Empathy can be a tool and a strength, bringing people together and motivating them to action. However, it also means sharing the feelings of others, including their pain and sorrows. While our protagonists follow the right path, it’s a perilous road filled with heartache and unease. At times, our team may want to quit and blame themselves for their misfortunes, but as long as they march forward, they’ll eventually find the end and come out on top.
EPISODE 11 RECAP
Tae-yong praises Yoo-kyung’s latest article for emphasizing the police mishandling the case rather than the culprit, but all Sam-soo can think about is money. On top of supporting Doo-shik’s family, they have to pay Yoo-kyung a salary. On cue, their newest team member walks in after quitting her job, and Tae-yong exchanges worried looks with Sam-soo.
Not everyone is happy with the article, though, and Mayor Kang scolds Prosecutor Jang for messing up again. His daughter, Kang Chae-eun, defends her husband, and Prosecutor Jang explains how they will shift all the blame to the police.
Prosecutor Jang laughs at Prosecutor Yoon’s nervous pacing and tells him to stop fretting. He encourages his junior prosecutor to chose his sides wisely since acting out now will mean turning against Partner Kim. Prosecutor Yoon is skeptical of his advice, so Prosecutor Jang tells him that humiliation is brief while glory is long.
The police are also meeting to discuss how to deal with Yoo-kyung’s article, and Chief Ahn asks Detective Bong what happened to the knife. Detective Bong tells them that he threw it off a bridge, and the others relax since the only evidence to open up the case is gone.
Unlike the rest, Detective Bong displays a sense of guilt for what they did, but neither Chief Ahn nor Detective Bae are sympathetic to his woes. They tell him to divide up the guilt—the prosecutors and judges are equally if not more guilty than they are—and treat it like a light feather.
In the past, Detective Bae overheard Jae-sung telling Sang-man about the knife’s location, and before Sang-man got his search warrant, the three officers went to the house and found the knife. Unwilling to dirty their own hands, the others tasked Detective Bong with destroying the weapon.
Back in the present, Tae-yong arrives at Sang-man’s place and finds him mediating in the dark. The ex-detective has a favor and asks Tae-yong to meet with Detective Bong instead of him. In exchange, he offers to meet Jae-sung since he still wants to believe in his juniors and their integrity. Tae-yong wonders if the other officers will know his feelings, but Sang-man isn’t doing it to garner appreciation.
Sang-man looks over to Tae-yong and wonders where his courage comes from to be able to fight these difficult battles over and over again. Tae-yong calls Sang-man an even more incredible person than him since he dedicated his life to solving cases and sympathizing with those in pain.
Answering his question, Tae-yong tells Sang-man that he works in order to keep smiling. The real bad guys live without an ounce of guilt, so he refuses to let them steal his smile, too. Tae-yong believes that the selfless will reach the top in the end, and he asks Sang-man to keep smiling with him until they reach that end.
Sang-man marvels at Tae-yong’s energy, and Tae-yong promises to let the ex-detective get the last laugh. They both comment on how lucky they are to be partners, and Sang-man places his arm around Tae-yong’s shoulders.
Sam-soo reads the article about Jae-sung, and seeing the daughters reminds him of his conversation with Doo-shik from before. The moment he feared has arrived, and Sam-soo asks Yoo-kyung to put a hold on their plans for a while.
While Sang-man watches Jae-sung from afar, his wife calls to scold him about his obsession with the case and hangs up before he can explain. Returning to his current task, Sang-man joins Jae-sung as he helps an old man pick up recycling. Jae-sung frowns when he recognizes the ex-detective, but Sang-man smiles back and tells him to keep working.
Detective Bong reads through the notebook and cries as he realizes just how much Sang-man trusted him. Later that night, he calls Sang-man out for drinks, and after a few bottles, he asks why Sang-man would be afraid to see him. Sang-man tells him that with age, one comes to fear the weak and frail.
His answer upsets Detective Bong, and he shouts at Sang-man, demanding an answer to his question: why does he trust him? Sang-man wishes he could hate him, too, but he just can’t. Unable to face him any longer, Detective Bong leaves in a taxi, and in his drunken stupor, he stumbles through a neighbor and recalls the day he betrayed Sang-man.
Contrary to what he told the others, Detective Bong hid the weapon inside an old wall, and in the present, he finds his way to the same location and falls to the ground, weeping. Memories of Sang-man fill the detective with guilt, and he remembers how much he admired the ex-detective.
Detective Bong looked on with awe as Sang-man arrested two gang members by himself. When he asked how he did it, Sang-man offered to share his method, but it only consisted of declaring his name, staring down criminals, and arresting them. Since Detective Bong’s eyes were too kind for this tactic, Sang-man made him practice growling his name in order to intimidate criminals.
In Tae-yong’s office, Yoo-kyung tells the team that they need to reveal all the officers’ names, but Sam-soo is against the idea. A call from Detective Bong puts their argument on hold, and Tae-yong goes down to meet with him. At a café, the detective returns the notebook since he’s leaving to someplace far away, and Tae-yong agrees to pass it along to Sang-man.
The next day, Tae-yong and the crew drop by Sang-man’s place, but the ex-detective barely registers their presence as he watches the news. Everyone’s attention turns to the tv, and they stare in shock at the news of Detective Bong’s suicide. Prosecutor Jang calls Sam-soo to blame him for another death, but his goading is unnecessary since the whole team already looks devastated.
Tae-yong joins Sang-man for drinks and apologizes for making him experience so much pain. Tipping back another shot, Sang-man shares the story of his son’s death. The two of them went fishing one day, and coincidentally, the person next to them was a wanted rapist and murderer. While Sang-man chased after the criminal, his son fell into the lake, and by the time he looked back, his son was nowhere to be found.
Sang-man weeps for his son and tells Tae-yong that his son was the same age as Doo-shik when he died. He wanted to help Doo-shik because he reminded him of his son, but now he lost his most cherished junior as well. He blames himself for both deaths, but Tae-yong says that he isn’t the one at fault.
After Tae-yong accompanies Sang-man to Detective Bong’s funeral, he returns to his office to work. Though Yoo-kyung worries about him, Tae-yong says that he is fine thanks to her comforting words, and he wonders why Sam-soo always disappears to the mountains when something happens.
Visiting Detective Bong’s urn, Sang-man places a photo of the old team and breaks down into tears. The detective’s wife finds him, and they sit down to chat. While she still resents Sang-man, she isn’t here to blame him for her husband’s death. Sliding over the suicide note, she asks Sang-man to uncover the truth since that’s the only way to bring him peace.
COMMENTS
Another person takes his life out of guilt, and once again, our protagonists deal with the sorrow and pain that comes with it. As Tae-yong mentioned, the victims and those who help them tend to blame themselves for the tragedies that happen in their lives while the actual people responsible for these problems are often going about their day without an ounce of guilt. It should not come as a surprise that those without a conscience feel no remorse for their actions, but Tae-yong is right, this reality needs to change. Though Detective Bong’s suicide was still the cowardly way out—he never apologized to Doo-shik, left behind his family, and ran away from the consequences—I still pity him. As the rookie, you could argue that Detective Bong had the least amount of responsibility for this mess, yet out of everyone, he carried the most guilt. The ones who should have also been quaking in their boots and enduring nightmares are too busy shifting the blame to other people. Just as Jae-sung believes he’s now an innocent man, it appears as if the police and prosecution think they have no fault because if the others did their job, then none of this would have happened. However, like Jae-sung, their logic is utter garbage, and it doesn’t change the truth of the matter: they all framed an innocent boy and let the murderer walk away.
It infuriated me that Chief Ahn blamed Sang-man for causing the detective’s death because it shows how little he thinks of his past misdeeds. Rather than reflect on his actions and realize the harm he caused Detective Bong, Chief Ahn still thinks he did the right thing and uses his relative “powerlessness” as an excuse for his behavior. He’s a toxic person through and through, and it breaks my heart that Detective Bong’s family resents Sang-man more than they do Chief Ahn or Detective Bae. I was especially enraged at Chief Ahn when he brought up Sang-man’s deceased son because he should know about the circumstances of the son’s death. It was clearly an unfortunate accident, and in that situation, how could you blame Sang-man for chasing after a rapist murderer? I didn’t see his actions as a case-obsessed detective who abandons his family to catch criminals, yet Chief Ahn twists the narrative in a way to deliberately hurt Sang-man for his own benefit. By painting Sang-man as this crazed officer who heeds no one’s safety—not even his own family—it becomes easier to vilify him instead of dealing with their own shame and wrongdoings. Unfortunately, Sang-man believes a part of this narrative and blames himself for his son’s death as well as Detective Bong’s, but luckily, this time Tae-yong is around to tell Sang-man that he isn’t at fault.
In some ways, Tae-yong feels like the son that Sang-man never got to see grown up, and Sang-man feels like the supportive father that Tae-yong never experienced. Watching them playfully argue about who was luckier to have the other as their partner was sweet, but as the camera panned away, it didn’t just look like two coworkers. It appeared as if a father was lovingly patting his son on his shoulder, and in that moment, these two lonely individuals found comfort in each other’s presence. This is also probably why Tae-yong became so emotional after hearing Sang-man’s sorrows and also why Sang-man felt vulnerable enough to share his biggest pain with Tae-yong. While these two characters have just met in the grand scheme of things, they’ve quickly bonded over their mutual admiration for each other, and unbeknownst to them, they’re slowly filling in the role the other needed.
Though not directly related to this episode, it’s hard not to talk about the show without mentioning all the behind-the-scenes drama. With an episode cancelled this week since filming came to a halt after someone tested positive for COVID-19 and Bae Sung-woo’s drunk driving incident coming to light recently, the production of Fly Dragon has met a crisis. Fans are clamoring for a solution—varying from a cast replacement to early cancellation—and no matter the resolution, it seems unlikely for the creators to please everyone. As a Bae Sung-woo fan, I’m deeply disappointed by his actions, and while I loved his performance, a crime is a crime. Ignoring this incident and letting things remain the same would have contradicted the very essence of the show. However, with three episodes left to film, it seems difficult to replace the actor at this point and refilm his scenes. In the end, the production team has decided to edit out Sam-soo as much as they can, which seems like the best course of action right now. Most of the time, I have no problem separating an actor from their role—it is their job to convince the viewers, after all—but this situation is a bit different. Not only has the scandal occurred during the show’s run, Sam-soo isn’t just any character. He might be brash and materialistic, but he’s an empathetic journalist who stands for justice. Even if this means saying bye to Sam-soo completely, I wish for the best, and hope the creators can manage some semblance of closure. While I wouldn’t call Fly Dragon an amazing drama, I still really enjoy it, and hope that its core message isn’t lost because of one individual’s mistake.