Angel’s Last Mission: Love: Episodes 23-24

by SailorJumun

It’s been a long time coming, but with all the secrets pouring out, the gloves are finally off. Some characters know exactly who and what they’re fighting for, while others — tsk, tsk — are still struggling to find out which side they’re on. Our heroine believes that everything will be okay, though, so long as she’s got her guardian angel.

 
EPISODES 23-24 RECAP

Yeon-seo wanders to the street, unable to believe that she’d gone missing the night of the auditions. But when a car zooms by and startles her backwards, she’s hit with the memory of being pushed off Fantasia’s roof — and of Dan flying down to save her. At the church, all the candles go out, telling Hoo that Yeon-seo’s amnesia has faded.

We fast-forward to Yeon-seo asking Dan if he’s an angel. He answers yes, making her step back, and he quickly says that he can explain. Composing herself, she snaps that she doesn’t want to hear it; she already gave him his last chance. He continues anyway, saying that he’d meant to confess to her that day, even though the thought of him scaring her drove him crazy. But how could he bring it up after she’d been kidnapped?

Still, she says angrily, he could’ve told her much sooner, like the day the chandelier fell or the day she’d asked why he couldn’t like her. “If I told you,” he says, “would you have believed me?” She tells him that whether he was a vampire, a goblin, or an alien, he should’ve trusted her enough to say something. The fact that he didn’t trust her or her feelings makes her furious.

When she turns to leave, he tries to reach for her, but she whips his hand away, accidentally scraping it across a tree. Her anger turning into concern, she demands to see his hand, and she jumps back when the wound disappears before her eyes. So this is real, she realizes — he’s actually an angel.

Though Dan can tell that Yeon-seo is a bit shaken, he firmly states that with her life currently in danger, he must stay by her side. She yells (halfheartedly) that she’s going to ignore him, and he yells right back that she can think of him as an annoying ghost then. Pfft, you kids.

Later, at the estate, Dan asks Yeon-seo if she wants him to spend the night with her. He knows that her regained memories of the kidnapping may have her on edge, but he promises to protect her.

Her eyes soften as he takes her hands. Was that his mission all along, she asks. To protect her? He struggles to find the right words, and frustrated, she urges him to follow her out to get some direct answers.

Yeon-seo drags Dan down to the church, where the ever-so prepared Hoo is disguised as a nun. However, Yeon-seo knows that it’s him, recognizing his scent from the last time they met. As she inspects their secret room and chides them for deceiving her, the two angels practically cower in fear, ha. She asks Dan what his official mission was, and he gives her the guiltiest puppy eyes ever.

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Were you sent here to protect me?

Cut to: Yeon-seo chasing Dan out the church, horrified that he was trying to be her matchmaker. He then blurts out, “I instantly regretted it! I hoped that you would love me instead of someone like [Kang-woo].” She’s flustered by this but warns him not to sway her with words like he always does. Before he can catch her blush, she hurries away.

As Dan goes after her, Hoo watches them with an amused grin. Then, all of a sudden, Hoo disappears against his will.

Meanwhile, at their home, Director Choi asks her husband what his life goal is. He says that, after the girls get married, he’d like to retire as a farmer with her. To that, Choi hesitantly asks what he’d do if one of the precious plants he’d raised suddenly became poisonous and killed everything around it.

“I’d have to weed it out,” he answers, “before it spread any more.” So, later, the anxious Choi slips into Luna’s room and gets to the point by asking how long she’s been scheming. With her signature creepy smile, Luna says that she merely wants to make Choi and Nina’s wishes come true.

Choi shakes her head, telling Luna not to do these kinds of things behind her back anymore. As for the crimes that Luna has already committed, Choi intends to take responsibility for all of it.

As Yeon-seo is about to sleep, Dan calls her from his room to say one last thing: He was seriously torn up when he sent her to Kang-woo’s side, so he doesn’t plan to do that again. She just tells him to hang up, and when he does, she lets herself smile.

The next day, Chief Jung meets with Mr. Park to say that she’s decided to give up on their case. She then throws Park’s phone into the water, having known it was bugged and that Luna would be listening.

The real reason why Jung is here is because Yeon-seo now knows everything and wants her justice. To Park’s surprise, Yeon-seo and Dan come out to join them, and he immediately drops to his knees.

He apologizes to Yeon-seo for his actions and says that Driver Jo even tried to stop him, which is news to her. She’s beyond outraged to learn that Jo was killed for knowing too much. She gets down to Park’s eye level, seething that he better find a way to be forgiven.

Jung stays with Park as Dan takes Yeon-seo away to simmer down. Still in disbelief, Yeon-seo weakly tells Dan that the innocent Jo didn’t deserve to die. “Tell me,” she says. “If God exists, how could He do this?”

All Dan can say is that neither humans nor angels can know God’s will, but that doesn’t satisfy her. Determination setting in, he then leads her to an open fountain, a beautiful rainbow overhead.

As Yeon-seo admires the rainbow, Dan nervously takes out the gift box she’d given him when they were kids. When she opens it and finds the photo and drawing inside, she asks why he has Sung-woo’s things.

“It’s me,” he lets out. He finally admits that he’s the boy she met on the island, and that his memories slowly came back to him after they reunited. She stares at him as this sinks in, and he continues that he promised her as a kid that he would grow up and protect her.

“I think I was sent to you to keep that promise,” he says. “By that terrible God that you despised.” Once he’s done, he asks if she’s at all mad, and she just gets up, her voice wavering as she tells him not to follow.

He hurries to block her path and shuts his eyes, saying she can hit him as much as she wants. He slowly opens his eyes and is surprised to see that she’s crying. She shakily says that she’d mourned him on the island without realizing he was with her all along.

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My last thoughts were of you

Smiling, he assures her that she was, in fact, the last thing he thought of before he died. Her tears keep falling, so he gently wipes them away and tells her not to cry because of him. And then he pulls her in for a soft kiss.

As the two are walking home, holding hands, Yeon-seo asks what will happen since Dan technically failed his mission — will he get sent back to heaven? Dan doesn’t give her a real yes or no, instead saying that he’ll find a way to stay with her. However, that night, Dan doesn’t look as hopeful as he stares at his calendar. (Ack! Only two weeks left!) He decides to call Kang-woo out, him being his only chance to become human.

Of course, Kang-woo has no desire to reveal how, only saying that it would be extremely painful. Dan insists that he can take it since he was human once; he explains that he was the boy Yeon-seo had danced for years ago. Though this comes as a huge shock to Kang-woo, he retorts that even if God allowed him to become human, Kang-woo himself wouldn’t allow it. “Because,” he says, leaning in, “Yeon-seo would have to die.”

Dan trudges back home, remembering Kang-woo’s final words — that an act of sacrificial love was the only way to turn human. He finds a cheerful Yeon-seo in the garden, planting the same flowers from the island to celebrate their reunion. She mentions that they’ll bloom next spring, which makes him look at her sadly.

The next day, Nina finds a letter in her locker (left by Mr. Park) telling her that the incident from three years ago wasn’t an accident. Nina is shaken by this, especially when Yeon-seo approaches her. Yeon-seo doesn’t know if Nina was involved, but she says that being an understudy is pointless if she expects another accident to happen. Unable to believe the letter, Nina pretends she doesn’t know what she’s talking about.

Four dancers pull Yeon-seo aside and sincerely apologize, revealing that Director Choi and Luna had bribed them for their audition votes. Though Yeon-seo is disappointed in them, she’s able to be a little forgiving.

After practice, Yeon-seo visits Kang-woo in his office to give him a polite but firm rejection to his confession. He stubbornly insists on waiting for her, which she also rejects, as she already likes someone else. He interrupts with, “As you know, he’s not a person.”

The confused Yeon-seo asks how he knew, and he lies that he found out when he saw Dan save her. Either way, he says, he can wait until she wakes up from her silly fantasy of being with an angel.

Yeon-seo tells him that even if she woke up, she wouldn’t come to him. She gets up to leave, but he gets the last word, asking if she really believes that her angel will be around forever.

Later, Yeon-seo is thinking about Kang-woo’s words as Dan films her practicing. Dan, too, is thinking about what was said to him, so he stops Yeon-seo and asks if there’s a way for Giselle to live. “Act II has to begin with Giselle dying,” Yeon-seo points out. “That way she can save Albrecht.”

Dan shakes his head, saying Albrecht wouldn’t have wanted that. She smiles and tells him not to take the story too seriously — it’s not like she’s the one dying. This only stresses him more, and he leaves for the church. Hoo isn’t there, though, because he was poofed into jail by the deity.

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Do you really have to die?

Hoo’s cellmate Elena urges him to listen to the police before being released herself, making him suspicious. He asks if she’s God in disguise, but she just acts like her usual kooky self instead of answering.

The next day, an envelope comes to Yeon-seo’s estate, full of documentary evidence and Mr. Park’s written confession. With everything in hand, Yeon-seo and friends are now able to go to the police and execute the rest of their plans.

Luna catches on that Yeon-seo knows of her crimes, and she calls minion Joon-soo to tell him to lie low. But it’s too late — Dan corners Joon-soo once and for all, even tying him up on the roof to repent.

Dan then searches through Joon-soo’s belongings and finds Moon Ji-woong’s wallet. (Ha, got ’em.) Meanwhile, as Nina is about to ask her mom about Park’s letter, Yeon-seo comes by their house. She gathers Nina and her parents to the living room to read her letter from Park.

She reads Park’s confession of taking part in obstructing with her cornea donation and in lacing her drinks at the boat party — all under Choi’s orders. Nina starts to cry, making Choi shake with anger and insist that Yeon-seo is lying. To that, Yeon-seo takes out Park’s tape recorder and plays the conversation he had with Choi about the bribes. Choi is crying now too as she curses Park under her breath.

“What?” Yeon-seo asks. “Are you going to kill him? Like Moon Ji-woong and Driver Jo?” Holding back her own tears, she says that as much as she wants to kill Choi, she wants to handle this as cleanly as possible for Fantasia’s sake. She orders Choi to quietly resign if she doesn’t want her and her family to end up in handcuffs. Yeon-seo then drops Park’s letter and walks out on her family, who are too shocked to speak.

Stepping out into the rain, Yeon-seo is relieved to see Dan waiting for her in his car. She’s glad to that he’s okay even though it’s raining and suggests that they spend the rest of their rainy days inside together. He smiles, but remains silent on their drive home. By the time they get there, he sees that she’s fallen asleep and sweetly caresses her face. She wakes up and tells him not to look at her, thinking she looks ugly sleeping.

“You look pretty,” Dan assures her before giving her a quick kiss. She pulls him back for another kiss, and jeez, it’s the cutest freaking thing. We then cut to Kang-woo in his apartment, drinking heavily as he recalls his separate conversations with the couple.

Kang-woo ends up calling Yeon-seo out to chat, and she only agrees when he mentions that it’s about Dan. She tells him to explain what he said earlier, asking if Dan is supposed to return to heaven soon. Kang-woo laughs dryly, making her frown.

Assuming this means Dan really is leaving soon, she says that she’ll just have to love him even more with the time they still have. When Kang-woo still looks annoyed, she demands that he spit it out already — what’s going to happen to Dan?

With that, Kang-woo looks Yeon-seo in the eye and says, “Like dust, like powder, he’ll disappear. Because God’s jealousy is great. He doesn’t want what’s His to be taken away. So Kim Dan will disappear because of your love.”

Kang-soo barely bats an eye as this new information hits Yeon-seo hard. She leaves in a daze, having to steady herself on a bench so she can cry. And back at the estate, Dan writes another entry in his angel report.

Dan: This is my confession. You told me to watch over a human, but I long for that human. You told me to look within the human, but I keep looking within myself. From within, my soul speaks to me. I want to ask You for the first time — why am I not a human? Why am I here, and she is there? Can we be angels for each other? No, if possible, I want to be a human for her.

Dan continues that he wants to be a human who can hug warmly, who can lie that everything will be okay, and who can love with his life on the line. He’s determined to find a way to become human without risking Yeon-seo’s life. “Even if it means I must turn my back on You,” he concludes.

Dan looks up to see Yeon-seo approaching, and upon seeing her sad expression, he asks what’s wrong. She walks up to him and hugs him, lying that nothing happened and that she just missed him so much. He smiles and says that he missed her too, making her eyes well up with tears. And as she tightens her hold on him, the report that he left on the table starts to burn away.

 
COMMENTS

Um, didn’t we agree we were done with the secrets, Show? I want to be mad, but since our couple made so much progress this episode, I’m gonna assume that they’ll talk this one out too. Preferably next week. I will be mad with Kang-woo, however, for telling Yeon-seo about Dan’s fate, all while drunk as a skunk and smirking like an asshole. It’s good that she knows, since I don’t want her to be left in the dark anymore, but man, that was a terrible way to find out. She still doesn’t know that she could save him by dying in his place, but I’m sure no one is itching to tell her that. That would just lead to her and Dan scrambling around trying to save each other.

But anyway — we finally got progress! Teamwork! Success! This is why characters need to work together (*cough* Kang-woo *double cough* Nina). There were so many wins this episode, and every single one was so satisfying. First, I was happy that Yeon-seo didn’t stay angry with Dan for too long after their fight. And I’ve gotta say, whenever they bring some of the wacky comedy back, it’s gold. Yeon-seo and Dan can be super sweet and romantic, but it’s when they’re playfully bickering that they really shine. It’s like they have a queen/servant dynamic and a best friend dynamic at the same time. Second, I was happy that Dan got his moment to reveal his past life. It was just a nice, quiet confession with no interruptions or misunderstandings. And Yeon-seo reacted as expected, with her surprise and sadness quickly shifting into relief and gratitude. This is what I call an awesome heroine.

Finally, I was happy that Yeon-seo’s team got the advantage. I was hoping for Director Choi to turn things around and come clean first, but I guess I expected too much of her. It’s consistent with her character, after all, to do whatever it takes to protect her two daughters. Also, was it just me or was her conversation with Luna in the bedroom oddly… sad? As if Mom had realized that Luna was merely trying to gain some kind of approval? That helped Mom come to her senses a little bit, but I think it’ll be Nina who influences a serious change. If Nina doesn’t do something, then there’s honestly no hope for this family. I at least want Nina and her dad to come out of this as better people; they’re the only ones I care about at this point.

I actually didn’t realize that the drama was ending so soon until I saw Dan’s calendar. I don’t know how they’re going to solve everything in two weeks, but my best guess would be that they won’t. I have a feeling that the big ballet performance will be around the same time that Dan is due to disappear or, who knows, be saved. I’m wondering, will Yeon-seo really be Fantasia’s Giselle? Or will Nina, as the understudy, have to be Fantasia’s Giselle — with Yeon-seo out there living her own “Giselle” heartbreak? Either way, there’s no way they’re building up the performance this much for there not to be some kind of emotional payoff.

If you know me, I’m all for happy endings filled with smiles and kisses, puppies and rainbows, the whole shabang. But I’m tired of K-dramas mindlessly killing off characters and bringing them back with a lame explanation. I recently finished a drama that did exactly that (you know who you are), and it just doesn’t work anymore. How can I be sad over a death when I know from past drama experiences that it’s most likely a fake-out? That’s why — and don’t @ me — if Dan disappears… I want him to stay that way. I want the show to have the guts to keep the hero dead. Yeah, I’ll be ecstatic if our couple finds a way to stay together, but give me a good reason. They deserve it as characters and we deserve it as viewers.

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