We have kick-in-the-face action in this Fashion King universe. Literally! The four characters make their transition from New York City to Seoul in classic drama fashion. Lots of face slapping, heart stabbing, hair grabbing, and tofu eating in this episode. Oh, and a drama kiss you won't want to miss.
THE EPISODE
Kang Young-gul (Yoo Ah-in) comes out of Michael J.'s office all gleeful with a hop, skip, and jump. Maybe a little too happy when he bumps into Choi Anna (Yuri) who has mascara trails down her cheeks. Nevertheless, he comes back to the apartment with two big bags of groceries complete with a happy face.
Over at the J Fashion offices, Jung Jae-hyuk (Lee Je-hoon) and his team are in a meeting to find a designer, apparently. Jae-hyuk then gets a phone call from the consulate. Now, what's this about? He coldly rejects the presenting designer before meeting the consulate man.
They start talking about business stuff, like how Korea's electronic goods are selling hot yet the fashion is no where near that caliber. But of course why would a consulate come over just to talk about business? "Do you know anyone named Kang Young-gul?" Even with a rough patch between them, Jae-hyuk answers he has no idea. Even looking surprised when the consulate mentions Young-gul was his high school classmate. Does he have more up his sleeves than I thought?
Lee Ga-young (Shin Se-kyung) comes back to the apartment but feels like something is different in her surroundings. I guess you have to always be careful wherever you go, but the background music tells that there's just more than stranger danger. And there you have behind a wall somewhere out comes Jung-ah (Han Yoo-yi). Shivers.
But who cares about that when in your apartment Young-gul is making you dinner in a super romantic atmosphere, complete with "the first meat you've had in New York". The meat doesn't really look mouth watering, but it's meat nonetheless. The reason for the meat was because Michael not only likes his samples, but he would like to take Young-gul to a bigger market. A Chinese market. Where the starting contract is at least $1 million. Don't choke on that celery, Ga-young. Because you're in for a surprise.
A knock was at the door and you know it's not going to be good. They didn't invite anyone, it was their date night! There at the door is Jae-hyuk, who somehow got his hands on the address. He came to warn Ga-young that her involvement with a criminal not only will get her in trouble, but also ruin his own reputation. It's not something he wants to risk as the two don't even know each other well. After putting his hand mark on Young-gul's face and officially considering him a loser, he steps out of the apartment.
On his way down he spots two men in leather. More like Men in Black. Seriously, that is so lame, drama. And the detective changed later on. Lol wut? Anyways, the two police came over the apartment and dragged Young-gul and Ga-young out. Right outside is Jae-hyuk who witnesses the scene with a confused face. So it's not his doing? Just as the police cars were off, Jae-hyuk spots Jung-ah with a contempt face. Ooh, she be so evil.
After a long day of crime-busting and face-slapping, Jae-hyuk comes back to his apartment and he also has his own unexpected visitor, his old love, Choi Anna (Yuri). Apparently the chick is drunk because she asks Jae-hyuk for that designer spot she rejected before and asks to start over relationship-wise. Taking this as his perhaps one and only chance, Jae-hyuk grabs her (in the least aggressive way possible) and plants a nice kiss on her. And boy was it a good kiss as far as dramas go. No wonder fanboys were over jealous.
Being the great roommate that she is, Jung-ah interrupts their hot steamy-ness out of jealousy or probably simply because she's annoying. Thankfully Jae-hyuk also knows she's an annoying little brat and shoos her out of his apartment, claiming she's just a nobody to him. Off goes her top as Jung-ah goes in a bratty tantrum scream.
Perhaps the people at J Fashion was a little too nice as they were able to bail Ga-young out of her misery. She's sad that she's the only one that came out of this. She comes back in to the apartment, only to be greeted by what was to be a really nice dinner with the hot boss. Drama life is never a good life.
Over at the loan shark master head quarters, the news was on reporting on the capture of Kang Young-gul. The news bit was really stupid, what kind of prime time news would you even mention anything like "beautiful lover"? What was that, man? Okay, so Young-gul is officially captured and is trialed for. In the end he is partially guilty, mostly for the illegal immigration part. He is then sentenced to one year in jail. That gavel sounded weak if you ask me. Might as well make it a dramatic boom, no?
Anna is now an official designer for J Fashion, where she is introducing herself in typical idol pose. You can never run away from that, can you Yuri. Under her leadership, J Fashion launches their debut collection in New York City which was met with mixed to negative reviews. It was even deemed terrible by Michael J. Ouch.
Life in jail isn't exactly toast and honey either, as Young-gul gets bullied by seniors, has to do nasty chores, and surprise, surprise, has to go shirtless for a sweaty, steamy push-up scene. Are they that desperate? His number one target at the moment is Jae-hyuk, as he is the person who had officially ruined his life. To make things worse, his best bud Jang Il-gook (Shin Seung-hwan) notifies him that his boss, Hwang Tae-san (Lee Han-wie) still has a grudge on him for sleeping in with his girl.
What happened to our girl Ga-young, you may ask? Well, she was deported and is now back working in clothing factories. Even her boss knows she is better than this, but you know. With a deportation on your permanent record, well, things might not be too easy. She went back to the Young Girl factory and finds it locked. She goes to apply in designer fashion and gets rejected for not graduating.
The atmosphere in the J Fashion offices doesn't seem bright either. The failed fashion show was a costly mistake for the company and in turns, big trouble for Jae-hyuk and Anna who are the decision makers of this collection. The two goes back to Seoul to only to enter more trouble. Well that's what you get when you waste $5 million. Multiple slaps in the face by father for Jae-hyuk and a stab in the heart by president mother for Anna.
Not everyone is in such of a horrible rut though. It was known that Michael J. was inspired by Young-gul's tenacity. Now I'm not sure if that design was Michael's all along and Young-gul just made it cool, or it was Young-gul's design and Michael used it with or without pay. But it must've been a good thing as both Young-gul and Ga-young seemed happy about it.
It's a good thing because Young-gul is finally a free man. His best bud Il-gook is at the gate to greet him with a bag of tofu. Yes a block of tofu in a black plastic bag. Isn't that dirty? Anyways, it's not only Il-gook at the gate but also his boys. They're not there to welcome him back, but to bring him to the loan shark master. Oh yes, there's some business to take care of between them. What a great welcome back party. But Young-gul isn't about to be a captured man right after he was freed and he decided to run away. Again.
Despite the previous tension, Anna managed to get her own offices in the Seoul HQ. She chats with a fellow J Fashion designer and we now know that she has a seller's background. Is that supposed to be a bad thing? Because when the designer leaves, she smiled a suspicious smile.
It seems like Young-gul's quest to take down Jae-hyuk is anything but over. He somehow, with drama magic, finds Jae-hyuk in a movie theater, one of the probable hundreds in Seoul. He comes in the theater like a stalker and is ready to hunt Jae-hyuk down. Little did he know that Jae-hyuk is quite good at martial arts himself. Well martial arts versus raging hormones, we all know who will win this battle. Jae-hyuk totally pinned Young-gul down. But the war is not over, and Young-gul knows how to stab the heart. "Don't be so cocky just because you have your parents' money." Burn. I think I saw Jae-hyuk tear up a bit there.
The misery continues as Ga-young was kicked out of her apartment for not paying rent. She comes back to the only place she knows will probably take her, the Young Girl factory (that didn't sound right). Apparently it's far and she didn't have transport money because even though she was on her way in the afternoon, she only arrived well into the night.
Her luck seems to be wearing thin because not only is there a new boss, her co-workers are no where to be seen, she is then cursed left and right, having to take responsibility to the trouble Young-gul has caused. Young-gul comes over but he had no power to do anything and by no choice had to run away from the scene. Poor him. I'm sure he feels guilty, but it's a harsh dog eat dog world out there.
THE COMMENTARY
Compared to the last episode, this one sucked more. I think it has a lot to do with the fact that they had to haphazardly fast forward time and put everyone in place. The time lapse didn't match for each character, as the only person that might actually go through a whole year was only Young-gul. Why are the others so lazy in dealing with their problems?
As you can tell from my jumping back and forth, that's exactly what happened in this episode. The jump between each character so fast, and sometimes for a few measly minutes that doesn't really mean anything. They could've just stayed on one character a lot longer you know. I think it would've been easy. Especially considering they want to explain a lot about a character but only have a few minutes to do so. Time management is key, my friends, and the people at Fashion King is missing out horribly.
Another character I'm appreciative of is Jae-hyuk. I'm glad that Lee Je-hoon is the person who is playing him because, despite his antagonistic status, Lee was able to give a lot of depth to him. He wasn't just that evil dude who just wants to ruin our hot boy Young-gul, but he also has thorns he has to spit out inside of him. A lot of this is shown during scenes where his parents are involved, whether the parents are scolding him or when they are mentioned as the sole reason he is what he is (like in the scene with Young-gul). If this keeps going, we might actually be able to root for him.
The first four episodes were glitchy because mostly they had to place everything and everyone in place for the characters to come together and make up the plot they're trying to tell. I really hope by next year the story can be more smooth and better than before. The preview for next week's episode looks promising. It took so long to put things in place, but I'm appreciative of how they just want to get to the story itself. I really do hope the actual main story is worthwhile.
Oh, I think I did a better job with this recap. It's a lot more consistent. I think I sort of know how to do it now. Is it a lot better? Anyone? Anybody reading? Hello...?
No comments:
Post a Comment