PrettyCarEye

What in the world are you talking about? JW was the epitome of nice, humble & with a good job (until he quit). That's why she married him!

JW did NOT change ... he was/still is that nice, humble, nerdy guy who craves her love. The only misstep he made was to leave his job without discussing it with her (and even so ... she eventually accepted his decision & went along with him focusing on his inventions). Otherwise if she was completely against his entrepreneurial endeavours, at the time or later, she should have insisted that he go out & find himself another job no matter what.

Æ-ra, however, did change. At the beginning of the marriage when his future looked set she led him to believe (or he naively arrived at that conclusion on his own) that she'd stick by him no matter what, but when they encountered a boulder in the road, she bailed!

Wanting a secure life doesn't make her a gold digger, but loving someone & marrying them only on the condition that they provide the lifestyle to which one thinks they're entitled is the hallmark of selfishness & greed!

Falling in love with someone & marrying them because they're beautiful is the first rule of attraction & where love sprouts its first bud. The mechanism is as old as time. You do it, I do it. So find a more sensible reason to hate JW rather than something so silly.

JW is as much at fault so he shouldn't hold a grudge if she's willing to let go of hers. But so what if he does so a little long than her? I'm sure nobody would enjoy the realization that the person they loved with all their heart mostly saw them as a wallet.

Living their dream together with Æ-ra, that is!

I completely agree with you. And I did say the same in my posts above yours. Yes, he should be sorry & grateful to her (as she should be to him) ... deep down I think he really is, but he's still too caught up in the blame game to acknowledge his part. A bit silly & immature of him, but give him some time & he'll come around because SHE is ultimately the woman he wants to be with.

And don't get me wrong, I am NOT on JW's side (I was before, but as the show progressed I became more neutral because I saw where they BOTH royally screwed up). I just think it's sooo easy for some women, when a relationship breaks down, to lay all the blame at men's feet without looking at their own faults. Æ-ra did this & that's why JW started resenting her back (because she acted like he did NOTHING at all in those 4 yrs when he was actually working his butt off to find investors).

When you marry an entrepreneur you can't expect to live a cushy life right off the bat. Four yrs of struggle is actually nothing compared to reality. I have an issue with Æ-ra's huge sense of entitlement that JW is OBLIGED to financially support her no matter what (but when she had to support him for 4 yrs she got fed up & left).

Anyway, we DO actually agree! JW should man up, apologize & get on with the business of living their dream! :)

You keep saying that ... that he married her because she's pretty. God forbid we marry someone we find physically appealing! JW may have been nerdy in his past life, but he was still a handsome man. I'm sure Æ-ra noticed that too! JW had no expectation of her other than her loving him & staying by his side (while Æ-ra loved him as long as he's able to provide the cushy lifestyle she wanted for herself). Again, I don't blame her for wanting to living well. What I blame her for is thinking that it's ONLY JW's responsibility to make her live in style (and when she had to do a little hard work she bails). I blame him for being too naive to realize that love never conquers all! Love pretty much leaves your ass out in the cold, without food when you're not bringing in any money & the rent is due. That's how love works. It thrives only under very specified circumstances.

Exactly!
People are so focused on casting blame. Which is exactly what JW & AR did and are still doing. Just blame, not solutions which can solve their problems. #smh

My original post was in direct response to you calling JW a shitty husband. I wanted to show where JW may have been shitty in certain of his actions, but so was Æ-ra in certain of hers as well. You're more interested in arguing who was more shitty when it's entirely irrelevant to the totality of their situation. The fact is more than being shitty (or intentionally so) the both of them were too immature to take on the challenges of marriage.

Moreover, we're not the ones who changed the narrative of this discussion, you guys did (lily & now you). First you guys where all up in arms about how JW behaved in the past. We debunked a lot the grandiose ideas you guys seem to have of marriage & what Æ-ra was entitled to. So now you guys have found another reason to jump on Jung Woo's ass ... because he's not ready to open up to Æ-ra.

You guys did exactly what Æ-ra did. Expecting the guy to behave how you want him to behave & when he doesn't, he becomes your punching bag. #smh What is he, a robot?

The fact that he doesn't want other men around Æ-ra should tell you what I've known from day one. The man loves the woman, he is IN love with her ... everything he's worked for is for her. So he's not yet ready to grow up & apologize for his lot. #shrug

Let him take whatever time he needs. Æ-ra had her share of petty revenge ... why shouldn't he?

Like the others have said, if they sat down & have a real conversation the drama would end prematurely (because let's face it, it's a crappily scripted soap opera rather than any real treatise on love & forgiveness).

Just because he's not ready to openly admit his mistakes doesn't mean he's not sorry. The guy isn't an idiot. He knows he messed up just as much as she did. When the time is right he'll repent.

See my post above.

Just to be clear, I'm not really on anyone's side. I understand why they both feel hurt.

That said I would have been more sympathetic to Æ-ra if I saw where she generally tried to find a solution in collaboration with him.

All I saw from her part was entitlement. Entitlement to a comfortable life that HE, and solely he, is responsible to provide. The fact that he wasn't able to live up to his promise & she had to go out & work and contribute ... that's not what she signed up for.

I'm not saying she doesn't have a right to be angry, but let's face it her love for JW came with strings attached.

In analyzing the show so far I make a lot of assumptions based on what I know about men & relationships and by reading thru the lines of the drama. Only time will tell if I'm right or not.

Up to this point, though, we've only seen her being MAD ... not any honest conversation on where her heart & head is at and that she's feeling so disillusioned & overwhelmed about the future that she wants to leave.

In not doing so that IS passive aggression, because he's not able to read her mind to know the extent of her frustration.

Many women endure a lot of crap from their husbands, but never leave. How can a man know the difference? It's clear JW never expected her to leave him even though he knew she was practically spitting fire. He probably thought she was being overemotional (like when they were watching the football game) & with time she'll cool down.

JW strikes me as that type of nerdy guy who is loving & kind, but also a little self-absorbed & clueless. So yes she needed to spell it out for him to get it. Communication, they both just failed badly at it. I believe he really thought their love was strong enough to hold them together.

Are we watching the same show? Cuz I see the two of them acting petty & immature. Both of them think they're victims, when they're not. So if JW is annoying you, Æ-ra should too as neither of them are trying to be the bigger person. You might want to staunchly take sides, but I'm trying to remain objective. In general I don't even like this show all that much because the plot is silly & advances at a snail's pace. I guess if they let JW & AR have an honest conversation, there'd be no more drama.

Come on, that's just false bravado, hurt & bitterness talking! Once that's out of the way, you'll see the gratitude. After all, the whole reason he wanted to succeed was to make her dreams come thru! To buy her the pretty house with the potted plants she wanted & to let her be a pampered housewife with not a care in the world. The way I interpret JW's character is that he was/is this besotted nerd who fell head over heels for this beautiful girl who's way out of his league. He wanted to give her EVERYTHING. None of his current success means anything to him if he can't share it with her -- the woman he built the empire for.

And yes there's no denying that he made mistakes. At the risk of sounding like a singing parrot THEY BOTH MADE MISTAKES! He's not a victim, neither is she. They botched the marriage because of poor communication & unrealistic expectations of what it means to be married.

Like I've said elsewhere in this discussion, engaging in blame games & arguing over who is the bigger victim is pointless. Fact is, they ruined their marriage ... now they both need to man/woman up & acknowledge their individual mistakes & learn from them as they move toward getting back together.

//

Hehe ... You clearly have never tried to run a business. If you think 4 years means you're gonna be rolling in dough. No.

Start-ups are bloody hard. 95% of them fail, esp technology companies like JW's. Blood, sweat, tears. Failure after failure. The people who succeed are those who never give up. People like Jung Woo. You think 4 yrs is too much ... it's hardly enough. Many entrepreneurs would sell their left nut just to have a successful, profitable business after 4 - 7 yrs.

And I completely disagree. JW is grateful to her. How I know? Because he was & is still doing the entire thing FOR her ... because shocker ... he LOVES her. More than she loves him. Always has, always will. That's why he's so bitter now & thinks he's a victim. Because he feels SHE never appreciated that everything he did was in pursuit of giving her HER DREAM. He's too angry & hurt from the callous way she dumped him to show her any gratitude right now. But later on when they both stop being so stubborn & prideful ... I'm sure he'll acknowledge his mistakes & thank her for her contribution to his success (and I hope she does the same).

Now about the kid. You know what losing a child is pretty hard I'm sure, but it's not the end of the world. It's one of the many possible outcomes of a pregnancy. It's not like JW punched her in the gut and caused her to miscarry. Had he known he would have been over the moon. Thing is, shit happens. Life sucks. It doesn't make her a victim.

NEITHER of them are victims!

Aside from Docnty ... most people are coming down hard on Jung Woo & as usual my instinct to champion the underdog is alive & well even though I DO believe JW shares 1/2 the blame.

If Jung Woo was a shitty husband then Æ ra was a shitty wife.

He - because he was a typical guy: well meaning, but at the same time selfish & self-centered.
She - because she was a spoiled entitlement princess, though she had real love for him.

While I don't excuse JW's behaviour, he didn't make her go out & work multiple jobs for kicks & giggles. He himself was working hard at building a life FOR them. Things simply weren't going as fast as they'd hope.

If Aæ Ra felt like he was dragging his ass SHE should've reasoned with him & get him to understand that they can't continue that way. Work TOGETHER to make things better. THAT IS MARRIAGE. Instead she lashed out at him, took away his food (how is he to invent things on a hungry belly?) & locked him out.

Moreover, in these modern times who says only a man is beholden to provide for the family? So she had to support him for a few years ... bo-hoo! Men have been financially supporting women for centuries. A lot of them don't like it, but they suck it up.

While she did love Jung Woo, her love had conditions. The promise of a cushy, comfortable life. Perhaps not to gold digger portions, but she certainly wanted to be taken care of, rather than build a future together from their mutual sweat. When her little dream life failed to appear & she's forced to work ... she started to resent Jung Woo. If she had a healthy approach to the marriage from the get - go, them going thru hard times wouldn't have come as such a horrible shock.

Jung Woo on his part was an idealistic, naive fool of a dreamer who thought 'love will see us thru!'

Æ-ra is not a victim, neither is Jung Woo. They both were and still are too immature and full of pride to acknowledge their mutual hand in the demise of their marriage.

So she lost the baby. Sad. But it's not the end of the world. Happens every day to countless women. It's not Jung Woo's fault ... he didn't even know the kid existed. She could've just as easily lost the child living the life of a pampered princess. So it is what is it.

The thing is we're all falling in the same trap that tore Æ-ra & Jung Woo apart. The blame game. It's pointless for both them & us to bicker over who is the bigger victim. It gets them no where. What they need to do is ACKNOWLEDGE their past mistakes (they BOTH made them) & LEARN from the experience as they move toward getting back together.

Did she really tell him though? Or was she just passive aggressive? Men are notoriously thick & clueless to a woman's emotions. Gotta spell shit out before they finally realize things are getting hot.

Just like with the divorce. It came completely out of left field for him because he never took her seriously. And why? Because she never actually sat him down and had a conversation about the future. Instead she cussed him out at every opportunity, take away his food & put him out. Stupid guy is probably thinking ... she's just mad, she'll cool down, NEVER that she'd actually up and leave him. He foolishly though their love was enough to see them thru.

At the same time his own resentment starts to grow because while she was working, so was he! His work might not have brought in any money, but it was important work that had the potential to compensate them 10 times over.

Your idea of marriage is a fantasy. It is hardly ever 50/50. Sometimes it's 70/30, 60/40 10/90 and so on. I hold traditional views as well, in that I believe a man should provide for the family. At the same time I accept that rigid gender roles aren't always conducive to the unpredictability of life. A woman can & should take on the role of the breadwinner if that's in the best interest of her family. And at the time her working & Jung Woo focusing on his inventions was what's best for their situation.

In those years Æ-ra worked, Jung Woo worked too. He was working on an invention that had a potentially high windfall. He was perhaps a bit too optimistic about how soon it will be a success & too self-absorbed, but he wasn't sitting around getting fat ... well, not for any reason! lol

He truly believed he was doing something that would benefit his family in the long run.

The one thing I disagree with you on is that only Jung Woo was the shitty party here. If Jung Woo was a shitty husband then Æ ra was a shitty wife. Neither of them were mature enough to be married.

He - because he was a typical guy: well meaning, but at the same time selfish & self-centered.
She - because she was a spoiled entitlement princess, though she had real love for him.

While I don't excuse Jung Woo's behaviour, he didn't make her go out & work multiple jobs because he relished the idea of his wife suffering at the fire side. He himself was working hard at building a life FOR them. Things simply weren't going as fast as they'd hope.

If Aæ Ra felt like he was dragging his ass SHE should've reasoned with him and get him to understand that they can't continue that way. Work TOGETHER to make things better. Instead she lashed out at him, took away his food (how is he to invent anything substantial on a hungry belly?) & locked him out.

Moreover, in these modern times who says only a man is beholden to provide for the family? So she had to support him for a few years ... bo-hoo! Men have been financially supporting women for centuries. A lot of them don't like it, but they suck it up.

The point is while she did love Jung Woo, her love had conditions. The promise of a cushy, comfortable life. Perhaps not to gold digger portions, but she certainly wanted to be taken care of, rather than build a future together based on their mutual sweat. When her little dream life failed to appear & she's forced to work ... she started to resent Jung Woo. If she had a healthy approach to the marriage from the get - go, them going thru hard times wouldn't have come as such horrible shock.

Jung Woo on his part was a naive fool who thought love would see them thru.

Oh I can't wait to start Wonderful Days, but I have no patience to watch it while it's still airing so I'm waiting until a decent amount of episodes come out. I don't trust the writer of this drama, but I'm praying she doesn't eff up the whole thing with a whole heap of makjang and melodrama.

As for Secret Love Affair ... sounds like just my type of drama in terms of maturity, but I do not watch noona love dramas under any circumstances. Besides the woman is over 20 yrs his senior, that's too old. How sustainable is that relationship beyond the initial novelty??? Even if the genders were reserved I'd hesitate to watch such a show. Moreover, next to the guy she looks like his mother. Nah, not for me. I prefer dramas where the characters are more or less the same age or if there has to be an age gap ... it's only by a few years (under 5 yrs). I know I'm being very picky & perhaps a little prejudiced about this but I like what I like! :p

Arasso.
Looking forward to it! :)
By the way, dongsæng, are you watching Wonderful Days with our smexy ass ahjussi? If so, how are you liking it?

Cheers.
I'll probably watch Mother before Woman then. I've heard nothing but praise for it.