This is my take. Don’t worry if it doesn’t jibe with yours. We can have different interpretations of the ending.
1. The Sisyphean loop is over. Taesul and Seohae got the happy ending they wanted. Sigma got the fanboy ending he deserved.
2. Their lives were reset when Taesul activated the “kill switch.” His suicide ended the never-ending time loop for all the characters who time-traveled. For Taesul, a reset was like a computer reboot.
3. For Taesul, his new life 2.0 began right BEFORE the plane experienced turbulence and his Hyung and suitcase collided with the plane. For Sigma, judging by the bullet hole in the bust, his life was reset to the time AFTER he was shown a simple act of kindness by Seohae’s dad.
4. My logic tree is simple. I asked these questions:
a. Is Taesul dead or alive?
If he’s dead, then this final airplane scene is a figment of imagination. It’s just like a myth.
I say he’s alive. He’s alive because he’s featured on the cover of the cover of EORBES (It’s not Forbes, lol) magazine. He’s alive and flying on a plane.
b. If he’s alive, is he repeating history or not?
If he’s repeating history, then he’s still trapped in a time loop.
I say he’s NOT repeating history. Here are the signs that he isn’t repeating history:
he didn’t confront the ramen passenger;
he didn’t boast about being the famous Quantum & Time founder;
he didn’t flirt with the stewardess and ask for her number;
he wasn’t sitting alone by the window;
he didn’t have to save the plane from crashing.
c. If he isn’t repeating history, is he hallucinating or not?
If he’s hallucinating, then it means he’s still trapped in a time loop (and I already rejected that idea). The only reason he hallucinated in the previous lifetime was because he regretted not showing profound gratitude to his Hyung before his Hyung supposedly “died.”
After the reset, however, his reason for his hallucination no longer exists. Since there’s no time loop, his Hyung wouldn’t locked up in an asylum by Sigma, and he wouldn’t have any reason to regret his brother’s death.
I say he isn’t hallucinating. At first, he isn’t sure. When Seohae begins talking beside him, he’s scared that he’s delusional again.
Seohae: White wine, Chardonnay, 2018. Why is there a number at the end?
The old Seohae didn’t know much about different beverages either.
Seohae: Why? Well, never mind the wine. Korean meal. Naengchae. What’s naengchae? I have no idea what these are. You choose for me. Which one is the best? Hey, Han Taesul. Why aren’t you answering me?
He just stares at her. He must be wondering whether she’s real or not. If she’s real, how come she didn’t know what a naengchae is? Naengchae is a cold salad.
Seohae: I have no idea what these are. You choose for me. Which one is the best? Hey, Han Taesul. Why aren’t you answering me?
Taesul: You…
Seohae: What?
Here, Seohae’s conversation sounds eerily like his Hyung’s monologue in Episode 1. Back then, his Hyung complimented him on their first-class seat and wine, but not the stewardess. He said, “She’s not your type. I have to say these first-class seats are super comfortable. I’m really proud of you, brother. And the quality of this wine is top-notch. You should have a glass, too. You see, Taesul, there’s this article I read. If the brain is stressed all the time like yours is…what is that? Right, adrenaline. The body produces it, which weakens the immune system. I read it in the newspaper. Hey, Taesul. I’m talking to you. Look at me. Are you mad at me or something? Why are you ignoring me?” Taesul reminded himself that he was hallucinating, “Because you’re dead.”
Taesul is about to tell Seohae that she’s also a delusion because she’s dead. But before he can do so, a flight attendant brought him a glass of water.
Stewardess: Here’s you water, sir.
Taesul: Thank you.
He takes out his medicine vial from his pocket and shakes out two pills. He glances again at Seohae. She still sits beside him. She hasn’t disappeared.
Seohae: (smiling) What? Is something wrong?
Taesul: (searching her eyes then smiling weakly) No.
He drops the pills to the floor. He takes a deep breath, blinks his eyes, and looks at her again.
5. To me, this is the turning point. The second he decided to drop the pills and face her, he left the past behind. That’s the emotional significance of the moment. He was making a choice to believe in her presence beside him.
He slowly dropped his head as Seohae inched closer to him to give her shoulder for him to rest on. They held hands. He smiled contentedly. Behind them, the flight attendants and passengers paid them no heed.
He well and truly broke the Sisyphean cycle.
If Sigma hadn’t arranged a plane crash and began his elaborate vengeance, this was how things would have been for Taesul. He would have been a regular CEO flying first-class with a companion named Seohae. He and Seohae would have been coming home from a vacation in Saipan or Hawaii. He would have been awakened from a terrifying nightmare about time machines and nuclear holocaust. He would have been comforted to see a starving Seohae beside him. Seohae could have been named Grace Park.
But Sigma injected himself into his life.
He trapped them in an endless loop, so much so that nobody could remember the beginning anymore. It’s become a long-forgotten memory like a myth. Sigma couldn’t remember the original person who shot and gave him the scar.
5. As for the final camera shot of Taesul and Seohae sitting in front of the plane,
I viewed it as the director’s artistic license.
It signified that the viewers didn’t have to worry about the plane crashing — and time loops again — because Taesul and Seohae were metaphorically flying into the sunset. This camera shot was a commingling of fantasy and reality so the story could end on a high note. Didn’t Park Shin Hye say that this kdrama had a hopeful message?
BTW, did you see what the props guy did? The blue magazine in the seat pocket is called, “Morning Clam.” The inflight magazine of Korean Airways is called “Morning Calm.” lol.
6. As for Sigma, or the artist formerly known as Seo Gilbok. I believe his life was reset too.
Like Taesul’s life was transformed because of Seohae, I’d like to think that Gilbok’s life was transformed because of the simple act of a kindness by a police detective like Seohae’s dad…or because of a bright smile of a child appreciative of his artwork.
The old Gilbok didn’t have a chance to interact with family with children. They looked suspiciously at him, and he kept his distance from them.
But this new Gilbok had children and parents lining up to have their sketches done. His money bucket had a fair amount of bills in it which indicated a thriving trade for him.
The happy faces of the children and parents would have neutralized the contempt and suspicion he received in his previous lifetime. He was very sensitive to people staring at him. His favorite expression was “Don’t look at me like that.”
He gouged Taesul’s eyes out in his portraits because Taesul without eyeballs meant that he could no longer judge him. He also painted Taesul with bloody tears probably to depict Taesul regretting the day he looked at him with disgust. He hero-worshipped Taesul when they were kids, and he was still obsessed with Taesul as an adult.
As for the notebook, yes, the notebook belonged to Seohae’s dad, and those were his notes. But since it’s uncertain whether Gilbok had total recall of his previous life, this notebook might prove useless to him, too, like Taesul’s medical pills.
But I don’t think he would be able to trap Taesul in a similar crisis.
For one, Taesul would never build that uploader to jumpstart Sigma’s scheme. For another, Taesul already learned that when given the false dichotomy of saving the girl or saving the world, the correct choice was to sacrifice himself in order to save both the girl and the world.
Besides, this Gilbok was channeling his jealous and envy for Taesul in a different way. The old Gilbok took to writing malicious comments to get back at Taesul. The new Gilbok merely copycat Taesul’s style of casual dressing.
So there you go. My short takes on the finale.
Thanks for your short take on the finale @pkml3. Having the reset bring different people back to different times of their ‘history’ is a nifty way to get around the break in logic.
I’ve been thinking that show is smart to tag on ‘The Myth’ at the end of the title. When any bits don’t fit into whatever ‘logic’ there appears to be, it’s because there’s a mythical element in it. For instance the inexplicable scenes of guns being fired at point blank range and the victim being fine, or merely waking up after that. I was going to propose at one time that those were sleep inducing guns. LOL. But we could always say that TSul only imagined himself getting shot, or… it was just a myth!
This is a convincing explanation and many points I agree with.
However, if this is the reality, it would be disappointing from the point of view of the SF concept. But one could also imagine that during the reset, there was some kind of final merge, explaining the strange disparities of the last scenes. This is a bit vague and arbitrary, but why not?
With a more rigid and logical vision, the reset can only take place at the very beginning.
Certainly, we see Tae Sul later on. The reason he doesn’t replay the events of episode 1 is the lack of preconditions related to time travel. But I imagine that he lived a new life from 2001 to 2020.
Sigma’s change in attitude comes from a more meta, subterranean aspect that he himself ignores after the reset. Tae Sul was the hero Sigma was waiting for. He did not choose the girl but the world, by sacrificing himself. The drama insists a lot on the false choices Sigma offers, cynical about people, accusing them of their selfish choice. Tae Sul’s choice is just what Sigma envisioned as a way out, and it breaks through his cynicism.
From an SF point of view, the most convincing explanation for why Tae Sul remembers (or hallucinates about) Seo Hae, and why the end scene with Sigma has remaining elements related to time travel, is this: the loop is not over. The uploader will be built. Otherwise, there is no reason for the real and physical (or even illusory) presence of Seo Hae in the plane after the reset. And before he died, Tae Sul insisted a lot by telling Seo Hae: find me! Implied, the Seo Hae who is currently a child, will grow up in the future, and will use the uploader to find Tae Sul. The sequences in the scene also suggest that Tae Sul has indeed given the right code to Eddy, so that Seo Hae can find him. If the end scene shows Sigma in the new loop (it is not said, it may be from the end of the loop we see in the drama), the hole in the bust comes from another event, not necessarily an assassination attempt, and the diary too. It comes from the events rewritten in the new loop, from time travel. We don’t know anything about that.
On the other hand, in the new loop, the scenario takes into account the “one choice, two futures”. Here a future without war.
It may seem sad that this time loop is endless, but this is the myth of Sisyphus. And the meaning of all this is the one given by the philosopher Camus. Sisyphus makes peace with himself and accepts the absurdity of his eternal damnation. The principle of making peace is reflected in the fact that the time loop no longer leads to a nuclear war. And Sigma also made peace, as most of the characters in the drama. Sisyphus can be incarnated in each of them.
@GB, regarding the events that strangely overlap (there are many), like the scene at the Control Bureau: the boss tells Tae Sul that he can leave, but his assistant shoots him in the head (then Tae Sul wakes up). Just like: in the morning, Seo Hae eats 5 bananas. Then she wakes up again and Sun gives her 5 bananas.
All these strange events are a way used to expose multiple loops, without breaking the continuity of the story we see on the screen. A situation comes from the past loop, there is a future loop, but we don’t see the events happening again. For example, if you have seen the movie “The Butterfly Effect”, here we still see the totality of the events happening again. In Sisyphus, the script uses a shortcut, very brief. This presents an anomaly to the viewer. Just to say “it happened this way once before”, it now starts again in another way, but everything is treated in elypse and we go directly to the next part.
@WEnchanteur, Yes, that was my interpretation of the ‘strange’ and unexplained scenes. Show merely displays an anomaly and it’s up to us whether we noticed or not, and if we did notice … it’s up to us whatever conclusion we draw from it.
My conclusion was that we are seeing the merged similar events from the myriad time loops. Where there was enough similarity in time, place and person(s), but a big enough disparity in an element (as in suddenly Gil Bok experiences kindness when he’d never done so in past loops), then there was an instant of merging a new element in the current loop, and these merges are accompanied by glitching, and/or fainting spells, and/or visions of ‘prophecies’ or ‘dreams of things to come’.
LOL. I was just imagining that maybe in past loops, instead of bananas, Jae Sun had grapes or some other fruit for SH to eat, and that’s why she glitched so much (and collapsed!) in his company. LOL.
@WEnchanteur, it is strange, I must be in a non-Sisyphean loop, because I am very sure that I posted this before, but it is MISSING! Hence I loop back to write it again… to the best of my memory. Now is a good time for the glitches to come and remind me.
Yes, those were my interpretations too. Show just gave us scenes where strange occurrences took place and it was up to us, viewers, to notice them or not. If we did notice them, Show also left it up to us how to interpret those strange scenes.
I felt that we were seeing a myriad loops and where there were enough similarities in many things, but 1 great disparity that came along, then we’d notice glitches, and/or fainting spells, and maybe visions of the future. The case in point was when Gil Bok was confronted for the first time in all the loops, with kindness. At that very moment in time, Sigma glitched because a significant change had happened in a past loop.
And so with the case of Seo Hae when she first arrived, I’ve come to the conclusion that perhaps in previous time loops, Jae Sun may have offered SH grapes or some other types of fruits instead of bananas, that totally went against the norm, and that’s why she glitched so many times in his presence. LOL. She even collapsed once and passed out. That’s why we saw him with bananas again, to keep away the fainting spells.
(๑>ᴗ<๑) ✌✌(˵¯̴͒ꇴ¯̴͒˵)✌✌
And now, after refreshing many times and posting again long after … I see two posts!!! @pkml3, pl do the necessary.
Thank you @packmule3 for another great insight! I gladly take any interpretation that Tae Sul is not hallucinating. 🙂
Now think about it, where Tae Sul sacrificed himself was set in a Chapel. Anything that’s hard to explain can also attribute to some sort of miracles, loosely.
@GB @WEnchanteur
I also felt those scenes in the ep 1 and 2
are showing the events are slightly different in each loops.
@Viva, he is not hallucinating ?… but remember what GB pointed out (if it’s not GB I apologize, I don’t have a big memory) :
Look at the start of the scene : the seat is empty!!!
But it could be a successfull download. 😉
This time, it’s Seo Hae downloaded and not Tae San.
And there is no more disaster, like download outside the plane and causing crash (because of Sigma plan). So she download in the plane. Hypothesis #101. 🙂
Otherwize I agree, we should have deciphered most of the drama now.
I’m still perplex about the train roof scene.
Hypothesis #007. 🙂
I forgot to say that again in my first comment here : the people from the future don’t disapear because there will be no uploader. They disapear because there will be no war (no reason to come back so).
Also : Eddy take the role of Sigma in the church. And so, I stick to him the same way of thinking. He accuse Tae Sul of being selfish, so to not choose the world.
So it’s why Tae Sul can give the uploader to Eddy, because Tae Sul will commit suicide and prove to Eddy (as to Sigma) that is not selfish and sacrifice himself to save the world. It’s a way to convince both Sigma and Eddy to not create the war. Not to don’t build the uploader. Tae Sul need the uploader to be build, so Seo Hae will travel back in time and find him.
(sorry for bad english, I didnt use translator here).
@WEnchanteur
Is it possible that the girl just came back from the bathroom? Lol I like to think Tae Sul 2.0 can move on from the past and is with a girl he loves, just like Seo Hae. Or future Seo Hae brought back to life with a divine intervention given the chapel setting? (Now I am stretching). I am just not 100% to think Tae Sul interacts with a hallucination. He had no physical interaction with the Tae San’s hallucination.
Also I notice the sound tracks titles. I wonder why they put (In Paradisum), or (Lacrimosa) in the titles. If that can help our interpretation.
Now I know why ICB is so incompetent, the Tae San storyline is the next with the least explanation. The future Tae San did a deal with Mr Park to keep Tae Sul safe. I supposed he had a midway download, collided with a plane and somewhat landed safely. Tae San then appeared at the Chairman party, presumably wanting to see Seo Hae? Then caught by Mr Park/Sigma. Then Agnes helped him to escape so he started wondering in Time and Space. He managed to wander in time and space with a living body. Contrast to Tae Sul who could not stayed in Time and Space as he would be dead. I suppose in the previous loop he didn’t wonder in Time and Space because he could take a picture of Tae Sul and Seo Hae’s wedding. I probably will save that part to think about when I rewatch Sisyphus in a year or two time. Or just attribute this to the weak part of the story.
I also figured out why Tae Sul needed to buy a gun from Mr Park when he walked out of the bunker with one. The present Tae Sul took the gun with him to meet Sigma in the end of ep14 and ep 15, whereas the future Tae Sul is the one went to Mr Park to buy guns with Seo Hae in ep 16.
Your English is totally fine! I would not be able to write anything in French! We visited Paris before and when I attempted to speak French from the phrasebook, they answered back in English (Clearly spotted we are tourists haha). Or if they did answer back in French, I have no idea what they were saying. lol
Hang on – I may have mixed up the Tae Sans. The Tae San that sat with Mr Park when Mr Park had the phone call with Tae Sul in Gimpol is probably the present one (in ep 12). He was convinced by Mr Park to take Uploader to bring back the key. (years after 2021?) The future Tae San that collided with the plane is probably dead. Anyway, brain is a bit fried, I will park it for now.
Bathroom explanation !!!!!!!!
Why is it so difficult to find the obvious way ?!
🙂 🙂 🙂
I will rewatch too, but not now.
I need time pass before, it was exhausting to watch it during broadcast, write so many comments, theories, decyphering. Whooofff, my brain hurt. Overdose. 🤢
@Viva @WEnchanteur
I was the one who said that Tae Sul was hallucinating and seeing SH in the airplane. My reasons for this:
1a) He had no one beside him to begin with. He had asked for water and closed his eyes. In the minutes that went by, SH was suddenly there talking to him as if she’d been there all along. This was very much the way that the Tae San hallucination behaved as well. Also, both the hallucination of Tae San and SH were miffed that TSul was unresponsive towards them. This similarity seems to me to mean that it’s TSul putting the words into the mouths of his hallucinations.
1b) The seat that SH occupies had been the seat that TSan occupied. The delusion’s seat LOL.
2) Instead of being worried that TSul was taking out pills, SH was blithely “(smiling) [and she said] What? Is something wrong? (because TSul was just looking at her to see if she was still there before he took his pills.) This is NOT Seo Hae-like behaviour. She should have been concerned that TSul was taking pills.
3) The strange light that only shone on SH was an indication that she was not in ‘normal space’. At best she appeared other-worldly, like an angel. At worst it was a trick of the light and only TSul could see her. In effect it was SH illuminated in TSul’s mind as his forever saviour. My only grouse about the scene is that SH should have been wearing pink.
4) She couldn’t have been uploaded and been really there, because the air stewardesses would have been upset that an extra passenger had cropped up. Also, I’m not sure, but aside from TSan who was flying through the air… all Uploaded people were supposed to end up in a location that I’m guessing should have been stationary. It’s hard enough to get all one’s limbs materialised in a normal Download, how much worse if it was a Download into a speeding airplane which could meet air pockets etc!! (Of course one could argue that the newer Downloaders could download anywhere, but that is moot!)
5) The scene ends with us zooming out and seeing TSul from behind. The seats around him which should have had passengers in them, were suddenly empty. This means to me that TSul was in a world of his own, in his own mind. He was heading into the light happily with his illusion of SH, and nothing else in the world existed except that they were together in his mind.
It was a nice bookend ending, with TSul deciding not to be a druggie, and to just be happy in his unstable mental state.
@WEnchanteur
To me that train roof scene was the PD trolling us. They showed us the merged happenings from different time loops in a single scene to confound us. At the same time in different time loops or maybe even at different times on different loops, SH was above the train just as the ICB were on the ground around it with radiation detectors. It was probably also at the same time in a different loop that drones were flying. ICB Hwang sent his men in as a matter of course, because the report said that that’s what they’d always done.
I watched that scene again. Somehow, SH was invisible to all the ICB. She could see their light and the light of the drones, but the ICB were trying to sense her through the radiation detectors only. From an aerial view, there were 2 groups of ICB agents running on different sides of the train toward the same point, but none of them could see SH, who was hiding under the train.
Strangely, she emerges then sees something that makes her duck back under the train, but the next thing we see, she’s throwing her suitcase out to the side, and she’s jumping down. That is strange… she went under the train, so why should she have suddenly been on a carriage and jumping down?
While they run after her, she’s plainly climbing up to the roof of the train, but they ALL run past where she climbed. Not a single one of them could see her. Instead of keeping watch on the train that she’d climbed up on, they refer to their radiation detector and walk away!!
We next see all of them closing in on one point of the train and looking below, while SH walks to the place above them and looks around, appearing to see nothing that alarms her. She sits and relaxes.
@Viva, you’ve got a good point that the storyline for Tae San is very lacking. We get snippets, but we are not sure how to string his movements together. The thing about Tae San being Tae San version 1 of 2020, sitting with Park, is that he should have already had the key with him and Park should not need to wait for the suitcase to get the key. So I tend to think that this TSan really did come from the future.
Odd pointYou know how the Uploaders bring just a few necessary things with them… but one thing they really should bring is a pair of good running shoes! It was painful watching SH run around without shoes.
Re. the Chapel
I forgot to mention that the painting of Jesus on the wall is the “Divine Mercy.” Like with any props here in this drama, I thought that was interesting choice.
The “Divine Mercy” reminds the faithful that Christ has infinite mercy flowing from His Heart. To me, it was a foreshadowing. It signified that Taesul could petition God for mercy so he’d be rescued by Seohae from his solitary past, and that his earnest prayer was granted when he woke up on the plane.
To me, the fact that this story is called a “myth” matters a lot in the interpretation of the ending.
If he had been hallucinating, dropping the pills on the floor should have been enough to stop the hallucination because this is a reset.
A reset means that he was no longer the junkie that he had been in his previous lifetime. He didn’t need the drugs to keep him sane because he was already sane once again.
A reset also meant that Sigma NEVER figured in the creation and success of his Quantum&Time. Taesul started his company on his own merits (with or without the help of Eddie and SeoJin’s dad) because he was a genius.
His Hyung would be beside him throughout as his primary support and cheerleader. He wouldn’t regard his Hyung as delusional because his Hyung wouldn’t have acted irrationally since the encounter with Sigma on the train tracks never happened.
Anything and everybody he had met because of Sigma would be *incidental* characters in his life, and thus, nonessential to him and could be erased in this new reality. Except for Seohae. Seohae alone wasn’t incidental; she was prayed for.
His brother existed because he was there before Sigma. His company existed because his research was already there before Sigma.
Killing himself was the only way he could escape the myth. He admitted that he’d known this all along but he was scared because he didn’t want to lose Seohae.
As it turned out, it was the only option NOT to lose Seohae. By killing himself, he woke himself up from the nightmare of a Sisyphean task to save the girl or save the world.
It’s the only way for him to exit this myth. He woke up to reality and discovered that he dreamt it all.
And he was content in the knowledge that he successfully resolved the problem of the Sisyphean time loop. Like he told his driver Bongseon there wasn’t any problem in the world he couldn’t solve.
He gave everybody their own happy endings: nuclear war was averted. Jaesun lived. Seojin wouldn’t be forced to corrupt herself for Sigma’s drugs (lol. She was a junkie too when you think about this.)
SeoHae’s family was safe. The child Seohae would grow happily with both parents. Her dad proved to be good cop and decent human being.
Mr Park ended his jealous rage because his wife wouldn’t receive money anymore from his future self. Bongseon wouldn’t be in a coma. His brother was neither dead or insane.
Sigma’s happy ending was dependent on him though.
Personally, I don’t think the screenwriters wanted this myth to go on interminably so this was a good enough exit strategy for them to devise. The emphasis was on the story being a myth.
But the viewers can see this as a never-ending loop if they wish. I just don’t view it that way because it would contradict the hopeful tone of the drama and encouraging messages interspersed throughout the story, like “make good choices,” “forgiveness is the only way you can win” “don’t live a life with regrets,” “you can carve your own future,” “brotherly love rocks,” “don’t go looking for somebody and miss the very person in front of you,” “a small act of kindness can alter a course of life,” and…
“I can do it.”
Do you see what I mean?
🙂
The screenwriters would be mocking and upending their own moral lessons if, at the end of the drama, all the secondary characters got their happy endings, but Taesul and Seohae didn’t. The result would be cognitive dissonance.
I expect the director and screenwriters to be true and consistent with their theme.
@PM3, I understand the positive messages you are talking about.
And they are compatible, whether the Sisyphus loop is broken or not.
In a loop, it evokes the endless cycle of life.
One could imagine the loop as the cycle of Samsara, the wheel of karma, good or bad. Or even imagine that the scene in the plane is a journey to nirvana. But I don’t think Tae Sul becomes a Buddha. We just see him freeing himself from some of his burden in the final scene. And the notion of nirvana is different from the notion of heaven in the Bible.
However, I place the context of the story in Greek mythology, hence my conclusion.
I agree @packmule3.
The choice of the painting has implied meaning.
In episode 15, Sigma said to Tae Sul in the chapel.
“Do you know what is interesting? Everything burned to ashes, but this church survived, unscathed. I suppose God really does exist.”
Further to the choice of the painting, I noticed (In Paradisum) is part of the song title of the soundtrack that dedicates to Seo Hae. I looked up the text of In paradisum – it mentions Lazarus. I think this is another meaningful choice – Lazarus was bought back to life by Jesus.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_paradisum
Likewise, the soundtrack that dedicates to Tae Sul has (Lacrimosa) as part of the song title. I looked up the text. It is possible to interpret that there is a prayer to ask God to spare him.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lacrimosa_(Requiem)
wanted to share with you how much I enjoy watching dramas that will be commented here 🙂
Thoughtful insights, interest in details, confounding theories but most of all fun and respect for everybody – grownup kdrama lovers
who care…thank you
I am so glad I “happened” to meet you bitches -heart-
Hi @Claudia, great to know you’ve been journeying with us and enjoyed it!
I did say before that I really appreciate when lurkers pop-in and make a “PeeP!” so that we know you’re here. And of course your appreciation is also very much appreciated LOL.
Thanks for the info on the connections and the links @Viva, the possible significance of the choices made gives show so much more depth!! Love it!
@pkml3 I’ve been actually praying the Divine Mercy prayer, and I’ve noticed that Divine Mercy picture in this show every time. I did wonder if it was an intentional thing that the camera made sure it was included in so many scenes.
@GB, given the lyrics are co-written by the director (I think, as Jin Hyuk is listed and that is the name of the director), these are potentially more clues he left us to join the dots with Divine Mercy and Sigma’s dialogue about God. Like you said, we did get to see the painting right next to couple a lot. This ending is harder to spot though, I imagine an average viewer may not be able to identify the painting and the deeper implication of that. Thanks @pm3 for helping us on this 🙂
So, like there are many loops, there are also many ways to interpret the ending using the information they left us. Agree with you the show has a lot of depth. It is the type I want to re-watch later. After its finale, the regrets/make the right decisions/small change counts messages still pop up in my mind here and then.
As an afterthought, I only fully appreciate Seo Hae’s part in the love line after seeing the completion of the two timelines in episodes 15 and 16. If in the previous loop, the good bye with Tae Sul was just as devastating like this loop, she would certainly go back again after gaining the memories from time paradox encounter (touching her dead self). In the later episodes, we can see going back is no easy decision for Seo Hae. That includes leaving the father we saw she bonded so well with, a brave character who deserves so much love. The journey to get from her bunker to uploader was hard fought too. Yet she did it over and over again, to find him.
@WEnchanteur
Have you published your article in Dramalist? Keen to read it! 🙂 Now I think the Sisyphus production team is very brave. They pre-produced the entire drama before airing. They tried the Sci Fic category which generally tends to attract polarised views. They tried to tell the story in two time lines. Viewers in the “get it” camp know how to appreciate its depth, from the use of background props, CGI, moral stories and subtle love line built up. Whereas viewers who are in the process of getting it may read the wrong reviews and concluded too quickly. When viewers’ experience always varies, this one, if willing to invest, to me it is more rewarding than watching a romcom (or slice of life hahaha) which I hardly remember.
@Claudia, I am new here and I too really enjoy the discussions and guidance here! It takes drama viewing to another level!
Ahh, also, I noticed Seo Hae wasn’t dressed for war/fighting anymore in the plane scene. I think she is wearing high heel shoes? and with rings on her fingers too.
@Viva, it’s in “edition” process. I have no idea how long time it take.
I suppose they have planning, something like that.
Since I wrote it, I could already have changed my mind about what I wrote. lol!
Hey
I love both @packmule3’s and @WEnchanteur’s version of the ending but I want to add one tiny detail that could back up @GB’s version with the hallucination which also makes sense. While reading all your interpretations I went back 3-4 times to see that last scene on the plane as, for example, I didn’t notice on my first watch if the seat next to TaeSul was at first empty or not.
It was empty but what caught my eye was the yellow cloth on the upper part of the seat. @GB wondered why SeoHae was dressed in yellow, not her favorite color, pink. If TaeSul is imagining her, the fact that he’s seeing her wearing almost the same color (not sure if it’s the exact shade) as part of the chair makes sense to me.
Anyway, I love all the possible endings, I think they all wrap up the story nicely and it’s great that the scene was made in a way that multiple interpretations are backed up by little things shown to us.
Hi @oil I never thought of that. Yes the cloths that are used to protect the headrests of plane seats were yellow. A slightly different yellow from SH’s t-shirt. How observant of you! So while resting his head on the seat next to him, it’s possible that he’s hallucinating that he’s leaning on SH. Also the sunlight seemed to have been streaming into the front seat of the plane, so maybe that had something to do with the way the yellow looked. What fun!
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1piaWwojn3J-461dQiAPp6AkaZWqEKuVh/view?usp=sharing
Sorry @oli, I mean. I thought I corrected it before I posted. Oh well.
After learning how to decipher a scene from my fellow BODers, I had a go at analyse the scenes that I tried to understand better 😊
The train scene in Ep 2
Considering this is the first time Tae Sul and Seo Hae met in the show, could it be hinting their fates metaphorically? Train journey = timeline. Tae Sul and Seo Hae are two people belong to two different timelines. They always met briefly. Then, he disappeared and left first. She caught up on him and arrived in the same destination later.
Light
Light seems to be used to introduce/frame the arrival and departure of Tae Sul and Seo Hae in a timeline
Ep 16: In the chapel, there is a blinding bright light behind and on Seo Hae when she was leaving the timeline.
Ep 1: In the plane, when the very first time Tae Sul appears in the show, there is a blinding bright light surrounding him. He was on a single seat near the window. Whoever seated him there was not intending a companion for him. I noticed Tae San the hallucination has not got same blinding glowing light around him. Tae Sul never looked at him too when Tae San speaks. He just knew Tae San the hallucination exists.
Compared to the plane scene in ep 16: Bright light first, then empty seat, then Tae Sul. I noticed it is the extra light on the right hand side of the frame that woke him up. The camera didn’t give us the full frame of the seat next to him then (no yellow seat cover) in the next shot. If light is used to introduce an arrival, this light could potentially be Seo Hae arriving at the seat. We could not see it because the arrival happens outside the frame. Like the potential metaphor from the train scene in ep2, Tae Sul left the chapel and arrived at the plane first, Seo Hae left later and arrived at the destination later. Notice now Tae Sul was sitting in a double seat. Whoever gave him the seat this time planned to give him a companion. Also, Tae Sul was looking into Seo Hae’s eyes. He could also hold Seo Hae’s hand and lean on her. This is different to the zero physical and eye contact with Tae San the hallucination.
I have capture some screenshots to show that, hope the link works 🙂
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1kbN0aPffmI8v9-wS8q-GNiOpja6cfZpQ/view?usp=sharing
Tae San hallucination
I noticed Tae Sul never had direct physical or eye contacts with Tae San the hallucination.
In ep 1, Tae Sul never looked at Tae San when he was talking.
In ep 5: Tae Sul saw Tae San walking by, he tried to get hold of him but hallucination burst and he grabbed the wrong person.
In ep 6: Tae Sul was talking, but he could not establish direct eye contact for a two way conversation with Tae San hallucination. Tae San keeps moving every time Tae Sul talks.
I have captured some screenshots to show that:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/16WC1wxGWLuDpRzkbbDkVcnWHlhpwtaHT/view?usp=sharing
To me, Tae Sul knew he could not interact with a hallucination. Once Tae Sul found himself could look into Seo Hae’s eyes and established a two way conversation, he knew that Seo Hae was real. That is why he could ditch the pills. He knew he could hold her hand and leaned on her. She would not turned into another person like ep 5’s Tae San.
Sigma’s dialogue about God exists, to me, explains how Tae Sul and Seo Hae can still exist. The chapel survived when everything else disappeared. It’s like Tae Sul and Seo Hae survived when it’s meant to disappear because God exists and allows that. 😊
My intuitive interpretation of the empty seat scene is perhaps it is showing us how Tae Sul and Seo Hae were feeling. They only have eyes for each other as if no one else around them exists. The light on the left reminds me of how ep 11 ends. There was also light beaming down the room when Tae Sul and Seo Hae reunited when they were lost in the time and space. To me, it is light used for a happy reunion.
As for that scene where artist Gil Bok was copying Tae Sul, I think it is a realistic view that deep rooted problem of him cannot be fixed overnight. Villian cannot be changed to a 100% better person right away.
So here is my amateur attempt. 😊 Off to finish off DAYS ep 6.
Thanks for your thoughts @Viva. Your interpretation is as good as any. I like your analogy of the trains and arriving at different times, and the use of light as you describe it could possibly be what the director had in mind as the sign of arrival/departure. That’s what is so much fun about deconstructing what the show offers us. It’s makes all viewing that much richer.
°˖ ✧◝(○ ヮ ○)◜✧˖ °
This is the best take I’ve read on the ending so far. Thanks for giving me some peace of mind , I can finally sleep without being haunted by the ending :’)
You’re welcome, @sun buns. Glad my writing put you to sleep…errr…in a good way. lol.