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gifs from wooshikie’s tumblr
Just because this is one of my pet peeves in kdramas…
I don’t get this put-your-shoes-up-on-the-desk affectation, especially when Koreans have this culture of removing their outdoor shoes at the foyer and changing into indoor slippers to walk around the house. Do they really think that outdoor shoes are too dirty to use inside the house but clean enough to plop on top of the desk where they work, place their coffee mugs, and lay their phones? I see a disconnect there. lol.
Let’s enjoy the show.
Thanks @pkml3, I almost forgot about this show! Too many shows suddenly. 🤪 😧 🥴 😑
Great observation @packmule3. The only explanation I can come up with is that it’s a chaebol “I can do anything I want” thing or “Do you know who I am”. I agree with you-it’s a dirty habit like shoes on the couch or coffee table-yuck!
Adhoc Thoughts
SPOILERS Below
SJ finally demonstrates more humane emotions as a smart phone, than he’d done as a person, when he congratulates IS for a job well done and thanks him for spending time with Mina. This is so unlike him that IS makes a prophetic comment: “They say when someone changes suddenly, he’ll die soon.” Then he promptly drops SJ’s phone into the toilet LOL. Death to electronics.
The theme continues of a lack of the right human connections being made by adults with children as symbolised by Mina. Mina notes that In Sung is special because unlike other adults who merely give her money or compliments, he actually plays with her, which is the connection that she appreciates.
She’s angry with her father for disappearing without even saying goodbye and Sung Joo compounds this by not even calling to speak with her, afraid that he was not able to explain why he had disappeared.
A reverse mirroring, so to speak, of what we saw in Ep 1 about Secretary Jung Se Yeon behaving like a robot, and Sung Joo relating better with his AI than with his daughter, is shown with In Sung’s dad and the little robot, Baro.
While IS plays with Mina, showing her a trick with a flower that his father had shown him. His dad shows the same trick to Baro and treats Baro like his son. Dad thinks that Baro behaves far more like a son than IS does and reciprocates by hugging the little robot.
This is mirrored by how IS hugs and is hugged back by little Mina who comforts him after he dropped her ‘dad’ into the toilet LOL.
The irony is that while SJ was able to make a robot that could react like a child and endear itself to a father, he was not willing to interact with his own daughter.
More Adhoc Thoughts
SPOILERS Below
Secretary Se Yeon and visual storytelling
Clever visual story telling in Ep 4, SY sits in Kwak’s car, wondering why Kwak had met SJ on the night he disappeared. She thinks that everything just seems twisted, and instead of us getting a camera Dutch angle view of her, we see that she’s really tilted while sitting in Kwak’s car as it’s being prepared for towing.
SY’s loyalties are being compromised by Oh Mi Ran who wants her to keep an eye on IS. As Se Yeon considers with difficulty Oh Mi Ran’s offer in the face of the bribe where her comatose mother has been moved to a first class room in hospital, she stops momentarily at the road construction where the warning “Danger Falling Hazard” seems to apply to her. She’s afraid that she’s entering into hazardous territory by working for Mi Ran. She is also a hazardous driver.
SY does not say much, and is generally powerless, but she drives the car to good effect to get others to do what she needs. She scared IS into telling her about SJ’s phone by speeding off the road, crashed into Kwak’s car twice to get access to the car’s SD card and literally knocked down Team Manager Nam who’d hired thugs to intimidate her and IS. She’s prepared to drive dangerously to solve her problems instead of talking them out.
More Adhoc Thoughts
SPOILERS Below
I like how show continues to use IS’s talents that were on display in Ep 1. He still takes recourse to pretending to be acting in a drama whenever he has to summon the confidence to act the part of CEO. He put on such a good performance even without the ‘script’ of SJ telling him what to say that SJ praises him for convincing acting.
We get to see more of his great throwing arm when he threw a tissue box or a toilet role to switch off the lights in any room, when he throws an apple to take out a thug.
IS’s imagination continues to work in these 2 episodes. It’s so vivid that even his dreams take on the image of him being a bad CEO on his own TV show. (LOL it even has ending credits!!! Took me by surprise that we were ending the episode so soon.) It’s good that his dream/imagination gets him to take his role as CEO more seriously, so that the livelihoods of others would not be compromised by his playacting.
The theme of blurring reality with VR. There’s an interesting, unexplained scene of a woman in tears, who had been wearing a VR Headset. It was tied to SY observing this and then likely asking for a favour from SJ. (I’m guessing that she asked him to enable her to have a VR experience, possibly of her mum before she ended up in a coma.)
When IS does a good job acting as the CEO in front of an audience at the press conference. SJ says to him: ” You looked like the real CEO to everyone watching.”
However the appearance of being CEO and Secretary gives way to the irony of IS and SY’s role as victims of thugs being turned on its head when they suddenly become mean bosses who hire a loan shark thug to beat up Team Leader Nam. Even the smartphone SJ is a mean boss when says he can do worse things to get at the truth. And we find that he really was the one who set Nam upon his own people. Interesting cliff hanger.
Yes, @GB, I really like how IS’ years of experience as a struggling artist/actor prepared him to stand up to corporate bullies.
I’m still at Ep 3. Too many kdramas. Too little time. 😂
@GB,This drama is so meta with a dra within a drama
There is a lot of cleverness here.I also think that the whole loan shark trope is being turned on its head. The flashback to when the Boss lost his wife and him cradling his young daughter was so poignant. I am happy he got some screen time instead of voice overs.
Got a big kick out of the interactions of IS’parents with him and SY that was funny but brought tears to SY’s eyes when she remembered the good times with her mother. And of course, his parents commenting when the by kids left that he never brought a girl home before-hint,hint…
I was afraid when the phone dropped in the toilet because he took them into a repair shop(another funny segment making it like an ER) because I thought the phone would be compromised.
So far, this is a fun and clever watch
Strange, I thought I posted this last night! (@pkml3, pl check if this is a duplicate post).
@pkml3 Speaking of corporate bullies, I noticed that corporate skyscrapers in the background appeared more than once while troubled Se Yeon or miserable dream folks who’d lost their livelihoods (in the stock market over Silver Lining shares) walked across the bridge in the foreground (in IS’s dream).
Show is making a statement about how the little man is unfairly beaten by the corporate bullies and gives us little IS who rights the injustices that he can manage as fake CEO. I like how he stood up for the cleaning lady, and for Se Yeon and tells Mina not to call the employees of her father underlings.
I trust that his character will remain consistent and that he’ll have an impact on changing the toxic corporate culture in at least one place.
@pkml3 Aah… I see that a comment of mine is awaiting moderation. 🙂
My comment has finally appeared. Thanks @pkml3!