Woohoo Waikiki 2: Episode 9

by LollyPip

Beginning a new career isn’t easy for anyone, but it’s especially difficult when you’re brand-new to the business. Two of our housemates are struggling to nurture their new dreams in life, and it’s not going well for either of them. Meanwhile, another houseguest has developed a raging crush that quickly gets out of hand.

 
EPISODE 9: “All About My Male Friend/Extreme Job

After rescuing Jung-eun from her disastrous date, Joon-ki drives home, and Jung-eun is oddly subdued the whole way. Joon-ki chalks her mood up to the shock of being taken advantage of and tells her to get some rest, but Jung-eun can’t stop thinking about how swoony Joon-ki was when he punched out her date for disrespecting her.

In the morning, Woo-shik asks Joon-ki why he walked off his shoot yesterday, but he’s weirdly vague. Soo-yeon says that the PD was pretty angry, and Joon-ki says he’s already gotten the call that he’s fired. He tells Soo-yeon that she was so good, the writer wants to recommend her for other jobs, and assures her that he prefers acting jobs anyway.

They hear a weird noise — it’s Jung-eun blowing on her alphorn, ha. She’s trying to clear her mind, mostly regarding her brand-new confusing feelings for Joon-ki. She spots him making a phone call and decides that he’s actually pretty good-looking, but he turns out to be prank-calling Ki-bong and she remembers that, oh right, Joon-ki is an idiot.

Yu-ri wanders downstairs still sleepy after staying up all night doing research for her restaurant. Ki-bong asks if he can borrow her laptop, because a friend is getting him a job selling cars, but he still needs to write up a resume. Yu-ri asks about his poetry, but Ki-bong says that the pains of creativity were too difficult, not that she could possibly understand.

Jung-eun runs into Joon-ki again and goes all starry-eyed to see him cleaning without being asked… but it’s a front to steal money from the guesthouse’s petty cash, ha. He goes right back to the safe, looking a bit guilty, and Jung-eun wonders if he’s going to put the money back. But nope, he just forgot to wipe his fingerprints off the safe.

Soo-yeon goes on an interview regarding a job as a reporter, but the writer who interviews her refuses to hire her because of her sloppy diction. She tells Woo-shik later that she wants to practice hard and try again, determined to get this job and pay off her father’s debt, then hits him up for another hotteok.

Yu-ri guesses that Joon-ki took the missing money when he comes home with a new megaphone, of all things. He yells through the megaphone at Woo-shik and Soo-yeon when they get home, and LOL, their faces.

Soo-yeon tells Joon-ki that she needs to improve her diction for that reporter job, and he puts her in touch with a reporter who’s also a speech instructor. The teacher seems very professional and offers to help Soo-yeon right away. She tells Soo-yeon to repeat after her, but when she recites the consonant sounds, she starts to spit all over Soo-yeon.

The teacher doesn’t seem to notice that she’s giving Soo-yeon a shower and fusses at her for blinking and not repeating. Soo-yeon doesn’t want to complain since she’s getting the lesson for free, so she fibs that her vision went blurry. She continues to sit and get spit on for the rest of the lesson, disgusted but unable to move away.

Ki-bong returns Yu-ri’s laptop and asks her to look at his resume, and when she sees his cover letter, she reads it aloud to Woo-shik. It sounds like something written by a gradeschooler and mentions things like his love for sausage and hatred of spinach. Woo-shik tries to explain what a cover letter is, so Ki-bong goes to rewrite it.

He falls asleep on the keyboard while it types the same letter over and over (LOL, been there, done that). Joon-ki comes home with his megaphone, and Jung-eun watches him secretly from the patio as Joon-ki covers Ki-bong with a blankie. She thinks that he’s really kind-hearted, until he sticks his butt under the blanket and dutch-ovens poor Ki-bong.

Ki-bong wakes up screaming, and Joon-ki apologizes and promises never to do it again. Ki-bong lays back down, and Joon-ki sneaks back to him and toots in his face… then learns why they say never trust a fart. He hobbles off to the bathroom and Jung-eun despairs that she could have fallen for a guy like him.

Soo-yeon goes back for her second diction lessons and they move on to complete sentences. Soo-yeon gets yelled at again for blinking when the teacher’s spit hits her in the face, so when the teacher recites a sentence with a lot of “T” sounds (the one that produces the most saliva), Soo-yeon begs to be allowed to practice that particular sound at home.

The teacher says no, and leans even closer so Soo-yeon can see how her mouth moves. She holds Soo-yeon’s face so she can’t turn away, and sprays her from only inches away. But Soo-yeon perseveres, and soon she’s spitting as good as she gets.

Back at the guesthouse, Ki-bong brings Yu-ri his new cover letter to read. It starts out much better, talking about how much he loved baseball. But he uses several incorrect idioms, and he argues with Yu-ri when she tries to tell him how they actually go.

Soo-yeon shows up to see the writer who rejected her and rattles off a lecture about judging people too quickly with perfect diction, complete with spit-shower. The director of the station happens to be nearby, and he’s impressed enough to offer her a thirty-day trial, and the possibly of a contract after that.

She runs home to tell her friends, and Ki-bong congratulates her with another incorrect idiom so Yu-ri chases him to his room, ha. Soo-yeon asks where Joon-ki is, and Woo-shik says he went somewhere with his megaphone. He asks Jung-eun what Joon-ki’s deal is with the megaphone, but she just snaps that she doesn’t know and stomps off to her room.

A few minutes later, Joon-ki calls Jung-eun and asks her to meet him outside. When she gets to the patio, Sang-woo, the TV host who tried to trick her into sleeping with him, is also there. Joon-ki makes Sang-woo apologize to Jung-eun, then grumbles that it wasn’t sincere enough.

He takes out his megaphone and announces to the world that Jo Sang-woo, famous news anchor, messed with his innocent friend. Sang-woo can’t get on his knees fast enough, and this time his apology is much more heartfelt. Sang-woo tells Joon-ki to stop protesting in front of the broadcasting station, and Joon-ki snarls that if Sang-woo ever acts that way towards any woman again, he’ll make a huge fuss on the news.

After he’s gone, Joon-ki tells Jung-eun to let him know if anyone messes with her and he’ll destroy them, then throws an arm around her shoulders again to lead her inside. Poor girl, you can actually see her falling in love at that exact moment.

Some time later, Soo-yeon practices a news story in front of Woo-shik and Yu-ri. They’re impressed and tell her that she sounds like a real reporter. Woo-shik offers Soo-yeon a ride to her shooting location way down in Pyeongchang (almost two hours away), flat-out lying that his event is near there.

Soo-yeon is sleepy when they arrive from staying up all night practicing, but she says she’ll be fine. Woo-shik offers to pick her up when her shoot is done, then calls his boss to lie that he’s stuck in traffic.

Ki-bong struggles on his first day selling cars, losing customers when he has to look up the answers to all of their questions. His boss tells him not to come back if he doesn’t sell a car by the end of the day.

At the house, Yu-ri shows Joon-ki that she’s researching how to get government support money to start her restaurant. He’s worried that Jung-eun has been in her room all day and hasn’t eaten, but when he goes to check on her, she comes out and nearly collides with his chest.

She bites his head off for suggesting she eat something, then snaps that she’s not mad, SHEESH and goes back in, slamming the door in Joon-ki’s face. He yells through the door, asking what he did to deserve that. Yu-ri quips that he must have done something or Jung-eun wouldn’t have acted angry. Awww, he’s so confused.

He lets himself into Jung-eun’s room and asks her what he did wrong to make her act this way. He asks if it was the time he put soy sauce in her soda, or played ice hockey with her shoe, or took money from her wallet, giving Jung-eun several new reasons to be mad at him, HA.

Soo-yeon can’t stop yawning as she waits to tape her interview. She asks to do a pre-interview with her subject, and when she meets him, he speaks veeery slowly and his eyes are barely open, seeming half asleep himself. His low, soothing voice lulls Soo-yeon to sleep for a second, and she’s horribly embarrassed.

Jung-eun absently writes Joon-ki’s name on a sticky note, adding, “Do I like him? Am I going crazy?” underneath, then a long string of emphatic “no’s.” She leaves the note on her desk when Joon-ki calls to her that she got a package. Excited, Jung-eun trips and falls, hurting her back.

She asks Joon-ki to carry her to her room, then to get her a pain patch from her desk drawer. She belatedly remembers that the note about her feelings for him is still on her desk, so she says that she’s out of pain patches and asks him to go buy one.

While he’s gone, Jung-eun tries to get up to get rid of the note, but she’s pretty badly hurt and can’t move much. She rolls off the bed and crawls to the desk, but Joon-ki returns just as she’s reaching for the note. She screams at him not to come any closer and asks him to help her back to bed, then sends him away.

A lady comes into Ki-bong’s dealership, and asks to take the car she’s interested in for a test drive, and also to stop by the store because she needs to buy a few things. Ki-bong is desperate, so he agrees to the test drive and the shopping, and he even helps the lady carry the groceries into her kitchen.

He asks when she wants to sign the purchase contract, and she says she’s ready to sign the papers right now. Ki-bong gets excited, but the woman’s husband comes home and forbids her to buy the car, trapping Ki-bong smack in the middle of an ugly marital spat.

Soo-yeon’s interview subject is a famous conductor who decided to retire and run a sheep farm. She asks him why, and when he slowly starts to mumble his answer, Soo-yeon struggles to stay awake. She makes the mistake of asking how many sheep he owns, but he’s not exactly sure and decides to count the sheep. LOL, oh no!

As he’s counting, his voice has Soo-yeon nodding off long enough to collapse to the ground. The writer, who’s been snapping at her all day for being sleepy, tells her that she only gets one last chance.

Ki-bong is still stuck at his customer’s house listening to her fight with her husband, unable to leave or risk losing the sale. Their son comes home and asks his mom for help with his homework, but she asks Ki-bong to do it, promising to sign the purchase contract as soon as she wraps up her argument.

Jung-eun crawls across the floor to get rid of the note again, and this time she knocks it off the desk onto the floor. Joon-ki barges in and picks her up a third time, but he trips and they both tumble to the floor. Joon-ki manages to get her back into bed, and when he turns around to leave, Jung-eun is horrified to see the note stuck to his butt.

Ki-bong’s customer’s teenage daughter comes home, and when she hears their parents fighting again, she threatens to run away from home. Ki-bong plays therapist in a desperate attempt to prevent giving the parents another reason to fight, and winds up hearing about every moment of her teen-drama-filled day in excruciating detail.

During a break at Soo-yeon’s shoot, she admonishes herself to stay awake no matter what it takes. The interview resumes and she starts out bright and cheerful, but when the conductor offers to show her his secret for keeping his sheep healthy, she’s horrified when he starts playing a lullaby on a harp. LOL.

Jung-eun is frantic to get her note back so that Joon-ki doesn’t find out that she’s having feelings for him. She slithers into the kitchen where he’s dancing to some music while making ramyun. But when she reaches up towards his butt, he whirls around and suddenly she’s reaching for something entirely different, hee.

Joon-ki smacks away her hand, and Jung-eun claims that she’s just here for the ramyun. He brings her some ramyun in bed, and when he tries to go, Jung-eun starts asking random movie questions to keep him from leaving.

A third kid shows up while Ki-bong is still waiting for his customer to buy the car. He says that he needs to talk to his parents about his university applications, but since they’re always fighting, he may as well just give up. Ki-bong offers to talk to him about which school to choose, but unfortunately, he knows nothing of higher education.

He starts to wonder if all this is even worth selling a car. He knocks on the parents’ door and pokes his head in just as the wife sobs that FINE, she won’t get a car. But her husband goes soft and admits that he’s just worried about her getting into an accident, and they hug and make up.

Oh yikes, they start making out, so Ki-bong quickly closes the door. The kids ask what’s happening, but Ki-bong hustles them off to their bedroom to keep them from seeing something inappropriate.

Soo-yeon is still at the sheep farm after dark. She’s invited to have dinner with the conductor and his wife, who speaks as slowly and methodically as her husband. She says that she used to be a singer and offers to sing one of her songs for Soo-yeon. Her voice is lovely, but she chooses a lullaby and her husband joins her on his harp, forcing Soo-yeon to eat straight horseradish to keep awake.

She finally finishes the interview, and she tells the writer that she feels so good about her first assignment that she could fly, and proceeds to demonstrate. Unfortunately, she actually fell asleep on the dinner table during the song — but fortunately, the entire crew has also been lulled into slumber.

Joon-ki gets tired of answering Jung-eun’s questions and tries to go to bed, but she gets a brilliant idea. She asks him to get her teddy bear down from the shelf over her head, and while he’s leaning close to reach it, she finally grabs the note off of his hiney. Joon-ki snaps at her for groping him, then sees the note and asks what it is.

In a panic, Jung-eun eats the note. Joon-ki pries her mouth open and snatches it, and he goes very still when he reads what Jung-eun wrote about him. He’s all hurt, because hilariously, Jung-eun’s spit smeared the words and all it says now is “Lee Joon-ki, crazy fool.”

He whines that it was mean of her to write it down and stick it to his butt, then flounces out of her room and complains to Yu-ri. Yu-ri says that whatever he did to make Jung-eun mad, it must have been pretty bad.

When Woo-shik picks up Soo-yeon, she tells him all about her very sleepy first day. She thanks him for giving her a ride home, but he says again that he was very close anyway. Soo-yeon offers to buy him dinner on the way, but he falls asleep while she’s still talking.

She answers his phone when it rings, and it’s the manager of the event hall where he worked today. Woo-shik had told Soo-yeon repeatedly that his event was very close to her shoot, but she learns that actually, he’s been driving back and forth from Seoul all day to give her rides. She smiles sweetly at him, then settles in to take a nap of her own.

 
COMMENTS

Whee, Swoony Joon-ki is back! I loved him in the first season whenever he was being all accidentally sweet, especially when he wasn’t even trying to be, so I was excited when he pulled that megaphone trick on Jung-eun to get her an apology. That was pure Joon-ki, doing the weirdest thing possible with the most awesome results, and I don’t blame Jung-eun for going head over heels. Joon-ki is a goofball, but he’s also the most caring, thoughtful person in the house. That’s the best thing about him, actually… he’s not swoony because he’s trying to impress anyone, he’s only being his normal self, and his normal self just happens to be loyal, supportive, and fiercely protective of those he cares about. And I also love that when Jung-eun got mad at him, he immediately tried to talk to her about it and make things right. He’s total boyfriend material, or he will be once he notices Jung-eun as more than a friend.

I’ll be completely honest, out of all three couples, I was the least invested in the Woo-shik/Soo-yeon ship until that very last scene. Woo-shik has been doing thoughtful, caring things for Soo-yeon without her knowledge for a while now, but because she didn’t know, there was no tension in their relationship. Now she knows that, at least in this case, Woo-shik was going way out of his way to help her and trying his best to keep her from feeling guilty or beholden to him. Hopefully Soo-yeon will start to notice the other sweet little things that Woo-shik does for her (like keeping her supplied with all the hotteok she can eat), and how lately, he’s much more like the kind, smiling boy who was her first love. Once she does notice, it won’t be long before she starts to crush on Woo-shik again.

I don’t know why I find the humor in Waikiki so much fun, because normally this type of slapstick and bathroom humor isn’t my thing at all (although I will admit that the bathroom humor can occasionally go a bit far for my taste). Mostly I blame Lee Yi-kyung for having a serious talent for making just about anything hilarious. He just fully, wholly commits and has fun with it, and you can’t help but have fun right along with him. But the other actors are right there with him — they’re all willing to do just about anything, and it’s hilarious to see actors that we’ve previously seen in very serious roles just let it all hang out. And no matter how ridiculous, gross, or just plain outlandish the situations get, they always, always serve the story — the jokes are there for laughs, but they’re also necessary for the progression of plot and relationships.

RELATED POSTS

• Premiere Watch: Woohoo Waikiki 2, The Banker
• Catch a falling comet for some luck in JTBC’s Woohoo Waikiki 2
• Hitting a new rock bottom in JTBC’s Woohoo Waikiki 2
• First peek at Woohoo Waikiki 2
• Cast and crew hold first script read for JTBC’s Woohoo Waikiki season 2
• Lee Yi-kyung to return for second season of Woohoo Waikiki