Our leads are going to college! We’ve said goodbye to school uniforms and also to adulting and landed ourselves kerplunk in the middle — and I’m welcoming the change to sweatpants and varsity jackets with open arms. Jealousies are high, truth-telling is low, and our hero’s heartbreak is through the roof. But is there any sadness that can’t be curbed by having your amor fall in your arms? Twice!?
EPISODES 9-10
Last week I asked to shelve the serial killer so we could get back to kissing, and I got my wish! No, we’re not done with the crazy cabbie altogether, but there are enough touchy-feely moments in these episodes to make up for whatever we saw of him.
To pick up where we left off, we get a glimpse of Sun-jae’s stabbing incident. Yes, it’s the same looney that attacked Sol and he’s held a grudge against Sun-jae since then because Sun-jae reported him and sent him to prison.
We learn, though, that Sol was attacked twice by the same dude. She was kidnapped by the reservoir in 2008, but the attacker went scot-free because Adult Sol went back to the future and Young Sol had no idea what happened. In 2009, he kidnapped her again! What is this guy’s problem?
It was after the 2009 incident — when Sun-jae rescued Sol a second time — that all the hubbub started. In this instance, it went down at a construction site and Sun-jae and the creeper tussled until the police showed up. And in the scuffle, Sun-jae lost his watch — you know, that one that Sol no longer has to control time travel with?
In 2024, when Sol reads the police report from 2009, she’s overcome with guilt. It’s all her fault Sun-jae died! If he hadn’t saved her, this looney bin wouldn’t hold a grudge, and then Sun-jae would still be alive! (How’s that for logic?) Anyway, for Sol, the pain is real. She sobs, wishing she’d been harmed instead of Sun-jae, as she searches for the watch.
She ends up finding it in her own house because, as the crime victim, the possessions found at the scene were returned to her at some point. The watch now reads 1:00 — meaning she’s got one more chance. At midnight, she reactivates the time travel and wakes up in 2009 — sitting atop a very tall statue on a university campus. When she attempts to get down, she falls, floats through the air for a long while, and lands in Sun-jae’s grasp. (How does this show produce such sudden and severe elation?)
But then, she hops down and runs away. It looks like her plan is to stay away from him, thus preventing him from liking her/saving her later. (Good luck with that one, Sol.) Sun-jae’s path has changed since the last time we saw him, and he’s a college student now too, majoring in PE, rather than signed with an agency already. Cue up the campus antics!
After filing a long-belated report with the police about her reservoir kidnapping, Sol runs smack into Tae-sung — who’s as cute and flirtatious as ever. (“My ex-girlfriend has gotten prettier.” Gah, why do his lines work so well on me?) It turns out his path has changed too. After graduating from high school, he successfully started an online clothing business. And now that he’s seen her, it seems like he’s not giving up on Sol. “If you wanted a memorable reunion, you succeeded,” he tells her, recognizing the older, moodier Sol straight away — and loving it.
At the same time, lovestruck Sun-jae is wondering why Sol ran away so quickly. He’s hoping with all hope that it’s because he actually stirred up some emotions in her this time. In-hyuk shuts this theory down quickly, but it doesn’t stop Sun-jae from pouring his heart into writing a song about Sol. It’s the piano ballad we heard at the beginning, which Sun-jae played at the Eclipse concert.
For all her trying to evade Sun-jae, Sol finds herself on a student field trip with him, along with the rest of their classmates. And there’s nothing like putting our characters in a closed-off space where they can’t escape for the night and seeing what happens. To start, Sol loses a drinking game and her penalty is to go next door and dance in front of the PE majors.
She doesn’t see Sun-jae amidst the group, so she does an embarrassing dance — just as Sun-jae sits up and spots her. His face shifts from surprise to amusement in a split second, and she runs out of the room and into the woods mortified. Sun-jae follows, accidentally sneaking up on her, and the next thing you know Sol is caught in a wild boar trap and hanging by her heel from a tree (naturally).
As Sun-jae helps her unravel, she lands in his arms for a second time. Fireflies rise all around them as butterflies rise in their stomachs (I imagine), but Sol moves away before any funny business can go down. But Sun-jae is irked by Sol’s response. “Do you hate me that much? That you don’t even want to see me?” His pain is just streaming through the screen and I can barely handle the secondhand heartbreak I’m feeling.
Later, when Sol gets drunk and goes off on her own again, Sun-jae is still traipsing behind to make sure she’s all right. At one point, she’s about to fall off a platform and he catches her (again!), before Sol starts sobbing. Why is he still following her? Why does he keep doing this? She told him to think only of himself. She continues to cry and babble into his shoulder until he apologizes and says, “Don’t cry.” She tells him to act like he doesn’t know her and to not worry about her no matter what.
But Sun-jae being who he is, he ignores her advice and moves to help her onto his back so he can carry her. In the process, Sol’s lips land on his — and it’s an omen. We’ve already heard the student myth that anyone who kisses on this field trip always ends up married. No exceptions (insert list of times it happened in the past). We also see Sol’s bro and bestie have a Spiderman-kiss while they’re there, and we know those two end up hitched, so it seems like a sign.
As Sun-jae piggybacks Sol out of there, she begins singing the ballad he just wrote, stopping him in his tracks. No one has heard it yet, how can she know it? She mutters something about going back to her own time and Sun-jae confronts her once they’re back in the city. Is she really from the future?
Sol tries to explain as best she can (using Terminator as a reference) but keeps stopping time by mentioning the future. Her main point is that she didn’t mean to confuse him and stir up his feelings, she won’t do it again. Sun-jae says not to worry about it because he’s decided to go to the U.S. for a spell to get rehab for his shoulder. (He’s bluffing, but it doesn’t faze her.) He thinks all her time travel talk is just an excuse to get rid of him, so he’ll leave on his own — no need to lie. Sol is sad, but accepts the idea that Sun-jae will leave so he doesn’t run into the murderer.
And now on to the jealousy triangle! A.K.A., the good part (*rubs palms together*). So, some chick in Sun-jae’s class starts putting the moves on him and Sol is right there to see it. It gets worse when a group of classmates go out for drinks, Sunjae and said girl included — and Sol is just tables away at the same bar. Sol drops some coins, which roll under Sun-jae’s table, and as she’s scrambling to pick them up (unseen by anyone), she witnesses a total scene.
The crushing classmate confesses to Sun-jae and then asks him if he wants to date. And then leans in and kisses him! The camera cuts away as Sol turns her head not to look and we’re spared the shock. Is this a drama rebellion!? How can this casual non-OTP kissing occur?!
The truth is: it can’t. Before there was a lip lock, Sun-jae pushed her away with one finger to the forehead. But it doesn’t matter because Sol “saw” the same thing we did on the first take. Sol scrambles from under the table and runs out the door with Sun-jae unsuccessfully chasing behind. Outside, a classmate tells Sun-jae that he thinks Sol likes him and she’s probably run off because she’s jealous. This perks Sun-jae right up. (Aww, he’s so adorable perked up.)
And yes. Sol is indeed jealous, drinking and screaming from her rooftop about the kiss. In a fit of frustration, she flails her feet, kicking one slipper over the roof’s edge — where Sun-jae is standing in the alley between their houses. When she goes down to retrieve her fallen footwear, he kneels and slides it on her foot before asking the important question. How does it feel to see him kiss another girl?
Our determined Sol says it’s nothing to be upset about. (Oof.) He tries another angle. Forget about her traveling between the future and the past, was there ever a moment that she liked him? In any of those times? Sol thinks to herself that she doesn’t deserve to like him and then answers, “No.” Oh. My. God. She’s cruel. I know, I get it, she wants to save his life by having him go far away. But she might just kill him with heartbreak before he even leaves!
At school, Tae-sung is waiting for Sol. (Why am I so excited whenever he appears on the screen now?) This time, the jealousy flows in the other direction and Sun-jae imagines a teary, love-filled reunion between them. But really, Tae-sung is there because his dad is the detective on the murder case and he heard Sol was in a terrible accident last year. (The good news is: the police are hot on the bad guy’s trail.)
After a bunch of flirty banter that it seems neither of these two cuties can control, Sol asks Tae-sung for a favor. In 2024, he needs to tell his dad to protect Sun-jae. And now it’s Tae-sung’s turn to be bitten by the jealousy bug — how can his ex-girlfriend ask him to protect another guy? Sol counters that he’s just a natural flirt and brushes off what he says. But Tae-sung walks her home, truly worried about her.
What follows is a totally superfluous scene that’s also so fabulous I can’t not talk about it. When Tae-sung and Sol arrive to her house, water is pouring from the ceiling of her mom’s video rental store that’s on the ground floor. Also, Sun-jae is there holding a bucket over his head to help catch the water. The two boys glare at each other and then we’re back to the mini macho competitions we had a few weeks ago.
Mom is smitten with Tae-sung because he can’t hold in his sweet talking, even to her. But this drives Sun-jae mad. The tension ramps up as the two boy beauties steady their buckets, showing off to each other by using only one hand (hello, forearms). But when they’re left alone, the arguing turns ugly, and suddenly they’re grappling under the free-flowing water. In the skirmish, they knock down a light, which is about to fall onto the flooded floor and zap them, but Sol kills the power before it does. Phew. Electric shock avoided (except maybe for anyone that was watching that scene).
To stop Tae-sung from sleeping over at Sol’s (Mom invited him), Sun-jae drags Tae-sung to his own house for the night. There, Tae-sung tells Sun-jae that he shouldn’t feel threatened by him. If Sun-jae likes Sol, how can he not tell that she likes him back?
We end with two possible departures. First, Sun-jae’s dad really wants him to go to the U.S. to have that rehab for his shoulder. And so, the trip is scheduled and Sun-jae is at the airport. But on the same day, he’s supposed to go act as the vocalist for Eclipse, since the group was selected to try out for a spot on Superstar K (!). When Sun-jae doesn’t come to the audition, the group tries out anyway — and makes it. Will Sun-jae still be a member of Eclipse?
But even though Sun-jae isn’t at the audition, he’s not on the plane either. As you can guess, he’s standing in front of Sol, telling her he can’t go anywhere because he realized that she likes him. He knows why she’s pushing him away and he’s staying around to change her mind. Not only has he been piecing things together, but he went and dug up the time capsule (right now) and found what she put inside it. He knows she’s trying to save his life and he believes her about the time travel.
He asks if he dies in 2024. And, is it because of her? Sol says no, but she’s crying and can’t really explain. He holds her face in his hands. “Sol-ah, if that’s the reason, stop running away from me. Just pursue your feelings for me. If I end up dying to save you, I’m okay with that.” Sealed with a teary kiss.
What a couple of jam-packed episodes. So much push-pull tension. The holding, the kisses, the jealousy, and oh my god the heartbreak. While all the prior weeks had me making high-pitched sounds, this is the first time I had actual tears. My heart ached for Sun-jae like every three seconds.
But in feel-good news, of the three epochs we’ve witnessed, Sun-jae’s fashion in this one about killed me — sneakers, hoodies, sweats, and letterman jackets? Yep, I’m a sucker for streamlined casualwear almost as much as I am for Tae-sung’s bad-boy attitude. I mean, I’m totally team Sun-jae (for Sol), but the return of Tae-sung had a much more pleasant effect on me than I anticipated. Still, with all the angst driving these episodes, I have a hunch we’ll be in for more happy feels next week.