Vincenzo: Episode 15

by quirkycase

Our leads get thrown a major curveball that calls for a new strategy. Thankfully, our consigliere has a secret weapon that could be a game changer. We get more undercover hijinks from our team – this time involving the impersonation of a shaman – that once again puts Babel in a tight spot and makes the chairman more determined than ever to see his ex-Mafia foe suffer.

 
EPISODE 15

One of the hitmen relays Paolo’s message that so long as Vincenzo shows him respect, his death will be painless. Vincenzo shoots that down, and right as the man prepares to shoot, Inzaghi the pigeon makes an appearance. He calls all his birdy friends who rise up and swarm the men. (I swear, I’m not making this up.)

Vincenzo takes advantage of the chaos to grab one of the men and uses his gun to shoot his companion. He uses the second man as a shield when the third shoots, and then Vincenzo shoots the third man dead. With the crisis averted, Vincenzo watches pigeon Inzaghi fly off into the night.

Vincenzo meets Cha-young on the stairs and prevents her from going up. He suggests they drink in the office because of all the pigeon poop on the roof. When she blames Inzaghi, Vincenzo gets all offended on behalf of his bird savior.

Thanks to Jipuragi’s scheme, Prosecutor Jung now has the financial files and makes his way to arrest Joon-woo who’s currently at Ragusang Gallery. Myung-hee encourages Joon-woo to flee the country, so he has Han-seo book him a flight to New York.

Joon-woo’s calm lasts all of a few minutes, and then he’s destroying the beloved “Nothing” artwork in a rage while Director Jung cries. Elsewhere, Vincenzo’s minions clean up the roof and report that Myung-hee’s number was in one of the men’s phones. Vincenzo makes a call to Luca.

At the gallery, Myung-hee receives a photo of the three men dead – they failed again. She apologizes to Joon-woo, ignoring Han-seo’s mocking smile. Before Joon-woo can leave for the airport, Prosecutor Jung and his team arrive with a warrant and take Joon-woo away in handcuffs.

That night, Vincenzo feeds Inzaghi on his windowsill and laughs off the idea a bird could’ve intentionally saved him. He gets an excited text from Cha-young about Joon-woo’s arrest and Prosecutor Jung’s upcoming press conference to announce it.

Later that night, Cha-young takes out the scarf Kyung-ja made her and opens the letter Kyung-ja had asked her to read later. As she reads, Cha-young begins to cry.

The following day, all the tenants gather excitedly at Jipuragi to watch the press conference. Everyone stares in shock when Prosecutor Jung claims that he let his “personal feelings” get in the way and falsely accused Babel. He apologizes to the public and Joon-woo and announces all charges will be dropped and the investigation closed.

Cha-young hurls her coffee mug at the TV and storms out. Vincenzo follows, trying to talk her down. She wants to make Prosecutor Jung pay for his betrayal, but Vincenzo argues they’ll only hurt themselves by reacting emotionally.

Chief Prosecutor Hwang is pleased with Prosecutor Jung’s backtracking and intends to promote him after a short suspension for appearance’s sake. Prosecutor Jung asks for guards for him and his family in case the Mafia comes for him.

In a flashback, he’d offered to make all the charges go away for Joon-woo. He’d been biding his time, waiting until he had enough evidence to present this deal to Babel. Prosecutor Jung asked to be made prosecutor general and even told Joon-woo about the Guillotine file to seal the deal.

When Prosecutor Jung arrives home, he finds the guards incapacitated. He runs upstairs in a panic and sees Vincenzo sitting at the table, chatting with his wife and daughter. Vincenzo even cooked them dinner.

Outside, Prosecutor Jung offers to do anything if Vincenzo will spare him and his family. Vincenzo remarks that you know someone has gone to the dark side when they lose all sense of shame. He yanks Prosecutor Jung to the ground by his tie and vows to let him have all he’s wanted – and then he’ll kill him.

Meanwhile, Joon-woo orders Han-seo to set up a meeting with CEO Oh of Deachang Daily. Joon-woo is planning to publicize their electric car battery (which isn’t complete) to raise Babel’s stock price, and then they’ll back out of making the cars later. Joon-woo also commands Han-seo to make sure Director Jung doesn’t talk.

At Geumga Plaza, the tenants realize that they’ve gotten invested in the Babel case. Before, they were too busy with their own lives to worry about stuff like that. Cheol-wook and Yeon-jin even confess that they’ve changed their minds and are planning to try to have a baby.

Elsewhere, Cha-young takes Vincenzo with her to shop for a purse for Kyung-ja. Cha-young got the okay from the doctor and plans to take Kyung-ja out for a bit. She asks Vincenzo to help her pick something out and smiles as she watches him.

Over coffee, Cha-young tells Vincenzo he should give his mother the purse since he bought it. So she does know. Vincenzo freezes for a second and guesses her father told her, but Cha-young says she worked it out herself from the way he’s been helping Kyung-ja.

Cha-young doesn’t like to interfere, but she’s worried Vincenzo will live with regret. She encourages him to openly talk with his mom and admit he’s her son before she passes.

When they give Kyung-ja the purse, Cha-young makes sure to say that Vincenzo took an hour picking it out himself. Kyung-ja loves it, but she worries taking her out will be an inconvenience to them. Cha-young clarifies that she’s not going – Vincenzo is the one who will be taking her out. Kyung-ja stares at him with wide eyes.

Kyung-ja stops them before they leave: she’s decided she wants a retrial. She’s always wanted a retrial but didn’t have enough courage to go through with it. Now that death is approaching, she finally has the courage.

Cha-young defers to Vincenzo, leaving it up to him whether Jipuragi takes on the retrial. Vincenzo looks at his mom for a long while before agreeing. Kyung-ja lets out a sigh of relief and thanks them.

Meanwhile, Joon-woo meets with CEO Oh who is a long-time partner of Babel’s. CEO Oh thinks what Joon-woo is doing with the stocks is risky, but Joon-woo asks that he just keep doing for him what he used to do for his father.

At Geumga Plaza, Director Jung visits CEO Park’s hot-air balloon operation – Soo-nam gave her a business card – hoping to flee to Taiwan. Director Jung is desperate enough to even risk ending up in some random location because it’s a freaking balloon.

Over at Jipuragi, after seeing their stock price jump, Cha-young rails about how Babel just keeps getting richer. She thinks Vincenzo should’ve punished Prosecutor Jung for making this possible, but Vincenzo assures her all in good time.

Joo-sung brings up the possibility that Prosecutor Jung is playing the double agent and is a good guy, but Cha-young thinks that’s ridiculous. Vincenzo blasely states they don’t need Prosecutor Jung when he has the Guillotine file.

He’d managed to slip it in his pocket before they’d tossed the gold bars back in the room. Joo-sung is ready to release the file to the world, but Vincenzo and Cha-young have other ideas. Releasing it wouldn’t get any of the corrupt officials punished. They need to use it as the creators intended – as blackmail.

At Wusang, Attorney Han muses that Prosecutor Jung must’ve struck a deal with Joon-woo using more than just the financial evidence. But he and Han-seo can’t figure out what else he might have. Regardless, Joon-woo is consolidating his power which spells trouble for them.

The Jipuragi team opens the Guillotine file for the first time and marvels at the amount of information gathered. Vincenzo’s plan is to focus on getting Babel and Daechang Daily to destroy each other using the intel from the file.

As they start looking into their targets, Han-seo waltzes into their office. He gives this awkward little wave and says he’s likes their shabby office. Pfft. He even bought them expensive coffee as a gift.

While Han-seo crashes Jipuragi, Joon-woo lets Myung-hee in on the fact that Vincenzo has all that gold and the Guillotine file. She comments that whether he’s lucky or talented, Vincenzo is impressive. Joon-woo decides to focus on demolishing Geumga Plaza to get the file and promises to share the gold with Myung-hee.

Han-seo decides to try a different tactic since Vincenzo doesn’t do familial betrayal. Now he’s arguing that he’s just trying to set Babel on the straight and narrow. No more of this killing business. And he knows only Jipuragi is suited to getting rid of his brother so he can run the company all legal like.

Vincenzo and Cha-young grin like Han-seo is being adorable and entertain his unlikely story. Why should he run Babel? Han-seo responds like he’s in an interview, talking about how he’s been studying and reading all sorts of things now.

He even lets Vincenzo quiz him, and although he gets every question wrong, he answers with enthusiasm. Vincenzo tells him to come back once he’s studied more; only smart people can join their team. Han-seo mumbles about the unfairness but clearly intends to study and come back. After he leaves, Cha-young asks if Vincenzo will really accept Han-seo. Vincenzo just smiles.

Over drinks, Joon-woo wonders what he should take from Vincenzo to make him suffer. Myung-hee suggests looking into his family, and she actually has to explain to Joon-woo that for normal people, their families are important. He agrees they should start there, then.

The Jipuragi team has lunch at Hee-soo’s place, and Joo-sung looks a mess. He’s been reading the file nonstop and tells them how awful CEO Oh of Daechang Daily is. Despite being caught on CCTV killing his older brother, he was acquitted; the intelligence agency got ahold of the footage and used it to cut a deal.

Joo-sung also discovered that CEO Oh takes his trusted shaman’s advice on everything from busines to family matters. Unfortunately for him, he’s unaware that this shaman is a former cult leader with a record for sexual harassment and fraud.

Cut to the shaman tied to a chair on the roof with Cheol-wook and Team Leader Ahn guarding him. Vincenzo saunters over with his indestructible lighter while Cheol-wook holds a bottle of lighter fluid.

Next, the tenants hold a vote for who will play the role of shaman in their upcoming operation. To his disappointment, Vincenzo gets voted in unanimously.

The following day, CEO Oh is dismayed when his shaman tells him the gods have left him, and he can no longer commune with the spirits. He refers to him a powerful shaman he knows instead.

CEO Oh walks into Geumga Plaza and finds several of the tenants waiting in line for this renowned shaman. They created a shrine where Vincenzo sits holding a bouquet of white flowers. He looks picturesque, robed in white with a flower in his hair.

Vincenzo angers CEO Oh by telling him to get out – he doesn’t have time to talk to a dead man. He then acts like he’s CEO Oh’s dead brother and starts convulsing. CEO Oh flips out when Vincenzo grabs him and says over and over that he’s cold.

Once he calms down, CEO Oh is ready to listen to whatever Vincenzo tells him. Vincenzo calls him weak and asks if he wants to know what will kill him. In red ink, Cha-young solemnly writes “Babel” on a piece of paper and dramatically holds it up.

Vincenzo warns that CEO Oh will die if he doesn’t cut ties with Babel and “completely trample” them. CEO Oh balks at that, so Cha-young holds up a paper with “5” written on it: the number of his remaining days. CEO Oh is convinced and terrified.

After their little performance, the Jipuragi team goes back to the office, and Joo-sung shares something he found in the Guillotine file. In case he wasn’t psychopathic enough already, Joon-woo apparently killed four classmates before he graduated high school.

For minor infractions, Joon-woo would make kids jump off the roof, hunt them down in the woods, or strangle them. He used to brag about killing them and even kept their watches as trophies.

After Joon-woo was diagnosed as a psychopath, his father sent him off to the States. Joon-woo’s abuse of Han-seo has led to him seeing a therapist for years and likely is what caused him to start doing drugs. Their father covered everything up, naturally.

CEO Oh’s paper publishes a story about how Babel made false claims to inflate their stock prices, and now Babel’s stock price is plummeting. A livid Joon-woo calls CEO Oh who says the paper is going in an honest direction now and berates him for not running his company better.

At the “shrine,” CEO Oh is horrified to discover his days are still numbered. Vincenzo tells him that he needs to relieve the spirits of those who can’t move on because of Joon-woo and expose the chairman’s evil deeds.

Shocked, CEO Oh asks if Joon-woo has killed someone. Vincenzo rolls his eyes back in his head and starts convulsing. He drops to his knees and begins begging Joon-woo not to hurt him. CEO Oh screams in terror.

Cue the news reporting about Joon-woo’s murdering spree in his school years and how he was never held accountable. People are even petitioning online for Joon-woo to be punished.

At first, Joon-woo suspects Han-seo of leaking the info since no one else would know about his childhood, but Han-seo points out the coverage is disparaging him too, calling him a crazy drug user. The only other people who knew were their father, the head detective, and the head prosecutor, all of whom are dead.

Someone photographs CEO Oh as he makes another visit to Vincenzo’s “shrine.” He’s relieved to the point of tears when Vincenzo tells him fate has spared his life thanks to his brave efforts.

That night, Young-woon asks Vincenzo to meet him in the Geumga Plaza parking lot. While he waits for Vincenzo, a car almost bowls him over and a group of masked men jump out to attack him. Vincenzo shows up in the nick of time, and they fight off the three men together. Young-woo guesses Prosecutor Jung sent them.

Meanwhile, Myung-hee shows Joon-woo the photos of CEO Oh at the “shrine” at Geumga Plaza. Joon-woo is again impressed by Vincenzo, but they still can’t figure out how he learned of Joon-woo’s past. Myung-hee is close when she supposes it’s linked to the intelligence agency.

Myung-hee briefs Joon-woo on her findings about Vincenzo’s family, and Joon-woo is thrilled to learn about Kyung-ja’s situation and that Cha-young just filed for a retrial. Myung-hee is trying to find where Kyung-ja is being treated.

Outside the plaza, Young-woon tells Vincenzo that he met Prosecutor Jung through his job at the intelligence agency five years prior. After learning about the Guillotine file, they decided to work together to root out corruption.

Young-woon has been suspicious of Prosecutor Jung’s motives for months, and now he’s betrayed him too. Prosecutor Jung knows where the gold and the file is, so he’ll surely try to demolish Geumga Plaza.

While Cha-young watches over Kyung-ja at the hospital that night, Vincenzo returns to find someone broke into their office. He chases the man up to the roof but loses sight of him. As he looks around, a body hits the ground behind him.

Vincenzo slowly makes his way toward the body and sees it’s CEO Oh. Suddenly, police surround Vincenzo and announce he’s under arrest for CEO Oh’s murder. He’s been setup.

 
COMMENTS

How many times are people going to get arrested in this drama? I probably should be more worried about Vincenzo getting setup for murder, but at this point, I just kind of expect these things to happen and assume he’ll get out of it. Maybe Inzaghi’s flock of pigeons will descend and carry Vincenzo off to safety. I know this drama isn’t what you’d call realistic, but watching pigeons organize and launch a targeted attack was on another level of ridiculous. Speaking of the attack, I need to make a correction. My prediction that I’d at some point mix up characters’ names came true: Paolo, not Emilio, is the name of Vincenzo’s brother, which makes that whole plotline a lot less confusing. Sorry for the mixup!

Rivaling the number of arrests in this drama is the number of betrayals. I was hoping my half-joking prediction Prosecutor Jung would turn out to be an evil boss in disguise wouldn’t be right, but alas. At this point, I expect everyone to be terrible, so it would’ve been more surprising to have Prosecutor Jung as a solid good guy. Like Joo-sung posited, I guess it’s possible he’s doing a double cross, but it seems more likely he’s just greedy like the rest. Honestly, it’d be a bit much if they did the twist of him being evil only to have another twist of him actually being good this whole time. I like a good twist, but when you have everyone constantly switching sides or having fake identities, it gets tiring.

Okay, I know he’s got his issues, but Han-seo is kind of adorable. I so want Vincenzo to let him into the team. I mean, he’s studying and everything! Even Cha-young and Vincenzo struggled to keep a straight face while he tried so hard to impress them. He’s like a little kid who’s desperate for some positive affirmation and just needs someone to keep him on the right track. Joon-woo has kept Han-seo under his thumb since he was a wee murderous lad, so who knows what Han-seo could be like out from under his psychopathic brother’s influence? I had wondered why Joon-woo was out of the picture for so long, but now that we know his father sent him away because he was getting too murder happy, it all makes sense. Why is it that every drama these days has to have a serial killer running amuck? They’ve migrated from crime dramas into pretty much all genres now, and I’m getting serial killer fatigue. You can only see so many violent psychopaths before they start to lose their impact.

And we know serial killers must go after the lead’s family for maximum suffering. I knew Myung-hee, and therefore Joon-woo, would find out about Vincenzo’s mother before long. There’s no way that connection would stay hidden forever. Despite their rocky relationship, we’ve already seen that Vincenzo doesn’t let anyone get away with going after Kyung-ja. They’re finally warming up to each other and starting to heal, so she’d better not die before they have a chance to talk things out. Let’s hope Vincenzo and Cha-young have some protections in place or at least find out what the evil duo is up to in time to prevent them. With all the murders in this drama, it’d be nice if at least one parental figure isn’t offed.

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