It's insane, and I swear I hate it as much as I love it, but it's gotten so far under my skin I can't escape.
Twelve episodes in, and we've hit every drama trope I can think of--chaebols and evil first loves, amnesia and fatal illnesses lurking in the wings, cruel fathers, gangsters, poor but plucky heroes lured into the tangled family politics of the company, romantic rectangles, revenge and murder and the redemptive power of love. And I'm wallowing in it. What do they even have left? I'm equal parts terrified and excited to find out.
Kang Maru is played by the spectacular Song Joong Ki, who brings life to a tricky character. Maru walks that fine antihero line of "I hate you so much I want to slug you" and "God you poor baby, what has life done to you."Which seriously, could go so, so wrong. And let's be real, Joong Ki has the face of a mischievous angel, which makes Maru's dead expression and heartless manipulation of others all the more terrifying. The thing about Maru is you never know where truth and lies begin and end...not the other characters, not you. Maybe not even him.
And that's all down to his tortured love affair with Han Jae Hee, a femme fatale he's known from childhood who betrays him in favor of climbing the social ladder. He loves her, he hates her, he wants her back and he wants to destroy her like she destroyed him. It's a messed up addiction for both parties, and they're always finding new ways to hurt each other. She's a terrible person, but she's a terrible person with reasons, and I keep veering from hating her murdering guts and wincing in sympathy because she's so human in her wants--prosperity, belonging, love, her son's wellbeing. Occasionally, she even shows flashes of human kindness. It can be hard to tell, though, because they never last long enough for anyone to get a good look.
She, in turn, is stepmother to chaebol heiress Seo Eun Ki, played by a Moon Chae Won who grounds this vulnerable wild child in a way a lesser actress couldn't have. Fierce, brilliant and determined on the surface, Eun Ki is emotionally fragile and intensely lonely within. Her father is an icy perfectionist, for whom even her skills are never enough. Her mother gave up on an impossible marital situation and left, dying in mysterious circumstances some time later. And Eun Ki sees her hypocritical stepmother for the manipulative gold digger she is, willingly existing in a perpetual state of tense stalemate with her. She's devoted to her family's company, but is rapidly being shoved out by her father and stepmother. All this leaves her painfully ripe for Maru to use to get revenge on Jae Hee.
Twisted enough for you yet?
It's the easiest thing in the world for a master player like Maru to seduce an emotional innocent like Eun Ki--all he has to do is be there when she needs him, and feed her all the classic hallmarks of a grand passion. She falls so hard you could hear it across the ocean. But then it gets complicated.
What started out as a doorway to Maru's ex and his revenge becomes an increasingly intense love affair, all the more so because while Eun Ki succumbs to her feelings without hesitation, Maru tries to strangle his stillborn. In true Nice Guy fashion, it's impossible to tell what degree of sincerity he's applying in any given situation, doubly so because there are always a multiplicity of motives involved.
For instance, he tells Eun Ki he loves her over the phone, while gleefully locking eyes with Jae Hee, stabbing home at her. He and Jae Hee then proceed to have a vindictive make out session. However, that night, he'll watch a sweetly sleeping Eun Ki with opaque eyes, brushing a strand of hair from her face. That particular strand seems to fascinate him--he's always brushing it out of her eyes. The next morning, he'll be the most generous we've ever seen him be to an outsider (ie, not Jae Gil his best friend or Choco his beloved little sister) by urging her to leave. He's not good for her. Is it another manipulative ploy, knowing she'll never go? Or is it raw honesty for once? Or is it both?
For another, after she discovers some of the things he's done and coldly ends it, he'll take a brutal beating from hired thugs sent by Jae Hee seeking a promise he'll never pursue Eun Ki again. He refuses to make it, and the audience is left wondering why--does he still hope to use her? Does he just want to get under Jae Hee's skin? Or does he genuinely have feelings for her he doesn't want to sell? All we know is that when she show up on his doorstep, barefoot in the rain, abandoning her family and life in a wild bet that his past actions aren't his real self, he simply embraces her...while once again locking eyes in an unreadable message with Jae Hee. That night, he'll give her a soft kiss as she sleeps, despite having shied away from her attempts to look at his injuries. The next day, she'll beg him to run away with her, and he'll brush her off, coolly declaring all he wants from her is her position in society. But we discover later that after she disappears for a year, he's been refusing to move, hoping against hope she would come find him....even though when she does, he sends her briskly away, disclaiming all attachment.
Do you see what I mean by hard to read? It might even be considered downright contradictory, except that I think there is a logic to Maru and his choices.
What started out as a doorway to Maru's ex and his revenge becomes an increasingly intense love affair, all the more so because while Eun Ki succumbs to her feelings without hesitation, Maru tries to strangle his stillborn. In true Nice Guy fashion, it's impossible to tell what degree of sincerity he's applying in any given situation, doubly so because there are always a multiplicity of motives involved.
For instance, he tells Eun Ki he loves her over the phone, while gleefully locking eyes with Jae Hee, stabbing home at her. He and Jae Hee then proceed to have a vindictive make out session. However, that night, he'll watch a sweetly sleeping Eun Ki with opaque eyes, brushing a strand of hair from her face. That particular strand seems to fascinate him--he's always brushing it out of her eyes. The next morning, he'll be the most generous we've ever seen him be to an outsider (ie, not Jae Gil his best friend or Choco his beloved little sister) by urging her to leave. He's not good for her. Is it another manipulative ploy, knowing she'll never go? Or is it raw honesty for once? Or is it both?
For another, after she discovers some of the things he's done and coldly ends it, he'll take a brutal beating from hired thugs sent by Jae Hee seeking a promise he'll never pursue Eun Ki again. He refuses to make it, and the audience is left wondering why--does he still hope to use her? Does he just want to get under Jae Hee's skin? Or does he genuinely have feelings for her he doesn't want to sell? All we know is that when she show up on his doorstep, barefoot in the rain, abandoning her family and life in a wild bet that his past actions aren't his real self, he simply embraces her...while once again locking eyes in an unreadable message with Jae Hee. That night, he'll give her a soft kiss as she sleeps, despite having shied away from her attempts to look at his injuries. The next day, she'll beg him to run away with her, and he'll brush her off, coolly declaring all he wants from her is her position in society. But we discover later that after she disappears for a year, he's been refusing to move, hoping against hope she would come find him....even though when she does, he sends her briskly away, disclaiming all attachment.
Do you see what I mean by hard to read? It might even be considered downright contradictory, except that I think there is a logic to Maru and his choices.
A car crash marks the half-way point of the story, with both predictable and not-so-predictable results. Eun Ki suffers a truly intense form of amnesia, which not only wipes away her memories but many of her basic skills, such as reading and mathematics. She's reduced to the naivete of a child, and one who desperately needs protection in the wake of her father's death and Jae Hee's ruthless company takeover. Maru suffers potentially fatal brain damage as well, although in tune with his self-destructive tendencies, he chooses to ignore it rather than seeking the medical help that could fix it.
In the end, he's the only one who can protect her and help her start to recover both her self and her place. And with this role in her life comes a softening, both internally and externally. In my favorite scene so far, he reluctantly asks his sweet best friend for dating advice...while he knows how to seduce women, he doesn't know to be genuine. But he wants to be, with her.
Their date is a haunting montage of walks along a deserted beach and through an autumnal field, with an especially eerie scene of the two of them sitting by the water while he plays her a melancholy tune on a harmonica. Over all this, he thoughtfully address his long-dead father (or possibly God. There's a long-running debate within the show about whether it's possible for a supreme being to exist in such an unfair world):
“Father,
One day, a woman walked into my life. I hurt her deeply with the harshest words possible. I pushed her away as much as I could. But, she still came back to me. She is so much like me; I look at myself often when I look at her. She has the physical wounds that I have. The tears that fill my brain are flowing through her heart as well. I gave her those wounds. I made her cry. I should not have met her. I should not have allowed her to come into the life of a guy like me.
Father, I’m regretting it. This is the first time… that I have ever regretted anything in my life.” (dramabeans translation)
Do you see why I'm a mess? It's absurd, but gloriously absurd. I love gloriously absurd. I now spend my free time listening to music that reminds me of these two, dreamily trying to plumb the depths of Maru's twisty brain.
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