Our hero’s recovery takes the limelight this week, but what should be good news actually brings more trouble to our protagonists. Unable to outrun his past, our hero must finish the battles he started and untangle decades-old secrets if he wishes to keep his family — both old and new — safe from harm.
EPISODES 11-12
A lot happens in these two episodes, and it seems the revenge plot line will take center stage as the show nears its end. For the most part, characters remain consistent (for better or worse), which means Young-soon is still stubborn and set in her ways. While her tenacity has helped her survive through tragedy after tragedy, it has also made her reluctant to ask for help, especially when she needs it.
As a result, Young-soon tries to hide her worsening condition from everyone around her until the pain becomes unbearable, and she faints at home to Kang-ho’s shock. Luckily, the right people are present at the right time and take her to the hospital for treatment. As Kang-ho learns of the severity of her illness, he promises to give up his dreams — including his crush on Mi-joo — if it means Young-soon will get better.
The nice nurse who was interested in Kang-ho overhears his plea and bows out gracefully once she learns that his feelings lay elsewhere. Unfortunately, when Young-soon wakes up and hears the nurse’s decision, she takes her anger out on Mi-joo and blames her for ruining her son’s future yet again. Thankfully, Mi-joo’s mom comes to her daughter’s defense and yells at Young-soon for knowing nothing.
As Young-soon takes a stroll to calm down, she stumbles across Kang-ho talking to his dad’s grave. She sits next to him and shares memories of Hae-shik. Putting on a brave face, she asks Kang-ho to bury her next to him so they can be together, but her request makes Kang-ho cry. He asks his mom to not leave him, so she agrees to take her time.
Young-soon returns to Mi-joo’s house and gets on her knees to apologize to Mi-joo’s mom. Seeing her sincerity, Mi-joo’s mom accepts her apology, but the moment of tenderness weakens Young-soon’s resolve. Holding onto her friend for dear life, Young-soon begs her to save her, and from inside, Mi-joo overhears her cries and silently weeps.
Realizing that her days are numbered, Young-soon starts crossing things off her bucket list and invites Kang-ho out on a date. They dress up and enjoy a nice day in town, but Young-soon never catches a break because that very night, their farm is on fire. While Kang-ho manages to push his mom to safety, an explosion throws him off his feet before he can escape. As he hits the ground with a thud, the impact causes his memories to return.
Meanwhile, the bad guys are beginning to realize how much Kang-ho has planned for their demise, and they start making their moves. However, Sam-shik suddenly becomes plot relevant when he discovers one of the pieces of evidence Kang-ho hid (the original DNA result test), and dives into the fray, unaware of the danger he got himself into.
He assumes threatening Ha-young for money would be simple, but alas, Tae-soo’s men kidnap and nearly kill him. Luckily, Woo-byeok’s stooges rescue Sam-shik using their newly acquired farming tools, and Sam-shik lives to see another day.
Though his initial plan failed, Sam-shik’s appearance causes Ha-young to doubt her dad, and on her wedding day, she disappears after receiving a photo of a recovering Kang-ho. She travels all the way to his house to catch a glimpse of him, but Tae-soo has his men drag her back home. Enraged, he hits Ha-young and orders her locked up until the election.
After barely getting away, Sam-shik attempts to contact Kang-ho and sees him heading out with his mom. He follows after them and inadvertently creates a chain reaction that leads the rest of the villagers to the burning farm. By the time everyone arrives, Young-soon is safely outside, but Kang-ho is nowhere to be found.
Mi-joo walks towards the flames as if in a trance until Sam-shik pulls her back. He douses himself in water and heroically steps into the burning building to save Kang-ho. As the villagers wait with bated breath, two figures emerge from the smoke, and they let out a cheer as Sam-shik Kang-ho carries his fiancé to safety.
In the hospital, the police come to investigate the fire, and Young-soon lies about starting it even though Sam-shik knows the truth. Realizing that it was not an accident, Mi-joo confronts Sam-shik, and after some convincing, she learns about Tae-soo’s involvement. She immediately finds Young-soon so they can call the police, but Young-soon tells her that she plans to run away.
Today’s fire reminds Young-soon of her husband’s death, and like back then, she believes nothing can be done to save them. As Mi-joo listens to her story, she reveals to Young-soon that Kang-ho never resented her. It was the opposite; he missed her.
With tears spilling down her cheeks, Young-soon looks up at Mi-joo, and it finally clicks: she was the one Kang-ho wrote about in his journal. Hugging Mi-joo, Young-soon apologizes on her son’s behalf, but Mi-joo also wants to ask for her forgiveness. She tells her the truth about the twins, and from his bed, Kang-ho hears everything and cries.
The others notice Kang-ho wake up, but their happy reunion is cut short when two detectives march into the room. They arrest Kang-ho for the murder of Hwang Soo-hyun (Tae-soo’s mistress), but with their flimsy evidence and Kang-ho’s amnesia, they are forced to let him go for now.
Unfortunately, Kang-ho’s efforts to save the mistress and the child appear to have failed since her body was found in the ocean along with her possessions. Ever the twisted soul, Tae-soo found this news aggravating, and to cover his tracks, he joined hands with Woo-byeok to pin the murder on Kang-ho.
In order to clear his name, Kang-ho keeps up his act as the injured man, but Young-soon sees right through him. She welcomes him back and apologizes for everything she did. After their tearful reconciliation, Kang-ho says his goodbyes to the rest of his family: the twins and Mi-joo. Though he longs to stay with them, he knows they will always be in danger as long as Tae-soo and Woo-byeok roam free, so he tells Mi-joo to hate him a bit longer until his return.
While Kang-ho investigates the new murder case and looks for his old boss, Mi-joo refuses to sit by idly and takes matters into her own hands. Teaming up with Sam-shik, they go to meet Ha-young but are turned away at the door. Utilizing some crocodile tears, Mi-joo obtains some information from the housekeeper, and the two of them deduce that Tae-soo had his daughter hospitalized until the election. Thus, their hunt for the missing politician’s daughter begins.
It turns out that Kang-ho’s greatest ally is and will always be Mi-joo. At first, I thought Young-soon would help her son take down Tae-soo and Woo-byeok because if anyone has a vendetta against them, it should be her. However, when I saw her burn all the evidence, I knew Young-soon would always assume she knew what was best for Kang-ho, so it made sense that her desire is his safety above all else. Even with Woo-byeok and Tae-soo actively going after him, she is too scared to act against them and chooses to run instead of fight. It’s a valid response, but it also makes me wonder if her story is over since Kang-ho has switched to full vengeance-mode.
I wish the reconciliation between her and Kang-ho was handled better because the current ending feels forced. The show is taking the easy way out by glossing over Young-soon’s actions and telling the audience that Kang-ho never resented her so we should forgive her in tandem. However, just hours before she tried to marry him off without his consent and treated him so poorly that even Kang-ho called her out on her controlling behavior, and yet… everything is all right now because she apologized? Young-soon has so much room for growth (and desperately needs it), but I don’t think the show wants to do any heavy lifting for her character. Now that the story has shifted as well, I doubt she will get any meaningful moments in the last two episodes besides her cancer story line, which is a shame because she could have been so much more than a “bad mother.”
While I am disappointed with Young-soon’s trajectory, Mi-joo has gone above and beyond as a character, and with each passing episode, I adore her more. Like everyone else, Mi-joo makes mistakes, but unlike most of the other characters in the show, she learns from them and tries to be better. She shows people compassion, yet she does not allow others to walk all over her, even if that person is Kang-ho. When he tried to pull the same stunt on her again, Mi-joo doesn’t wait around for him like last time, but instead, she jumps in to help him. She’s smart and resilient, similar to Young-soon, but unlike the latter, Mi-joo meets Kang-ho where he is rather than force him to change into someone he is not. Thus, if anyone can pull Kang-ho from the brink of self-destruction, it’s Mi-joo.
Though I am a bit unsure about how much practical help Mi-joo’s team will provide Kang-ho, I am glad more characters are involving themselves in the case if the last two episodes are going to focus on revenge. Mi-joo and Sam-shik add a nice bit of levity to the show, and I much prefer this version of Sam-shik (a scaredy-cat who hides in closets) over the stealing, con artist Sam-shik. I also wouldn’t be surprised if the villagers become important later on to provide a contrast to Hae-shik’s situation and show Young-soon that she is not alone this time around. It would also give the villagers a nice redemption arc from the composer fiasco and serve as a bookend to their story — they banded together to kick her out and now they band together to save her.