Only a few days remain before the end of the world, and our genius engineer makes a choice that might alter the course of history. However, his decision comes at a cost, but if it means saving the love of his life, then he is willing to pay the price even if it means making her cry in the process.
EPISODE 14 RECAP
Tae-sool chucks his phone to the ground, but something catches his eye. He discovers the hidden camera inside the studio, and it slowly dawns on him that Sigma must have been watching him this entire time.
Sigma joins the table after his call and tells Officer Hwang to carry on with their plans. He proposes a toast to their futures, and they raise their glasses. After the party, Seung-bok brings snacks to his research team and thinks back to his conversation with Sigma.
During their private chat, Sigma told Seung-bok that history-makers do not always know how special they are in the beginning. He used Edison as the classic example, and explained how he lost to Tesla constantly yet everyone only remembers Edison now. Like the famed inventor, Sigma believed Seung-bok could be the same.
Remembering Tae-sool’s warnings, Seung-bok pointed out that building the uploader meant starting a war, but Sigma denied it. He claimed that the uploader saved lives like Seo-jin’s mom, and turned his icy stare towards her. To Seung-bok’s disbelief, Seo-jin pleaded with him to build the uploader, and Sigma smiled, knowing that he won.
While Sigma tries to get ahold of Tae-sool’s coding, Seung-bok meets with his researchers and informs them of their change in plans. He needs them to build the machine first and hands them a blueprint for the new uploader.
Mr. Park monitors his old house and pulls out a gun when he sees himself beating his wife again. Before he gets out, Bingbing arrives to stop him. While they bicker, the wife comes out, and Mr. Park is too distracted by her to notice his present self walking towards the van.
His present self hits the windshield and accuses Mr. Park of having an affair with his wife. While Bingbing cries at her boss to do something, he drives away from his present self and bumps into a parked car. With nowhere else to run, Mr. Park starts to vanish as his present self draws closer to him.
As his present self prepares for his final swing, his wife jumps in and grabs her husband. Enraged by her meddling, he raises his hand to hit her, but Bingbing shoots the ground first. She screams at him to leave the woman alone, and the wife drags present Mr. Park away.
Tae-sool returns her old gun to her and asks for a few minutes to talk. He shows her the storage room and reveals the refrigerators filled with antibiotics. He also got them weapons, but more importantly, he stocked the bunker with plenty of food, particularly all her favorites.
The last stop on their tour is the levers, and Tae-sools explains how the bunker doors will close and open even if the buttons break. Seo-hae asks if he really made all this, and Tae-sool tells her that it was the least he could do for her.
Since his time is up, Tae-sool leaves, but Seo-hae runs up to him and hugs him. They lie on the bed together and stare into each other’s eyes until Tae-sool gets up. He has Seo-hae teach him how to shoot, and she gives him a quick lesson from how to hold a gun to basic maintenance.
He asks how long she stayed inside the bunker, and she tells him that it was for nine years. In the beginning, she wondered about her friends and the outside world, but after a while, time became a blur. She smiles, hiding the pain behind her words, but Tae-sool holds her back and hugs her.
The Control Bureau locates Tae-sool in his car, but no matter where they look, they cannot find Seo-hae. Officer Hwang informs Sigma of the unprecedented situation, and for once, he seems slightly flustered. Right then, he receives a call from Tae-sool who tells him that he is in charge now, and Sigma chuckles to himself, wondering how he will win again this time.
Still searching for Seo-hae, Sun drops by his old workplace and checks the alley where they first met. He only finds garbage there, but things turn from bad to worse when the Control Bureau shows up. Though Sun tries to flee, Officer Hwang threatens to bring his family back to Korea, so Sun turns himself over.
They drag Sun to Sigma, and as soon as the younger man learns his name, he drops to his knees. Sigma tells him that he will not hurt him and explains to Sun that he is just trying to make some money. When his nice guy tactic fails, Sigma takes a different route and mentions Seo-hae.
He knows that Sun stayed in the country because of her and says that he likes her, too. However, if things continue, then she will die in the end, but Sigma offers an alternative. He hands Sun two plane tickets and claims that all he has to do is find Seo-hae.
Sun does not fall for his ploy, so Sigma shows his true colors and threatens to kill him and his family if he refuses. He gives him one more chance to reconsider, and Sun accepts his deal as long as he promises to let Seo-hae live.
Sigma instructs Officer Hwang to make Seo-hae come to them instead of chasing her. As for Tae-sool, he will catch him personally since he knows where he will be.
With only a day left until the war, the time traveling politicians all leave the country under the pretenses of work, and Seung-bok prepares a bunker for Seo-jin and her mom. He offers to help her in any way he can and begs her to let him stay by her side. She refuses his advances, but Seung-bok takes out the ring and tells her that he can wait forever.
The brokers also prepare for the end of the world when Tae-sool walks into their store. Meanwhile, Mr. Park is still recovering from his last visit to his present self and tries to step out despite his condition. Bingbing holds him back, having figured out that he kills himself today, and Mr. Park asks who she really is.
As their fight gets heated, the other brokers interrupt them since they have a guest. Tae-sool enters the room and tosses a bag at Mr. Park’s feet in exchange for a gun to kill Sigma. Mr. Park laughs at his offer since money is useless, but when they open the bag, they find fifty years’ worth of antibiotics.
It is enough to get him a gun, and his earlier lesson pays off as he checks the weapon for any defects. He ignores Mr. Park’s mocking advice and repeats the quote about the future already being here. He whispers something in his ear, and Mr. Park’s face turns grim.
COMMENTS
The short scenes of Seo-hae and her dad in the future were bittersweet, capturing the harsh reality of a post-apocalyptic world in quieter, more character-driven moments. Dad is split between his two desires—to teach Seo-hae how to survive and to shield her from suffering—and we see his attempts to create a semblance of normalcy for his daughter whether that be Christmas parties or recording her height on the wall. I wished the show spent more time on their relationship and Seo-hae’s childhood in the bunker because it sheds so much light on her character as well as her dad. It explains the dichotomy that exists in Seo-hae and meshes the two sides of her so well. She can be both the fangirl who loves plushies and the badass warrior who never misses a shot because of her dad’s parenting. He teaches her how to fight, but at the same time, he tries his best to preserve her youth so she grows up to be a caring person rather than a heartless killing machine.
We learn in the episode that Tae-sool built the bunker, and in a way, it also served as a metaphor for his relationship with Seo-hae. He created a state-of-the-art facility filled with all the amenities her family will need, and his choice of food and goods reflects what he knows about Seo-hae. While it is a sweet gesture, there is something ironic about the whole scene because, in the end, Seo-hae tells him that living in the bunker was a nightmare. No matter how well Tae-sool builds the place with her needs in mind, he does not understand what life was like for Seo-hae growing up. He fails to recognize the emotional toil she went through trapped in that bunker with no hope for a better future, and thus, he traps her in there again with his own two hands because he thinks this will save her. He claims that his actions are for her sake, but Tae-sool strips Seo-hae of her agency and makes her feel helpless as a result. Tae-sool believes he is doing the right thing for her—and maybe he is—but Seo-hae does not see it that way because, to her, Tae-sool is her hope and future. Just as he does not want her to sacrifice her life for him, she does not want him to die for her sake.
Though the war is only a day away, I’m not that excited about the upcoming battle between Tae-sool and Sigma. I’m assuming Tae-sool has some plan up his sleeve, especially now that he knows the future, but since the show revealed so little of his thoughts, I don’t understand why he is so confident all of a sudden. The main problem Tae-sool has is not technically defeating Sigma, but defeating him while also protecting Seo-hae. Keeping her inside the bunker might save her from a physical death, but it does not answer the question of the time paradox. If Tae-sool was not able to shoot present Sigma because of his fear of losing Seo-hae, what makes this time different? Hopefully, the final week will provide some much-needed answers, but as I’ve said multiple times before (and as many of you have pointed out as well), the show should have answered a lot more questions by now.
Whenever the show focused on the secondary and tertiary characters this episode, my interest dropped considerably which is a shame since the actors are great and I love a well-developed supporting role. The brokers have become one-note, and their motivations are either paper-thin or nonexistent. If Bingbing really is Mr. Park’s daughter or somehow related to his backstory, I wish they revealed it sooner because it would have made his character more complex and possibly explained why he wants his family with him again after abusing them for years. Besides the brokers, Seo-jin and Seung-bok’s storyline has dissolved into mediocrity, and I couldn’t care less about what happens to either of them. The show turned Seung-bok into a sniveling ex-boyfriend who is fueled by jealousy, and his declaration of “love” to Seo-jin was puzzling and problematic. All in all, everything that has to do with Sigma tends to fall flat, and his manipulation of Seung-bok and Sun was banal at best. The use of red to show his evilness is cool in certain scenes, but as with many things with the show, the creators overdo it, and consequently, the impact lessens. With only two more episodes left, I don’t expect a spectacular ending that will resolve all the show’s problems, but hopefully, the creators will at least be able to pull off a decent closure for its characters and answer some of the time paradox questions in a meaningful way.