DFR: Faith ep 18

In case you missed it before, let's recap where we left off in episode 17.

Now, it may not have been perfect, but it was still what we've been waiting 17 long episodes for - A KISS!!!!!!

Are you kidding me with this intense LMH stare right now?!?!?  Suddenly questioning everything I hold near and dear. Time to break out the mantra... "I love my husband.  This is a fictional character.  I am an extremely happily married woman and mother of two.  I love my husband...."

Okay, so why did I call that an imperfect kiss?  I do have to say that upon further review *eyebrow wiggle* it was better than originally thought.  The shots that they used at the beginning of 18 were better for one.  And secondly, I paid a little more attention to the faces of both Choi Young and Eun Soo.  Oh, they were both digging it.  Yes, it was a strategic move on his part and a great way to get the job done as far as stopping Deok Heung and Gi Cheol's plan at least temporarily.  But, let's look at this a different way - the way that I interpreted it more the second time I watched it.  He probably could have found another way to save the king and the village and all.  Let's assume that.  Kissing her was to save her.  He knew it would mean big trouble for him, but he willingly put himself on the line in order to save her.  And the looks they gave each other?!  Oh yeah, they were both into it.  This wasn't a meaningless kiss without any feeling behind it.  It spoke volumes.  I definitely had a case of the butterflies the second time around.  It was a very intimate moment in a very non-intimate setting.  And the little smiles they exchange as he is being arrested???

K-dramas, this is EXACTLY why I love you so much!  Those beautiful little subtleties that give you goosebumps and set those butterflies a flight!

***Side note, as if I wasn't already WAYYY behind - like I have 3 reviews to write today, including two on two episodes I haven't even watched yet and it's Friday.  :O  I just have to throw this in.  It would probably be better served in a Monday Morning Therapy or something, but I have to say it now.  Forgive the interruption.  I took the summer off from American TV.  My normal shows weren't on and my regular summer shows weren't available online anymore (poopheads over at XYZ network!) and we had temporarily given up cable (temporary until football and political season hit and my poor husband couldn't stand it anymore and finally caved and came crawling back to the cable company).  So I heavily immersed myself into the K dramas.  You know.  You saw the lists of what I was watching all summer.  Well, now summer is over and the American shows are back on the air.  I started watching a few (many didn't make the cut this time around), one in particular that will remain nameless, but it's always been a favorite of mine.  The leads finally, after seasons of painful "will they, won't they", got together.  And my reaction?  Eh.  Not feeling it.  It wasn't fun to watch them paw at each other.  It went from long-time crush to sex.  I really found myself missing the subtle romantic moments found in K-dramas.  No goosebumps, no delightful chills.  Butterflies?  Nope.  Just...nothing.  I was disappointed.  And realized again just how much I really appreciate romance in dramas, even when they are so mean and wait 17 episodes for a kiss.  Still beats season after season though if you want to look at it that way.  K-dramas know how to get the romance right.  They have mastered it.  It is just so much better.  I hate to sound like an American TV traitor, but I'm sorry, I have to call it like I see it.  I'm not saying that it's totally worthless trash - there are still things I love about my American shows - but it's not the romance.  Definitely not.  K-dramas have forever spoiled me in that department.  Okay, interruption over.  Sorry again about that.***  

Now, where was I?  They kiss, he's arrested and tossed, once again, back in jail.

He doesn't stay there too long, don't worry.  He's able to convince one of the guards to switch teams.  Hahaha...no, not that kind of switching teams.  I know it's prison and all, but no.  Not what I meant.  Remember how all the palace guards revolted and drove out the king?  It was because some of the superiors had been bribed.  Choi Young needs to win the palace guards back over and assure the underlings that were following orders from their superiors that they're safe to come back.  Oh yeah, he starts to get busy capturing the guard leaders who took the bribes and revolted against the king.  And he does it in an amusing way.  He's very impatient.  Time is short.  He's got a lot to do - a kingdom to save, a king to reinstate, a doctor to return to the heavens, etc.  He starts arresting the dirty guard superiors and promoting the underlings into the now open leadership positions.

While all that is going on, the king and queen are escaping from the village they've been hanging out in and heading back to the palace.  They escape just in the nick of time, as we see a bunch of archers shooting into the chamber where, according to Fire Lady's detective work (feeling the tea pot that's still warm), they just were a mere 30 minutes before.  That's not much of a head start.  Especially when the hound dog Pipeling with super sonic hearing is on the case.  Let the chase begin!

It's a bad day to be the Woodalchi 3rd in charge.  Okay, so not exactly sure that is his official position, but I'm assuming.

If Choi Young is in charge and he's locked up and then dirty guard hunting down/good guard head hunting and the other guy is staying with the king, leaving the 3rd guy there with only 10 Woodalchi to stall the bad guys, wouldn't you say that sounds like that poor guy is 3rd in command?  Either way, it's a bad day for him and his band of 10.  They battle the bad guys and lose.

The royal entourage make it safely to an empty house but can't stay there long.

More Woodalchi are left behind, this time with two dressed as the king and queen to serve as decoys.

They don't make it.  By the end of the day, 24 Woodalchi are lost.  That's pretty much half of them, isn't it?  I think they started out with 50.  Wow, sad day for sure.

Choi Young's recruiting mission works though as he gains some soldiers to help escort the king back to the palace.

Choi Young doesn't take the news of his lost men very well.  He blames himself.  The king blames himself.  Everyone is feeling responsible and guilty.  CY admits to the king that his loyalties lie more with the high doctor than the kingdom at this point.  See what happened here?  He saves Eun Soo and then is locked up.  Again.  And again, something major happens with him not at the helm, and it spells disaster for the king and now his men.  He asks to be released from his position because his loyalties lie elsewhere and that is putting everyone and everything else at risk.

How about this scene?  Everyone is reconvening at the palace after all the turmoil and everything.  Someone approaches CY and whispers some bit of news in his ear.  And he goes rushing off.  He even starts running.

Ooh!  Who is he running off to see?  Did he just find out that the king and queen have safely arrived and he's going to go say hi?  Nope.  It's Eun Soo that he has just heard has shown up.  He literally runs to see her.  And embraces her the moment he sees her.  I literally died.  Death by swoon.  Literally.

Now, I am really all over the place chronologically here.  Forgive me.  It's just how my brain is firing right now and as this is already a week late, I figured I better just let it fire at will instead of trying to reign it in and make it tow the chronological line.  Let's back up and start talking about what Eun Soo has been up to.  After the kiss and the breaking off of her engagement to him, Deok Heung shows up, a little peeved.  He starts threatening her and she pulls a knife on him!

Haha!  Thank you Mr Shmexy Choi Young for teaching her how to handle a knife!  I had to cheer.  And then they sit down to talk.  And Deok Heung makes a strange request of her.  He asks her to run away with Choi Young and stay out of the grasp of Gi Cheol.  But just when you think that maybe he's not such a bad guy after all, he poisons her again.  Oh bother.  This time it's a poison he injects in her arm and is venom from some Japanese bug.

It's a slow-acting one but will eventually kill her.  Deok Heung claims to have the antidote - gotta keep her on her poison leash once again after all so that she'll come a'runnin when he comes a'callin.  But Eun Soo, after chatting with Dr Jang about it, isn't too worried.  It's something that can easily be fixed once she returns back to the future, which she'll be doing before the poison starts to take effect.

Now she and CY are back together at the palace after all this stuff has been going on.  It's a happy reunion.  Except when he sees that she's been poisoned and flips out because she didn't tell him.

He really is hurt and takes it to mean that she is still too distant from him, kind of like "why don't you trust me?" or "I thought we had something here".  He leaves, she runs after him and grabs him from behind.

And they have a very moving, one-sided conversation where she talks about what happens when she goes back.  Or she is trying to figure out if she should stay.  This is a complicated relationship, is it not?  700 years divide them.  She has to leave soon or will be stuck there forever.  He has a job to do there and can't exactly run off to the future with her.  What will they do?  They are crazy in love but ignoring the reality that their relationship is -- impossible to maintain.  They will make it work, won't they?  *nervously bites nails*

We conclude with a few points worth pointing out.  There is an envoy from Yuan on their way with a letter that names Deok Heung as the new king.  There is a mystery guy in a mysterious hat that a couple of the Suribang (look!  I remembered the name of the merry band of miscreants!) guys encounter.

Is he the Yuan envoy?  We don't know.  But we do get a sense that he'll be a player in the story later on.  Gi Cheol is pretty much to raving lunatic status now, desperate to get Eun Soo and travel to the heavens with her.

Deok Heung is arrested, imprisoned and later released.  And a letter shows up from Yuan requesting/ordering Eun Soo to come to them.

You know what's coming next...
DUHN DUHN DUHN!

Join us in episode 19 to see what happens next!

And thank you for your patience as this poor review is an entire week late.  I tried so hard to get it out.  I watched the episode as soon as it was available on Tuesday.  I got the pictures selected.  I made the art.  I wrote and scheduled the review for 17.  But I just plain ran out of time.  I had to pack and prepare for my trip too and then we left bright and early Wednesday morning.  I planned to dictate it as we drove using a talk to text app, but that turned out to be a disaster.  Dragon can't handle Asian names for one.  And just plain didn't like me or all the background noise that comes with a road trip and children.  And then we got home and I still haven't caught up on anything.  We've been dealing with sickness and stuff around here all week and so I find myself, once again, way behind on where I would like to be with my reviews.  But, I shall sally forth, search out some head cold meds so that my head and everything in it stops feeling like a giant zit ready to pop, and chain myself to this desk dungeon until Faith is reviewed!  Because I love you.  And because I love to talk about this stuff (well, except for the political stuff - I don't like that. But the kissing and romance stuff? I like to talk about that. That's happy stuff that makes me all smiley and giddy and warm and fuzzy inside).  I'm going to show this cold who's boss!  It can't keep me from my Lee Min HoTTness!  No sirree!  Alrighty then, enough rambling and on to 19!