Luna123

The writer wanted to show the South Korean regime in bed with their North Korean counterparts, both trampling over their citizens. The setting is not the June democracy struggles but the 1987 election at the end of the year, which the ruling party plans to win by framing the opposition... the story could not be easily put into another time frame.

check out The Three Musketeers (also famous for his first shirtless scene 😉), or the movies The Age of Blood, The Kings Case Note, Heungboo: The Revolutionist

FL is sympathetic to the democracy movement, as every decent person would be. But she is also not happy that her own brother took part in it, because it is so dangerous. She actually told ML (whom she mistook for a student protestor) to stop it and just study and live his life. So he would not join the movement to please her, even if he does change sides.

Jtbc declared several times that ML will at no point take part in the protests - they might have been overconfident, but they are not as stupid as to blatantly lie about such a sensitive point.

this is just the first 2 episodes, there must be lots of plot twists coming, to fill the remaining 14+ hours

None of this is speculation, all laid out in the first 2 episodes. 🙂 The ploy of the ruling party was this: kidnap the professor who is a prominent figure of the opposition, drag him to the north for some propaganda photos, use that to fabricate fake news that the opposition is in cahoots with the communists. They made the agreement in China, paid a lot of money to NK for their cooperation, and Suho's group got the mission to get close to the professor and eventually kidnap him.
But, the lower ranks of NSA knew nothing about this top secret op, and they kept chasing the spy they had their eyes on. Their attack botched up the kidnapping, and did NOT please the top levels. Remember the phone call FL's father/NSA boss got?
Suho does not directly follow orders from the NSA, he got his mission from home. But the end is the same, he is doing the dirty work for the NSA/the SK dictator's party.

yeah I agree

He went to the dorm because he accidentally landed at the fence and he had no other options to hide, he was too injured to run.
The headmistress had no idea, only some suspicion after she saw blood on the floor of room 207.

episode 2 spoilers, if you haven't seen it yet

ML is a NK spy, who was hired by the NSA to do some dirty work for them (a super secret op that only the top level knew, not the bottom ranks who were out to catch him).
But he is not a student protester and has nothing to do with the democracy struggle. So how does his mere presence in South Korea distort history? Do some people really think North Korea stopped sending agents during the 1980s?

I heard it is a common illness in the country 🤣

Then the only explanation is that Jihan has severe memory issues, is that why his brother didn't want him to become an idol before? 🤣
Tbh this drama has issues that I would normally drop for, no idea how I'm still watching and enjoying it 😂😂

I'm too lazy to go back and check, did Jihan hear THE song or maybe Jenna's other one? That could plug two plotholes at once. Though still no idea why picking song1 for the comeback if song2 is actually better... 🤣

As for the time issue, since Cotton Candy don't have to rush anymore to release their song at the same time as Mars, they can go with their original schedule which was a few weeks behind. And now they have a team who will take care of choreography, and I think pretty much everything else from wardrobe to PR? That should make their workload manageable I guess.

Throughout the drama we saw Junho's dreams/hallucinations on screen multiple times. That scene is not necessarily reality, can be just a symbol of how he will go against the flow, refusing to join the cycle of abuse... it was left ambiguous on purpose

please mark this as spoiler

It is a standalone story. If ratings allow, it might eventually get a second season (because abuse in the army can provide endless plotlines), but the story arc of this season is complete.

It was intentionally ambiguous, but I choose to think he is not deserting for real - he is still a DP, he could disappear far more easily during a mission than from the middle of the camp wearing the uniform... Throughout the series, there were scenes when we saw his fantasies playing out, and imo this is one of them as well.

Can't say that I blame the lady, he did look early 20s that day 😆

We are talking about SK, where at the moment some men want to strip an Olympics gold winner of her medals, because she has short hair ergo she must be a feminist... 🤦 they have a talent to make a big deal out of nothing

that's because Haein looks so young 😂

People just assumed Junhee was in his 20s (because why make a big fuss about the age gap otherwise?) But he is 31 according to jtbc's official character sheet: https://tv.jtbc.joins.com/cast/PR10010757/2 ;)

Thank you for the lovely article! <3
Just one small correction: Junhee is 31 in SITR (that would be 30 in international age) - only in Korea would they make a big deal out of a 4 years age gap between people in their 30s...

my most expected drama of the year <3