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Answer Me 1994: Episode 17

Big things are in store for many of our characters, and a few mysteries are answered for us (though not, of course, the main one. Goodness knows we couldn’t have that). It’s a rewarding hour for those of us who’ve been waiting for concrete movement on multiple fronts, and the payoff is both sweet and a little melancholy, which is pretty much what this series does best.

SONG OF THE DAY

Jung-woo, Yoo Yeon-seok, Sohn Ho-joon – “Feeling Only You” [ Download ]

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EPISODE 17: “Love, Fear Part 2: Answer Me 1997”

In 2013, Haitai wonders where Binggeure went, to which Yoon-jin asks, “Can’t you guess?” Haitai can but we can’t, since we’re being kept in the dark. Thanks for that, drama.

Back to May of 1997, where post-bus-accident Garbage now has his arm in a sling and his neck in a brace. That’s what you get for messing with fangirls, dude. He assures Na-jung over the phone that he’s totally fine, and his friend Min-jung raises an eyebrow at the obvious lie. He makes sure that Na-jung is coming down tomorrow for her birthday, and it’s sweet how much he clearly wants to see her, busy schedule and practicality be damned. The next day he sleeps in the break room sitting up, afraid he’ll oversleep if he lies down.

Na-jung arrives at the hospital, and for a moment they both light up to see each other. Garbage hurries to her with arms outstretched for a hug, but Na-jung registers his injuries and starts in on the worried scolding. He’s all, I’m not even that hurt, and Na-jung screams (while hitting his cast, ha), “You call this not hurt?!”

Na-jung asks about her birthday present, and Garbage puffs up proudly to assure her that he bought it ages ago. She warns that if he bought “something strange like last year,” he’s dead and they’re over. Garbage tugs nervously at his collar…

In a flashback to 1996, Garbage leads Na-jung to her room, building up the suspense while promising her the thing she wanted most. She’s about to burst out of her skin, saying that it might be too small to see as she rubs her ring finger in excitement (uh-oh… is she thinking a diamond?). Garbage scoffs, saying there’s no way he’d buy a small one, and then, TADA!

He opens the door giggling in glee… she bursts in shaking in excitement… and then she sees the gym equipment standing there with a big bow around it. OH, OPPA, you didn’t.

Okay, it’s for her back exercises and not a hint to, say, lose weight or anything. But still! One can see exactly why she’s so skeptical this year. It’s hilarious the way that Garbage registers Na-jung’s less-than-enthused reaction and knows something went wrong, but he can’t quite figure out what. His voice trails off as he asks, “Was this… not it? Did you want something else…?”

She blows her top and looks at him through angry tears. A suspicion dawns on him, and he asks if she wanted the more expensive exerciser, lol.

Back to 1997, where he asks how she can threaten a breakup so easily. He says he gets nervous if a day goes by without her calling, knowing he’s going to get even busier and worrying that she might really dump him. She says he’s worrying for nothing, and he starts to ask something in a serious tone… but then decides against it.

Samcheonpo he tries again to wheedle Yoon-jin into meeting his old school buddies, which gets a flat rejection. He slumps in his seat and wonders if she doesn’t like him much. Yoon-jin doesn’t see why he should connect those two things and says, “I like you a ton, you know.” Which, aw.

She gentles her tone and explains that she’s terrible at these forced social niceties, feeding him coffee to soften the blow. He grudgingly lets go of some of his crankiness.

Then as they’re paying, his dorky hometown sunbaes drop in coincidentally and Samcheonpo proudly introduces his girlfriend… who is nowhere to be seen. Hee.

Na-jung and Garbage go to his apartment for her birthday dinner, and she glares at the mess—it’s nowhere near as bad as the last time, but let’s face it, that’s a pretty low bar we’re talking about. Garbage gets simultaneously nervous and defensive, and lands on the one thing keeping her from blowing her lid: “I’m hungry, can’t we eat? [aegyo whine]”

So Na-jung cooks and sets the table, but before they can eat a bite, he gets paged by the hospital and has to dash. She urges him to go quickly and not to worry, and he promises to get back in time to light the candles of her cake. As he leaves, he pelts her with kisses.

Garbage goes about his rounds efficiently, but gets held back with more and more work. Na-jung waits at the table long into the night, falling asleep by her cake. It isn’t until early morning that Garbage finally gets off duty, and he races home.

By the time he gets there, though, all he finds is an empty (and freshly cleaned) home, with the birthday cake still sitting there unlit.

Binggeure gets another voicemail from the Die-Die sunbae (named Jin-yi), in which she nervously says she hopes he didn’t show up last time because she couldn’t make it. It’s one of those embarrassingly nervous messages where she rattles on, and right after she says goodbye the recording catches her muttering to herself, “Ack, my heart is pounding.” Cute.

Yoon-jin still has ruffled feathers to smooth over, since Samcheonpo is still annoyed that she ditched him at the cafe (she panicked out of nerves, she says). But she drags him along to partake of a cool new trend—sticker pictures, haha. (He sticks a photo onto her wallet, only to get yelled at for it.)

Garbage gets a voicemail from his mother, whom he’d promised to pick up at the terminal for her physical and has forgotten to meet. He’s in a bind because he’s got a patient to attend to, so Min-jung offers to pick his mother up for him. Uh-oh. She makes me nervous; does she have designs on Oppa or not?

Garbage’s reaction suggests he’s aware of some strangeness going on, and he asks Min-jung plainly why she’d meet his mother. Instead, he foists off his rounds on his (male) friend and heads out. Phew for Oppa drawing lines.

Turns out he doesn’t need to do that, because his mother pulls up in a taxi, accompanied by Na-jung. Mom had called Na-jung’s pager just in case, and is thankful that she came to pick her up. Garbage gapes the whole time, having thought she’d left.

They have an hour to wait while Mom undergoes her exam, so Na-jung tells Garbage to take a nap. He suggests they both take a nap together, which is a prospect that makes her a little nervous. Not that she dislikes the idea, since once he cuddles with her she breaks into a giddy smile.

Binggeure gets another call from Jin-yi sunbae, and she starts off with more nervous chitchat before inviting him to her study group, which she says is really coveted. She makes a slip of the tongue when she orders him to be there, saying, “You’d better not be like last time when I waited two hours—er, would have waited for two hours!” Aw, so she told him she skipped it so he wouldn’t feel bad?

You can see that Binggeure doesn’t quite know what to do with all this, though he isn’t necessarily indifferent. And on second thought, this time he reaches for the phone to make a call.

Na-jung jerks awake and finds that she’s slept the day away. Oppa guesses that Na-jung barely got any sleep last night waiting up for him and apologizes for not spending her birthday with her. She’s not very upset and says it’s understandable, but he has his serious face on as he kneels to look her in the eye and says this could happen again, no matter how he tries to avoid it.

She laughs, “I know, it’s okay.” Garbage replies, “It’s not okay to me.” He gets really serious and takes a deep breath, and takes something out of his pocket. Then he gets up, and then kneels down again, only this time it’s on one knee. Omg. Is this what I think it is?

Na-jung looks half-terrified waiting for the ball to drop. Garbage asks, “Jungie… will you marry me?” He opens the box and shows her the ring. “Please marry me,” he asks.

Na-jung breaks into a big wet smile and throws her arms around his neck. And then they seal the deal with kisses.

That night, Garbage gets a surprise visitor in front of the hospital: Binggeure, who is for once pretty forward about asking for dinner and for more food. He’s usually so shy and passive with Garbage, but he’s clearly got Things On His Mind today. And when he gets to the point, he says that Garbage no longer has to buy him meals after today—in the future he’d like to be treated to just drinks. Puppy’s growing up.

The song scoring the moment is Kim Dong-ryul’s “Truth in Wine,” and after a long moment, Binggeure says, “Sunbae-nim, because I have you, I’m happy.” Then for the first time ever, he calls him hyung. Omo. More than anything, that simple “hyung” brings a tear to my eye.

His narration says, “Now, this blank space that I’d left empty for a long time… I will fill with the answer to my confusing love.”

Next thing we know, Binggeure’s out for drinks with Jin-yi’s study group, playing a game of Spin the Truth Bottle. When she’s in the hot seat, they ask why she invited Binggeure—does she like him? She drinks to avoid answering, and Binggeure smiles to himself.

Binggeure gets the next question, a yes or no: “I came here not to study but because of Jin-yi sunbae, yes or no?” He answers yes, and Jin-yi gets giddy.

He walks her home that night, and when he doesn’t make any kind of move, she asks for a handshake. He looks at her in his pensive way, thinking:

Binggeure: “1997, age 23. I wanted to confirm whether this heart-pounding feeling, or this person who kept weighing on my mind, was out of simple curiosity for the first person to approach me from the opposite sex. Or whether it was that thing called love that other people keep talking about.”

Binggeure says aloud, “Confirmation.” Then he moves in to kiss her.

We come back to the curbside scene in 2013, with Binggeure standing by as a red car zooms past—ha, total fakeout. Are we surprised? It’s the next car that brings a smile to his face, and Jin-yi pulls up to say she just wanted to see hubby’s face on her way to the hospital. She drops off a cake for the party, then asks for a kiss. Like a good husband, he complies.

Ah, and we finally hear his name, Kim Dong-joon. Not that he was ever seriously in the running, but I suppose we can officially strike him from the list now.

Back in 1997, Samcheonpo and Yoon-jin make another visit to the army. Haitai’s on his final 100-day countdown, eager to get back to the outside world, convinced that he’s kept current on trends to fit right in… though his clipped army speech will need work easing out of.

Mom and Dad watch a commercial of that one-way cell phone they invested in, positive they’ll be rolling in the money soon. Na-jung tells Garbage about it, and he thinks those phones sound cool… until he hears that you can only make the calls in range of a phone booth. “Then why don’t you just use the phone booth? Why would you use that phone?… How much did you say he invested?” Gulp.

Mom asks after Haitai, and Samcheonpo chuckles that it’ll take him a long time to get rid of his army mannerisms. But then Samcheonpo’s father calls with bad news: Samcheonpo’s draft papers just arrived. He’s being enlisted in a month.

He locks himself in his room in shock, and Yoon-jin beats on his door assuring him that she’ll visit every day. But that’s not comforting enough, and Binggeure notes that Samcheonpo was already worried about Yoon-jin getting tired of him. With him off in army, who knows how her feelings might cool.

Na-jung chats with Garbage over the phone and starts in on him for not eating a proper breakfast. Halfway through her tirade, though, he goes silent, and we see that on the other end of the line his attention has been diverted by the TV. He and his buddies look on as Chilbongie is interviewed on Japanese TV, which is a nice reminder that Chilbongie still exists in this world. Not that I’m bitter. (Much.)

Chilbongie interviews in fluent Japanese, and is asked about a girlfriend. He doesn’t have one, but admits that he does have somebody he likes, though he declines to give details. It puts Garbage into a funk.

Binggeure: “If you have nothing to lose, you have nothing to fear. The deeper love grows, and the more you don’t want to lose it, the more your fear grows. Love feeds on fear.”

In the early hours of the morning, Yoon-jin sneaks into Samcheonpo’s room and wakes him. He resists until she says they’re going on that trip she’d refused before, and then he bolts up immediately and half-sleepily stumbles around getting ready as fast as he can. Lol, boys.

Binggeure: “But what overcomes that love-fueled fear is love itself.”

2013. Na-jung and her father head upstairs to deal with the noisy neighbors… and who should open the door but Sung Shi-won (Jung Eun-ji). Omo, more 1997 crossovers?

Shi-won politely apologizes for the noise, and the ladies bond over being from neighboring cities in the south. Shi-won invites them in for coffee (and is briefly startled at Dad’s familiar face, pwahaha), then roars for her husband to come out and say hi. She lets out a string of swears under her breath, and Dad mutters that she has a temper to match Na-jung’s.

So Yoon-jae (Seo In-gook again) comes out, and he recognizes Dad as a famous coach, saying that he heard a lot about him from his father-in-law, pfffft. (Who, just to make the joke clear, is also Sung Dong-il in 1997′s alternaverse.)

Yoon-jae calls his father-in-law out to say hi, and ’97 Dad comes out grumbling to greet ’94 Dad. To make it even stranger, the two Dong-ils recognize each other as former teammates and distant cousins (well, there’s only one Sung clan, so all Sungs are considered very very distant relations at some point).

The two Dong-ils trade stories of their well-married daughters, and all we get from this exchange is that Na-jung’s husband is rather famous and he’s heading up to join them in a minute. Husband rings the bell moments later, and Shi-won opens the door, only to recognize him. “Wait… are you…?”

And we fade out, because of course we don’t get to see him.

We jump back to 1997, before the proposal, with Garbage shopping for rings. He picks the gaudiest, ugliest ring of the set, but thankfully someone with better taste speaks up to veto the choice. It’s Shi-won in her high school uniform, and she steers him in the direction of the simple diamond solitaire.

Things are all fun and cheer until Garbage asks for the radio to be turned down (H.O.T’s “Candy” is playing, uh-oh), and Shi-won immediately argues for it to be turned up. Tempers flare and he recognizes her from the bus, and Shi-won goes running. Let’s consider that a boon—Garbage can’t afford another broken arm.

Na-jung begins tutoring the troublemaker student she has just taken on, and now we see that it’s Eun Ji-won! (Er, Hak-chan.) I hadn’t even realized till now how bummed I was at not getting a full cameo set, and now that we have it, I can rest easy.

Na-jung isn’t having any luck ordering him to join her at the desk, mostly ’cause he’s so uncomfortable around her. I’d totally forgotten how hilariously awkward Hak-chan got around girls, but this is a pretty great reminder. Na-jung interprets this as rebelliousness and bellows at him to study, chasing him around and hitting him with pillows.

 
COMMENTS

You know, I’ve totally accepted that Garbage is the husband and Chilbongie is no longer in the running, and my emotional investment in the husband question is pretty low (at this point it’s everything other than the mystery that keeps me interested), but I’m still super annoyed at how they’ve just dropped him off the map. Haitai too, whose trip to army I thought would be fodder for some poignant character moments. But I feel like Haitai and Chilbongie have been eliminated from the husband question and have been unceremoniously dropped from the drama as a result—whether or not that was the intention—and that just highlights how little story there was in the first place.

I don’t like any drama that treats characters as mere plot devices, and despite the fact that Chilbongie was played with warmth and sweetness, it’s only too clear now that he wasn’t really given much depth as a character on his own. That makes me seriously sad, because I absolutely loved him. I still do, in fact, but I feel like he’s become an afterthought. That’s why as much as I awwed over the progression of Na-jung and Oppa’s romance in this episode (the proposal was a lovely bit of acting on her part especially), I can’t shake my dissatisfaction over the mishandling of the whole love triangle aspect.

I don’t think the crux of the dissatisfaction on Team Chilbongie was because supporters felt Chilbongie was a better person than Garbage, or “deserved” love more, or was better hero material. Honestly, I think it’s a simple matter of the drama literally setting Chilbongie up to be the love interest, and making him the primary contender for ten episodes. So when you suddenly take that away from him (and from us), of course we’re going to feel cheated. I will argue that this was done strictly to preserve the mystery, which makes it a fault of the production for serving its gimmick more than its characters. It has nothing to do with which character is the better man, and everything to do with the fact that the writing bait-and-switched us, and I think we have the right to feel unhappy about it.

Binggeure’s slow development, on the other hand, feels more like a planned arc. I suppose our confusion over his feelings wasn’t too far from the mark, since he himself was just as confused. At first when Jin-yi was introduced (in the last episode), I was disgruntled with the drama for jerking our expectations around yet again in service of a gotcha moment (making us think he was gay and then giving him a girlfriend). But I’m more appreciative now, because I do think the orientation ambiguity was a genuine issue for him.

I don’t think Binggeure is bisexual (and I chafe when stories paint bisexual people as the catch-all category for people who haven’t decided whether they’re gay, because I really don’t think sexuality works like that), but I do think he was working out what exactly he felt for Garbage, and that there were moments when it was more than plain friendship or affection. It was nearly hero-worship, and I can see how that can confuse the romantic-platonic question when you’re an inexperienced young adult who’s never had any romantic relationships before. For instance, we might talk of girls having girl-crushes and understand that this doesn’t make someone gay. In Binggeure’s case it’s possible he conflated his emotions with other feelings, which led to him taking his time sussing everything out carefully and methodically. That fits with what we already know of his character, given that he took time off of school to work through how he felt about his future, so this feels consistent with his personality.

I also think that’s why he was so adamant about sticking to using “sunbae-nim” for Garbage, because he hadn’t quite decided yet how he felt about him, and thus he didn’t know what to call him. Until he did, he would keep to the nice formal “sunbae,” and taking a clear step by calling him hyung denotes that he’s come to a point of acceptance, where he’s comfortable defining their relationship as a friendly brotherly one. And only then does he feel able to move forward with those other feelings and pursue a romantic relationship as well.

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Omg it was annoying me how many times they showed Binggeure waiting in the present in this and last episode. I also think it's a little unrealistic for that noona/future wife to keep on calling Binggeure when she barely knew him. I thought noona and Kim Dong Joon's romance was a bit forced and OOC. It wasn't that I dislike her, but it was because I didn't like the execution. What was the point with Bingeure telling oppa during the meal scene that, that should be the last time oppa should treat him well? I'm still confused if Bingpuppy had any feelings for oppa. Why did the writers have to use Deli Spice's song "Chau Chau" in the last ep for Binggeure and Oppa? That's the utimate song of love/affection and also Joon Hee's song so it confused me. I didn't like how the writers made Bingeure's love interest a mystery and it literally annoyed me. Btw, how does Oppa have the time to eat with Bingeure, but be so busy at 4 a.m. with NJ? Why could Oppa take an hour off for his mom but not for NJ's birthday and when he had a cast on his arm? I thought the writers did a really sucky job of making Oppa being busy, a conflict, because there were so many plot holes along with it.

I honestly think it was a wrong move for the writers to make Oppa and NJ to date so early because I dont know what the conflict is. Distance? Work? It's been proven that NJ will always stay by Oppa's side and love him no matter what the problem is.

I don't understand the whole it's not over until the end with Chilbong and then the writers chose not to ever show him again. So when Oppa saw CB on the tv, and giving his wide eyed, serious/stern face, it was a bit frustrating for me. Oppa and NJ are already engaged. Why is Oppa being so afraid of CB? I hate hate hate how the writers are going to continue making CB pursue/wait for NJ. I desperately wish for the writers to make him move on and be happy.
It shouldn't be CB that's making Oppa change or be scared or whatever.

The message of this episode: "fear is what makes love grow." I thought was stupid. This episode really upset me and I'm starting to question this show. Maybe it's because I had high expectations because this was the only drama I stayed with from the beginning and didn't quit (unlike Heirs, Potato Star, Basketball, Mirae, Let's Eat, Unemployed Romance, etc.). Honestly, I'm not watching anything else at the moment other than BtVS.

Enough of the rant, here are the scenes I did like:

-When oppa showed NJ her surprise birthday gift last year haha

-When Binggeure was waiting at the end, and the red car I thought was coming to pick him up passed by (I firmly believe Joon Hee was in that car haha)

-Samcheonpo and Yoon Jin <3 <3 (so sad SCP is going to the army)

-Eunji's and Jiwon's cameos <3 love love love them!!

-Sung Dong Il and Sung Dong Il (the two most awesome distant cousins lololol)

-~-I know that because this was a more negative comment than positive, that it will get a lot of disagreements, but I stick with what I believe, and this is my honest opinion. I really believe AM94 has lost its charm for playing with my (CB shippers') heart(s) and believing they can still do something with CB to make him a possible husband for NJ. I just want him happy, which I know he will be in the future, so they should stop screwing with his character in future episodes because he deserves more. More importantly, I want more character growths. I'm happy we got to see...

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I'm happy we got to see Binggeure's and I'm praying that the writers know what they are doing with the rest because there are still 4 episodes left. In the beginning, without a doubt, 1994 was better than 1997 imo. Now, I'm not so sure. I think I like 1997 as a whole more at this rate. Okay, that's my 2, long cents. Sorry for the rant. I hope I didn't upset anyone :D-~-

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And woah! Go Ara can kiss! Park Shin Hye has some serious competition!

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LOL Park Shinhye's kissing scenes are so awkward to watch, regardless of the actor kissing her.

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@kate, A dead fish would give Shin Hye serious competitions and I believe the fish would win!

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LOL, 'tis a seemingly popular thing to rag on Park ShinHye's kisses these days, haha.... but I see no lies. *Snerk*

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I know I was joking and being sarcastic about psh's kissing.

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She's already in her mid 20s and a kdrama veteran. She needs to drop the innocent image and learn how to give a proper passionate korean kiss (mouth open no tongue and not looking like a stiff board). lol

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Guys, let's stay on topic please. Park Shin-hye has nothing to do with this drama.

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During the 1st ep, I thought 1997 was still gonna be better but then things started picking up...until ep 10ish...now I still think 1997 is the best drama everrr.

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It seems the show is relying more on gimmicks rather than substance in the home stretch. I think it would have been more interesting if they didn't send the second lead (CB) to Japan. He would have been a more plausible threat as far as being able to steal NJ's affections from Trash. Unless they do something drastic in the next few episodes, I feel that CB and Haitai have become throwaway/filler characters which is a shame because I felt their stories were the most interesting.

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Ebay, your username makes me wonder if you are an Emmet & Bay fan? Switched at Birth.
or you just like the website Ebay :D

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I agree, for the last two episodes i lost a bit interest about the show. And I will not keep the fact that, it is because of Chilbonggie getting out of the scene. Though it's clear that NJ feelings is on Trash Oppa, doesn't mean that CB should be taken out. --- But still, there are 4 episodes to come and I still want to consider the fact that NJ also have some concerns (still a feeling) for CB (see previous episodes). And it's fine, if CB is not the husband (he can have me instead, lol!). But it would be better if the writer will give a deep portrayal and justice to CB character (also for Haitai).

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This week's 2 eps feel really flat to me. If i say that it has nothing to do w CB's absence, it'd be a lie. But that is not the only reason by far.

While I love to see the Reply 1997 gang again, these cameos feel completely like add-ons. They are not integral to what's going on in the lives of the boards in 1995.
While I love to see other chars be given a chance to shine, Bing's reckoning of his sexuality feels way too rushed and therefore unreal becos Die-Die had to have been in love w him even before they met for her to down that wash basin full of liquor for him like that, in order to plant a kiss on him. It doesn't seem possible.

HT's is in the army. We've only seen him once when he messed up first thing upon arrival. Then he gets to sit opposite CSP and YJ when they visit. How is that interesting?

Why not show us Joonie? Yes, he is with that girl, but he can come home and interact w his parents and the whole gang, can he not?

I don't even know what to make of the 2 dads meeting and recognizing each other as distant cousins. I think the show is trying to be too damned clever for its own good. Of course we like it when shows are clever, but pulling stunts that say "Look at me! See how clever I can be!" is irritating.
OK, we know CB is in Japan. It is not Mars. Why just dump him there? I suppose the whole purpose of sending him to Japan is so that he'd be out of the running and out of the pic. If so, then why build him up so much for 12-13 eps?

Some ppl were saying not so nice things about the shippers. You got to see that the show has Deliberately built up Both guys as being equally likely mates for NJ in order to confuse us and to withhold the answer. Consequently, half the viewers ship NJ w one, and half w the other. We can say the show has done an excellent job at pitching both guys.

And we've all seen NJ becoming this flat char who has no life besides Oppa. That dance sequence in front of the tv is the hi-light of her existence for 12 eps!

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The show has not built them up as being equally likely partners for NJ. That is false equivalency: just because there are two guys who like her does not mean she is equally likely to go with either of them.

It ignores:

1-NJ never ever showed a shred of romantic interest in CB. About all she did was ogle him when he was bare chest in front of her and people check other people out without wanting to be with them all the time. Other than that, it was all him and she did not even see their interactions as romantic while he thought his stealth dating was going to win her heart. I do not know why so many people disrespect NJ's heart in this. She is not primarily a self insert, but rather a character her own.

2-All CB is the husband evidence comes from 2013 and 2002. This is evidence that is meant to color what is happening in the drama and generate angst and hope. It is not a replacement for the actual drama itself. I do not know why so many people were lured along by just 2013 scenes. Seriously, they trolled TW hard with 2012 too.

3-The trash evidence is the drama itself: NJ's feelings for him and the Trash's confusion/development of feelings for her and then their dating. After 17 episodes, the drama would have to completely betray itself to have a CB ending.

You can prefer CB; wish he was the male lead, but do not pretend the drama actually betrayed you. Perhaps you were goaded by the 2013 scenes to believe in the CB romance strategy despite its obvious failure and the shows feint to CB early fooled you. Perhaps the show should not have the whole mystery thing as a lot of people seem to have been fooled and are now disappointed. This does not, however, mean that CB had an equal chance to win NJ's heart. He did not.

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Those 2013 scenes are not part of the drama?

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I would just like to reiterate what Samcheonpo said in a 2013 scene along the lines of "It's the present that's important. The past is useless."

Although the directors have time and again teased us with the Na Jeong winking scene, the use of stand-ins, and those moments where Na Jeong says something and the 4 guys react, I still believe that in the end the 1994-2002 drama must still tie up with what we see in 2013. The 2013 scenes are still part of the drama in the same way that the 2012 scenes were part of AM1997, and the happenings in the past of AM1997 all correlated with all characters' future.

As viewers first and foremost, I don't think anyone of us can say for sure what is meaningful/relevant and what is not with this drama because if you believe the plush-toy theory, even the minutest details are treated as important by the PD and the writers.

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@Kaddict

90+% of the show is the present and heavily suggests trash. This is the continuous drama.

The 2013, if it is like AM97 is cut off weirdly as we will see in the last episode. Also, there is a history where TW got the strong clues early on and they became more ambiguous and eventually favored YJ. The same has happened here. As time has passed the 2013 stuff largely supports trash now. The creators are banking on people being invested in Trash/Nj and it taking less to rock their boat.

Would you seriously hope that 90+% of the drama said one thing? But the conclusion went with the other 10% or so (being generous)? I mean that is horrendous writing, why would anyone hope for that?!

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Also, the 2013 stuff is cut to frame the main story line, much like the psychic scene. It is window dressing meant to stoke fear and hope and set the tone. If this drama is decided by little clues planted here and there in a purposely obscuring segment as opposed to the emotional drama in the main segments....we would be dealing with the most trollish and ill-conceived show.

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I understand what you mean. I was actually amused at first when Yoon Jae in the 2013 scene was talking how he knew about Na Jeong's appa. It was a *winkwink*, "our own secret" moment for those who watched and loved the 1997 series and I was like "This is great". I would have wanted them however to have stopped at that, because when Shi Won's appa and the 2 appas met each other, I was already thinking how gimmicky and too-clever-for-its-own-good this show was getting.

And really I've ranted about this a lot of times already but Na Jeong is like a puppet in this series ever since her and oppa got together. It's like she doesn't do anything anymore aside from tend to oppa/pine for oppa, which is a world different from the Na Jeong character that grew on me during the first 10 episodes. She's clearly a reactive character now of a proactive one. It's like she won't do anything anymore unless another character talks to her/makes her do something.

It's so disappointing, during the last 2 week but during the episodes this week especially, I really feel that the magic of this series is gone. The heartfelt moments don't feel so natural and organic anymore.

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@Earl Grey

Ok. First and foremost, I'm not trying to start anything here. But it would be interesting to see how an oppa-shipper sees those 2013 scenes.

Could you please cite the specific scenes in 2013 which largely supports Trash? Because to me, aside from CB throwing that baseball towards Trash (which really to me can't even be treated as a clue because we don't really know what happened with the baseball after CB gives it to Trash), I seem to think that the 2013 scenes are heavily in favor of Chilbong right now.

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1-The fact that he is even in the room. Especially after he proposed to her, Oppa cannot just go back to being her elder brother, i.e. the mayo scene is unbelievable. CB didn't even date her yet, so it would be much less awkward.

2-the baseball. As even this site admitted, CB would have to be an extreme ass to throw that ball at Oppa if he had come back and taken it and NJ

3-the scene in shiwon's apartment just in this episode. It was leaning cb with the "he's a famous..." line and the recognition of siwon but then we get the ring scene and it is oh!

4- the catching. at first the wallet catching seemed clearly in cb's favor, but then there was the ball scene and oppa caught the ball in exactly the same way.

5-the wallet, yeah oppa is messy but why is it lying around in Nj's house?

5-this is 2002, but the dad thought the groom was the ugliest of the bunch, an odd thing for him to say about cb given his man crush

6-also in 2002 the dad says the groom waited a long time. it is much easier to say that that a fiance waited then someone who has not even dated her yet.

I do not spend much time on 2013 and 2002, but yeah there are a lot of oppa clues.

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ah, ha, ha, ha.

the wallet of na jung's husband that she threw to him in episode 7 is different from trash' wallet that was shown extensively in episode 14. http://pic.twitter.com/mYrFHH9tvm

it was trash oppa who said (ad lib?) "nice catch". if he caught the husband's wallet, why would he say nice catch to himself?

the fact that trash stood up to get the wallet in episode 14 to put in his pocket is telling because he wouldn't have to do that if that's his house. when the order comes, he can just go to the door and pick up the wallet on his way there. you normally don't take care of your personal possessions in your house but you do so if you are a guest. he may have left it at the table when he went to the bathroom and then forgot to get it but he remembered to get it when he said he'll pay for the food.

the baseball thing is currently assumed to be chil bong's love to na jung and na jung because it wasn't really clearly explained. but if the baseball is about chil bong and/or about his friendship/relationship with trash, and they are clearly friends in the 2013 scenes, there is no winner (husband) and loser (not husband). therefore even if chil bong throws it back to trash, it is not in poor taste if he's the husband. it would be a reiteration of what the baseball signifies, i.e. chil bong's relationship/friendship with trash. this may be speculations but since it is not clear what it was about, then this reasoning can still apply.

in 1990s, the dad said he'll be enemies with chil bong if he signs up with the opposing team. if he does, the dad may be angry with him so if he's the husband, the comment may still apply to him.

yoon jin stated that the groom waited for a very long time. in that conversation, she talked to the groom informally. in that same conversation, she talked to trash oppa formally, with the -yo part.

the waiting part may still apply for chil bong if he is the husband, as he waited since 1994.

thus far, trash has not done any waiting. only na jung in their relationship. in the next episodes, he may have to wait, then this statement will apply to him. currently, the waiting part does not apply to him at all.

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@Yunna111

The wallet is easily explained a multiple different ways. I offer the follow as one example how it might happen:

(Oppa catches the white banded wallet. Looks at it surprised.)

Oppa: Wait, this isn't my wallet. Whose wallet is it? Oh, Chilbongie's? Don't leave your wallet around like that or you'll forget it!

(Oppa tosses wallet to Chilbongie who catches it one-handed.)

Oppa: Nice catch!

I'm not even offering this as proof, just a reminder that all the 2013 scenes are open to interprtation, whether the are pro-Oppa, pro-Chilbongie... or even pro-Haitai. That's the problem with circumstancial evidence. You twist your head in a different direction and it's a whole new interprtation of the exact same momment.

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@yuna111. There's absolutely no support in the text for the idea that the ball symbolizes Trash/CB's friendship (let alone support for the idea that they have a friendship that would trump Trash's history with NJ, except Chilbong calling him hyung and the fact they're both there in 2013), and when it already symbolizes CB saying, I'm going to come back and steal your girlfriend...like, how is that defused? It's okay you stole my fiancee because we're bros now? I've said this before, but relying on 2013 to justify a CB ending is like saying the drama itself should be considered irrelevant, and NJ should be written off as a character. And now that he's proposed and we have 3 episodes left to go (before 21, which in AM 1997 was just a victory lap episode), the only way Trash's presence in NJ's flat can be justified is if he's living there.

Also, I don't find that wallet photo conclusive. It looks brownish, but it's possible there could be a white stripe on one side or the other. And as you admit, there are other possible explanations, much the way any 2013 scene can be seen as trolling or meaningful, Trash or Chilbong, etc. Basically, reading into those scenes offers no definitive proof of how things will turn out, while analysis of 1994-7 story provides substantial (and substantiated) grounds for arguing how the drama should turn out. So, basically, relying on 2013 is sophistic and useless. Anyway, if the husband is decided on wallet colors instead of NJ's feelings (with 3 episodes left to go and no change), that would go way beyond any structural complaints Chilbong shippers are leveling in hindsight based in their claim that Chilbong was set up as the male lead. This is like acknowledging that he wasn't the male lead, but wanting him to "win" anyway. Basically, it's a logic that attempts to justify sacrificing the drama for one character. At this point, if Chilbong is the husband, the drama will have taken a qualitative nosedive, because there has been so little support for that potential ending in the actual story. If he is the husband, we will not have seen his story as her husband; we will have seen Trash's story as NJ's would be husband, and NJ not as CB's wife, but as Trash's would be wife.

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during the group study/drinking session, one of the girls said something about die die being interested in kim dong joon (bing geu re) since the yonsei concert or music festival.

there may be some background there that is not given, although i don't really know if it will be addressed in the next episodes.

i'm happy with bing geu re's story but yes, i also felt it was a bit rushed because everything happened in just two episodes. perhaps if their scenes were evenly spaced out in several episodes, it wouldn't feel as rushed?

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oh, i didn't like the na jung dancing part. she didn't seem like that type of person during the first half of the drama so it seemed out of character.

and her dancing alone while her parents and boyfriend were sitting around just seemed more awkward. it would be better if she's with them and they are also dancing around, or maybe with friends and boyfriend and also dancing around...

i also did not see the point of the am1997 cameos. their scenes were fun but i feel they already had a drama of their own, and am1994 could use the time on their other characters for development or bonding sessions or whatever.

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So now people are even critical about the AM97 cameos which were just fanservice?

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maybe na jung and trash' conflict is how to deal with their fears?

they are very much in love but whenever trash has his serious face on, na jung gets all worried that it means they'll break up? she had that face when trash wanted to meet her to confess but she didn't know then about his feelings for her so her reaction is understandable. here, before the proposal, the first thought that came to her mind was he's breaking up with her even after dating for almost two years (?) and even after knowing how he feels about her.

trash is also the same thing. even after knowing that na jung likes her forever, he admitted to his feelings because he doesn't want to lose her, he was insecure that na jung is helping chil bong study even though he knows na jung likes him and is only helping chil bong as a friend, and he was really rattled when he thought na jung cancelled their date for chil bong.

i'm not really eloquent so i hope it's okay to point you to this very insightful post about an examination of trash' character in a romantic relationship at the answer me 1994 soompi forum thread here -- http://forums.soompi.com/discussion/comment/26765997

i really like reading the forum because some people share really thoughtful analysis about the drama and its characters, like the user i linked to above and many others.

anyway, perhaps dealing with that fear (as was stated by kim dong joon aka bing geu re in his voiceovers) will be what na jung and trash' relationship will focus on in that last four episodes.

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I lurk on Soompi AM threads and this is one of the more well-thought out, insightful and non-delusional comments that I've seen on the thread. LOL

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I'm still not getting this whole "fear" thing. In an immature love, yes, fear is a part of it because you are unsure of yourself, unsure of the other person, unsure about how relationships are supposed to work. It's a trust thing. But if you are an adult (Trash, I'm looking specifically at you) you respect the person you love, which means you also trust them. When you propose to someone, your trust level should be at the point where you have no doubts about them, about yourself, or about the future of your relationship. If you do, then you have no business proposing.

This whole "Love feeds on fear" thing is totally ridiculous. I have been around for over five decades, and I've seen a lot of relationships come and go, and the only thing fear does is poison a relationship with doubts and game-playing. Love feeds on trust, kindnesses, sharing, and support. Fear is only a symptom of self-doubt and buried anger.

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I totally agree with you skelly. I, too believe that love does not feed on fear, but instead, what you listed was exactly right imo. This is why I thought this episode's message was frustrating.

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I agree. I paid more attention to what Trash actually said during the proposal. It didn't sound like a man who wanted to spend the rest of his life with the woman he loved, it came off as someone who was scared their partner may run off the next chance they get if he doesn't tie her down. To me, there was nothing romantic about that proposal except Na Jung's reaction, she was happy. But both of them have almost no trust in the other one. She doesn't trust him around Min Jung and he doesn't trust her around Chilbong despite the fact that he's in another damn country. I think the narration about fear is a foreshadowing of their relationship's possible future. Trash loves Na Jung but his fear of her leaving him is feeding on his love for her which in turn makes him seem a tad delulu and obsessive.

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about binggere you're totally right.. to me it was kinda like a message from the pd's, now that the homosexuality subject is getting headlines in korea, don't you feel that making this a faze for him is ignorant and rude? i don't know how many people actually experience it as a passing thing but i'm sure as hell this is siding with this korean notion i got from NB article yesterday.. like it's not a real issue. sorry that was a little bit out of topic but i was disappointed..

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i'm not that disappointed with the depiction of binggeure's confusion, tbh. this team has already written a homosexual character, so its not like they're afraid of depicting it or anything (also, homosexuality getting headlines isn't like a recent thing... i mean, there was plenty about it &the controversy surrounding 'life is beautiful' back in like 2010 &even when the topic came up in dramas like coffee prince and personal taste..and i'd imagine the same was true when celebs like hong seok-cheon came out in 2000 or when Kim Ji-hoo committed suicide in 08.. these are only a few examples, but i'm just trying to say that saying "no that homosexuality is getting headlines" makes it sound like a recent trend when it isnt, really). i don't see it as ignorant or rude at all. i just see it as an acknowledgment of people who do question their sexuality as their growing up. but i've kinda felt for awhile that several of the 94 characters are kinda similar to some of the 97 characters--not like carbon copies or anything, but there are some general similarities-- so i don't really mind seeing the writers going in a different direction rather than re-using the "gay side character is secretly in love with male lead" story line. idk, that might just be me, though~

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When B went to meet his wife..could he not tell the other friends so? The stupid suspense is getting on my nerves esp over the last couple episodes. I would hate myself for loyaly watching this drama if the scenes from 2013 and the reactions from oppa, nj and cb were all not relevant to the scene but just to screw us with this unnecessary suspense.

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Regarding the conflict between Oppa and NJ, Bing says it well in his voiceover. When we love someone, we get scared. Oppa is a nervous wreck the whole episode, thinking that NJ will get tired of their relationship since they barely see each other. After he proposes, he even says that he does not want to be anxious anymore.

I love the show, with its flaws and all, because I can actually understand the characters' motivations (unlike so maaanny other dramas) and the characters just feel so real...

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Kate, you have totally nailed why I feel so angry about this show right now. I don't like being jerked around, I don't like it when writers set up characters and scenarios just to fool the audience. I don't feel like characters are being allowed to develop organically, which is strange because this true-to-life characterization was, I felt, one of Reply 1997's strengths.

I think they got too fond of the gimmick.

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As an asian myself I understand why Trash was so hesitant. Family relations is important to some asians still. He knew his track record with women weren't good at all. And if it does happen with Na Jeung.. it would jeopardize his relationship with NJ's parents, especially her father whose father and family felt close and indebted to... it would also sour NJ's friendship with his father's.

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whose father and family = whom his father and family felt close and indebted to.

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The whole red car thing made me feel manipulated and not in a good way. Manipulation should be a little more subtle or it just leads to annoyance.

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This was my biggest gripe with how the Binguerre story played out. I'm not as sold on the "Binguerre was just confused story arc", mostly because of the sudden appearance of the female romantic interest. And layering on another "who's the spouse?" mystery was unearned and annoying. Especially with the cutesy "who'd he leave to see?" conversation among the friends. A) If they know he's married, why wouldn't they just assume it's his wife? B) why was there that silly line about "Trash, you know who it is", when they should all know inguerre's wife if they are still good friends.

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they are just playing off the mystery, but it's getting annoying.... Just cut to the chase, think even the oppa lovers are tired of this play on "this weeks mystery"...

This is where the comment about how there is very little plot to this drama is highlighted, I know it's supposed to be a play and we're supposed to be confused, but at this point in the game we all know who the husband is, if they wanted to make it more interesting they should have played the story another way.

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I appreciated Binggeurae's story, but man, his 2013 fakeout scenes annoyed me so much. When Garbage asked who called him, why would he say 'You know this person too..' to Garbage when he could easily say 'it's the wife' or even use a nickname. Meh.

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Exactly and why could the wife not drop by a minute to say hi to the other guys! Seriously the scenes are getting annoying and totally irrelevant to what they should actually be doing just to keep the suspense in loop. I now give two hoots to who the husband is. I love 1997!!

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I'm disappointed with Binguerre's arc, too, but for other reasons. Answer Me 1997 is one of the few Korean shows that offers the LGBT youth of this country a rolemodel. A country supressing homosexuality like Korea is in dire need of a realistic portrayal of a gay person, normally all we get to see is a sissy.
They lost the chance to do something brave and show, that it is ok to be confused and that it is ok to be gay.

The recent news around Kim Jho Gwang-soo and his husband showed, that one argument against registering a gay marriage is, that the birthrate would decrease. Seriously WTF!?

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*suppressing

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Yeah I really was uncomfortable with this. I know it might have smacked of BG and JH are the only gay guys in Korea, but I would have liked them to get together. Personally, I was hoping BG would try to be with the girl thinking that maybe he was not gay after all and then finding out he actually was or at least preferred men. Obviously that would be very bad to the girl, but it would have been an interesting story. That said, I increasingly doubted they would put enough time in BG to do such a story. It would have been quite jarring to see that kiss scene then see him get in a car with JH. I just think they totally fumbled this BG story even if some of the messages of sexual confusion and the early scenes with Trash were good.

Having the red car drive past him was just too much, so many of us wanted this proof of a happy ending for both BG and JH in just one blow that it was really a tone-death and insensitive Troll. I do not think it is "oh, guess what, he wasn't in love with trash at all." the scene where he called him hyung was potent stuff showing the pain of getting over trash. Also, there is something to be said for depicting a character of confused sexual preferences. But what they did with that car is just unforgivable...

The BG story seemed the strongest in 16, but with 17 in account the Trash/NJ one and the Samcheonpo/YJ one are stronger imo.

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I agree on the red car thing. It was a disappointment to me as well.

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I want haitai and chilbongie back. The next episodes preview seems promising cuz there's haitai in it. Aaagh I want chilbongie back.

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I would like to dedicate this song to all chilbongie shippers and @kate who voiced some of my thoughts.
Our bongie lies over the ocean..our bongie lies over the sea
Our bongie lies over the ocean..oh bring back our bongie to jungie
Oh bring back ,.oh bring back..oh bring back our bongie to jungie, na jungie
Oh bring back ..oh bring back..oh bring back before we like am97 over am94

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I don't think I've laughed so hard in ages LOOL

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LOLOL! Bless you!

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Lmaooooo I died. I think my brain will never stop playing this song inside my head for the whole day. Ahahaha i love you

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Thanks Elza!!! I love the song hahaha <3

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THIS WAS SUPER FUNNY! and I agree with it 100%

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Lol @ elza!
I actually thought of a song that suits Chilbong. Not sure if anyone has posted it up...it's Invisible Man by 98 Degrees:

You can hardly
wait to tell all your friends
How his kisses taste sweet like wine
And how he always
makes your heart skip a beat
Every time he walks by
And if you're feeling down
He'll pick you up
He'll hold you close when
you're makin' love
He's everything
you've been dreaming of
Oh baby

I wish you'd look at me that way
Your beautiful eyes
lookin' deep into mine
Telling me more than
any words could say
But you don't even know I'm alive
Baby to you all I am
Is the invisible man

You probably spend
hours on the phone
Talkin' 'bout nothing at all
It doesn't matter
what the conversation
Just as long as he called
Lost in a love so real
And so sincere
You wipe away each other's tears
Your face lights up
whenever he appears

I see you all the time baby
The way you look at him
I wish it was me sweetheart
Boy I wish it was me
But I guess I'll never be...

Hope we get to see MORE of Chilbong and Haitai for the upcoming episodes!

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i do hope chil bong will be back soon. i love him. he's my favorite character.

i hate how manipulative the production has been with chil bong, putting him in the episode 16 cover in the website (which you would think means he would have a side story/focus in said episode) and then he barely appeared there; and then putting chil bong and power pitching in the text preview for episode 17 and then he barely appeared again and he didn't talk about power pitching but about the girl that he likes that is not his girlfriend. they have put him again in the video preview for episode 18, but i'm frankly running on very little hope at the moment. i'd probably dial my expectations low so as not to be too disappointed when he barely appears again.

i hate that his characterization was made to revolve around the love triangle, even making him do things that you wouldn't think he'd do based on how he was presented in the first 10 episodes. but not giving him any screen time at all is really very terrible for me. i wish they'd give him a side story no related to na jung and the triangle.

some people are interpreting that the girl chil bong talks about in the interview is na jung, but i hope that's not the case. i wish it means he's moved on and he met someone and he's dating her, and these all happened offscreen.

i have a feeling the production will make him go back to the love triangle again but i really hope they won't do that. i really hope they won't further butcher his characterization, and won't make him suffer more, and instead work on a side story for him or if that's not at all possible, maybe show how he's moved on and is happy at least.

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Just saying, what he did in the latter episodes was perfectly in line with what he did in the early episodes for some folk. Personally, the way he stealth dated her and was confident this romance tactic would work smacked of "If I put the effort in, whatever girl I like will like me," i.e. reduction of NJ to an object and "nice guy" entitlement (thing is "nice guy" entitlement proves you are actually not such a nice guy). He was legitimately shocked to find out she was into trash and that he would consider that to be the sole reason he did not win her was not surprising (actually refreshing that the second male lead didn't have supreme knowledge of the girl's heart for once).

He was into NJ for her folksy charms and lovable if gruff family, even if he showed clear disdain and amusement at country folk (think all the smirks as he says polite things, or the way he joked with his friends about country life despite H's clear discomfort, or the way he acts like NJ's accent is cute to her clear discomfort).

I am not saying that such a man should be boycotted by woman by any stretch or that he is a bad character for being flawed. People have issues and conceits; Trash has them too. What I am saying is that people seem to put CB on this pedestal and act like the drama told them he was such a great dude and then he started acting weirdly. He did not. You just misread him. My reading of him might be a bit too harsh, but I am pretty sure you can scale it back and still find a consistent reading.

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I don't think writernim wrote Chilbongie that way to be interpreted to as how you interpreted him to be by the viewers. I think it's more of a lapse on her part, or YYS or PDnim's part, because most likely she wants all her characters to be seen in a good light by viewers. AM1994 is a rare kdrama where there are no antagonists. And reflecting on how far she's gone with the dragged-out husband gimmick and bing's u-turn, I'd say she wouldn't have that much thought to Chilbongie's character to add in these little subtleties and nuances. Chilbongie basically appeared like he was a cameo in the past few episodes, he basically is quite flat a character without Na Jung and baseball. But oh well: just putting my opinion out there. Not discrediting yours. It could be what she intended his character to be, but for me it feels highly unlikely.

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i agree. she may have ignored some characters and focused more on other characters, but all her characters (in this drama and in the other drama) are all realistic people.

other people may interpret some characters to be -- i don't know, evil, or whatever. and they do have the right to interpret things however they want.

i think the narrative's focus on the love triangle and the husband mystery is what's keeping the characters from development, and also what drives the thought behind some of the character's actions.

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Evil is a strong word. I don't know if you meant me when you said that, but that is not what I was saying about CB. I was saying that he does have an arrogant side and seems to think of NJ, at least in part, as an object. That is not evil; these are run of the mill flaws particularly as I do not think they are deep running. He objectifies NJ, yes, but I do not mean to say that that is all he sees her as. He is problematic; most people are and I do not think most people are evil. Sorry if you misunderstood.

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THis episode just didn't do anything for me... Sorry.... Since we all know who the husband is now... the fillers are getting bored... They should have focused on the other characters more in the beginning and not now... It feels like they are being used for only showing the obvious in the end...

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Umm...this show has been anything but obvious. Yeah, Trash/NJ is obvious but the way their dating has panned out is refreshing. There are so many moments when I think trash is going to be the standard male lead and do things that throw the relationship into jeopardy and then the show subverts this expectation and gives a satisfyingly real alternative/what I say would be nice if it happened. In just this last episode there was the moment where Trash did not let the other girl go to his mom; the moment where he proposed to NJ instead of being paternalistic and breaking up with her. The way the show does this reminds me of the cancer story or how TW gave up in the end for his brother. Very refreshing stuff.

Every episode I keep expecting for the drama to fall into cliche and hoping other wise and it keeps defying my expectations. While I think the romance should be obvious, otherwise this would be pretty bad drama at this point, I am refreshed that the approach is decidedly not. I am very fearful that next week will be the serious heartburn stuff with the relationship thrown into false ambiguity, and indeed expect that to happen. At this point, it might not be so bad but here is to hoping my drama instincts are subverted again.

I guess that if you cannot even get into the trash/nj relationship you kind of miss out on all the neat things the drama is doing, which sucks for you but whatever floats your boat, I guess.

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Earl Grey,
I don't think next week is going to bring heartburn, actually i think the scene in 2002 is just showing the big wedding that her parents wanted to give her but could not afford to because the father lost all their money. I think trash/nj did not wait 5 years, but are already married long before the actual wedding reception.

Lets have faith in a drama-free love story.

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Trash/NJ episode 18, fighting! Let's take no drama all the way to 21!! :D

I'm so pleased they've stayed together and we haven't had to deal with the BS Kdramas typically employ to keep the leads apart even when they're yes, dating. The premise has demonstrably changed from will they get together? to will they stay together?, a jump most dramas never make even when the leads have gotten together. NJ/Trash has actually been one of the most subversive Kdrama couples I've seen to date, in that Trash is actually like a real dude (only a really awesome one, like the perfect boyfriend you could actually hope for realistically), NJ is not wishy washy and self-denigrating, and they aren't driven apart by misunderstandings and difficulties that could be taken on by just talking to each other. This was particularly well done, in how they paralleled the NJ/Trash storyline with the YJ/SG storyline, such that we were able to watch with a realistic eye: yes, couples that we know stay together go through this kind of stuff too. It kind of reminds me of how revolutionary the Jim/Pam thing in The Office was in American TV, in that they got together, stayed together, got married, had kids, etc, and lo and behold, it did not detract from their dramatic relevance or ruin their characters. Rather, it made their characters and their storyline all the more attractive. I'm ready for Kdramas to take that step too.

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Also, that's a really really interesting and cool idea, that they got married before the ceremony. Now I'm kind of in love with it. Is it too much to expect, though...

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:) So hope you are right!

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That condescending tone... "Boat"? What boat? Did I imply anything...? The guess game is over and the fillers doesn't interest me... I am finding the drama stretchy... Okay yes, we are not on the same "boat" but it doesn't mean that I can't put my opinions down...

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I've been waiting all day for this recap. Whenever I refreshed, I only saw When dramas go crazy. Let me tell you, I was ready to become "when readers go crazy" :) Haha jk

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I don't necessarily agree that HaeTae and Chilbong are mere plot devices. The focus on Binggeurae these two episodes showed that each of the characters will get their own focus. From previews, we already know that the next focus is going to be HaeTae and his girl/ wife and I'm betting all my money episodes 19/20 will focus on giving Chilbong and give him his happy ending.
And I do have faith in the writers that they will wrap up Chilbong's arc satisfactorily. Who saw Die-Die coming? and Baro not being gay. But the way they played the story out, I think most people were happy and are enjoying the Die-Bingeurae couple

On a happier note, the proposal was so romantic and un-flashy. I think my heart was beating as fast as Najung's when he started to get all serious. Props to both Go Ara and Jung Woo who carried off the scene flawlessly. Jung Woo's lone tear as he kissed and the quivering voice. And Najung smiling through her tears was absolutely beautiful. The scene before that with them lying down to take a nap was also wonderfully done. While i almost died of laughter when Oppa was like "Did you by chance... want the automatic machine? That's 1800 bucks!" lmao

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I think the 1996 birthday has been one of my favorite laugh out loud moment of the series. Omo, oppa looked so proud of himself like "yeah I got this, I got my girl the perfect gift" only to see that back thing. I died when he jumped to the conclusion and became angry that she wanted a more expensive back thing. The boy is so imperfectly flawless!

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He's a total idiot in choosing gifts...poor big baby....

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WORD. i'm super glad siwon stepped in for the precious ring. XDD

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"This oppa is a very sensitive man!" XD

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it took me four tries to reply to your message!! i just want to agree with you that i lean towards the belief that haitai and chilbongie are not mere plot devices, but that different characters get the focus during the various episodes. i think this show has done a good job, better than AM1997, on fleshing out the so-called secondary characters and showing them to be real, living people, not just mere plot devices like SO many other dramas. i think that the realistic portrayal has the audience loving the characters, leading us to want to see them more and to be with them in the moments where they grow and change.

i started watching the series in the middle (honestly to see what the deal was with chilbongie and the love that people had for him. and swooon. hehe) and was wondering why bingeurae had practically NO scenes for a few episodes. and then bam, the last few were clearly focused on him.

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Yup, it's like a revolving door. Everyone had one round with their own storylines in the beginning and the second round is happening now. I don't think the writers were like - there you've served your purpose, now off you go! It seems premeditated.
and i agree with you that Binggeurae actually had the least focus out of all the characters until this more Bing-centric second half. CB got a chunk of episodes, it's just we never saw him doing anything but pursuing najung and playing baseball. Samchunpo and Yoonjin are a couple so because they are usually together, their storylines seem to be a constant. anyway, i'm looking forward to how they wrap everyone's lovelines up and have enough faith in the writers that it will be satisfactory.
I'm hoping for Chilbong and the baseball girl. She was cool. HaeTae, i think will have someone totally new like Die Die.

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Thanks for touching on Binggurae's sexuality, which I think is important to address.

He may not be bisexual, but as sexuality is more fluid than many people want to believe, I don't think its fair to call this queer baiting. It was a true representation of what its like to feel confused about sexuality in a society that wants you to pick one, and only one. Intense emotions can happen regardless of gender/sexuality, and to ignore that in media representation is as detrimental to people who have had relationships/crushes/feelings for someone of the same gender and the opposite gender.

I actually really liked "Die-Die." I thought, personality wise, she was perfect for him.

Oh, God the proposal. It almost reminded me of my own, because for a brief moment there I thought he might break up with me. I could see the visceral terror on Na Jung's face and I knew exactly what she was feeling. And Oppa....his shaky voice and his insistence that it wasn't okay for him to be gone all the time. Ugh. It was so perfect.

I also agree on the treatment of Haitai and Chilbongie. The writer (or producer I dunno who had more control) really dropped the ball on them, leaving their characters hanging out to dry. I'm actually really upset about Chilbongie. His character deserved better, and I really hope they can salvage something of it in the end.

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Yeah. The only part I really did not like was the trolling with the red car. If they had not done that I would have been perfectly fine with BG's story. It seemed to deal with his confusing sexuality in a nuanced way, with the nice voice overs, the touching getting into and over oppa scenes, and the getting into die stuff. That red car troll is, however, a big deal. It dangled "see JH and BG together and happy, an explicit gay couple in a k-drama" too hard in front of us. Without that tease, the story would have been really good but that left a sour taste.

Haitai has not been left out to dry imo. He's been in the military 4 episodes and 2 of those 4 have involved story lines at his camp. The cozy group of friends boarding house atmosphere was not going to last the whole show. Now we are getting more individual/pairing stories as opposed to group dynamic stories.

Also CB was always the most extraneous character in the group. He just hung out there because he wanted to get with NJ and had no meaningful relationship with any of the other friends; even his cousin has a deeper relationship with Trash. Yeah, it would be nice if he was more developed but seriously not every character can or should be super developed and if anyone had to get the short-end he was the obvious/best choice. It has also just been 2 episodes since he went to Japan and he is clearly coming back.

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To their credit, I don't think the Red car thing was planned from the beginning. I think the idea that he must be Junhee's man gained so much traction that they just decided to roll with it. It would never have occurred to me to link the two if I hadn't read it here and on Viki and I, even though I was convinced he was gay, I never believed he would end up with Junhee. I really think the is is a case of the writers saying "Hey, did you here the rumor going around about Bing and Junhee? Let's have some fun with it." It's one of the few fake-out that I've really enjoyed.

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I'll accept Haitai, but Chilbongie was not extraneous, not when he was supposed to be a strong contender for Na Jung's affections.

If the show hadn't promoted this being about Na Jung and Chilbongie, then there wouldn't have been expectations for one over the other. If he was supposed to have a shot, they should have given him a shot. It's manipulation and audiences don't like being manipulated. It makes them cranky and distrustful.

I don't care that she isn't with CB, that's fine. I've always been a Trash shipper, anyways. But I don't think its fair to the character that he's disappeared for two episodes (which is a lot this late in the show) when he was supposed to be a leading role, and hasn't gotten any story outside his relationship to Na Jung (baseball doesn't count. I'm talking about people). I don't miss him and I don't care about his feelings, but I don't think that's what the writer was going for, not when they are still playing the "whose the husband" game.

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*who's* doh.

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i wonder if the writers were just hedging their bets... like, in the beginning, i honestly thought chilbong would, without a doubt, be endgame, but as the series progressed (and [korean] audiences received jung woo's character so well) i think it became increasingly apparent that it wouldn't be chilbong, even though i felt that a lot of the promotion made it seem that way--though i understand that that was to preserve the little surprise in the beginning of oppa not being her real oppa... i read somewhere before that the writers weren't sure whether the audience would accept garbage as a contender because he and na-jung grew up as siblings, which might veer a little too close to incest for some. if that were true i can totally see them beginning with the intent of chilbong being endgame, seeing how much people loved garbage/na-jung, and changing their plans accordingly (kind of like that one bae doo-na drama where [spoilers?] the guy who was clearly meant to be the male lead ended up not getting the girl because people liked park shi-hoo so much... but i think this has been handled muuuuch better than that drama, cos i was so confused when male dude was alone at the end.)

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i don't think that the storyline really changed because of audience reactions and preferences though. Shin PD said in an interview that both Reply 94 and 97 stories are about how two people - a boy and a girl - who've practically grown up together suddenly become aware of each other and seeing how their relationships develop. He likes telling that kind of story.

Also Jung Woo was always intended to be the main guy. They were actually developing Reply 94 first and wanted Jung Woo to be in it but he had to go to the army so while they were looking for other characters to cast, the first one they liked and hired was Eun Ji Won. The PD/ Writers then thought it would be more fun to change the year to when Eun Ji Won was famous as Sechkies and thus Reply 1997 was born. It became a big enough hit to garner a follow-up and the PD/writers went to Jung Woo again.

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You might be right, I don't know. I do know that often the fact that a show that isn't pre-written can suffer. Changing who she ends up with is okay, as long as it makes sense.

I guess my biggest issue with this, is that its so obviously going to be Trash, but the game is still being played over who her husband is, and at this point I can't trust the writer not to suddenly switch it at the end.

I am disappointed because the show was so promising with great characters. But I have had a hard time enjoying the beautiful moments between Trash and Na Jung because of the fear it might be taken away, and not in the good way (like if it would make sense narratively for her to be with CB over Trash).

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I'm just angry at how the writers handled the 3 triangle. To me it wasn't even a competition bc oppa got the better hand (and of course Na Jung never wavered) plus why did they make chilbong leave for so long? I thought his absence would make a big impact but they simply pushed him aside.
And now that oppa proposed, how can chilbongie come and compete when it's that serious?????
Ughh ;(

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This drama reminds me of dream high where we thought she would end up with JG but at the 14th ep she realized she liked SD and quite intensely I might add cos every moment they sent together after that was hot and I mean hot

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This episode made me realize how much I'm on team chilbong :(( before I didn't really care all that much and I was fine with oppa being the husband, but there was just something about the fact that garbage kind of put work above na jung that didn't quite sit right with me, especially when I knew chilbongie would have done the opposite...
Sigh I still love you show...

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Not to mention that OUR CHILBONGIE GOT LIKE ONE MINUTE OF SCREENTIME WHAT IS THIS SORCERY

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Haha....now that's funny...it's true....though I love love oppa,,, I will follow what na jeong wants...but CB should've been around as an equal contender,,,even if he is the husband, there's too little time to suddenly develop his love line....why writer nim?

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but there was just something about the fact that garbage kind of put work above na jung that didn’t quite sit right with me

But he's a doctor... whose job is to heal people and get rid of illnesses... and illnesses don't wait for working hours to come before they rear their ugly head.

Compared to many other professions, doctors require the most intensive training ever and also the most agile minds, which leads to each carefully chosen med-student taking up lots of resources, resulting in limited number of doctors everywhere and therefore usually high doctor-to-patient ratios in hospitals.

Besides actively treating patients by their bedside, they also have to analyse charts and what-not.

With all that important work, how can anyone really expect Oppa to put NaJung above his work? What, so when NaJung calls for him, he's supposed to drop all his patients and fly to her because the worst that can happen is one just of his patients dying due to untimely treatment?

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It is simply that people have unrealistic and frankly unattractive expectations of men. They dislike trash/Nj because trash had doubts about whether romancing her was really a good idea in light of his close relationship with her and her family. They dislike that he showed any confusion about his feelings. They dislike that he did not come running to her in Samcheonpo like CB did. They dislike that he takes his career seriously (but come on guys, he did almost not go to Pusan because of NJ and he is proposing to her so that they can be closer during the internship and he can actually see her).

Basically people whine about how Nj is all about oppa but then whine when Oppa has other things in his life besides NJ. It is the gendered expectations of this drama: Oppa is in a lot of ways playing a traditionally female role for a k-romance and people don't like it; Nj is playing a traditionally masculine role. Notice how they do not care about how obsessed CB is with NJ, cause he is a dude (they also do not care that CB only went to Samcheonpo cause his job permitted or that we went of to japan (instead it was the cruel writers who sent him off)).

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@peeps I agree with you and adore how knowing and understanding Jeong is of this. I really like how even though the trip would take hours, he is extremely busy and both knew it was highly possible that he would only see her for an hour or so at best or not at all. They missed each other enough and he really wanted to be there for her birthday; that, that hour or even simple 10 minutes of time was worth the long trip :D love them and their ability to make it work.

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this is funny.

"that hour or even simple 10 minutes of time was worth the long trip"

that was the reason why most viewers were touched when chil bong took that long 12-hour (6-hours each way) trip to be with na jung and the others at sam chun po.

and why there's some disappointment that oppa, even just as a friend, didn't make the same decision then to be with the group. and there's more disappointment if as most trash shippers say that he already knows his romantic feelings for na jung then.

but whenever that scene was brought up, and the two actions were compared because the scenes were shown in parallel and the previous voiceover is about "how life is about choices" by sam chun po, most trash shippers would argue that other people are being too demanding of men to expect them to always do extravagant things and to want them to show epic portrayals of romantic love.

but you seem to feel the same way anyway. "that hour or even simple 10 minutes of time was worth the long trip"

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were chilbong and najung dating? no. so what are you trying to say lol

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i think trash thinks na jung and his work are both important, except his work is not the kind of thing that works within specified time frames like 8-to-5 or 9-to-5 thing.

and chil bong also thinks his work/career is important. there was a time that he missed practice to drink with friends, but he is also prioritizing his work/career: in an episode he drank only because his game the next day was postponed the day after, and he stayed behind in seoul to meet a recruiter and he only followed his friends when that meeting got cancelled, and he went to japan to play baseball there because it was a good opportunity for his career even though it meant he will be away from his real family (dad, mom, and stepdad) and his makeshift family and friends in the boardinghouse.

i think, chil bong is in a better position to plan out his life between work and love (and family in the future) because baseball has seasons, and he can work around the 24 hours to plan his training, etc.

trash as a doctor does not really have that luxury because there are emergency cases, etc. but that doesn't mean he thinks work is more important than na jung.

i think that's why yoon jin's statement that "doctors marry doctors" is very telling. because they are in the same profession, they can deal better with the profession's negative aspects in terms of work-life balance.

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I'm reminded of a Scrubs episode where Elliott told her then bf that she couldn't promise he'll always come first but when the decision is hers to make she'll always pick him.

He's a hospital doctor and that's more a vocation than a job.

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When you have ever been on Trash Oppa's shoes or you are on the position of a patient and your doctor chooses his girlfriend over you and you will know why

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Your comment made me wonder at your age because no sensible grown up would have made such a lousy comment!!

How would you feel if say you have a major health crises and your doctor would rather go on a date with his wife or girlfriend instead of taking care of you; but lets forget medicine for awhile, does love feed you?

Trash is in medicine and having his internship at that; it's a very important time in his life careerwise. CB ditching baseball to be with NJ is his own problem, it doesn't make him wise or better than the person who doens't have that option.

Next time, think before you blabber!!

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"Your comment made me wonder at your age because no sensible grown up would have made such a lousy comment!!"

i never know how to feel about comments like this. because what about the fact that maturity doesn't necessarily come with age? being young doesn't necessarily mean you're ignorant, and being old doesn't necessarily mean you're wise. plenty of "grown ups" are immature and not "sensible.." but that has nothing to do with their ages, tbh.

(for the record, i'm 22.)

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im sorry, i really didn't mean my comment in an offensive way...im really truly sorry
im not a doctor so i guess i wouldnt know
and its not like i expected oppa would drop everything in the hospital and run to najung cause its her birthday, its just that that scene reminded me of the fact that it was almost always najung running to trash and never really vice versa (this is my own opinion)

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yea... like everyone has already said, you obviously have no idea what it's like to be a doctor during the residency time period. it is described to be a LIVING HELL.

older doctors bossing you around to their work. ridiculous sleep hours (normal to sleep 2-3 hours). all the while studying ur ass off. eating snacks all the time.

i know cuz my boyfriend is in med school.

oppa not having "time" for NJ is completely understandable. and NJ obviously understands as well since she didnt make a big fuss over her bday ordeal.

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Didnt najung get married in 2002? if Trash proposed in 1996 thats a long (6 year long) engagement. something to think about with four more episodes to go

still on team chilbongie!

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With the foreshadowing of the parents' financial troubles, is it possible that Na Jung waited until her family was more financially sound to have a wedding? She seems like a doting enough daughter to do that for her parents and her parents seem like the kind of people who'd want to give their only daughter a big wedding.

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(And this is spoken as a Chilbong fan; I need some cold logic to temper my dissatisfaction with his character arc.)

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Aww... some one give me a cold reminder too cuz I can't bring myself to ship for Oppa/Na jung

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Mhm, isn't it only 5 years?

I actually have hopes for the millenium promise that Oppa doesn't even know about.
He wasn't there when the rest of the boardinghouse friends promised to meet at NJ house for '99/2000 "end of the world"-day.

So, Oppa doesn't know and CB will come from every corner of the world for NJ, right?
I mean he earns a lot of money "now" (being MVP in '97) and he should be saving up for this ticket since 1995 (? - or since he knew he was going to Japan).

Thank god, it's not as expensive anymore (less than 100$ to go from Japan to Korea...)

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Ahra and Jung Woo did a wonderful job in that proposal scene. I am happy for Najung and Oppa. They will be wonderful together.

My real problem lies with the treatment of Chilbong during these last few episodes. I am really frustrated as a fan. I don't really care for Chilbong to be the husband. Who am I to decide Najung's husband for her?

I feel like the author had many opportunities to grow Chilbong as a character especially with the divorce, absentee parents but chose not to do it. I am a fan of Chilbong and YYS is doing an excellent job portraying him. I have never been attached to a drama character before ever. There was so much potential with his character with him relocating to Japan and joining a team. I know there are four episodes left but I still don't really know what more to expect. I know that everyone is happy in the end but it feels really late to throw all his character development in the last four episodes.

Sorry to sound so negative. This has been on my mind for a while.

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Yes, I absolutely agree! He had so much potential to be developed outside of the "love triangle", but for whatever reasons, the writer completely disregarded it. It saddens me, because if he wasn't going to get the girl in the end it'd been at least satisfying to see that he got the character development he deserved.

Total disservice to Chilbongie and Yoo Yeon Seok, in my opinion.

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With YYS being cast in 3 movies makes his sudden disappearance from the show a lot more palatable. Now I don't have to worry for him. Yes, my worry over CB has been transferred to him.^^

Ps: some of the comments surprise me if they think CB disappeared from the show cuz YYS is now attached to 3 projects. :S

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i agree. i love chil bong and he's my favorite character. for some strange reason, i grew really attached to him and i was really invested in his story.

i'm fine if his story arc is unrequited love. but to actually ship him somewhere and then ignore his existence and forget to follow-through with his resolution is really frustrating for me.

i mean, why let me get attached to a character and then forget him in the end? am i supposed to forget about him as well? i don't think that's possible, i'm already invested in his story and i want to see things through for his character. :(

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I'm still hoping there is room for Chilbong to make it in as the ultimate husband within four episodes. I'm trying to be optimistic. However, I think I'll still be pretty disappointed if he is the true husband, since there was so much more going on between Na Jung and Trash.

-Still crossing my fingers and holding out all hope for Chilbong to have a happy ending-

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Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that I was so happy to see Eun Ji Won making a cameo. Although Hak Chan didn't play a big role in 1997, he was still such a character.

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that may be possible, given that they resolved kim dong joon aka bing geu re's story arc in just two episodes, but well, i don't know if it will be satisfying?

i mean i loved bing geu re's story but i can't help feeling that everything happened way too fast for him? we got the first couple of times he met die die (jin yi), then they kissed, and then we find out they are married?

i loved these parts actually, and i'm happy with his story, except i would have wanted more moments of them together, like the case with sam chun po and yoon jin?

if ever the ending becomes na jung and chil bong (and this is a big if), we wouldn't get a lot of those sweet moments because there are other characters that the drama will surely find closure for.

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idk, i like chilbong more than garbage oppa, but i'll be kinda pissed if he ends up na-jung's husband. i mean, they established and wrapped up binggeure's future relationship in two episodes (and actually, the same was true with yoon-jin and samcheonpo; we found out about their relationship fairly quickly, as well) so i don't doubt that the writers COULD do it... i'd just feel weird about it. na-jung spent so many episodes only seeing oppa... first pining after him and then building this relationship with him, and now they're engaged... in that time, she was aware of chilbong's feelings but never indicated the slightest romantic interest in him, not to mention the fact that he's basically dropped off the face of the earth in the last few episodes and no one cares...

idk. i'd feel cheated. his character and relationship with na-jung hasn't been developed much, so it'd seem very last minute. if we were shown that she was more conflicted in her feelings for chilbong, i might feel differently, but she pretty much immediately forgot about his confession &didn't react at all to her photo being tucked into his hat... so even though i love chilbong and my heart has broken for him about a dozen times in the last five or so episodes, i'd feel weird if he ended up being the husband.

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I feel the same. As a viewer, I can't help but love Chilbongie, who's proven to be sweet, determined, hard-working and madly in love with the female character (not to mention his perfect abs and smile...)

Trash on the other hand, I find it difficult to root for. Firstly, it is difficult to believe he's a student in his early 20's and all his aeygos and childish expressions look out of place (or is just me who thinks he looks rather 40?). The girl confesses and he has nothing to say when facing her suffering (I can understand he has doubts, but still in a case like this, you owe an answer to the other person, playing with others feelings is not nice). They have a date and we see that the girl ends up cleaning his appartment (no comment),...and the kisses and romantic moments, where is the sexual tension and the passion?? he kisses her as if they were 5 and at the kindergarten.
This show does not touch the right strings for me, it started well but now it's becoming boring. And part is because of my beloved Chilbongie, but the other part is the lack of excitement in the main loveline. And the two things are bad writing in my view...a good drama writer knows how to make you love the main character...
These are my thoughts, of course I respect T-NJ shippers, in fact, I don't want CB to end up with NJ because it doesn't make sense anymore...but I hope the writers give him a nice and decent story so the character doesn't feel such a waste in the end...Well, not very commited with the story anymore, I think I will skip the other parts and follow only CB scenes from now on, hahaha!!

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lmao, you sure is biased, basically you put everything about oppa on a bad light because of the bias inside you.

Their kiss was kindergarden level, what about CB? Fetus kiss scene?

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I feel happy for najung and oppa! Even though I was a Chilbong fan, I just love to see them so beautifully happy. Answer Me 1994. You make my day <3

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Not watching, and only reading occasionally, but after reading your analysis of Binggeure's character development [which I can't judge since I'm not watching and have not opinion on] I really enjoyed 'listening' to your at mind work.

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honestly as a queer individual the resolution of the binggeure storyline really bothered me. it's deliberate queer-baiting on the part of the writers and that's manipulative and wrong, tbh! you can't tell me that they didn't specifically write the binggeure-trash relationship to SEEM like a one-sided romantic feelings sort of thing, only to pull the rug out from under us and be like lol! you thought he was gay? silly kids! he was straight all along! we're cleverer than you!!! watch us fake you out with red cars and pillow-covering-face-squeeing moments!

i wouldn't even be upset if they wrote him as sexually fluid/bisexual, but that would mean there would need to be a canonical recognition of the fact that those feelings for trash WERE romantic, which there wasn't. instead, it's just ~hero-worship and those of us who were invested in binggeure as a character because we thought he was a representation of us as a minority get a swift kick in the pants and are, ultimately, dismissed. smh. i guess i expected better from the writers who gave me kang joonhee, but then again we never got to SEE his happy ending so i guess i shouldn't have expected so much. siiigh -_-

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addendum: i realize that people struggle with their sexuality all the time (god knows i have) and sometimes that ends with people deciding that they're straight. my problem is that binggeure's storyline was never explicitly written as a struggle with sexuality - it was never referenced, and that makes me upset. if that was the story they wanted to portray, it deserved to be talked about and, y'know, actually /there/ rather than just alluded to mysteriously. because without that it just seems like they were trying to pull a gotcha! moment.

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There has got to be a defining moment towards the end, as subtle as they can lay it out, don't think it's a gotcha moment. Can't imagine how else they could have done it, I thought it was beautifully done.

Struggling with sexuality is just a small part of life, is it really such a big deal as so many make it out to be, or the need to amplify it?

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The thing is, Bing it's not like Joonhee, who had a best friend to suss these things out with so that we knew his feelings were definitely romantic. It's totally within his character to struggle with this silently, much in the same way that he didn't tell anyone that he quit school and mainly kept his own counsel about it even when everyone found out. We didnt know how he felt about that and we didn't know how he felt about Trash, because he didn't really know.p

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I agree....totally agree... most people would squeal with delight by the turn of character but it didn't feel right... they should have made him bi-sexual... since the looks he gave or feelings he showed were no where near "Hero worship"...It was simply LOVE and they did show some sort of sexual conflicts before like the kissing scene and when Garbage changes in front of him...etc...etc.

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Here is the thing; the writers never said that BG was gay or bi-sexual, we imposed that label on him. He did say when he quit medicine the first time that he doesn't know what he likes or dislikes, so he went through a discovery phase in his life. Should he be made bi-sexual if the only male he was ever attracted to was only Oppa? I am sure there are a million people in this world who call themselves straight but find that there is one person from thesame sex they would consider being in love with, but I can't say that they will go as far as carrying out the relationship...it is almost like a sacred love/feelings kind of thing.

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If writer-nim was going to build Binggurae's story into something that parallels Joon-hee's, then I think she has made a miscalculation somewhere along the episodes.

When I first read the interview stating how Joon-hee's love story was the most precious one to the staff due to the delicate nature of the matter, and the fact that Joon-hee's character himself was a delicate personality, I had high hopes for Binggurae's story, which seemed like it was beginning to venture along those lines.

But alas, I was disappointed that they chose to 'end' Binggurae's story with a simple 2-episode introduction of Die Die as the conclusion to his love story. Oh of course, I loved Die Die (it's quite hard to hate Yoon Jin-yi) and thought their love was sweet. But I just feel that the conclusion to Binggurae's confusion wasn't done as well as Joon-hee's.

Joon-hee more silent moments to mull over his feelings/ more screen time showing us audience that this was what was going on in his head, we hear his dialogues with Shi-won about Yoon-jae and know what Joon-hee's feelings were, we see it in his reactions towards Yoon-jae which gives us clues to his state of mind.

Bottomline: I felt the conclusion to Binggurae's 'confusion'/ love story wasn't done as delicately well as Joon-hee's, which is a waste.

Perhaps it was just that AM1997 had raised my expectations so high for AM1994, that prompted this disappointment.

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Am I the only one who is glad that they didn't make the storyline parallel to Junhee's? I love AM97 but I watched that last year; I'm watching this now. When this show started I was really disappointed because I thought all the characters were just copies of their '97 templates. So I was pleasantly surprised that everyone pretty much went in their own direction... all except Bingie,w ho up until this weekend was just Junhee Lite. I was ecstatic that they did something different with him.

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I'm not gay and I feel the same way, it was too much of a gimmick in the end. I wrote something on the last epi thread. I too felt it was a bit of a dismissal to not go ahead and deal with Bing as a gay man, or bisexual. I will say I'm not even sure the show itself is saying Bing was not bisexual and that it was hero worship. I think that it may be interpreted like that by fans. And I felt that Trash was also....enigmatic...I'll go with that, in his behavior towards Bing. In fact in the first two episodes I thought that Trash was going to be the gay character and end up flashing forward to be red car person. I never felt Bing was going to be red car person.

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I'm pretty sure that in the preview we hear chilbongies voice.. I got some hope that he's coming back! A small cloud of hope but hope nonetheless. Chilbong fighting!

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Gosh I'm loving these 1997 crossovers haha. I hope we get to see Shiwon and Trash's reunion in 2013, cause we all know how that's gonna go rofl. I love Najung's reaction to Shiwon's temper when she's calling out Yoonjae. I mean, the great Sung Najung is a tad taken back by Sung Shiwon's presence. The 1997 cameos were honestly the most fun of the drama so far, and most of that is because of the sentimental reminders on how special Reply 1997 is. I miss the characters, I miss the OTPs, I miss their friendship, I miss the whole thing.

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OK maybe I'm in the minority but I'm loving all the trash and na jung moments. I realize that they are neglecting some of the characters and while that's not cool every time those two come on screen I can't stop myself from squealing. That proposal was honestly the best I've seen. The two portrayed their characters and the feelings they were experiencing at the time so beautifully and accurately I felt like I was invading on a private moment. And don't even get me started on the pelting of kisses right before trash left to go to the hospital. I'm so happy that he's finally reciprocating the romantic feelings na jung has always expressed. I do hope to see more insight on his feelings, perhaps a series of flashbacks where we can see things through his point of view? I don't think I can hold out for two more weeks..

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We are few but here. I feel the same way about Na-Jeong and Oppa. I squee and fangirl and get happy and smiley or laugh till my sides hurt (like the 96 b-day scene) whenever they are on screen together.

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Don't think you are minority. Many here loved Trash & NJ moments.

Though I love Chilbongie & NJ moments as well, I squeal at Trash & NJ also. It's a drama. Of course, I wish Chilbongie is real, though it's difficult to imagine such perfect man exist.

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I know we all have our own opinions, but I feel like in every deconstructing post, trash and najeong moments are always downplayed while chilbong is always highlighted. I highly disagree that chilbong and Haiti were mere 'plot devices'. With chilbong, I think what the author is trying to teach us is that, sometimes in life, no matter how hard you try, you won't win. Life and love aren't like baseball where the amount of effort and persistence will equal victory. Sometimes you have to learn to accept failure. I think this is an extremely important lesson for chilbong, because for all his life, effort equaled results. Oppa may have put his work first, but it doesn't mean to him work is more important than najeong. You can see it affected him way more than it did for najeong to miss her birthday. But if a patient is dying, it's a doctor's responsibility be there. He has a moral responsibility. As for Haitai, I think we will see his character develop in the next episode with the mystery girl. For people who said the proposal was not romantic, I can tell you I watched that scene 4 times now, and every time I cry. The raw emotions and love they have for each other is the purest thing in the world.

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The re-cappers are CB shippers plain and simple no matter how hard they try to hide that from us and maybe themselves behind an "objective" problem with the plot (which so happens to be obviously couched in extreme CB shipping reading of the story/denial that what so many of us see could actually be what happened). Seriously, I wish they would just admit it instead of denying it. Really uncool and disappointing. Should relabel the site with "shipping" instead of "deconstructing" and "analyzing," and not pretend that their bias is indicative of a structural problem with the plot (instead of personal preference or at most the husband mystery gimmick).

This is the same re-capper who just last week appealed to people to stop the shipping war when CB clearly said some disturbing things and now wades full throttle into the shipping war and makes most of a recap about a touching Oppa/NJ episode about CB. It is so obvious, and yet denial.

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well then, why are you using the word "re-capper"? You, my friend are not so honest or straightforward as well

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I do realize that the recapper is a CB shipper, but I believe that they are doing a good job of not imposing their preference on us. They make general comments after their recaps that manages to not take sides and I kind of like that because I totally hate when recappers impose their preference on others and you know, many people just follow and nod!! They can use a different user name and write their comment in the comment section just like us, though.

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hmm yea i agree with some of this. i agree that i too, sense that the dramabeans recappers are skewed toward CB. however, i don't think it's super extreme or anything.

but it is def THERE. i mean for gods sake they dedicated a longass paragraph about how they are so disappointed over CB's absence in the recent episodes. there is nothing wrong with that, but it is a mighty stark contrast to the literally nonexistent commentary on how amazing the execution of the proposal was.

I really liked dramabeans recap for best love - it was VERY equal in discussing/squealing/fangirling over both male leads. even if it was obvious that dok go jin was gonna end up with ae jung no matter what.

i hate how ppl keep saying they feel so "cheated" by reply1994. yes, it may have started out as a "whos the husband" fiasco, but everyone knew that at a certain point the writer was going to choose one over the other. it just so happens that the writer seemingly chose one earlier on. ALSO its sad that CB's absence has somehow made NJ/trash oppa getting together that much more uneventful and boring. when in actuality, it is one of the more organic and mutual relationships ever depicted in kdrama history. lol cuz man kdrama relationships can be pretty ridic sometimes.

even if i am a trash shipper i sincerely missed CB's presence in the show. but i really think he will have an episode or two dedicated to his storyline, kinda like bing's two episode arc. and with that in mind, i dont think there is anything wrong dedicating this much time to develop NJ/trash relationship esp if the writer plan on making them endgame.

and yes, many CB fans have admitted that their distaste in the show is directly correlated to CB's absence. which is a shame because the progression of NJ/Trash relationship is beautiful no matter what stance you may have.

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So agree. Really into this romance as a relationship and as a continual subversion of drama norms. You do not stand alone :)

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I was so impressed with Jung Woo and Go Ara in the proposal scene. When Ara smile-cried, I could feel what Na Jung was feeling ;_;

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She was so afraid he was going to say, "Let's break up," as was I. EVEN THOUGH I SAW THE LITTLE BOX!
Her face had me convinced it was earrings or a "Don't forget me in your future life without me necklace."

I think I actually yelped in happiness when he got down on one knee.

The looks of adoration from both sides were lovely. NJ is so proud that he is a doctor and weathering the storms of his crazy schedule is the least of her worries.

They are indeed, made for each other.

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For some reason even though everything is swimmingly fine and I swoon over the proposal like no other, but I have a naggy feeling, when things are this perfect, why do I feel fearful, something might happen...I don't mean to rain on the parade... Coz I prolly can't take the heart attack. Its the pessimist in me.... Ah...what is this show doing to me?!

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"Confirmation."

LOL

I remember that SNL episode with Seo In Guk...

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I also think Trash Oppa was influenced somewhat by Seo In Guk... *cough* OMG, that one episode.... He makes Trash Oppa look tidy. =P

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Thank you. It was a beautiful proposal according to me. I had tearsin my eyes.
Oppa is the Husband. Not only because the emotional connect is so good that it would be just plain trolling to break it and show someone else as husband, but because of this awesome piece of CSI work that I read in soompi.(Credit totally to this mastermind genius who figured this out)
We see the picture from the wedding with the guys where they are in the same order in episode when they wait outside the door in house warming party
From Left to right : Oppa, SCP, Binggeure , Haitai and Chilbongie

Episode 4 - First Name Revealed - Kim Jae Joon- NJ calls her Husband-Oppa
Episode 8 - Second Name Revealed - Kim Seong Gyun - Yj calls her Husband-SCP
Episode 17 - Third Name Revealed - Kim Dong Joon - Doc calls her Husband- Binggeure
Episode 18 or 19 am fairly certain Haitai will be called by his wife with his name
Episode 21 will be reaveal of CB wife along with his name which will not be Kim Jae Joon(or he will be the husband with the same name as Oppa which I really doubt seems tacky and not writers style.)

Given the writers love for clues and attention to detail (for the most part) am confident this theory will pan put. Of all the theories about colours and coffee cups this one seems more reliable and sens.

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ummm, I believe she called her husband "Yeobo", not Oppa.

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i think she/he meant najung called her husband "Kim Jae Joon" and Oppa's the first person in the line-up.

Also, rewatching the scene where everyone had to pick which person they would marry if the world ended - None of the people who picked each other have worked out so far:

Haetae- YoonJin
Yoonjin- Oppa
Oppa- Yoonjin
Samchunpo- Najung
Bingeurae- Najung

so the only one left now is Najung- Chilbong

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She calls her husband "Kim Jae Joon" the second time, after calling him "Yeobo". Right now, we're still assuming that the husband is Oppa, but it's a pretty safe assumption for most of us.

I bet this was a pattern that the audience was supposed to pull together after the big reveal... or at least after Haitai's real name reveal. (If it's a pattern at all. We'll find out with Haitai next week!)

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This has been weighing on me for a while...

But in real life, over the course of a day or a few hours, I prolly call my best friend many different names... her real name, or formally Miss Y, her nickname, her internet/sns nickname, or downright tough and all we call each other my boo or my bitch affectionately sometimes...

I believe its the same for many couples too... my mom will call my dad... Mr X, old hubby, Papa if she wants him to nag him to do something we kids (as in me and my very advance in age brother requested, but we are still kids at home) or in the privacy without us knowing, hubby-wifey, sweetie, darling, dear, honey etc...

Thus, what I meant to say is... we already know the trolling nature and the whole hubby mystery, I think its kinda even an open/understood secret that the writers is messing with us... hence Najung calling her hubby, yobbo, chagiya and throw in Oppa & Kim Jaejoon into the mix as well. It could be one or 2 person. But my point is we don't call people close to us by one name, we normally have more ways to call them. Especially more evident now, they can't even want to have Binggereu say who he is going to meet but just someone Oppa know. He could just say his wife or give a nickname only the gang knew or something... but the writer had to made it mysterious...

Seriously this writing is making me wonder if they are geniuses or they are just into mind-effing us.... but I guess it made for effective watching with us all discussing and analysing...

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Did they leave CB out in the running because of the actor's movie commitments?

I am honestly very disappointed... I don't like how the love triangle was written. I wish they would have added more meat in the Oppa/NJ line because I felt that it was too rushed and it didn't make me feel so invested. How are they going to insert CB into the story from now on?

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Did they leave CB out in the running because of the actor’s movie commitments?

Uhm, I don't think any of the movies have started shooting yet... He JUST confirmed with them...

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was anyone else bothered by the recycling of scenes from Answer me '97? For instance, Yoo Jin claims to be socially awkward and disappears when SCP's friends show up. Hak Chan did the same thing to Yoo Jung in '97! Also, the famous "confirmation" kiss between Shi-Won and Yoon Jae was used again with Binggurae's kiss with Die-Die. i mean i guess it was kinda fitting since he was confirming if he had feelings for a girl. i love the answer me series but i wish they would come up with new material!

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I don't think it was for want of new material but done on purpose. For the majority of fans of both the series, it was kind of a tongue-in-cheek inside joke thing. Like on DC a lot of the people watching just Reply 1994 couldn't understand why Hak chan was acting that way with Najung.

I for one enjoyed it and loved the nostalgia.

Especially when the same song that played during Yoonjae's proposal to Shiwon played during Oppa's proposal too

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Yayyyy have been waiting for this!!

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OMG did anybody else squeal when they saw shiwon &yoon.jae n the baby awwwwwwwwww omg.im rewatching 97 I <397 4ever

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Am not sure what to say about the show anymore; for sure, NJ can't be falling in love with another character next week even if it makes sense time wise, it just wouldn't episode wise as the writers needs to start tying up loose ends rather than creating more drama.

I know some of us are angry about the disappearance of CB and HT's character this week and part of last, but what if that's due to their other projects and not because there was no story for them? I don't want to misjudge the writers if they are only giving their subjects room to take advantage of the fame they are receiving due to their involvement in this project. After all, they were perfect with each character in the 1997 show. Am just worried that even with the additional episode, they may not be able to tie up loose ends properly!

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no, that's not possible.

the actors playing hai tai and chil bong have only just confirmed their casting in their movies, those are not filming yet, and will probably not film until this drama finishes shooting/airing.

the actors playing hai tai and chil bong have already received the filming schedule of this drama in advance so their respective management agencies would have planned their activities in a way that there's no conflict of schedule.

i mean it's possible they will barely have any sleep with drama shootings, cf shootings (if any), photo shoots (if any), events (etc). but their management agencies will not double book them for same time/day because then they obviously will not be able to report for work if that's the case.

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I thought it was because I was a CB fan that I felt his sudden disappearance from the show was handled to badly. But seeing it mentioned here, I really feel the need to agree. The thing is, I understand that he was a part of that central love triangle and that was why most of his character sort of revolved around liking/loving NJ. And thats no reason for me to feel he isn't a well carved out character because I kinda liked that simplicity about him.

But now that its clear who the husband is (and has been for so many episodes tbh), wasn't it necessary to maybe give CB another story arc. Maybe elaborate on his past, or how he's coping with the heartbreak and living through it all. Or maybe having a new love interest. Anything that doesn't make it feel like he was there because they needed him - now that they don't, its like he no longer exists. If they still want to go with this godforsaken 'mystery' then it would still make sense for them to show him move on, only to realize he still loves NJ or something.

If the point is to portray him as an equal contender, why isn't he being treated like one. When I was reading the recaps, I don't think I saw a single photo of his, and thats just sad. I wish they'd let him live a life that just doesn't revolve around NJ. I do like Oppa and her, but I'd rather know what happens to the other characters I've grown to love than see the main couple being in love. That may sound bitter but I actually didn't get invested in this show for the love triangle. It was about everyone, their friendship and relationships. We don't have that anymore, and thats just disappointing.

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what makes you think CB wont get his own story arc within the last 4 episodes? even binggrae (who wasnt treated nearly as major of a character as CB) got ~2 episodes about his backstory. therefore, im pretty sure the writers are just saving the "best for last"

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I loved that proposal! I loved it, I loved it, I loved it!! I adore the fact that there were no grand theatrics of one thousand and one candles, heart shaped roses, and far too many balloons that will have to be popped. It was just a guy offering his heart and future to a girl who had been dreaming of it since she was little.

It was small and intimate and in the moment. I loved that Na-Jeong had bed hair and sleep still in her eyes. Oppa had the ring for a while (a week) and maybe he had been planning something grand but as he watched her sleep and thought of the misery he went through when he had believed she had left him; he knew that it couldn't wait. That right then was the moment because if he let it pass him by, another moment and her would be gone.

I adored the throw back to the 2nd ep with their sharing a bed and the song. That was the ep we learned that he was not her oppa and her dream growing up was to marry him *gets teary* and by the end of the scene that dream is realized. No words needed. She leaned in and "answered with [her] body".

Jung Woo and Go Ara acted that scene to perfection. It felt like watching a real proposal happen. Oppa's teary eyes, the quiver in his voice, the nervousness of knowing but still not knowing. I like that he was honest. He didn't make promises that he knew circumstances wouldn't allow him to keep. He was honest in wanting a commitment, a shared future that would settle his fears. I melted when he said "Jeong...My Jeong, would you marry me? Please marry me?" *fangirls* Go Ara's facial expression, the joy and excitement and the hint of wonderment that it was really truly happening. The tears and when she leaned in to kiss answer the tear from both of them...it pulled me in without subs and even more so with.

I don't know why it takes them 5 years nor the turns the writers will throw their way; the two will make it down the aisle.

*continues being a happy fangirl*

The 1996 birthday scene was one of their funniest to date. What I try love is when he catches on....then assumes and gets angry that she wanted a ridiculously expensive back thingy! Never change Oppaa!!

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I love your comment!!!

I agree, it didn't need to have a gimmicky type event but just a pure genuine proposal. I really love how Oppa built it up and the way Najung looks at him, I was like please don't tell me you are breaking up, when he said regardless how hard he tried, they will be times where he will put work above her. But when he kneel down.... I died. Najung tears, Oppa voice breaking slightly. I could feel their love from my screen... Most perfect ever. I have not gotten weak knees for a drama proposal in a really long time... (And to think Shiwon was the one that help to choose the ring. Oppa, you really do have questionable taste sometimes with the exercise bench... I lol so hard when she was flipping Oppa in the bench on anger and he got nauseous. Which is why I think its amazing he got Najung that pretty necklace earlier.)

And Oppa knows the girl is for keeps. She came all the way from Seoul, and you showing her your injuries. (Oppa screen injury make my heart hurt and wanted to pet my screen, and he really look like a tired resident/intern, the sallowness in his cheek shows... I hope Jung Woo rest well before his next project). Make her cook her own birthday meal. Leave her before you can start eating... And she surprise you by picking your mom up from the terminal and is cheerfully munching her biscuit and is understanding of your job. I mean how chic can she get? It was just so understanding, so adult.

Maybe that crazy cousin was right, initially Najung will like Oppa more but later Oppa will like her more... But his fear was really fearful to see, how scared he is to lose Najung, when she said she is ok with his work commitment but Oppa mentioned he is not... I died again... I was like this man is not real... I don't think I see much portrayal of such sensitive guys much on K-dramas.

I think they took a while to get married in 2002, due to Appa's bad investment and IMF crisis hitting Asia at that point... Najung have at least 1-2 year to graduation, Oppa finishing his residency and completing his army service... so the timeline from 1996/7 to 2002 wedding make sense.

So with this are we still getting any glimpse of the groom actually at wedding or they had stopped watching the video? But then we all know it could just all be a fakeout again like the red car!

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My grasp on reality has been unraveling a bit due to being a Chilbong fan, so bear with me here.

Ohhh, Writer Lee. Were you simply just going to make Chilbong a plot device in the end? I couldn't bring myself to watch episode 16 just because he was barely even there. I cannot believe you would waste a character that had one of the underdeveloped background stories (his childhood, parental divorce, etc.) and essentially whisk him away like that (and you also had plenty of episodes to work on him, too). As much as I really wanted Chilbong and Na Jung together, I loved Oppa and Na Jung's engagement. But I feel cheated! C'mon writer, I expected more from you!!!

Now lets go to the good bits. I loved that Binggeure gets his time to shine (Haitai will, too), and he also gets his happy ending. I wasn't really bothered by "confused sexuality" arc like some people were, because I never thought he was gay (neither did I think that way with Oppa). I saw it more of an idolized view, and I didn't think it was necessarily a bad thing. I CANNOT wait for Haitai's story up next!

I'm being a stubborn dumbass for being in the Chilbong/Na Jung ship, but I'm trying to remain optimistic. I really hope Writer Lee can put more impact between these two if they end up together, because she has very little to work on with just four episodes left. I'm very worried that their journey will be very underdeveloped and underwelming, so I'm being very cautious here.

But more than anything, please, please, please give Chilbong a happy ending. I have never fallen so hard for a character and actor before, and it pains me more than anything to see him reduced to shreds in such a wonderful drama.

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We've all gone down with a ship before. It's totally understandable... and I say that as Team Oppa. If it makes you feel better, I firmly believe that we will get to see Chilbongie fall in love with a wonderful woman who will erase the pain of his failed first love. It may not be your primary ship, but hopefully it will be an acceptable alterna!ship.

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For some reason I thought this writer would not make CB a plot device in NJ/GB's love story. The fact that she actually did so makes me believe that most of us gave her too much credit. After NJ/GB started going out she's literally taken CB (like a fly) and tossed him out from the world of the show.

Her development of CB's chararcter or rather lack of makes me very bitter. Does she think she can tie up his journey in an episode and it'll satiate us?! :/

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i think two episodes would be enough - kinda like binggraes arc. but honestly i dont know why CB fans feel cheated to the extent that they are claiming. i agree you guys feel cheated at this point in time. but with 4 eps left, i am imperative the writer will dedicate a big chunk to CBs story. however it can never amount to be on the same level as oppa's story.

i mean from the very beginning of the series, there was sooooo much focus on oppa. not even relating to NJ - im talking more about his hospital life, his relationship with binggrae, his relationship with NJs parents, his family etc.

so i think its a bit much to have expected or expect CB to be on the same playing field as oppa. and i think the writer made that pretty obvious from the very beginning

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No matter what happens, we should be happy that our beloved group of friends are happy now in 2013. There were conflicts, there was laughter, tears, confusion as to one's feelings, but what's more important, is that their friendship and love for each other as friends never wavered. I'm still unsure about the husband question, because there might be twists and turns in the upcoming four episodes. I'm a NaReki shipper. I've always been one. It might be Jung Woo's complete natural acting and how he can be so hilarious. Of course I'm happy with the load of Nareki skinship and kisses (man, they're hot), but I've come to the conclusion that I'd be happy for NJ, whoever her husband might be. Ultimately, she IS happy, and the friends ARE happy. The story ends on a happy note. That's what's important. Not fan wars.

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the Chilbong ship you say, I believe it was last seen next to another ship called the Titanic. Yes it went under while its members were trying to fish out something called the HOPE diamond. If I'm not mistaken, I think they were hit by the Iceberg known as Oppa-Ya.

I kid, I kid, it is just a little joke.
I am so dead, commence the public stoning.

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If that's a joke, I kinda... don't find it funny. But no stoning or anything, cz I don't think (m)any of us are in that so called ship. I think everyone's mostly upset CB isn't getting treated with sensibility.

I for one prefer him to be given a new love interest and maybe give him a chance to start over new and open up his past. But I'd say that kind of comment are what starts shipping wars, so...

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What I really love about this show is how it depicts a realistic love story. What truly matters are not some grand gestures (like confessing on national tv *cough*) but all the little meaningful things. I think the main reason why I don't root for Chilbongie is because his actions are - ironically - rarely about Na-jung; they're mostly about HIS feelings. Keeping her photo inside a baseball cap, insisting on her presence during matches, asking her for tutoring, the great trip to Samcheonpo or the midnight kiss - they all seemed very romantic, but have been done without any consideration of Na-jung's feelings or wishes. On the other hand, we have Trash who: gives her the things she wants/needs (snacks, marshmallows, plush seal, heart necklace), cares about her health (hospital scene, massages, reminding about exercises, torture device aka therapy table), loves and deeply respects her parents (issue of menopause, birthday letter to mom, hesitance about the relationship, official confession) and participates in the events that are important to her, even if they don't suit his tastes (movie club gathering, match-up date, the musical). I find his actions sweet, thoughtful and at the same time very natural and I don't understand why so many people insist that he doesn't express his feelings properly. Should he be singing serenades, writing love poems and showering her with flowers...? Don't tell me that there's no affection - just look how he gazes at her, stupidly smiles, gently speaks to her, strokes her hair, tightly hugs her and passionately kisses her. Of course there's also his lazy trashy side, proneness to bickering and acting dorky... Hovever, those aspects make him a more believable character. He's not perfect and that's ok because perfect men don't exist. An epic love story full of amazing surprises and never-ending ecstasy only looks good on paper. In real life I prefer a comfortable relationship with someone who's not only my lover, but also my best friend and becomes a part of my family.

On a side note, I was really touched by the proposal scene, partially because of Jung Woo's acting - that tension in his face, nervous swallowing, trembling voice and teary eyes... He's really good! And Go Ara is great as well.

(Excuse my mistakes, I'm not a native English speaker. ^^')

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want to marry your comment!!!!!!!!!!! ..only because i can't marry oppa since he's already najung's :D

But I agree 100%. Oppa just has a rough personality but the ones he loves and cares for, he would move mountains for them. And he does - silently and without any fanfare. The gift of the seal, bringing the Seotaeji tape to the hospital or even getting that Singing competition poster for Binggeurae.
p.s I am sad they didn't show us any scenes of Oppa having to "always massage Najung's back" lol that sounded pervy but i'm all for any naregi skinship

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Let me love you!!! these reasons are exactly why I love oppa and adore the Na-Jeong/Oppa relationship. It feels real, and not just drama real, but real life this is how a mature adult relationship works real.

i like Chilbong but have to agree with some your reasons about his like being too one sided. I also couldn't get behind him because he is just too seemingly dreamy and perfect. I think he would make a great first boyfriend who will dote on you, cherish you, and make you feel how special you are...too special, too adoring. I would date him, a great first love. However for marrying, building a future together, ever lasting; I would marry oppa. I like you would want an imperfect lover and best friend.

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Yes! Yes! Yes! You've said it so well! I mean, he had me in episode 2, when wordlessly did all the things that would help Na-jung sleep: warm milk, closed blinds, second pillow. And episode 4, when he's just doing everything he can and then some to make the day go a little easier for the family of his best friend who died far, far too young. It's not meant to be romantic, just sweetly devoted. But you can tell how much that just makes Na-jung love him, the solid, considerate man he is deep down.

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The first time the dad talked about who could marry his daughter at the table, I exclaimed too bad it can't be Oppa! lol I was pretty happy when it was revealed he was not her brother.

But yeah it is the realness of this relationship and its subversion of drama norms like false ambiguity which has me hooked on this relationship. Also being a man it is kind of nice not seeing NJ fall into the miss-passive-I-do-not-want-you- to-touch-me-are-we-really-dating-paradigm that so often strikes after heartfelt confessions in these dramas. It is also nice that Oppa is shown to be so in love with her but still can have concerns like "what about our friendship or what about my relationship to your parents" and even "what am I feeling." It is so refreshing that him leaving to Pusan was not treated as the end of the world; that he did not go all paternalistic and dump her and instead proposed. I loved how quickly he handled that other girl in the office where most male leads would let that fester. I love how he has the strong hyung relationship with the boarding house members.

Really, really like these two characters; like them together; like how expertly they defy drama-hood.

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Here is one thought that just came to me; a girl marries a man much close to their father, right? Given as to how Dad yells all the time and Mom still loves him and we all know they love each other, does anyone really believe that NJ will marry a guy she will be afraid to express her emotions just like her parents does with each other (we all know she loves to yell too); who amongst all the guys can take it and give back just thesame? Actually, I think two of the guys are probable....Trash for sure and Haitai, maybe.

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I read an interesting theory on another site where they think that the writers could have deliberately taken Chilbong away from the story and the viewers for these past episodes in order to make him return with a BANG! I am not really familiar with these writers or this franchise (I plan to watch AM97' as soon as this series is over though) to know if this would be characteristic of them, or if they just like to raise viewer hopes and then crush them.

I choose to stand by this theory because I think its sad Chilbong has gotten zero love this entire show and I need SOMETHING to hold on to. Plus, his whole bottom of the 9th, 2 outs thing. At this point it seems like his metaphor is becoming a literal part of the plot.

This series is driving me crazy. I NEED TO KNOW RIGHT NOW. I just need a spoiler, so I can enjoy watching Oppa and Na Jung on their way to a blissful HEA or smirk at them knowing my boy Chilbong is about come back and win the game at the last minute(AKA NJ's heart).

I'm not sure how I'm going to last until next week...

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About Chilbong returning, I actually do think that will happen (thought of it happening ever since episode 13), because I don't think Writer Lee is completely inconsiderate of her characters, and I know she isn't dumb enough to forget one.

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That's the impression I've been getting from all the comments I've read throughout all these recaps, and all the love people have for the 97' series. And that is also what makes me think this was a planned and deliberate exclusion.

Of course, I am also grasping at straws and Chilbongi's return could be a huge letdown. I'm totally prepared for that.

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he will return. and for some strange reason, i still think he's the husband. *shrug*

oh well, i may be wrong, and he's not. it's fine.

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Come on girls, confused? he was swooning and smelling his shirt for gods sake. He was totally in love, or at least crushing hard. I was so ready for him to confess to oppa and regognise his feelings... and then he marries a girl lol wtf? how can the writer back pedal thazmt fucking much. As if it isnt bad enough how they are neglecting chilbongie, but the writer doesnt even have the guts to follow through with this arc realistically. I swear these writers are getting too cocky. Trolls of all trolls. So pissed off right now. And oppa being oppa and proposing to her because hes insecure and wants her ass stuck at home -which no one bothered mentioning because they were too busy distracted by the 'moving' proposal without looking at the intentions behind it.

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I completely agree with the proposal being sweet but somehow unsatisfying, because he framed it as "i've gotta tie you down because I might just lose you since i'm too busy" instead of "I'm proposing simply because I love you and want a future with you". I enjoyed the acting of that scene, but I think at this point they are both too insecure. Marriage, after all, is not the end game of a relationship. It's just another beginning.

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Agree with you, pickles. I saw too much insecurity on his part to really get into the scene, even though both actors did a fabulous job.
If he truly trusted her, and their mutual feelings, he wouldn't be so insecure. Nervous, yes - if you really get the import of what you are doing, yes you will be nervous - but his continued fear over Chilbongie, and letting an outside person fuel the development of the relationship, I find troublesome.

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While I agree that he's scared, he didn't propose because of Chil Bong. His main fear is that she will leave him because he can't devote the necessary time to her (and some other man might). That's why he got so scared that she left when he couldn't spend her birthday with her. Everyone told him that relationships don't survive internships. He's scared that they might be right.

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her ass stuck at home? ok im sure even CB fans would have to agree that is way too harsh.

i do agree that the proposal was done out of fear. but not the kind of fear that you suggest.

he is scared that she will come to hate him/not love him at a certain point because of the nature of his career. (very understandable since he is a freaking doctor for gods sake, if you have no idea what it's like i suggest you look up what it's like for a doctor to be in their residency)

if anything , he is offering NJ marriage, aka more commitment so that she will not feel like all these hardships are for nothing. he is giving both her and their relationship more security. man if this is how you view this concept u are dissing alot of real relationships out there. another reason why the proposal was so amazing was simply how realistic it was. ALOT of couples in which one partner is a doctor end up getting married early on before residency begins. its a very common practice. and its exactly for the same reasons as NJ and trash

sometimes you have to FORCE ur relationship to work out if u want it that bad.

my bf is in med school, and we plan on tying the knot before his residency as well. because we know how hard itll be to even see each other's faces once it starts.

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My- official- favorite character of the show is Binggeure. His character had all the poignant moments (love & career) associated with our college life (even though the hero worship akka gay thing was overdone).
CB was a strong contender but sadly his character had no development after the New Year's eve confession. It is almost as if the writers took a poll in the middle of the show and chose to drop CB :-( It prompts me to ask if there was any management problem involved with Yoo Yeon-Seok's company?!!
Most hilarious moment was when the two Dad's meet (the editing was cleverly done). This episode handled the crossover characters with more subtlety & finesse than the previous one.

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The last few episodes are full of angst for me...because it is just so irritating to note that despite Oopa being the husband that the world know, why are they still playing with the clues and guess who game... so irritating...

Haitai come and take Najung away.

On a alternate universe, I hope Najung and Haitai end up together and in other one, Najung and Chilbong.

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okay I will not lie, I started as Team Chilbong and am still to this day. I just have some stuff that's been eating at me

1. Chilbong and Najung seem more like a couple in 2013 than Oppa and Najung
2. so the ring in this episode does not match the ring that Najung has in 2013 (I even went so far as to make sure, beginning of episode 8 is a good place to see) I mean I get that Najung could still end up with Oppa, but me personally hopes that the different ring means something
3. Oppa's cousin saying stuff about them breaking up, I mean it could be her lying...but it could also be her telling the truth
4. I really want her to end up with Chilbong because I want something different from Answer Me 1997 (and I tend to catch SLS in almost every drama I watch hehe)
5. They basically shut Haitai out of the running, I mean it would've been cool to see another possibility but it just seems to out of the way to be him which I feel like they're starting to do with Chilbong
6. WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED TO BASKETBALL? the obsessions with pop culture is a huge part or at least was a huge part of the Answer Me series, I want more of Najung as an individual, not Oppa and Najung, JUST SOME NAJUNG ALONE TIME

Okay I'm done. I know I'm really CB bias haha, but I'm just saying don't count him out! hopefully next episode offers more progression!

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100% agree on BG's arc.. I think it was done pretty well. I think here the mystery paid of pretty well.

"Honestly, I think it’s a simple matter of the drama literally setting Chilbongie up to be the love interest, and making him the primary contender for ten episodes."

Funny enough, I never saw CB as a legit contender.. heck, he wasn't there the first 2 episodes and he never had much dimension. So, I agree with what you said about his character being used as a plot device. The writer should've done better, even in other dramas, the second leads have a full fledged story but here we didn't get much of CB sadly.

The one thing this drama desperately needs is time management. This had to be 16 episodes, so the overall story would've been tighter and less meandering..

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I'm only at ep 8 but have read recaps to the latest ep. If Garbage proposed in 1997, wouldnt it seem a bit odd for them to only be married in 2002? That's a LONG engagement.

And Shi Won (I love Eun Ji!) commented that Na Jung's husband is famous. I'd assume that baseball stars are usually more "well known" than doctors, unless of course, Garbage did some huge surgery that catapulted him to fame.

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The IMF crisis is happening and the dad specifically says in an early episode "the groom has been waiting a long time for this" about the wedding.

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the proposal scene... idk man i think eunji charmed me too much and its my fault for always comparing AM97 with 94, but always always ALWAYS, i cant help myself to see how much ahra is lacking compared to eunji. she did well on her part but im still not seeing chemistry? maybe because i like chilbong more. but i see no chemistry with yeonseok either. i feel like she can act well as her own character but i see no connection with her and the rest. im blaming myself though because i really think ahra is awesome for taking this role.

also yeah, everything thats been said about chilbongie. why ruin such a nice character. on tumblr someone mentioned that he was the perfect mix of nice guy-little naughty boy but now hes just an ass. even for me. i was team chilbong (not idgaf about the husband), but god, what a frustrating guy if you try to break up a couple that's engaged!

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I don't think he knows that they're engaged though...

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Just thinking.. what if he wasn't talking about Najeong in the interview.. that would be a nice plot twist: He fell in love with someone else, while everyone thinks he is still pining for Najeong.

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^ I really want to believe this xD When he was asked whether the girl he likes is in Japan or Korea, he answered "No comment!"

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I would love that twist. He comes back is briefly confused when he sees NJ again but in the end it just enforces his love for the new LI.

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Yeah I so want this to be true, but I do not expect it. This drama has subverted so many of my expectations but I still cannot actively hope this happens. Would be good though, both for the story and CB's character imo.

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Yes, at this point, Najung has so much personal baggage with Trash that I really want Chilbong to end up with someone else. Someone who finds him absolutely wonderful from the get-go.

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You know when he said he likes someone though in that interview, it may not still be NJ and he doesn't know that they are engaged but I agree that he should give up knowing they are dating and love each other.

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They Should just tell us who the husband is. How awesome would it have been if Shi-won opened the door and it was oppa. I would have screamed in delight. I can't enjoy the great moments between oppa and NJ. How wonderful was the proposal? But all I could think was someone is going to be so hurt? Why did they have to add CB in at the end? The hate in oppa's eyes was palatable. What is the point, NJ only has eyes for oppa and vice versa. That was clearly pointed out this episode. Please show just let us enjoy the next 4 episodes

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*Palpable: able to be touched or felt.
*Palatable: (of food or drink) pleasant to taste.

Though I would take a bite out of Oppa.

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Wasn't sure how to comment back or if I should, but thank you. Thank you for making my comment clearer. Next time I will make sure I check that my spell check has the correct word.

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To be honest, I was VERY happy with the resolution of Bing's love.

I never understood why so many kept insisting that he was gay. Just because he seems to worship the ground that trash steps on does not mean that he romantically loves him (at least, it seemed that way to me).

I think it really bugged me that people kept labeling him with whatever he has not identified with yet. Like, society likes to label a-little-more-active-than-usual kids as hyperactive and then proceed to stuff them with drugs. Or treat super-shy kids as autistic and then treat them as queer when they probably just need much more encouragement to look past their many fears and open up.

Or someone who idolises another person of the same sex and gets labelled as gay. Then proceeds to like someone of another sex and then gets called bisexual. Like come on, he's just confused! Feelings don't come with labels and even specific feelings like love have so many kinds like platonic-love, fan-love, romantic-love... etc etc. And just because something seemed like that to you doesn't mean that it is, until the person is ready and sure and confirms it himself.

So when Bing's story came to a close and it just showed in the end that he was just confused, I was like HA! IN YOUR FACE! (I'm sorry, but that was really what I felt.)

I thought his story was more of a stop-judging-and-stop-labeling-others-however-you-like lesson and for that, I was really grateful.

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I never thought that B is gay. But I did think that he has some feeling toward T. After AM97, Shin PD said in an interview that he didn't mean to make JH a gay character. JH loves YJ because he loves him, simply just that.

Because it is the same PD/writer duo here in AM94, I think that such principles will be carried over and apply to characters such as B. In reality though, I know it's normal for young people to take time to figure out their sexuality. But this is a drama. And after 15 episodes of vague hints about B's feelings and they just end everything within 2 episodes with the new introduction of a new character, I as a viewer couldn't help but feel everything is wrapped up a little rushed. Can't we at least be introduced to Jinyi a little bit earlier and see a little more screen time between B and her?

And I think audience should not be felt like they are told "HA! IN YOUR FACE!". Do we watch drama to be out-smarted? To be told that we are dumb? No. If a drama wants to deliver a message that is unpopular, it should handle that with skill and delicacy. That is what makes the writing brilliant.

Because we have seen B's case, I can totally see a possibility that they will bring CB back and make him the husband. The "lesson"? Proposal isn't a happy ending. So, I guess that will be another "HA! IN YOUR FACE!" moment? Again, it is a realistic thing in life. But will the audience be able to handle such sudden change in emotion?

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Also, remember that just like B never says that he likes "sunbaenim", NJ, regardless of how much she always thinks about T, never tells CB "Sorry, I don't like you" either.

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So... what I got from this is that you have an issue with the handling or execution of Bing's resolution, which I agree was a little sloppy and could probably have been done better.

And... I don't understand what point you were trying to make in that last paragraph.

That 'HA! IN YOUR FACE!' (by me) wasn't so much because of the writers subverting (almost) everyone's expectations. It was more of see, not everything is as it seems so stop labeling others however you like. It was more of me being (evilly) glad at the rude awakening for those others who have been labeling Bing however they like all this time.

I mean, for example, a kid stares at two ice creams of different flavors, one strawberry and one chocolate. He seems to stare at the chocolate one more and so the someone gives him the chocolate one, telling him that he likes chocolate when really, he actually likes the strawberry one and he was staring at the chocolate one because there was a bug on it or something.

Okay, that was a bad example but I think I liked the way Bing's story was told was because it reflects so effectively people's tendency to TELL others who they are instead of waiting and accepting others for who they identify to be.

Throughout the whole series so far, people have been calling him gay or bisexual or whatever. In the end, He. Was. Just. Confused. The End.

Let him make decisions himself and stop 'telling' him what he is.

And I believe that if the writers indeed do make CB the husband in 2013, they will handle it so that you don't feel the whiplash in feelings. I trust them to give very good reasons.

But there was no sudden change in feelings in Bing's case. He just finally understood which direction he wanted to move in after turning in circles for what seemed like forever.

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I don't think the argument that Chilbongie is set up to be a legitimate contender against Oppa for 10 eps is valid. NJ has never shown any sign of returning his feelings for the last 16 episodes. Thus, objectively speaking, Chilbong is actually a very traditional second-lead in Korean dramas. He is sweet; he is good-looking; he is successful. He is also very nice to the girl. He is just not the person she's in love with. Period.

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My argument was that Chilbongie was the ONLY contender for 10 episodes. Na-jung had a crush on Oppa, but as far as we knew he had no feelings back; the show didn't make him a contender until Episode 11. Hence the confusion.

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i would argue though that there were hints of Oppa liking Najung back right around episode 7-8. Yes, he was not shouting it from the rooftops but I, personally, was never left in doubt that he felt something back.
To me, his unspoken reactions didn't come off as "uh oh how do i let this girl down" but more of being conflicted/trying to deny it - "i like her but the family thing is holding me back".

Telling his army friend Najung had a boyfriend, that flicker of jealousy when Najung said one of his hometown friends was goodlooking, The look on his face when Chilbong kissed Najung during the game, the look on his face when he realized Chilbong gave Najung that Magic Eye heart.
The hearfelt "Of course it's Najung. Does oppa have anyone else besides you?"

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@cafelatte thank you for pointing these things out. From most of the internwebs commenting I thought I was the only one who could see these things. For me Oppa's feelings of liking Na-Jeong but being in conflict because of there history had been obvious since we found out he wasn't really her oppa oppa.

Along with your examples, his attentiveness towards her, his telling Bingare that like NaJeong he couldn't remember the movie they had seen together although he acted like he was so submerged (atoned feelings anyone). His reactions of discomfort like someone who wants but can't act on feelings whenever Na-Jeong would get really close (her face in his face while eating), and all the opportunties he takes to get in bed with her, or the discomfort of seeing her in her bra and the wet shirt, or getting close with another guy (the ep where NJ and CB were fooling around and oppa watches at the door, then NJ goes flying to him once she sees him).

If this isn't enough, his facial reactions of wanting when he saw what a happy open relationship that SCP and YJ had. Then his look of despair and acceptance (which even CB recognized) of Na-Jeong's parents not even seeing him as a boyfriend/son in law candidate. Trash had been a contender-if you were paying attention to things said and not said- far before ep 11. I swear *le sigh*

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i just rewatched the Patracchu scene and the signs started way back then. How he kind of froze when Najung seemed like she was going to kiss him and i totally forgot about the movie theater scene. My computer refuses to download that episode. I remember people immediately jumping to, "oh trash said that because he wants to watch the movie with binggeurae" and i was like "am i in a twilight zone watching a completely different drama?"

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There were several hints of Trash's feelings in the first ten episodes. For example, we knew that Na Jung refused to give his number to her friends after the group date because she liked him. There was a parallel scene where Trash also refused to give Na Jung's number out. We also had the scene where Na Jung said she didn't remember the movie she'd watched with Trash because of her feelings. Trash echoed her words to Binggeure. There were several signs he had feelings and was a contender but I think many people ignored them.

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Yup, so many hints and JW great acting ignored...

If they consider Trash a contender just after he confessed, then BG never liked Trash because he never confessed?

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ha! now that makes sense!

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My thoughts exactly!I even think he started liking NJ before she realized her feelings for him. Remember when Haitai asked him if he liked NJ, he said that if he didn't ha

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have these circumstances holding him back he would have confessed first.
It's funny because i only started watching the show when 10 episodes had already aired but before that i read the recaps. When i read the comments, people seemed to be really annoyed by the fact that they didn't know how oppa felt.
But then i watched the episodes and i was WHAT? Isn't it obvious? Sure it was subtle but still clear. With all the hints you mentioned and so much more.
I think when people start to be biased towards a character they choose to see what they want to see.
And both fandom tend to do it of course.

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? But even if oppa never admited his feelings, we knew he really cared for her, that hospital scene made it very clear, and everytime they talked about NJ liking Oppa, Oppa eyes showed lots of expressions and we knew there was something holding oppa. So no, I don't think the drama made CB the main love interest for 10 episodes.

I never thought CB was the main love interest.

I get that is your opinion, but the way you talk it is as if this is a fact and not your opinion....

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I disagree, but sure, you're free to disagree with my disagreement. Everything here is my interpretation, obviously.

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It wasn't an argument; it was a bold and demonstrably false claim.

As people are saying there were lots of clues that Trash liked NJ:
-the way he did not want to give that man from the date her number
-the way he reacted to the heart in the book
-the way he ignored CB and walked with NJ with the umbrella
-the way he didn't stop her when she was drunkenly approaching to kiss/ultimately bite him
etc
-the time he says he'd choose NJ over YJ and trash says YJ over NJ only to recant to NJ

Also as people are saying there were lots of clues that Cb was a second male lead:
-the way NJ was oblivious to and did not reciprocate his feelings. His stealth dating was a flop
-the airport gifts scene where he gave NJ the best gift as a generic woman and trash gave the best gift to her as a person
-he had no strong relationships with the wider cast (aside from her dad, even his cousin had a stronger relationship with Trash)
-he had no structural obstacles to being with NJ, unlike trash who had his oppa relationship to her and his son relationship to her parents to consider
etc

Do not get me wrong, although I thought Trash was the male lead as soon as I knew he was not her brother, I do not think it was clear cut until episode 11 or so. That said it is patently false to say he was not a contender until ep 11. Other people saw that story and still see it continuing and we can point to the drama to show it. And if this is entirely couched in him not announcing his feelings till ep 11 (which is a silly rule to apply)...why is CB a contender when NJ didn't like him? Seriously, the man has to announce himself a lover in an arbitrary time-frame, but the woman does not?

You can like CB; wish he was the male lead, but please do not dress up your preference as the fact of the drama till it suddenly changed course. That is shoddy analysis to cover up your disappointed personal preference.

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I don't know why I did not think that Trash Oppa is not actually her real brother when I watched episode 0. This might have changed the way I looked at the love angles of this show and not bank on CB so much that clouded my judgement on this show.

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thank you for your eloquence. I wanted to say as much but didn't know how to put it in proper words. I have to admit I've been disappointed with the turn the recaps have taken since Oppa and Najung's loveline took the forefront. Every great moment they had is usually undercut with follow-up comments of 'oh but.. Oppa waited too long/ Oppa didn't express his feelings/ he is frustrating so I don't buy it/ his dilemma isn't even a big deal/ I don't enjoy the main couple scenes because..' etc. I realize that both gf and jb are entitled to their own preferences, i mean it's their blog and an awesome one at that but with all due respect, this is really the first time i've been let down by their recaps. Usually I think they strike a nice balance between personal bias and being objective but they hardly ever throw a bone to people who love najung and oppa together. We want to celebrate the milestones in their relationship like the proposal but all it gets is a measly line within a chilbong discussion. this is perhaps the reason most najung-oppa supporters are so hesitant to post here -- but seem to be growing in numbers slowly - feeling compelled to defend the couple.
I feel really bad myself for writing this comment, having been an avid follower of this blog for years now but I guess the greater the love and respect, the greater the disappointment.

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wow, i completely and utterly agree with your post. i have nothing else to really add besides to say that i too have been a huge fan of dramabeans and will always continue to be. cuz face it, their level of analysis is just too good!! HAHA

however, with this specific drama, the bias is just way too obvious. once again, this is their blog, and have no obligation whatsoever to be objective. they can technically make the whole recap about CB and they have every right to do so. however, i have been seeing the whole "i can't enjoy the main couple's scene..." line way too much these past few recaps. and its like ok.. so somehow NJ and trash oppas scenes get underrated every single time because of a lack of CB development? and yea def not even trying to throw us nareki fans a bone. NO JOKE. nothing remotely positive about any of their scenes.

i wanna go back to the "best love" recap days. where DGJ and YPJ got equal amounts of love. and the argument that this drama was set up to be "whos the husband" game and best love wasnt doesnt mean anything. if you just watched reply 1994 as it is now, without thinking about the husband question, u would soon realize that it is still a thoroughly enjoyable drama the way that it is progressing.

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But, it's not entirely true that we didn't know Oppa had any feelings for Na Jung till Episode 11. As early as episode six, we had Oppa reacting to Chilbong kissing Na Jung in a way only someone who likes her would. And then, we had other moments (him ruefully looking at her as she slept, him observing how Chilbong clung to Na Jung's every word) in the very same episode. Even if we weren't quite sure how exactly Oppa felt about Na Jung (and I would go so far as to say that Oppa, himself, wasn't sure how he felt about her at that point), I think it's safe to say that he did see her as more than just a dongsaeng even before he became aware of her feelings for him. How is it then that he wasn't a real contender till Episode 11?

Admittedly, episodes 5-10 were written in a way that gave Chilbong the upper hand in the love triangle, and I dreaded the moment Na Jung would start wavering in her affections for Trash, and start liking Chilbong back, but that never happened. And I understand yours and all the Chilbong fans' disappoint on that point, but why was Na Jung's affections for Oppa wavering in favor of Chilbong such a given to the extent that you feel cheated when it didn't happen? I guess I just see the same sense of entitlement here that Chilbong demonstrated in asking Na Jung to date him if she is single in the future or going up to Oppa and giving him his baseball and telling him he's going to be back for it one day.

My excitement in waiting for the recaps for AM1994 has been on a descent lately, and I couldn't quite figure out why. It's certainly not because I don't like the show anymore. Contrary to how most commenters here feel, my love for the show is only increasing with each new episode. But, reading your comments on this episode has really opened my eyes to why I haven't been enjoying these recaps as much as I used to. I appreciate all that you and girlfriday do and almost always find myself in agreement with your thoughts, but I guess this is one show where we just won't see eye to eye.

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I understand what Javabeans is saying. It is true that Oppa did all the things people said, but NJ never saw him most of those things, that is why NJ felt that oppa did not like her back. If he did all those things and NJ new, then there would be no doubt in her mind that oppa likes her. She wouldn't have been in so much angst is she had a clear view of Oppa's feeling. On the other hand, CB's actions were all toward NJ with NJ. Nothing was hidden from her because he wore his heart on his sleeves. Oppa did romantic things for NJ while CB did romantic things with NJ. That is the big difference. Until Oppa showed that he was interested her, he wouldn't be considered a romantic option for NJ.

I am not trying to put oppa down, all of the things he did for her were amazing and wonderful and that is why people love him. But that does not mean that you can discount what CB did. Why would so many people love him if he was so great. Plus I know that people are saying that in Korea, people love Trash more, but what I have been reading, CB gets a lot of love too. Why would he be getting movie roles if he wasn't so popular. Really we should feel lucky that we have two great male characters that we can root for.

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The problem with CB did romantic things with NJ is that she did not realized any of them is supposed to be romantic. NJ never saw the heart in the Magic Eye book. She just seemed perplexed when he threw her his ball. She didn't think the reason of him ordering delivery from her part-time job so that he could see her. She didn't understand his 6 hour trip until his confession. Yes, ultimately all those things are sweet and romantic but NJ never see it. So I don't see how CB could be considered a romantic option if NJ never saw any of the things he did (except the bus trip).

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but we knew as viewers what all those actions signify because chil bong was clear about it to us with his voice overs, etc.

so as viewers we knew where he was coming from, what the intentions were, and identified with that.

in the first few episodes when it wasn't clear what oppa's feelings were, you can interpret his actions two ways: he was being a good brother/friend or he was being romantic(showing his romantic love).

since that wasn't clear, there were just hints, viewers can interpret it however they can interpret it, because there's that room for interpretation.

when he declared that he likes na jung and when he finally had a voiceover about it in episode 11, we can now look at his actions in a romantic way without question because it is already clear to us.

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In that same logic, NJ didn't know all the things that oppa did for her as romantic either. She just thought that everything he was doing was because he was here Oppa. If she felt that he was being romantic toward her then there would haven't been any angst on her part. For the most part, it was one sided love for NJ. In your own words, all the things that Oppa did are sweet and romantic, but NJ never see it. If that was true then Oppa wouldn't have been a romantic contender either until he said that he liked her.

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@leeeezzzzz, my point is yes CB did do romantic things with NJ but she did not see it which is similar to Trash doing romantic things for NJ but she did not know it. If we're saying that thus Trash should not be a romantic contender then similarly CB should not be as well because NJ noticed none of the romantic stuff (whether direct or indirect).

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@leeeezzzzz. She's not saying that Oppa did romantic things "with" her, merely that CB did not, because she didn't realize. It's not a date if one person doesn't even realize that the other person thinks it is, and wasn't given the opportunity to consent on those terms.

The way I see it, this whole with vs for thing kind of misses the point. NJ is a character with feelings, and the right to feel how she feels and act on those feelings irregardless of who romanced her in what way. Oppa was a romantic contender for NJ in that she liked him. CB was not, in that she didn't.

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@lume and @grumpy The point of this drama was to high light who the husband is mystery. In order for that to happen there needs to be more than one contender. CB could have won her heart over in the beginning and it would have been a plausible story. You can't negate all of the things that CB did with NJ. Yes NJ has feelings but those feelings could have been swayed toward CB. Plus if CB was not a contender then why would Oppa feel so threatened by him. CB is in Japan doesn't even talk to NJ but Oppa still can that upset means something.

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@leeezzzzz, I'm not discrediting the fact that CB is not a contender. I agree that the story could have gone the other way and developed the NJ/CB story line. My main argument is disagreeing in the point that since Trash did not do anything romantic for NJ in the earlier episodes he is not a romantic contender. I'm just trying point out that the argument you made why Trash should not be considered could be applied to CB as well.

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@leeezzzz. Yes, Chilbong could have been a contender. My main thing is, the way the drama panned out, NJ stayed consistently into Trash and only Trash. Therein, while Chilbong could have been a contender, and I'll give you that he was presented as such, he was never made into a real contender as far as NJ was concerned. The worst thing about this husband mystery is that it couches this whole love triangle in the form of competition, where each guy loses or wins NJ. She is not something to be won or lost; she's someone who makes her own decisions. To be fair, the drama is as guilty as we are of employing that kind of language, but it doesn't make me hate it or resist it any less.

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Javabeans has said in previous dramas that she likes it when the male lead does things and doesn't beat the drum and try to take credit. This is the typical Korean Male Lead. He does things silently that support the female lead.

The difference here, though is the Oppa is a lot more subtle and doesn't even try to take credit on screen through verbal cues. This is something that Javabeans and girlfriday consistently have shown that they dislike. (And this is not a criticism of their opinions, but an analysis of them).

Also, not accusing them of anything, but Oppa's actor isn't exactly Minam material. Which I think the writers wanted to capitalize on... and we do know that Dramabeans does like it's shirtless and Minam material. (To each their own).

Chilbong, as much as he is a good character has counts against him in the Korean eye. He lies to NJ too afraid to ask her on a date. Koreans hate that consistently in dramas across the board.

He tries to do grand gestures and takes credit for them. He goes down and takes the bus, then declares why he did it and then takes credit for it. The writers stated they hate that sort of thing.

He doesn't do anything to really sway her either... I mean in ways that are personal and touch her and when he tries, they are big and a bit generic. He doesn't really seem to get to know her as a person either... but she stays an object of his affection. I understand Oppa had the upper hand on that, but Chilbong can close the distance by learning what she likes.

Also, he's a remove all obstacles type of person whereas Oppa despite her objections tries to constantly do what's best for her out of knowledge of what she needs.

I also admit, myself that I do hate the Knight in Shining armor type. I could gag them with my handkerchief as soon as they open their big fat mouths. At the same time, I do recognize that Chilbong is easy to look at and some women like his type. He's just typical second lead material.

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the thing that's weird about trash is you're not certain as a viewer if what he feels is romantic love more than sister love and friend love.

there was no moment that he realized he loved na jung romantically as a woman (like in am1997 with yoon jae and shi won wearing contacts, or most other characters that fell in like/love with another character in the am1997 and am1994).

it is also evident with how he answered when asked if he likes na jung too, and it's also evident in his proposal...
confession -- "my heart hurts when I see NJ hurt over her feelings for me, therefore I guess I love her too."

he also says he is afraid to lose her, as a what? as a woman? as a sister? as a friend? as a lover?

again, there may be hints but as i said, the hints are not clear. he obviously cares for her, that was never the question. but in what capacity and in what level -- this is not particularly clear in the early episodes, especially prior to episode 11.

some people have interpreted it as romantic interest and that's fine. those situations and actions are subject to interpretation. some people also did not interpret it as romantic and they also have the right to interpret it that way.

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not trying to start an argument but I do enjoy civil discussions, the likes of which i have been unable to find on sp and vk so I hope you don't mind me responding to you.

If we're going by the YoonJae analogy in '97, I think the proper person to compare him to is Najung because they are both the people who realized it first. Oppa would be Shiwon in this scenario - those who are suddenly faced with this daunting revelation from someone they've known all their lives. And just like Shiwon went through her angst and fears about not wanting things to chance and to keep YoonJae as a friend, so was Oppa agonizing about how things would change, all the relationships it would affect etc. Once you've already been confessed to, I think it's hard to expect one identifiable Eureka moment from them because they themselves are trying to sift through all their feelings. You get that struggle with Oppa when he says outloud, "Najung and I are family" as if trying to reaffirm to himself but then he has his moment of weakness when faced with najung's tearful question about who he would pick.

Sure, I agree everything is up for interpretation so I won't argue on that point. I think our gripe is just that what our side is seeing is never being acknowledged or represented - with everything being looked through the lens of "Oppa didn't feel anything until episode 11 when he declared his feelings" to analyze everything else that has followed like it was a fact - one that is held against him no matter what he's done since.

I don't think his confession showed uncertainty either. It wasn't literally that he guessed he loved her because of that but rather was a discussion of the things he was mulling over in his mind to try to straighten out his feelings. Like he said, all these thoughts and having to weigh what the consequences would mean for the family were so overwhelming but he centers on Najung and cares about how she feels and to me that shows a deeper love. Realizing how much her happiness/ sadness matters to him and affects him rather than, "she looked so beautiful in that yellow dress, I knew it was love". So maybe that was his A-ha moment. But to each his own.

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Can I marry this comment? And to continue the Shi-won analogy, SW was just as opaque emotionally as Trash for the majority of the 97 storyline. But it's amazing how different interpretations of YJ/SW and NJ/T are, in that most of us showed a willingness to read into SW's emotional subtlety/ambiguity and understand her feelings for YJ were more than she maybe thought, while there's outright refusal to do the same for Trash. And to accept her emotional storyline even though she didn't realize she might like him till the end of the 97 storyline, and never explicitly said she liked him till the last four episodes. With Trash, though, even though he's telegraphed his interest more obviously than SW IMO, there's this idea that he can't feel anything unless we're explicitly told he does, that he can't be confused in the same way, or that he had to confess in order to justify his loveline with NJ. I just think it's a question of gendered expectations, wherein all the burden of confession and action is placed unfairly upon the man.

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I cut Shi-won slack because she was rather immature throughout most of the drama, especially in terms of relationships and sexuality. I still found her the least believable, most obtuse character.
Trash is supposed to be older, more mature, the veteran of other relationships; shouldn't he know his own mind and what he wants by now? I am not as willing to give someone four years older the same benefit of the doubt.

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@skelly.
Trash is a worrywort and risk averse. That's not what the usual kdrama hero is. He's overanalyzes and overthinks everything, except the mundane day-to-day things where he doesn't think at all.

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@skelly. it won't let me reply directly to you so gotta do it this way.
Anyhow, i don't really agree that Oppa is a veteran of relationships and so he should know what he wants.
He's always been portrayed as having two extreme sides. For instance, he's the medical genius of his class but also the most forgetful person who needs people to even tell him he didn't bring his backpack home the night before. Similarly his maturity is developed on an intuitive level in that he REALLY cares about the people that he cares about to the extent that he can anticipate just what they need. However, on a romantic level - he may have been a player but definitely not a veteran of "relationships". The reason his ex girlfriend broke up with him is because he didn't even recognize her when she dyed her hair. And following the break-up, he wasn't affected at all. Similarly when Najung describes the girls he's dated, none of them sound like they were even serious "relationships".

But more importantly, it is not a question of whether he knows what he wants -- i'd argue he's known for a loong time-- but his struggle was solely because he was worried about how it would affect the parents and that is precisely something that comes with being four years older and able to put not just your own interests and desires first but to also consider others, especially mom and dad who are like his surrogate parents - almost. Moreover being older than Najung, he is the one who has to take responsibility for the relationship so Najung can afford to be more carefree than him.

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Agree with all the Oppa scenes above. In addition, I wanted to add that the scene that unraveled Oppa's feelings for NJ the most to me was when CB was looking at NJ in the balcony, NJ was looking at Oppa from outside, and Oppa was looking at a high school picture of himself and NJ. The perplex look that Oppa was showing while staring at the picture indicates that he is seeing NJ more than a sister/close friend. If he didn't have an interest, he would have gone to sleep or kept on studying his medical books.

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I would argue that it was six episodes at most where Chilbongie was the "only" contender. The first four were all about Na-jung's feelings, so I would say there was no front leader during those episodes.

Not that I think Chilbongie was in fact the only contender at any one point, at all. Leaving aside Oppa's "what do I have if I don't have you" and other such moments (well documented above)... there was Haitai, who keep having enough of these sweet little (platonic) moments with Na-jung that you couldn't entirely discount him as the darkhorse. In fact, the whole "both of us letting go our past loves, to build something strong with my best friend" would have been very 9End 2 Outs, in the best possible way!

And honestly, the more Na-jung DIDN'T see Chilbongie in a romantic light, the less he was a serious contender for me. It's really hard for me to root for a pairing when one half so clearly did not feel the same... especially when the other is convinced that if he (or she) just tried harder and waited longer, he'll win in the end. (In contrast, Na-jung seemed to let go any expectation that her feelings would be returned. She didn't want to let go for her own sake.)

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Excuse me? "As far as we knew?" Most everything be spelled out for us to know that someone cares about someone else? I never felt that Trash and NJ's relationship was sibling like and I don't care what anyone else says...it would be too weird to be playing that way with my grown up sibling and I felt that way from episode one before it was revealed that they were not related....just too much chemistry. We may not have been made privy of Trash's inner thoughts but we knew there was something there, whether it be love in the non-sibling way or love in the sibling way, he cared for her and that's that.
"Show didn't make him a contender?" He became a contender as soon as NJ started liking him whether he reciprocated or not.

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You take my feelings and you write 'em all down, JB.

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I drop my expectation for chilbong n najung. At least he really succeed in his role as pitcher. He's not the type of a real puppy, tagging along the girl that he likes, or one who cry out loud during his heart break, he moves on, he keeps his love for the girl, but he break his leg for his career. We all learn a lot from his character.

Binggurae and diedie sunbae. Why they call her diedie?? Will the show exchange scp for haitai? I really want to see them all, together, in the boarding house again. Hiks

I'll let the show tell me what plot for the rest of the cast, one by one, slowly, surprisingly. But in the end, if chilbongie isn't the husband, i won't be dissapointed.

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Diedie: I die, You die. Meaning, she just takes things overboard sometimes, haha. (Like drinking?)

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I agree that it's not right that CB's character hasn't been developed more but am not sure it hasn't at the same time; they dealt with his story when he first showed up in episode 3 with his family and the divorce and still caring about his Mom, then they showed his love for baseball and then his love for NJ; the real issue I am understanding from some complaints is that he wasn't made an effective love rival. So here is my grip with the complaints: must NJ feel anything for him just because he loves her? Most she be indecisive about who she loves for everyone to be happy and call the triangle effective?; because I see that in mostly all korean dramas or she would have started off liking CB first before falling for Oppa. It is just that sometimes I would like to watch a drama where the couple love each other and there is no wavering. But I understand the problem here is the show forcing everyone to guess who the husband is! The writers are laughing because even though they may have implied that there's a love triangle in this road to husband to-be, we are essentially the ones that created the war by choosing a side and thinking there's something else order than what we are already seeing.

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I don't understand why they're still playing the husband mystery! Obviously Oppa is the husband because what the hell are they gonna do with chilbongie if he does end up being the husband? There's not enough time left to develop chilbongie and najung's relationship! So at this point i'm just like "ok show just stop, oppa's the husband, now stop it." I wish this husband mystery would just stop already to end my misery because i'm so sad for chilbongie T__T

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Yup unfortunately they will just keep trolling with us until the end, although it's so obvious now that Oppa is the husband. The proposal scene is so sweet and realistic, I could feel Na-jung's happiness and Trash's nervousness. Seriously though to bring Chilbongie in the end and seeing Oppa's reaction subverts the proposal scene adds to the general trolling that is so unnecessary at this point IMO.

I love the extended cameos of the 1997 characters on this and seeing Eun ji won is an extra treat - I was dying when Na-Jung was chasing Hak-chan around

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To add (coz my fat fingers hit the enter button), this is one of the episodes that I connected with the characters again after all the angst from the past few episodes. Laughed so hard at Oppa's birthday gift to Na-Jung. Yoon ji's thoughtful send off for SCP. Swooned at Binggurae's line, The two appas, Shi-won and Na-Jung meeting ( more Am 1997 metas please!). Now I'm anxiously awaiting Chilbong's return and see how they wrap up his story.

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It's so obvious that Oppa is the husband so I think it's really lame they keep dragging it out. Everyone KNOWS who it is already, there is no way Najung will even look at Chilbong so use him as a plot device this way? It's so messed up. I wanted Chilbong/Najung since the beginning but I've accepted that's not gonna happen so give Chilbong another AWESOME girl who's gonna love him back instead. That would be so much better than having him being the forever waiting/lovesick guy forever. It's totally unfair to his character! I also hated how him and Haitai disappeared for the last two episodes. Like really? I thought about why I haven't found the last two episodes funny and it's because there's no Haitai. He's definitely the comic relief of this show and I think the one person that ties the group together. Blagh. Idk. In the beginning I loved AM1994 so much and thought it was so good, funny, sweet, thoughtful, and interesting but it's not anymore. I feel like it lost the magic of the first half of the show.
I also really didn't like how Bing's relationship became about. It's understandable that he was confused but I agree with some of the above posters, it wasn't just confusion it was definitely a crush. There were feelings there, they just decided to leave it unexplored to the end. I think it's fine that he is straight and ends up married to a woman but I also feel like it's SO RUSHED. I don't really get how he can meet someone and "feel this feeling called love" so easily and quickly. It doesn't make sense to me or to his character which they have shown throughout the whole series.
I'm gonna finish this series but I really hope when they bring Chilbong back they give him something else in his life instead of pining over Najung who is clearly head over heels for someone else. Give us something else because I really missed Chilbongie.

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This was honestly one of my favorite episodes. Got me in the heart in a lot of ways. I honestly really love the way the writers have portrayed najung and oppas relationship along with samcheonpo and yoojin's relationship. Both started from such different places so they have different hurdles and challenges to overcome, but I think they are developing in such realistic and nrmal ways.

More flashbacks please!! Hopefully there will be many more!

And swoon. Loved the proposal scene. Swoon again.

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It was mine to mainly because of the 97 cameos which were AWESOME............but seriously why are u guys going so hard about this it's just a show LOL

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I am not a second lead syndrome person. I might love the character, but we generally know what end game is going to be. Even in a show like Heirs, when they subvert the lead and second lead tropes, I do not bite.

However the great thing about k dramas is that both guys are probably good life choices for the lead female character.

The first guy on the cast list usually=end game. If you have any confusion when your watching a drama, that is your safe bet. SPOILER for Medical Top Team-

We just had Medical Top Team wrap up with the lead female character ending up with the second lead male, but that is a rare exception.

Jung Woo as Trash is the first guy on the cast list. To me that's end game.

However, we have seen throughout Chilbongie set up with end game tropes from her crush is on another guy, first kiss, to long separation. However what we haven't seen much character development for him, and that is what bothers me the most. I am totally cool for throwing out some tropes and mixing things up.

Character wise, love the Chilbongie, but really, not sure he and Na-jeong's personalities and intellect match. Love Trash too as a character but realistically, I'd not let that nasty dood come near me. Run now Na-jeong.

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