The thread is open!
I’m now in South Korea. If I can fight this jetlag, I’ll join you tomorrow evening for Episode 1, @GB. I’ll open the “What Are We Watching” June thread after I catch some Zzzs.
Here’s the short note from our @GB.
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PINOCCHIO REWATCH PARTY
Pinocchio is a 20-episode series by Park Hye Ryun.These are the proposed dates for the rewatch that bring us all the way to mid-November 2026!!!
Episode 1 – 6 June 2026
Break – 13 June 2026
Episode 2 – 20 June 2026
Episode 3 – 27 June 2026
Break – 4 July 2026
Break – 11 July 2026
Episode 4 – 18 July 2026
Episode 5 – 25 July 2026
Episode 6 – 1 August 2026
Break – 8 August 2026
Episode 7 – 15 August 2026
Episode 8 – 22 August 2026
Episode 9 – 29 August 2026
Episode 10 – 5 September 2026
Episode 11 – 12 September 2026
Episode 12 – 19 September 2026
Episode 13 – 26 September 2026
Episode 14 – 3 October 2026
Episode 15 – 10 October 2026
Episode 16 – 17 October 2026
Episode 17 – 24 October 2026
Episode 18 – 31 October 2026
Episode 19 – 7 November 2026
Episode 20 – 14 November 2026See some of you in 12.5 hours time!!
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Let’s enjoy the show!
Thanks my dear @pkml3!! May the jetlag lag behind you very soon! Would love to see you joining us in our Pinocchio Party! 😁🥳🙂↕️😆
Yay! Thanks pkml3!
2014. Teenagers, bad hair and massive self-regard. I am in the middle of Dream High (2011) as well, so wallowing in it!
I’m here…
I have started the drama and I hope I can watch more but it depends on what is happening here.
I very much like the quiz show introduction and don’t you love his hair?
Hi GB and IF.
Here, I wonder 2 things about this episode 1:
– is there a strong hooking power? How?
– is there a hard hitting emotional scene like other PHR dramas?
Hi MM !!
Hi @WE, @IB, @MM We start NOW!!!
I’m getting an error message so I’m not sure I can use the REPLY to option in email.
So many familiar faces. I will need to look them up and see what they have been in.
Hi @MM, yes so many of them were in ‘I Hear Your Voice’. Love the young Nam Da Reum.
I recall this episode really made me hate the press.
So dramatic but also kind to wrap the quiz show around the tragedy, WE, and let the quiz show be a kinder gentler hook.
First mystery, we see the competitor kid isn’t MC.
But as MC is missing, it’s a surprise he’s the opponent.
WIth a funny and ridiculuous presentation of his own.
Nam Da Reum is so omnipresent as everyone’s younger self in that decade. He was excellent in this one.
@WE @IB, it’s good to see that Dal Po with lousy hair did grow up… then we see his terribly traumatic past.
Yes, a gentler hook.
@IF, yeah, I like this actor.
As a kid, he looks like a “serious and mature” kid.
MC can’t answer when one her co-student has this syndrome.
There is the awkward female co-producer as comic relief.
The TV show question allows to introduce indirectly FL.
As well as lot of expo about Dal Po being the last student.
Flashback, so the “last student” has super ability about math, and maybe seomething else?
Anyway, for some reason, he want to look like the last studient.
Pinocchio syndrome seems to hit lot of people in the country, as the brother have it.
Now we have the 2 brothers being shown off as wizards at calculating the 12-animal year cycles.
And the nice relationship his dad has with his firemen workmates. But after he promises the boys a trip to play with fireworks, the alarm goes off to put out a fire.
We already know what’s going to happen.
There is that sort of fractured parallel in korean comedy fusion — the darker side of human nature..
on the quiz show thw boys agree to slp each other and the good kid almost swears on camera.
Obviously the crowds and neighbors eager to lynch without proof.
@WE, whose brother has Pinocchio syndrome?
I’m at the part where the father is in the fire.
Ok, a fire, no time to loose to introduce a drama, I think will lead to father death. Quite typical from PHR…
@GB, yeah, scene before with the two brothers.
Telling us that Dal Po isn’t an idiot.
So why he want to look as such?
I hate that the press makes the family out to be culprits too, all without proof, all in order to strike while the iron is hot to make more news.
Really beautiful contrast betw visuals of scene on boat (In Ah and Dad) and the darker scenes inside the studio and at the fire scene.
Fireworks!!!!
@WE, I don’t think that question is answered. He knew what a Pinocchio is in their ‘world’ but the brother was not a Pinoccio. They were both smart kids.
The real culprits are lying to save their own skins while throwing the innocent family of the man who sincerely tried to save lives under the bus.
Something like when air (oxygen) enters, then the fire is out of control and everything explodes.
@GB. I don’t know why they have that other random young man with Pinocchio. They’ve already established the syndrome in the drama.
I remember hating that female reporter.
Oh is he the witness who cannot lie- thinks he has seen the captain.
The female journalist is obssessed by best scoop, to the point she doesn’t care of her failed mariage.. If you haven’t watch it, I rec the movie “Night Call” about that, awesome movie.
The ones who do not have Pinocchio Syndrome are lying … thunder and lightning when the 3 guys who started the fire and got the poor Fire Chief to go in to save their lives hope he is dead so that they won’t get into trouble.
Press lady Song Cha Ok pretends to need the fire jacket when she’s nowhere near the fire. She wants to make everything sound worse than it is to make the news more exciting. She does not care about the consequences of what she reports as long as they do not fall upon her.
how that? The father is alive??
@MM yes you’re right. That other Pinocchio guy made a mistake in identifying the man The trouble was that someone made up the idea of a man in a grey jacket etc etc and so people think he really did see the dead Fire Chief although he never really saw his face.
Yes, I hated that Report Song Cha Ok.
Thunder at 20 minutes in! Sins committed.
Who will be punished?
A list of unforgiveable actions by Mrs Song and the three persons who set and covered up the origin of the fire. They werent painted as evil but they are unsympathetic.
Ms.Song gets the divorce papers and is inhumane over and over again.
The three may believe that they will not harm anyone by their lies?
@WE, no the father is never found. It was mistaken identity.
Dal Po has an amazing memory!!!
INJUSTICE. Now the family is prey of journalists.
So for sure, we understand why Dal Po hates so much journalists.
WE I am really not sure why Dal Po behaves the way he does — is it a 60’s rebellion sort of thing — intelligent and ironic?
Dal Po speech about how his father care about his team is the fast and exploding emotional moment. Damn. PHR at her best.
@IB, I can’t recall if there ever was comeuppance for those 3 liars and Reporter Song. They seem to have gotten away with slandering a good-hearted, responsible fire chief. And starting the ball rolling that destroys his family.
GB that was rhetorical and I cant answer yr question because it would be a total spoiler…except to say that I have never forgiven Mrs. song in any way shape or form.
@WE, yes, that illustration of his father’s care for his fellow fire fighters was an impressive monologue.
Yes, I really hate that Reporter and the 3 liars who got innocent firemen killed and ran away instead of coming clean.
I am at the scene in The Newsroom where they are discussing whether to release an emotional scene of the brothers defending their father. I am not quite following the argument watching under time pressure. I think the man who we see in the quiz shows scene who was a reporter at the time will probably feel guilty about his role and all of this and we are presented with this scenario in order to understand that later.
Remember the ‘grey jacket, brown pants’ in the older brothers’ interview, was that Mrs.Song lying about a man in a grey hoodie to hide that she was talking to her husband? Or was that the original pinocchio neighbor? (and isnt he a plot hole — never shows up again?)
@GB, ah, we hate that, or rather, love to hate that. Injustice is a powerful engine. Thanks to you and IF about the lightning strikes, I was focused on something else, and it’s a good symbol of a sin. Maybe I forgot it and it was rampant in my subconscious and I used red screens for sin in one of my short. Something visual complementing the narration is always welcome.
@IB now the family cannot even get the stores to sell to them.
Brother promises that when dad returns things will go back to normal and they will watch the fireworks… then he disappears.
That promise is ill-omened!!! Father then brother disappears.
WE, GB, Dal Po’s recitration of facts about his dad and his dads care for his colleagues was also so close to the scenes of Reporter Song that it was a direct rebuke to her lying way of telling a story. The boy does the reporting the right way.
Also a good scene during the reporters harassing them at their home where the young ml and the evil reporte stare at each other- setting up their opposition.
I don’t see how the father could survive, as we saw the scene of explosion. But not his family. So the mother lies to her son, because she feels he’s really dead, but don’t want Dal Po to be hurt.
This situation also create a legitimate want for revenge for the older brother.
@IF, yes!! This monologue isn’t here by chance, but to show how a good journalist he could become… if he overcome his hate for journalists. 😉
So the obstacle is created, as well as the proof of talent.
@IB so true about the right way to do reporting.
The child was truthful. He did not make up stories to sell the news.
“cut it!” integrity at its finest.
The editing decisions, the two station cut in and out of each other….NICE
I think thats Kang Shun
Il and Yeong Tak the MGN station chief (we will get better at the staff names later)
Then the mother commit suicide??
Introducing the FL now, and anything she says is the painful truth. But her father, is he the ex-husband of the bad journalist? I bet yes.
Lovely how the two brothers do the promise and we see their father doing it as well
Kang Shin Il AS the station chief. Do the reporters change their hairstyles later? This one looks awful, I dont remember him later..
By the way, her father looks like the person people confused with Dal Po father. It makes sens if he came to talk to her ex journalist-wife on the spot.
And its YGN, the ‘good’ station?
Or all they all grey in the story.
Childhood continues. The drama dropped us fast into it, at what? Half or episode, or even before? But we didn’t feel it coming, so now we are in the past without asking questions about that, and just follow the story. 😀
@IF, the child playing Dal Po is also good as a child actor!
I don’t remember where I saw him else, but I saw him.
And now I’ve no idea if he did something as an adult actor.
So sad that the mother commits suicide and takes her son with her leaving that one soul shoe on the shore only to be used malevolently by the reporters, as I recall. I am not yet there.
The kid doing FL as a child is amazing too. She looks like a young Park Shin Hye like a drop of water!
Dal Po mother lose her mind, just like that. Damn…
@WE, poor Dal Po had everyone lying to him. And now he has to live a lie ie he has to become the Dal Po who was supposed to have died many years ago.
Such a joyful scene where we see the young dalpo again being greeted by his niece and brother
@MM yes you remember quite correctly.
Dal Po opens the back of his bike-chariot with such a flourish! Cute. And he does get stuck going up the hill.
A joyful funny scene after the pain of the previous scenes. Yes though he is again living in lies. The grandfather lends a good dose of humor to this scene
@WE Dal Po finally finds someone who says something nice about his dad, which is true.
I forget what the numbers are on the back of the grandfather’s shirt?
@WE, Nam Da Reum (the youngML)is still working as an actor but not getting roles. Probably is also in uni.
He was in the Great Doo Shimm, the Kim Saeron tragedy derailed a lot of things.
The high-concept “someone who can’t lie” provides a lot of emotion when used well. And also a vulnerable character, unable to lie, so everything is often one sided against her, even feelings. But with the right person, these feeling can be an emotional peak.
Great Shaman Ga Doo Shim.
When he discovers when is her mother, he becomes bad against her. Terrible reaction, really. But ah, it’s drama, let give him a reason to regret it later. 😉
And we come back to present now?
I didn’t remember that.
But I find it a good loop for an episode 1.
“Do you love him”, but.. it doesn’t trigger the pinnochio syndrome.
How complicated for Dal Po, to live with a girl whose Mom was responsible for part of the tragedy that broke his family.
What a good set-up this episode was. Now lots of things we cant wait to see how they turn out.
Ending about who will win the TV show.
So, if I compare with some other PHR dramas, nothing huge about hooking and emotional hit. It’s rather a slow and deeper process making us to care for the characters. Many of the hints are still unknow about their effect at this stage (if you watch it for first time), and we can appreciate more the episode while rewatching.
It was a good episode with the set up so thorough that the path to lies and truth, liking or hating is put in place already.
Always when something good happens, something happens to overturn it. Now that Dal Po makes friends with In Ha, he decides to dislike her because of whom her mum is… rather similar to the way those townspeople made his life miserable just because of the false accusations towards his father.
This mother was so depressed that she could not leave her child behind in such a bad world as she saw it. He calls his mother a liar. Will there be more in the drama about how he sees his mother When he is older.
@WE I remember she has some kind of trick about lying, but maybe that is later — so now we know that she definitely doesnt like him ‘as a man’.
But in those lost-in-the-either voice messages she seems to be very fond of her new ‘uncle’.
First love.
@MM I cannot recall much about the smaller details of the show. I can maybe recall only the broad strokes and then just a couple of the several.
Lost-in-the-ether. Meaning upper airs.
@IB you mean the text message she was sending to her mother?
oh, texts, yes. But they dont go to her mother, the phone number is incorrect. Part of her illusions about her parents.
Also part of the entrance of my favourite big goofy actor, Kim Young Kwang!
It is very sad to see his doubts about his father as expressed in his asking what she thinks about his father and she says he was probably a nice man and she cannot lie.
@MM that was the first time in 6 months or more that he’d heard someone say something nice about his dad and mean it. So sad that after this he got angry with her because of whom her mum is.
I quite understand his being angry with her. He finally felt that he could have an honest relationship. And now it was a relationship complicated by her mother being to some extent responsible for his life taking such a bad turn.
@MM I must say that this episode had quite a few emotional ups and downs. However typically when something was looking up, it was a precursor to something going wrong.
I recall wanting Dal Po’s brother Jae Myung to find him quickly but it turned out not to be as expected.
Did others notice in the very last scene where the brother sees his younger brother on the TV screen that the TV playing next to it was the news with the terrible reporter lady?
So now I go and do my groceries!
This was an excellent first episode.
I must go too. Have a good week!
Ooops, was making a list for you @WE. Will repost to next week when it opens.
Nam Da Reum. You recognize him as the younger version of Lee Jong Suk in While You Were Sleeping.
Of the 50 roles NDR has done, starting at the age of 7, fully 24 have been younger versions of one of the main leads.
I dont know all of the actors, but here’s those I do know… btw for me the greatest was as the boy trapped in the rubble of the Sampoong department store in Rain or Shine.
Lee Dong Wook (2009 The Partner)
Lee Jong Suk (2014 Pinocchio)
Yoo Ah In (2015 Six Flying Dragons)
Lee Sung Min (not quite main cast; 2015 Hwa Jung Princess of light)
Lee Jun Ho (2017 Rain or Shine )
Lee Jong Suk (While You Were Sleeping)
Im Si Wan (2017 The King In Love)
Jang Ki Yong (2018 Come and Hug Me)
Lee Je Hoon (2018 Where Stars Land)
Jung Hae In (2020 A Piece of Your Mind)
Kim Seon Ho (2020 Start-up)
Strange how they all looked so similiar when they were young!
Bye @WE, @GB, @MM, fun times!
See you all next week!
Yes I think mostly I remember him from rain and shine as well as from this drama.
The opening episode reminds me of Angel eyes where two families become entangled through an accident- fire and things blowing up and breaking down in a tunnel collapse. Might have been some of the same actors.
I thought the scene where they are trying to establish the new relationships when she and her father go to her. Grandfather’s was about the Korean trope of found families after family tragedy.
Lee Pil Mo the reporter who I think helps him.
I have always liked him but have not seen him on many dramas. He was the father on a flashback in Another Ms Oh