Jugglers Episode 3 Title: Too Much Happened to Pretend that Nothing Happened

I’m beginning to love this bitchy blog concept. I can skip all over the place and nobody’s going to bellyache or question my sanity. I’m skipping now to Episode 3 because the stormy weather intrigues me. Did you notice it too? How the elements of the atmosphere were employed as a plot device in this kdrama? It’s an empathic weather that signals and duplicates the moods of CW and YY.

As the title implies, too much happened to the weather to pretend that nothing happened.

Take for instance, the thunderstorm.

The third episode started with a thunderstorm while CW was having a nightmare. At first, I thought that the rain brought back suppressed memories and insecurities. The voices he was hearing in his sleep could have been comments that he had overhead said about him. People were ostracizing him because he was different, enigmatic, even scary. The descriptions seem to fit him. People couldn’t tell what he was thinking. He rarely smiled. He was shunned.

But the voices could also have been whisperings said about his long-dead parents. Only one person, this unknown uncle, had died saving him. His parents could have been involved in other deaths, too.

If I were to psychoanalyze CW’s character in one line sentence, I’d say that the reason he gravitates toward comic book heroes even as a grown-up is that he feels a kindred spirit with those superheroes. More often than not, superheroes are people who had once suffered trauma which they couldn’t entirely resolve or reconcile with — like CW and the fire tragedy. For superheroes, the trauma served as impetus or motivation to correct injustices in the society so that the same trauma they survived wouldn’t befall upon others. Superheroes fight and endure whatever catastrophe and insanity are thrown at them by the villains. Similarly, CW identifies himself as a real-life version of a comic book superhero. As a journalist, he viewed himself as a crusader fighting against unscrupulous conglomerates like YB.

Thus, the voices in his nightmare are contradictory to his self-perception. He isn’t scary; he isn’t a murderer; he isn’t a fake. The turmoil inside of him is mirrored in the turbulent weather outside his room.

2. The next weather-related incident was introduced in Yul’s flashback of his first encounter with CY. When he finished poking CW on the chest to emphasize his desire to make CW a hyung, a strong gust of wind blew. It’s too early to tell whether this was an ominous sign. But I associate the cold wind is related to the gingko tree.

Cold Wind = Tree

Here’s why:

a. in Episode 1, at 25:58, while YY was typing advice on her website, the wind blew into her room and she closed the curtains, griping, “Darn it. That stupid ginko tree. I should chop it down when the weather’s nice.”

b. in Episode 3, on that night she got drunk and CW drove her home, she complained nonstop that the night was very cold, despite her wearing an overcoat and her appearing flushed from drinking alcohol. CW wasn’t wearing a winter jacket, only a suit, but he didn’t complain of a freezing temperature. It was on that cold evening that CW returned to his childhood home and recognized the gingko tree. Then, as he turned to leave, a gust of air came out nowhere and blew the room-for-rent flyer right onto his face.

c. in Episode 3, after he finished inspecting the second floor apartment and walked towards the gingko tree, the leaves rustled in the breeze. It appeared as if the tree was welcoming him home. Later on, we discover that he told the YY’s mom not to chop down the tree as he liked the tree.

It’s significant to me the gingko tree brings forth the cold air, and the wind is on friendly terms with CY.

3. The downpour.

I thought nothing much of CW’s and YY’s chance encounter in the rain in Episode 1, except that it was odd that CW went back to his car to grab an umbrella when they were already both drenched anyway. To me, the umbrella had no use and CW’s effort to shelter her from the pouring rain was futile.

However, it was when the sprinklers turned on in Episode 3 and drenched the two of them that I began to suspect that perhaps the downpour of water wasn’t so innocent after all. It was also a plot device.

In Episode 1, the rain got the two characters to meet, literally, by accident. CW’s wipers conveniently stopped working so he didn’t see YY dart across the street. In Episode 3, the sprinkler shower marked the changed in his attitude towards her. When the sprinkler turned on, he had been correcting their papers with his usual red pen as usual. The deluge of water caught them all by surprise. His manager woke up to find a red ink stain (looking like a blood stain) on his white shirt. Everybody frantically scrambled to protect their precious papers from getting soaked. Only CW sat there immobilized, as if in a trance, watching his employees in panic mode.

Then he realized that YY was standing beside him, holding a hanky over his head, the same hanky he’d given her earlier. Her gesture was sweet but silly because he was getting drenched as a rat anyway. Just like when he ran to get an umbrella for her during the car accident. But her action showed that her first instinct was to shield him. If others were protecting what was important to them — their documents — she was protecting what was important to her: him.

This was probably the moment he realized that YY was an earnest and dedicated worker. Back in Episode 1, she refused to seek medical attention because she was in a hurry to reach her office. Now, in Episode 3, she refused to leave his side during the sprinkler shower. And to really drive the point home, when she woke up from her nap, she refused to go home and chose to stay until he had finished his task.

The rain had cleared up the air between them. And to me, his use of the pencil instead of the red pen which he favored, was proof that he relented and was no longer inclined to shunt her off to another department.

At any rate, if I were the screenwriter, I would tie in the rain with his childhood trauma. There was undoubtedly a fire that killed a person (or two?) whom he loved dearly. But I would make the pouring rain come and save him from the fire. I’d make rainwater a purifying agent or a source of his healing after a disaster.

4. The other weather-related incident happened at 5:20 when YY realized that her former boss succeeded in being promoted but didn’t move to re-hire her as he promised. She was livid with anger and pounded her desk. Inside his office, CW was enjoying his cup of coffee when thunder rumbled. Startled he glanced outside the window to see a sunny day. When he turned his head again, he saw YY standing in front of him, looking dark and stormy as a thundercloud.
lol.

I think nature could be split into two camps in this drama: rain and thunder are YY’s elements and the cold wind is CW’s.

Indeed, too much happened to the WEATHER in this episode to pretend that nothing happened.