TooEmotional

He must be the Dad's brother because the Dad's name is Cha Seong Woo.

I hope he is endgame but it's hard to know which direction it will go in. But with Seok Jin being more determined than ever to marry Hae Ra, Hyeon Jae's chances are high. And it's not like Seok Jin is being tricked by Hae Ra or something so he knows exactly the kind of person he will be marrying.

💯 on all points.
Eun Seol seems to have lost a few brain cells while pursuing Seok Jin and has lowered her guard. She is far too trusting of Mi Ran too. Old Eun Seol would have been immediately suspicious of Secretary Choi like she was of Manager Na. Hopefully, now that she is slowly accepting that Seok Jin is marrying Hae Ra, she will actually focus on her retrial.

From the preview, a pair of female legs is shown while Eun Seol is seated outside and drunk. I hope it's not Hae Ra and it's a new character. I also hope that Seok Jin will not come to drunk Eun Seol's aid🤦🏾‍♀️.

One thing for sure, Mi Ran's plans are going full steam ahead and she will be on a winning streak for a while.

Yeah- I prefer him here, though. He has a good acting range.

That was anticlimactic- I think Seok Jin inadvertently alerted Yeong Hun about the lighter but the look and discomfort on Yeong Hun's face proves that he is guilty. What will he do now? Try to break up him and Hae Ra? Could Seok Jin end up being in danger? How will Seok Jin realise that there is something suspicious about his Dad's death? I hope his Mom's mind becomes normal again- the chances are high.

I guess it was too much to expect for Eun Seol to be completely done with Seok Jin but she still stares at him, longingly, and is competing with Hae Ra.

Who called Mi Ran- her brother? Or her husband? He said, "oppa".

The stares that Secretary Choi gives Mi Ran shows that he definitely has his own agenda. Someone as intelligent as Mi Ran cannot tell that something is not right with him? He is not even trying to hide it🤦🏾‍♀️. Maybe she is that desperate. He mentioned that he used to live on the street and rob people and Mi Ran saved him. I wonder what the story is.

Am looking forward to many more flashbacks.

Looks like the retrial is forcing Eun Seol and Hyeon Jae to dig into Manager Na's past. Finally, things will start moving again on that revenge front. I wonder what they will find. Hopefully, Eun Seol will not be confiding in Secretary Choi.

Yeong Hun's continued association with Mi Ran will be the beginning of his downfall- he will make a lot of enemies if he goes round blackmailing everyone. His marriage will not survive this. At least Eun Seol has one good Dad. Also, it seems like Yeong Hun might know that Jeong Seon is adopted- he spoke about being deceived by her.

Jeong Seon needs allies in that house- I think Seok Jin can make a good ally if he marries Hae Ra and moves in. But what will happen to his mother?🤔 Eun Seol's Dad and Grandma should just become her babysitters- they do almost nothing all day.

I was surprised to see that Eun Seol is still Hyeon Jae's client. I guess she stopped being his client when she was released from jail, then she became his client again after Manager Na's death and news of the retrial. So he professed his feelings for her while she was his client🤔🤔.

💯

Yes- the assistant has his own agenda. Maybe he was close to Manager Na and is suspicious of the circumstances surrounding his death? Is it possible that Manager Na was not as trusting of Mi Ran as we thought and he told the new assistant everything about Mi Ran so that if anything were to happen to him, he could avenge him. It's hard to figure out what his history is because he was also at the orphanage and was recommended by the director of the orphanage. If he has a personal revenge agenda, was he just waiting around for an opportunity to get close to her, and Manager Na's death provided an opening? In any case, I am glad he has been introduced- he is a more exciting character right now.

Jeong Seon also feels beholden to Mi Ran because Mi Ran practically raised Hae Ra so it will be a while before she feels confident enough to kick her out. Plus Hae Ra depends on Mi Ran so getting rid of Mi Ran will risk alienating Hae Ra.

Interesting development: Yeong Hun might have been involved in Seok Jin's Dad's death. Yeong Hun said something about his Dad and lighters- will know when I watch with subs later. So was his Dad responsible or was it Yeong Hun, himself? Seok Jin will see the lighter on Yeong Hun's desk so will he become suspicious and start his own revenge journey ? We do need a change in direction since no one is taking on any revenge right now- Eun Seol has no reason to suspect Mi Ran of anything yet so it might be a while before anything happens on that front.

Also- awesome news- Mi Ran helped Eun Seol to come to her senses, and she seems to finally be letting Seok Jin go. But if Seok Jin starts his own revenge journey, he might start gravitating towards Eun Seol again, reigniting their romance. OR revenge might make Seok Jin more determined than ever to marry Hae Ra so he can get into the family and take Yeong Hun down from the inside. I hope it's the latter.

I do like the idea of two completely different revenge stories going on at the same time.

Mi Ran's new assistant is quite forward and ballsy. I hope Eun Seol won't fall for him lol.

Jeong Seon might be starting to resent Mi Ran. I hope it sticks and she wises up.

I don't see it as a revenge plot. I think she genuinely wants to be with Seok Jin. She wants to experience the first love that she never got to experience. She is being as aggressive in her pursuit as Seok Jin was with her, 10 years ago.
Also, in the preview, it looks like Mi Ran says something to dissuade her, making her re-think her pursuit. So it's just lust at this point.

I was also surprised when Seok Jin admitted that. It shows that he and Hae Ra really are friends and he does care about her a lot. But it also means that he is toying with Eun Seol because he knows she likes him, knows that she is openly pursuing him, and he is going along with it. He basically said that his desire to marry Hae Ra is stronger than any feelings he has for Eun Seol 🤦🏾‍♀️. He is slowly losing points with me. Hyeon Jae gave Eun Seol great advice when he informed her that she has more to lose by pursuing an engaged man. But I doubt she will heed his warning. While I want her to find out about Jeong Seon and Yeong Hun being her birth parents, she is not yet mature enough to learn about it. She will just use that information to get together with Seok Jin.

Hyeon Jae is far too good for her.

Mine too. I disliked him after that and never forgave him. I just could not root for him after that. As he was dying, he said fate brought them together- that might have been true when she ended up becoming a Lin maid, but then he went and manipulated things to his advantage🤦‍♀️.
I was not even sad when he died young and I was glad that she had four more decades to herself where she just focussed on being a Mom, writing plays and running the Lin household.
Thankfully, the romance aspect of their relationship was kept to a bare minimum and was only featured in the final 9 episodes, sporadically, after she decided to accept him as her husband.

He got to live the life he wanted. She lived the life she was forced into.

I honestly think that given the choice, Lan Xiang would have preferred being single, writing plays and fighting for women's rights, while taking care of her parents. She was just not interested in romance and marriage.

Jin Qi is a grey character. So he is bound to do some things to make people dislike him. So I think the writer portrayed this well. From what I hear, he was far worse in the book and did even more unforgiveable things to Lan Xiang.

The writer chose Liu Xue Yi for the role because he is good at portraying grey characters. He did a fantastic job with Jin Qi.

At least with Han, she knew it was in the works and she was ready to accept it. Similar to how the Shen and Lin families had discussed her marriage to him when they were younger. The decree blindsided her, and everyone else, and was disrespectful to her adoptive parents.
We don't know how things would have worked out with Scholar Han- maybe she might have got him to change course too. You know how the success of a man is usually credited to the woman behind him.

In any case, yes- another reason for forcing her into marriage was his fear and jealousy that she would marry Scholar Han. Which really makes me hate him even more.

By freedom, I also mean that she was free to determine her own destiny. If she had chosen to marry Han, it would have been her choice . But Jin Qi made sure to take that choice away from her. She was very happy in her small cage.

I have been looking forward to this show since it started production and it was worth the wait. The initial synopsis of the show led me to believe that Lan Xiang was a jilted bride who intentionally made her way into the Lin household and worked her way up to become the Young Madam. I am so glad that this was not the case and the synopsis has since been updated. Lan Xiang wanted absolutely nothing to do with the Lin family, and after being forced to work for them as a maid, used her wit to get emancipated. I shared her joy when she and her parents became commoners. It was clear that Lan Xiang had big plans for their future- which is why I was so mad at Jin Qi for getting the marriage decree and clipping Lan Xiang’s wings. From that moment, I honestly started to dislike him, and he never really redeemed himself in my books. He selfishly wanted to marry her and did everything to get that outcome, no matter who he hurt in the process, including her. When Lan Xiang slapped him, he genuinely looked surprised. He actually thought she would be happy to marry him and to marry into nobility. But he was in for a rude awakening. I did, however, try to play devil’s advocate and see things from his perspective- the fact is that she only saw him as her boss. She was never attracted to him and if he had made his feelings known, she would have definitely rejected him, and he did not want to allow for that outcome. So a forced marriage was his only solution to his one-sided love. And that made me even madder- there is just no defending his actions. In so doing, he also made her a boss to her friends- so awkward and uncool. The beating and slap were not enough penance. The writer agreed because Lan Xiang did not warm up to him for two years, and really only started to after she saw that he had buried her birth family. She was incredibly grateful, and in that moment decided that she would, once again, accept her fate, and make lemonade out of lemons. She decided to accept her husband and her role as the Young Madam of the Lin family, and she would give it her all. As she bowed at the Shen family grave, she was honouring her family; committing to her marriage; and saying goodbye to the dreams she had before she was forced into a marriage which tied her life to the Lin family.

I was so glad that even after committing herself to the marriage, she refused to consummate the marriage until they were both on the same path. Personally, I loved it because it was more punishment from Jin Qi😂. It took another three years for them to be on the same path, and finally, after 5 years of marriage, Lan Xiang was willing to share a bed with him and start a family- which they did. Jin Qi loved Lan Xiang far more than she loved him, or could ever love him, and he knew and accepted that and was ok with it. You could tell by how he interacted with her- he was a completely different man from the one we met when he was her boss. He was less confident around her as his wife than when he was her boss- he was shameless, yes, but he handled her with kid gloves, because her love and respect were hard won. The actor portrayed this so well. I think that this is why he wanted to be with her in the next life. He wants to pay her back for all the pain he caused her, and he wants to earn her love the right way- and not force the issue. I, like many, believe that Lan Xiang grew to be fond of him and eventually grew to love him as they spent more time together and grew their family, as anyone would when you have a person in your life who is a consistent presence, be it a friend or spouse. She was not necessarily in love with him- which is very much ok. The writer portrayed the struggles of a woman in an arranged marriage so well, especially one she was forced into by the groom. This story makes for a good literature read.

So they were married for approximately 22 years in total and had two children in that time. Jin Qi got to see his daughter and son get to the ages of 16 and 13- which is a gift. After he died, Lan Xiang lived as widow for 40+ years (probably double the time she was married)- am basing this on the fact that her great granddaughter was 20 years old- that would require at least 40 more years. Her great granddaughter also has the Lin surname so she is very likely Lan Xiang’s son’s grandchild, who was 13 when his Dad died- not yet marrying age.

I would have loved to see what Lan Xiang had been up to in those 40-something years- I’m sure she lived to the fullest and enjoyed her life. I would have also loved to see Nanke's and Jiu Gao’s kids. And who knows, maybe one of Scholar Han’s kids could have married of Lan Xiang’s kids.

Against the Current is a superb story but I missed pre-marriage Lan Xiang, especially when they showed her again in the last couple of episodes. That version of her was free to do what she wanted, unlike when she was the Lin Young Madam. There were rules and restrictions that came with her status that would have prevented her from entering certain spaces and conversations. But I would be remiss if I did not mention that her power as a Lin Young Madam enabled her to rescue Ji’er, educate her maids and empower the Lin women. Pre- and post-marriage, she became the Lin family Fixer and Saviour, many times. It is not an exaggeration to say that the Lin family would have perished without her- which is ironic given how they survived while the Shen family perished and they didn’t bother to warn them in advance. All they gave the Shen family was a letter to break off the engagement between the two families. So I still grieve pre-marriage Lan Xiang. I would have loved to see what kind of dreams she had and what she could have accomplished. She could have helped far more people outside the Lin family. This is why I believe that Episodes 1-25 were the best.

But all in all, Lan Xiang lived a good life, stuck to her principles and fulfilled some of her dreams of writing plays and empowering women. She took the hands she was dealt and played them well, with no regrets. She saw a lot of death from the time she was a teenager but it did not harden her- she chose life and goodness, always.

Do I still dislike Jin Qi for marriage decree. Yes. Can I forgive him? No. But I did like some facets of his character- like the way he loved his mother. That was beautiful and I cried with him when she died. I find peace in knowing that he only featured in one-quarter of Lan Xiang’s life so I am trying not to hate him too much lol. I like grey characters but when they take actions that intentionally hurt the people they claim to love- I have a problem with that. Especially when they hate being manipulated themselves.

I loved the scene where Grandpa Lin asked the Lu children if they wanted to become Lins- that was beautiful. And when he declared that Lan Xiang would be taking over the household. These are just a few of the numerous scenes that touched my heart. Well thought out show. I loved the focus on family, friendships, freedom, and life.

I don't feel bad for Jin Qi. He knew that she did not love him as much as he loved her and she really gave him all that she could. She became fond of him and grew to love him but was not necessarily 'in love' with him. Maybe it's why he wanted a second life, so he could do things differently.

Mi Ran's plan concerning Ae Sook was pretty solid and clever. But I kept thinking "why not just give her a hair sample to test the DNA?" But killing off Ae Sook does guarantee that Granny stops looking for her. I hope they tell Eun Seol that her birth Mom is "dead". Mi Ran still has the maternity book- who knows how she will use it. Or will someone else find it?

As Jeong Seon says repeatedly, Seok Jin is the younger version of Yeong Hun. From the preview, it looks like Yeong Hun still suffers from an inferiority complex, just like Seok Jin, and this might lead him into Mi Ran's bed.

Am glad we got confirmation on who Hae Ra's Dad is- they have the same mosquito allergy. Hae Ra will be traumatized.

Looks like the orphanage where Mi Ran grew up has a lot of minions she can use. I wonder if he was close to Manager Na🤔🤔. Hopefully, he is not as gullible as his predecessor.

I hope Eun Seol won't be dumb enough to give her the money 🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️. She should kick Granny out- she is already housing and feeding her. She should also tell her Dad and brother.

It is taking away from any depth that their potential future romantic relationship might have. It's more lust-filled than real love- not a relationship built to last. It's hard to root for them.

I hope so too. I hope the new guy's role is more than just being a love interest and being Mi Ran's assistant. I hope he is a kid of one of the people Mi Ran ruined on the way to the top, and he is out for his own revenge. Eun Seol is not in revenge mode right now so we need other players.