Bad Memory Eraser: Episodes 11-12

17 September 8, 2024September 8, 2024

Bad Memory Eraser: Episodes 11-12

by solstices

Our resident amnesiac circles back to the vignettes of his past, while those around him scramble to keep up the facade. Alas, the fault lines have long been etched into their relationships, and the widening cracks are about to drive them all apart.

EPISODES 11-12

Basking in the afterglow of their kiss, Gun invites Joo-yeon to stay the night at his grandma’s house. It’s empty, since she’s abroad, and the pair stargaze in the front yard while Gun reminisces about his childhood memories. They fall asleep next to each other in the car’s trunk, serene and contented.

Morning dawns upon the media day at the athlete’s village, but Shin’s camera anxiety has him avoiding all the interviews. When Joo-yeon approaches him to talk, Shin opens up about his imposter syndrome — he’s been walking in his brother’s shoes for so long that he fears the cameras will expose him as an empty shell.

In turn, Joo-yeon advises him to acknowledge that feeling, and grow accustomed to it. She empathizes sincerely — she isn’t without struggles either — and that finally spurs Shin to take it one step at a time, together. Holding out a marker, he asks her for a talisman to cheer him on, and she draws a cute smiley face on his palm.

Unfortunately for our little spitfire, she can’t run away forever. Sae-yan’s mom has flown in to urge her back home and discourage her search for her biological father. After all, Sae-yan’s Italian stepfather had taken them in back when they’d been penniless, and they ought to be grateful instead of inciting his fury. Overhearing, Gun comes to Sae-yan’s defense by spinning a case about her work visa — only to panic later once he learns her dad is part of the biggest mafia syndicate in Italy, lol.

Gun ends up whisked along on Sae-yan’s hunt for her father, and as they traipse through their hometown, a villager recognizes Gun and recounts a memory. There had been a period of time when Gun refused to speak or go to school: “Someone died because of that child.” The words trigger a migraine, and Gun nearly jumps into the creek again, chasing his memories. His first love had pulled a young Gun out of the water, then searched for the medal on his behalf — but the girl hadn’t resurfaced, leaving Gun to shout futilely across the silent creek. Oh no…

Shaken by the memory, Gun rushes back to the training center, sweeping Joo-yeon up into a hug. “Don’t leave,” he pleads. “I thought you died because of me.” She reassures him that she isn’t going anywhere, embracing him in return — and from afar, Shin witnesses this scene. Wounded, he heads straight for the toilets, frantically scrubbing the smiley face off his palm.

Meanwhile, Sae-yan’s run into trouble yet again — a jealous Shi-on immaturely spiked her drink with a laxative, then trapped her in a wetsuit. Unable to extricate herself from her predicament, Sae-yan latches onto the first person to walk past. Which just so happens to be Shin. With no other choice, Sae-yan pleads for him to help unzip her wetsuit, then shrivels up in shame afterwards. Guess they’re now even on the embarrassment front, at least.

Since Sae-yan won’t listen, her mom reaches out to Joo-yeon for help, since Joo-yeon is the only person Sae-yan has ever willingly followed. Joo-yeon reiterates that Sae-yan is a grown adult and can make her own decisions, but Sae-yan’s mom insists it’s for her own good — and for Joo-yeon’s too. Huh, I wonder what that means.

When Sae-yan’s mom reveals her previous involvement with Shin, Joo-yeon connects the dots and realizes Sae-yan is Gun’s actual first love. Reeling, she stands Gun up, opting to confront Shin at the swimming pool instead. Except Shin’s jaded and hurting, and he lashes out: “Why, did you catch feelings for Gun while acting as his first love?”

Then Shin notices Gun approaching, and impulsively — deliberately — pulls Joo-yeon into a forceful kiss. Ugh, not cool. Gun accosts Shin, and in their tussle, Shin ends up pushing Gun into the pool. Submerged in water again, Gun freezes up and blanks out, though he’s hauled to safety by the other two.

Subsequently, Joo-yeon avoids the issue entirely by occupying herself with household chores and rejecting both brothers’ calls. So much for her advice about facing problems and emotions head-on — she can’t bring herself to walk the talk. Instead, she cares in the most roundabout way possible. At her request, an overzealous Sae-yan nurses the feverish Gun (through hilariously questionable methods, but A for effort lol).

It’s at this worst possible time that Gun’s old emotion diary resurfaces. Joo-yeon finds it among her books — Sae-yan had taken it out from their mixed-up luggage — and it’s filled with entries about Gun’s first love and how he wants to see her again. Then later, when Joo-yeon is out, Shin pays her house a visit and accidentally stumbles upon the diary too.

Unsurprisingly, Joo-yeon is incensed when she returns home to find Shin playing cards with her mom in the living room. Shin attempts to defend himself — he couldn’t reach her any other way — then tells her he didn’t kiss her just to make Gun give up on her, but because he likes her. Coldly, Joo-yeon informs him she hadn’t known of his feelings, and doesn’t reciprocate anyway. (Um, you’re telling me his obvious flirting and date requests somehow flew right over your head?)

Right then, Gun walks in, piggy-backing a woozy Sae-yan who got drunk off the home remedy she attempted to make for him. Joo-yeon worriedly fusses over Sae-yan, and Gun pointedly asks why she isn’t concerned about him. He’s the one who’s been sick all day. Joo-yeon avoids answering, and when Shin purposely says things that can be taken the wrong way, she doesn’t correct him. Oy, these two are testing my patience.

As they leave, Gun challenges Shin to a game of tennis. In the heat of the match, Gun asks a pointed question about the neon bracelet Shin used to always wear — why isn’t he wearing it anymore? Did he, perhaps, lose it in the Han river? Ah, Gun saw that in his memory. Shaken, Shin freezes up, uncharacteristically missing the ball.

Later that night, Shin burns Gun’s emotion diary, but a mysterious person retrieves it after he’s gone. The next day, Shin receives a message with a photo of the emotion diary and the brothers’ bridge altercation. The anonymous sender asks to meet, but it goes awry when Director Hong’s men waylay an innocent fan instead. Shin chases after the escaping blackmailer, even running into the path of a car in the process, but he doesn’t manage to catch up before the episode ends.

Whew, as if our leads don’t already have enough on their plate to contend with! I can’t help but feel the emphasis on the (messy) romance is detracting from the Lee family’s redemption arc, because the focus is no longer on Gun healing from his perceived worthlessness, but on tracking down his lost love. That aside, I have to admit I grew quite exasperated with our leads this week. (Thank goodness for our sunshine Sae-yan, at least.)

Shin is acting like a spurned lover, when he’s the one who got ahead of himself after falling head over heels. Joo-yeon isn’t entirely blameless either; she did inadvertently lead him on by being wilfully oblivious, and she never properly set boundaries with either brother. It’s a mess all around, and I need these two to start communicating properly — not just with each other, but also the people around them.

As for Gun, he’s gleaned an intriguing piece of information from the police — Shin had been soaking wet down to his shoes, despite people usually removing their footwear before diving in to rescue someone. I wonder if that implies Shin fell in first, and Gun injured himself trying to save him? That would be a nice mirroring of his childhood experience, but it wouldn’t explain why the incident is grounds for blackmail. Hmm. Maybe all our leads should just stay away from large bodies of water until they have their feelings sorted out.

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1 Seon-ha

September 8, 2024 at 12:36 PM

Thanks, @solstices. You're doing a great job making sense of nonsense. I am also now sort of intrigued by your theory of "What happened that night at the Han?" I feel confident that Shin is definitely as mentally damaged as Gun from his past experience. If nothing else it shows in the fact that his red flag/minute rate is even higher than Jun-ho from Hagwon. Impressive.

Now, in less sympathec news...I'm so, SO glad that our FL got her whole life's research agenda kneecapped because of a random-man-splanation on a park bench. "Bad memories eventually also are good because we learn life's lessons BLAHBLAHBLAH." Whatever, random plot device character. 🖐️

I would also now like to offer a transcription (of the translation) of few lines from this week's episodes. The scene is between Shin and the FL and it contains sentences that are just not reasonable thoughts coming from these characters mouths. You'll remember the one. The one where you shouted at the screen, "LADY, you are claiming that you didn't know he liked you?" You didn't know he LIKED you?? That's simply not reasonable. How, in god's name, were you interpreting all the things he's SAID OUT LOUD to you this entire drama???? It's just not possible. In the least.

Anyway, I offer this as evidence that the translator has truly given up trying to make English sentences out of whatever is being said in Korean. I'm not saying they're doing a bad job translating. I'm saying that they've realized it's a fool's errand to try to make sense of what's being said.

Shin: But it's also my first time, so without any prior learning on how to behave in such situations, my expression might be clumsy, unfamiliar, and awkward, like you. But I can't help it. Since my feelings don't follow my mind. Like you are now.

Lady-Woman: Even though my feelings don't follow my mind, my reason already knows well. There won't be any issues you are worried about, and I believe you will do the same. Both of us.

Astute listeners will also note that Shin is repeating word for word phrases ("...prior learning on how to behave...") that Lady-Woman had said earlier in the scene. Word-for-word. I also remembered that this happens at one other time this week--that a different character repeats a line word-for-word in a second scene. I lost a little bit of my will to live when I considered going and looking for it. Does anyone else remember when this happened?

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Seon-ha

September 8, 2024 at 12:43 PM

Also, I see what you did there, @solstices , just pretending that mom's-home-brewlove-potion/red-eyed-mouse-slaughter(?) thing didn't even happen.

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Mr Everything

September 8, 2024 at 1:33 PM

Not only was it mansplaining, it was mental patient mansplaining, the best kind of mansplaining. It was also drenched in irony. Joo-yeon is having all these bad memories and not learning her lesson. Gun lost his bad memories but he seems to have a lot more wisdom than her. They also said something about the mouse experiment being a success. So, happy creatures regularly run in front of moving trucks. Maybe because they saw BME and were inspired...

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AmnesiaYawns

September 9, 2024 at 2:36 AM

Sidenote: As a translator, this shit is the worst thing that can happen to you. You read it, you hear it, you know it does not make even a tiny bit of sense, you spiral, you rabbit hole, you panic. You have to make non-sense make sense, because if you don't make it look good, noone will look good and that will absolutely always be the translators fault in the public eye - and in some cases (see above) it is just not fucking possible.
If you do actually find a way to make it make sense and change a bit here and there, the possibility of stuff hitting the fan in the next episode is very high, because whatever happens in the next episode might refer to it.
The usual rule is "when in trouble, keep it vague" or "just stick to the text and hope for the best".

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2 Mr Everything

September 8, 2024 at 1:29 PM

Thank you @solstices. The recap as usual is very entertaining. I also agree with @attiton that you did a good job of cutting a lot of the fat from this week. For people who have given up on this show (I don't blame you), ex-boyf is going around snooping to find out how to steal the research (such a nice guy), and FL is possibly the half-sister of Sae-yan. There is still an open question about who FL's nephew's parents are (or even if he is a nephew).

I was getting very bored with this week. So, bored that I forgot most of what happened until your recap reminded me. This week they had another poop joke in the chamber because this show is all about that sh... It is really building up and the feeling is overwhelming. I would quit the show, but I feel like I am pot committed. Still it leaves a bad odor.

On the other hand, I didn't feel any worse about Sae-yan or Si-on. Maybe it is because I was bored with the rest of the week, but maybe I am slowly developing a fetish...

I look forward to the comments this week. There were a lot of unfortunate things to discuss. As a side note, whoever is doing Sae-yan's makeup is knocking it out of the park. It is clean and effortless and doesn't make her look 45. It also takes layers well, so the drunk face was exaggerated but believable.

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Seon-ha

September 8, 2024 at 2:09 PM

45! That's like death's door!

Watching this show is inching me closer to death too.

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3 hacja

September 8, 2024 at 2:11 PM

After these two episodes, I just want to reaffirm my conviction that this show, all things considered, is one of the worst kdrama rom-com's, if not THE worst rom-com that's appeared in recent years, and that's the only reason it has any interest at all. To its incoherent writing and chaotic character development, episode 12 added a new element of boringness to the mix.

I had 2 questions going into these two episodes:
How were they going to extend a story that was already spinning its wheels, another 6 episodes? The obvious answer, a sudden pang of conscience on the part of the FL, and a bout of noble idiocy was a given. Bringing in new characters and new storylines out of the blue —-like the threatening Italian Mom and the mysterious blackmailer— to add fake urgency was also expected.

But I had assumed at this point that Shin and Sae-yan would start warming up to each other, which would have been a logical way to kill some episode time. NO. Instead, in the 3rd iteration of his character (1.caring brother, 2.annoying cutsey flirt— Shin somehow turned near 3.villain/stalker, while Joo-yeon pretty much encouraged his attentions, that is, when she wasn’t walking around morosely hearing idiotic words of wisdom from a random guy on the street. (Note: I had no idea that an "injury to the heart" was harder to heal than a surface cut! That's brilliant insight! Still, that guy gave her more sympathy than I was willing to, that's for sure)

The second question I had for these episodes: what would the poop jokes be? The horrible one in episode 11 has already been discussed, so no reason to give it any more attention, though its worth reiterating that is was actually kind of sick, in a way that made you wonder if the writer wasn't psychologically disturbed.

But I did notice that in episode 12, the show missed a clear opportunity for more toilet humor, when Joo-Yeon offered to do anything around the house, and went into the bathroom. I know the dirty tub water in the quilt she was kneading with her feet was supposed to be reminiscent of toilet water, but why be indirect? Just have her clean a clogged toilet with appropriate expressions of disgust!

But, I guess that’s how you know she’s the FL—she is the only one who has not yet been the victim of a poop joke. Of course, there are still 4 episodes to go! Come on, writer--don't miss this opportunity, and flush away your claim to kdrama fame!

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Seon-ha

September 8, 2024 at 2:51 PM

Here's a question your comment brought to mind: Do you think any of the actors' careers are going to be materially damaged by this drama? I don't, but then again, maybe?

OK, though, let's play a game (those of us watching)!

Who is your favorite character (up to this point in the drama)? And, for heaven's sake, why?

I'll start. It was Si-on until she played the laxative "joke" this week, although I did appreciate that she was brand-loyal and demonstrated that she was shilling for a drug that woooorrrrks it on out.

I think my favorite character right now is the Korean tennis coach guy who isn't the Italian head coach? I don't know what his job actually is, but he's the one who, this week, said one of the most normal things I've heard said on this show to Shin (?): "Help me get with Sae-yan," he said.

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hacja

September 8, 2024 at 7:16 PM

As to your first question, I think you are right. The male actors are good looking, and their main failure this show is WAY overacting. But they could excuse themselves by the weakness of the script. So they'll be back. I do think the FL actress, Jin Se-yeon, should never get a lead role again. She could be good in a secondary role, say a character injured in a white truck accident, who never left her hospital bed during the show. So I'm not writing her off entirely. Yang Hye-ji and Lee Ruby (playing Sae-yon and Si-on). are both young and attractive. They won't be scarred by this disaster. The writer Jung Eun-Young wrote what's wrong with Secretary Kim, not my favorite, but popular, and not the literal sh-tshow this one is. So she'll probably get another chance, much to my regret. I will make an effort to avoid any future production of hers. The director has to go, though. I'm hoping the .03 percent viewer rating will keep him in low budget films that don't make it out of Korea.

As far as my favorite character, I'm assuming you are excluding Cola, the dog. If so, I guess I'll choose the ill-tempered Italian coach, who exists only because he allows Sae-yan to be part of the Athletes Village--otherwise, why would the Korean national team employ an Italian coach? Also, I like him because he did such a great job praising the instant coffee in the PPL--and we know Italians only drink instant coffee!

One final thing, I like to think the .03 percent Korean viewing rating means that you, @mreverything and myself are the only 3 people watching this IN THE WORLD. I'm not excluding @solstices, not at all, but I'm desperately hoping that she is getting paid at least a nominal amount for her labor. If not, I'll be happy to start a GoFundMe for her sacrifices.

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Seon-ha

September 9, 2024 at 4:11 AM

I, in no way, would ever, EVER exclude Cola from any list whatsoever. He's certainly a dog who's frequently in the right place at the right time. He's also got a great deal more chemistry with our ML than the FL.

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Becky

September 9, 2024 at 6:28 AM

FL: "She could be good in a secondary role, say a character injured in a white truck accident, who never left her hospital bed during the show." Too funny!!

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Mr Everything

September 8, 2024 at 8:00 PM

My favorite character is Gun. I think in any other show, we would like his character as the irrationally confident, caring, lovesick, not desperate, affectionate older brother. It is because his playful banter and romantic gestures are aimed at Joo-yeon that we don't appreciate them for what they are. Stealing a worthless keychain so that your crush doesn't find out she lost a memento from her crush is relationship goals.

Si-on is great for comic relief but there isn't anything else to her character. I wonder if this week's poop jokes were ppl and if that laxative is a real product.

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Seon-ha

September 9, 2024 at 4:17 AM

One thing about our ML...no matter how you transliterate his name into English, he loses. It's either "Gun" or "Goon."

Every time I see that sign for "Agency Goon," I think, "Sigh."

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4 AmnesiaYawns

September 9, 2024 at 2:52 AM

Someone on reddit called this show the "Weekly dose of dafook is going on" and they are not wrong.
The FL and Shin clearly have multiple personalities (or maybe it's just the writing), or maybe the FL is just extraordinarily bad at her job and/ or plain stupid. Shin forced a kiss and tried to kill his brother (again!) in one episode, FL abandoned the guy with huge abandonment issues because she had to think about her feelings or something.
And then there was the thing with the herbal drink, the red eyed mice, the illness after nearly drowning, the cold patches, the anorak, the Sageuk-speak and let's be honest, I will be back for more next week.
While sticking to my theory from last week that they are trying to make the worst drama in history on purpose.

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Seon-ha

September 9, 2024 at 4:22 AM

And none of us are even talking about the last 2-3 minutes from this week where one brother is driving AT NIGHT towards another brother who's clearly running around IN THE DAYTIME. I'm sure it'll all be explained. Not.

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AmnesiaYawns

September 9, 2024 at 8:02 AM

Omo, yes! And in one scene in episode 11 Shin is driving in his car and suddenly! the light and mood is different, they just edited some extra seconds of him in his car into it. Why? Who knows!

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5 Diana Hansen

September 9, 2024 at 10:02 AM

I am very sorry to JJ (Jaejoong) but I had to drop this at episode 4. I thought the actors were laboring sincerely to make sense of the poorly written storyline but I just can't swim my way through all the nonsense, even for JJ.