's my thing. OK, I just want to make a very
• 1:20:04
  quick comment. The part about the the character
• 1:20:07
  who reveals parts, who flashes people, essentially.
• 1:20:10
  Yeah, like. I I agree with the people who
• 1:20:13
  are defending the scene, right? Because they're like, this is
• 1:20:15
  the character, right? He has this mental illness and
• 1:20:18
  this is how he's acting out. And so it's almost like if this
• 1:20:21
  were happening in real life, you would pish posh and do whatever.
• 1:20:24
  But it's yeah, it is what it is. Anyway you.
• 1:20:28
  See if they penalize this one, which is it makes it difficult
• 1:20:31
  for other shows to air. It makes it difficult for the
• 1:20:35
  broadcast station or the broadcaster to get other
• 1:20:39
  licenses and things. It's it's a pretty heavy slap on
• 1:20:42
  the wrist. Other shows are not going to do
• 1:20:45
  this. You understand where I'm coming
• 1:20:47
  from. Like this is also going to make
• 1:20:50
  other shows play it safer. Yeah, yeah.
• 1:20:54
  They basically said we need to find them before.
• 1:20:57
  This sets a precedent. Yeah, yeah, exactly.
• 1:21:03
  So think about it from a lot of different angles.
• 1:21:06
  How many soju bottles would you give?
• 1:21:10
  It's OK to not be OK. Five being the best, the most.
• 1:21:14
  I would give it 4 soju bottles and I think this might be higher
• 1:21:18
  than what I gave it in our review because as I said
• 1:21:22
  retrospectively, I think it's gotten better with age besides
• 1:21:28
  all the drama surrounding the scandal.
• 1:21:33
  But it is such and I I recommend this to people when they ask me
• 1:21:39
  if they're entering the K drama world well based on their
• 1:21:42
  preferences. But it's usually one that comes
• 1:21:44
  to the top of the list. And like, you should try this.
• 1:21:47
  It's got good acting, a good story.
• 1:21:50
  The short stories are great. I mean, we did critique the
• 1:21:53
  stuff about the mental health for sure.
• 1:21:56
  But I think overall it's it's a it's a banger for me.
• 1:22:01
  I loved it. And I hope to see.
• 1:22:04
  So yeah, G Moore in the coming years, honestly.
• 1:22:08
  Yeah, me too. Mal, you actually had a high
• 1:22:12
  rating in our episode. But but my, yeah, my rating is a
• 1:22:19
  four. We can't do partials, right.
• 1:22:21
  I can't say. You can do, yeah, you can do
• 1:22:22
  halves, I think. I can I just.
• 1:22:24
  Like halves, Yeah. OK, OK.
• 1:22:26
  I would give it channeling. OK.
• 1:22:30
  I would give it a four and a half out of five soju bottles.
• 1:22:33
  I think just the drama is it's, it's just, it's giving, it's
• 1:22:40
  giving. It's always been giving.
• 1:22:42
  I think that the characters are so rich.
• 1:22:45
  They're they're complex. And yeah, the only points I
• 1:22:50
  would take away are four things we've already talked about.
• 1:22:52
  But this is a really, I think, a well done drama.
• 1:22:56
  For sure. OK, I am going to come in and
• 1:22:59
  give it one. I'm just kidding.
• 1:23:01
  I'm not going to get one. I did after all this.
• 1:23:04
  I'm like 1 Sodu bottle. Yeah, I'm going to give it.
• 1:23:10
  I think I'm going to give it the same thing that I gave it last
• 1:23:13
  time. I think I gave like 3.99 out of
• 1:23:16
  five. I'm just going to round it up to
• 1:23:19
  four. I don't know what I was on in
• 1:23:20
  2020 thinking. I think I was getting cute with
• 1:23:22
  it and like 3.999. Yeah, I'm just going to give it
• 1:23:25
  four out of five's Hoju bottles because it's quite good.
• 1:23:31
  And the complaints that I had last time, I don't even know
• 1:23:34
  what they were, but I have complaints now and I can get it.
• 1:23:38
  I already said some, but I can get into like my biggest one now
• 1:23:43
  in the spoiler section. And like that also factors in
• 1:23:49
  the Kim Sukian of it all as well.
• 1:23:52
  And I feel like that is maybe half a star because while I was
• 1:23:56
  re watching it, I did have to take a break.
• 1:23:58
  I did have to, you know, collect myself and get through a couple
• 1:24:02
  of episodes where I was like, like wincing a little bit.
• 1:24:05
  But I feel like the characters are so strong, are so vivid, and
• 1:24:14
  the storytelling is pretty great that I just got sucked in again
• 1:24:20
  after a few days and after, you know, taking a minute.
• 1:24:23
  But to collect myself and doing other things and like going out
• 1:24:27
  inside and touching some grass, I was like, OK, I'm back in.
• 1:24:30
  Like I'm locked in again. I really enjoy the show.
• 1:24:33
  I would still recommend it. It's still excellent.
• 1:24:35
  So 4 out of five Hoju bottles. I think we all, you know,
• 1:24:40
  wrestled with it in different ways and it still came out
• 1:24:45
  high-ranking high for us. So that's great.
• 1:24:48
  We are going to get into the spoiler section right after
• 1:24:51
  this. Excuse me?
• 1:24:55
  I can't, you know, I am. Oh, sorry.
• 1:25:01
  Swear. Discussing shit?
• 1:25:02
  What? All right, we're on the other
• 1:25:07
  side of spoilers. We are going to spoil.
• 1:25:09
  It's OK to not be OK. It is a 5 year old show and if
• 1:25:14
  you haven't watched it, we encourage you to go watch it and
• 1:25:17
  then come back later. Come back and continue listening
• 1:25:20
  to this episode. We did give a few things away,
• 1:25:23
  but nothing that wasn't necessarily an episode 1.
• 1:25:26
  So I think you had something you wanted to revise.
• 1:25:29
  Noli, did you want to revise your score at this point in
• 1:25:33
  time? Yes, yes, I did.
• 1:25:37
  I wanted to revise it down because I remembered.
• 1:25:42
  Actually it's because of something you said just in your
• 1:25:45
  rating, which is just remembering my experience of
• 1:25:49
  rewatching it the second time around.
• 1:25:50
  I couldn't rewatch it to the end.
• 1:25:52
  And so I will just bring it down to a four.
• 1:25:56
  And I also remember there was some wild things and I was like
• 1:25:58
  wait, wait what how did we get here kind of thing.
• 1:26:03
  And yeah, because I didn't finish rewatching, maybe, maybe
• 1:26:07
  y'all can help me understand that little the plot twist, the
• 1:26:11
  whole thing with Kobe Young's mother.
• 1:26:13
  Girl, so let's talk about it. So there was somebody reached
• 1:26:17
  out. That was the question that I got
• 1:26:19
  that someone was like you guys need to talk about this thing
• 1:26:24
  that happened since the last few episodes.
• 1:26:27
  So this person said I only watched this last year and I
• 1:26:30
  ended up watching it twice the second time forcing my husband
• 1:26:33
  to watch it with me. It is a 10 out of 10K drama for
• 1:26:36
  me. I love the arc with all three
• 1:26:38
  leads. Some of my questions what do you
• 1:26:40
  think about the mystery nurse slash mom plot twist?
• 1:26:44
  I cannot tell you anything about the motivations of that mom.
• 1:26:50
  I was so confused. I was so confused by her and
• 1:26:55
  that she just first she she was like plotting this for 12 years
• 1:27:00
  with the dad as a patient and then she flipped in the last
• 1:27:05
  moments because she wanted Munyang to be hers.
• 1:27:08
  Guys I am completely lost with that one.
• 1:27:12
  And you know what normally bring it down 3.5.
• 1:27:18
  I get it. So half a star for Kim SU Hyun
• 1:27:24
  and the mental health and half a star for this fucking wild plot
• 1:27:30
  twist in this show. And that's where I'm at with
• 1:27:32
  four-star four. I'm not sorry.
• 1:27:34
  Force hold you bottles out of five.
• 1:27:37
  Because I'll tell you, five years ago when I watched this, I
• 1:27:42
  thought it came out of left field, but I just kind of like
• 1:27:44
  took it. I was just like, OK, fine.
• 1:27:48
  And that was my approach in the blog review that I did this time
• 1:27:52
  around. I was like reading the tea
• 1:27:54
  leaves on it. I was picking up all the clues.
• 1:27:56
  I was like, OK, they're setting a lot of things into motion in
• 1:27:59
  the early episodes with there's a ghost haunting the hospital,
• 1:28:04
  people are hearing My Darling Clementine being hummed in the
• 1:28:08
  halls, and someone is is choking out the dad in the middle of the
• 1:28:12
  night and causing his seizures. And a lot of different things
• 1:28:17
  are happening that are supposedly clues.
• 1:28:20
  I appreciated the mystery, the enigma of the mom when it was
• 1:28:26
  just this spirit, this sort of ghost, this presence that was
• 1:28:32
  oppressing Moon Young and sort of heavy over her life, right?
• 1:28:38
  And I liked the mystery that she could be alive.
• 1:28:42
  We don't know where she is. Her body is missing.
• 1:28:44
  We don't know if she could be around, could come back into her
• 1:28:50
  life. When it was revealed that it was
• 1:28:52
  Nurse Park, I was like, get the fuck out.
• 1:28:54
  Like, honestly, I hated it. I hated it.
• 1:28:58
  I hated it. I wanted to flip a table.
• 1:29:00
  Even though apparently this was a theory that people had back in
• 1:29:06
  the day when they when people were watching it ongoing, they
• 1:29:10
  had the theory that Nurse Park was the mom.
• 1:29:13
  Yeah, I remember. I called it like episode like 3
• 1:29:16
  or something. Normally remember I was like
• 1:29:19
  Nurse Dad, She's shady, something's gonna come up with
• 1:29:22
  her. But that does not mean that I
• 1:29:25
  appreciated how it came. Up exactly the execution.
• 1:29:28
  It's the execution, right? I was.
• 1:29:31
  Like what? And you know, they connected all
• 1:29:34
  the dots with the butterfly, the brother's mom.
• 1:29:37
  And, and then she said she just, she just blew up on us.
• 1:29:41
  And it's like I was fast forwarding a little bit.
• 1:29:48
  No, Lisa, do you want to, like, weigh in on the mom on the
• 1:29:52
  twist? I mean, I just remember again,
• 1:29:55
  like, it did feel rewatching it, I didn't get to the point where,
• 1:30:00
  you know, she's revealed. But rewatching it, I was
• 1:30:03
  watching that character. Yeah, because I was just like,
• 1:30:05
  OK, what? What did I miss the first time
• 1:30:08
  around? It's not overt.
• 1:30:10
  I will say it's not, not yeah. It's not there are many things
• 1:30:14
  because all along I was just like, wow, like, you know, this
• 1:30:16
  nurse, what a she's so good at her job.
• 1:30:20
  Look at her go you and, you know, rewatching it, I'm like,
• 1:30:24
  OK, there were some moments. So I'm just like, she's staring
• 1:30:27
  a little too long at this person or whatever it was, right?
• 1:30:31
  But even then, I was just like, what a wild, wild, wild, wild,
• 1:30:35
  wild it. Still feels like it came out of
• 1:30:37
  left field. Yeah, it did feel like I was
• 1:30:40
  just like, wow, that's kind of contrived in a sense.
• 1:30:43
  And then, as always, whenever you have, we met as kids, Yeah.
• 1:30:48
  And then for there to now be this added layer of childhood,
• 1:30:51
  can you know? Yeah.
• 1:30:53
  Yeah, yeah. Oh.
• 1:30:54
  My gosh, guys, remember the scene where Gangte is with
• 1:31:00
  Munyang and then she's like a child and normally remember we
• 1:31:04
  had the conversation even back then we were like, that's what
• 1:31:08
  we had seen. Like they tried.
• 1:31:10
  Oh, wait, are you talking about the flowers, the flower scene
• 1:31:12
  when he gives her flowers and then he kind of envisions her as
• 1:31:15
  a child? Yeah.
• 1:31:17
  You know, he finally gave her flowers.
• 1:31:20
  Yeah. That's not hitting like it used
• 1:31:23
  to. Definitely.
• 1:31:27
  Not, not quite not. Quite not quite hitting the
• 1:31:31
  same. I agree completely.
• 1:31:34
  I almost did a video. I was because I I was like,
• 1:31:38
  maybe I'll do like a little quick, you know, shitty little
• 1:31:40
  TikTok on this. And then I was like, I'm not
• 1:31:42
  going to you know what? I'm choosing peace today.
• 1:31:45
  And I was like, no, we're just going to move on and keep
• 1:31:49
  playing this show. I agree completely.
• 1:31:53
  That was what, like midway through the show, maybe.
• 1:31:57
  Yeah, around midway through the show.
• 1:32:00
  And I agree. I, I had to pause and take a
• 1:32:03
  minute. I was like, because what, what
• 1:32:08
  transpired before that was so sweet, was so pure.
• 1:32:13
  He finally goes and gets her flowers.
• 1:32:16
  He's like, I got you something that I, you know, never got to
• 1:32:18
  give you before because she trampled on the flowers that he
• 1:32:23
  came to give her before as a child and scared him off.
• 1:32:27
  He ran off and he gives her the flowers.
• 1:32:30
  She's like, oh, my God, they're so beautiful.
• 1:32:32
  And he's like, you're beautiful. It's like, very.
• 1:32:35
  It's like, you know, it's so saccharine.
• 1:32:38
  And he goes in and he just kisses her and he just starts
• 1:32:41
  giggling. And he's so giddy and smiley and
• 1:32:45
  she's smiling. It's just such a great moment
• 1:32:48
  between them. It's so almost innocent, like
• 1:32:50
  childlike between them. And then they go with like, cut
• 1:32:54
  to it is adult Kim Sukhyon envisioning her as a child with
• 1:32:59
  the flowers. And I'm like, Yep, Nope.
• 1:33:01
  I'm tapping out. I'm tapping.
• 1:33:08
  Oh, no, Seth didn't age well. Didn't age well at all.
• 1:33:11
  But, you know, circling back to the mom, OK, the plot twist for
• 1:33:17
  the reveal of Nurse Park and everything happens in episode
• 1:33:20
  13. We see Nurse Park driving off,
• 1:33:24
  smiling maniacally. She's alive.
• 1:33:28
  She's wearing her bespoke butterfly brooch again that she
• 1:33:32
  stole from the mansion, and she's got her red nails on the
• 1:33:35
  red lipstick, and she's just vandalized Sante's painting with
• 1:33:40
  the butterfly, which is the fugliest butterfly I've ever
• 1:33:42
  seen. Like, I was like, she couldn't
• 1:33:44
  have drawn it better. Anyway, I'm like nitpicking the
• 1:33:48
  shit out of this bitch. Anyway, so that is when everyone
• 1:33:52
  is reeling. Moon Young finally realizes that
• 1:33:56
  not only is her mother alive and that her mother is Nurse Park,
• 1:34:00
  their mother murdered their mother back in the day and
• 1:34:06
  caused all of this heartache and all of this whole spiral to
• 1:34:09
  happen in their lives. How did you feel about maybe
• 1:34:14
  Moon Young feeling responsible and at fault for what her mother
• 1:34:20
  did? Did that feel true to her
• 1:34:23
  character, or was her even feeling bad a reflection of how
• 1:34:29
  much growth she'd had? Because I almost feel like,
• 1:34:32
  well, I mean, I don't know. I don't know.
• 1:34:34
  Because I wonder if episode 1 Munyang would have been like,
• 1:34:39
  OK, sounds like a personal problem to me, right.
• 1:34:44
  Whereas here for her to even be feeling bad is is it because she
• 1:34:48
  now has this this connection, this affection for these
• 1:34:51
  brothers. And so, you know, she their pain
• 1:34:55
  is her pain, Ish. And so, yeah, I don't know.
• 1:34:59
  I mean, I don't know, hadn't thought about it.
• 1:35:01
  It's. Like I think it's definitely a
• 1:35:02
  character growth thing where she now had more empathy and she was
• 1:35:08
  now in in love, right? And this is a pain that her love
• 1:35:14
  was feeling, and she felt the weight of that.
• 1:35:18
  And I thought, yeah, I thought it made sense for her to to feel
• 1:35:22
  that way at that stage. I mean, they drew it out a
• 1:35:27
  little bit, but definitely I felt that it would it would make
• 1:35:31
  sense for her to be at that point and that at that stage of
• 1:35:35
  the story. I think it was completely
• 1:35:38
  unbelievable and warranted that she would feel that way.
• 1:35:41
  And if you haven't been watching K dramas for a long time, there
• 1:35:46
  is a huge like sins of the father thing in Korea, right?
• 1:35:50
  So they place a lot of blame on children.
• 1:35:54
  And there is this whole bloodlines concept in Korea
• 1:35:59
  where you don't really know someone unless they you know who
• 1:36:02
  their family is, what they do and where they come from.
• 1:36:06
  Our mother is a psycho and a murderer.
• 1:36:09
  The fact that she's like, leave, I'm going to hurt you eventually
• 1:36:13
  stems from that. It stems from not the fact that
• 1:36:16
  she's been, you know, nurtured by them the last several months,
• 1:36:21
  healed throughout the show. It's that she could turn out
• 1:36:26
  like her mom, right? That's her blood.
• 1:36:29
  It's really heartbreaking to see her think that way.
• 1:36:33
  And it's really sad, but also gratifying to see that contest
• 1:36:38
  stays by her. He want, he's like, you know
• 1:36:41
  what? No, I've made my decision.
• 1:36:43
  You know, I've wrestled with this and I love you.
• 1:36:45
  We're going to stick together and I'm going to work through
• 1:36:48
  this alongside of you because I love you.
• 1:36:50
  The alternative is you're not in my life, and that's more
• 1:36:53
  painful. So I found that extremely
• 1:36:56
  powerful, extremely moving in the argument of nature versus
• 1:37:01
  nurture. Korea's definitely on the nature
• 1:37:04
  side. If some, if you're the daughter
• 1:37:07
  or son of a of a killer, you're definitely going to turn out to
• 1:37:10
  be a killer, right? Like for sure, that's what Korea
• 1:37:13
  thinks. So what's interesting about the
• 1:37:16
  show is that the mom also nurtured her to be a psycho, to
• 1:37:21
  have these antisocial personality disorder tendencies,
• 1:37:26
  which is why I think maybe the writer didn't want to make
• 1:37:30
  anything black and white regarding her diagnosis.
• 1:37:34
  Because it seems like by the end of the show, she's well on her
• 1:37:38
  way to being cured, right? She's, she's showing so much
• 1:37:43
  emotion, so much promise. She's understanding herself a
• 1:37:47
  lot better and she's integrating better within, you know, this
• 1:37:51
  found family and this, this new family that she's forged.
• 1:37:54
  She's a lot less volatile. I wonder if she even had any
• 1:38:01
  social personality disorder, truly, or if it was nurtured in
• 1:38:06
  her by her psycho mother. If that was something that her
• 1:38:10
  mother was like, I'm going to nurture also train her to be
• 1:38:13
  just like me, something that isn't, again, like that's just
• 1:38:17
  something open to her interpretation.
• 1:38:19
  Although I'm not sure it should be in the context of like good
• 1:38:23
  mental illness representation and mental health
• 1:38:25
  representation. It's kind of just like very
• 1:38:29
  vague. Does she or does she not have
• 1:38:33
  antisocial personality disorder? But the goofiness of the mom in
• 1:38:39
  the last couple of episodes, I couldn't get behind that.
• 1:38:44
  Yeah, couldn't get behind that. She came back and she was like,
• 1:38:48
  oh, I want my daughter. She's not acting right.
• 1:38:51
  I want her to become more like how she used to be.
• 1:38:54
  She kidnaps on drugs. Sante Kante rushes to the
• 1:38:58
  mansion. It's a face off.
• 1:39:01
  It is so cartoonish. It just cheapened a lot of the
• 1:39:04
  show to me. I didn't like the ultimatum also
• 1:39:10
  that she gave him. Yeah.
• 1:39:13
  When she's going like this, like with her arms wide open, she's
• 1:39:15
  like, or you just kill me. And then when she realizes that
• 1:39:21
  you've killed me for revenge, you've killed her mother for
• 1:39:24
  revenge, then she'll go back to how she used to be.
• 1:39:27
  I was like, what the fuck are we doing here?
• 1:39:30
  I was like. Like, no way, just we're, we're
• 1:39:33
  always talking about how K dramas, like when it comes to
• 1:39:39
  the ending, it's always such a, it's a, it's a shaky road to the
• 1:39:44
  end because the plot can get derailed so easily, you know,
• 1:39:49
  and it's almost like I'm all, we're always laughing stuff
• 1:39:52
  like, OK, is it now that they're feeling the pressure?
• 1:39:55
  Like the drama is doing really well and it's like, we want
• 1:39:57
  there to be a really spectacular ending.
• 1:40:00
  And sometimes it's like, are we trying to do too much?
• 1:40:03
  To to wrap it up. They did too much.
• 1:40:06
  Yeah, yeah. And it's like sometimes, you
• 1:40:08
  know, simple, simple is OK, right.
• 1:40:11
  I think to your point where it was like, OK, we could keep it.
• 1:40:14
  I don't know how they would have resolved her mother that whole
• 1:40:18
  thing in a simpler or like at least a way that's more like,
• 1:40:22
  OK, yeah, love that. That makes sense.
• 1:40:24
  But I'm not the writer here. So right, like I'm not going to
• 1:40:28
  do her job, but like, honestly, well, what did I just watch?
• 1:40:31
  What did I just watch? The whole the entire
• 1:40:35
  confrontation was so cringy. And the I think from Jiang Yung
• 1:40:39
  Nam, who is playing the resurrected mom over the top.
• 1:40:43
  And it's not necessarily her fault.
• 1:40:46
  Like that's how the writer intended that to be. 100% Yeah.
• 1:40:51
  Even the ham fisted that Sunday clocks are over the head with a
• 1:40:57
  freaking fairy tale book. There's so many scenes, Oh my
• 1:41:02
  gosh. Oh God, it was too.
• 1:41:07
  So here's a fist. Here's Ham.
• 1:41:09
  Like it was literally so Ham fisted.
• 1:41:11
  I like the fact that he saved the day.
• 1:41:13
  I don't like how he saved it. It was just.
• 1:41:19
  It's like you had the right idea.
• 1:41:20
  Right, that's what the hell. That's what I'm saying anyway.
• 1:41:25
  So there's a lot of really great moments in the finale though,
• 1:41:31
  post all of this nonsense that I teared up at, like the tree
• 1:41:37
  planting scene where they like plant the tree in honor of their
• 1:41:40
  mom and they put the new family photo on there.
• 1:41:44
  Sante is saying you weren't born to take care of me, that's not
• 1:41:49
  why mom gave birth to you. And it's just a very full circle
• 1:41:52
  moment for the brothers. It's completely needed.
• 1:41:56
  Appealing moment between them. Very beautiful.
• 1:42:00
  What was also beautiful, something we haven't touched on
• 1:42:03
  specifically is the relationship between Sante and Munyang and
• 1:42:09
  how she just treated him just really just like another person.
• 1:42:13
  And the way they relationship evolved is as siblings.
• 1:42:17
  And him feeding her in the last few episodes when she felt
• 1:42:21
  guilty about her her mom killing their mom.
• 1:42:24
  It was such a sweet relationship and it was so pure.
• 1:42:29
  I love that I I just wanted to let those dynamics those two did
• 1:42:35
  did so well. Yeah.
• 1:42:38
  Now, thank you for bringing that up, because I was just thinking
• 1:42:41
  how for Sante, it seems one of his gripes, if we can call it
• 1:42:45
  that, is that all he wanted to do was to be seen and treated as
• 1:42:51
  the Big Brother right by by Kante, right.
• 1:42:54
  And it's like he wasn't. He knew he wasn't getting that.
• 1:42:56
  He knew that Kante was essentially walking on egg
• 1:42:59
  shells around him and never really being honest about how he
• 1:43:04
  may have been feeling. Whereas with Munyang, Munyang
• 1:43:07
  from the get go was like, that's my dog.
• 1:43:09
  Like the fact that they were able to fight and, you know,
• 1:43:13
  have their little spats, but like it was such a a genuine and
• 1:43:17
  yeah, a really authentic connection and relationship.
• 1:43:21
  And yeah, I love that. That then opened up a way for
• 1:43:24
  the brothers to also, you know, find a way to each other.
• 1:43:27
  Or back to each other? Yeah, you got that call back in
• 1:43:32
  the episode 15 of him desperately screaming at her.
• 1:43:37
  I love you because she's pushing him away.
• 1:43:39
  And like, no, I don't want to be with you because it's it, you
• 1:43:43
  know, I love when they circle back on things like that.
• 1:43:47
  Were there other big moments that you guys really appreciated
• 1:43:50
  in the show? I mean, I always love me a good
• 1:43:53
  kiss. Well, they're this show has so
• 1:43:57
  many like good kisses, right? Even the last episode between 15
• 1:44:05
  and 16, there's them. I think they make out on the
• 1:44:07
  desk right in the. Mansion.
• 1:44:11
  The castle, which is like. I remember being very proud of
• 1:44:17
  them and being like this is what we wanted, mature kissing that
• 1:44:22
  everybody short kissing, everybody's involved.
• 1:44:27
  Everybody kisses. Yeah, exactly.
• 1:44:33
  But. Yeah.
• 1:44:35
  I was going to say a scene that I really loved.
• 1:44:38
  I mean, it's earlier in the drama is when when she first
• 1:44:42
  has, it's not her first nightmare, but she has that
• 1:44:45
  nightmare and. Oh yeah.
• 1:44:47
  Essentially, he like, you know, he, he comes to the room and
• 1:44:50
  just calms her down. And I, I don't know, it was just
• 1:44:54
  such a a heart warming scene because it's we're seeing
• 1:44:59
  Munyang's vulnerability after we've seen her in her badass
• 1:45:03
  element and just, you know, like nobody can touch me.
• 1:45:06
  Nothing can touch me. But like just seeing her in that
• 1:45:08
  super vulnerable moment. And he bears witness to that.
• 1:45:12
  That was a a powerful scene for me.
• 1:45:14
  Yeah. I think it really just showed
• 1:45:16
  their chemistry, unconnectedness.
• 1:45:18
  Yeah, I agree. I agree completely.
• 1:45:20
  She's screaming and sobbing for him to get out while
• 1:45:23
  simultaneously clinging on to him for dear life, and he reads
• 1:45:28
  her correctly that she doesn't want him to leave, actually, and
• 1:45:32
  he just hugs her to his chest and says I won't leave, I won't
• 1:45:34
  leave, don't worry, I won't leave.
• 1:45:37
  I loved it, sue me, I'm buying it.
• 1:45:41
  I'm eating it up. It's great.
• 1:45:44
  That's a great scene. There's so many actually in in
• 1:45:48
  the first few episodes that are so iconic.
• 1:45:52
  Like I vividly remember her making the kid cry in the
• 1:45:55
  restaurant and stealing the knife and like trying to kill
• 1:46:03
  the escaped patient who was trying to commit suicide with
• 1:46:07
  his daughter, him blocking the knife and then she stabs Kante.
• 1:46:13
  Wild. Just like wild stuff in the 1st
• 1:46:17
  episode. Yeah.
• 1:46:19
  The flashback scene. All the flashback scenes are
• 1:46:21
  really cool because the little girl that plays her is so
• 1:46:26
  beautiful and so haunting. I'm not sure if I've seen her in
• 1:46:30
  some other stuff since then, but yeah, when you finally get the
• 1:46:34
  full flashback of her saving him, it's really great.
• 1:46:38
  And I think that's a little bit of the argument for she's
• 1:46:42
  probably not, doesn't have antisocial personality disorder
• 1:46:46
  because she's like ripping petals to figure out if she's
• 1:46:50
  going to save him. She's like, I'll save him, I
• 1:46:52
  won't save him, I'll save him, won't save him.
• 1:46:53
  And on the last pedal, it's she will not save him.
• 1:46:57
  And we know she does. She does it anyway.
• 1:47:00
  Yeah, yeah. So she's, you know, she's a good
• 1:47:03
  person. She does it anyway, even as a
• 1:47:05
  child. And thinking of flashbacks, one
• 1:47:08
  of the scenes that I really loved was when we we flashback
• 1:47:12
  to Sante and Kante with their mother.
• 1:47:16
  I think they were sleeping well. They're they're actually just a
• 1:47:19
  few different moments where Kante is remembering it as the
• 1:47:22
  mom focusing exclusively on Sante and he's just kind of
• 1:47:26
  like, you know, feeling just cast aside.
• 1:47:30
  But when they show, I guess the other perspective, it's like she
• 1:47:35
  she was always also looking out for him.
• 1:47:37
  Like when they're walking, I think she's carrying an umbrella
• 1:47:41
  and she turns back and like calls him when they're sleeping,
• 1:47:44
  he thinks. So she has her back to him and
• 1:47:48
  she's kind of hugging Sante and he's just there feeling unloved
• 1:47:51
  and whatever. But you know, she like she turns
• 1:47:54
  around and I don't know, it's just it's such a there's so much
• 1:47:58
  love that he wasn't seeing that his mom is really just.
• 1:48:04
  I agree, yeah. Yeah, what did you think about
• 1:48:08
  Chase Sue? The little psychic, the friends,
• 1:48:12
  the pizza pizzeria owner. I don't think I had that many
• 1:48:18
  thoughts about him to be honest. I honestly thought if this was a
• 1:48:24
  western show he would be in a full on one sided love with
• 1:48:29
  Kante right? Like this would be a gay
• 1:48:31
  character and he would be moving around because he loves it.
• 1:48:36
  Like he's romantically in love with him.
• 1:48:38
  But I guess because it's platonic and they're just
• 1:48:42
  friends it almost makes even less sense.
• 1:48:45
  Like why is this guy putting his life on hold?
• 1:48:48
  Exactly. Moving around with that, like
• 1:48:52
  what did you guys think? What?
• 1:48:53
  Same exactly. I'm like, I love my friends, but
• 1:48:56
  am I going to just yeah, like what?
• 1:48:59
  What am I doing in my life? Like what?
• 1:49:01
  What is motivating me in life? What do I want in life?
• 1:49:04
  And it's just not coming across so much for Jason.
• 1:49:07
  He's just like, I want to be. I'm the third brother and I'm
• 1:49:10
  like, OK. No one else.
• 1:49:14
  Cody was the 3rd brother. That was the saddest.
• 1:49:18
  That was the saddest part about Jason character Jason Jury, the
• 1:49:23
  publisher. All those characters, just like
• 1:49:26
  they were all created to just plop up the three main
• 1:49:31
  characters, regardless of how pitiful their own lives were.
• 1:49:35
  In episode 3, she says what is a fairy tale?
• 1:49:37
  A fairy tale is a cruel fantasy that illustrates the brutality
• 1:49:40
  and violence of this world in a paradoxical manner.
• 1:49:44
  Wow. She said glass half empty.
• 1:49:47
  Literally glass half empty. Something that I did love about
• 1:49:51
  her is that she is very sexually forward and she says multiple
• 1:49:56
  times like, do you want to sleep with me?
• 1:49:58
  Yes, I'm horny, I admit that. And she's constantly trying to
• 1:50:02
  jump his bones and I don't know, that really worked for me.
• 1:50:06
  Did you guys feel the same way or did you feel like it was
• 1:50:09
  overkill? No, I loved it.
• 1:50:11
  She was. She represents what we always
• 1:50:14
  see in those CEO's, those K drama CEO's.
• 1:50:18
  And I was, I was here for it. I was like, Munya.
• 1:50:21
  Express yourself, girl. Get that man naked.
• 1:50:25
  And I think, I think it's also how, and she says a couple of
• 1:50:28
  times she's like, when I see what I like, I must get it.
• 1:50:32
  So she's just very, she's, she's just all about it.
• 1:50:35
  And I'm like, I, I love to see a sex positive character that's
• 1:50:40
  you know, and she's not shying away from it.
• 1:50:43
  This is, this is who she is and just how she rolls.
• 1:50:46
  And I know a lot of people were probably clutching their pearls
• 1:50:50
  like, what in the Yeah. I have no doubt.
• 1:50:54
  It was great. Yeah, in episode 3, there's a
• 1:50:59
  scene where the flasher escapes and she helps him escape and go
• 1:51:03
  to the father's political rally. And it's this whole thing where
• 1:51:07
  he admits on the stage that he's been seeking his father's
• 1:51:12
  attention because he was abused and scorned since he wasn't as
• 1:51:15
  smart as his siblings who did well in school and went to SNU,
• 1:51:19
  and he gradually became mentally ill In the black sheep of the
• 1:51:23
  family, the male lead, Kante imagines that he's in his place.
• 1:51:29
  He's taking the place of the flasher, evading security and
• 1:51:32
  laughing and making a scene and dancing on stage and being free,
• 1:51:37
  freely admitting that he has a problem and freely admitting
• 1:51:41
  that he's not OK and letting loose and unafraid of
• 1:51:45
  consequences or of looking different or wrong.
• 1:51:48
  And this, this OST song is playing in the background that's
• 1:51:51
  saying Hallelujah over and over again, which to me implies that
• 1:51:55
  this whole thing, there's something about this is holy.
• 1:51:58
  And at the end of this, he turns to Moon Young and says, should I
• 1:52:01
  just have fun with you? I love how that kind of bears
• 1:52:04
  out in the rest of the show, how he gradually just unburdens
• 1:52:10
  himself and does let loose and has fun with her and definitely
• 1:52:16
  loosens up, right. He's just so uptight, so
• 1:52:20
  suppressed, and nothing about him is happy, right?
• 1:52:26
  Even his brother, you know, Sante sees him smiling in his
• 1:52:30
  sleep and he's like, I've never seen him happy, right?
• 1:52:34
  He's like shocked. He has to go to the poster full
• 1:52:36
  of emotions and he's like, I have to identify this emotion
• 1:52:39
  because he's never seen Kante happy.
• 1:52:42
  Yeah. My goodness, that was definitely
• 1:52:45
  one of the most heartbreaking things about Kante's character.
• 1:52:49
  And to see him smile at the end in the last episode, it was
• 1:52:54
  just, yeah, I was so beautiful. What a what a character,
• 1:52:58
  honestly. Yeah, not wanting to be a
• 1:53:01
  caregiver, being actually really good at being a caregiver, and
• 1:53:04
  then understanding that it's really not necessarily a burden
• 1:53:07
  and letting go. And, you know, it's a delicate
• 1:53:10
  balance. And Moon Young actually asked
• 1:53:13
  him in one of the early episodes, why can't he take care
• 1:53:16
  of her, too? And he answers, I don't want to
• 1:53:18
  be someone who's needed by others anymore.
• 1:53:20
  He's just tired, right? And she's chasing after him,
• 1:53:23
  threatening to kill him if he leaves.
• 1:53:26
  And she's being very manipulative and possessive in
• 1:53:30
  this point, using Sante to get him to come to her.
• 1:53:34
  She's constantly using Sante to lure him to the mansion or to
• 1:53:38
  where she is. And at this point, she says, you
• 1:53:40
  are mine. I let you live.
• 1:53:42
  Because the whole thing at this point was that they realized the
• 1:53:45
  childhood connection. I don't know.
• 1:53:47
  Like, I understand why people dropped it if they didn't like
• 1:53:51
  the manipulation tactics from her.
• 1:53:55
  But I also understand that she saw through him and he saw
• 1:54:00
  through her. Yeah, she saw what he needed and
• 1:54:03
  he saw what she needed. Yeah, she calls him a hypocrite,
• 1:54:07
  like, right off the bat, right? And it's like you're out here
• 1:54:11
  with this facade, but I see you. I see you.
• 1:54:15
  But what do you think of the moment that she cuts her hair?
• 1:54:19
  I don't remember that what happens in that scene.
• 1:54:22
  Yeah, so she cuts her hair. It was one of those things where
• 1:54:25
  her mom was like, you should never cut your hair.
• 1:54:28
  Kind of unpacking mom trauma. She cuts her hair finally, kind
• 1:54:33
  of trying to cut off this connection and this, this
• 1:54:36
  trauma, all this baggage that she has with her mom.
• 1:54:39
  And she does like a hack job. It looks horrible.
• 1:54:42
  And Kante fixes her hair and does this Bob for her.
• 1:54:47
  It looks amazing. Apparently he's also a
• 1:54:49
  hairdresser. Well, from cutting his brother's
• 1:54:53
  hair, right? Because nobody Sante didn't.
• 1:54:56
  We didn't want people touching his thing.
• 1:54:58
  So it's like, OK. Apparently.
• 1:55:00
  He's he's really talented at this because he's his brother's.
• 1:55:04
  Barber, sure, sure, sure, sure. From being a Barber to one
• 1:55:09
  person to cutting like an entire like style.
• 1:55:13
  All right, anyway. I mean, I think I, I like, I
• 1:55:19
  like the symbolism of, you know, like just that untethering from
• 1:55:24
  her, her mom or the, the lore of her mother, right?
• 1:55:28
  Just that, yeah, I think it's always, not always.
• 1:55:32
  But I like when you have that really powerful moment or it's
• 1:55:36
  like, OK, this means something to the character.
• 1:55:39
  And for us looking in, you're like, OK, I can see how this
• 1:55:43
  this could free you or unburden you or untether you from the
• 1:55:46
  source of your your pain and trauma.
• 1:55:49
  And yeah. I agree and in the same episode
• 1:55:53
  so you have her untethering. I like that word they use.
• 1:55:56
  So you have her untethering from her mom, cutting her hair and
• 1:55:58
  trying to disassociate from her. And you have Kante actually
• 1:56:04
  getting closer to his mom in this episode because he gets
• 1:56:08
  drunk and he's wondering if his mom feels badly or sorry for how
• 1:56:13
  she treated him. And he suggests to Sante back at
• 1:56:18
  the mansion that they go eat Chambon at the restaurant that
• 1:56:21
  he loves to eat at. And Sante unlocks this flashback
• 1:56:25
  memory saying that they only ate there so often because their mom
• 1:56:28
  knew that was his favorite. That was Kante's favorite to
• 1:56:32
  eat. And it sends him like spiraling.
• 1:56:35
  He's sobbing into Sang Pei's back in the middle of the night
• 1:56:39
  and I'm just like Oh my God. This is interesting to see how
• 1:56:44
  their dynamics with their moms play out and how they address
• 1:56:49
  it. Each character addresses it
• 1:56:50
  differently in the show. That scene is one of those that
• 1:56:55
  for me shows Kim Sokkun's talent because it's such a, it's such a
• 1:57:00
  quiet moment. You see it and and I'm just
• 1:57:03
  like, look at that, look at that.
• 1:57:05
  So that that was acting, good acting.
• 1:57:08
  It is acting. The other showcase that has
• 1:57:14
  stuck with me, and I remember this scene vividly is in episode
• 1:57:18
  9. And I don't know if you remember
• 1:57:20
  this scene. It's when they do, like a
• 1:57:23
  sleepaway thing. We just talked about this scene
• 1:57:25
  where he gives her flowers and they kiss for the first time.
• 1:57:29
  It's kind of like a pop kiss. But they end up back at the
• 1:57:31
  hospital. And Kante lied to his brother,
• 1:57:34
  to Sante about where he was overnight.
• 1:57:37
  Sante was worried sick. He was waiting up for him.
• 1:57:40
  And that's when Sante overnight draws that picture of them in
• 1:57:44
  the camper. And that foreshadows like the
• 1:57:47
  end of the show. But Sante has a breakdown in the
• 1:57:51
  hospital. He reveals that he remembers
• 1:57:55
  Kante wishing him dead and almost letting him die.
• 1:58:00
  This scene is an emotional touch point for me personally for the
• 1:58:06
  entire show because despite me remembering like little things
• 1:58:09
  here and there and scenes here and there and iconic things, the
• 1:58:14
  safety pin and the butterfly method of her hugging and stuff.
• 1:58:17
  No no no. This scene of Sante throwing
• 1:58:22
  water at him and calling him fake and Kante trying to
• 1:58:26
  apologize can't get the words out.
• 1:58:29
  Sante has completely locked him up because he's touched on what
• 1:58:35
  he is most ashamed of, what he's feels most guilty of.
• 1:58:40
  And he repeats, oh, I wish Young would just die.
• 1:58:43
  You said that Kant is breaking down in tears.
• 1:58:46
  Sante is a mess, crying, screaming.
• 1:58:50
  He wants his young dead through every corner of the hospital,
• 1:58:54
  and Kante is literally just on the floor.
• 1:58:57
  That was powerful. I remember that scene now and
• 1:59:00
  like if you cannot say Kim SU Hyun didn't act his socks off
• 1:59:06
  for that drama. If you watch that scene, wow, so
• 1:59:10
  emotional jazz. And you know, just following on
• 1:59:15
  that, Kante is busy saying I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry.
• 1:59:18
  And then later when they're back at the apartment, the roof
• 1:59:21
  apartment, Jerry's mom's place, and Kante comes back and Sante
• 1:59:27
  goes into his little zip up closet.
• 1:59:31
  And you know, so Kante is trying to apologize and Sante makes him
• 1:59:36
  say what it is he's apologizing for, right?
• 1:59:38
  He says, what are you sorry for? And I think that's that's such
• 1:59:42
  an important moment for them both because there are many
• 1:59:47
  times that Kante has said, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, you know,
• 1:59:50
  usually to cover up some lie or whatever it is.
• 1:59:53
  But in this moment, because it's it's really just that source of
• 1:59:57
  their pain. It's like, no, you need to
• 1:59:59
  actually say out loud what it is you're sorry for.
• 2:00:03
  And he then I think that also frees or unburdens Kante to some
• 2:00:08
  degree because he's like. I'm sorry for leaving you or
• 2:00:11
  running away. I'm sorry for saying I wish you
• 2:00:14
  would die. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I wish,
• 2:00:15
  I'm sorry, I said. I wish I had a normal brother
• 2:00:19
  and and and. Yeah, all of it. 10 out of 10.
• 2:00:23
  So powerful. So I think I liked Munyong's
• 2:00:28
  sentiment when she says it's ridiculous.
• 2:00:30
  Are all parents automatically forgiven for the bad things they
• 2:00:34
  did before they die? And I think that's pretty
• 2:00:37
  accurate because on people's deathbeds, they want
• 2:00:40
  forgiveness. They want to bury the hatchet.
• 2:00:43
  And she's like, fuck all that. We're not going to do that.
• 2:00:49
  Yeah, it's like just that redemption, the redemption arc,
• 2:00:51
  right? And it's like, you haven't
• 2:00:53
  actually. For what?
• 2:00:54
  Earned it. Yeah.
• 2:00:55
  Yeah, exactly. So interesting, Interesting
• 2:00:58
  thoughts. I think that we've been here
• 2:01:02
  long enough and we've litigated a lot of the show.
• 2:01:05
  I don't know if you guys had anything you guys wanted to add.
• 2:01:09
  I really enjoyed this trip down memory lane and I think it just
• 2:01:14
  we and I ended up having so much more to say than I thought
• 2:01:18
  coming in. So just credit to you for
• 2:01:22
  setting us up for, for this, this conversation.
• 2:01:25
  And yeah, I mean, I, I now am curious.
• 2:01:29
  I want to go back and see Ko Munyong's smoking scenes.
• 2:01:33
  I want to go back and see what what happened with the dad at
• 2:01:37
  the end since I didn't get to do to wrap that up.
• 2:01:39
  But yeah, so many things that I'm like, huh, OK, I'm thinking
• 2:01:43
  a little differently about that, so.
• 2:01:45
  Yeah, like there's a lot of K drama isms in it that I do, and
• 2:01:49
  I don't mind like the deer interrupting them every time
• 2:01:53
  they like want to have an intimate moment.
• 2:01:56
  Kim SU Kyon having his shirt off in the 1st 12 minutes of the
• 2:01:59
  show. So there's some things.
• 2:02:06
  So thank you guys for coming on here.
• 2:02:08
  Thank you guys for for taking the time out and doing this deep
• 2:02:11
  dive with me. Before we get out of here, where
• 2:02:14
  can we find you guys online? We are on Instagram at Africans
• 2:02:19
  Soulmates, on X at Afrosoulmates and then for the podcast itself
• 2:02:25
  you can find us on Google Podcast, Spotify and Apple.
• 2:02:30
  And we love the DMS, that's where you find us the most.
• 2:02:34
  So if you get on our Instagram, we love getting into the Kiki of
• 2:02:38
  all the dramas that everyone. And I love the Insta takeovers.
• 2:02:44
  They do Instagram takeovers every now and then and it's so
• 2:02:46
  much fun. And that's it.
• 2:02:48
  I'm Jessica and this has been the Tiba K Rambles podcast.
• 2:02:52
  Thank you, Jess.