Delivery Man: Episodes 9-10

by quirkycase

All that unofficial investigating finally pays off for our leads when they make some startling discoveries about the murders that tie everything together. But since murderers don’t like when people start to close in on their crimes, our taxi driver’s persistent attempts to uncover the truth lands him in danger. Meanwhile, our amnesiac ghost grows concerned when she finds herself a little less substantial than usual… well, for a ghost.

 
EPISODES 9-10

Things go from bad to worse for Young-min after discovering that serial killer photo wall at Jung-woo’s. Nurse Hee-yeon spots him lurking in Jung-woo’s apartment and calls the police who immediately arrest Young-min. As soon as Young-min is taken in, Hee-yeon (who didn’t look the least bit bothered by the dead woman on the floor) calls Kyu-jin to report.

Young-min is convinced it will be fine because he’s innocent – and we all know that the police never charge the wrong person – but Ji-hyun and his taxi driving colleagues are understandably worried. I love how supportive the taxi drivers are of each other; they jump right in, offering to petition for his release (he declines) and then contact Boon-ja to make sure she doesn’t worry.

Thankfully, Young-min is released quickly after they confirm he’s not the culprit. Unsurprisingly, Jung-woo is the prime suspect of both Mi-kyung’s murder and the overarching murder case given his drug theft, creepy photo wall, and DNA evidence found in the motorcycle helmet the police somehow have. But even the cops find all this a little too perfect, almost like a setup.

Of course, Ji-hyun and Young-min continue their own investigation with ghost Mi-kyung’s help. They’re shocked to learn that she and Jung-woo used to hang out at Hee-yeon’s mansion, suggesting Hee-yeon and Jung-woo were much closer than anyone let on. In fact, Mi-kyung and Jung-woo were at the mansion on the day of Young-min’s mother’s death – there are rental car and toll records to prove it – so Jung-woo is either innocent or wasn’t working alone.

Meanwhile, although we now know that Ji-hyun is in a coma rather than dead, Ji-hyun is still baffled by the oddities of her ghostly existence. She’s having a flickering problem where whenever her physical body experiences a medical emergency, her ghost self starts to disappear. Clearly Ji-hyun and Young-min have never seen a ghost drama because neither of them even consider that she could be in a coma.

Ji-hyun fares a little better when it comes to her memories, finally recognizing her father and remembering some details of their relationship. They visit Hyun-soo at home, but he’s reluctant to trust Young-min. He does eventually agree to share intel, finally catching them up on what we’ve long known about the death of Ji-hyun’s friend Min-seo. Using his sway with the police department, Hyun-soo forces his colleagues to let him and Young-min in on the investigation.

Hee-yeon’s shady behavior, like having a secret mansion and not even blinking at the sight of a dead woman on Jung-woo’s floor, puts her on Young-min and Ji-hyun’s suspect list. They even find a note from her to Jung-woo offering help if he ever needs it. Then, that PI who was taking the photos is found dead, and the cops find a photo of a keyring with the shady hospital’s logo on it. And what do you know, Hee-yeon has that exact keyring.

Both she and Kyu-jin are getting jumpy with all this investigating, and at this point it’s glaringly obvious Kyu-jin is villain material. When Eun-soo’s mom falls and is taken to the only hospital in Seoul, Kyu-jin takes care of her, and I do not trust those creepy eyes one bit. He seems intrigued by Eun-soo’s devotion to her mom and smiles in this disturbing way that makes me think her mom isn’t making it out of the hospital. Sure enough, she dies in hospital of a suspicious heart attack.

Kyu-jin shows up at the funeral and cries, saying it’s all his fault for not taking better care of her. While Eun-soo sobs, he stifles a laugh that Ji-hyun catches. She tells Young-min, but he insists Ji-hyun must’ve seen incorrectly. Perfect Kyu-jin would never!

Eun-soo’s mom comes back as a ghost for one last conversation with her daughter. Sweet Eun-soo is devastated by her mom’s death, but her mom encourages her to live for herself now and be happy.

After that touching moment, we’re back to murder. With mounting evidence that Kyu-jin is a murderer with a thing for funerals, we finally get the full story. He and Hee-yeon have been a ride-or-die murder duo for a while. It started with Hee-yeon medically murdering teenaged Kyu-jin’s abusive grandfather, but then Kyu-jin took that as a license to kill whoever, which seems to be putting a strain on Hee-yeon who wants to stop. Kyu-jin emotionally blackmails her into continuing and promises he won’t let them get caught.

It seems that Jung-woo was their drug supplier, since Kyu-jin’s method of choice is injecting his victims and causing them to go into cardiac arrest. I guess Jung-woo outlived his usefulness, though, because Kyu-jin now has him bound in some creepy basement like all good serial killers and sticks him with the death syringe.

Kyu-jin knows Young-min has been poking around and is getting close to the truth, so he pays him an unexpected house call on the pretense of dropping off Boon-ja’s meds. (If he messes with halmeoni, I will riot.) Ji-hyun and Young-min catch him snooping around, and he takes a weird interest in the old phone charger on Young-min’s nightstand.

Since Young-min still thinks Hee-yeon is the accomplice (he’s not wrong), he comes up with a risky and some would say stupid plan to use himself as bait. He shows her the note he has from her to Jung-woo and the photo of her key ring, and then he waits to see how she reacts.

He doesn’t have to wait long – as soon as he arrives home, he’s knocked out and kidnapped. Young-min wakes in the creepy basement with Jung-woo’s body nearby. Yikes. Kyu-jin gleefully reveals himself to Young-min, laughing about how fun it was to have Young-min thinking Kyu-jin was his mother’s savior instead of killer.

Now that we have all the pieces, we get a flashback to the complete sequence of events. Ji-hyun suspected Hee-yeon of Min-seo’s death, so she befriended her. While she was snooping around Hee-yeon’s apartment, Kyu-jin popped out and stabbed her with the death syringe. Only, his dosage must’ve been off because she was able to run outside to Young-min’s mom who put her in the taxi. But before Young-min’s mom could drive to the hospital, Hee-yeon ran her over with the motorcycle. While Kyu-jin pretended to save Young-min’s mom, Hee-yeon returned to get the taxi and dumped Ji-hyun off at home. (Was she trying to save her?)

Back to the present, Kyu-jin has finished gloating and decides to change things up. Rather than the death syringe, he just sets the whole basement on fire, leaving Young-min tied to a chair as the fire races toward him and Ji-hyun.

I’m sure Young-min will get out of this fine, but intentionally telling a suspected murderer he’s onto them maybe wasn’t the smartest plan. Young-min did tell Ji-hyun about some secret contingency he had in place, which he’d better hope includes firefighting assistance.

Now that the main murder mystery is solved, I’m assuming the final episodes will circle back to the original premise: Ji-hyun’s ghost situation. After all this, I’m guessing Hyun-soo will trust Young-min enough to let him in on the fact that Ji-hyun is not dead. I’m hoping they don’t pull the forgets-everything-from-when-in-coma card, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Ji-hyun’s new memories are erased once she wakes up.

 
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