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Running Man: Episode 72

Welcome to Hong Kong Running Man! You’ve got 24 hours to unlock the secrets of the Nine Dragons and the entire city is your stage. This episode is going to get your heart pumping and you’ll feel the adrenaline rush every second. The clock’s against you so it’s time to get a’crackin’!

EPISODE 72. Broadcast on December 11, 2011.

It’s 3 PM and our cast has just arrived at Hong Kong, revved up at the start of their new international adventure. Well, most of them anyway because Jae-suk complains that his phone doesn’t get service here.

They’re too busy with the opening to notice our guests’ entrance: returning guest, Jung Yong-hwa (You’ve Fallen For Me, CNBlue) and actress Lee Min-jung (Midas, Cyrano Dating Agency). The boys are absolutely beside themselves, fumbling over their words and actions in front of the pretty.

Haha complains that Jae-suk addresses Min-jung by her first name, which alludes to a sense of familiarity, and they poke fun at Jong-kook flexing his guns moreso than usual.

A few selca shots later, it’s time for the group to greet the few fans – holy cow, that’s a SEA of fans who’ve swarmed the place, waiting for a glimpse of the Running Man and holding up their placards excitedly. There’s even a small sign for Jae-suk’s VJ and the maknae FD!

There are so many of them, in fact, that their security detail escorts the crew through a different exit, but the fans have flocked to the entrances as well. The reception is absolutely incredible, and it really speaks to the power of Hallyu in recent times.

It’s time for our guests to pick teams and poor Suk-jin remarks, “I’ll bet my life savings they won’t pick me.” Aww. Yong-hwa goes first, and the flustered looks on the boys’ faces when Yong-hwa fakes them out is hilarious. He picks Ji-hyo and Jong-kook (to the other’s rousing cheers) rounding out the best of the best.

Min-jung’s next, picking Haha and Jae-suk but I love how both of them are tightly-lipped at first, and then Haha yells out, “Open your eyes fools!” That effectively leaves the Easy Brothers and Gary to form the last team.

All of the members are left flabbergasted – how did Running Man get Jackie Chan to participate? And Yong-hwa chips in “Gu-ryong/Sung-ryong/Yong-hwa” (Dragon/ Jackie Chan/Yong-hwa – they all have similar sounds). Oh Yong-hwa, you’re so punny!

All the while in Jae-suk (Green)’s car, Min-jung excitedly asks if their task is simply solving the mystery and if they can go eat dim sum then.

At the hint of Min-jung’s competitiveness, Jae-suk explains that he’s noticed that beauties tend to be competitive and get annoyed easily. He asks if she falls under that category and she quips, “Well, I’m not a beauty!” Cut to a bashful, infatuated VJ.

First stop: Soho. Their mission here takes place on the Central-Mid Level Escalators, the longest outside escalators in the world. The Green Team climbs out to more cheering fans.

The first round is a Speed Quiz while piggybacking a team member and to answer three questions before reaching the end. Haha offers to answer the quizzes (as to avoid using his strength, or lack thereof).

They fail, and they gripe at the PD for conveniently leaving out that the quiz only applies to the first part of escalator. Yeah, I kinda wanna grab you by the collar too, PD.

The Red Team doesn’t fare any better and before they completely explode, Mr. PD kindly reminds them that their Hong Kong fans are watching. Got to maintain that image Spartakooks!

Out of all of the teams, however, it’s the Yellow Team I worry most about. They think that they’ve taught the locals a new rhyme (that they’re already familiar with), and are clueless about the mission. It’s no surprise that they fail before getting even one right.

The second round is a bit more complicated: one member runs up to the bar, tosses a die, concocts a cocktail, all before the other two teammates arrive by escalator and guess the contents of the drink. Given the selection, a combination of three could be really tasty (like apples and pears!) or rather nasty (Cola and OJ, anyone?)

Haha speeds to the bar, and starts mixing up the drink, nearly spilling it all in his haste. Jae-suk thinks for a moment and answers, “Lemon, apple…courage, and confidence.” HA.

The Yellow Team move on to the second round but they fail to identify the one ingredient in their cocktail – lime. So Mr. PD revises the rules, so that they need to match two items. But I don’t see how it makes things any easier (goes to concoct own juice cocktail).

The Green Team gives it another go (and Haha blushes at the chance to share drinks with Min-jung) and succeed. They pick up a gold chained medallion and Jackie points them to their next destination: Tsim Sha Tsui, or TST for short.

Meanwhile, Jong-kook zooms up the hill like a bunny slope as Ji-hyo strategizes how to guess the different kinds of juice by color. Smart girl. And like the Ace she is, she rattles off the correct answers without skipping a beat.

They’re off to TST too, and our clock reminds us that two and half hours have ticked away.

The Red Team hits a snag when they spot a Running Man sign in the street and they get out, thinking it’s the ferry terminal. But their VJ was mistaken (and gets a light beating from Spartakooks) and they employ the help of some fans to grab another taxi.

Turns out that the sign the Red Team mistook as their stop is for the Yellow Team, now in last place, headed to Victoria Peak via tram.

All the teams drink in the breathtaking Hong Kong evening skyline from their ferries and tram. Gorgeous.

At the second location, they receive their next mission: Dictate a song by ear and sing it back accurately. Jae-suk is a movie fanatic and is fairly confident about the songs from A Better Tomorrow 2, but worries about butchering the pronunciation and offending their Hong Kong fans.

Luckily for them, the speakers blare the theme song from the first movie and Jae-suk quickly starts jotting the phonemes on his pad.

It’s like the RM staff has piled on all the hard missions today, so I don’t blame them for getting frustrated.

And then there’s the Yellow Team, too busy taking selcas with the skyline versus focusing on the task at hand. Time’s tickin’ fellas! Their song is from Comrades: An Almost Love Story. Gosh, I could watch these guys dance all day – it cracks me up.

The Red Team moseys in last, but their tune is a familiar one from Once Upon A Time in China, much to the dismay of the Green Team. But they don’t call Ji-hyo the Ace for nothing because she soon gets the crowd to sing along to tweak their mistakes and the others readily follow.

And I mean a huge crowd, because it keeps growing the longer they stick around. How much do I love that Jong-kook’s kryptonite is women and that he freezes in place whenever Min-jung gets close to him?

But the Red Team passes… to find out that they’re second to the Yellow Team. What the? But that’s right because we see the Easy Brothers and Gary pick up the gold medallion.

All our teams revel as they drive through the brightly-lit streets, careful not to stand up in the open double-decker bus. Haha: “It doesn’t matter to me. I can jump.” Haroro, you’re not that short!

The lightning-fast fans crowd the third mission location: a shopping mall. What’s impressive is that they’ve filled nearly every nook and cranny, nearly 5,000 in all and even made headline news.

Now it’s the midst of Hour 9 and because of the crowds, everyone relocates to a hotel for their following mission: find the lady with the golden ball.

Each team receive their respective hints (a body part) and given a secret phrase to help identify their target. They at least identify that they need to find a woman and wonder whether a popular actress might be their third guest.

So the teams roam the halls, and note that the extras are particularly well-trained to keep up suspicion. Even the Red Team finds the mission difficult also, though they’re armed with the cream of the crop teammates.

Yong-hwa’s so adorable, shouting out the key phrase to the entire room and it falls on deaf ears. Heee.

The clock continues to tick and it becomes clear to us that the Running Men need to find Carrie Lam, former Miss Hong Kong. The closest is Kwang-soo, who examines the halls for her and fails to recognize her as she climbs into the elevator.

But never fear as Gary spots the same group of ladies and slowly approaches them, reciting the phrase, and she reaches into her pocket… revealing the golden ball. Score – things are looking up for the Yellow Team!

It’s a race to the final mission destination with the Green Team hot on their tail. The Yellow Team arrives first, picking up the last gold medallion and head inside to Jackie’s video message.

Wait, what do you mean this isn’t their final destination? Jackie has left another message for our teams and the Yellow Team listens in: there’s only one real medal out of the 9, and tomorrow morning, they’ll find a sign outside the door of where the real medallion is located. Ooh, nice twist RM!

What’s better is that although the message is the same, each team gets a different version: a dubbed Korean, an English, and lastly, a Chinese version for the Red Team. The increased level of confusion on their faces with each version has me dying in laughter. HAHAHAHA.

Now the tables have turned – it’s every man or woman for themselves. They distribute the medals among themselves and head to bed as the timer hits the halfway point – Hour 12.

Sleep well, Running Men… and keep a sharp eye out. Only one of you has the real medallion….

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The crowds were amazing. And I would've expected to see a lot of fangirls there for Yonghwa but nope, it was all for the Running Man guys.

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You will see in this weeks episode Kpop isn't that big yet in HongKong. They're more on K-drama & variety shows. ^^ He did have some fans though as for the English subs that I watched when they were singing in TST.

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yeh. sadly, kpop stil isnt that popular here, which means many groups don't really see hk as a place to come if theyre having an asian tour which can get really annoying. but cuz yonghwa has been in a few dramas, he's fairly well known. we all love our drama though! :D was really weird seeing hk on running man. just walked through arrivals yesterday at the airport, and kept htinking, if only i'd arrived when they had...

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ikr!!! im from hk and i didn't even KNOW they ever came!!! if they come again im taking all my obsessed with running man friends and make a huge poster lmaoo

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Thanks for the recap. It was really well written but I have to say I didn't enjoy this episode as much as I did the previous ones.

I felt like the vibe was so wrong, everyone was quiet after the airport, and it seemed a bit awkward.

Also why have we not had some Monday Couple actions for 3 weeks now if I remember correctly ? Gary did shout "Ji Hyo" at one point when they went to sing in this episode, but that was all...
I really hope that today's episode will make up for all these little things as that's what make RM more enjoyable.

Or have they made some change announced somewhere in Korean ?

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This episode gotta be one of my favourites. I love the supreme ace team though they had the least air time. My favourite part has to be how MC Yoo sang Leslie Cheung's song. Shows how much he really likes Kor Kor. :)

But RM, I just want to point out that Tang Wei and Zhang Ziyi are Chinese..

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What's up with my grammar... Anyway, thank you for the recap!

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Amazing to see how crazy famous running man is in other countries! Didn't love this episode though - I wanted to see more of the aces team. And its like they abandoned poor guest yong-hwa in favour of min-jung..

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This was a fun episode to watch, but I'm hoping that the 2nd half will be better once they get out into the open, looking for the dragons.

My only disappointment was that Yonghwa's screentime was almost non-existent - there was way too much focus on Min-jung.

Those crowds were unbelievable - who knew that RM was so popular there?!
:)

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I did! I did! *waves hand* The iSubs forum even holds games for fans from various countries and gatherings and even reports on when and where RM will show up next. They are pretty popular in Indonesia too. Way popular.

I am mad about the Ace Team not getting major screen time too. Sad day. X/

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It was indeed a really fun episode. Thanks for the recap! By the way, what was up with Jackie's face?

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He's in the middle of filming an action movie, hence the "combat" look all over his face.
:)

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yaye, handsome gary!

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Was actually arm's lenght while the crew was filiming running man in TST Star Ferry area for over an hour. The red and green teams were great, interacting with fans and spectators, but Ep 72 was disappointing as it didn't show too much of this and Yonghwa's screen time was pretty short to my liking. Anyway, I posted four RAW clips onto youtube for anyone who is interested to see more.

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Wow - lucky you! Did you see our Yong hwa up close?
How about posting some links to your YouTube vids?
;)

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Sorry, think this is a better clip
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eqh4FWqL3fQ&feature=results_main&playnext=1&list=PLB22F51DB383DA19D

By the way, Yong Hwa was real sweet during the filming. He was actually abit shy at the beginning but warmed up towards the crowd after 15mins. Actually all the casts and production team were great...dedicated, hardworking, patient and understanding. Fighting Running Man.....looking forward to more epic episodes to come!!

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OMG- you were THAT close to Yonghwa?!?! All of those 1,000's of fans chasing RM thru HK and you managed to be right next to them for the song and drink missions?!?! How in the world did you do it?
And frankly, YOUR coverage of Yonghwa& RMen was better than what we saw on the show!
:)

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I am so sorry for being a bitch here, but Jackie was speaking Cantonese, not Chinese [and Chinese is NOT a language, its a form of human race like Korean and Japanese]. :) The songs for JiHyo's team and Jaesuk's team are in Cantonese but Gary's team's song is in Mandarin. Although HK is a part of China [hence their light usage of Mandarin] their primary dialect is still Cantonese. Just hope to be able to clear some things up because I am a language purist and hopes that the terms can be mentioned in their most correct form. :)

That aside, awesome recapping. I wonder what will happen next! :D

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You're not being a bitch at all!!! Mandarin and Cantonese are not mutually intelligible and I still don't get why they are so lumped together into a single language. :S

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*so often

I also have to add that on a cursory listen, they sound similar, so that was not against the recapping at all, gummimochi! :)

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Hahaha, I hate that too. It's the same when someone asks if a person speaks Indian and this is me "Er, Indian is not a language". And I get just as frustrated with the usual clumping together of Cantonese and Mandarin into the word Chinese.

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I'm aware that Jackie can speak both Mandarin and Cantonese, and that there is a distinction between the two. I had an inkling it was Cantonese but didn't want to run the risk of identifying it incorrectly. So, though not fully PC, had to make a decision and didn't mean to offend anyone. Because I don't speak either, I'm indebted to fans such as yourself who can clarify it for the rest of us. Thanks! :)

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That gets me too. There's no such thing as Chinese language. I try to explain to others, but I just get the "you're crazy" look. People aren't aware of how culturally diverse China is, so everything is just Chinese.

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I know that 'Chinese' isn't a language but differentiating the two is absolutely impossible for me. So if I hear someone from China speaking, honestly its easier to say 'they're speaking in Chinese' as opposed to 'they're speaking in cantonese or mandarin or another dialect from China.' No harm is meant by 'clumping' the two languages together...but in ignorance, it cannot be helped.

Its annoying when people lump Japanese, Korean and Mandarin(etc) together and call it Chinese.

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i agree. while i can differentiate the two, you can't possibly blame people for just grouping the languages as chinese. it's normal to expect people to know that "chinese" consists of many different languages and dialects, but i think it's sorta unreasonable to expect people to know the difference. they "lump" those languages together and call it chinese to avoid being wrong (and possibly offending some people).

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i understand your frustration but it's the same from other countries as well...like our country Philippines, other people from other country often said it's Filipino language but our language here is called "Tagalog" and we call the people here, ourselves, as "Filipino"

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actually our language is FILIPINO. Tagalog is the language of the Tagalogs or those from the Luzon area. There's a very big difference which we should all know since it's painstakingly taught early on in our education. the people are Pilipinos but known as Filipinos by foreigners. calling our language Tagalog will merit a lot of hate from non-Tagalog Filipinos. SO ACTUALLY THE FOREIGNERS ARE CORRECT IN ADDRESSING OUR LANGUAGE AS THE FILIPINO LANGUAGE.

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Technically, the Chinese are not a "race" - since there are no. of ethnicities that make up the Chinese, w/ Han being by far the largest ethnicity.

Also, while some people use the terms Korean or Japanese "race" - it's really not accurate either.

Asians are a race, but not individual nationalities or ethnicities.

There are actually a no. of ethnicities that make up the Japanese people - including the Ainu and Ryukyuans.

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Go Jackie!I wonder if he was in the middle of filming a movie when he did this. Or maybe the RM crew made him do it. Fighting Running Man! I really hope we get to see more of the Ace Team next week. And what is with Gary's hair? Hahaha. Oh Kang Gary! And as someone pointed out, we need some Monday Couple moments up in here, and some Ace Couple moments as well. The Easy Brothers are really going at it this week. Haroro though, hahaha, is as always postering. Knock him down a few Jihyo. And I'm never surprised at how much Yoo Jaesuk loves movies. XD

P.S. The power of Running Man for sure.

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I really wanna go to Hong Kong for a visit now, all thanks to running man! It's looks gorgeous!

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this was really good episode though there was a lot edited out...i think the reason why the ace team didn't have a lot of airtime was because at that time Ji hyo was sick, maybe they didn't want to show that in tv though...fans who saw them said Ji hyo was dizzy at that time and said she felt like vomiting...Gary was actually sick also at that time, they said he even needed to go to hospital at that time...

and the scene at the mall, it was really crowded...they got there actually about 8pm or 9pm but when you watched this ep, it was said 12am something because of overcrowding in the mall...

anyways still a great ep and i watched the live stream yesterday for the next ep, it was funnier and more epic although i don't understand what they're saying...i just felt sorry for all of them because the filming at the mall ended at 4am to 5am and they have to wake up at 7am..some said that the PD's were able to sleep for just 30mins...

i really love this show and it just shows how professional they are and how dedicated they are in their work, not just the cast but the whole staff

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aww i wanna add - 'cantonese' 'hokkien' 'hakka' are like dialects. and not all chinese understands all dialects. it's like tamil and hindi are different. Jackie chan's mother tongue is cantonese and in fact spoke good mandarin. some hong kong ppl speaks mainly cantonese and some speaks 'weird' mandarin. some ppl can understand but not speak it. its like watching korean variety- a korean may not not jeju dialect. i love this episode- it may be patchy at tyms but was so happy to see running man all hype out; so happy to see their fans, so happy to see hongkong and best of all understood wat jackie sais. last but not least I love hongkong too!

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It was so fun to watch this episode! It's been awhile since I've been to Hong Kong! And the fans!!! Totally amazing!

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Many times the games on RM aren't the most entertaining things (it's usually the interaction btwn the guests and regulars - esp. when they poke fun at each other), but the games in this ep were pretty fun (having the large crowds and crowd participation certainly helped).

Still, I think shopping challenges/excursions tend to be among the most entertaining (such as the food shopping challenge the last time they were in China).

Didn't have much of an impression of Min-jung before this but it seems she has a pretty fun personality.

And w/ this ep, RM broke 20% viewership in Seoul.

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Crazy how popular RM is outside of Korea. Wonder which other place they'll visit. Signapore?

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The third clue given by Jackie Chan to the red team is in Cantonese, not in Chinese.

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