If you’re looking for something sinister and dark — and you like not quite knowing who in the show to trust — Perfect Family is definitely worth the watch. There are some twists and turns coupled with misdirection, and quite honestly I think this is going to be a shocking drama.
EPISODES 1-2
The main protagonist of our story is CHOI SUN-HEE (Park Joo-hyun) and for the moment she is living an idyllic life. Sun-hee was adopted from an orphanage as a child by Dad (Kim Byung-chul) and Mum (Yoon Se-ah). As a family they eat together, go for runs together, and it seems they are very close-knit. Dad wins an “Excellent Persons” award fourth year in a row at work, and Mum and Sun-hee are there to get the “perfect picture” of his achievement together as a family.
Sun-hee is also a high achiever at school, and is focused solely on her studies and the college entrance exam. Both of Sun-hee’s best friends have a crush on her: PARK KYUNG-HO (Kim Young-dae) is quite obvious about his feelings, and JI HYUN-WOO (Lee Shi-woo) tends to hide his feelings as he feels inferior being from a more humble background. For Sun-hee’s birthday Kyung-ho has bought her bedazzled keyring, it seems to me that Kyung-ho’s intense attention makes Sun-hee uncomfortable. The boys seem to have a friendly rivalry when it comes to their feelings for Sun-hee, but everything is about to change with the arrival of LEE SOO-YEON (Choi Ye-bin).
In a very insidious way, Soo-yeon joins Sun-hee’s class and asks Sun-hee if she remembers her. When Sun-hee is alone, Soo-yeon approaches her again and asks her about tying her hair up with a pencil (something we later find out Soo-yeon had taught her to do at the orphanage). She also hands Sun-hee a box of matches. This triggers a memory for Sun-hee from when she was young and a group of boys were bullying her behind the orphanage. Soo-yeon had come to her rescue and told a creepy story about her parents being killed in a fire while she lit the matches, and this was enough to scare the boys away. After this incident, the girls had become inseparable, and Soo-yeon had taught Sun-hee how to strike a match, even though she wasn’t very good at it. Then everything changed when Soo-yeon told Sun-hee she was going to be adopted so she would be leaving the next day.
In the dead of that night, a fire had broken out at the orphanage and Soo-yeon had been hurt pretty badly – burning half of her scalp. This meant that her adoption was cancelled because it costs a lot of money to treat burns. In the present, Soo-yeon snarls at Sun-hee that she wouldn’t understand because she’s always been happy. Poor Sun-hee feels awful — I genuinely think she had no idea all of this had happened to Soo-yeon. Soo-yeon holds Sun-hee to ransom with her guilt and tells her she wants the bedazzled keyring (that Kyung-ho had given her) and helps herself to it. It’s hard not to swing between feeling sorry for Soo-yeon and wanting to slap her – she’s been dealt a horrible hand in life so far but she doesn’t do herself any favors behaving like a brat.
After this revelation, we see Sun-hee return from school the next day and ask her dad for advice. Sun-hee tells Dad that she has a friend who she doesn’t really know how to talk to. And with Soo-yeon’s erratic behavior — screaming and throwing things at the drop of a hat — I can totally understand why. Sun-hee says it’s different with Hyun-woo and Kyung-ho, because she can tell what they’re thinking. Dad laughs and tells her that’s just what teenage boys are like, even though he was an exception. Yeah I bet you were. There is something creepy in the forced smiling and fake laughing that comes from both of Sun-hee’s parents. Dad suggests Sun-hee write a letter to this friend as it will enable her to get all of her thoughts out — not bad advice.
We get a little insight into Soo-yeon’s life at the moment. Soo-yeon has been swindled by her part time job: the boss sold the store and did off with all their wages. Soo-yeon’s living with an older girl from the orphanage and we learn that she chose to go to this expensive school because she wanted to be close to Sun-hee — weird, considering her resentment. Now that Soo-yeon has no money, she decides to ask Sun-hee for it. Sun-hee doesn’t hear her request at first which enrages Soo-yeon who then screams in Sun-hee’s face that she needs money, making a huge scene.
At school the next day, Kyung-ho puts money on Soo-yeon’s desk and tells her not to bully Sun-hee and ask him if she’s desperate for money – Kyung-ho’s father is a famous painter so he’s loaded. Enraged again, Soo-yeon smacks Kyung-ho as he’s walking away from her, and screams she doesn’t want his money. Soo-yeon proceeds to get in Sun-hee’s face on the way out screaming, “Do you think I’m a beggar!?” Calm down, tiger – geez. Kyung-ho didn’t exactly handle the situation well, but Soo-yeon seems to be becoming more unhinged by the second.
Jealousy peaks for Soo-yeon when she sees Sun-hee’s mum pick Sun-hee and Kyung-ho up after school. This is noticed by two school bullies who start following Soo-yeon. The bullies say they’ve heard about Soo-yeon’s outburst and they’ve heard she was infamous at her last school. Trying to get Soo-yeon on their side, they ask her if she wants them to take care of Sun-hee, whom they call annoying because she is rich, a model student, and even has a handsome bodyguard. If Soo-yeon agrees, she can become their friend. But Soo-yeon isn’t interested; she’s not interested in making friends with the nice kids, let alone these two.
The next day, Kyung-ho apologizes to Soo-yeon for the way he behaved. Soo-yeon was not expecting that (but I noticed she didn’t give him an apology for whooping his ass…). Meanwhile, Sun-hee waits for Soo-yeon after Kyung-ho’s apology, and Soo-yeon asks if she made him do it. Sun-hee confirms she asked him too because she felt it was her fault. Sun-hee seems to be a genuinely sweet girl, and it seems since the orphanage, she hasn’t really had to deal with challenging people or situations; this is her way of keeping everyone on good terms.
However, this gentle maneuver by Sun-hee seems to have gotten right up Soo-yeon’s nose. Soo-yeon waits for Sun-hee to finish at her academy and then lures her to a dark alley with “something to tell her.” Soo-yeon starts menacingly asking Sun-hee how badly she thinks she was hurt in that fire…? Soo-yeon yanks her wig off, and we see half her hair missing and she has disfiguring scars over half of her scalp. Sun-hee is stunned into silence and completely shocked — as was I. Soo-yeon starts asking Sun-hee how much she has wronged her. She is placing all the blame on Sun-hee.
In a flashback, we see a sad Sun-hee behind the orphanage thinking about being left all alone and trying to strike a match. She thinks she hasn’t lit it, and decides to put the match back in the box and leaves it there amongst a load of wood and rubbish. It seems Sun-hee had no idea she had started that fire, and she is horrified. It turns out Sun-hee had been adopted while Soo-yeon was in hospital and didn’t know about the extent of her injuries. In the present, Sun-hee tells Soo-yeon she assumed she had been adopted too and was living a good life, and Sun-hee promises to pay Soo-yeon back for the rest of her life. Upon Sun-hee’s return home after that horrifying story of enlightenment, she can’t sleep. She decides to write that letter to Soo-yeon, apologizing and asking if they can be close friends like before.
With said letter in hand, Soo-yeon goes to a rooftop at the school to read it alone, and she seems touched by the contents. Just as Soo-yeon is about to calmly go back to class, the two school bullies from earlier turn up. The bullies taunt her, asking her what she had to talk to Sun-hee about and if she wears a wig. Calm Soo-yeon has left the building, and slightly unhinged Soo-yeon is back as the camera angle pans to the sky. When the audience reenter the scene, the bullies are cowering on the floor with bloody noses and Soo-yeon telling them to stay away from Sun-hee. (Soo-yeon’s bad personality traits seem to come in handy sometimes.)
On her way, home Soo-yeon is followed and attacked by the two bullies she put in their place earlier, but unfortunately for Soo-yeon, they have back up in the form of two older boys. One of the boys comments that Soo-yeon is tough because she’s not making a sound even though one of the girls is slapping her on the ground. Seeing this as an invitation, the other boy goes over and smacks Soo-yeon – hard. Just then, Kyung-ho turns up and defends Soo-yeon from the boys. (Hyun-woo is hiding around the corner calling the police.)
As the police arrive, Kyung-ho grabs Soo-yeon’s hand and along with Hyun-woo they run away. Soo-yeon has a serious “savior crush” now, and the boys follow her home to make sure she’s safe. At school, Soo-yeon takes the class bin out and overhears Kyung-ho and Hyun-woo talking. Hyun-woo asks Kyung-ho if he likes Soo-yeon now and he says no way – he’ll only ever like Sun-hee. Unhinged Soo-yeon makes another appearance as she aggressively tells Sun–hee if Kyung-ho wants to speak to her today that Sun-hee better ignore it and not go – otherwise their friendship is over. Sun-hee is so out of her depth not knowing how to handle Soo-yeon’s rages, and she does as she’s told.
At this point, we finally reach the scene that has been flashed forward to several times throughout these episodes, but the month-long lead up is needed for the scene to make sense. When Sun-hee gets home, she remembers she hasn’t given Soo-yeon the math text book yet, so she goes out to find her. Seeing Soo-yeon enter Kyung-ho’s house, she dithers about following her in until she hears shouting. Kyung-ho has decked his front room out in pictures and balloons for his love confession to Sun-hee. Then Soo-yeon comes in and tells him it’s a crappy idea, and not to do it because he will fail. Kyung-ho asks Soo-yeon if she likes Sun–hee, and that’s why she’s being like this. This is enough to flip that switch in Soo-yeon’s head and she goes nuts. When Sun-hee enters, Soo-yeon’s wig is on the floor and she is wrestling with Kyung-ho and a very large kitchen knife.
Soo-yeon starts screaming at Sun-hee telling her she broke her promise she shouldn’t be here. As Kyung-ho breaks free, Soo-yeon screams that her life is like this because of Sun-hee. She lunges for her just as Kyung-ho jumps in the way and gets stabbed on Sun-hee’s behalf, falling to the floor and losing consciousness. We then see Sun-hee stumbling home in shock, covered in blood. She tells her mum she killed Kyung-ho and she needs to turn herself in. (Pretty normal response, I would say, apart from the fact Sun-hee didn’t actually do it. Maybe her guilt over Soo-yeon is making Sun-hee want to cover for her?) Mum’s response, however, is worrying to say the least.
Sun-hee is curled up on the floor an absolute mess, but Mum asks what did she kill him with, where’s the body, and if there were any witnesses. (Sorry Mum, run that one past me again?) After telling Sun-hee to change and wash, Mum brings Sun-hee some warm milk with a side order of drugs and tells her to turn herself in if she wants to make mum an accomplice. Mum’s last parting question was: did Sun-hee leave anything behind? Sun-hee says she left her phone and text book, and a very shifty-looking Mum leaves Sun-hee to pass out. When Sun-hee comes to, her lost belongings are on her desk, and Mum and Dad are being very creepy and smiley at the breakfast table saying Sun-hee looks unwell, and asking if she had a nightmare. Argh – the chills…
Things start to resemble the twilight zone when Mum and Dad are being as “normal” as ever and everyone is eating breakfast when Sun-hee hears the news. A fire broke out in Kyung-ho’s house and his entire family are dead! Wait a damn minute, covering up a murder for your child is wrong. But killing an entire family is a completely different level of crazy, wrong, and a few more expletives I have chosen but will not share.
The police are on the scene at Kyung-ho’s house and discussing how the parents were blackout drunk in bed, and how that’s strange because even in this situation at least one person usually survives. The fire started in the son’s room with cigarettes and thinner – Kyung-ho’s dad was a painter, remember – and it looks like Kyung-ho will take the blame for this. Soo-yeon is standing behind the police barrier looking all shifty, and the police see her and decide to look into Kyung-ho’s friends. Soo-yeon is frantically trying to get in touch with Sun-hee who is currently having a breakdown in her room.
Wow, what a premiere week! If you want a drama that makes you think – this is it. Soo-yeon is clearly acting out and feels the world is unfair (which it is). However, this is not an excuse for her violent and manipulative behavior. But as bad as Soo-yeon is, I don’t think she’s the “big bad” in this show. Sun-hee’s parents however, seem to be in a whole other league of creepy and badness. Next week’s episodes will hopefully fill in some blanks and give us a clear direction, because right now I am uncertain where this is going… which I think is exactly as intended.