My Secret Hotel Ep 4: They Really Weren't Kidding About this Whole Secret Business

Helloooo and welcome back. Sorry this is late. I didn't get it finished before the holiday weekend, and so I'm playing catch up now. My apologies. But let's get started, shall we?

First, I want to give you the "who is she talking about" nickname rundown, so that as we go along, we're all clear on just who is being referred to.

Our boot-clad Urban Cowboy I call ROKer Ranger. ROK (Republic of Korea)-er Ranger, you know, like Walker Texas Ranger. Cheesy, stupid goodness, huh? ;) Only, Chuck Norris has got nothing on this guy. I love this guy.

I call this one Ms Picasso because in one camera shot, she totally looked like a Picasso painting. With the hair and then the distorted look of her face...well, I tried to screenshot it, but you'll just have to take my word for it I guess. She totally looked like a Picasso painting. And because "Whore" just seemed too mean, even if deserving.

Lastly, this is Ms Buttinski, because, everywhere we turn, she's butting in to the relationship between our hero and heroine. I'm convinced she played a major role in their breakup. I don't think she's quite evil enough for a total evil nickname though. She seems harmless enough, just way too involved and causing problems where problems don't need to be.



Now that that's all cleared up, onto the recap!

When we left off with episode 3, the writers were doing their darndest to make us think that our gorgeous hero was the culprit behind the mysterious murder of Mr Ice Pick McCreepy from Creepytown. They even go as far as to show him in flashback with said ice pick pointed directly at, and mere millimeters away from, the man's ice-like heart.




Top that off with the "evidence" - something small and mysterious pulled from the hero's wallet found beneath the corpse. Without even seeing it, I'm pretty sure I know what it is. Sure enough, it turns out to be a picture of Sang Hyo back from the couple's "good old days". Now, just why would groom Hae Young be carrying around a picture of his wedding planner in his wallet, hmm?  That's the question that ROKer Ranger has to ask. Not being necessarily the sharpest tool in the box, he wrongfully assumes that groom fell for his wedding planner while she was his wedding planner instead of her being a part of his past. But that's okay. The guy still gets points for his sheer coolness and comedic relief. I love this character. He's fun in Surplus Princess, and he's fun here too.  Pulling double duty, yet keeping his two characters so vastly different and completely entertaining. My ahjumma visor's off to you, Ahn Kil Kang.

Our hero's only concern, as he begins his story, and as we see later in the flashback, is for Sang Hyo. All thoughts are on her and her protection in this investigation. RoKer Ranger even asks him in surprise why he, the murder suspect, is concerned more for her than himself even under these circumstances. We get some of their story – how they met in Vegas 7 years ago, and after just a short few weeks, he proposed. The wedding though was apparently done more as a joke, was never registered, therefore never legal, and ended less than 3 months later. *Side note: doesn't seem so "jokey" on his part...just sayin'* Later on in the episode we see more of the breakup, at least how it relates to the picture he carries with him. We see her sitting at a table looking at the picture of them taken together on the day he proposed and crying. She tears the picture in half and next thing we know, he’s running into a now empty apartment. She has left and all he finds is the torn picture. He obviously takes the half with her image on it and treasures it over the next 7 years, even as he is walking down the aisle with another woman. After his interrogation and consequent clearing of suspect-status, we see him literally cradling the photograph in his hand, but then eventually setting it on fire and letting it burn. All while I gasp and cry out, “no! Don’t give up yet!” That’s okay though, I’m sure they’ll take a new one together once their love is sufficiently renewed ;)

 
All the angst of our Hae Young being Prime Suspect #1 is soon laid to rest though as RoKer Ranger let's the poor guy off the hook after toying with him, and us, for a bit.

Then the investigation continues. If I was some crime/mystery show with cool graphics, I'd put up all of the people being interviewed with all of their pertinent information/reasons why they could be the killer. But, I'm not. So I won't. But envision it as you go along. It makes it much more CSI-y. Two things important to mention though is that the death occurred between 10pm and midnight and that it is suspected that it was a hotel employee who was the murderer.  Let the interrogations begin!

One by one the employees are brought into a conference room with RoKer Ranger and asked the same question - where were you between the hours of 10pm and midnight? All have varying excuses, some better than others. It quickly becomes evident to us viewers as well as our dogged detective that these walls truly do hold many, many secrets among the people who work there.

When Sang Hyo’s turn comes for interrogation, all RoKer Ranger wants to know is who she likes between Hae Yeong and Director Seong Gyeom. This is where I get slightly unsure of his intentions. We’ve seen how he wrote in his notebook about how she, Sang Hyo, is his style and beautiful. Is he hitting on her in some strange, convoluted way? Trying to figure out what her type is? Or is he just curious because there is obviously something to be curious about going on between her and both men? Either way, it’s hilarious and seeing her confused face when he asks her is priceless. As is her eventual reply of pleading her right to not answer. What was even more butterfly-inducing though was when she learns that she is not even a suspect because Hae Yeong has given her an alibi already – she was talking in the garden with Director Seong Gyeom at the time of death. She is shocked to find out that Hae Yeong had come back to the hotel that night, on the eve of his wedding and wonders what it was all about. Obviously he was coming back to her, but does she put all this together? Certainly she has to suspect as much, right? It gets her thinking and wondering though and that is good enough for me at this point.

Let’s talk about Director Seong Gyeom for a moment. Now, I vary slightly from Kmuse here. I honestly don’t find him to be all that creepy. At least not in a sexual harassment kind of way. My only issue with him at this point is that he seems to really enjoy playing the ladies against each other. He comes across as really liking the attention and knowing that he is so popular. Okay, but let’s be fair, wouldn’t we all? Who doesn’t want to be the object of affection for multiple gorgeous people? I mean, really. So yeah, he comes across to me as a tad cocky, but he’s changing. This improvement is most noticeable the night they go out for drinks.

He and Sang Hyo are heading out when Ms Picasso butts in and invites herself and the security guy along. While there, she unabashedly hits on the director. It starts out a little more subtle, but soon becomes full on “whoa! I can’t believe she just said that!” when she starts talking about blindfolding and tying him up with the tie she gave him and that he is wearing. Giving a man a tie is apparently the same as claiming him as your own. Didja know that? Well, now you do. So be careful, ladies, in who you choose a silk leash for. As the very uncomfortable and sexual-harassment-tinged drinks come to a close, Ms Picasso asks Director to take her home, which he readily agrees to, much to my utter shock and disdain. He quickly then shows us that he's got some taste and decency after all though, as he shuts her in his car and waves as she is driven off, choosing instead, of course, to go with our leading lady. Good choice, bro, good choice. 

When they reach Sang Hyo's place, she invites him in, all coyly, for some ramen noodles, informing him how her noodles are the best. Seems innocent enough, until at the next scene where they are sitting outside a convenience store eating noodles and he looks a little disappointed and bamboozled. It would seem as if he had hoped that "ramen noodle" was code for something else, huh? Tricky little tricksy fox Sang Hyo - I'm proud of her! She proves that you don't need to be all overt and whore-y like Ms Picasso in order to toy with a guy ;) After noodles, he walks her home. She's just come in the door when Director calls her. She's obviously all flattered and soaking up his attentions, especially when, after going through the nightly check to make sure no creepy ice-pick wielding ghosts are hanging about, he leads her to look out her window where she then sees him standing there. Okay, okay, admittedly it doesn't take a whole heck of a lot to get me all fluttery, but that was definitely one moment that had me all filled with squeeees. Insert the "I wanna look out my window and see a gorgeous, rich, sexy guy standing there looking up at me" whine here.

Okay, yeah, so I'm running out of time here. I gotta speed this last little bit up. 

Two more main scenes I want to mention.

One - the scene where HY is at work and thinking about the phone conversation he had overheard Ice Pick Ice-y Corpse having when he was running around at the hotel looking to confess his undying love for SH that fateful night before the wedding. He was threatening someone. Specifically, he threatening to tell this mystery person's son something. HY is trying to decide if this is information that he should be sharing with the investigator when, suddenly, he gets a call informing him that his beloved SH is at the police station. Thinking she is being suspected, he runs off to save her and claim her innocence. See, look, this boy is ALWAYS running off or back or here or there for this girl that is his ex. How can you not love that? I know I sure do. I love it a lot. He rushes to the police station, basically barging in yelling, "she's innocent!". One of the cops says "oh look, it's the first suspect" which SH overhears and freaks out over.

Turns out that she was only there to pick up Dead Guy's personal belongings since he has no next of kin or friends or anyone to take his box of dead guy stuff. 

SH doesn't leave the police station with just the box of stuff though.  No, now she leaves also with thoughts of her ex possibly being the murderer. She is driven with enough curiosity about this to don Dead Guy's stuff and sneak into his car. She kinda stinks at this disguise/sneaking business though as she is clearly seen by the officers up in the police station who are very amused by her and her "cuteness". Anyway, synopsis here is that she gets into his car, "makes" him drive by "threatening" him with a back scratcher (how adorable was his smile here as he laughed at her?!?!),

and they drive off to have a conversation in a park. The conversation all boils down to him being hurt that she would even consider that he might have been the killer. He's all broken-hearted as he lobs a "you still don't really know or understand my true self" in her direction and walks off, leaving her sitting there looking like, well, she just had a dose of cruel reality lobbed her direction. The picture of just what went wrong in their marriage is ever so slightly beginning to take form here.

The last scene I wanted to talk about is when Ms Buttinski again involves herself in the relationship between our star-crossed ex-lovers. She writes this scathing article about the corpse at the wedding which sends everybody scrambling. It's a PR nightmare for the Secret Hotel and fingers are pointing at SH. The solution? Well, first she starts out by taking on full responsibility and offering to resign. That's not good enough though. No, instead, she must plan another wedding, because for some reason, getting the two hitched without a dead body this time will make everyone out there forget about the dead body at the first attempted ceremony.  The logic is stupid, but the effect is there - she's not off the hook yet as the wedding planner for the ex. Crap. Crap crap crap crap crappity crap. 

Now, a few "clues" to point out. Go on ahead and add them to your notepad as we try to piece together the mystery. 

These two

This necklace

These suspicious characters and incidents

Something fishy is going on for sure. Secrets, secrets and more secrets. I'm curious to see how everything starts to unravel and piece together, how about you? Good luck with this one Detective ROKer - it seems as if you have your work cut out for you.

Stay tuned for KMuse's recap of this week's episode 5 coming soon!