We Are All Trying Here: Episodes 5-6
by quirkycase
We dig deeper into some key relationships in these episodes, giving more insight into current dynamics and how our characters got to this point. Family comes to the forefront when our leads both face long-held pain and secrets. As our producer and aspiring director navigate their most recent challenges, they grow closer and realize that they might have more in common than they thought.
EPISODES 5-6
The character writing is so strong in this drama – as I expected given the writer’s past works – and this week we slowly peel back more layers to get at the core of our characters and their relationships. People are messy and complicated, and we see there’s a lot more to some relationships than meets the eye. Everyone is the central character in their own narrative, and it’s easy to make assumptions and let your own insecurities run away with you rather than truly getting to know someone else.
Dong-man and Kyung-se are the perfect example. They’ve been fighting for years thanks to their own pain and insecurities. After their very public fight, Dong-man tells Kyung-se that he won – Dong-man is leaving the club. But Kyung-se doesn’t look all that happy about it.
They used to be roommates and best friends in college, but it all fell apart thanks to one decision. Dong-man came home drunk one night, rambling about giving this bottle opener to a girl he liked and later seeing on some other guy’s fridge. Kyung-se found the story so entertaining he stole the anecdote and based his debut film around it. Dong-man was blackout drunk and to this day has no idea Kyung-se’s movie was directly taken from his life. Kyung-se has felt so guilty and afraid for all these years that it made him spiteful toward Dong-man, especially since everyone tells him his debut film is his best work.
The real tragedy of it all is that Dong-man is the only one who doesn’t realize how naturally entertaining he is and how easily he could mine his own life for ideas. In fact, that’s exactly what all his friends have been doing for decades. Every last one of them has used Dong-man in their works without his knowledge; that’s why they’ve kept him in the group so long despite being annoyed. His antics are creative gold for them, and their guilt makes them hate him. And Dong-man is left wondering why he’s ostracized.
When Dong-man makes good on his word and officially leaves the group, they all have to face that without him, their art will suffer. Eun-ah is there when Young-soo brings this up to the group and says he wants to keep mining Dong-man’s life for inspiration. She speaks up to say she hopes Dong-man won’t come back to the group so that she can help him make use of everything he has and discover his own brilliance.
That shuts them all up, except Hye-jin who grins and immediately calls Dong-man to ask why he didn’t tell her he has a girlfriend. She told him if he got a girlfriend, she’d lift the ban on him coming to the bar. Dong-man argues it’s a one-sided crush, but Hye-jin is sure it isn’t and tells him he’s allowed back. Dong-man can’t resist for long and returns to the group to their secret relief.
At this point, it’s pretty clear to everyone that Dong-man and Eun-ah like each other, although they’re both too shy to confess. Instead, Eun-ah promises to help him revise his screenplay, and Dong-man writes like crazy. When Eun-ah finally makes an overture by bringing some of her grandmother’s kimchi to share, Jin-man’s third wheeling makes for an awkward meal, especially when he starts asking casual questions. You know, like what Eun-ah’s purpose in life is and what kind of person she wants to be.
She surprises the brothers (and herself) by answering that she hopes to be a strong, steady mother; someone like her halmoni. Eun-ah must pass the test because Jin-man then gives her a personalized copy of his book of poetry.
The topic of parenthood strikes a chord in Jin-man. It turns out, he has a daughter named Young-shil whom he hasn’t seen in many years. After he and his wife divorced, the girl was put up for adoption without his knowledge, and the brothers have no idea where Young-shil is now. No wonder Jin-man’s sadness runs so deep. He’s tormented by this and is basically living on autopilot at this point. So it’s not surprising when he makes another attempt to die. Dong-man barely gets there in time to save his life once again.
Clearly, Jin-man needs serious help. (Someone please get this man a therapist.) Jin-man is miserable, and it’s untenable for Dong-man to be responsible for his brother’s survival like this. It’s eating away at them both and explains a lot about the brothers’ dynamic. Dong-man didn’t really fight back when Jin-man beat him up (and it’s not the first time, apparently), and he doesn’t make a big fuss over it later. Jin-man may be the more practical one with a steady paycheck, but Dong-man is holding them together while terrified he won’t be able to save his brother.
Meanwhile, Eun-ah is dealing with her own family trauma. Jung-hee’s people track Eun-ah down, which was a little complicated given that Eun-ah changed her name. Jung-hee is shocked to learn that her ex-husband died when Eun-ah was in middle school, and Eun-ah has been living with her step-grandmother all these years.
Jung-hee calls Eun-ah and tries to play the mom after all these years. She claims she would’ve come back for Eun-ah had she known her dad died, but Eun-ah isn’t buying it. Jung-hee was never a caring mother to begin with. Eun-ah tells Jung-hee she has no desire to be known as the pitiful, abandoned daughter, so she’ll keep quiet and asks Jung-hee to do the same.
However, Jung-hee’s stepdaughter Mi-ran ends up in Eun-ah’s circle coincidentally. Mi-ran witnessed Dong-man and Kyung-se’s fight, and she was thoroughly entertained by Dong-man. So when Joon-hwan contacts her about acting in his upcoming project, she agrees to meet if Dong-man comes too. She and Dong-man hit it off, and she even sings at Dong-man’s relative’s wedding as a favor when he asks.
Mi-ran takes an official meeting with Dong-hyun’s film company about Joon-hwan’s script, and she’s ready to turn it down. But Eun-ah, blunt as ever, gives it to Mi-ran straight: she needs to stop trying to play smart, rational characters. Mi-ran isn’t the thinking type, she’s the feeling type. This role would let her shine with an impulsive, emotion-driven character that matches her energy. Mi-ran is affronted at first, but she ends up agreeing to the film thanks to Eun-ah’s candor.
Eun-ah’s own screenplay situation isn’t fairing so well. Jae-young is still refusing to credit her as a co-writer, like the insecure jerk he is. Dong-man happens to run into him – Jae-young is a former student of his – and has no love for him. So when Dong-man starts to smell something fishy with Jae-young’s grant-winning screenplay, he digs a little. It doesn’t take long for him to get ahold of the script and see Eun-ah all over it. Dong-man confronts Jae-young over the artistic theft, but Jae-young is unrepentant and rude as ever.
With their challenging family situations, Dong-man and Eun-ah have been emotionally struggling. But the watch trial provides a surprising revelation for them both. During his participant interview, Dong-man learns that he also has registered an “unknown” emotion, the same one that Eun-ah has regularly. It’s the emotion he felt both times he found his brother about to die. When the researcher asks him to name the feeling, he cries and says it feels like, “Help me.” Eun-ah recognizes Dong-man’s participant number during her interview, and cries when the researcher tells her his description of the “unknown” feeling they share.
Eun-ah and Dong-man are both emotional after the interviews and sit beside each other in silence. They head home, Dong-man walking quietly behind Eun-ah. She stops and runs back toward him, throwing her arms around Dong-man as they both cry and comfort each other.
At home, Dong-man tells Jin-man they should find Young-shil. Both men shovel food in their mouths while in tears rather than talk about it, but Jin-man doesn’t say no. We end as Dong-man envisions himself side-by-side with Eun-ah while they watch a joyful reunion between Jin-man and Young-shil.
Whew, things just keep getting rougher and rougher for everyone! I still don’t understand how Young-shil could’ve been adopted without Jin-man being told. The woman at the adoption agency told Dong-man that Jin-man couldn’t be reached at the time, so I’m wondering if he went off the grid for a while after his divorce. Still, that’s a wild situation.
Now we have two abandoned daughters in Young-shil and Eun-ah, and two very different parents in Jin-man and Jung-hee. Jin-man seems miserable since losing his daughter, whereas Jung-hee has pushed down her guilt and thrived. She didn’t even try to find Eun-ah until her career was threatened. She’s justified her abandonment all this time by assuming her ex-husband would take care of Eun-ah, and maybe she didn’t look for Eun-ah on the off chance she was wrong. Now, she has to face that Eun-ah was left an orphan in relative poverty while she was living it up as a movie star. Thankfully, Eun-ah and Dong-man have each other for support because I have a feeling things are going to get worse before they get better.
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