by: Raine

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This post is for 14th-Century Bitte. I was having a terrible day and she totally bolstered me.

Kang-chil = adorable.

“???” – ??? (from the Padam Padam OST)

There are no additional tracks. *sob* I’ll stick it in when more of the OST comes out!

episode 4 recap

Im Jung, Kang-chil’s son, watches the other kids at school play sports while Gook-soo talks to his teacher. Jung is one of the best students in the nation and the teacher looks distressed when Gook-soo says Jung has to transfer. Jung, too, looks perturbed.

On the terrace of the animal hospital, Kang-chil is waiting for Ji-na’s response and looks as flustered as she does. A man who has nothing and learned nothing doesn’t have the right to date or love, right? he assumes from her silence. He’ll pass it along to that guy.

She asks why this man hasn’t dated, loved, and broken up by his age. What had he been doing instead? Kang-chil replies that the man was framed and in jail for a very, very long time. Her face drops. They both get nervous and she changes the subject, asking him about his plans for the interior of the hospital.

They look through a magazine for ideas and he wonders when they are going to get materials. When she doesn’t answer he says they don’t have to go together but it will be costly for him to buy materials and return them if she doesn’t like them. (He’s trying too hard. Que cute!)

She, charmed by him, asks when he’d like to go. “Now!” He smiles at her and stares, completely smitten. She wonders why he does that and he says that merely looking at a woman makes him smile.

Min Hyo-sook comes by with her baby and Kang-chil adorably asks, “What’s that? Is that a person?” HAHAHA!!!!! He begins to play with the child, making her cry but is interrupted by Hyo-sook ordering him to go down to the street.

There he finds a busted up blue flatbed. He proceeds to ADORABLY freak out over it and Hyo-sook and Ji-na both smile uncontrollably at his childlike enthusiasm. Ji-na, however, sobers at the thought of his liver cancer as Hyo-sook tells him he has to pay her back, but he doesn’t care. He’s too stoked.

The mysterious man in the cap, Oh Yong-hak is watching Kang-chil when DA Park Chan-gul’s lackies chase him. He gets away and calls DA Park who notes that Yong-hak must be worried about his father seeing as he moved him somewhere. Yong-hak says he’s thinking about meeting Kang-chil to which DA Park replies that Kang-chil won’t be too happy to see him. “Come see me. You won’t get a cent anymore.”

As DA Park looks into a room where the drug dealer that Detective Jung shot is being held for questioning, he angrily calls his lackies and tells them to bring Yong-hak to him before he meets with Kang-chil.

Kang-chil is whistling in the new flatbed on the way to Seoul and Ji-na smiles at him as he smiles at her: smitten. However, she is not even close to realizing it.

Gook-soo follows Im Jung to his apartment (Kim Nana’s apartment from City Hunter) explaining Kang-chil’s behavior. He was surprised to have a son but Jung says he doesn’t care.

When he steps in the apartment, he sees shoes and leaves, face dark. A man comes out, his aunt’s boyfriend, and starts yelling at him and beating on him. Jung glares and they both leave, one after the other. A kid comes out and Gook-soo finds out that they are not related…and then steals the kid’s lollipop.

In Seoul, Kang-chil takes him time getting to material shopping, taking detours at a museum, staring intently at shops and just confusing Ji-na. Finally, she says she’s going to wait for him at a cafe. He can come find her there. She starts to worry about his sleeping and eating, but catches herself and walks away, smiling at his spirited answers.

Kang-chil looks at samples and materials, then joins her. She wonders where the samples are as he does calculations and he points to his head. “In here.” Ah, so that’s where his kid gets his smarts. He starts drawing the hospital and as the 3-D image begins to pop out on paper, Ji-na’s eyes pop out of her head. He labels the different parts of the hospital with product numbers and she asks if he memorized it all.

However, he doesn’t answer as he’s mesmerized by her ice-cream. She gives it to him with a smile and watches him eat like a kid. I think she enjoys the fact that he’s so completely unaware of his gifts or his childlike charms.

Gook-soo follows Jung to his tutoring, declaring him a prodigy. Then, they head to a pojangmacha (tented, street restaurant) where his aunt (his mother’s friend) works. Her boyfriend is harassing her for money and generally frustrated over taking care of an unrelated.

“Your dad will send you to college,” Gook-soo says and Jung says he can send himself. He’s not a poor kid with no where to go. Amused, Gook-soo says his temper is like his father’s. He also points out that it would be easier on his aunt if Jung lived with his dad. The only reason he’d go would be for revenge. That’s fine by Gook-soo. Jung leaves his bank information for his aunt and leaves.

At a street stall, Ji-na and Kang-chil are eating spicy rice cakes, fish cakes and intestines. Kang-chil is practically inhaling his food and she asks why. He replies that he swore to eat as much of this kind of food as possible when he got out. Then he gets serious and says he doesn’t think that he’ll ever have a moment in his life that’s earnest. I think he just feels jaded by all of the ill fortune that has befallen him.

Ji-na pays for their meal and asks him to go eat real food because he hasn’t slept, worked very hard and ate junk food. When she realizes she’s holding onto him, she quickly mutters that he’ll get a stomach ache. But he doesn’t leave and she tells him it’s not good for his health later on to eat junk food. There is no later for me, he replies. I lived sixteen years without thinking of later. What is in front of me is good food that I can eat now. He feeds her some and gets it on her mouth. He cleans it off and they have a cute smiley session.

They go shopping and he’s dancing around as she, while trying to be inconspicuous, conspicuously chooses a shirt for him; she also gets some men’s underwear. He ends up not buying anything, not knowing how to go about it. But that’s okay, she got him a shirt he’d been eying. He says it looks ever better now.

Their cute moment is interrupted by a bunch of kids running past, excited for a fireworks show. Ji-na is absolutely surprised and delighted by the fact that he’s never seen a fireworks show. They find a tall building and he races up the stairs like a kid and then is completely blown away by the show. She seems to find more joy in watching him than the fireworks.

On the way back from Seoul, Kang-chil is singing…badly. But he’s enjoying himself. Then he starts listing all the places he wants to go and things he wants to do with his mom. If he only had a few months to live, that’s what he would want to do. He asks what she would want and she immediately sobers, shutting down as she thinks about his cancer.

Why ask? It’s pointless. Besides he said before there was only this moment. He says you never know. I think the day got to him and he started to want more in the future. It’s the little things that are making him expand his hopes and horizons. Anyway, she asks for silence, as she tends to do when she’s on the defense.

He drops her off and Young-cheol immediately gets jealous. She then tells him that Kang-chil is the man she hit. Young-cheol orders her not to tell Kang-chil. It’s settled and over. Then she asks him what Kangchil asked her. If you only had a few months to live, what would you want to do? AWW!

Kang-chil’s mother, Kim Mi-ja, tells him to stop working and get some rest, but there is no other time to work on the house since he works during the day. He tries to send her to Hyo-sook’s but she wants to stay. Why did you not answer my call when I was stabbed? She gets flustered and he says he won’t forgive her until she apologizes in earnest. Na Moon-hee as Mi-ja breaks my heart as she goes inside and gets lost in thought. There has to be a good reason why she didn’t answer the phone.

Kang-chil wallpapers as Gook-soo’s vision of the bus ride with Im Jung comes true. Gook-soo pulls photos of Jung and his mother, Soo-mi while Jung is sleeping on the bus. There is also a photo of a man in graduation clothes. Who is he?

On a rooftop, Gook-soo points out Jung who is waiting below. What’s he doing here? Gook-soo presses Kang-chil to get a liver transplant for his mom’s sake. She’s already lost one son. Kang-chil snaps that he won’t let her seem him die.

Gook-soo gets really upset. It isn’t fair. He gets framed and stuck in jail for sixteen years. He finally gets out, gets a job, lives with his mom and then he gets cancer?! Kang-chil can barely process the emotions that overwhelm him. Get a transplant, Gook-soo says. The kid is young and can afford to donate part of his liver. They can care for him and send him to college in America.

“It’s been 16 years since you’ve been out. Isn’t it amazing? When you open your eyes tom morning this isn’t solitary confinement or a cell! Isn’t it crazy and amazing that you’re with your mother, even if this place is a shi thole? Don’t you love being able to see your mother and saying hello to her every day, you crazy fool? Aish! Coming back into the world, everything seems amazing. It’s amazing for you too. You need to date a girl too. You need to love someone like everyone else. Like a human being. at least once.”

Kang-chil is completely affected by Gook-soo who continues. Let your mom be able to boast about you to the people in the market. Kang-chil collapses into a crouch because this much future talk and hope is overwhelming.

“What if he doesn’t’ give me his liver?” They just have to put in the effort and love him. Kang-chil says to find out if they’re really related. “Then let’s talk again.” Gook-soo is unsure whether to give him a white or black star because stealing a kid’s liver kinda puts the whole star system in a gray black area.

Gook-soo takes Jung up some stairs and then “accidentally” knocks him down. Oh! Time to visit the hospital. Oh! and while we’re at it, let’s take some blood. Oh! You’re AB. Gook-soo freaks and thinks that they’re for sure related. You sure don’t know a lot about science, buddy.

Kang-chil heads to an old farmhouse that Hyo-sook told him about and he checks it out, imagining his future workshop in it with a smile.

Ji-na feeds wild animals and springs traps. The ahjumma who set them chases her and she gets caught in one.

Meanwhile, Jung checks out the shabby house as Gook-soo tells Mi-ja about Kang-chil’s amazingly smart song. Mi-ja immediately sets to making food for him but is interrupted by a furious Jung. How is a poor family to send him to America?

Tenggie, pooch of destiny, finds Kang-chil on his way back and leads him to Ji-na who is in shock from the pain. She keeps asking him why he’s there. He asks her if she can handle when he takes the trap off. She nods and he makes a chomp out of a rag and puts it in her mouth. He removes it quickly and then pinches her cheeks, proud of how brave she was.

Then, he tenderly cleans her wound and she falls for him more. She loves his gentleness and he loves her strength.

And we have our requisite piggyback ride as the pooch of destiny leads the way forward. When he gets tired, he is pleasantly surprised that he can rests when he wants (unlike in prison.) They stop for a moment and he wipes his face. We get to see his abs and she sees his scar. She kindly tells him he doesn’t have to explain about the scar.

Her foot starts bothering her, so he picks her up bridal style, making her nervous with all the sexual tension, and starts out again.

Detective Jung flirts with a younger pharmacist (gross) by buying hangover remedies (smooth) and goes to drink soju with Young-cheol. He especially misses his wife today.

On the way home, Ji-na apologizes but Kang-chil replies that those are just words. She offers to take him to the movie or the zoo – whatever he wants. He asks for two movies, together. When she doesn’t reply he hopefully asks, “One movie?” which makes her smile and agree.

But on one condition: they have to have a decent meal first. Once and a while he has to think about later on. He stares at her, touched. No one had ever said anything so nice to him.

Young-cheol walks a wasted Detective Jung home, saying you can have Ji-na instead of her mom. When Kang-chil drives up, the green-eyed monster comes out.

Kang-chil is excited to go to the movies and she’s really pleased. When he helps her out of the car, Young-cheol sees and goes to meet them. He is prevented from asking any questions by a drunk Detective Jung. Then Kang-chil happily watches her go inside.

As Kang-chil walks home, Yong-hak calls out to him and Kang-chil thinks he’s one of DA Parks lackies and gives chase. (Watching Jung Woo-sung run = *drool*) He almost gets hit by a car. Dude, you need to check both directions before you cross the road.

Gook-soo is having a nightmare and mutters, “hyung.”

Yong-hak says, “It’s been a long time. You didn’t forget me, right? Oh Yong-hak”

We get a flashback to the night of Jung Min-ho’s murder. Chan-gul plants the knife and runs. Another kid, Yong-hak, is a bit further down the tunnel and gets up. We flash to a court room where Yong-hak indicates Chan-gul as the murderer.

Kang-chil chases Yong-hak who escapes in a taxi.

Gook-soo dreams of Kang-chil getting hit by a truck that sends him flying into the water where he floats lifelessly, eyes open.

“Kang-chil ah!”

 Comments:

WTF?! He’s not dead. Wait!!! He has miracles. But he can’t use another miracle already! NO!

*ahem*

Let’s not forget that this episode had so many cute parts I was squeeing the whole time. It also let be put on my detective cap a little.

1) Secrets of Min-ho’s murder: Here’s what we know so far:

• There were four people there that night: Kang-chil, Min-ho, Chan-gul and Yong-hak.
• Kang-chil was stabbed and then framed by Chan-gul for Min-ho’s murder.
• Yong-hak was on the ground as Chan-gul put the knife in Kang-chil’s hand and then implicated him in the murder at the trial.
• Yong-hak has something on Chan-gul that has to do with Kang-chil. Chan-gul is so upset that he sent lackies after him. He’s also been bribing Yong-hak for silence.

Is it just me, or is it that every time Tenggie, pooch of destiny, is in a scene, something happens to move the couple forward? And Kang-chil. The more he is loved, the more he is pulled out of his solely moment-to-moment living (his double-edged sword.)

I hope they go somewhere with Kang-chil’s intelligence now that they’ve introduced it.

Ji-na really won me over this episode. I love how she simply enjoys Kang-chil’s joy in life and it brings out her ability to do the same. Her character consistency is also great. When she encounters a social problem or something scary, she immediately shuts down. I really look forward to her over-coming this.

As for Im Jung’s possible other dad (’cause that’s all that other guy in the picture could mean, right?) I don’t think that’s going to pan out. Not with Gook-soo being all angel-y. Well, sorta. What’s with jackin’ the kid’s liver? That’s not going to go over well…

Oh, Gook-soo. Man, does this kid know how to pack a verbal punch. He’s brighter than he gets credit for because this guy’s tongue is SLICK.

Gimme moar.

Episodes 1 (MadDino Asylum), 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11

Character introductions.

Padam Padam Episode 4 Screencaps