The Red King’s Dream, part 3

Two of the “Red King’s Dream” posts are protected. I warned readers not to repost them or I would put them under lock-and-key. I mean what I say, and I say what I mean. I’m not known as an uber-Bitch for nothing.

Please do NOT ask for password.

New poster E=MCsquared asked:

I like your take on this. But if the current Lee Gon, who remembers everything and does the time loop, he will still be living a lonely life in his time space. While the child Lee Gon will grow up and find Tae Eul again. So what happens to the current Lee Gon? Become the great and lonely goblin? And then the child Lee Gon grows up and does his time loop. So how many time loops exist?

Bravo!

You — AND Lee Gon — saw the *fatal* flaw of the time loop. It’s this: what happens to the Savior after he saved the young Lee Gon?

If current Lee Gon becomes the Savior, then what happens to him after he saved his young self? He cannot exist in the timeline anymore, right?

So far, I can only think of one exit strategy that ends happily, and that’s the “Red King’s Dream.”

I wrote about it in my “First Impressions” but I didn’t want to finish it because I thought it was an ugly SPOILER. You see, if you were watching this show purely for entertainment, then my so-called theory (if it was correct) would have ruined the plot twist. Hence, I put a break in my theorizing and said “stop!” Since I wasn’t 100% sure where the writer is going with this, I don’t want to get ahead of her. I said we should all wait to watch KES’ drama to unfold rather than get hyped up my theories.

The priority here is KES’ drama. Not my blog.

Besides, I’m not Alice and I don’t want to go down that rabbit-hole. 😊

However, I have a dear friend, @Growing_Beautifully, who’s like the White Rabbit to me. lol. For her, I gave the clues and hints on to how to interpret the kdrama with the “Red King’s Dream.” After Episode 5, I told her to watch out because:

One, TaeEul just referred to herself as Alice.
Two, TaeEul just saw who the Red King was. And it was Lee Gon.

All Lee Gon needed was celestial music and sunlight coming down from the heaven to shine on him.

Three, Tweedle-dee and Tweedle-dum were there. They’re the doppelgangers Jo Yeong and Eunsup.
Four, the “Back to the Future” phone case was prominently displayed.
And five, LG’s shooting skill at the arcade doesn’t match up with Savior’s shooting skill (it’s dream vs reality).

By now, all of my readers on this blog should know that the KEY POINT of both “Alice in Wonderland” and its sequel “Through the Looking Glass” is that everything, everything! happened in a dream. Alice dreamt all her fantastical adventures.

The writer KES knew THAT before she started writing.

And I knew that, too, before I started reviewing her show. I’m not Korean and I’m not literature grad. But the Alice books were read aloud to me at bedtime. And I read them (just excerpts, though) to my own sons when they were little, more than two decades ago.

So if you’re an Alice fan, you’d anticipate a “dream sequence” to be an element in this story. 🙂

Anyway, I believe that TaeEul knew the SIGNIFICANCE of being a literal and metaphorical Alice in Wonderland. Maybe not at first when she said this,

but later on.

As a liberal art student, 😊 she would know that, in the book, a) the dream ended and b) Alice wasn’t sure whether she or the Red King dreamt the whole thing up. That’s the point of “Through the Looking Glass.”

But what about Lee Gon? Does he know about the significance of the book? I say yes, from the very beginning of this drama, he knew what the book meant.

He loved the book, didn’t he? To me, he should the significance of book.

1. His understanding of the book would explain WHY he suddenly bolted and chased the White Rabbit…err…the Black Rabbit.

He was reading to the kids, “Alice didn’t even think about how she would return and jumped into the hole after the White Rabbit. She fell down and down. She was falling endlessly. She said in a loud voice, “How many miles have I fallen?” Then he explained to the kids, “This is my favorite book. The author was a mathematician, too. How is it? Is it interesting?”

Like Alice, he didn’t think of what would happen if he chased after the Black Rabbit and went through the portal. He just did it.

Later, he saw a black rabbit (Black because it’s Luna). He heard the gears winding in his head, and started to give chase.

Note: somebody pointing out that the sound wasn’t the steady tick-tock of a grandfather’s clock, but the sound of gears being set into motion. I think that poster is 100% correct. It meant that action is about to start.

Yeong: You really have a good stamina. You rowed 2000 meters and you ran like that right after. Why did you suddenly run like that?
Gon: I just saw the White Rabbit with the clock.

Yeong: What do you mean? Are you saying you saw a rabbit or a clock?
Gon: Weren’t you listening while I read Alice in Wonderland?
Yeong: I was busy organizing my team’s schedule.
Gon: You really need some fairy tales in your life.
Yeong: And I think you need some shoes, Your Majesty.
Gon: These aren’t my shoes.

Actually, Yeong posed a very profound question.

I’m sure it befuddled many viewers. Here’s my explanation, for now…

We don’t know whether Gon is chasing after the “rabbit” or the “clock.” If you ask me, I’d say Gon was chasing the rabbit. He was repeating the time loop because of the “rabbit” aka the woman he loved aka TaeEul. He got trapped in time because he’s been chasing after her.

He wasn’t really chasing after the “clock” or “an eternal life” or “never-ending life” like that of the Goblin. He only got stuck “chasing” the clock because he didn’t want a loved one to die.

Still later, he explained to Yeong:

Gon: I’m not catching anyone. I’m just trying to find the face that only I can recognize.

This is the face:

Gon: (cont) Every time something like this happens, it feels like that person is there. When it happened 25 years ago, and today as well.
Yeong: It’s been 25 years. Your savior must have aged a lot. Do you think you can recognize the face?
Gon: I’m not sure. We might have already met unknowingly. But why hasn’t my savior ever come to see me?
Yeong: Because you’ve grown up well. You don’t need anyone’s help now.
Gon: (thoughtful face then…) You’re not mad at me anymore. My dear Yeong. How about a glass of beer?

See there, E=MCsquared? Your question “So what happens to the current Lee Gon?” was ALREADY asked by LG himself. 🙂 He’d been thinking about it all this time.

Yeong suggested that he didn’t show up because LG didn’t need help anymore and he grew up well anyway.

But if you’re a mathematical person, I think the first thing to enter your head is to question the existence of the savior. Whether the savior exists or not. Is he still alive or already dead? Is it 0 or 1?

Moreover, if you’re a mathematical person who happens to love “Alice in Wonderland” or the fairy tale side of life, then you begin to question whether the savior really existed, or did you just dream him up?

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Remember, nobody else saw the savior but young LG. Everybody at the scene of the massacre was dead.

And the ID that he held on to couldn’t be traced to anybody in the land. According to Lady Noh, that person didn’t exist, that job position didn’t exist.

Lady Noh: His Majesty has had a strange ID card since he was young. There was no police officer named Jeong TaeEul in the Kingdom of Corea, and there is no such rank as lieutenant in the police force here. I thought that it was a fake ID made as a joke or for some other reason, but that nonexistent person suddenly appeared here. It’s shocking.

Things didn’t compute in his own world, in his reality. So his answer was to search for another world – another reality, with a logical, mathematical basis – to explain what he lived through.

That’s how LG came to be a great believer of parallel worlds. A parallel world was the only explanation a mathematical mind could come up with, in order to explain the unexplainable phenomenon.

That’s why he felt great emotion when he saw TaeEul. Just like he was her proof that the parallel world existed,

SHE was HIS proof that he hadn’t gone crazy all those years. Lee Gon wasn’t crazy.

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Even though he did all that math problems, he was crazy delusional, people!

That’s why he was shocked to see her.

And he checked her ID.

Never in his wildest dreams did he think he could her. And yet he found her here in a parallel world.

In Your Dreams GIF - InYourDreams OneDirection KeepDreaming ...

I knew that #metoo people would make a big stink that he pulled her into his embrace (rolling my eyes here),

but in his case, an embrace was the MOST grateful response he could give her for what she’s done for him all these years, whether real or imagined.

2. In Episode 5, he ignored TaeEul when she brought up the book.

Didn’t anybody else notice what a weird reaction that was? TaeEul cracked a joke about being poisoned and he just sat there then. He ignored the reference to his favorite book.

TE: Pass me the snack.
LG: That’s not snack, it’s dinner. I thought you might be hungry.
TE: You try it first.
LG: What?
TE: I’m not joking. I’m Alice in Wonderland right now. She eats weird pills and grows bigger and smaller and stuff. What if I eat this and die from poisoning or natural causes?

If he loved the book as much as he did, he should have struck a conversation with TaeEul like, “Oh gosh!! That’s my favorite book! What part did you like about it? Tell me more?”

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It was a connection that he had with her, but he let the moment pass them by. He said, “Don’t worry. I keep my promises. You’ll die from a beheading.”

He knew the ending of Alice. But it must have been easier to joke about beheading than to talk about dreams ending, especially since she’d JUST arrived in a storybook setting, and he’d JUST begin to make her believe in his incredible status as ruling monarch of a kingdom.

The dream could last another day or so.

3. In Episode 6, he looked pensively at TaeEul when she met the Prime Minister for the first time. Remember I also said that his reaction was weird. Like he was…pained about something.

Koo: (addressing LG) When it comes to the country’s affairs, personal occasions are business too. And you are my country. (addressing TE) Nice to meet you. I’m Koo Seo-ryeong, the PM of the KoC.
TE: It’s nice to meet you. I’m a big fan.
Koo: I’m flattered to have such a young and beautiful fan. May I ask your name?
TE: I’m a traveler. I’m honored just to be able to see you like this. I’m leaving soon.

TE: (cont) This my first time in the Kingdom of Corea. I feel like I’m in a storybook.

Irony alert.

Best Oh Really GIFs | Gfycat

Koo: It’s your first time here, but you speak our language well.
TE: Ah, well…(scratching her cheek) I studied liberal arts.
LG: (laughing)

He looked sad because he knew that everything she said was true. He KNEW that she had to return to her world. But he didn’t want to just yet. It was too soon.

Even here, he knew that the dream had to end. She was his honored guest in his kingdom but she couldn’t be named nor exposed. Metaphorically, she had to pass through his land like a dream, a figment of imagination.

4. He uttered his last words at the chicken place. (I wrote about this, too….)

Listen, E=mcsquared.

You should know the stereotype of math nerds and realize that Lee Gon is NO poet.

Nah.

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He’s a math guy. Don’t you “hear” how measured, dry, methodical, professorial, and mathematical he is when he speaks?

“I’ve finally met you, Lieutenant Jeong TaeEul.”
“That was a greeting.”
“I am who I am.”
“The proof is right in front of you.”

Even his proposal was ludicrous —

“And you’re standing in front of the root symbol I’m trapped in.”

You Say What Now Thats Funny GIF - YouSayWhatNow ThatsFunny WhatDidYouSay GIFs

So, he’s definitely NOT like the poet Kim Sa-Wol in his “Invocation of the Dead” who wrote this:

Oh, name shattered.
Oh, name that parted in the air.
Oh, name without an owner.
Oh, name I will call until I die.
I won’t finish the last words
I had in my heart.
The one I loved.
The one I loved.

You see, Lee Gon actually DID say the last words in his heart. lol. In fact, it was one of the few things he told her at the chicken place.

TE: So, are you saying that I should taste your food?
LG: No. If this food is poisoned and I’m dying here, what I’m going to tell you now will be my last words.
TE: Shoot!

lol. The wordplay on murder is too funny in this kdrama. I wish I had time to list them all.

Looking at her seriously, he said his last words.

LG: Thank you for everything. Because you existed somewhere, I was less lonely for the past 25 years.

See that? He said the last words he kept in his heart.

And TaeEul was rendered speechless.

Now, I’m not Korean, I’m not lit grad, and I’m not really romantic in real life. Didn’t I say in the beginning I’m an uber-Bitch? However, I believe that should lovers separate for reasons beyond their control and their sorrow cannot be delayed any longer, then Lee Gon’s pithy words were enough to express these three important sentiments:

I’ve kept the faith.
I’ve no regrets.
Thank you for being part of my life.

 

36 Comments On “The Red King’s Dream, part 3”

  1. Where is the button to say you are AWESOME?

    Oh no… i wish you wouldnt restrict your posts about the King to 50 but keep them at 63 😀

    Given that ES likes 63 and king said there were 63 such buildings in Corean Seoul!

    Jokes apart…thank you for taking the time to put these together. It adds colour to my days 🙂

  2. But does it make sense? 🙂

  3. I just realized that my blog posts are being translated into different languages.

    “To keep the faith” is an expression that may or may not translate well. It means He believed in her even when he wasn’t sure that she existed.

    When you think about this philosophically, that’s what faith means, right? To believe in a presence of somebody greater than you, that you haven’t seen physically in front of you. It’s a belief that cannot be explained by science or math. Science and math can only approach, approximate, estimate and theorize. They have limits to comprehending the natural world and other greater works of a Transcendental Being.

  4. It makes sense and these sentiments you have offered ‘should lovers separate for reasons beyond their control’:
    “I’ve kept the faith.
    I’ve no regrets.
    Thank you for being part of my life.” I think are balanced by Tae-Eul’s reflections on accepting her fate and voicing her feelings quickly. She said she would wait for him, she can have no regrets or she wouldn’t accept him and she understands that their relationship is going to be short and fragile.

  5. Old American Lady

    Just some random comments. I’m neither a liberal arts or science graduate. Ibelong in the gray ground of social science-where some schools give you a ba and others give you a bs. So from that background, Iam very impressed with how the writer handles social norms in the way the characters interact in tbe ROK and the KOC. There is a lot more free-wheeling communication, joking, sarcasm, lightness in the ROK. And the stiffness is palpable in the KOC. Food issues and mealtime are so telling. And the production does this down to the clothing (informal v formal-no sloppysweats in the KOC) and the sets-very well thought out.

    And from a feligious point of view-the most significant Jewish prayer is the Shema-which is a short sentence, translated to Hear o Israel, the Lord our G-d, the Lord is ONE(my emphasis). So, ifthe Eternal King isthenumber one, is he a deity? And this was one of the first monotheistic religions.

    Again, thanks for all of your wonderfully thought-provoking posts. They add so much to my enjoymentnof this drama. And I’m in awe of your lively, curious mind.

  6. @packmule3

    I think it makes sense. To be honest my reading of the drama is totally colored with your vision of it.
    I often question: how much of a drama is about audience’s reading of it and how much of it is the actual medium itself and that often brings me to my favourite question — what is art?

    The long winding sentiment just to tell you that you shouldn’t be worried about whether it makes sense or not because it will to some and won’t to others depending upon their bias/cultural/life experiences. I for one believe that as long as enjoy something we should play with it. So do play the music, the notes can be heard in lands far and near.

    How people like or dislike the music should not stop you from creating it. Stay safe and continue being creative.

  7. @Packmule3, it makes sense. And although you say you’re no lit grad, be assured you and your mind could hold your own in a room full of lit grads. I, a lit grad, bow down to you.

    @NoOne, I’m with you…let’s campaign for #Makeit63!

    I’d like to add a humanistic view of how LG and TE are approaching their love. Neither have grown up in households where they’ve witnessed a loving relationship between a husband and wife. It’s not part of their vernacular. LG was motherless from a young age. (We haven’t been told when or how she died.) LG became an orphan at age 8 after seeing his father’s murder. TE’s mother died when TE was five, and we’re told she had been sick.

    These two are figuring out their love as they go along, not able to fall back on examples set for them by their parents.

    Speaking from experience: my mother’s mother died when my mom was seven years old. The effects of that loss have reverberated through the generations. Things that may have felt natural to my mom if she’d learned them at her mother’s knee were instead mastered (or not) with much effort and concentration. She accomplished so much in her long life, but wrestled with her confidence because she lacked a template.

    LG grew up in an environment where no one else was his social equal. Let that sink in a bit. My having grown up in a two-parent home with three siblings, I have difficulty imagining what that kind of social and emotional isolation would do to LG’s worldview and sense of self. Even when people in LG’s life loved him, like HCL Noh, there were roles they had to adhere to and lines they couldn’t cross. TE entering his life brought a dynamic that was new beyond the standard issues accompanying the development of a romantic relationship. No template for him here. And he didn’t have the benefit of unconsciously absorbing from parents their example of how to navigate as a couple in a loving relationship.

    TE was raised by a loving father, but his isn’t the warm fuzzy style of love. Instead of immersing herself in girly fare as she grew up, she watched and rewatched a police TV show. By the time she was in her first year in high school, she’d already earned a black belt in taekwondo. Rather than fine tuning her concept of romance by channeling Disney princesses, she’d spent her childhood internalizing the five tenants of taekwondo: courtesy, integrity, perseverance, self-control and indomitable spirit.

    LG and TE are unique characters because of the unique environments in which they grew to be adults. No wonder their approach to love and confession is different than other people’s. Unfortunately, those other people are us viewers, and if viewers don’t empathize with their characters, understanding breaks down.

    What I appreciate about BoD is that we, as viewers, keep working on developing our understanding of the story and empathy for the characters. And yes, it is work to not look superficially or fall back on expectations. For some of us, the work of understanding a drama is equal to the enjoyment of watching the drama.

    That said, I’m not adverse to watching a fluffy (but coherent) Kdrama every now and then. Any recommendations?

  8. Mind-blowing!!!

    Funny (or intentionally) enough in that scene where she saw the Red King, the White King was right in front of her.

    Now regarding the book, in the end Alice is not sure whether it was her dream or the king’s. It’s gonna be interesting to see how that is gonna be played out later on.

    Chapeau to @packmule3, KES and everyone involved in this drama. In a way, this drama gives me Matrix vibes in that there is more to it than meets the eye.

  9. “I’ve kept the faith.
    I’ve no regrets.
    Thank you for being part of my life.”

    I feel I’ll say this to you someday. ☺️ I’m sure you’ll understand it too. Just accept my gratefulness now. 🙇🏻‍♀️

  10. “ And from a feligious point of view-the most significant Jewish prayer is the Shema-which is a short sentence, translated to Hear o Israel, the Lord our G-d, the Lord is ONE(my emphasis). So, ifthe Eternal King isthenumber one, is he a deity? And this was one of the first monotheistic religions.”

    Hmm…his statement “I am who I am” (Exodus 3:14) is quite literally a quote from the Bible and the Torah. “I am” is God’s name which He spoke to Moses. He is the great “I am”. It is a claim to be a god-equivalent. Hence the almost stoning (by the Jewish religious leaders) that Jesus got when he declared, “Before a Abraham was, I am”, John 8:58-59. He was laying claim to the one name that was God’s alone.

  11. Growing Beautifully (GB)

    @packmule3
    Thanks for making sense of the dream for us. As usual, you went over and above from where I was in my ‘dreamscape’ LOL. I’m delighted to be considered your dear friend, by the way! 😊 😆

    It was I who mentioned the sound of gears. It was in this post
    https://bitchesoverdramas.com/2020/04/21/the-king-eternal-monarch-episode-2/ I thought it might have meant that the clock was being wound up for a long haul series of action.

    It was a little puzzling when he mentioned the white rabbit with the clock because on both counts he was ‘wrong’. The rabbit was black and there was no visible clock. That should have sounded warning bells for me!!! But it wasn’t just a clock, it was the clock.

    Now that this has cropped up again, (and as usual I take the idea on a not necessarily logical trail), I’m toying with the image that the metaphorical clock was wound up, by a deity/god, and the characters are pawns in a game that has a time limit. Like the way chess players in competitions hit the countdown timer (so stressful!) once they finish their move, so that their opponent has only a limited time to strategise and act.

    The gears will keep unwinding, until they are totally done and have to be wound up again (the time loop). If LG is the ‘1’ and the deity, then it’s his clock that he has to keep rewinding. He is both in control and not in control of those moving gears. At the very end, he can choose to let the clock die, (which is the end of his dream) or he can wind it up again to restart the action and the dream.

    If Tae Eul is the ‘0’ whom Fate prods to change the action, then she is the one in his dream who’s destined to throw a spoke into his gear wheels to stop that clock. And yes, she may be the spoke itself, therefore it sounds like it gets painful.

    Speaking of keeping the faith, it’s 14 May, a day proposed for prayer across all faiths. So I’ll catch ya later!

  12. As long as you don’t say, “She’s psychic,” or “So long, stinker!” I’m fine. 😂🤦‍♀️

    A few weeks ago, my hubby and I updated our wills and living trusts. I changed the music to be sung at the funeral. 😂 I wanted BTS “Spring Day,” just to confuse my guests. (Good luck finding a cantor to sing that.) I’m tired of “On Eagle’s Wings.”

  13. I laughed 😂 when I read your post because I can imagine the congregation’s surprise when they hear the song but I’ve looked at the lyrics and I actually like it. 🙂

    I especially like this line :

    Snowflakes are falling
    And you are getting farther away
    I miss you (I miss you)
    I miss you (I miss you)
    How much more do I have to wait?
    How many more days do I have to stay up all nights?
    Until I can see you? (until I can see you?)
    Until I can meet you? (until I can meet you?)

    You know it all
    You’re my best friend
    The sun will rise again
    No darkness, no season
    Can last forever

    I really don’t like Winter but I feel it’s here now because we’re having under 10 degrees by night time. Did I just take another jab at HP followers? LOL. Sorry! 😂

  14. “ I really don’t like Winter but I feel it’s here now because we’re having under 10 degrees by night time. Did I just take another jab at HP followers? LOL. Sorry! ”

    😂 Sneaky. I was going to take a jab at a Disney Princess reference (Frozen)… I think it’s about time she “LET HIM GO”.

  15. Good one @nrllee, but knowing them they are probably following the series 2 song which is Into The Unknown! 😂

  16. Dear @GrowingBeautiful, it is always apleasure to read you!

    A king going back in time and getting trapped in a loop to try to save his white rabbit kind of feels like a sad thing, for there is not much variation (can I say possibilities?) that the imagination of both can have, so every loop must feel like variations on the same theme.

    As for the excellent insights of @Welmaris on their relationship, I get them from the other side. Having a mother that was very in love with my father and that behaved in a very lady-like fashion in all the areas of her life didn’t prepare me to leave that bubble and confront the today’s actual dating scene. So it can be a limitation also (not knowing how to protect yourself, the part of knowing what to look for is wonderful).

    On the other hand Tae-Eul accepting that her moments with Lee Gon are both fleeting, fragile and with hidden dangers are what they are, and that she should love and treasure them for what they are remembered me of an old song by Ilan Chester, “Amor Sin Medida” (Measureless Love). Please tell me if I am abusing on these cultural cookies 😉

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WTOVwSwdG8Y

    Una sola mirada me bastará para hacerme feliz

    una sola palabra desborda mi alma por ti

    tú me hechizas y a cada momento más

    tú me das lo que siempre soñé.

    Una sola balada me bastará para hacerme llorar

    una sola llamada es una cascada por ti

    tú me llevas por aires que no conozco

    y entiendo me robas sueños en este volar.

    Amor sin medida, amor al natural

    que puedes saber? quien lo puede estar?

    amor sin medidas, amor al natural

    y es poco lo que hoy siento por ti.

    Tu me hechizas y a cada momento mas

    tu me das lo que siempre soñé.

    Una sola balada me bastara para hacerme llorar

    una sola llamada es una cascada por ti

    tu me llevas por aires que no conozco

    y entiendo me robas sueños en este volar

    Amor sin medida, amor al natural

    que puede saber? quien lo puede estar?

    amor sin medidas, amor al natural

    y es poco lo que hoy siento por ti

    es poco lo que hoy siento por ti

    ****Translation by Google Translate (retouched a little).

    NOTE: the explanation and *hopefully* little snippets with MY personal understanding in the lyrics are in brackets.

    Just a single glance will be enough to make me happy

    a single word overflows my soul for you

    you cast a spell on me, and every moment more

    You give me what I always dreamed of.

    A single ballad will be enough to make me cry

    a single call is a waterfall (of feelings about you)

    You take me through airs [spiriual landscapes] that I don’t know

    and I understand you steal dreams from me [as in you made real] in this flight.

    Love without measure, love as is natural

    Who can know, who can be [as in an ego – so in love]?

    love without measure, love as is natural

    [And it is very little [what I felt then] compared with what I feel today].

    You spellbound me and every moment more

    You give me what I always dreamed of.

    A single ballad will be enough to make me cry

    a single call is a waterfall for you

    You take me through airs that I don’t know

    and I understand you steal dreams from me in this flight

    Love without measure, love as it is [natural]

    what can you know who can be?

    love without measures, love as it is [natural]

    {and I feel little for you today

    I feel little for you today} [And it is very little [what I felt then] compared with what I feel today].

    ***

    So for me her answer is Acceptance and to live in the present.

    @Packmule3, as for the (hopefully happy ending) I get that the bamboo flute (Daegeum) is a very powerful McGuffin. Even split in two it can open a door between worlds (hell, when I was a child I destroyed a plastic recorder by sitting in top of it and rendered it into a funny whistle at best). The true power of a full, restored Manpasikjeok must be astonishing.

    Sadly I see it coming through as a big cop out from a worldbuilding and script point of view so I hope that the “how we get there” is constructed tightly.

  17. Growing Beautifully (GB)

    Hello @FGB4877 it is most certainly a pleasure to read you!!

    My thoughts on the winding of the clock are just playing with how the gear sounds bring in the metaphors, and yes, I would hate to be in any kind of loop.

    It’s true what you say. I don’t think coming from a home intact or not had much bearing on how one knew how to date.

    Yes, I liked that TE is always clear headed about practical realities and priorities. … Her dad should not receive payment in eggs because how are they going to pay the rent! … LG had been telling her the truth and he had a name so by rights she should be beheaded for breaking his rules in his kingdom! … And time could run out at any moment for them so cut to the chase and tell him “I love you” without delay and regret. I highly applaud her practical stance and initiative.

    Thank you for the lovely song. I’m listening to it and it sounds so romantic already, even without my reading the English translation. The lyrics are what we’d love to hear from our beloved (a bit cheesy) but so warm!

    And since we are on the Red King’s Dream post… the lyrics:

    “You give me what I always dreamed of.”

    If these words can be applied to LG’s thoughts, then TE fulfils his dreams. He had searched for her for 25 years and had finally found her.

    “A single ballad will be enough to make me cry
    a single call is a waterfall (of feelings about you)
    You take me through airs [spiritual landscapes] that I don’t know
    and I understand you steal dreams from me [as in you made real] in this flight.”

    All possible imaginings of what and whom she might be, she had put to rest … by being who she was. I recall with a laugh how shocked he was that she was so rude. He thought she’d be softer, but she claimed to have been hard and blunt for at least 30 years. To his credit, he accepted her completely, warts and all.

    I like the part about her taking him through spiritual landscapes. It could be her words to him actually, since it was he who brought her to the weird landscape of his No Man’s Land and into his kingdom.

    “Love without measure, love as is natural
    Who can know, who can be [as in an ego – so in love]?
    love without measure, love as is natural
    [And it is very little [what I felt then] compared with what I feel today].”

    Taken in the way we like to re-interpret words here, “love is as natural” – ie she is destined to be, fated to be his love without measure, it is only natural that they would love each other.

    “love without measure” – Neither will place limits on their love since it has to span universes and untold lengths of time.

    Muchas gracias. Disfruté la canción y los pensamientos que evocaba a fondo.

  18. We haven’t talked about OSTs here as much but the most recent OST that came out 4 days ago is Paul Kim’s “My Dream”. Just perfect.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jLdqPvuHJvE

    [MV] Paul Kim(폴킴)- Dream
    (The King: Eternal Monarch 더 킹: 영원의 군주 OST Part 8)

    You are my dream
    You are my love
    Because you’re the one who told me about love

    Follow your time
    Follow my heart
    On a blinding day
    You’re still here

    I love you
    I love you

    Meeting you
    It’s all you after that time
    My heart is full
    A flying you

    You are my dream
    You are my love
    Your warmth
    May I be there to stay
    ’til the end

    You are my dream
    You are my life
    My days in black and white
    I’m gonna paint your color

  19. Thanks for the spoiler alert.
    I saw your other “Red Dream” articles. I had quickly browsed the page but stopped reading when I felt it might be heavy spoiler.
    Here, I read the entire article.

    As I’ve just reviewed episodes 1 and 2, I found references that I noted. Good surprise, you mention some.
    The picture of the savior. I also did some freeze-frames, including the one you took.
    – Scenes from the beginning: the saviour looks like a man (build, shot on his hands).
    – Flashback scene: As you can see in your picture, the eyes look like a woman’s. In this scene, LG identifies JY as not being his savior.

    Regarding the savior’s life after his act of bravery, I had hypothesized that he had died in another comment lost in your articles. There, I had also made a topo on the different rules that can be used for time travel. I don’t know the one used in this drama.
    It could be a rule with no loops and no paradox: events fatally lead the savior to go back in time to accomplish what is seen at the beginning of the drama. Nothing can be changed. In this case, it is preferable that the savior is dead, as this is one less factor that could prevent this destiny from being fulfilled. This doesn’t mean that the characters don’t have a choice of destiny, but that the overall view is “a posteriori”, everything is already accomplished in an environment where everyone will have made their choice.

    – Example of films using a journey without a loop and without paradox: “Nimitz, return to hell”, “The warriors of the apocalypse” (Japanese film).
    – Extreme and realistic example of a film using a process of rewriting the same frame, without paradox, therefore with duplicate characters: “Primer”.
    – Example of rewriting process of the same frame, with multiple loops, without paradox and without duplicate: “Nine Time Travel”, “Butterfly effect”.
    – Process of creating a new parallel universe each time someone arrives in the past, and therefore never modifying the frame from which it comes, without paradox.

    In the case of TKEM. An infinite loop process leads to many problems, especially if at each loop, the events are different. And don’t forget that if even tiny details change, the future is also rewritten by butterfly effect. Hence the theory of infinite loops within the same frame is unlikely. I’ll leave you to think about it.

    But I’ll stop there, because I don’t want to guess, I prefer to discover this in drama. Just for a hypothesis, I wrote 3 heavy paragraphs, on top of that.

    About the “math guy”. Without being extreme, I understand, I have this tendency too. For example, I optimize my time for mundane things, which surprises those around me. Whenever Lee Gon is expected at the bottom of his home, the first thing he says is how long it took him to come.
    Episode 2, he comes down from his hotel room: “It took me 9:40”.
    Episode 8, the confession scene: “I took 8:40”.

    I enjoyed the drama a lot more when I saw it again.
    – The first half of episode 2 is very good. I threw the baby out with the bath water. “Jeter le bébé avec l’eau du bain.” French expression meaning that one rejects what is bad, but out of anger or disappointment, one rejects at the same time what is good.
    – I also manage to describe more accurately the problems that drama suffers from, confused scenes, badly arranged, too isolated, weak in storyline. I can also see some of the reasons for this. Maybe I will talk about them in more detail later, but in general: the scenes where LL makes his army with lots of characters, the scenes of police investigations.

    Quick inventory of references.
    Episode 1:
    – First scene of the drama. Unknown context. Interrogation of LL by TE. She doesn’t seem to know anything about the flute. Scene from a previous time loop ?
    – Close-up of the savior’s shoes. To keep in mind for identification.
    – Inverted scar : is it deliberate or logical error ? Mirror effect ? Just after the injury, the stained glass in the ceiling explodes. Possible effect : the wound is on one side, crash of the stained glass / passing through the mirror, the scar changes sides.
    – Crossing the dimensional portal. Rules: Triggers short timestop in the world of arrival + hallucination of the world of origin for a character connected to the story (here, Luna for TE).
    Episode 2 :
    – Eun Sup about LG. “He’s like king arthur, he rides a white horse, I saw it in the cartoon”. + more references about that in the episode.
    – Why TE takes care of the horse: No choice, LG sent her a message. She accepts but threatens to sell the horse if it goes wrong.

  20. @Alxmar97, you have LG as the white king? Ah. So would LL and the PM be the red king and queen? Both of them favour red; she in clothing and he in dye/paint/photo chemicals.

    @FGB4877, thank you for the thoughts and the beautiful and appropriate song.

  21. @Fern I’m not sure if he’s the White King but in that scene when he’s about to go to “war”, he’s completely dressed in white and behind him, there’s the red dress to which Tae Eul looks directly at. That could be another reference to the book, as @packmule3 pointed out.

    But you’re making an interesting point right there 😲😲😲 It could very well be.

  22. @Alxmar97, I was just wondering, based on what you wrote. Tae-Eul is more like Alice to me than the White Queen, who at first glance is more mild mannered and dozy than the Red Queen in the book. But TE must be queen, mustn’t she? It’s so muddled – so many stories and legends swirling around.

  23. Growing Beautifully (GB)

    Thanks @grace for the link and the lyrics. I enjoyed the YT vid. Also watched the OST 7. @pkml3 can add them to the list of OSTs post.

    The sentiments expressed are definitely apt! 😄

  24. I thoroughly enjoyed reading. Thank you for writing and trusting your readers again by not password protecting this post as a series as well.

    I still don’t like the hug in Ep 1. Whatever may have been LG’s reasons, it didn’t give him the right to violate TE personal space without her consent. It’s not about #metoo, it’s about general decency.

    Also, I know story writers don’t exist to explain themselves and that onus may be with the reader. But I suppose when a production is meant for a general viewing audience, wouldn’t it have been more prudent to make sure it’s more understable? Your posts for example make everything so clear. But the drama is paced in much harder to comprehend fashion and feels very jumpy.

  25. Thanks @FGB4877 for that music. I listened to it and it’s quite nice. ☺️

    I like that song too @grace. It’s my second fave after Please Don’t Cry by Davichi.

  26. @agdr03, I love the Davichi song as well. The video is a lovely compilation, too.

  27. Thanks, grace. I’ll update the OST list. You saved me work!

  28. I just noticed the title, Grace.
    It’s about “My Dream.” lol I guess we’re on the right track then with the Red King’s Dream/Alice’s dream.

  29. @Fern, yes it’s a lovely video compilation. 🥰 I was watching it while waiting for child pick up at school today. I want to memorise the song before the series ends. 😁

  30. Thank you @packmule3. I never thought that Lee Gon has already asked the question. I am so proud to have a little of his brain cells! Your blog is a delight to all of us who are watching this drama. Your insights make everything so much more interesting!

  31. I’m an Alice fan. I agree with you Packmule3, everything checks out with Through the Looking Glass.

    The mirror, the chess game (don’t get me started on the mirror chess pieces aka doppelgangers, some of who have died “in the game”, in the quest for the ultimate checkmate). My spine tingled too when PM’s husband started singing. Poetry & Songs are part of Through the Looking Glass as well as frequent references on time and spatial directions as a plot device. Which leads me to what you are saying Packmule3, the dream sequence.

    Watching Episode 10 makes me think – are all these TE’s hallucinations (aka the dream sequence)?

    In Psychology, there is an Alice in Wonderland Syndrome. Symptoms include intense hallucinations where patients can experience things that are not really around them or loss of sense/experience of time.

    Math and time have been very important elements of TKEM. In math, time can be defined as the ongoing and continuous sequence of events, from past, present and future.

    Time (via mathematics), is used to quantify, measure or compare the duration, intervals or sequence of events. It has been known, based on research & experiments, that people with neurological disorders (such as the Alice in Wonderland Syndrome), have a different perception of time. The way they perceive time intervals are different. Order of events are less precise as well.

    I’ve been seeing comments and complaints that the story is slow etc. The question is, are we actually missing the main plot of the story? 🙂

    Only time will tell. For now, let’s enjoy the show ❤️

  32. I haven’t watched Eps 5 and 6.

    But reading the comments, I wondered if the “Red King’s Dream” had any part of this. But are you saying that it’s “Alice’s Dream” now… or TaeEul’s Dream? 🤣 I’ll see.

    Welcome to the blog.

  33. @MsWhiteMoto wrote ‘Watching Episode 10 makes me think – are all these TE’s hallucinations (aka the dream sequence)?’ This is really interesting. I had been thinking, could LG be like a ghost or otherwise unreal, but then I thought, she does have the flowers even after he leaves.

    In Through the Looking glass doesn’t Alice wonder whether it was her dream or the Red King’s. Ah…I wonder how this will pan out.

  34. @ Fern – By far, KES has been very consistent with the elements of Through the Looking Glass. You’re right, in the story Alice acknowledges that the Red King was sleeping, but wonders if the whole thing was her dream or his 🤔

    So far, I’m happy with TKEM. I like that it doesn’t give me anything all at once. LMH has also improved here as an actor, but WDH steals the show 🤗

    If they end up becoming TE/Alice’s dream aka figment of imagination, it’s really going to be a bummer. Lol.

    I could be wrong in all this, but that’s the fun part isn’t it? 🙂 Speculating the show, but at the same time just enjoying how the writer unfolds her narrative, in her own time 🌻🍃

    ———

    “Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.” – Alice

  35. @MsWhiteMoto, yes, it’s a good ride.

    Yes, strange if it should be only a dream or dreams based on books read in someone’s past. Or if TE, LG and SJ were all subjects in a clinical trial on dreams. 🙄

    —-
    “Life, what is it but a dream?” – Carroll

  36. Growing Beautifully (GB)

    @pkml3 and Everyone
    When Show started with the Alice story, I should have known that I was entering a world of illogic. Elsewhere I was posting thoughts of mirror image reversals and the backwards/forwards chronology of time. Now I’ve returned to another motif that keeps knocking on the back of my mind, the show’s treatment of identity.

    (BTW. I stand corrected. In one of my posts I said that: “The only legend we are given with this show is that of the flute belonging to the King.” Well I spoke too soon because we don’t have just 1 story, we have at least 3!!)

    But the Flute legend remains in the background, while allusions to Alice’s topsy turvy dream world keep being offered to us. Hence here, identity can be an illogical and paradoxical thing.

    Elsewhere I wrote about Show’s play on having an identity, on being unidentified, and on having or not having a name. We need identity. We need to know the other’s identity. It matters because our decisions and interactions with others depend on who we are or think we are, and who we think the others are.

    Identity with the Manpasikjeok and The Four Tiger Sword:
    – Somewhere in the beginning, I mentioned that in the legendary opening (with scene of tree, roots, flute and lightning), that since it was the lightning that cut the flute, The Four Tiger Sword, wielded by LG might be the lightning.

    (Aside: a mystery remains as to why LG evinces great pain when there’s lightning and thunder, while LG goes around, unfazed, with fiery roots on his face.)

    The words on the Sword “The sky bestows the heart upon us, and the ground helps the spirit. The sun and the moon are formed. As the mountains and streams form, lightning strikes. A sage is moved to defeat the evil of the mountains and streams.”

    Another translation gets right to the point: “The sky and the ground help the earth balance. Defeat the bad and make things just.”

    Since LG considers himself the King and owner of the Sword, he will, like the lightning that struck to the root of the tree, join the sky and the earth to help the earth balance. But it seems he has allowed a great imbalance to take place. He will need help.

    TE, in her voiceover, believes that Fate has assigned her the role of ‘Balance Restorer of the Universes.’ I’d like to think that this means, what LG has lost in the balance, TE will restore.

    In my post to @Fern, “We mentioned in the early posts that balance was between sky and ground. Between heart and spirit. So the Sword will indeed be called into play/battle. Whether it must be LG who wields it or whether TE will have a hand in this will be interesting to watch for.”

    – LL seems to be more often associated with rain or water. His choosing an umbrella to house his half of the flute is most apt. More than once he walks in the rain, Once when time stopped he was by the sea, another time, when preparing paint. Once when LL passes through the portal, it is the stilling of the rain that alerts LG to LL’s crossing, while the last time it was the stilling of the water from the tap.

    In the legend of the flute, when it is blown, among other things:
    -The rainy season would end
    -The wind would stop
    -And strong waves would subside

    So with the flute held together as one, the upheaval and the rainy season of LL could be ended. LOL. To get the flute, however, the sword will probably have to strike.

    (A troubling thought – When lightning strikes a pool of water, it will get conducted and those nearby can be electrocuted.)

    Identity and the Alice Story:
    – TE in the role of Alice in KOC, without a means to prove her identity, was stymied. We assume that TE as the great ‘0’ to LG’s Square Root (where he is trapped) will be in a position to free him.

    TE in the role leading to becoming queen will need to start her moves from the other side of the board (other universe) and make her way with the help of a White Knight to where she can be crowned queen. We assume that she will take on the role of defender of the King as it happens in chess. Might Jo Yeong remain the other Unbreakable Sword for her and Shin Jae be the White Knight?

    Aside: I note, in the book, ‘Alice,’ that the chess pieces were red and white. When Alice got to the other side of the board and was made queen, she was an extra queen. There was already a Red and White Queen who insisted that she throw them a party. What this augers for her role in the end, will be interesting.

    The King Arthur legend:
    – This legend is strong in this show, since Fate is shown twice, reading the book and admits to being eager to know the end of the King Arthur tale. I find it a little strange that yet another legend is introduced into this show, as if the Manpasikjeok legend and Alice was not enough. We said before that KES is re-writing the legend, but somehow for several episodes now, she seems to have left the flute legend and used the more well known (to us) imagery of King Arthur.

    – LG is repeatedly called King Arthur and even refers to himself by that name. Even in the normal course of life, LG takes his kingly role rather seriously. However he has fun with it as well, when he threatens a beheading or claims King’s orders. The only time he was serious about the order to kill, was to Yeong over LL.

    Taking it seriously has implications in that he will not want to do anything to open his subjects to being hurt. Luna said to the man she bashed up that she couldn’t understand how he could have a family that would be a weakness to him, in his trade. Well, LG has a greater weakness with all the nation to be responsible for in KOC and TE in ROK. He will have a hard time taking down LL in his Kingdom or the ROK without the collateral damage. The King will need his ‘Unbreakable’ Sword, his Knights and his Queen in the game, but whether they will be on the same playing board is the question. In fact where the fight takes place might be the place of Legend between 1 and 0.

    – And again on the importance of believing in one’s identity – We look at Eun Seob. From the character write-up he came straight from school and only ever had a Public Service desk job in the military. This explains his lack of confidence in battle. But because ES was asked to become the true Unbreakable Sword, cowardly and untrained, though he was, he was able to take the bullet for LG.

    What is what?
    I started by saying “… our decisions and interactions with others depend on who we are or think we are, and who we think they are.” However, I’m thinking show upends what we think we know of identity and reality. So then, can we hold to what we think we know?

    The reality as proposed by the show is in question. We hear LG wax lyrical on quantum mechanics, on how light can exist simultaneously in 2 forms, namely both particles and waves, to explain the existence of parallel worlds.

    In Ep 2, HCL Noh says of the flute and the ID card: “What an odd thing it is. Something that is silent made a sound and something that cannot be identified exists.”

    In other words, the logic of this world allows some things to have ‘its cake and eat it at the same time’. (The way LG wants to have both TE and the Kingdom).

    I was remarking on the repetition of gender confusion:
    Maximus could be a Maxine? – a lady horse with a very masculine name. When she hears the vet referring to Max as Lady Max, even TE remarked in surprise “Lady?” I take it that she’s both surprised that Max is called by a title and that the title is not masculine but ‘Lady’.

    Then we meet Fate. Fate looks like a boy, but is acted by a girl and we are left wondering if show wants us to think that she/he can be either and neither because that’s fate and not a person. So many of us, viewers were calling her the ‘Boy Fate’ only to be stopped in our tracks, slack jawed.

    So does the logic allow for something to be ambiguous, as well as 1 thing to be 2 things simultaneously, even 2 diametrically opposite or different things?

    The Dream?
    Which brings us to the dream. Anything is possible in a dream. Who is the dreamer? Alice or the Red King? We note that Alice is the real human being who dreamed up the Looking Glass World, in which the Red King slept. It is the Red King who is the fictional character in the story/legend. And yet in that story, Alice herself is figmental, presupposing that she exists only because the Red King dreamed of her.

    What happens to Alice when the Red King awakes? Similarly, what happens to the Red King when Alice awakes? But if Show can have its cake and eat it, then we can have both dreamer and dreamt subject co-existing.

    Now the big question, who is whom? Identity is called into question so many times in this show. Is TE really Alice through the Looking Glass while LG is Alice who followed the White Rabbit down the rabbit hole? Are there 2 Alices, the way we have Yeong and Eun Seob, co-existing?

    We noted the role reversal where TE was the tsundere female who took much of the initiative and took care of LG. So are we sure who will take on the roles of king and queen? 🤨 🤪 😆

    All this remains unanswered but it tickles the imagination.

    If the conundrum that is to be solved is a dream, then we would like to know who is sleeping while dreaming, and who is awake. The latter needs to wake up the former in order for the dream to end, and we assume, for the solution to present itself. Might this be the simple and beautiful solution? Or are we in for a nightmare because it’s a long endless dream-memory like the one Shin Jae has lived through for 25 years? Even LL says to Fate that he’s in the middle of a fight and has a long way more to go.

    So if TE is the ‘real’ person who is dreaming, it is she who needs to wake up. If she is the figment of the Red King’s dream, it is he who has to wake up if he ever chooses. Is there a third option? LOL!

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