Ready or not, our teary tale comes to an end after eight weeks of breaking hearts and ratings. It’s a packed finale filled with twists at every turn, and the show goes out of its way to prove one thing: it’s not over until it is over.
EPISODES 15-16
It feels like only yesterday when I jumped into this fangirl pit of Kim Soo-hyun and tears, and now it’s over. *Cries in denial* I stalled for a bit before drafting this because I wasn’t ready to say goodbye, but all good things, as they say, must come to an end. Thus, it’s time to dive into our final week with Queen of Tears.
The week opens with Hyun-woo’s arrest for Land Scammer’s murder, and in the process, Hae-in’s diary slips out of his hands. Eun-seong dumps the diary into the incinerator, but the diary miraculously survives since the first snow is on BaekHong’s side. After donating hush up money to the hospital to become Hae-in’s guardian, Eun-Shakespeare retells the story of last week’s Truck of Doom incident and paints himself as the hero to Hyun-woo’s villain. He even bandages his hand like Hyun-woo to properly sell the story of breaking through the glass to rescue Hae-in — and at this point, I think the hospital needs to admit him into their psych ward because this is clearly a mental illness.
One month of brainwashing later, Eun-seong and Hae-in return to Korea but she’s distant with her family members because he told her not to trust them. To be honest, the Hongs have no one else to blame for this development because they all sat on their hands in Korea while Eun-seong was busy rewriting history. And the worst part is that they knew Hae-in was all alone in Germany because Hyun-woo’s arrest made the news (in what is, once again, a Kim Soo-hyun character getting arrested for a murder he didn’t commit).
In Queensville, Hae-in stumbles on the MP3 in Hyun-woo’s room, and I wonder how it ended up there when we left it in Hyun-woo’s apartment. Anyway, Hae-in grows curious about her ex-husband, so she visits him in prison. She wonders why she would fall for a heinous criminal but then her eyes go soft when Hyun-woo enters the visiting area. That’s right, you fell for that face, silly! Lol.
Hyun-woo is relieved to see his wife as he has missed her, but Hae-in is not about to let his sweet-talk get to her. She says they’ll never see each other again, but Hyun-woo is confident that they will meet again because he won’t give up in his quest to stay by her side. Hyun-woo apologizes for not being by her side when she woke up, and he’s more worried about her health than about whether she remembers him or not. Hae-in cannot reconcile the concerned Hyun-woo in front of her to the stalking murderer Eun-seong painted him to be, and this prison visit also serves to highlight the difference between Hyun-woo and Eun-set-his-lying-pants-on-fire.
Hyun-woo is not in a panicked frenzy to make Hae-in believe in him, and you cannot get that brand of confidence in the market. Meanwhile the “free man” in Queensville cannot rest because he’s afraid of losing his crush to her ex — who’s behind bars. Pfft. Acting like the jealous husband he will never be, Eun-seong demands to know Hae-in’s whereabouts, and when she shuts him down, he bugs her car. Uh-oh.
Eun-shame-on-you has never succeeded in any of his previous attempts to frame our sexy-brained SNU lawyer, so I don’t know why he’s surprised when Hyun-woo is eventually absolved of the murder charge. In any case, Secretary Na drives Hae-in to the prison to witness Hyun-woo’s release — and that’s the least she can do considering the fact that Eun-seong made all the staff at Queens department store to sign NDAs that bar them from speaking about Hyun-woo’s relationship with Hae-in, and Eun-seong’s hostile takeover of Queens.
Secretary Na might not be able to break her NDA, but she can tell her boss this: “Your heart lies where your body goes.” And where does Hae-in go? Why, of course, to Yongdu-ri. But this is not stalking, according to Hae-in, it’s being “on my toes since my stalker has been released.” Lol.
Since denial is clearly a thing with the Hong women, aunty Beom-ja also returns to Yongdu-ri under the pretext of throwing a party for Hyun-woo’s release. But the cat leaps out of the bag when she confesses her feelings to her crush — while wearing a wireless microphone that’s connected to the speaker in the town hall! The rest of the scene goes as expected with Beom-ja running away in mortification, and me joining the Yongdu-ri folks to laugh my head off.
Hyun-woo petitions to return to Queens since the murder charge has been dropped, and Eun-seong is faced with more woes when he learns that Ms. Girlfriend has rallied the shareholders to dismiss him in order to make room for her chairwoman ambitions. This is payback for Eun-seong’s threat to release the spy cam footage of Ms. Girlfriend poisoning Grandpa Hong if she makes any more attempts on Hae-in’s life — and you know that woman doesn’t take kindly to threats.
While the power tussle between mother and son is ongoing, Hyun-woo gets evidence of Eun-scam’s two-trillion investment fraud, courtesy: Da-hye and her USB. Vengeful Ms. Girlfriend orders Baby Daddy to get rid of Da-hye, but thanks to his bicycle riding and boxing lessons, Soo-cheol is able to chase after and fight off Baby Daddy and his thugs. I’m proud of Soo-cheol for protecting his family like he has always wanted to do, and it was nice to hear Da-hye address him as “Geon-woo’s dad,” before telling him that she loves him.
Back to BaekHong, they get invites from the aquarium, and it turns out that Hae-in arranged for this a month ago. Of course she had a private plan B to cope with her memory loss! Hyun-woo is surprised to hear from the staff that Hae-in also rented out the place four years ago — when he proposed — and now he knows that it wasn’t the universe that arranged everything back then, it was Hae-in.
Hyun-woo gets flowers and a card from pre-amnesia Hae-in expressing her desire to have another wedding after the surgery, and Hae-in wonders if she really did want to remarry the guy who cheated on her (according to Eun-seong). “You wouldn’t have done this had I really cheated on you,” Hyun-woo replies, and that’s a call for Hae-in to start doubting everything she’s been told post-surgery.
During the conversation, Hae-in spots the scar on Hyun-woo’s hand from the truck accident in Germany, but when she returns to Queensville, she doesn’t see a scar on the hand Eun-seong claimed to have injured while attempting to rescue her. What she sees is the footage of the spy camera in Grandpa Hong’s study on his tablet, and now she can tell who the liar is between both men.
Hae-in gets a package from Germany, and it’s her rescued-from-the-fire diary. In the diary, Hae-in had reintroduced Hyun-woo to herself as the reason why she didn’t want to lose her memory and the reason why she wanted to live. “Baek Hyun-woo is the person I want to remember forever.” *Sniffs* An apologetic Hae-in calls Hyun-woo to meet up, and soon they’re standing on opposite sides of the road. Hae-in disappears from sight as soon as a bus passes, and as Hyun-woo darts across the road, he’s knocked down by a car! OMG! How much more does this show want to hurt BaekHong and its audience?
There’s 1001 ways to end a penultimate episode with a cliffhanger, but an accident solely for shock value is not one of them. Then we move on to the epilogue that is usually reserved to advance the plot or make us swoon/laugh at least. But what do we get? The insertion of cameos from Man From the Stars to tell us that Eun-skinship makes Hae-in uncomfortable. “Her heart still knows despite losing her memory that she’s not attracted to him.” Duh! We have eyes, Writer, we already noticed.
But the needless cameo wasn’t as bad as the reveal that Eun-satan himself was Hyun-woo’s hit-and-run driver. You mean Show couldn’t spare an extra minute in the main episode for that? Why waste an epilogue on Eun-seong’s antics after he spent the entire episode annoying us? Sigh.
Thankfully, Hyun-woo’s accident is non-fatal, and he leaves the hospital to look for his wife. To track Hae-in faster, Hyun-woo instructs Grace to inform Ms. Girlfriend that Eun-seong has kidnapped Hae-in, and mommy dearest is forced into action when she learns that her son has moved all the secret funds in preparation to leave the country. Like the good friend he has always been, Yang-gi drives — a struggling and very much in pain — Hyun-woo as they trail after Ms. Girlfriend, and their “don’t die on me” banter would have been funnier if I wasn’t so mad at the situation.
Eun-seong holds Hae-in hostage at the Hong family’s hunting grounds, and when Ms. Girlfriend arrives, they get into a confrontation which ultimately reveals that she was behind Hae-in’s brother’s death — which Hae-in overhears. Hyun-woo sneaks in to rescue Hae-in and they manage to leave the villa, but there’s only so much distance they can cover on foot before Eun-seong catches up with them. Hae-in refuses to go with Eun-seong, and when she says “over my dead body,” something in his eyes shifts. Next thing you know, Eun-seong cocks his rifle at her.
You’d think the SWAT team on ground would know better than to negotiate with a terrorist, but no. Eun-seong is left to shoot, and Hyun-woo dives to take the bullet, of course, since this writer is a sadist whose track record features dramas where one half of the OTP takes a bullet for the other. That’s when the police remember they also have guns, and Eun-straight-to-hell goes down like the wild boar that Hyun-woo killed in Episode 2. It’s a pathetic end to a pathetic life, and I spare no thoughts and prayers because he shall not be missed. But I’m slightly miffed that everything ended for Eun-seong in mere seconds after all the pain and suffering he inflicted on BaekHong for episodes on end.
Hyun-woo is rushed to the hospital for the second time in one day, and it’s Hae-in’s turn to watch him go into surgery. This jogs her memories from before entering the OR in Germany, and she’s filled with regrets and guilt. Mommy Baek is the comforting anchor that holds the Baeks and Hongs together as they wait for Hyun-woo to pull through, and she’s very gracious about the discovery that Hyun-woo saved Hae-in from the drowning accident back then. Nah, this woman must be a saint, because I don’t think I can be as calm to hear that it’s not my son’s first time putting himself in danger to save the love of his life.
When Hyun-woo eventually wakes up, Hae-in apologizes for not recognizing him, and he apologizes for forgetting how much he loved her during their tumultuous days of marriage. A sprinkle of tears and “I love you” later, Hae-in embarks on the journey of falling in love with Hyun-woo all over again.
The more she learns about him and his many strengths, the more perfect he seems. And of course he’s perfect, because he’s fictional! Then he replies to her “Look here, Mr. Baek Hyun-woo,” with a “Yes, I’m looking at you” with the sweetest and flirtiest voice while looking straight into her eyes — and my heart skips several beats. I’d like to admit myself into this hospital since he’s also a patient, but you know, fictional world and all. *Laughs in isekai*
We finally see Mr. SNU lawyer making use of his degree in court when he files a business-related suit against Ms. Girlfriend. (I still can’t believe Hyun-woo’s first appearance in court was as a murder suspect. Smh.) Ms. Girlfriend tries to wriggle her way out by blaming the illegalities on her son. And since she has refused to allow him rest in peace, Eun-scorpion stings her from the grave with the spy camera footage on his tablet — which mommy dearest thought she had destroyed. Lool.
You see, Grace came in clutch for the Hongs by swapping out the tablet, and Ms. Girlfriend is promptly arrested and sent to jail after being exposed as a murdering psychopath. We’ve known for a while that Grace is a softie when it comes to Hyun-woo’s requests, and it turns out that she was also the one who dropped the MP3 at Queensville, and made sure that Hae-in received her diary from Germany. You’re amazing, Grace!
Da-hye is also on the path of honest living, and she convinces Grace to give witness statements against Ms. Girlfriend and to pay for their crimes against the Hongs. Both women get jail time — but they’re released and accepted back into the family after a time skip. For all their faults, their character growth was very visible, and their redemption arc didn’t feel forced. I especially liked that they didn’t do a complete 180° character-wise, and we could still see traces of the fun parts of their original characterization.
We still have no idea why Ms. Girlfriend targeted the Hongs in the first place, but we can just make stuff up in our heads. Anyway, the Hongs are reinstated back to Queens Group, and Beom-seok returns from exile to become chairman. The spy painting in Grandpa’s study is replaced with a joint family photo of the Hongs and Baek — and I liked the detail of Geon-woo sitting in Mommy Hong’s laps. Beom-ja and her crush eventually get together and she’ll be the one driving the ship because Mr. Rat is a relationship novice.
We circle back to Baby 1031 when Hae-in spots the glow-in-the-dark sticker on the ceiling in Hyun-woo’s room, and it jogs her memories of the miscarriage. She had assumed that Hyun-woo blamed her for their child loss, and he was too exhausted to convince her otherwise. As they reflect on the past, BaekHong comes to the understanding that confronting their problems is better than ignoring or avoiding said problems. And while they’re afraid that they’d end up disappointing each other over the most trivial of things, they’re still willing to give remarriage a try — but not now.
As much as I’d have liked to see BaekHong walk down the aisle again, I don’t mind their current resolution. They’re still in the beginning of their getting back together stage, and there’s no rush. Good things take time, and the most important thing is that they’re on solid ground and navigating their new reality as a team.
The drama draws to a close with a time skip montage featuring Hyun-woo’s wrap up monologue and Kim Soo-hyun’s OST in the background. BaekHong returns to Germany as a couple, then as parents to a cute baby girl — awwww — and finally, grandpa Hyun-woo comes to visit Hae-in’s grave after she passed away in the year 2074. LMAO! If doing the most was a drama, it’ll be Queen of Tears. It is insinuated that Hyun-woo dies afterwards, and as Hae-in promised, she comes to take him to the afterlife. Holding hands in the lavender field, Hyun-woo and Hae-in walk towards their eternity together, and with this, our drama comes to an end.
We got a happy ending, but at what cost? Our tear ducts are empty, our emotions are on life support, and — future or not — Show still went ahead to kill Hae-in. But hey, it could have been worse. After delivering a solid and fast-paced first half, the drama slowed in its second half and eventually swerved into makjang alley. And with the madness in Episodes 14, 15 and up until Eun-seong died in 16, I was worried about how everything was going to turn out in the end. While the show gets a pass, it definitely could have done better — and this hurts because actually we had a good thing going until we ran out of steam.
Overall, Queen of Tears is a mixed bag for me, but I have more positive feelings than negative ones. BaekHong leads by a mile among the show’s positives, and without Kim Soo-hyun and Kim Ji-won anchoring the characters, they’d probably have gone off the rails like the rest of the show. Personally, I don’t think I’d have been invested in their complexities and highs and lows if they were played by other actors — or maybe it’s because they imbibed the characters so well that I can’t see anyone else as Hyun-woo or Hae-in. The ensemble supporting cast also pulled their weight, and they kept me invested in their stories to a certain level even though they were mostly used to stir the dramatic pot or serve as filler.
And this is where I had a problem with the drama. For a show with extra-long episodes, you’re telling me to be satisfied with montages because there was no time to show all the opening kiss scenes and the happily ever after scenes in full? But somehow, there was a chunk of time to major on the minor, and drum up irrelevancies that we could have done without in the plot. The most annoying of all was the case with the villainous duo who were like ketchup on fries. They started off adding flavor to the show until they became downright messy, winning at every turn and pulling stunts that made me wonder whether the drama was anti-BaekHong.
But to borrow from Hyun-woo’s words, even if I knew how things would turn out, I still would have invested my time and emotions in this drama. It was a beautiful experience for the most parts, and I regret nothing! If anything, I’m leaving the show a bigger fan of Kim Ji-won, praying that Park Sung-hoon does a rom-com next, and of course, coming off with a renewed appreciation for the embodiment of excellence that is Kim Soo-hyun. Oppa, see you in the next one!