*part of this was posted in soompi*
As for SeJoo, he isn’t dead. He’s most likely stuck in that AR game mode and trying to get his way out of that level.
In Episode 1, he was shot on board the train and he wasn’t holding a gun when he opened the door.
In Episode 5, he was able to get out of the train and reach the train platform and he died holding a gun.
credit: dramabeans
So, as a game user, he’s still stuck in that level. HIS own level.
Right now, I don’t know why JinWoo can’t see him. It’s NOT because they’re on different levels. JinWoo was able to see HyunSik in Episode 2 when he was in Level 1? 2? and HyunSik was in Level 4. Some other game code or mechanism is obstructing JW from spotting that “dead body” of SeJoo.
Their point-of-contact however is HeeJoo. It should obvious by now to everyone that she holds the key. I like how the plot pivots on her continued ignorance of the game. She’s totally outside the realm of the Augmented Reality so she’s reacting to the situations in “real time.”
Take for instance when she saw a body fall down the staircase.
You’d think that she’d run down in panic and check whether the JW was dead. But her reaction was telling: she ran UP to check on JinWoo.
To me, her brain was processing what she’d seen, and it rejected the idea that JW could have committed suicide by flinging himself at the top of the stairs. She was in denial.
And since she was in denial, she did something irrational. She ran up instead of ran down. Her mind was clinging to hope that JW was safely upstairs in his bedroom. When she saw that he wasn’t there, her brain had no choice but to accept that JW was lying at the bottom of the stairs.
Now, before we start judging HeeJoo’s personality as dumb, weak, etc., I have to remind viewers that this mindset can actually come in handy later on. To me, she actually displayed a strength in that scene, not a weakness.
HeeJoo’s strength is she doesn’t trust what she sees.
…Which is very critical when we consider that both her brother and JinWoo are caught up in a world where what they all see will be distorted by Augmented Reality.
credit: dramabeans
That’s why I think this scene is clever. Without the audience realizing it, we were given an insight on how she thinks and differs from all the rest of the male characters. 😉
Thanks so much for that insight about why Heejoo ran upstairs instead of down! I didn’t quite get her thinking either, but it rubbed me the wrong way when I saw people calling her stupid or that it was unrealistic/bad writing. With everything else being so deliberate, I didn’t think the writer would’ve made that “mistake” for no reason. 🙄 I’m honestly really enjoying Heejoo’s character!
🙂 Many viewers spout nonsense just because they don’t like or don’t agree with what they see. And often the manner in which they proclaim their stupidity is rather peremptory. “I say it’s stupid, thus it’s stupid.” Like they must have the FINAL word on what’s good or bad writing. 😂🙄🤦♀️
Just ignore them. I made my own blog so encounters with these “drama queens” are kept to a minimum.
But heyyyy, when I say something is stupid, believe me it is stupid. 😆
It was surely clever writing to show her run up. I liked that.
About not seeing SeJoo on the platform dead.. it;s because JW wasn’t wearing his lenses, he wasn’t logged into the game.
And that dead body is not a real dead body of SeJoo or else it would have been as real as when Hyun Sik died, everyone would have seen it.
It’s just an in game corpse.
But it doesn’t explain why SeJoo is nowhere to be seen. How is he trapped in the game? JW was never trapped in any level, real people could still see him attempt to kill the first enemy to reach level 2. With all his tries.
It’s different when JW saw Hyun Sik on level 2. For once he was wearing the lenses and was connected to the game. And two, he would have seen the real person either way, only without the sword and enemies around, had he not be logged in too.
Good point about the lenses. I’ll have to keep a mental note on when they’re on or off.
As for the SeJoo’s “dead” body, I’m not sure if that’s NPC SeJoo or the real SeJoo.
You see, just like you, I also thought it was game corpse or a NPC SeJoo, not the user SeJoo.
But when I rewatched it, it was only his gun that — how do you call it? — flickered, fizzled? and became static-y. The whole body of SeJoo however remained solid.
With the game corpse/zombie HS, we know he’s just visual or AR every time he appeared, he’d flicker in and out. But SeJoo didn’t become staticky. Go ahead and check it.
I don’t know how SJ is trapped in the game. I don’t even know he got into the game. But it seems like both he and HS didn’t need JinWoo’s lenses to get logged onto the game — at least HS didn’t have JW’s lenses. JW wouldn’t make them available to his company, right?
Also, SJ was getting something from the pouch of his backpack before he opened the door. Did you see it in Episode 1? I wonder if it’s a flashdrive or USB with his program in it.