AYHT 31-32 More thoughts
While human Shin is trying his hardest to gain control of the company, everyone else is trying to save his soul instead. It’s not at all obvious to see, but my feeling is that everyone (bar Seo) is ultimately on human Shin’s side.

* YH: he does not want Shin to get the chairman position because doing so will just make him Seo’s next target, plus it would solidify his persona of the baddie who threw his gramps into care to steal his spot
* Shinnamon never truly wanted anything to do with it – he is helping them because SB encouraged him to continue doing what he feels to be the right thing (which was always that Shin gets everything and the only thing that belongs to roboShin is SB).
* Mum (despite being rather useless in her love) just wants him to try to be happy instead of obsessing about gramps and the company
* Gramps: when Shin asked him to just give him his company he did not say he wouldn’t, he only said that he wants see him be the kind of person who deserves to get it (and despite the way he has lived his life, I think that what he really means by that is a responsible, emotionally-stable adult). To me it felt he was still using roboShin as a straw-man hoping that the competition would kick Shin into gear (and being purposefully obnoxious about it). When it drove Shin to attempted murder instead, he gave up and went into care.

And yes it is condescending to assume that they all know better what Shin needs than himself, but at the moment I think everyone is focused on just getting him out of Seo’s influence. Now exactly clear how they plan to go about it … the save-Shin-from-himself plan is to block his nomination but then what? How do they plan to make sure that he overcomes his all-destructive anger? By pissing him off further? I don’t quite get YH’s plan for now. To Shin this would obviously feel like the ultimate betrayal…

The irony is that I think Shin would have gotten into a more forgiving mood if left all by himself. He hates the fact that his actions are alienating him from the people he cherishes (YH in particular). Also David’s comments helped bridge the gap between him as his mother. What he needed is time to process his emotions but as stuff keeps happing he keeps on just responding to those and getting angrier and more unstable in the process. Still, you see glimpses of the good in him even at this lowest. Underneath it all he is still the good kid who loves robots, hates lies and wants to hug his mum when she cries (fireman? really?). Hopefully next week he’ll find a way back to that person.

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    I agree with not understanding the plan.

    My first thought was: don’t humiliate him in public, this is not going to go down well…

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      agree,,i want shin to really wake up for good but i don’t want him to be humiliated in public 😢
      and why do i feel so empty in NSIII n sobong moment now 😢

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    Agreed. Getting the company is besides the point at this stage. The last thing human Shin needs is that company. He’s so carried away by his need for revenge he can’t see the wood for the trees.

    Save your love, Young-hoon!

    (Though Grandpa is trash. I don’t think he had such admirable expectations of Shin at all.)

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      I may give gramps a lot more credit than he deserves, but at least I can tell that what he loves about robo-Shin is rationality honesty and loyalty – most of which he completely lacks himself. He put a lot of effort into keeping Shin by his side for his reasoning to be as simple as it appears at first glance (even at his cruelest he is pretty rational).

      Even if I am wrong, he is still just a pathetic sad old man on his way to completely losing his mind. He gets my pity even if his actions don’t make him deserve it. I hope Shin converges to a similar opinion. For his sake.

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        All of his logic and rationality has been in service of his ego and ambition, though. Whatever twisted logic kept Shin by his side, I think it was to gratify his own desire for control rather than interest in his grandson’s wellbeing. I find it hard to see him as “loving” Roboshin so much as loving how Roboshin can fulfill his ambitions. Plus he enjoys seeing those beneath him scramble for power. I just hope Shin stops factoring him into his choices at all. He is a toxic person who only poisons the lives of those nearest him. I haven’t got an ounce of sympathy, tbh. He’s enjoyed ridiculous wealth and obscene privilege his entire life, abused his power. When faced with his own mortality and the possible destruction of his “legacy”, he succumbs to self-pity and still thinks he should be at the centre of other people’s priorities (e.g. protect him, protect the company, make M City a reality). I think he should spend the remainder of his life in prison. But I would be surprised if the show would mete out consequences like that.

        I may or may not have strong opinions about rich abusive patriarchs. Apologies if this is a bit ranty!

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    The Secret Plan made absolutely no sense to me. I thought they’d do it …by getting rid of Seo Gil. Not by humiliating Seo Gil…. AND HumanShin ….Im going to be scratching my head until next week trying to understand what the Plan was.

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    I think the only way they were going to free Shin of his obsession is by revealing RoboShin. I’m curious to see how the plan shakes out.
    I’m hoping the kill switch preview thing is a fake out 😐
    Either way they have to stop Shins vindictiveness and save him from himself.

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    I don’t understand the plan at all, though it is very exciting. NS 3 has said he likes being able to show people everything, but I am very concerned about how this will shake out for him–people are not that understanding about robots! I hope he will feel happier being honest and not get melted down. I guess NS 3 having his own place in the world is what might reassure NS? Honestly, I love Young Hoon, I love his love for NS and NS3, I believe he’s smart… but I’m not sure he’s a great planner. He’s the one who came up with this ‘replace my boss with a robot’ notion! He’s abused and traumatised too, and clearly centralises the company and grandpa more than he should. But… I guess they all agreed, and seeing them be a conspiracy dream team is too cute. Maybe NS 3 has improved whatever plan YH had (lord knows what YH’s plan without NS 3 was.)! I hope this turns out well for them all, and us.

    I don’t know whether NS would have risen or sunk on his own–but I guess they couldn’t trust he’d be alone, since he was inviting an assassin-hiring snake to be on his side. On the most basic level, all that drinking (which mirrors Seo) might render NS incapacitated if someone were to say, strangle him. But we have seen NS really hesitate twice (once with NS 3, once with David) and so maybe the third time will be the charm (but who will it be? His mom possibly). The fact NS wanted to be a fireman made me think of NS 3 saving So Bong and others in Disaster Mode, and reminded me NS 3 got to live the life NS dreamed of. They both deserve to live their own lives. (Of course NS also deserves to be in jail for choking out So Bong, so there’s that.) Still NS deserves so, so much more mercy than grandpa, and even grandpa got shown some.

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    Thank you for such a thoughtful write-up. This storyline has gotten so complicated and it helps to write it out.
    David and SB are the two that just love Shinnamon the way he is, which helps to keep him grounded in a way.
    It will be interesting how the writers develop Shin in a way that he finds his way back to his own decent self and humanity.

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    This episode was weird, I think grandfather actions didn’t make any sense, this guy didn’t care much about Shin when he was sleeping or when he woke up. If Shin3 was just a decoy he wouldn’t have had those conversations with David, or YH or even Shin3 himself, doesn’t fit with this theory. And if he wanted to protect the company and himself he would have had security stop Shin from coming close to him. This felt like lazy writing.

    About Shin still being a good kid, wait, how does that fit with attempted murder, 2 strikes at choking SB and plain stealing the company? I mean, it’s a bit too kind. 🙂

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      All fair points. I find it fascinating (and slightly disturbing) that the show has gotten me into a frame of mind where I feel inclined to give second chances to people after multiple attempted murders.

      Trying to put myself into everyone’s shoes for so long has finally messed up my ethical compass. But I still cannot help myself wanting to show Shin kindness. Call me weak if you want to. Or just blame the SKJ effect.

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      Also, if you were to take everything at face value then the ethical (or at least law abiding) thing to do would be to send a whole bunch of people to jail. But even legally circumstances and intentionality do matter to some degree. So I find myself asking the question “would anything good come out of sending this person to jail?”.

      In the case of Seo I’d say yes – he is a vicious snake and he will persevere in his bad behavior if allowed to; so removing Seo from society is a good thing.
      With gramps I’m not seeing it — because he is already imprisoned by his disease in a much more painful way than prison ever could achieve – a control freak losing his mind is punishment enough in my view.
      Now how about Shin? Yes he is guilty of at least a few counts of assault if not attempted murder and by all rights he should go to jail. But how would that help with anything? Isn’t it better (for him and everyone else ) for him to be around people who love and support him and who can help him become a decent member of society?
      How about YH, Mum, David, SB – they were all accessories to identity theft – should we send them to jail too?

      While asking all these complicated questions I think I have managed to emotionally detach from the characters to some degree. By now I may be focusing on their symbolism more than seeing them as living breathing people… Maybe YH was right. Right and wrong are really simple and it is humans trying to justify their views who overcomplicate things. Donno. treat all this as free flowing ramblings of a weirdo.

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        I wasn’t thinking about sending them to jail really, it was more curiosity about sometimes people being way too lenient on OriShin. 🙂 Mr. Seo will probably get some jail though, he has done plenty to deserve it. About Shin, he is totally mental at the moment and any decent lawyer would get him out easy if he was to be judged but he has also done enough that he has to pay that back somehow. Remember he didn’t stop himself, the only reason he didn’t kill grandpa is because SB stopped him and then Shin3 stopped him from hurting her. Also, he doesn’t think much of it, even Seo knows he committed crimes while Shin just finds excuses for his actions. If I were to guess though I think the writer still has some redemption plans for him at the very end.

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