Friday, August 17, 2012

Haeundae Lovers Episode 4 Recap

  This episode had quite a lot of plot development. Amnesia, yay! Wait. . . . 
  Anyway, we get plenty of back story, love polygons are set up, and we find out why Skeezo has such massive debts. Also, shirtless Jung Suk Won! Need I say more?
Blows to the Head: Tae Sung:☻ So Ra:☺☺☺

  Flashback to little Tae Sung watching a tattooed man sleep. Then we see him watching a gang fight. His mother picks him up and runs away with him, catching a train. He uses the skills he's learned from watching fights to beat up a little boy and steal his hard-boiled egg. His mother apologizes and when they get off the train she goes to buy him some eggs of his own. Tae Sung watches as she crosses the street towards him, only to be hit by a car. We see images of her loaded into the ambulance as Tae Sung looks on. 
  Tae Sung starts awake, with Dad's arm draped across him. He's amazed that he was able to sleep so well. 5 years of sleeping pills did nothing, but one night of acupuncture and he slept soundly. He panics when he doesn't see So Ra anywhere and runs around looking for her. 



  He finally locates her at the baseball diamond, where she is the pitcher for her team. A ball goes straight for Tae Sung's head, but he catches it bare-handed just in time. Everyone marvels at  his prowess and they ask him to play. He refuses and they continue with their game. So Ra hits a home run, and as she's reveling in her awesome hit she notices that everyone else is staring past her. She turns and sees Tae Sung doing a beautiful routine on the parallel bars. When he's finished, he throws the baseball at 2nd Uncle, knocking him back. Oldest Uncle swears he will scout him as he swaggers off the field. 
  Everyone is eating breakfast, and Tae Sung insists on getting his food from Dad's table, since it hasn't been touched by the others. He avoids all the seafood, though, and explains he's allergic. Gwan Soon comes out and makes a big deal about having to sit by Tae Sung. She offers him a hard-boiled egg, and he freaks out. "The very first thing I don't eat is eggs!!"
  Tae Sung's family is eating breakfast. His parents get in a fight about him. Mom storms out.
"Why does he keep staring at me?" *Shudder*
  Tae Sung is drinking tea and watching So Ra clean up after breakfast, waiting for her to go meet Boss. She's creeped out by his constant staring. Boss calls his cellphone that he left in So Ra's truck and says he'll come pick it up. Boss packs some drugs in a box and asks his girlfriend to drop it at the post office while they're out getting his phone.
  Gwan Soon is complaining that So Ra's wedding is going to be a shoddy affair—the uncles aren't even going to wear suits. But Gwan Soon thinks still needs a new expensive purse for it. Bandanna yells at her. After Bandanna and Gwan Soon leave So Ra apologizes to them and says that the reason she wants to marry Skeezo is because he's promised to take care of her dad. 


The drugs are on your face!
  Tae Sung complains about the dirt, but So Ra tells him to do it himself. He then overhears another of So Ra's phone conversations, as always assuming she's talking about the drugs. Boss shows up, but hides when he sees Tae Sung wandering around. Tae Sung follows So Ra into the deep freezer and doesn't notice when Boss locks them in. Tae Sung thinks the persimmons So Ra is eating are drugs and confronts her. She tells them she's storing them for Skeezo, and he asks who that is. "The person I'm going to marry." "The person you're going to marry is Boss! From the nightclub." She clears up the misunderstanding and tells him that Boss said he would come pick up his phone.
  They run to the door, only to find it locked; the uncles are gone on a delivery and neither Tae Sung nor So Ra have their cellphone with them. The uncles come back just as Boss is leaving with his cellphone. Luckily, So Ra happened to have a quilt with her when she snitched the persimmons, but Tae Sung refuses to use it until he realizes it's fruitless yelling.

(Sorry the pics are so misty. Special effects to show freeziness.)
  Tae Sung suddenly has a brilliant idea—short out the electricity by using water. So, he MacGyvers a device to short out the light bulb using a lighter, their quilt, and a stick of bamboo. Once So Ra realizes what he's up to, she throws a fit—he'll just electrocute himself and if he does manage to short out the freezer, they'll lose all their fish. They get in a fight over the lighter and he pins her against the wall. (Rawr. Or ouch, if she sticks to the frozen wall. She's not wearing much, after all.) 




  The uncles hear So Ra screaming for help, and they come rushing in to the freezer, catching Tae Sung in a compromising position. Thinking he's being a pervert again, Maknae grabs him. So Ra tells them that he wanted to ruin the business, and all he can talk about is whether Boss has come for the cellphone. They stand around arguing inside the freezer as 2nd Uncle tries to warm So Ra up. Maybe go outside, where it's hot. Tae Sung runs out and accidentally closes the door again in his hurry to catch Boss.

  Tae Sung chases Boss and his girlfriend to the harbor, where they take off in a yacht. He lets the air out of Boss' tires before using his half-torpedo powers again to catch up to the departing boat. He manages to catch up when they're in open water and climbs aboard.

  Gwan Soon comes home and notices nobody's around, so she tries to raid the cash register. Unfortunately for her, it's locked. As she's leaving again, a man comes up and offers to buy the fish in the tanks out front. Realizing she can take the money and run, she agrees to half price.
  Back on the yacht, Tae Sung makes his presence known. Boss realizes he came alone, so he can just dump his body to sleep with the fishes and be done with it. Tae Sung informs him that he has reached level 14 in several martial arts, so he's not afraid. (When did he have the time to learn all these skills while still becoming a prosecutor, I wonder. World class gymnast, 5 or 6 martial arts, baseball, swimming—oh wait, the swimming comes from natural ability.) 



  They fight, and we learn that for a top gangster, Boss is no good in a knife fight. When Tae Sung pins Boss, dangling him over the railing, Girlfriend hits him over the head with a wine bottle. Could this be it? Could this finally be the amnesia-inducing head trauma? They dump him overboard and head back to shore. Girlfriend picks up the watch and car key that fell out of Tae Sung's pocket in the scuffle and they realize they're both expensive brands. When they get to shore, they take Tae Sung's car, since theirs isn't going anywhere.
  So Ra and the uncles beg the police to find Tae Sung. Since all the fish are gone, he's not only a pervert, but also a thief, and responsible for mental distress as well. "If Dad hadn't come to the freezer to play hide and seek, we would have frozen to death."

  As they make their getaway, Girlfriend proves her utter obnoxiousness by pouting, whining, and interfering with Boss' driving. Because he can't see, and because Tae Sung's new car has apparently nonfunctioning brakes, they fly off a cliff into the ocean, complete with a Michael Bay explosion for good measure. Goodbye all evidence of Tae Sung's true identity. Your flaming death serves a higher plot purpose, and hopefully you're in a better place.

  So Ra and Bandanna go to the police station to try to find Tae Sung's identity, but they can't find him. 2nd Uncle and Maknae are back home trying to help the investigation. Apparently Tae Sung actually cleaned for himself, and did such a good job they can't find any fingerprints. 2nd Uncle imagines him wiping everything down while Maknae draws a sketch of Tae Sung for the police, and the family goes to pass out wanted posters. (Aww, no squid or crab suits this time? Nuts!) 

  So Ra bemoans the fact that a missing puppy brings in a reward for $1000, but they have no money to offer for Tae Sung. It's hilarious that his poster is just below the flier for the puppy. Keke!
  As they leave the boardwalk, So Ra literally bumps her head into a shirtless (finally!) Joon Hyuk as he jogs along. He realizes she hasn't been paid for her delivery yet and takes So Ra back to the hotel (he's a fast mover!).

  In the rotating door she slips and hits her head. Joon Hyuk tries to help by pushing the door the other way, but hits her in the head again. He teases her that she damaged the glass and he'll need to take the cost out of her pay and offers to buy her coffee. 
  Joon Hyuk offers So Ra a permanent contract for mackerel deliveries to the hotel. She tells him she can't, since the uncles don't like it. Tam Hee comes over to gloat about chasing her away from Busan, but So Ra replies that they're not afraid of her thugs, and they'll get the hotel back. Tam Hee scoffs and insults her dad. So Ra tells her how horrible she is and changes her mind about doing the delivery, since Tam Hee wouldn't like them coming to the hotel all the time. Plus, she can earn the money for the hotel that much faster. Joon Hyuk again tells Tam Hee to stay out of the hotel's business and dismisses her so he can discuss the contract with So Ra.
  Gwan Soon comes to the hotel with an expensive new bag and runs into Joo Hee. These two obviously hate each other. They trade insults and then Gwan Soon mentions how much prettier Joo Hee suddenly looks and asks what she's had done. Joo Hee insists that she hasn't had anything done, but Gwan Soon looks like she could do with some plastic surgery. "Why, when I already have the face everyone yearns for? How much did it cost you? $30,000? $40,000?" "$50,000!" Oops, Joo Hee, you outed yourself. They see So Ra and Joon Hyuk together, and Joo Hee is obviously jealous of her friend. Gwan Soon can't resist getting in a final jab and says how So Ra's warmth makes men comfortable and they can't help falling for her.

  Joon Hyuk flirts with So Ra, but goes silent when she gets a call from Skeezo. He says he wants money for the best appliances, as we see him playing Go Stop with some questionable characters. They ask if he's conning someone new and he tells them that she's a sucker for anyone who is a civil servant. Joon Hyuk asks if she's getting married, and can't hide his disappointment when he asks for an invitation to the wedding.


  So Ra comes home to find her dad fishing on the shore. She talks to him about her wedding and asks if Skeezo is a good man and if this is the right thing. He tells her that before she left, her mom only wanted a civil servant for a son-in-law, so a civil servant it will be. She confesses that Tae Sung made her waver a little. She also tells her dad that she's going to torment Tam Hee by delivering fish to the hotel. As she sings to her dad, we see Tae Sung floating in the water.
  The next day, Bandanna tells them about his dream the night before where General Lee Soon Shin brought his turtle boat and told them where to fish to find a treasure. As they pull in nets full of fish, they also land and unconscious Tae Sung.
  Comments: 
  So now we finally have our amnesia—with a side of mackerel. Maybe Tae Sung will think he's a fish? Or a mermaid? (Merman, pops. Mer-man. *Cough cough*)* I just have to say, for a half-torpedo, the guy is sure good at floating face up while unconscious. For hours and hours. 
  We learned that Tae Sung's mom left his dad to get away from the gang problems, but died in the process. We learned he has allergies to seafood (or a fear of cannibalism) and an aversion to hard-boiled eggs. We learned that So Ra's mom left her and her dad, and that the civil servant thing was all her idea. We learned that Skeezo has a major gambling problem.
  We also found out more about Jung Suk Won's hotness. (Or maybe we already knew.) Oh, and that Joo Hee is majorly crushing and will be a part of the love polygon. I don't know why I didn't see that coming. I should have, but I guess I just thought she would be a minor character. And we learned that Gwan Soon will do just about anything for a designer bag.
  We learned that trying much too hard to be aegyo ends in fiery death. Aegyo=good. Over-the-top cutsiness=Fireball of Doom. (Don't worry, it was just a Mustang.)
  Lastly, we learned not to get stuck in a deep freezer, because your face will freeze like this:

*From Zoolander.

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