Our Cinderella has never been one to celebrate her birthday, but as her big day arrives, she finds herself missing a particular someone even more than usual. Will her prince charming finally manage to sway her feelings, or will he play hard to get just when she needs him the most?
EPISODES 7-8
If you’re like me and feeling emotionally fatigued by our OTP’s long, drawn out breakup, then you will be disappointed to know that our penultimate week is mostly more of the same — keyword being “mostly.” Yes, we’ve got to slog through some more filler (good and bad) while our OTP navigates their breakup, but, I’m happy to report, we’ve finally reached the other side of the swamp with a happy ending in sight — but first, that slogging I mentioned.
When we last saw Joo-won, he’d spotted Yoon-seo and Seong-min, and from afar they looked a bit flirtatious. Yoon-seo immediately realizes how the scene must look to Joo-won, and even though she’s single and knows making Joo-won think she’s moved on would further her initial goal of getting him to fall out of love with her, her lingering feelings for Joo-won make her instinctively guilty. Before she can explain the truly platonic nature of her interaction with Seong-min, though, Joo-won — His Highness, The King of Jealousy and Adorable Bed Head — surprises her, Seong-min, and us with his nonchalance and business talk. Okaaaaay… where’s the meltdown?
Come to find out, Shi-won, who is disappointed that his use of the company helicopter was wasted on Joo-won, is back at his love coaching. This time, he offers up (what he believes to be) a foolproof plan to help Joo-won lure Yoon-seo back to him — but really it’s just a bunch of reverse psychology and mind games intended to make Yoon-seo miss Joo-won enough to take him back. In short, he advises Joo-won to use several pick-up artists’ tricks of the trade — like negging. (Ugh.)
Shi-won ain’t got no business dolling out love advice when he’s still struggling to communicate with his wife, but at least the Joo-won’s execution of his brother’s tactics are made less offensive by a comedic tone and, more importantly, Joo-won’s overall struggle to be anything other than genuine when around Yoon-seo. Joo-won, cutie-patootie that he is, absolutely balks at Shi-won’s suggestion that he should go on a blind date for the sole purpose of finding a woman to use as a prop to make Yoon-seo jealous.
However, Joo-won accidentally follows his brother’s most controversial piece of advice when he escorts Mi-jin into the office so she can surprise Shi-won with some macaroons — the same dessert she featured in her last social post that Shi-won accidently liked from his alt-account. Yoon-seo sees Joo-won and Mi-jin as they cross the lobby together, and in the moment it takes her to recognize Joo-won’s sister-in-law, she feels a pang of sorrow — not jealousy — at seeing Joo-won with another woman. Logically, she knew there would eventually come a time when he’d move on from their relationship and either date someone new or enter a contractual marriage, like his brother, but she wasn’t prepared for the unexpected gut punch — or the wave of relief once she recognized Mi-jin.
Yoon-seo’s birthday rolls around, and it’s on this day that she finds herself missing Joo-won the most. She’s not usually one to make a fuss about her birthday because of her family history, but when she was dating Joo-won, he enthusiastically celebrated the day of her birth because he was thankful she existed and was a part of her life. (Dawwwww!) This year, despite their breakup, she’s still in anticipation of him doing something to acknowledge her birthday — but he doesn’t. Because he’s still following Shi-won’s dumb advice. (*facepalm*)
Of course, once Shi-won finds out it’s Yoon-seo’s birthday, he tells Joo-won to abort his idiotic schemes and do a 180. Joo-won, now isn’t the time to ignore Yoon-seo! No, it’s time to go all in and lay on that Prince Charming charm, and Joo-won is amped up to do just that. Except, there’s one problem: Yoon-seo left work unexpectedly and isn’t answering her phone. For most people, this isn’t exactly a reason for concern, but Joo-won knows Yoon-seo well enough that he instinctively suspects something is amiss.
Sure enough, on her birthday of all days, Yoon-seo found out her mother, who was slightly less abusive than her father, had passed away. The last time Yoon-seo had seen her mother was when she was in college. She’d contacted Yoon-seo to let her know that her father had caused a car accident and died while driving under the influence. She’d expected Yoon-seo, who was about to graduate and start a career, to do her filial duty and pay off her father’s debts. In response, Yoon-seo had told her mother to go kick rocks.
There’s obviously no love lost between mother and daughter, but Yoon-seo feels some sort of way after hearing the news, and her mood is exacerbated by her longing for Joo-won. She refuses to acknowledge she’s affected by her mother’s death or act on her instinctive desire to seek Joo-won out. So she does what every forlorn K-drama heroine does and overindulges in alcohol while pouring her heart out… to Seong-min.
He just so happened to be passing by the restaurant where she was drowning herself in soju — because dramaland is that small and because their connection has been built entirely on coincidence, so why stop now? But Seong-min sees that there’s no room for him in Yoon-seo’s heart (romantically), so he steps into the role of Fairy Godmother/wingman and calls Joo-won when Yoon-seo passes out.
Joo-won takes Yoon-seo home, and patiently waits outside his car while she sleeps off the soju in his passenger seat. When she wakes up, there’s ten minutes left until her birthday, and instead of caving to his curiosity and pressing her to explain why she was so upset and drinking with Seong-min, Joo-won apologizes for ignoring her on her birthday and for his behavior (while following Shi-won’s advice). Although this would have been a good time for Yoon-seo to sway just a wee bit, she — yet again — insists that they should keep their distance. As annoyed as I am to hear Yoon-seo repeat her breakup mantra, I appreciate that our drama takes a step back (this time) to allow Yoon-seo to process her mother’s death and acknowledge how her abusive parents have affected her and Ji-seok, who is adamant that she not attend their mother’s funeral.
Against her brother’s wishes, she takes a day off work, but once she arrives at the funeral hall she can’t bring herself to approach her mother’s memorial altar. As she listens to staff judge her and her brother for not doing their filial duty, her eyes well with tears. She refuses to cry, initially assuming that the tears are for her mother, but as she watches the other mourning families around her, she realizes she’s grieving for the home life she never had. There’s also a sense of relief that, with her mother’s passing, the nightmare is finally over. The loss of a parent — even a shitty one — comes with its own host of complex emotions, and in that moment, she’s bereft to find herself alone — but that’s when she looks up and sees Joo-won.
Ji-seok called Joo-won and asked him to be there for his sister, and Joo-won immediately raced to Yoon-seo’s side to give her a much needed shoulder to cry on. After she’s finished crying, he builds up her self-esteem by praising her strength, and then, for some crazy reason, he decides it’s the appropriate time to — wait for it — propose to her. I can’t decide if his decision was wildly off base (for obvious reasons) or a rather ingenious way of diminishing her mother’s death — and its impact on Yoon-seo — by replacing the negativity of the day with a more positive memory.
Either way, Yoon-seo is surprised by the sudden proposal, and even though her instinct is to tell him no (because breakup), she agrees to take some time to think about it. As she tells Yi-rae later, marriage isn’t just about romantic love. It’s about family, and she’s worried that a marriage with a chaebol would inevitably result in people gossiping about her family history. She’d rather sacrifice her romance with Joo-won than have Ji-seok be hurt by all the negative comments directed at them.
The longer she ponders her decision, though, the more she feels herself being swayed. She recalls her earlier drunken conversation with Seong-min. Yoon-seo had compared herself to Cinderella at 2AM (cue: title sequence), after the magic had worn off and the impracticality and improbability of living happily ever after with Prince Charming had settled in. Seong-min had disagreed with her comparison, having previously been on the receiving end of her tenacity. She’s not a Cinderella who waits idly for her prince; she works hard for a happiness that isn’t guaranteed.
While Yoon-seo slowly comes to the realization that she wants to bravely fight for her relationship with Joo-won, the man himself waits impatiently and takes his own steps towards ensuring they find happiness by telling his mother in no uncertain terms that he will marry Yoon-seo. Chairwoman Kim is not pleased. She threatens to send him to Spain, and, not for the first time, I wonder why she’s so adamantly against our OTP. She obviously cares for her children and is pleased that Shi-won and Mi-jin are beginning a post-arranged-marriage romance, so what gives? Does she have a reason for disliking Yoon-seo that will become more apparent in our finale, or is this just a sign that the writing team has struggled to create a redeemable antagonist?
Rumors that Chairwoman Kim is sending Joo-won to Spain begin circulating around the office, and it’s the jolt Yoon-seo needs. In a classic rom-com move we haven’t seen much since before the TSA was given carte blanche to cavity search anyone and everyone, Yoon-seo races to the airport. Even though, as far as I can tell, she doesn’t know his departure time, she manages to track him down before he checks in with his airline, and she’s able to tell him how she feels. It’s all very romantic — until she realizes Shi-won is watching and that Joo-won is only going to be in Spain for five days.
It’s a long five — make that four — days before Joo-won returns, showing up unexpectedly outside Ji-seok’s school on the day of his college entrance exam and casually demonstrating how he’s ready and willing to join her and Ji-seok as a member of their family. Aside from Chairwoman Kim, it should be smooth sailing for our OTP at this point, but we should never underestimate a K-drama writer’s asinine attempts at keeping us in suspense — or annoy the hell out of us.
I don’t know about y’all, but I was ready to throw Jang-hee through a window. A good chunk of Episode 8 is dedicated to his caterwauling after he is seemingly passed over for a promotion, and he places the blame on Joo-won. Now that Yoon-seo is secretly dating Joo-won again, she tries to run interference between her subordinate and Joo-won, which prevents her from going on a much-anticipated date with her on-again boyfriend.
Even if you remove the unintentional cockblocking angle, his behavior is extremely unprofessional (more so than usual), which begs the question: Why exactly is Joo-won planning to promote Jang-hee to Yoon-seo’s position once her resignation is finalized? Honestly, Jang-hee’s behavior is so off-putting that I have a hard time enjoying the subsequent romantic scenes between Joo-won and Yoon-seo — not that the awkwardness of Joo-won and Yoon-seo’s make-out session did the scenes any favors either.
But whew, I’m glad Yoon-seo and Joo-won are back together. I like their characters, and I want them — and our story — to find their fairytale happily ever after. But, and maybe it’s because we’ve been held in suspense for so long, I found their reconciliation lacking. In hindsight, I think it all stems from timing.
As I’ve mentioned multiple times, the breakup has felt unnecessarily long, a feeling that I suspect could have been alleviated by delving more into Yoon-seo’s backstory and concerns and then pacing them more steadily. Instead of coming off like a broken record and repeatedly telling Joo-won “no” until she finally said caved to her feelings at a rather emotionally charged and sensitive moment in her life, I wish we could have seen Joo-won overcome each of her misgivings one by one until her mother’s death, when she finally realized that — chaebol status or not — he would protect her and be by her side in ways her parents never had been.
Although this week’s episodes had a more somber tone, they weren’t without their fair share of comedy — and no, I’m not talking about Jang-hee’s cringy, slapstick behavior. I’m, of course, referring to our secondary couple. Shi-won and Mi-jin stole the show for me in these latest episodes. I’m so used to seeing contractual marriages used as means to put characters in close proximity and to create opportunities for pretend intimacy that it’s rather novel to watch an arranged marriage couple fall for one another without the usual gimmicks and tropes.
Of course, this couple isn’t without their own breed of over-the-top shenanigans, and I got a huge kick out of the whole social media debacle. However, even though Shi-won and Mi-jin have their share of misunderstandings, they overcome the fact that they’re practically strangers with their open communication and mutual respect. They’re not perfect, but they’re trying. And that’s what’s important. Plus, you know, they’re hella cute together.