Love Me: Episodes 5-6
by lovepark
Love is in the air for our protagonists, but with it, comes new challenges. As they try to figure out their relationships, they stumble through their emotions and make mistakes. Sometimes their actions are selfish and destructive, but in order to grow as individuals and as a family, they need to accept their flaws and keep moving forward one day at a time.
EPISODES 5-6
The Seo family learns that love is not easy, especially when family is involved. Misunderstandings happen in the blink of an eye, fights break out over the tiniest infractions, and feelings are easily hurt when everyone only thinks of themselves. Despite their best intentions, things don’t always work out, and in the case of Jun-kyung, her first impression with Do-hyun’s son DANIEL (Moon Woo-jin) is “fulfilling a sexual fantasy and getting caught by your partner’s kid” level of disastrous.
Life is not much better for Jun-seo, either, at the moment. Another man is trying to steal his girlfriend, and his inferiority complex keeps him from showing up at her dance studio because his pork cutlets look pathetic next to the other man’s steak lunchboxes. It’s a metaphor for his life, and the more Jun-seo wallows in self-pity, the more he feels out of place in Sol’s future.
Since troubles seem to come in threes for this family, Jin-ho also struggles with his growing feelings for Ja-young. Though they spent the night together, he cannot shake off his wife’s presence in his life, and it makes his new relationship feel like an affair. He seeks out a priest to confess, but the younger man drops formalities to ask his neighborhood ahjussi when will he stop being afraid.
While each family member tries to overcome their hurdles, life blows up in their faces spectacularly. As Jun-kyung attempts to connect with Daniel, the moody teenager refuses to engage in any civil conversation and accidentally spills all over her clothes during dinner. However, rather than apologize to Jun-kyung, Daniel worries about Do-hyun’s reaction and only says sorry to him. As if his animosity wasn’t obvious enough, at the end of the night, Jun-kyung spots him stealing her wallet, and when it’s just the two of them, he calls her a whore in German.
As for Jun-seo, his resubmission of a paper after grades were finalized puts him in his professor’s good graces, and the latter offers him a research internship at a broadcasting station. This golden opportunity is exactly what he needed to feel “worthy” of Sol, but when he drops by her apartment with pork to celebrate, his efforts are too little, too late. She tells him that she slept with someone else (steak man), and Jun-seo storms out of the room to drown his sorrows in alcohol.
The final explosion comes from Jin-ho who tries to match Ja-young’s boldness but in the same breath promptly hides their relationship from passersby. He invites her over to his place only when he’s certain no one will be home, but in the middle of their date, Mi-ran’s sister drops by with some food. These moments — a nasty word from someone you want to impress, a betrayal from the person you love, a confrontation by the people you tried to hide from — happen too suddenly to escape and feel too incomprehensible to accept. Yet these very same moments are all-too-familiar for our protagonists as they tread back into known territory and self-sabotage.
Just as Mi-ran’s sister creates a scene, Jun-kyung walks in and notices the chaos. The splattered kimchi staining the floor reinforce her weariness of family and the accompanying requirements of understanding and patience. She says that they should live like strangers again, and her words cut into Jin-ho who has been enjoying their impromptu gatherings as of late.
With everything coalescing into one big mess, Jun-kyung confronts Daniel about his comment, and he spits back at her in German, saying that he hates her. She responds in kind, calling him a coward, but moments later, the tables are turned. Ja-young visits Jun-kyung at work, and now the latter becomes the petulant child lashing out at their parent’s new partner.
Ja-young came to apologize for the other night after realizing how much it hurt Jin-ho to not have his family’s support. At first, she thought nothing of other people’s approval since a relationship only matters between those involved, and since she had no intentions of playing family, his kids did not factor in, either. However, seeing Jin-ho cry taught her that this way of thinking was selfish.
In his attempts to forget about that night, Jin-ho throws away all of Mi-ran’s belongings and inadvertently discovers a letter she wrote him the day she died. She wanted to express her gratitude towards him including his bland food, clumsy noises, and unfunny jokes, but the message is left unfinished, much like their relationship. As remnants of his wife return to his consciousness, Jin-ho returns to retrieve the items he tossed out and breaks down in the streets, clinging to the little he has left of her.
Thoughts of Mi-ran also invade Jun-kyung’s mind as she recollects her earlier meeting with Daniel and Ja-young. As she calls herself pathetic, cowardly, and mean, she imagines her mother sitting across from her and telling her a story about the time she brought her brother home. She wore a glove to touch him in case her hands were too cold, and Mi-ran assures Jun-kyung that she has always been a warm person. Though she may be gone, memories of Mi-ran light up the dark room, and instead of pain, the idea of family brings comfort to Jun-kyung.
While the others go through their cycle of self-sabotage and healing, Jun-seo also experiences something similar. Heartbroken, he turns down the internship and barges into Sol’s apartment to win her back. Alas, he gets kicked out with a bruised face courtesy of her new boyfriend and seeks solace in Hye-on. She cries after seeing his state, and when he asks why, she confesses her feelings for him. He responds by kissing her, and the two childhood friends end up sleeping together.
In an ironic twist, Mi-ran’s presence is what brings the family back together again as they all decide to visit her memorial site. With the weight of their individual secrets starting to feel too heavy, they all begin to unload one by one, starting with Jun-seo. Then comes Jin-ho, and finally, Jun-kyung is the last to share about her boyfriend’s fifteen-year-old son. While they all try to be supportive given their own surprise revelations, their shock ultimately manifests into a near-crash, and our family of three wind up teetering over the edge in their car as they ask themselves if they really are okay.
The first part of this week (three-fourths if I’m being honest) was hard to watch. So many characters acted selfishly, and their inability to address their actual issues caused them to hurt others needlessly. From Daniel’s cruel comments to Mi-ran’s sister accusing Jin-ho of cheating, all these things weren’t really about the other person but their own insecurities. Daniel is afraid of losing his dad who he has met for the first time in his life, and from the brief conversation with his mom, I get the impression that he feels like he is being replaced. It’s not that he hates Jun-kyung as a person but the idea of his dad having someone else in his life who matters more to him scares Daniel. As for Mi-ran’s sister, she doesn’t want Jin-ho to be depressed, but seeing him look happier than he has in years with another woman probably feels like she is betraying her sister. Coupled with the fact that she hasn’t been a good sister to Mi-ran post-accident, her visceral reaction is more likely a manifestation of her own guilt and sense of propriety. However, rather than unpack these complicated feelings, it is easier for the characters to blame others than themselves. Hence, people do things they regret like throw out their spouse’s clothes, sleep with a childhood friend, and vilify others instead of extending compassion.
In the midst of all this finger-pointing and destructive behavior, Ja-young stood out to me for her confidence and introspection. Unlike Jin-ho, she had years to process her grief, and it led her to a stage in life where she no longer cares about what others say. She pursues her happiness with boldness and speaks her mind, yet she is thoughtful with her words and actions. While she isn’t perfect, her flaws are what make her an interesting and well-written character. Because she lost her husband at a young age, Ja-young tends to approach life with a slight frivolity and sees things, people, and connections as ephemeral. Her job as a tour guide is all about fleeting moments and escaping reality, but when she notices the roots Jin-ho has planted, she understands that he cannot blow away in the wind as easily as she does. Thus, she bridges the gap first by apologizing to Jun-kyung for not considering their position in all of this, and due to Ja-young’s wisdom, Jun-kyung was also able to identify her own shortcomings.
While the characters faced a lot of challenges this week individually, I thought they also had a lot of humorous moments together as a family. I found it endearing that both Jin-ho and Jun-seo did not immediately trash Jun-kyung’s food and tried to be encouraging about her first attempt at cooking. Even if their expressions failed to hide anything and they let their real opinions slip out, it showed how they still loved each other even if personal troubles kept them apart for so long. In a similar vein, the ending where everything comes to light captured what I love about their family dynamic and the writing. The juxtaposition of their shock next to their forced acceptance was hilarious, and I loved the conflicted expressions that flashed across their faces as they suppressed their gut reactions. Then, the car accident and Jun-seo’s comment about nearly seeing their mom was another humorous beat that served as a larger metaphor for their lives. By trying to avoid the real issue and their emotions, it caused an even bigger incident to occur and revealed just how much of a mess the Seo family truly is.
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