Makjang Mediocrity
Episode 4 of Mine begins with Mother Emma tending to the Chairman while he’s in hospital. Hi-Soo goes racing out too, intent on visiting Ji-Won’s Mother. She’s irate over the slap and demands Hi-Soo bring Ja-Kyeong to her to apologize. She’s not happy that the tutor stepped out of line and believes her rage is likened to that of a Mother. Eventually Hi-Soo heads home and confronts the tutor, telling her to stop getting involved. Meanwhile, Seo-Hyun speaks to Joo and tells her to stay quiet. She’s going to fire Yu-Yeon the following day, especially after her and Soo-Hyeok ended up together in the same room. This truth is finally brought to light and when Soon-Hye finds out, she throws herself at the maid. She slaps the girl across the face but Yu-Yeon sticks up for herself, telling her she shouldn’t be slapped for this. Hi-Soo eventually manages to calm things down and takes the maid aside. Yu-Yeon tells the truth, mentioning how the pair always switch rooms and slept well because of it. Even this though is enough to ring alarm bells, as Hi-Soo worries that this could lead to so much more. For now she tells her it’s best if they stay away from one another. Ja-Kyeong meanwhile, heads over to Ji-Won’s Mother’s and apologizes. It’s a half-baked apology in truth, as she eventually blackmails the woman. She’s done her homework and knows that Ji-Won’s Mother has fabricated her identity. Ja-Kyeong promises to send the truth on to all of her clients if her son doesn’t play ball with Ja-Kyeong. She uses the phrase “my son” too, giving further weight to the birth Mother story. Soo-Hyeok returns to the villa but is shocked when he finds out the truth about Yu-Yeon. Given she’s been kicked out, and his grandmother struck the girl, he hurries off in the rain to try and find her. Well, Yu-Yeon happens to be with Mother Emma, who encourages her to stay there for now, handing over a drink and refuge. Soo-Hyeok shows up at the church, desperate to speak to Yu-Yeon. While Mother Emma is gone, Yu-Yeon slips out. Soo-Hyeok immediately heads to see Seo-Hyun and demands that Yu-Yeon be brought back to the mansion. She refuses to do so and tells him he’s going to be wed to A-Rim whether he likes it or not. Soo-Hyeok is not happy and continues on the hunt for the girl. Meanwhile, the differences between Ji-Yong and Jin-ho continue to be felt. The former is apparently loyal to his wife while Jin-Ho is slumping into a depressive state despite now being in charge of the company. This is, of course, all part of Ja-Kyeong’s plan and she walks past Soon-Hye, who seems to always be stuffing her face with food. Is she substituting happiness for food? It sure seems that way. Jin-Hee’s woes continue after her outburst. She receives a call to confirm Ji-Yong is taking over all of her work and, because of her outburst, stocks have fallen. Now the guys are in damage limitation mode and need to try and soften the blows she’s caused. When she confronts Hi-Soo, she goes completely off the rails and shouts at Jin-Hee, forcing her out the door and giving the girl a piece of her mind. Only, all of this is actually part of her acting and Jin-hee is shell-shocked to find her acting this way. Later that day, the exhibit at the art museum gets underway. All the big players are there, including Mother Emma who watches from afar as Hi-Soo and her family show up. When Hi-Soo notices Ji-Won’s Mother, she’s taken aback by the woman being super nice and hurrying away quickly. Meanwhile, Ja-Kyeong continues to flirt with Ji-Yong, rubbing his hand while he’s holding two glasses. Soo-Hyun arrives and sees this take place, eventually heading upstairs to speak to her sister-in-law. It’s just the excuse Ja-Kyeong needs to take Ji-Yong aside into a corridor and begin kissing his face off. This happy family unit unfortunately comes crashing down around them all. Well, for now it’s all still a secret as Hi-Soo finds out from Mother Emma where Yu-Yeon is located. She’s working at a fast food joint and she relays that information on to Soo-Hyeok. He shows up and waits for Yu-Yeon. Eventually she speaks her mind, unhappy that such a high paying job has been taken away from her. Soo-Hyeok charges back to the mansion with Yu-Yeon and demands she be reinstated again. If Soonm-Hye can allow her to work, then Soo-Hyeok will agree to marry A-Rim. Trouble continues to brew though as we see Mother Emma organizing a group of single Mums called Ilsin. Sat together, they discuss the Lord’s will and – according to Emma anyway – God is okay with a bit of revenge every now and then. After, Emma checks on the computer where it turns out Ja-Kyeong is actually an alias and not the tutor’s real name. She recognizes her voice from a previous meeting and while doing some hunting, discovers that her real name is actually Hye-Jin. Hi-Soo doesn’t know this information but she does take the tutor aside and finally fires her for growing too close to her son. She admits to not feeling comfortable with this whole ordeal and admits that she’s getting on her nerves. a-Kyeong begrudgingly agrees to leave, as this tense atmosphere drags on. After, she speaks to Ji-Yong and tells him she’s fired the girl for crossing boundaries. He’s not happy though but Hi-Soo points out the previous tutor and calls him out for double standards. He simply gets up and walks away in a huff. In the morning, Ha-Joon is not happy and confronts his Mum over firing his tutor. He brings up the horse riding incident and getting hurt, demanding she explain herself. Well, Hi-Soo starts investigating and finds out what we’ve all known for two episodes or so now – Ja-Kyeong is actually Ha-Joon’s birth mother. Shock, horror! Or not, if you’ve already figured this one out!
The Episode Review
Where do you start with this drama? Mine is certainly a dramatic makjang but there’s so much going on that everything inevitably feels half-baked and underdeveloped. In total, there’s around 5 subplots and none of them are particularly interesting. The cliched romance between Yu-Yeon and Soo-Hyeok is given a dash of possessiveness this episode as Yu-Soo-Hyeok’s “romantic” gesture is tarnished by him mentioning how hard he’s worked to try and bring her back. Meanwhile, Jin-Ho and Ji-Yong have their work woes and continue to contrast one another – but not in any great detail. Then you have Jin-Hee and Soon-Hye who don’t have a lot of depth but simply shout and throw food around. The whole affair scandal and the truth about Ja-Kyeong being Ha-Joon’s biological Mother gets the lion’s share of the screen-time instead and it’s so painfully obvious by now that it actually insults viewers by dragging this out. Making this a big dramatic reveal when most people will have figured this out before is a testament to the poor editing and vision for this series. The only interesting part of this drama comes from Seo-Hyun’s romance with Suzy Choi and that’s completely sidelined. To be fair though, there’s also some teasing tidbits about happiness and whether money can substitute that (food, lottery tickets, scandalous affairs etc.) but this isn’t a consistent theme or really explored with a lot of depth right now. Hopefully in the weeks ahead things can calm down but based on this showing, there’s just not enough to make this a memorable Korean drama.
