Taino

I'd hope for it happen before the last episode, but failing all my predictions for episode 9, I believe this is very likely.

I think we can all agree, that since this changed to a love triangle, she is the only one that can bring this to a close, because even if the ML turns out from the airport and moves back in, no progress has been made until she rejects SML, and they can go back on track with family and healing for uncle, aunt and nephew.

Amen!

I learned that even between both main leads in a romance drama, there is a prominent one. This is usually dictated by the plot itself, which usually requires only one of them to take the lead to develop the main the plot, while the other supports the prominent one and/or has its own plot that feeds the main plot in the end.

For example, in "The King: Eternal Monarch", the main characters are: Lee Gon (The king) and Jung Tae Eul. The prominent one is the king from the title of the show to the plot, since he is the center figure, while the girl is still the main female lead, but because she is his love interest and consequently because her side plot merges with the main plot afterwards.

In "Our Universe" the prominent one should be Tae Hyeong, but why? because following the main plot, this is mainly about family and the biggest family issues are on the main male lead side. The guy was abandoned by his brother, finds out his brother is having his own family (adding salt to injury) and in a sick twist of destiny ends up taking care of the son of the guy that abandoned him, but starting a journey of finding what family really looks like and a chance to finally have a healthy family through his nephew and his in-law that soon after becomes his love interest. What would also make him the prominent one here, is that the main villain is also directly tied to him, which means that he is needed to resolve the main conflict in the theme of family and moving on from a traumatic past.

However, and unfortunately, Hyeon Jin ends up being the prominent one here, because the main plot explained in the previous paragraph is pushed to the side to become almost a side plot to position her love triangle in front and center of the story. The story suddenly shifts abruptly in only two or three episodes from family and healing to the trope of a girl that falls in love with the guy she is living with, but is too afraid to do something about it while she is a complete pushover for another guy who thinks he is better and who contributes absolutely nothing to the actual main plot that is about family and healing, because every scene with the guy doesn't contribute in the slightest to who should be the prominent one (the one with actual family issues) other than making him jealous and reminding him that he is not good enough.

Yes, the girl is the prominent one from the main leads, but for all the wrong reasons.

I don't think that she will flat out reject SML advances, but going after ML and prioritizing ML should send a clear message to SML before he has tricked her into marrying him and living a sad life

With this writer's mentality, it would be even worse with more episodes, because it feels like they just did not know how to write a proper plot, so went for the easy option and used an old love triangle trope instead

That sounds very bad, thank you for sharing.

I don't know if this is the writers intention, but his behavior has not been normal for a long time. He seems like a stalker at times.

As a superior, an older man and someone she knows from the past, he started doing and suggesting things that he knew she couldn't reject, like taking her home and having her keeping him company even late at night.

He started by giving her too much work even before he knew about our uncle and the nephew, just to double down when he found out.

As soon as he found out where she lived, he started visiting without notice which also forced her to just accept and allow him into her house.

He even eliminated the possibility of a rejection when immediately after confessing he set conditions of at least three dates, guaranteeing that she goes out with him even when she has not accepted his feelings.

And, last but not least, he is overdoing the "step-father candidate" pitch with not only buying toys for the kid, but trying to replace the role of the uncle, again without prior notice, he just does these things knowing that the girl won't feel comfortable saying no.

Real feminists don't need to minimize, hurt or destroy men to elevate women.

Unfortunately, it is Okay for the man to suffer and watch quietly how the girl looks over her catalog of perfect men all crazy for her before she chooses him despite of humiliations and the pain.

However, SML is also guilty because he saw the obvious even before the main leads could see it, and is actively trying to isolate her. It doesn't matter how much a couple love each other, and they are not a couple, and she doesn't love him, but having someone becoming your shadow is very unhealthy behavior.

If you don't mind, what happened in "Last Summer"? I haven't watched that.

I didn't really understand how the team leader found out in the first place, but might be a stalker at this point.

Let me give you some nightmare fuel...

Imagine the following, imagine that our uncle does leave to USA and takes a few years there far from his nephew, while the team leader keeps orbiting around our aunt for years, while not accepting his feelings, still allowing him to intrude in her life and the life of the nephew, for our uncle only to come back and find this scenario where he will believe that they have been together all this time, abandoned yet once again, with nobody to rely on. This would mean both uncle and aunt suffering, allowing things to happen to them, feeling defenseless and utterly defeated. The end.

There are a few things that could move things along, but with the reviews we have they are not likely to happen.

One is that the true manipulative nature of the team leader comes to light, but the classic trope of an imminent travel is the only thread we have left, and if leaves, everything will be lost, because the team leader is invading her space with the guy around, imagine if he goes to another country... but, fingers crossed and clock ticking, we can finally see some progress, since these separations trope almost all the time happen right before the main couple gets together and stay together.

I like your insight. This is all true.

Let's not forget that while the girl has been showing discomfort around the team leader, she still allows him to get too involved in her personal life.

What's even worse, he couldn't be further from main male lead, but still gets special attention like he was... even the characters themselves inside of the fictional story are discussing this... that's how bad it is.

At least she was disappointed...

Funny, how we are not even done with him. I am sure that third date will happen on episode 10, and now that our uncle is not living with them, the team leader will go out of his way to become more and more involved with the girl and the kid. The only hope is at the last seconds of the episode for some progress with the main leads, but sadly, that doesn't mean that the team leader will disappear.

The girl herself told her friend that it was her fault for not following our uncle's advice of staying away from the old man.

In the first place, the old man is the kid's grandfather, so with our uncle present or not, the old man was going to try and only because our uncle was there is that things didn't get worse for the girl. In the second place, we know that he will still be there on episode 10, but both our uncle and the girl must put him in his place, because he thinks he has the right to meddle in their family and that must stop!

Unfortunately, you are correct. The romance between the main leads is real, but acting on those feelings is as important. There is nothing more sad that a story about two people who deeply love each other, but never bring it out to experience the other side of the romance in a more conventional way.

On second thought, since their romance is real, that makes it even worse, because if she did not have feelings for our uncle, than it would be his fault for clinging to unrequited love, but in this case, she is clearly in love with him, but keeps hiding from this, and accepting a date in front of someone who recently confessed to you is extremely rude.

Unfortunately, you are also correct when you bring up that they deviated from the original premise which was promised to be about these two in-laws living together because they are raising their nephew.

This is definitely not going to be a great drama regardless of what they do to resolve the love triangles, the main couple misunderstandings, the main couple romance and their family issues, but I refuse to believe that so called professional writers will not address the obvious in this show next episode with everything that happened on episode 9.

I have rated only a very few dramas below 7, and I am hoping this one won't be part of that list.

Timing is most definitely wrong. I feel like too many things that have taken one or more episodes would have been condensed to a single episode. Episode 10 is not even out, and I feel like the events of episodes 9 and 10 could have been easily put together in a single episode. However, the blame is in the writers for the lack of plot, therefore relaying on love triangle tropes instead.