We are barreling towards the end of our drama faster than a Truck of Doom, which means certain plot arcs are tied off quickly and sloppily so our romantic pairings have time to blossom. But of course, there is still one mystery looming over our heroine’s head, and the more she learns about her first life, the more tragic our story becomes.
EPISODES 9-10
See You in My 19th Life is still some of the best visual storytelling I’ve encountered in a long while — like, I can’t even begin to describe my appreciation for the scene of Ji-eum walking across the pedestrian bridge with her past lives trailing behind her. But, to be frank, I’m disappointed with how our latest episodes settled two major plot points. Although, given how unceremoniously they were resolved, I’m not sure it’s worth calling the whole car wreck business and the matter of Seo-ha’s evil step-mistress “major” plot points anymore. Instead, their poorly executed resolutions highlight just how insignificant and unnecessary they were to our larger story.
First, our story deals with the issue of Seo-ha’s maternal uncle being the mastermind behind the car accident. Last we saw Seo-ha, he was a mess, having retreated to his corner-of-woe while he processed the weight of his uncle’s betrayal. Heavy stuff, for sure, and Ji-eum decides this is the moment to throw down an Uno reverse card and backtrack on her previous decision to help him through, well, everything as Ji-eum instead of Ju-won. As she later explains to Cho-won, she’s realized that Ju-won is the one who can help Seo-ha overcome his guilt and move forward with his relationship with Ji-eum.
Like any sane person, Seo-ha doesn’t immediately believe Ji-eum’s fantastical story of past lives, but she baits him with her unique knowledge of the locked box Ju-won gifted him on his birthday. She hands him a note — with instructions to not read it until after he’s opened the box — and sends him on a scavenger hunt that’s more of a distraction from Seo-ha’s problems than a solution to them. It’s an effective diversion, though, that shifts Seo-ha’s thoughts from his uncle to Ji-eum as he ponders — at the bottom of his pool, of course — the possibility that Ji-eum really is Ju-won reborn.
Considering our story has been building up slowly to the reveal, it was gratifying to watch Seo-ha finally locate the key Ju-won hid in the pages of her favorite picture book and then unlock the box. Inside, Seo-ha finds a homemade autobiographical book written by Ju-won that corroborates everything Ji-eum told Seo-ha in the present. As you can imagine, this book dispels any lingering doubts Seo-ha may have had about Ji-eum’s fantastical tale of past lives. And so, he eagerly follows the instructions in Ji-eum’s letter to meet her at the merry-go-round he’d wanted to ride on his birthday.
Because Ji-eum had every intention of staking out the merry-go-round every day until Seo-ha made an appearance, she was waiting when he finally arrived. Their reunion is accompanied by a shot of them as children, meeting in front of the bright lights of the theme park ride.
It’s gleeful, magical, and taps into the carefreeness of childhood memories, and although we’ve seen numerous flashbacks of them together as children, this particular one has many nuanced layers to it. It’s joyful because Seo-ha finally recognizes Ji-eum as Ju-won, but it’s as much a goodbye as it is a hello because he’s letting go of the part of himself that believed he was at fault for Ju-won’s death.
Instead, as we’ve already learned, the real culprit was Seo-ha’s uncle, who supposedly wasn’t trying to kill his nephew as we were previously led to believe. Without any explanation for why Ho-shik had thought he’d killed the “wrong kid,” Seo-ha’s uncle claims his intended target was Seo-ha’s father — but even then he wasn’t trying to kill him. Just maim him a little bit. Because nothing scares a cheating scumbag and makes him feel guilty for neglecting his dying wife quite like an anonymous, non-fatal car accident that could happen to anyone. I’m not sure which has more plot holes: the uncle’s logic or the drama’s shoddy conclusion to the car accident conspiracy.
Initially — and I was probably in the minority on this — I liked the added mystery of trying to figure out who was behind the car accident. But now that it’s concluded with Seo-ha’s uncle willingly turning himself over to the police, I wished they’d eliminated the conspiracy element. What if, instead, the accident had been a simple hit-and-run, and the only plot twist had been that Ji-eum’s father was the driver? By eliminating the conspiracy, our story could have developed Seo-ha’s feelings for Ji-eum — particularly his willingness to overlook the sins of Ji-eum’s father in order to be with her — a little deeper before she revealed her past life to him.
Now that Seo-ha knows Ji-eum is Ju-won, our couple is inseparable. They go on an overnight trip to the bridge Ji-eum saw in her fragmented memories of her first life. Their mini vacation is full of a lot of cutesy milestones, such as: Seo-ha’s official love confession, which Ji-eum rejects twice to make them even; some fancy Swarovski PPL (bling, bling); and a bashful Seo-ha who initially blushes at Ji-eum’s suggestion that they share a bed. Unfortunately, even though their overnight vacation progresses their relationship and does wonders for Seo-ha’s happiness, the mystery of Ji-eum’s first life is setting the stage for a dark turn in our story.
What Ji-eum initially believed was a romantic union between her and her lover amidst fireworks, was in reality a dark memory of her stabbing past-life Seo-ha and then getting shot in the back with an arrow. The vision is so visceral it leaves her breathless, but she does her best to shake it off and ignore what she saw. Unfortunately, as she and Seo-ha are driving home, her vacation bubble bursts. Min-ki calls and tells her that Ae-gyeong has been hospitalized.
It’s at this point Min-ki finally stops withholding key information and explains to Ji-eum that she’s the reason Ae-gyeong is in pain from a mysterious illness. Apparently, the Universe wants Ji-eum to make new friends each time she’s reborn, and if she reconnects with loved ones from her past lives, they pay the consequences. Well, unless they were her enemy in a past life, in which case the powers at be give a free pass for revenge or something.
Min-ki does a rather poor job of explaining the situation to Ji-eum, and I’m not sure if it’s due to more plot holes or him intentionally being evasive for inexplicable reasons. I’m leaning towards plot holes because if he was simply withholding information because of his own personal connection to Ji-eum in her first life, then the drama could have easily explained the rules to the audience by way of Han-na.
Supposedly, after settling her unfinished business with Yeon-ok and saying hello and goodbye to Seo-ha, we’re led to believe Han-na has concluded whatever ritual she needed to complete in order for her to cease remembering her past lives. But alas, Han-na’s business with Yeon-ok was wrapped up as quickly as the car wreck conspiracy and provided the audience no insight into this first life business.
Min-ki’s earlier passive aggressive attempts failed at getting Ji-eum to touch the shaman bells again, but Ae-gyeong’s illness renews Ji-eum’s interest in her first life. She holds and shakes the bells again, and at first, her memories are happy. She sees Cho-won in her newest vision and smiles when she realizes they were connected in her first life. But then her memories take a dark turn when past-life Seo-ha murders past-life Cho-won. A part of Ji-eum is still trapped in the visions of her first life when Seo-ha finds her, and as his present face overlaps with the one in Ji-eum’s memory, she reaches out and grabs him by the throat. In tears, she demands that he die.
Our concluding scene was a very tough one to watch. Not only was Ji-eum’s pain a fist to the solar plexus, but poor, confused Seo-ha had the most heartbreaking look on his face while he tried to coax her into reality. Seo-ha has worried for years that he was to blame for Ju-won’s death, and after finally getting confirmation — directly from the source — that she doesn’t condemn him, this happens. While Ji-eum can’t distinguish Seo-ha from his past life at this moment, I can’t help but imagine how this would be Seo-ha’s old nightmare coming to life. Does he see Ju-won choking him, condemning him, asking him to die?
After a scene like that, it’s hard to imagine a happy ending for this drama, but I trust Ji-eum to be able to separate the past from the present once she returns to reality. Somehow, this still will wrap everything up in one of those big bows heavily featured in holiday car dealership commercials — I demand it! I’m just hoping there aren’t many more plot holes on the way to achieving said happy ending. But at this point, I think I will be forgiving so long as I’m given lots of cutesy moments with both our couples as compensation.
Cho-won and Do-yoon are still moving at a snail’s pace, but if Do-yoon’s distracted cooking and concession that he won’t be Seo-ha’s stand-in at social gatherings for the Conceited Chaebol Club are any indication, our boy is on his way to having zero ducks left to give. At the same time, Cho-won is finally starting to understand why Do-yoon has reservations about dating her. I feel confident that these two will meet somewhere in the middle, and if it involves a matchmaking attempt by the adorable Do-jin, then even better!