At last, our destined tale has come to an end, and it’s time to bid farewell to the characters we have accompanied on this journey. The show spends its final week giving us a much-needed dose of OTP sweetness after last week’s angst, and it doesn’t forget to tie up loose ends with their stalker and his other colleagues on the wrong side of the law.
EPISODES 15-16
Since Shin-yu dumped Na-yeon, the mayor is eager to get rid of him, but he can’t be fired without due cause. Hence, Mr. Mayor does the next best thing: send Jae-kyung to persuade Shin-yu to resign from City Hall. Shin-yu remains unfazed, but he wonders why Jae-kyung is on the mayor’s side despite the unfairness of the situation. “I’m his advisor, not yours,” Jae-kyung replies.
Being loyal to the mayor explains why Jae-kyung transferred the ownership of the Mount Onju land that Shin-yu handed over to the city — during the haunted shrine fiasco — to Haum construction. Shin-yu calls him out on the illegal sale, but Jae-kyung maintains that it’s his job to legalize the sale. Since Jae-kyung is seemingly swimming in the Pool of Corruption now, Hyun-seo offers to buy him over — and then goes to brag to Shin-yu about getting a competent person on his side for the Mount Onju development project. Pfft.
Somehow, with Haum construction handling the development project, Shin-yu’s dad’s company is affected. Dad consoles himself by becoming a drunken mess, and in the process, he apologizes to Mom for his past actions. *Rolls eyes* Mom doesn’t accept the apology although she decides to postpone the divorce until the company overcomes the crisis. “Even if things get better at the company, if I don’t have you, what’s the point?” Dad wonders, and Mom wavers.
Still on the development project, Hong-jo attends her high school reunion, and confronts Na-yeon as the mastermind behind the project going to Haum. Hong-jo wants Na-yeon’s apology for slapping her the other day and also bullying her in school, but Na-yeon insists that she did nothing wrong. But as we come to learn, it was Na-yeon who made her high school boyfriend kiss Hong-jo forcefully, and she took a video of the kiss as ammunition to bully Hong-jo.
At present, there’s no evidence to prove that Hong-jo is right, and Na-yeon warns her to stop messing around, or she will deal with Shin-yu and his father’s company. *Insert wine splash on Hong-jo’s outfit* Jeez! I didn’t think I could dislike Na-yeon any further, but here we are.
Hong-jo heads to Shin-yu’s house to trade her wine soaked outfit for his oversized shirt, and we finally get what we’ve been waiting for for eight weeks — a proper kiss! The lights off, clothes off, kinda intense makeout session that satisfies the 300 years of longing from their past life to the present. *Fans self* Hong-jo’s thumb on the stabbing scar on Shin-yu’s stomach was a nice touch, and I may or may not have abused my replay button on the entire scene. But can you blame me? Even shaman Eun-wol could feel the magic of the night all the way from her nursing home — to the extent that she had a conception dream. Our OTP is having a daughter, y’all!
But lest we forget that we have a deranged stalker on the loose, we circle back to Garden Man — who has roped in a friendly grandpa into his scheme. He uses Grandpa’s relationship with Hong-jo to lower her guard, then he kidnaps her and bundles her up to a creepy ritualistic cave. But as it turns out, Grandpa already gave Hong-jo the heads up, and she was conscious the whole time. “Why did you come instead of reporting to the police?” Garden Man asks, on discovering that Hong-jo is conscious. “Because I had to catch you,” Hong-jo replies. Her logic and mine have been clashing since day one, so I’m not even surprised that she made herself bait.
But Hong-jo totally underestimated Garden Man’s level of delulu, because the information that the police are on their way doesn’t faze him. He plans to undergo a blood marriage with her, and end it with a murder-suicide so they can be together in the next life. But Garden Man has to wait for the full moon before carrying out his crazy ritual — giving the police enough time to catch him. Unfortunately, he already fed Hong-jo the poison by then. Welp! Shin-yu is left to rush an unconscious Hong-jo to the hospital — and boy, was I moved by Ro-woon’s utterly devastated acting. He nailed it!
Thankfully, Hong-jo has plot armor, so she survives another round of recklessness. Everyone is happy — except Shin-yu’s dad who complains that Hong-jo’s life is too eventful. No kidding! Anyway, sorry, not sorry to break it to your disapproving ass, sir, but you’re going to be a grandpa soon if Eun-wol’s conception dream is anything to go by. Hehehe.
Now that we’re done with Garden Man, we move on to his accomplice, Na-yeon. A video where she confessed her involvement in the Mount Onju development project, and to bullying Hong-jo, is leaked. Turns out that Na-yeon’s high school boyfriend took the video during the reunion, and released it as a way of apologizing to Hong-jo for what happened back then. But Hong-jo refuses to thank him for his late apology, and honestly, good for her.
To compound Na-yeon’s woes, Hyun-seo dumps her — but not before letting her know that he was only playing around with her because she was Shin-yu’s girlfriend — and she is arrested by the police for aiding and abetting Garden Man. Speaking of arrests, her dad and Hyun-seo are also nabbed by the prosecution.
With Shin-yu as his lawyer (lol), Jae-kyung testifies against the mayor and Hyun-seo in court. Apparently, he reported Hyun-seo’s bribe to the audit team, and sent them the money. As to why he changed his mind after siding with the mayor, Jae-kyung replies that he never changed his mind. He never wanted to join them to begin with, and he only accepted the money because it afforded him the opportunity to be a whistleblower. I knew Jae-kyung wasn’t stupid enough to join in the corruption, and I’m glad he didn’t prove me wrong.
One day, we will talk about how much of a disservice it is for the majority of second female leads to be written as hateful characters who only exist to be a stumbling block to the OTP’s happiness — to the extent that we rejoice in their downfall at the end, like with Na-yeon. And on the other hand, the second male lead — who is also part stumbling block in his own right — gets to flourish because his character is written with a little more grace and flexibility than his female counterpart. But that day is not today.
Today, we give Jae-kyung a thumbs up and applaud his cool departure from City Hall to go into politics. Yunno, since politicians have suddenly begun to fall over themselves to recruit him after his court appearance. Hong-jo thanks him for whistleblowing, but he replies that he didn’t do it for Shin-yu, he did it for himself. Typical of second male leads, Jae-kyung stays cool till the end. Although as he moves out of the house, he admits his regret about not accepting Hong-jo’s confession. Oh well, better luck next life. That’s if Hong-jo and Shin-yu don’t end up together again in the next life. Because as Hong-jo tells Jae-kyung, love is the collaboration of timing and destiny.
As for Hong-jo’s destiny in this life, Shin-yu gets a clean bill of health since the curse has been lifted. And with Jae-kyung out of the house, he buys the building and moves into the vacant flat. What a flex! But since Shin-yu is rich, why is Hong-jo so worried about the utilities? I promise you, sis, leaving the lights on during ~fun times~ won’t increase your electricity bill. Ahem.
Since our OTP have practically moved in together, they invite Shin-yu’s parents and shaman Eun-wol over for lunch. Here, we learn that Eun-wol’s conception dream was actually for Shin-yu’s mom. And I’m right there with Shin-yu’s priceless reaction at hearing that his mom is pregnant. Because, what!? I suppose his parents’ divorce is off the table now. And his dad had better make it up to Mom for the rest of his life.
Speaking of spending the rest of their lives together, Mr. Gong and Eun-young get married! But is it a K-drama wedding if there are no dramatic scenes preceding the event? Like when Mr. Gong’s blind date came to the Park Maintenance Team to slap him and drag Eun-young by the hair as payback for being dumped. And when he publicly embarrassed proposed to Eun-young at the dining hall, sending her running for the hills. Next thing you know, they’re walking down the aisle and reciting funny vows. Lol. At least one couple got married in the show.
But hey, Shin-yu managed to catch the bouquet, and you know what that means? It’s proposal time! Shin-yu pops the question at the beach after seeking permission from Hong-jo’s dad (so sweet!) and it’s a yes from Hong-jo. To wrap up the show, our OTP returns to Mount Onju to bury the wooden box (thank you for your service, box-nim) and with this, they proceed to walk the flowery path together forever.
That’s it, guys, we are done! Shout out to the show for keeping the momentum going till the end. I remember worrying about how the drama was going to handle the past life bits in week one, and I’m happy that it turned out better than I expected. Seriously, the past life story could actually stand on its own as a melo/tear-jerking sageuk, and I’d watch the hell out of it. If not for anything, for the gorgeous cinematography, the forbidden romance, and the compelling characters — especially Aeng-cho. She’s such fantastic heroine material. She knew how to push forward and hold back when necessary. And she combined her undaunted attitude with a sense of self-preservation — something that Hong-jo so badly lacked.
Hong-jo’s propensity to dive into problematic situations without a second thought frustrated me to no end. But she’s the heroine of this story, and I liked her (and sympathized with her plight as a bullying survivor and the office outcast), so she gets a pass. As for Shin-yu, I started out not liking him in week one, and then I went on to fall for him. It has to be a combination of The Ro-woon Effect and Shin-yu’s charms. Or maybe I was the one who drank the love potion.
In any case, our OTP gave us some great moments as they went from not being able to stand each other, to not being able to do without each other. They’re well deserving of their happily ever after, and you’ll get zero complaints about this ship from my end.
I do have a slight beef with how the show treated Wook. Just when I forget he exists, he shows up like the 29th of February, and disappears just as quickly. I guess I was expecting more from the character because of the actor playing the role. But to be honest, the screentime given to Hong-jo’s gossipy colleagues — who added no value to the plot and just existed to annoy me — would have been better utilized for the development of Wook’s character.
It’s sad because there was so much potential with Wook that the show failed to explore. It shouldn’t be in the final week that we’ll come to learn that Wook felt stuck in his career as a lawyer. Why should I care about his inner struggles when I haven’t been given enough chances to connect with his character? And it’s not like I didn’t want to. So he finally quit his job and became an actor? Good for him. It was kinda random, but hey, as long as he’s happy.
Overall, did the show have its flaws? Yes, there were a few hiccups here and there. But did I love it? Absolutely! Destined With You is one of my favorites watches (and my fav coverage) this year. But I’m not sad the drama is over (are you kidding me? No more Shin-yu!). Neither am I relieved that it’s done — as I usually am whenever I complete a torturous watch. I think I’m just content. I’m happy with the way things went, and I can send the drama off with a smile.