Yong Pal Episode 4 - Yong Pal Superhero

We started off with Yong Pal black market doctor, than transitioned to suck up money obsessed Yong Pal. Finally in ep 3 we saw the heart beneath the dollar signs Yong Pal and now finally we have transitioned to ep 4 where they introduce us to Super Hero Yong Pal.  I am worried that if this boy doesn't get some romantic action soon, he will end up the President of Korea before the end of the drama.  It is amazing how much character movement we can get when you don't have to worry about other characters, or romance, or pretty much anything other than making Joo Won look good.

We finally get some more OTP action (or inaction as the case may be since Yeo Jin is still in a coma) as Tae Hyun introduces himself to the VIP client.  But it is not what he is expecting and Chief Lee is all to happy to throw it in his face.

Chief Lee bites out --"Meet miss Yeo Jin, the majority shareholder of Hanshin Group.  The person who makes all final decisions on how the company is run. And she is also a human vegetable"   Oh, and by the way.  You now are involved in covering up her condition and are an official accomplice to this little bit of illegal activity that we are doing.  Chief Lee continues to mock Tae Hyun saying "Were you expecting a honey pot?  No you are a moth who moved to the fire and died in the flame".

At least we finally get some answers to why Yeo Jin has all the power and her brother is left with crumbs.  Turns out that it is not her father, but her mother who had control of the company and she left it to her daughter when she died.  Yeo Jin's father married her mother and brought his son into the family as well, making Do Joon only a half brother and no blood relation to the heiress mother.  Hence why the brother was left out of the money loop.

It doesn't take a genius to figure out that Yeo Jin is in a forced coma.  And if Tae Hyun is anything, it is a genius......and he saw her out of the coma just a week earlier so no brainer with this deduction.

What I did find interesting is that Chief Lee multiple times said that he tried to keep Tae Hyun clear of this room to protect him, but that once he forced his hand he had no choice.  What do you think?  Is Chief Lee completely evil?  Or is there a small spark of humanity somewhere in his cold hard heart?

Tae Hyun is overwhelmed when he realizes what just happened.  He is well and truly caught in a tough unethical situation.  However, Tae Hyun's qualms are overcome when he receives word that his sister has been moved up the transplant list thanks to the Director.

Tae Hyun wearily goes to his office, wanting to be alone to process, but waiting for him is an unexpected visitor.  Thinking she is a patient who found her way into the wrong room, Tae Hyun chides Chae Young for smoking in a hospital.  Hahaha

His smile is dazzling

Officially Dazzled

Chae Young tries to get Tae Hyun to join her but is rebuffed.  Instead Tae Hyun goes to a local street restaurant and gets drunk.  Only to find that Chae Young has tracked him down.  He promptly tells her --"If you need a man, just go to a host bar"  HAHAHAHA  They end up drinking the night away together, and Tae Hyun wakes up with a hangover and laying in a hotel bed.  Ooops.

Pictures of the drunken duo (Chae Young and Tae Hyun) entering the hotel together are taken by Do Joon's PI's.  I have a feeling this is going to come back to bite our hero in the butt. And we can now add a creepy voyeur secretary to our list of weirdos.  So now we have a Creepy voyeur secretary to add with our creepy nurse and our creepy doctor.  What to do we win if we are able to get 5 of a kind in the creepy department?

Excuse me while my inner OST music starts playing for this upcoming scene -- 

La la la..... Reunited and it feels so good Reunited 'cause we understood There's one perfect fit And, sugar, this one is it....la la la

Sometimes there are songs that just fit the mood.  And the reunion of Yong Pal and Gang Boss is just such a moment. It cracks me up when Gang Boss keeps making jokes about the shoddy treatment of his wound and how Yong Pal looks like a bell boy now that he is in a hospital setting.

Annoyed with over-entitled patients and wise cracking gang bosses, Tae Hyun seeks sanctuary in Yeo Jin's room.  Tae Hyun looks down at the silent (but listening) Yeo Jin and asks if she can hear him, he theorizes that she can't and envies her peace -- "Even being chased by loan sharks and the police, I never felt shitty like this til yesterday". 

In her mental round room, Yeo Jin listens to everything, but can only shift her eyebrows a bit in response to Tae Hyun.  She screams at him -- "look at me you idiot" but he continues to be oblivious.  Just as we think he is going to remain ignorant of her state, Tae Hyun turns back and checks her eyes.  We see Yeo Jin bathed in a beam of light (OK, I swear this director wants to do sci-fi.... can anyone else totally see the alien probe-style directing going on?) looking upward with hope.

Tae Hyun realizes that she is functioning as an awake person, but is interrupted by creepy nurse before he can take things further.  Creepy nurse puts our hero back into his peon place and leans in close saying -- "I know better than anyone else about her condition".  OH MY GOSH we totally have a "Misery" situation going on right here.

Now you might be wondering where the superhero reference in my title comes in?  So far I have just chatted about Tae Hyun doing his usual doctoring for rich people.  First, let me fill you in on some background stuff that happened throughout the episode.  One of the patients on level 12 is the girl who had been raped and stabbed by the hallyu jerk from last episode.  She had been brought in, along with the jerk, under the premise that a robber had forced his way into her room and stabbed her.  Hearing the commotion, the jerk supposedly burst in to save the girl, and was stabbed in the leg during the scuffle.  They even gave him a minor wound to support the story.  Needless to say, the rape victim was not doing to well with everyone trying to hush up her situation. Tae Hyun even suggested she get counseling, but his idea was nixed by Chief Lee who said the privacy of the jerk was more important since he was the VIP client.   

So here we are with a mentally unbalanced girl who no one will listen to.  What is a person to do?  Set off the proton reactor in the basement, causing the whole hospital to be engulfed in radiation and causing everyone to die, of course (I asked my bloggner, Dongsaeng if this is actually a real thing, and she assures me that some hospitals do in fact have this type of reactor built deep in their basements).  Who knew that this would be more believable than futuristic swipe screen hospital rooms?

Our mentally disturbed patient has barricaded herself into the room and turned off the vents.  It is only a matter of time til the reactor blows.  The first thing the higher ups do is save the VIP patients (Chae Young & Yeo Jin first) and themselves, leaving all the other people in the hospital vulnerable and unaware of what is about to happen.  

Tae Hyun is told to help evacuate Yeo Jin (in the act of moving her, her coma drug is accidentally stopped which sets up the scene for later) but refuses to actually let her leave until he finds out what is going on.  It seems that his sister is in the hospital doing dialysis and he refuses to leave with Yeo Jin.  Never get between Tae Hyun and his sister.  The boy is ruthless when it comes to her.

Realizing that his sister is in danger, Tae Hyun runs back into the hospital.  He passes through the children's wing and realizes that all these people are being left to die.  It really hits home as he sees all the VIPs and his bosses running away like mice avoiding a flood.  Tae Hyun pauses to contemplate what he is going to do.  Does he save his sister and himself, or try to protect everyone?  We see his decision as Tae Hyun runs down to the basement towards his patient in total superhero form.

If ever there was a need for a violin underscore then this is it.  Tae Hyun talks the poor patient down from her dreams of mass murder.  Hitting home that all the people who deserve to die have already escaped and the only people left are those that are innocent. He also described how horrible death by radiation is and that it won't be an explosion where everyone simply dies.

Just as he convinces her, the technicians are able to trick the computers into shutting down the reactor core.  But this causes lethal gas to be pumped into the room that the mental girl is trapped in.  Determined to not let her die, Tae Hyun volunteers to run into the room and save not only her, but turn the generator fans back on.

And that is the story of how Tae Hyun became the savior of the hospital and everyone in it.  The end....  Oh, and he passed out and almost died from inhaling poisonous gas, but he is our hero (and really the only character moving this drama), so he is of course OK.

Finally Tae Hyun was able to take a break (even though it was forced because he was passed out).  During this time we see him meet his mother in his dreams.  They talk and have some closure that Tae Hyun needed to unload some of his guilt.  Hallucination mom and Tae Hyun reunion totally made me tear up.  Darn you Joo Won and your genius ability to ugly cry.

But there is no rest for the wicked, or superheroes, and Tae Hyun is quickly up and moving about the second he regains consciousness.  First he checks on his sister and fakes that everything is normal.  Second he walks onto the twelfth floor and decks the rapist jerk in front of everyone.  Hahaha, I love how Gang Boss nods his head and says -- "now he looks like Yong Pal".

Upset and worried because of his moral issues, the money lender breathing down his neck, his sister's almost emergency, and pretty much all the stress of the world, Tae Hyun seeks refuge once again in Yeo Jin's room.  He articulates his concerns about how he is going to survive all this and a voice behind him inquires -- "Should I give you the money?"

My Thoughts:
SHE'S AWAKE.........finally.  I am not kidding when I say that I have never seen a drama go on so long without our leads actually meeting awake and face to face.  Sure you can say that there was that few seconds during her attempted suicide, but is that really a romantic meeting of the souls?  I think not.  

I really enjoy that Tae Hyun's attempt at being an immoral doctor didn't last long.  As Gang Boss aptly put it "Now he looks like Yong Pal".  This guy is just a rebellious trouble maker at heart and it just feels right when he goes all rogue against the establishment.  It is what makes the show work.  Sure I can handle Tae Hyun trying to be subservient for a little while, but another episode would just be pushing my interest with that aspect of the story. 

I was also wondering what would make him go against the powers that be and support her.  Sure, if he didn't have his sister to worry about, I could totally see him doing the right thing and saving the damsel in distress.  But not when it is at the expense of his sister.  Now that she is awake, and offering him the money he needs to escape his problems, it is a different story.  One of the benefits of Yeo Jin being aware of everything around while she is in the coma state is that we don't have to worry about our OTP bonding.  The bond is already there on Yeo Jin's side and Tae Hyun is desperate enough to jump on to the ship with the most money.  I can't wait til next week when we finally see the dynamic of our couple and can start seeing Tae Hyun fighting back against the establishment.

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