The First Responders: Episode 12 (Final)

by quirkycase

The finale is finally here, but don’t expect a tidy ending to the season. We end on a cliffhanger as our team responds to a challenging arson case. Our firefighter leads the charge this time, but when he finds himself in a bind, he’s not afraid to ask for help. The case takes a dangerous turn, leaving some of our team fighting for survival.

 
EPISODE 12 WEECAP

I expected to pick back up on Seol’s almost-confession to Ho-gae, but we move right along from that. Instead, we see news that Assemblyman Ma has been found dead. And there go Chief Prosecutor Jin’s dreams of riding on Assemblyman Ma’s coattails.

Tae-hwa is allowed out of prison for the funeral. He’s not exactly broken-hearted, but their relationship was complicated. I mean, there was that time his father literally had him buried alive and only let him live when he agreed to go to prison.

You know you’ve lived a problematic life when your only funeral visitor is the cop who chased after your son for years. Ho-gae pays his respects and has a civil conversation with Tae-hwa. Now that Ho-gae is a jaded ex-cop, it seems like the fight has gone out of him.

Elsewhere, Do-jin finally gets a job to do when several fires break out in quick succession within a single neighborhood every three hours. Do-jin is convinced this is serial arson, especially since he saw the same star sign burning at every fire like someone was leaving a signature. But he’s the only one who saw the sign, so everyone else thinks he’s going overboard.

Do-jin seems uncharacteristically angry about the arson, and sure enough, there’s past trauma involved. When he was a kid, he accidentally started a fire at his friend’s house and then ran away, leaving his friend to try to put out the fire. The kid ended up with lifelong burn scars. Even as a firefighter, Do-jin has watched his colleagues die or get injured, so he can’t stomach arson.

He’s so sure of his arson theory that he takes his anger out on Chief Baek for not investigating thoroughly and decides to take matters in his own hands. Do-jin’s propensity for rushing into fires alone and his stubbornness on a case make him more like Ho-gae than he’d probably like to admit. But he does realize that his frenemy might indeed be the person he needs most, so Do-jin tracks Ho-gae down.

Do-jin encourages Ho-gae to come back to do what he does best: catching criminals. He dangles this new case in front of Ho-gae, leaving him a USB with the evidence. Of course, Ho-gae can’t resist a case and dives right in.

I love that it was Do-jin who brought Ho-gae back into the fold. They’re more similar than they let on, and despite their petty competitions, they work well together. Even Hong comments on their compatibility as they methodically work on the case.

Ho-gae immediately connects the death of a neighborhood cat to the case due to location and timing, but rather than telling his team, he just goes and digs the cat up like a creep. It’s not until his team is called to arrest him by the neighbors that they realize Ho-gae is back.

The cat autopsy Ho-gae requests proves his hunch, showing the cat died of toluene which was used in all three fires. As they examine the scene of the kitty’s death, they find another star-shaped signature. Ho-gae speculates that someone is doing it for Do-jin’s benefit. It looks like Ho-gae isn’t the only one with enemies.

Meanwhile, Seol sits morosely in Ho-gae’s hallway chair, but she perks up when Ho-gae drops by unexpectedly. They’re a little awkward with each other – I’m guessing due to her partial confession – but neither addresses it. Ho-gae does say he’s happy she was by his side when his heart stopped. Given his emotional unavailability, that may be all the confession she’s going to get out of him. She seems happy with it.

The cooperative investigation continues with Ho-gae trying to narrow the list of suspects by tracing cell phones present at all three fires, while Do-jin works out how the fires were started. What I got from the fire investigation is that someone put way too much thought into their arson. When it starts involving statistics, reflection, the angle of the sun’s rays, and simulations, it just feels needlessly complicated.

Seeing how meticulous Do-jin is in his work, Hong suggests he come work with her at the NFS as a fire inspector. He’s hesitant since he prefers to be in the action, but he does agree to consider it. Post-heartbreak role, perhaps? Because Do-jin appears to be digging himself a deeper romantic hole – he even buys Seol a ring he must know she’s not going to accept. Do-jin starts to confess his feelings while they’re on patrol together, but they’re interrupted by another fire.

At the scene, Ho-gae insists on going into the fire with Do-jin since they traced the possible culprit’s phone to this fire, too. I can’t imagine that someone untrained, even a cop, would be allowed to tag along into a fire (again), but Do-jin doesn’t seem to have my reservations, so in they go.

Right after they enter the blazing building, there are multiple explosions. The ladder connecting the burning building to the next building where the other first responders are waiting falls to the ground, stranding Ho-gae and Do-jin inside without backup. Seol watches in horror, thinking of her last conversations with both men.

And that’s it for Season 1. I did not expect this season to end on a cliffhanger like that! I had assumed each season would have its own arc, but it’s more like they cut the drama into two parts. Not only did we end with two of our leads’ lives in danger and the current case unsolved (although my money’s on Do-jin’s burned friend being involved), but there was a lot of the overarching plot left hanging. We still didn’t resolve the Tae-hwa arc, Ho-gae’s father and his corruption, or the love triangle which has been dragged out all season.

I think what really frustrated me about this season is that it felt like a bait-and-switch. The first episodes promised a fast-paced, intense ensemble drama about the work of first responder teams. Soon after, it turned into a familiar hero’s journey with yet another hot-headed cop haunted by a past case and working out his trauma. Although I was disappointed with the direction the drama took, the strong ratings indicate that it worked for a lot of people. It just goes to show how much expectations play into our experience of dramas. The First Responders probably works a lot better if you go into it knowing that this is Ho-gae’s story with the cases as a backdrop, rather than expecting a true ensemble drama all about responding to crises.

With so much left to cover, I imagine Season 2 will mostly focus on existing arcs. But who knows? Now that Ho-gae’s cold case has been handled, maybe the next season will shift focus and give us something unexpected.

 
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