Phantom Lawyer: Episodes 13-14
by lovepark
This week is all about fathers and sons as the story resolves one case of a misguided dad hoping to make amends and then immediately dives into another about a son trying to reconcile the truth about his dad. Though not all dads are good, those who build their relationship on trust and love are like superheroes to their sons.
EPISODES 13-14
Last week, our friendly phantom lawyer died, but worry not! After a heartfelt plea from our littlest ghost Shi-ho, Yi-rang does not step into the light, and the minute the ER doctors proclaim him dead, his heart beats again. (‘Twas just a cliffhanger.) Thanks to Yi-rang’s courageous rescue, the detective is arrested but only for the most recent kidnapping. There is no evidence linking the man to Shi-ho’s disappearance, which means he will only get a 10 years max sentence. However, given the detective’s history — a single father who lost his son — Yi-rang believes he might talk if Shi-ho is the one to confront him.
While Yi-rang goes to meet with the detective, the rest of the team, including the officer who came to the abandoned golf range (he survived, folks!), search for Shi-ho’s body. Unfortunately, even if they have a general idea of the location, without a confession, finding the missing boy is nearly impossible, and the detective seems to know this, too. He refuses to admit to anything concerning Shi-ho, and though Yi-rang asks him to have some empathy, the detective argues that the boy’s parents would not have left him alone if they really loved him.
As the detective leaves, Shi-ho possesses Yi-rang’s body and defends his mom and dad. He says that he would not trade his parents for anything — not even for a hundred pizzas or a trip to the amusement park — so why is the detective trying to replace his son. When Shi-ho points out how sad that would make him, the detective finally breaks and apologizes for causing his death. He then reveals where Shi-ho is buried, and after a long, grueling year, our little ghost is reunited with his parents at last.
With another case completed, Yi-rang is now ghost-free and able to have a long overdue conversation with Na-hyun. They agree to meet up after work, and Yi-rang even prepares a belated birthday gift for her. Alas, the confession will have to wait. After reuniting Shi-ho with his parents, the dad hired Yi-rang to represent him but suddenly wishes to drop the case. Yi-rang does not understand at first, but when he learns that his dad caused the other man’s dad to commit suicide, his refusal starts to make sense.
According to Shi-ho’s dad, his father was once a respected teacher who got promoted to vice-principal. During his tenure, he expelled a student for bullying, and though the parents sued him for excessive punishment, the courts ruled in his favor. The real trouble, though, happened afterwards. Yi-rang’s dad began prosecuting the educator for bogus charges — real estate speculation, embezzlement of lunch funds, sexual harassment over dress code enforcement — until eventually, the trials and legal fees became too much. Shi-ho’s grandfather took his own life in an alley in Chinatown, and his grandmother followed after him a few months later.
Even though it comes twenty-two years too late, Yi-rang apologizes on his dad’s behalf. When his dad died a corrupt prosecutor, he tried to forget everything about him, but now, he realizes that turning away from the past was his mistake. As he returns to the office with a heavy heart, fate seems to play a cruel trick on our hero as the next ghost to appear is none other than his dad, SHIN GI-JOONG (Choi Won-young).
Like the previous ghosts, Gi-joong has no recollection of who he was, and Yi-rang plans to keep it that way. He tells Gi-joong that his presence is not welcomed here, but before he gets into a tirade, Bong-su drops by with lunch. Kyeong-hwa prepared kimbap, and the smell of his favorite food causes Gi-joong to possess Yi-rang. Gentle and well-mannered, he thanks Bong-su for the delicious meal and folds the napkin into a swan. At home, Kyeong-hwa immediately recognizes her husband’s description, but hearing that Yi-rang seems angry at this new ghost, she keeps this revelation to herself.
As Yi-rang tries to forcefully send his dad away, he tells him that he should actually be grateful that he can move on without knowing the truth because he was a bad man who made someone die and ruined countless lives without uttering a single apology. Gi-joong listens silently, looking devastated by the news, and then agrees to follow Yi-rang’s decision since he seems like a good man. He can tell because Yi-rang continues to help ghosts despite the troubles it causes him, and Gi-joong disappears, promising not to bother him again.
Though he got what he wanted, Yi-rang remains troubled since everywhere he goes, he is reminded of happy memories with his dad. The man he grew up loving and the man who died create an incongruous image, and when Yi-rang seeks his mom’s advice on the matter, she tells him that she never stopped believing in his dad. However, she understands if he feels differently about the situation, and keeps it a secret that she knows about her husband’s return. Instead, she visits the beach alone, in hopes of running into him again, and right beside her, Gi-joong stands — both looking at the same horizon yet unaware of the other’s presence.
While Yi-rang has been brooding, he missed his date with Na-hyun and asked her to work from home for the time being. Na-hyun, though, proves once again why she is the best because rather than watch from the sidelines, she investigates Shi-ho’s grandfather’s case. When she was in need, Yi-rang helped her out, and this time, Na-hyun hopes to return the favor. However, rather than insert herself into his business, she lets him deal with the situation at his own pace and only asks that he not shut her out.
Thanks to the women in his life, Yi-rang gains the courage to face the truth and visits Chairman Yang to ask about his dad. He gets directed to a cop in Incheon Chinatown, and from there, he gets sent to a local business owner. The man tells Yi-rang and Na-hyun about the righteous prosecutor who saved their town from the evil gangsters, but when Na-hyun asks if the prosecutor’s name was Shin Gi-joong, the man shudders. He claims that Prosecutor Shin was the worst of the worst, and the so-called “hero” was actually Chairman Yang.
If the above story sounds fishy, it’s because it is. As soon as our attorneys leave, Chairman Yang gets a call informing him that they did as he instructed, so everything Yi-rang and Na-hyun just heard was fabricated. To make matters worse, Do-kyeong has been digging into his father and discovered that he stopped treatment after learning about Yi-rang’s parentage and ghost-seeing abilities. The chairman even had the shaman kidnapped and beat up, confirming that he is not a law-abiding man with good intentions. On the other hand, Do-kyeong looks rather disgusted by his father’s actions, so maybe there is still hope for him yet.
The more Yi-rang learns about his dad, the more disappointed he gets. However, unlike all the stories he heard, the man from his childhood can be best summarized by one memory. During a baseball game, Yi-rang was called to the mound, but scared and unsure of his abilities, he wanted to run away. His dad, though, believed in him, and with his encouragement, Yi-rang was able to bring his team to victory. As Yi-rang ends up at his school’s baseball field, he runs into his dad. All this time, Yi-rang was trying to find an excuse to keep him around, but he is done searching. He has made his decision to reciprocate the trust he once received, and right then and there, he tells Gi-joong his name and birth date.
At this point in the story, the real bad guy is pretty obvious, and the show doesn’t try to hide the fact that Gi-joong is clearly the hero his son idolized. Even without his memories, Gi-joong has been the most mild-mannered ghost, and though Yi-rang was a jerk to him, he treated him with respect and kindness. He merely wanted to know the truth, and when he realized that his insistence was causing Yi-rang distress, he backed off. None of the accusations about Gi-joong match what we have seen of him, but clearly, something shady was going on since he and Shi-ho’s grandfather ended up dead. Speaking of Shi-ho, this poor family. The absolute worst luck in the world! That man lost both his parents and then his adorable son. I don’t blame him for not wanting to hire Yi-rang because what are the odds that the man who helps you find your boy’s corpse is the son of the man responsible for your parents’ deaths.
While I really enjoy Yi-rang and Na-hyun’s budding relationship, I was surprised by how emotionally invested I became in Yi-rang’s parents. Kudos to both Kim Mi-kyung and Choi Won-young for their stellar performances. I could feel the sorrow in every scene, and they were both so expressive and conveyed so much through so little. Kyeong-hwa, especially, has been an interesting character because all this time, she’s never truly been allowed to express her grief. She knows how much Yi-rang suffered because of Gi-joong’s besmirched name, and by putting her son’s well-being above her own, she cannot outwardly mourn. From the beginning, Kyeong-hwa probably hoped that Gi-joong would return one day as a ghost, but even though it happened, she can only watch from afar and wait. Seeing them on the beach, so close yet unable to know, was heart-wrenching because his death not only cut his future short but also unmoored hers. The water motifs — the waves, the rain, the empty beach — captures how the dead are left untethered without a sense of being, but the living, as well, often lose themselves when experiencing loss and grief. Thus, even though she found the strength to live, Kyeong-hwa has never forgotten nor given up on her husband, and there’s something beautifully tragic in her resilience and love.
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