Chibi

You're absolutely right, and I've done my double-take too. Given his characterization, he was VERY likely not out to to invalidate her feelings. He might even be confused about her liking him since she's heavy with the mixed signals too. And it fits right into the territory of a comedy of errors, where he goes onto 'fix' something and it epic-ly backfires. He was prolly out to pacify her instead, after her round of pettiness at the coffee shop, and make her feel less uncomfortable about the incident... but oh lord, he's so clueless, I feel bad for him now xD xD
And his innocent joking remarks to pull HJ's legs are certainly not malicious... but it sometimes is a tad insensitive, and causes HJ to raise her spikes once more. Gosh.. never-ending saga it seems! :P :P

Okay, like Hye-Jin, I have royally put my foot in my mouth. I'm doing a double-take on DS trying to friendzone HJ.
Keeping the genre of the story and DS's character in mind, it wasn't for the purpose of belittling her or invalidating her feelings... but he epic-ly failed and ended up doing just that. xD xD
Re-watching the episode and calibrating his 'reaction' post-clinic clarification in ep6 (i.e. his line after friend-zoning her, he says: 'okay that should make her less angry/ lessen the awkwardness a little')... He's Du-Shik the helper, afterall. He goes out of his way to 'solve' situations. And my conclusion is to give him the benefit of doubt, and say this was his way of 'solving' the 'situation' by making her try to forget a likely embarrassing moment. :D
All's good DS, but please be a little sensitive around HJ next time, maybe? <3 ILY.

Absolutely. Their reactions and feelings are both equally valid. It's just that the way they sometimes convey their stand, that can be hurtful to the other party. HJ does her own share of hurting by not-so-intentional nasty comments, and more often too... whereas DS does it more cool-headedly and with a smile on his face. Calling them out both, because she has a behavioral problem (as has been repeatedly shown) and he has some weird attachment-related issues where he can't stick to the lane he's being asked to stick to... hah!
I think ep5 'social position' remark from HJ was pretty below-the-belt. Similarly, DS's remark on 'are you going to misinterpret every kind gesture as me hitting on you' is also very innocent and fitting his character, but hurtful (considering he remembers the kiss, & she's forgotten about it at that point, but also has the possibility of recovering her memory and being hurt by it when she does, in retrospect).
Similarly, ep6... DS's friend-zoning her was brutal and he trivialized and invalidated her feelings all in one go, riling her up once again and also hurting her in the process. HJ's reaction later was valid, drawing lines... but she's once again very caustic with how she treats DS. Also, he's considerate of the villagers, but fails to show the same depth of consideration to HJ, maybe because she's bitter all the time, and actively goes on with her attacks sometimes, and maybe because of the possibility of a whole new range of emotions being involved between the two!
let's just say they are very immature and have lots to grow up, it seems. Looking forward to that! :D

Hahaha, and I also noticed how HJ's prickliness manages to push each of Du-Shik's button every now-and-then, and transforms him from the 'ideal, Prince-Charming' that he is to the villagers, to somebody instantly more complex, layered, and 3-dimensional. He's pretty nasty and snide too, sometimes... which keeps their dynamic so much fun and spicy!
Some of it is plain hurtful though (coming from both parties).... I think Du-Shik too is like a hedge-hog, but not a wild one like HJ that hasn't yet been tamed yet. Often, when you add a new hedgehog to the same pen of an old, tamed one... the new one can aggravate the older pet... He's the soft and cuddly old hedgehog, but the new one (HJ) manages to piss him off, and raise his quills too <3 Now I wanna see the old-hedgehog DS taming the new playmate HJ :')

I really enjoy the fact that she is flawed to her bone, and that gives us so much space for character growth over 16 well-paced episodes! I'm tired of the perfect and ideal Mary-Sues, (and even anti Mary-Sues to a certain extent)... it's refreshing to watch a MC screw-up and receive their due consequences. She frequently puts her foot in her mouth, and it's hilarious!

And her 'quirks' don't magically endear her to an entire population of villagers, and she's shown her place, and schooled quite immediately following her goof-ups. She works hard to be an ethical professional, and the kindness she ultimately displays is what garners her all the love, admiration and affection.... which is pretty realistic! :)

Also, given her prickly nature and history, her reaction to being friend-zoned is pretty logical. She after-all made the first move, only to be turned down, AND have her pride hurt in the process of having her feeling completely trivialized and invalidated by the man of her affection. She has every right to draw the boundaries, and infact I think it's very selfish of Du-Shik wanting to blur boundaries every now-and-then (only the ones HE'S comfortable crossing, though...) almost as he wants to have his cake and eat it too. I wish HJ calls him out on his BS more :D

No hate to fellow agency-mate Kim Ji-Won and earlier co-star Moon Ga-Young... but I'm GLAD he turned down scripts with them in favor of Home-Cha... and look he's getting the recognition he deserves and got two movies in a span of 10 days. Honestly, picking the project with those actresses would have been playing it safe... and would have cloistered him-in even more... Good-boy... i hope you keep going far, farrrr ahead! :D

I have entertained this EXACT chain of thoughts my friend, and I'm glad you took time to explain everything logically! I agree with every little thing you theorized in the subsequent 3 paragraphs... but the argument relies heavily on the fact that Du-Shik friend-zoned her based on A. his own trauma, and B. her nasty comment on being misfits due to social positions.
The first is on him completely... whereas I wonder if he'd have friend-zoned her (at all, or as brutally) had she NOT made snide remarks on their finances.
Secondly, you say in Du-Shik's perspective, HJ does not remember the kiss. I had assumed the same (up to ep5) and your argument holds, till we actually see early on in ep6 that Du-Shik DOES realize the reason she's acting sour is definitely *because* she has finally remembered, and highly likely because he lied about it on the beach (for whatever reason... we'll get to that later). Hence, the friend-zoning happens very clearly *after* Du-Shik's realized that she remembers.

I think I was cool with him denying it initially, assuming he just wanted to be gentlemanly (let's give him the benefit of doubt here)... but his 'clarification in the clinic' post-realization that HJ now remembers, was a douche-move. Not saying he doesn't have the right to turn her down (esp considering it follows the movie plot where DS turns her down not once, but multiple times...), I think he could have been less of an ass about it. Trivializing somebody's feelings just because you can't deal with emotions and attachments is not cool (aka making light of the kiss calling it 'western traditions' and 'biological crisis' is just uncalled for... even high-schoolers aren't that petty!) Also, what's with the 'are you now going to overthink my kind gestures as hitting on you?' and making fun of her? I get that's his character... but ugh DS -__- I instantly flashback to the time where my feelings were once a subject of jokes among boys, and I might be projecting a little here :'(

HJ was clearly hurt, and she's done plenty of her share of hurting DS too. I hope they can overcome their prickliness and tone it down to casual bickering about inconsequential things like wallpaper instead... the amount of times I have felt second-hand embarrassment for them trying to one-up the other! TT But then again, if they were mature, sorted individuals... would we have as much fun watching and talking about them? :P

Yep, i hope he does a good balance of mindless fluff and 'serious' scripts, because heaven knows, man is multi-talented and has potential in both areas :D

hahaha, 100% on this :P

As someone who lives far away from their parents and belongs to an emotionally (& verbally) stunted Asian family... I really choked up when HJ rings Dad, and they talk randomly about a plant, and Dad's just happy to hear from his daughter after so long! :')
Gosh, Home-Cha gets some things magically right! <3

Yep, we love us some criminal-husbands :D

Yayyy! Plot sounds cliche, but I guess it's going to be one of those really warm and sweet Christmas-movies! <3

That's a very interesting take on this! Zishu and WKX are our MCs, but were they really heroes?
To me, ZZS seemed like he wanted to be a righteous man, but he ended up being on the wrong side because of his allegiances, that made him do very bad things. Sadly, he's too far down the road which won't bring back the dead, or undo his deeds. He also likes to think of himself as more morally upright, about what he can mess with, and what is absolutely out-of-bounds unethical... but he isn't AS good as he'd like to believe.
Whereas WKX is an out-and-out gangster. Nothing is forbidden to him as long as he gets to achieve his end-goal, aka his redemption. He knows he's bad, and has no ambiguity about that!
I think more than their individual moral-compass, WoH was always about a relative-comparison of their morality with the rest of the Jiang-Hu. In textbook terms, yes they are 'villains'; but what about the 'good side'? I think the concept of a 'villain' is completely moot here, because literally everybody did bad stuff in the end. Were there really any heroes in the WoH-verse? :O Maybe you're right... ChengLing was the only one <3

They had palpable chemistry over a SONG. heck...
He's getting casted next to women considered as some of the prettiest by S.Koreans... ohhhhooo, the visuals! <3

She's a little bit of a kill-joy, and also an emotional masochist. If she hates Gongjin, she should just leave, right? :P I think that makes her characterization consistent yet fun to watch xD Like you said, it's going to be sooo good when she comes around :D

I think the negative reaction towards Hye-Jin comes from the fact that her intentions and her stand can be conveyed equally effectively, while being a little LESS mean and petty, doing it. She's right to put in boundaries, but she's also unnecessarily rude in the process.
A mature individual would explain their stand clearly, without being on the defensive, and with adequate reasoning to how they feel, and how the other person makes them feel, without bringing in caustic comments on 'social position' and 'being nosy.'
I 100% am with Hye-Jin on this one, while I do enjoy friendship with multiple men (and have been on both ends of a friend-zone before)... but I also agree she could have gone about it in a nicer, more civil manner, and not been so bitter and offended about it all. Though, I believe her successful medic-persona is a nice contrast to how childish and immature she can be at times.. and that makes her fun to watch :D

I think they wanted show that he spared her 10cents for her milk back then... even though he didn't give her the 4USD for coffee as an adult xD It's far-fetched, but also cute :D

110% with you... :)

C-netz love Chinese/Taiwanese dramas set in the countryside/ fishing-villages... :')

I agree with everything you said... except for the fact that he acted the way he thought she wanted him to act. I really don't think Du-Shik friend-zoned her, because he thought she wanted him to friendzone her... He did it very selfishly, to protect himself :)