Doctor on the Edge: Episodes 7-8
by DaebakGrits
Our story takes a somber turn this week as both romantic and familial tensions come to the forefront, and our poor male lead finds himself unfairly bearing the brunt of others’ frustrations when the loss of a beloved character leaves hearts heavy and emotions running high.
EPISODES 7-8
Before our OTP officially enters their slightly ambiguous break-up era — because are they broken up or just “on a break” like Ross and Rachel? — we rewind our story a little bit so we can witness how events went down from Ha-ri’s perspective. Following Ji-eui’s departure from the island, she was very mopey in his absence, but the physical distance became a one-sided emotional separation once Chi-yeon disclosed that Mi-ja had withdrawn from the clinical trial and signed an advanced directive indicating that she no longer wanted to receive cancer treatment.
Ha-ri is understandably distraught upon hearing the news, and faced with her grandmother’s mortality, she can barely function. She tries to convince Mi-ja to change her mind and refuses to listen when Mi-ja attempts to explain she wants to die on her own terms. Instead, Ha-ri selfishly wants Mi-ja to live — at the the expense of a lower quality of life — for her, and she’s disappointed to hear from Chi-yeon that it’s too late to re-enroll Mi-ga in the trial. As she ignores Ji-eui’s phone call, Ha-ri asks Chi-yeon why Ji-eui would let her grandmother sign the directive, and he explains that Ji-eui is a doctor who respects his patients’ wishes.
Back in the present, Ha-ri asks Ji-eui to think of her wishes instead of her grandmother’s, and when he doesn’t concede the way she wants, she walks away. And so begins a lengthy separation arc in which Ha-ri loses all sense of objectivity and tries to emotionally blackmail Mi-ja into seeking treatment for her cancer. Between Ha-ri’s cold shoulder and the pressures of other villagers who want Mi-ja to live for as long as possible, Ji-eui’s resolve slips just enough that he lets his feet guide him to Mi-ja’s home, but once he’s standing outside her house, he reconsiders.
As he turns to leave, he hears Mi-ja fall inside the house and rushes to her. She’s fine, but she’s struggling to prepare Ha-ri’s favorite foods for her upcoming birthday because of her dwindling strength. Ji-eui steps in to help, and while they cook, Mi-ja asks Ji-eui to stay on the island after his term is up for Ha-ri’s sake. Even though Ha-ri is still shutting him out, he promises Mi-ja that he will stick around and help her ease into a life without her grandmother.
At the clinic, Ha-ri and Ji-eui manage to coexist and work together, but the distance between them remains. When a fisherman falls into a propeller and dies, Ha-ri can’t help but resent the care Ji-eui shows the grieving family. If he can preserve a dead man’s dignity — shielding his body from view and stitching closed his wounds — why can’t he spare the same consideration for her? Why can’t he see how much she’s hurting and persuade her grandmother to fight to stay alive? “I like you, but I hate you,” she cries, and Ji-eui, who made a house call to treat her fever, comforts her even though their relationship remains in limbo. It seems Chi-yeon, despite his unreciprocated crush, was correct in his assumption that he needed Ji-eui on this particular night, and stepped back to let Ji-eui be there for her.
They are still a long way from reconciling, though, because Ha-ri refuses to let go of the hope that she can somehow convince Mi-ja to undergo another round of chemotherapy. Given her state of mind, it’s not surprising that Ha-ri reacts poorly when she discovers her grandmother’s funeral portrait, dropping it on the floor so the glass shatters. Over the sounds of Ha-ri’s crying and hysterics, Mi-ja admits a painful truth: she’s scared. She doesn’t want to die, and she doesn’t want to leave Ha-ri behind. But she also knows what awaits her, and she would rather face death with dignity than prolong her suffering. Ha-ri hears every word, yet she’s too overwhelmed by grief and desperation to accept her grandmother’s decision. Unable to imagine life without Mi-ja, she continues to cling to the belief that there must be a way to keep her alive.
By this point in our story, I’d grown increasingly frustrated with Ha-ri’s inability to empathize with what Mi-ja was going through — especially given that she’s a nurse. As a medical professional, she has undoubtedly cared for patients who lost long battles with cancer, and while it’s understandable that she would be grieving her grandmother’s impending death, the ferocity with which she opposes Mi-ja’s decision to die as peacefully and painlessly as possible feels difficult to justify.
Even setting aside her profession, however, Ha-ri’s treatment of Mi-ja often comes across as callous. It’s one thing to beg and plead with a loved one to reconsider such a final decision; it’s another to refuse to truly listen to them. Time and again, Ha-ri prioritizes her own fear of loss over Mi-ja’s wishes, shutting down conversations whenever her grandmother tries to explain her reasoning. Her grief is natural, but her unwillingness to hear Mi-ja out borders on cruelty. So, in light of Ha-ri’s behavior, it honestly felt like Karma had a hand in what happened next…
Ji-eui and Ha-ri make a house call to their former diabetic patient, who has since had his foot amputated. During their walk back to the village, Ji-eui apologizes for not initially telling her that Mi-ja signed an advanced directive, but he’d promised Mi-ja he wouldn’t interfere with her decision. She’d turned down the trial so she could spend more time with Ha-ri, he explains before advising her to let Mi-ja explain and then be by her side until the end.
Something Ji-eui says magically cuts through Ha-ri’s stubbornness just enough for Ha-ri to realize she’s been a shitty granddaughter, so when she returns home, she curls up next to Mi-ja and apologizes. Unfortunately, Mi-ja has already passed away in her sleep, and despite the somberness of the moment, my reaction to this scene was entirely cynical: sucks to be you, Ha-ri. Bet you regret being an ass to your grandmother in her final moments. I had more sympathy for Ji-eui, who had the painful task of calling Mi-ja’s time of death, something he’s admitted never gets less painful.
Mi-ja’s funeral is simple, but well attended by the villagers who are anxious for a replacement frame for her portrait to arrive from a mainland store. Ha-ri is noticeably absent, but she’d just raced home to prepare Mi-ja’s favorite pasta for her funeral altar. When she returns, she’s trying her best to smile through her tears because, as she explains to Ji-eui later, she wants to stay strong for Mi-ja. The problem, though, is that every time she sees Ji-eui, she wants to cry. She doesn’t hate him, but she would prefer it if he kept his distance.”Pretend you don’t see me,” she says.
This conversation is eerily similiar to the one Ji-eui had with his ex at their mutual friend’s funeral, but he calmly respects Ha-ri’s wishes while she grieves instead of getting cut up in his own emotions. If Ha-ri is feeling guilty for the way she treated Mi-ja in her final days, though, she hides it, along with her heartache, behind a forced smile. She returns to work to keep her mind busy and distracted, but Mi-ja’s absence is still so fresh that Ha-ri has moments when she forgets her grandmother is gone, like when she overlooks the fact that Mi-ja won’t be home to close the windows in preparation for the approaching storm.
That oversight leads to water intrusion that coincides with a major roof leak that displaces Ha-ri from her home, and Ji-eui offers up his room at the clinic for her to stay in while repairs are made. Of course, Chi-yeon volunteered his room first, but Ji-eui wasn’t going to let that happen, especially not when his relationship with Ha-ri is being held together by little more than duct tape and a prayer.
And has Chi-yeon been taking advantage of their separation? Not aggressively, but he has been quietly by her side, stepping in to defend her when the annoying helipad project manager caused another scene at the clinic. He also helps her prepare breakfast the morning after her first night in the house in a move that is extremely domesticated and has Ju-cheon, who knows Ha-ri and Ji-eui are/were an item, concerned that Ji-eui is going to lose his girl to the strong, handsome doctor with the red convertible.
Ha-ri has also noticed Chi-yeon’s interest in her, and while she thanks him for looking into treatments for her grandmother, she asks him to give up on his feelings. Is it because of Ji-eui, he asks, wondering if her attempt to blame him for everything has failed, and when she answers in the affirmative, he questions her choice because she cried all the time while she was with him. Uhm, excuse me?
I dislike Chi-yeon’s implication that Ji-eui is the source of Ha-ri’s unhappiness merely because he respected Mi-ja’s dying wishes. Although I have major issues with Ha-ri’s behavior, her unhappiness was rooted in grief, and Ji-eui simply became the convenient scapegoat for emotions she couldn’t direct elsewhere. Ha-ri’s misdirected anger is marginally reasonable given what she was going through, but Chi-yeon should know better. As a doctor and a relatively objective observer, he ought to recognize the difference between the cause of someone’s pain and the person who happens to bear the brunt of it. Then again, perhaps it was just said in a moment of jealousy because, after smoking Ji-eui in a foot race, he concedes his romantic defeat and tells Ji-eui to be good to Ha-ri.
Before Ha-ri and Ji-eui can repair their relationship, Governor Ko arrives on the island to celebrate the inauguration of his helipad renovation project. It’s another publicity stunt designed to make him the center of attention and to get his name and image in the news. Behind the scenes, though, workers have been getting injured left-and-right because Governor Ko’s asshole project manager has been pushing them to deadlines. Suffice it to say, the villagers have little respect for the man, but they fear him because he’s prone to throwing his weight around and punishing them when he doesn’t get his way — which is how he got the entire clinic staff to show up at his event.
Well, his big to-do does not go as smoothly as he’d like because he’s upstaged by a missing Parkinson’s patient and booted from his microphone so Chun-sik can organize a search party. Thankfully, Ha-ri and Ji-eui find the patient, who lost his balance and fell down a hill, with only a few minor bumps and bruises, but because he’d wet himself, their patient is a bit cantankerous from embarrassment and would rather not call attention to himself.
And while we’re on the topic of men who do not want to call attention to themselves, Ji-eui has been secretly spending his nights cleaning up the water damage done to Ha-ri’s house. The damage is so extensive that Chun-sik hesitates to commence work without knowing Ha-ri’s long-term plans on the island. Will she move into Mi-ja’s house and become a permanent resident or return to the mainland? Even though Ha-ri appears to be giving the idea some thought, Ji-eui is seemingly doing what he can to help her, in the event she chooses to stay.
When Ha-ri discovers what he’s been up to in the middle of the night when he should be sleeping on the sofa, she questions his willingness to help her when all she’s done is mistreat him, and he responds that he’s not a nice person either. That’s why he can’t do as she asked and pretend he doesn’t see her, even if it makes her hate him. “Can’t you put up with me?” he asks, and Ha-ri finally comes to her senses and hugs him. Then they kiss.
Presumably, with only four episodes left, our OTP is together for good. For the sake of my sanity, I hope I can find a reason to enjoy them as a pairing again after this week’s episodes drained away whatever warm fuzzies I had for our main couple.
Although Ha-ri’s unresolved grief and obvious need for therapy were the true reasons behind their separation, Ji-eui ended up taking the bulk of the blame — from both Ha-ri and everyone around them — and that didn’t sit right with me. If I’d been in Ji-eui’s position, I wouldn’t have wanted to continue a romantic relationship with her after being pushed aside so early in the courtship. She would certainly have my sympathy — but as a friend. My romantic feelings would have evaporated faster than a snowflake in the Sahara because, in my opinion, their relationship simply hadn’t had enough time to develop the trust and foundation necessary for Ji-eui to weather a storm like that. Then again, I guess Ji-eui doesn’t exactly have the freedom to leave the island now that he’s burned bridges with Governor Ko, so he might as well make the best of a crappy situation and date the girl he’s known less than a month who also blamed him for her grandmother’s death.
Our OTP’s dynamic was so blah this week that I almost preferred our childish secondary couple — almost. Ater learning that Ha-ri was actually dating Ji-eui, not Chi-yeon as the gossip suggested, and that the pair were currently estranged, Jeong-seon and Ju-cheon thoughtfully ran interference while keeping their knowledge of the relationship a secret. It led to some slightly humorous and awkward situations. Otherwise, Jeong-seon and Ju-cheon’s relationship continued to show few signs of maturity. Case in point: Jeong-seon’s inability to tell Ju-cheon that her current houseguest is a man. While I doubt this mystery man is being set up as a romantic rival (probably her deadbeat brother that she’s embarrassed of), she still should have been upfront about his identity rather than hiding his presence altogether.
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