Every time I see the reincarnation trope in kdramas, I sigh and think, oh no! Not this shit again. 

In Hwayugi, I tried to restrain myself from exposing what an utter cock-and-bull story this reincarnation is, for the sake of peace. But I’m finally calling BS on this episode 13. Remember what I said in my welcoming remarks here: this blog will have all the drama, but none of the bullshit. Well… prepare for the shit to hit the fan then.

That Mawang is a major producer of bovine excrement is a foregone conclusion. We knew that from the start when he tasked young SunMi to retrieve a fan in OhGong’s prison walls.

But to me, the supreme shit-makers are the gods who thought reincarnation was a brilliant idea for Mawang’s wife, Princess Iron Fan. Here are my reasons:

First, the gods are punishing a human individual who has NO knowledge of why she’s being punished with her miserable fate. That’s cruel and unusual punishment.

Unlike Mawang and OhGong, who are atoning for a misdeed that they clearly remembered committing, Na Chal-nyeo (nee Princess Iron Fan) has absolutely no idea what’s going on. She has NO memory of her past sins so, in each lifetime that her child gets murdered, she’s acting on her motherly instincts and wrath to avenge her child’s death. She cannot correct her ways because of her memory loss.

Don’t you see how sadistic the gods are? Give her her memory so at least she knows what she’s doing wrong. pfffttt.

Second, not only are the gods cruel, they’re also insane. As a wise man once said (was it Einstein or Benjamin Franklin?), “Insanity is doing something over and over again and expecting a different result each time.”

The gods expect Na Chal-nyeo to go through the rebirth-death cycle 200 times – but what’s their point? The outcome will always be the same because she doesn’t know that she’s doing something wrong. Even if she discovers at the last second before her death, that revenge is wrong, her reincarnation will wipe out that memory, and she’ll start from scratch all over again. Smart move there, ye gods! 

To use an analogy, the gods are behaving like a mother leaving an unattended plate of cookies on a table before dinner time. Can she really blame her child for eating them? And if she smacks her child so hard that he gets amnesia, and then she once more leaves another plate of cookies, is it right to punish the child for eating the cookies AGAIN? The mother is being UNREASONABLE in her expectations…like the gods.

Third, Princess Iron Fan’s punishment has no restorative value. Her soul doesn’t get cleansed despite being on an eternal loop because she’s “bound” or fated to repeat the same mistake. She isn’t atoning for her crime because she’s ignorant that she’s done something wrong. She just keeps on dying miserably without improvement and without restitution. Her 108 reincarnations are just one big exercise in futility.

Her reincarnation is merely a “retributive justice,” meaning the primary emphasis is on payback.  An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. As a deity, Princess Iron Fan stole souls of human children, therefore, as a human, she must suffer throughthe death of her child over and over again.  This retributive justice was the kind Mawang favored in Episode 11.

NOooo. Stop Mawang! Why do you think SunMi stopped OhGong from killing those men and avenging Buja’s injuries? 

That time, Mawang relished frightening that crooked man to jump into the elevator shaft. He wasn’t any different from the gods who punished PIF. He was just as merciless and vengeful. But that’s NOT the divine way of justice. Instead of this punitive form of reincarnation, it would have been better for Mawang and the gods to practice a reformative justice.

With reformative justice, the focus would have been on 1) reconciling Princess Iron Fan with her victims through atonement and good deeds and 2) restoring her back with the gods through rehabilitation. This would have been a wiser and humane punishment than the gods’ reincarnation bullshit. You correct the wrong thing she did, not by repeating the exact wrong things, but by stopping the cycle of violence and doing things right.

If you look at SunMi, revenge was never her solution to an injustice.

Edited to add this: And I know many viewers have complained that she was too goody two shoes when monsters like PK or Buja (in her zombie-ness) took advantage of her. They want her to pay back PK and Buja in their own coin. Lol. They don’t get it, do they?  She’s a monk, or at least has the blood of SamJang coursing in her veins. Remember what I wrote about the writings on the wall of the chapel where she and OhGong got married the second time? Love is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. She does all these because she’s innately a good person.

Fourth, what about Na Chal-nyeo’s son??  Her reincarnation is unfair and illogical to her son.

If Na Cheol-nyeo is being punished because of her sin she committed as an adult, how is it FAIR that her son is also punished along with her and trapped in the same fate as hers? Did you get that? lol. As long as she’s trapped in this shitty reincarnation, then her son, too, is being murdered in each reincarnation. But why? He didn’t commit a sin as an infant, did he?

Fifth, this reincarnation stupidly blames the victim. Really! I get that Princess Iron Fan did a heinous crime, but her human reincarnation??? She was the victim. Her child was the one who was abducted and murdered.

But to the gods, her misfortune is seen as her just desserts, as nothing more as a consequence of sins in the past. They didn’t understand her mother’s pain. She felt powerless that’s why instead of resolving her grievances with the penal system in a legal way, she resorted to administering her own brand of justice to her child’s murderer.

This happened too in the earlier episode when she and Mawang encountered each other during the Japanese occupation. There was a keen sense of injustice back then as well, and she felt she had no other recourse but to take the law into her own hands. What did the gods want her to do? Passively accept her unjust fate? Pfffttt.

Sixth, reincarnation made Mawang’s love for the Princess Iron Fan tragic. The reincarnated PIF is no longer the same PIF of his memories. Remember, with each rebirth, she loses her past and become an entirely new human being. If she has no connection to her past multiple lives, then how can she have a connection to HIS original past love? This reincarnated person is different from the real Princess Iron Fan, as much as the two-dimensional painting of PIF is different from a breathing PIF. The character, personality, thoughts, actions and feelings of the original PIF made her who she was. The reincarnated person is no longer her.

In many ways, I regard Mawang’s love for PIF as the love between spouses when one of them is afflicted with Alzheimer’s disease. Although the beloved is a new person with no recollection of who the lover is (in this case, Mawang), his love and dedication show that true love never fades away. Caring for somebody with Alzheimer’s, like caring for PIF, is part of the “in sickness and in health…till death do us part” kind of love.

I think it’s very interesting that in this Episode 13, when OhGong and SunMi are contemplating getting married again for the third time, Mawang is demonstrating that an actual wedding ceremony isn’t needed to attest to love.

Seventh, I don’t think the Hong sisters believe in this reincarnation shit either, judging by the anti-climactic way that they ended Princess Iron Fan’s punishment. All it needed was OhGong going up to that chubby God Representative and demanding that the gods put an end to it or he’d create a big stink. The Hong sisters even made a COSMIC joke out of it.  All those remaining 99 lifetimes were simply divvied up like that?! With 88 laser strikes for Mawang, 10 for OhGong and 1 for the God Representative. What the heck?? I was expecting Lord Sidious’ lightning bolts.

Last, I personally reject reincarnation. Reincarnation reinforces the idea that fate has absolute control over one’s life, and that one’s individual decisions don’t matter because it’s the shady gods who’ll decide when one is finished with reincarnating. 🙄Just look at Princess Iron Fan. She loses her child because it’s her fate; she avenges the death of her child because it’s her fate; then she gets killed herself because it’s fate. The cycle repeats itself because it’s her fate.

So really, who’s at fault here?😵

It’s no longer Princess Iron Fan’s fault but Fate. Fate is conspiring against her. Frankly, if it were up to me, and I were the Queen Bitch of the heavens, I’d put Fate on trial, and condemn it, like it condemned PIF, for coercion and entrapment. It would be funny to have Fate have a dose of its own karma.

Instead of fate, I believe in destiny, in making my own choices and being somebody else’s life choice. I don’t want to be somebody’s stinking soulmate. 💩 Soulmates are over-rated in kdramas and I know that the Hong sisters share my repugnance for this concept of soulmates. Do you remember what OhGong said before the backhug here? He said, he wouldn’t remove the GGG. It was his choice to wear it and to love her. He said, “It’s my free will.”

If you want to re-read what I said about fate and destiny, and being somebody’s CHOICE,  and not fated soulmate, here’s my post: