It’s a week of arguments as our leads blow their tops all over town. But it’s also a week of alliances as new friendships form and enemies convene over shared goals. Everyone is showing their true colors now — but not all colors are flattering for all characters.
EPISODES 11-12
The events this week revolve around character dispositions, with some making a total turnaround and others coming back into their own. To dive in, let’s start with a backstabbing. I haven’t yet introduced the Vice Director of Daechi Chase, WOO SEUNG-HEE (Kim Jung-young), but her part in the story just got too big to ignore anymore.
For a while now, we’ve seen that Seung-hee is at odds with her boss, Hyun-tak, but it wasn’t clear why. This week we learn that as director of Daechi Chase, Hyun-tak took over Seung-hee’s hagwon about eight years ago and she’s been working for him ever since. But, she’s been quietly plotting her revenge, and now she sees an opportunity to carry it out. Her ultimate goal is to take down Hyun-tak, but to make sure the business won’t get back up and running right away, she wants to remove his big moneymaker: Hye-jin.
To that end, she sets up a private meeting with the Gray Witch (who also has it out for Hye-jin) and tries to cut a deal. She hands the Gray Witch a flash drive that contains all of Hye-jin’s teaching materials from the past ten years (lectures, textbooks, everything). Now that Sang-seob will be working at Choisun, Seung-hee wants to give all this material to him so he can sabotage Hye-jin and take her students.
The Gray Witch is totally on board with this plan, but as it turns out, Sang-seob has a heck of a conscience. He wants to teach in his own way, based on his own ethics. And so, not only does he refuse to show up for the meeting to get the drive, he contacts Hye-jin to grab a drink together — and tells her about the plot against her.
Now, this is a total 180 from last week when Sang-seob and Hye-jin were sitting on opposite sides of a table and he was shooting daggers. Here, they’re facing each other again, and becoming allies. Sang-seob has had a change of heart because of one of his students — the same student that Hye-jin stood up for in Episode 1, causing Sang-seob so much humiliation. This student took his supplementary class at Chanyeong and actually did the work, reading extra novels and writing book reports. He’s moved by this, and feels ashamed that he turned on his students in order to try to hurt Hye-jin.
This change in his character is really the highlight of the episodes. And the convivial dynamic that forms between him and Hye-jin is so pleasant to watch. Neither holds a grudge. Both embrace their love of teaching. And it’s nice to see these competitors putting their heads together to do what’s right. Plus, they’re both so much happier now that they can put last week’s tumult behind them. (And I’m happy to see Hye-jin back to herself again.)
So, we’ve got one character revealing herself as a double-crosser and another showing his true good-guy colors, but what about our leads? Our OTP does not get as much screen time together this week as usual but when they do, man, is it explosive. And this has nothing to do with that bedroom scene we saw last time. Nope. Our leads have an argument to end all arguments — blowing their lids at the hagwon until the whole staff is standing around watching in dismay.
First, let’s talk about Jun-ho. He’s argumentative this week in just about every situation he finds himself. When we ended last time, Hye-jin was in the closet hiding from Jun-ho’s mom. She manages to sneak out while Mom’s in the bathroom (trucking home in her heeled boots and sweatpants, poor thing), leaving Jun-ho to get in a heated disagreement about his career.
We’ve known for some time that Jun-ho’s parents aren’t happy with his change in careers. But Mom is there to offer what she thinks is an olive branch, since Jun-ho’s dad has set up a meeting for him with a high-paying online school. Jun-ho’s not interested, but Mom keeps pushing until he’s frustrated and mouthing off about how they need to stop controlling his life. She finally backs down, and later he feels bad about how he acted.
So, that somewhat bratty blowup is how we start the show this week, and Jun-ho’s antics only escalate from there. We learn that the entire time he and Chung-mi have been working at Daechi Chase, they’ve been developing their own textbooks to use in their classes. Well, the big day is upon them and the textbook proofs arrive. And Jun-ho promptly puts his through the shredder and deletes the original files.
After Hye-jin’s confrontation with the Gray Witch last week, Jun-ho has decided that they need a paradigm shift in the way they teach. He’s going to start over from scratch, and this time, his idea is to teach the students in the way that Hye-jin once taught him (the same way she taught Shi-woo at the free lecture). He’ll teach the students how to think on their own, not just memorize passages from Korean literature. It’s bigger than test taking because they’ll have the skills to read any passage and understand it instinctively.
Now, all that might be well and good to discuss with his bosses at some point — but he’s just destroyed his teaching materials. And Hye-jin flips out. She begins by telling him there’s no time to make new ones — does he think teaching students is a joke? He’s being irresponsible. They start to argue in earnest, with Jun-ho countering that they need a new curriculum. Hye-jin’s voice keeps going up as she tells him to forget about life-long benefits for the students. They need to show results to the parents quickly, and they need to use a proven model.
She’s yelling and being sarcastic in her digs and Jun-ho whispers, “Don’t belittle me.” By now, the entire office has heard their screaming and come to see what’s going on. They go round for round, each defending their positions staunchly — hers very business minded and his focused on long-term student learning. Jun-ho says he’s a success because Hye-jin used this method with him, but she is not trying to hear it. The scene goes on and on, their faces contorted as they yell and gesticulate.
Finally, she tries to walk out since they’re getting nowhere. He grabs her arm but she throws him off: “Don’t follow me.” And she leaves the office to get some air and walk it off, while Jun-ho goes to wash his face and try to calm down. The scene is really well written and acted, and while both passionately defend their side, neither lets it get quite personal, which is impressive.
It’s in this moment, while Hye-jin is walking in the rain and ignoring Jun-ho’s calls, that she receives the call from Sang-seob that leads to their reconciliation. And in it’s in the moments following that reconciliation that Jun-ho’s argumentativeness really starts to grate on me.
Their colleague at the hagwon tells Jun-ho that Hye-jin wants to be alone right now (i.e., lay off, dude). But Jun-ho keeps calling and then goes out to track her down. He finds her at the restaurant with Sang-seob, walks in, sits down at the table, and starts talking shit to Sang-seob. Hye-jin keeps telling him to leave and wait for her elsewhere but he ignores her, until finally she informs him of the plot against her.
Jun-ho then uses this information as ammo to get back to his point. Who cares about ten years of teaching materials when they can just start over with a new paradigm? They then re-start the exact same argument we just saw, right in front of Sang-seob. Hye-jin tries to quell it multiple times but Jun-ho will not give up. Sang-seob looks incredibly uncomfortable but also, he agrees with Jun-ho’s model. He says it’s every teacher’s dream to teach that way, and it’s what he intended for his supplementary class.
When the discussions are over, Jun-ho apologizes to Sang-seob for being so rude — but tells Hye-jin he will not apologize to her. Instead, he drives her to the seaside on a whim, where they arrive in the morning and walk along the water, and Hye-jin changes her mind, telling Jun-ho to do what he wants.
Back at Choisun, Sang-seob gives a free lecture to entice students and it’s riveting from start to finish. Hye-jin sits in the back to observe (while the Gray Witch sits up front making snarly faces) and Sang-seob really comes into his own. He’s decided to teach the ways he wants — the same way Jun-ho wants — and the kids (and Hye-jin) are excited for the class. At the end of the lecture, Hye-jin approaches him and says she learned a lot (aww). And so, by the time she’s sitting through Jun-ho’s new practice lecture later on, she admits that he won — and they smile brightly at each other.
This brings us full circle to the backstabber, where we see yet again that Hye-jin can hold her own in every situation. Essentially, since Sang-seob wouldn’t go along with sabotaging Hye-jin, Seung-hee needs a new strategy. The plan is to blackmail Hye-jin into leaving Daechi Chase by presenting her with the drive that has all her materials on it. If Hye-jin doesn’t leave on her own — and join Seung-hee at a new hagwon — Seung-hee will give the drive to someone else.
Hye-jin plays it off like she’s seriously considering it, but she’s really plotting her own payback. At their next meeting, she invites the Gray Witch (surprising both women) and hands back the drive with her materials. They can do whatever they want with it because she doesn’t value it anymore. Then she smiles sweetly at Seung-hee and the credits roll.
This was a really distinct pair of episodes that I started out not liking (because our leads were not on screen being lovey-dovey) and ended up finding really heartwarming. I’m shocked at how the show was able to turn around Sang-seob’s character from this cranky, dorky guy that I hated to watch, to someone whose lecture I was actually fascinated listening to. Really, that ten minutes of real-time Korean Lit class had me mesmerized. He’s endearing as a teacher. And the nerdy niceness that pours out when he stands up for his ethics and allies with Hye-jin is completely believable. It’s clear that he’s a good guy who just got caught up in some obsessive thinking after being humiliated at work.
On turnarounds that I didn’t love, what is up with Jun-ho? While the argument scenes between him and Hye-jin were exceptionally well done — and I’m totally for his side of the debate — I really hated how he treated his girlfriend. It’s impressive to me how he and Hye-jin are equals within the context of their fights. Neither holds back on their aggression or seems worried that the other is too fragile to take it. That’s a nice thing to witness. But outside of that, I find him overbearing and needy in a way that I’m surprised Hye-jin is putting up with. He follows her when she needs time alone, barges into her meeting and takes over the conversation, and then ignores her when she tells him to leave. I know he has to prove he’s an equal since he’s younger and also a former student, but I feel like he’s trying to position himself above her — and I’m getting over my like for him.
The one thing I wish we saw more of is the adorableness that is Chung-mi and Seung-kyu. I could watch these two all day (sorry leads, they’re my new favorite couple). They’re both so humbly confident, and I squeed at Seung-kyu’s low-key confession at the cafeteria (that is, he likes someone and is trying to get closer by taking her to eat at the cafeteria). So cute. Both have tons of work to do at all times, but they squeeze in dates when they can — and I’m living for those mini-date moments.