Man these episodes exploded. I'm still not sure why Hae Dun is holding out, what is she hoping to get or not get. San, do not fall for that sir, she is convincing though. Also, all your organs girl, BS. So much happening.

I was trying to write out my favourite parts of both episodes but I loved ALL of it. Didn't even realise how fast they ended. Both Chae-woon and Ja-yu's confrontations with the PM were so well done. As was the back-and-forth press conferences. The torture scenes were tough to watch but so intense. Excited about the finale!

The collective moral compass of people in BF is in the deep end of negative scale. I actually expected Chae-woon to protest the torture method.

I liked ep 7 a lot. It was intense.

The entire reveal of all the players was done well. The greed wasn’t surprising. And Ja Yoo disclosing everything made sense. I was expecting her to reveal the patent or make it available for everyone thereby killing monopoly. Assuming money was never her goal for the organoids. But what she did was equally cool.

I absolutely loved Chae-woon these episodes. He came clean. That doesn’t mean he didn’t stop caring. When he said that the second best plan will stop her first plan I cheered!! The little hand touch and gestures between them were nice.

So the entire terrorist attack was a family affair?? Did the President really not know? I liked the confrontation between Chae-woon and President. He wasn’t going to ‘frame’ anyone. Also will the President volunteer to be one of the subjects?

The scene with the bodyguards having tea with Ja Yoo was so sweet. I hope she buys that house!

I’m all-in for the rest of the rollercoaster ride. BUT: our protagonists are not only performing experiments on unwitting and unwilling human subjects, they're now engaging in straight-up torture? And then following up with moody, broody, soft-focus scenes that totally fail to acknowledge that? Why does BF even own a torture-ready restraint chair? The show might use this as a chance to comment on ends and means, and how the obsessive pursuit of noble goals can cause idealists to lose their moral compasses, but I don't see how it can credibly redeem the leads. My guess is they will have to pay a price and probably the ultimate price for this. And spending most of two episodes on the simplistic “who’s the mole/murderer/terrorist?” part of the plot leaves precious little time in the remaining two episodes for far more interesting questions raised by BF's technology, for example, about the reproducibility, interchangeability, and value of humans and other living creatures.

The physics and economics of replacing plant products with cultured products will never work out, but that's a quibble - if only they'd use the possibility to examine how it would affect everyone in the world, or at least farmers, instead of just peripheral allusions to that. I'd rather they'd left that part of the storyline out.

The end justifies the means seems to be the moto of BF and Hell is paved with good intentions Ja-Yoo's one.

They went too far with the lawyer. They completely lost their moral because they lost their colleague. With Chae-Woon, we still can think they didn't have time to think about it but in this case, it was completely thought about and assumed.

I wonder how BF makes food but they need something to begin with. If people can live longer thanks to new organs, the population will grow a lot, they don't do legums/fruits neither cereals for now, so how she thinks it will work in a long term?

Chae-Woon is the snake of the story, he took the technology that the PM wants so much.

What is this rom com; they even had the penultimate week “break up”... 🤣

Before ranting, please let me ensure that everyone knows that I do truly care for this drama. Each week I think, "I don't want to click play." But each week I do and I end up glued to my screen for the duration. BUT I sort of hate it at the same time for being an intensely viscerally uncomfortable experience.

Scientist Kim was so fixated on saving his wife that he did not care about maintaining moral behavior in the present, if that would come between him and a future with her in it. Then when he lost everything he went ballistic. In part because of this blind fixation, the drama makes it pretty clear that he was an easy target for the "quick" brainwashing strategies of our political baddies.

Secretary Jeong is in a similar position. If the tortured mental delusions we see of hers are to be believed, she is fixated on the image of the mourning wife of that man who committed protest-suicide against BF. It seems again likely, in part because this blind fixation on one issue, the drama is making it clear that she is an easy target for "quick" brainwashing strategies of our political baddies.

I'm afraid I see the same story pattern with Woo Chae-woon, who is so fixated on finding out what happened to his fallen comrades that he is willing to forgive not only his own bodily mutilation but willing, even eager, to stay loyal to Ja-yu--a woman who clearly will stop at nothing to put her world-dominating and world-ravaging vision into action--saying (I paraphrase), "I'm sorry for not telling you my real motivation, I didn't know what your dream was then," as if knowing her flimsy, self-centered dream--again something that's keeping her from seeing the ramifications of her actions in the PRESENT--justifies any of the behavior we have seen thus far from BF.

Well, guess what, folks. As @kurama also notes, the ends don't justify the means. It takes more than that to maintain ongoing moral behavior, and maintaining ongoing moral behavior is something that I don't think a single person with lines--who is still ALIVE--can do.

[RIP sweet, young bodyguard. You never had a chance around these people.]

It's a good drama. It fills me with real emotions, the most prominent being fear about the fact that things like this do happen (on more reasonable scales) in real life and disgust at the motivations and short-sightedness of the characters...something also not only plausible but recognizable in the real world.

@solstices Thank you so much for the recap, all of your previous recaps were precious but I love this one even more, as you've really made some truly thought-provoking comments about these 2 episodes of BF.

I think ep7-8 might have been my absolute favorite K-drama episodes EVER. I don't recall watching something so cliché-free, so unpredictable (and yet what actually happened made perfect sense) and so engrossing in recent years. The acting, has been strong from the get-go but was CRAZY magnificent in these eps, I was in awe.

And I LOVE that all of our protagonists have shown their sketchy and even outright immoral sides and the writer does not even try to present these traits of theirs in a good light, the characters themselves outright admitted they were torturing their suspect, and that they were being intentionally cruel in their effort to obtain information and as a form of revenge (San even said the lawyer "deserved" the pain Chae-woon was inflicting on her). Though I think some viewers may have forgotten that this isn't just them being extremely ends-justifying-means, this is also LIFE AND DEATH for them, for the enemies have already killed two of their colleagues, orchestrated a bombing attack that killed innocent soldiers, government employees and children, an ambush that almost killed Chae-woon and others. So Ja-yoo and co can rightfully assume their own lives are in danger this very moment after she has chosen to not surrender to the PM.

I've seen comments comparing BF more to western drama series and less to other K drama series, with BF having protagonists that are a lot less morally upright but at the same time feel a lot more realistic and three dimensional and I totally agree. I mean Breaking Bad is one of the most popular US drama series and the protagonist in that show can at best appear as a "nuanced, layered villain" in a K-drama series.

As for the debate over Ja-yoo's revolutionary technology advancements potentially doing the mankind more harm than good, if not handled well (putting aside the question as to if human beings are even capable of ever utilizing high tech in a purely benign manner). The obvious answer is that the best alternative is somewhere in the middle between the two extremes -keeping the status quo and allowing only the elite to have access to bleeding edge technology vs making the tech available to everyone w/o dealing with the negative consequences. A balanced, regulated, moderate approach is definitely required as what we always (try to) do in real life. Of course our writer has made Ja-yoo's stance extreme to create conflict and drama, we are not watching a documentary or reading a thesis after all, I think I've read one of the actors comment that the writer has cleverly made a dry subject (that is coming our way in real life some years down the road) interesting and timely, for it's best for us to contemplate a relevant life-changing technology in advance instead of...

First of all, another excellent recap, @solstices, thoughtful discussion of the episodes.
I find this show interesting on a number of levels, even though there it definitely has its comic book sci-fi elements which seem kind of cliched to me. Speaking of those, I wouldn't mind a holographic projection of Han Hyo-joo in my living room. (I don't think my wife would like it, though.)

I kind of feel by adding the issue of medical equality to the range of themes it is already trying to tackle might be too much, especially since there are only 2 more episodes.
Also, these episodes seemed to suggest that in her drive to save humankind, Ja-yoo had victimized farmers and fisherman. Here, the show's politics veer toward the conservative and anti-environmental politics.
Just to start on a brief rant: in real life the villain is not a corporation trying to produce a blood-free meat substitute, but giant corporate farms that produce actual meat. The show could have easily balanced its perspective by making the "Dorson" coporation a huge agribusiness firm, but instead, it has the giant corporate monopoly producing a meat and fish substitute.

In real life, I guess you could make an argument that fisherman themselves weren't responsible for overfishing and depleting the oceans, but still, they haven't exactly been wise stewards. As for farming--it is no longer the domain of individual farmers, but rather ruthless global agribusinesses, which use all sorts of technology in nefarious ways such as gene modification to promote use of particular products and anti-biotics to encourage animal growth (promoting bacterial immunity and causing human "superbugs" that are untreatable)
In fact, here in the U.S., its not being alarmist to think that we will soon be suffering from a human avian flu pandemic, because of the disease promoting chicken "farms" holding 10s of thousands chickens at a time, and shipping millions of chickens a year around the country and then the avian flu propagated by those conditions jumping to dairy farms that hold 10,000 cows at time, and then the cow variant of the avian flu jumping to humans.
What bugged me is that the show actually mentioned avian flu as something that the farmers sacrificed for, rather than something the corporate farming industry actually encouraged! Let me tell you, faced with the avian flu pandemic, I'd prefer the world of "Blood Free" especially if they expanded that holographic tech to include some other kdrama actresses!

I just love this writer, she makes true sci fi dramas or those non rom com or crime thriller genre K drama which are available just few. Ja-yoo is so cool, Han Hyeo-joo makes me saying this every single week. Such a girl crush (See On San is not the only one, who has eyes on her). Ha ha ha
Am I the only mind with the torture, I know it is cruel, better not do that, but I bet going hungry because food are to scarce or being in end stage of disease that even breathing is painful are more cruel than that?
I think Ja-yoo, On-san, and Seo-hui are people who genuine believe in science can improve things that the reason why I really like them. I am not vegan but meat based foods is not my favorite, I don't mind not eating meat as long as I got my vegie. But I think if people can eat meat/fish without having to kill all of those animals is better, no? There will be a time in future when all of earth natural resources cannot feed all human in the world. We are who never been in the position of starvation because having no money to buy food because the price too expensive, easy to say this or that, but what about those people?
There will be always a niche for the farmers and fishermen for their product even if somehow one day fish/meat even vegetable can be cultured. Their products will become like a craftmanship which have a higher price, like some high fashion brand these days.