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D-Day: Episode 4

Hye-sung only has one goal in mind: keep his patients alive. But it’s no easy route to Mirae Hospital, and not just because the roads are blocked. The emotional journey is also a struggle, as tensions run high and the desire to save everyone clashes against the realities of low supply versus high demand. Memories are stirred up as the present mimics the past, and we finally get a glimpse of why Woo-jin and Hye-sung seem to despise each other so much, and why, perhaps, they so strongly believe in their current (and completely opposite) ideologies about how to best serve their patients.

EPISODE 4 RECAP

When the dust clears after the hospital collapses, Hye-sung (still alive!) slowly crawls out of his fetal position, staring in shock at the utterly destroyed building in front of him. Staggering to his feet, he slowly approaches the rubble, studying the ruins in dismay. He finds one of the men’s slippers, and as he picks it up, he hears a gasping noise from within the debris.

Frantically he digs at the broken blocks of concrete, trying to save the trapped patient. No one gets left behind if he can help it, but the large heavy concrete slabs are too much for him to move by himself.

When the other men arrive from the dock, he orders them to help him move the slabs of concrete. But even with everyone helping, they aren’t able to free the trapped patient, and in fact, cause more rubble to topple. Hye-sung gets a wild look of determination in his eyes as he desperately begs the men to help him — he knows he heard someone there in the rubble.

They try to talk sense into him, but it isn’t until Ddol-mi rushes up, screaming at him to remember the patients he left down at the bottom of the hill — after barely saving their lives, is Hye-sung going to abandon them to try and save a man who’s most likely already dead? Didn’t he tell them to give up the minimal and worst cases? Even if it hurts, there’s nothing they can do.

Hye-sung slowly drops the slipper in his hand and, without a word, walks back to his still-living patients.

Meanwhile, back in Seoul, triage tents are being assembled in front of the ER while injured patients slowly form a long queue, waiting to be treated. The firefighters rush up hills and flights of stairs, carrying buckets of water since they aren’t able to use their trucks. Sweat pouring from their faces, they exhaustedly stagger from the back-breaking labor.

A worried woman stands outside of the building, begging the firefighters to save her baby. They break down the windows to get inside because the hallway is blocked, and after a moment or two, Woo-sung and Ki-woong come out holding the cutest little pup. Awww.

The frantic woman thanks them profusely, with grateful tears that her “baby” has been saved, while Captain Choi laughs in disbelief that they just saved a dog. Hey, now — pets are important members of a family! But it gives everyone a light-hearted moment to release some pent-up tension.

As the firefighters rest a bit, Captain Choi tries to figure out when the roads will be cleared of rubble so their trucks can get through. He’s told over the radio that the heavy equipment used to clear rubble is being sent to help clear the subways first, and then will be used on the roads.

He asks dispatch what they should do with the injured people they’ve found, wondering if they should bring them to Han River Mirae Hospital since that’s the closest hospital, but the dispatch operator tells him it collapsed so they should go somewhere else. Woo-sung overhears this last bit, and his face fills with worry as he digs out his phone, stopping short of actually calling his brother.

Hye-sung and his ragtag army of hospital refugees reach the river cruise ship, and as soon as everyone is on board, he and the twins’ father race to the bridge to figure out how to start the ship. Ha, it’s cute how they both give each other a “I have no idea what we’re doing” look, but Twins Papa twists the ignition key and… nothing happens. The engines rev, but they don’t start.

Despairing, he bows his head, but Hye-sung reaches over, telling him to try once more. And it starts! Yay! They have power! The ship slowly sails away from the dock. The refugees are on their way.

Except who knows how far they will get. Twins Papa isn’t a sailor, so he has no idea what the position on the fuel gage means — they could stop halfway there, for all he knows. But Hye-sung tells him that they’ll just go as far as they can.

Ddol-mi wanders the ship, checking on all the patients that have settled in for their impromptu cruise. When she spots cases of soda and other drinks, she gets a big smile her face and proceeds to hand them out to the patients, raising their spirits a little. She has a can of coffee to give to Hye-sung, too, and she finds him alone on the top deck. Nonchalantly she hands over the coffee, telling him it’s not because she thinks he deserves it or anything, oh no.

But when he doesn’t respond, she looks out to where he’s staring — a bridge has been completely destroyed halfway through and a bus hangs off the edge. Ddol-mi covers her mouth in horror and she instinctively leans agains Hye-sung, who holds her steady as the ship slowly cruises past.

From the safety of a helicopter, the president looks down at his destroyed city. They hover over a ruined National Assembly building, and the president wonders how this could have happened. They’ll need to create a committee to be in charge of the nation’s safety, and the president orders his team to get in touch with Ja-hyuk ASAP.

Back on the ship, Hye-sung’s devised another makeshift way to incubate the babies — by using boiled cans of coffee as hot packs. Ddol-mi’s impressed at his ingenuity and wonders if they can’t just sail all the way to safety in Incheon and by-pass Seoul altogether. But Hye-sung quietly tells her that they’ll soon have to get off (because they’re low on fuel).

Mirae Hospital is surrounded by crowds of desperate people being held at bay by police guards, and cranky Doctor Yoo Myung-hyun wonders why they’re so noisy and keeping him from his sleep. A man rushes out from one of the triage tents, begging the doctor for some help — his wife is going into labor.

Myung-hyun tells them to try another hospital because theirs doesn’t have an OB/GYN department, but the husband wonders why such an elite hospital with all its technology can’t do a simple procedure like give birth. When Myung-hyun once again refuses him, the man lashes out and punches him in the face. They have to be separated by the security guards — tensions are high, to say the least.

Due to the earthquake interfering with all the delicate high-powered equipment, the only reliable device at the moment is an ultrasound machine that Woo-jin uses check for internal bleeding on a patient. Intern Dae-gil hurries over to grab the man’s charts but only manages to knock off the neatly organized stack the nurse had set there.

Irritated, she reprimands him and kicks him out to go get more bedding for the patients. Grumbling that it’s always the interns who get stuck with the crappy jobs, he settles into the store room for a quick break when he’s surprised by So-yul.

She tells him it’s good to let out all his frustrations, and she’s there to get supplies as well, just like him, since there isn’t much call for a psychiatrist right now. Aw, it’s cute how she’s manages to distract him and perk up his spirits as they work together to bring the bedding.

Night has fallen, and slowly Hye-sung pushes his mother in the wheel chair as everyone makes their way along the path next to the river. The image of the man trapped under the rubble refuses to leave him, but Ddol-mi catches his attention as she helps him push his mother. She’s amazed at how different the Han River looks now — less like a place to relax and have fun, and more like how it was during the Korean War.

She’s surprised to discover that they’re making their way to Mirae Hospital, since she knows they don’t have incubators for the babies. But Hye-sung points out that because it’s state-of-the-art, the hospital will have a working power generator. If they can at least get there, they’ll somehow make it work.

Just then, Ji-na calls out, worried about the twins’ mother — her vitals aren’t looking good. Hye-sung orders more drips to help counteract the shock of hemorrhage from giving birth, but Sister holds out the empty IV bag, telling them they don’t have any more.

That’s Hye-sung’s breaking point, and he takes out his frustration on a nearby garbage can, kicking it until it’s crushed. “What do we have, then?” he yells. “What do you expect me to do?” He turns his face up to the heavens: “You left us with nothing! Do you want to see these people die in the streets?!”

He staggers over to where his mother sits comatose in her wheelchair and falls to his knees, resting his face on her shoulder. Sister kneels in front of him, gently reminding him that he once told her that he believed in her. She — and everyone else here — have been following him on this road because they trust him. With a small smile, she tells him to not be shaken — she still believes in him.

Despite the late hour, the president has assembled his emergency national safety committee. He’s not impressed with the way the Ministers in charge of safety, health and welfare, and land management keep trying pass the bureaucratic buck to each other. That’s why he’s appointed someone else to be in charge of this committee — someone who he trusts will get results.

There are dissatisfied mumblings as Ja-hyuk enters. He’s newly elected and doesn’t have the seniority, but the president points out he’s more of an expert than anyone else here on earthquakes, so he’s the man in charge now.

As Hye-sung and his refugees arrive at the security line of Mirae Hospital, he’s stopped by Manager Park who tells him that the hospital is closed and he’ll have to wait with the others in the ER or take his patients elsewhere. Director Park is astonished that Hye-sung is there, and as he peers down from his office window, he says that they’ll only accept the man in the bed. Ah, yes, the VIP.

There’s a showdown in the hospital lobby as Hye-sung demands to know why the Director isn’t taking any more patients. Director Park says it’s because they don’t have space but they’ll accept that “one man” on the hospital bed. So, then, are the rest of the patients supposed to just die in the streets?

Just then, Chief Kang staggers in, bloody and exhausted. She insists that the hospital should stay open after an earthquake of such magnitude. The Director quickly orders Chief Kang to talk with him in private — and to move the VIP to the ICU. Ah, yes, priorities.

Cleaned up and in a fresh pair of scrubs, Chief Kang relays the severity of the earthquake. If they reject patients, they’ll only be bringing in even more negative publicity to the hospital (thanks to Hye-sung’s interview earlier).

Woo-jin worries about opening up to endless lawsuits since they won’t be able to help everyone, and the people they do help might not receive the best medical attention based on their low supplies and limited equipment. Director Park decides to take a middle path — they’ll quietly close down portions of the hospital in such a way that won’t alert the media.

He’s also figured out a way to avoid lawsuits by making everyone sign a waiver that will not hold Mirae Hospital responsible for any neglect. The kicker is that they can refuse to help anyone who refuses to sign — which means patients brought to the hospital unconscious won’t receive assistance by default.

Hye-sung finds a waiver left on his mother’s lap, and he and Ji-na share a “can you believe this?” glance as he reads it over. But he doesn’t need to sign it — Director Park informs Hye-sung that because he’s no longer a doctor at Mirae Hospital, they are not responsible for his actions, or the patients he brought with him. He orders everyone out.

The twins’ father rushes forward, desperately pleading for them to keep his wife and children. But an unfazed Director Park orders the guards to move them out. Hye-sung begins to push his mother’s wheelchair, ready to hit the road again, but then he stops. Steeling himself, he wheels her back around.

The fireman are busy searching through rubble, and Captain Choi barely saves Woo-sung’s life as a roof caves in. He yells at him, asking why Woo-sung is so distracted, and Woo-sung dazedly tells him that he thinks his mother is dead (since he assumes she was in the hospital when it collapsed).

Hye-sung is on his knees in the middle of the hospital lobby. Director Park walks down the stairs, and even though he seems annoyed, there’s a small aura of triumph when he sees Hye-sung. As everyone watches, Hye-sung explains how much his patients trusted him to follow him all the way here, begging for the chance to continue treating them at the hospital. He promises to never go against Director Park’s will again.

But Director Park points out that it’s not his will, it’s simply hospital policy. Ugh. Hye-sung, still kneeling, says that if they leave, there’s little hope that anyone will live.

Chief Kang intervenes, pointing out that they’re already understaffed and they could use Hye-sung’s expertise in the ER. She promises to take responsibility for Hye-sung, and then quietly reminds him that if they let a woman and her newborn babies die because they kicked them out of the hospital, that will be an even bigger blow to the hospital’s public image.

That’s logic Director Park understands, and he permits them to stay. He tells the twins’ father and Hye-sung to see him in private, where he explains that they don’t have the equipment to care for the newborns, and hands over a waiver for the father to sign, releasing them of any responsibility should something happen.

The responsibility will rest squarely on Hye-sung’s shoulders, as Director Park gives him a contract that says Hye-sung is liable for anything that happens to his refugee patients and not Mirae Hospital. Glaring at him, Hye-sung signs the contract, and then leaves with Director Park’s Park reminder that he promised not to go against him.

He runs into Woo-jin, who points out that Hye-sung isn’t the type to get down on his knees like that. But Hye-sung says that he’s just trying to be the best doctor he can be — if it means getting down on his knees to save a patient’s life, then it’s only embarrassing for him. Why is Woo-jin so concerned — is it because he knows he was wrong?

Angrily, Woo-jin tells him that he, too, makes his decisions based on his patients. Before the bickering can get more intense, Chief Kang tells them to knock it off. There’s clearly some history here, and it doesn’t seem very pleasant.

Ji-na hurries after Hye-sung, asking if he isn’t worried about his mother. Oh yeah. He rushes into her room to sit down beside her.

A flashback shows us a little more what happened that snowy night when Hye-sung is wheeled into the ER along with his parents — looks like a car accident. Hye-sung begs Woo-jin — who he calls “hyung” — to do the surgery for his mother, since he is the only one he trusts. A worried Woo-jin promises to do everything in his power to save Hye-sung’s mother.

But when she’s still unconscious a month after the surgery, Woo-sung insists that it must be medical malpractice that made their mother like this, and that they need to take the hospital to court. After the hearing (which rules in the hospital’s favor), Hye-sung pulls Woo-jin aside. Hesitantly, Hye-sung asks his “hyung” Woo-jin to tell him — doctor-to-doctor — if anything happened during the surgery.

Woo-jin’s face is guarded as he says the answer he gave in the hearing is the truth, that nothing happened, and Hye-sung says he accepts his answer. But the look on his face betrays his doubt. Back in the present day, Hye-sung tells his comatose mother to stay put for awhile — he has some patients to care for.

In a meeting with the hospital chiefs (what few are available, that is), one of the chiefs points out that they don’t have enough supplies to last very long, thanks to the previous decision to downsize the emergency budget. Woo-jin still thinks the best procedure is to close down the hospital, but he puts Chief Kang on the spot — she’s the Chief of the ER so she should have countermeasures in place for a large disaster.

Her countermeasure, though, is to accept more patients. Woo-jin is astonished by this answer, since it means the hospital will become useless even sooner. Chief Kang points out they can blame their lack of supplies on governmental emergency support being late, therefore absolving them of blame. Instead, Mirae Hospital will be known as a hero in this time of crisis by taking in all the trauma patients.

The ever-wily Director Park likes the sound of that, but he demands to know if Chief Kang will take responsibility for whatever happens during this plan of hers. She says she will, on the condition that she’s given complete command of the hospital.

The proud parents are cuddling their newborns, and happily tell Hye-sung that even though they know it damaged his pride, they’re thankful for everything he’s done to take care of them. But Hye-sung needs the father to go out and look for more fuel for the ship.

He also sees Sister and Ddol-mi hanging outside the ER. They were just waiting to say “good-bye” — Sister is worried about her family and Ddol-mi isn’t familiar with this hospital, so she’d just be a hindrance. Of course Hye-sung thinks those are ridiculous excuses when they need all the man-power they can get, but before he can argue too much, Chief Kang’s voice sounds over the intercom.

She tells everyone that Mirae Hospital is going into a state of emergency. From this moment on, in order to conserve electricity for the patients on life-support, all power to the building will be shut off except for the ICU, operating rooms, and the ER. The only elevators that will work are the ones leading to the operating rooms. Any patient who is able to walk will be discharged immediately.

As Hye-sung — with his head-lamp — walks through the hallways, he stops to do a second-take when he sees Sister and Ddol-mi with a flashlight, helping to discharge patients. Aw, of course they wouldn’t leave.

However, the patients aren’t exactly cooperative, and they refuse to leave. A particularly irate guardian of a patient on a respirator is angry enough to push a weary Chief Kang against the wall, and Hye-sung passionately points out that these measures are in place to save the patients who can’t move. They’re not giving up on the patients — it’s so they can save as many people as they can.

Woo-jin and Hye-sung continue their multi-layered bickering as Hye-sung points out that since he’s a guardian himself, he knows exactly the words that a guardian needs to hear. But Woo-jin knows how easily the guardians of patients can turn against you. Do we want history to repeat itself? Once again, Chief Kang is the one to break them up, and Woo-jin practically sneers as he tells her he’s looking forward to seeing how well her emergency measures work.

Watching all the discharged patients and their families slowly leave the hospital, she tearfully says a final goodbye over the intercom, apologizing for the inconvenience and reminding them the hospital isn’t simply kicking them out. Instead, they’re just doing the best they can due to the earthquake. The hospital has to return to normal so they can treat everyone again, and she hopes they’ll see each other again soon. She respectfully bows to the hundreds of patients filing out the doors.

COMMENTS

I wasn’t exactly sure what I was getting into with this show, since I’m not generally a fan of medical dramas, but I’m delighted to discover that I’m really enjoying it so far. Perhaps it’s because I’m a sucker for an ensemble cast (and despite the fact that Kim Young-kwang gets top billing, it’s most definitely an ensemble) and I’m even more of a sucker for when we get a cast with interesting and dynamic female characters who do more than just try to win over the leading man. Which is to say I absolutely adore Ddol-mi and Ji-na and Sister and Chief Kang and So-yul and our stubborn female firefighter (to whom I apologize because I didn’t catch her name, but she’s awesome and I hope we see more of her).

As for the medical aspect of it, while that perhaps interested me the least originally, I really enjoy watching the “human” side of the first responders. In a big disaster, you just assume someone will be there to help — doctors and firefighters and police. You don’t necessarily stop to consider that these people may also be worried about their families or be going on little-to-no sleep for days. You just know that you need help, and these are the people who are supposed to help you. Can I really blame Sister for her desire to abandon her patients to make sure her family is safe? But I do admire her for sticking around, even though she doesn’t have as much confidence in her abilities — or even really seemed to care about her job, originally.

I also love seeing Ddol-mi challenge herself (and just be adorable, because Jung So-min is adorable. And so tiny! I love any time the camera likes to have fun with the extreme height difference between her and Kim Young-kwang). She’s the character I assumed from the get-go that would encounter the most growth, but that’s before I realized how many characters we’d get to focus on in the meantime. While I’d love to see more of Ddol-mi, I also want to see more Sister, and Chief Kang (her final words made me tear up, especially knowing how she must be feeling now that her son is missing), and all the firefighters, and, heck, I want to know what happened to our favorite homeless suicidal musician Mr. Kang, who is probably still stuck in the subway.

I think what I love most is that, even though there is a big tragedy and people are struggling through, the show still gives us those beats of human warmth and humor — which is something that’s not only necessary to relieve tension narratively, but also in the real world. The firefighters saving the little dog after hours of slaving away saving other people might have seemed ridiculous, but it was adorable to realize that such a small act meant the world to that woman. The discover of the soda and coffee in the storage room of the cruise ship was a tiny moment, but it encouraged not only Ddol-mi, but the patients she served (and the coffee had a practical use, too!). These little beats of humor aren’t just to give us a little chuckle, but to remind us that despite the big tragedy around us, there are moments worth savoring and enjoying.

That’s not say I don’t expect things to get much, much worse. We’re only four episodes in so far, and there’s still a lot of work to do to get the city back to rights. As Hye-sung surely knows by now, just when you think you’re safe, something will come along and rip it away from you, be it a smug bureaucrat, a sinkhole, or a building collapsing. But thankfully he has a great team alongside him who believes in him, and (whether they realize it or not yet) believes in his goal to save as many people as they can.

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Thanks for recapping this drama! It's amazing Kim Young-kwang is really surprising me with his acting. I just wish it was being subbed faster.

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I really love this show. Just wished it will get more love.
Outstanding acting.

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I'm thinking about starting this but I'm not too sure yet. Still like skimming the recaps, though (✿◠‿◠) it gives me a good overall understanding.

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Depends on what you are looking for. It's watchable, but the portrayal of the disaster just isn't very realistic.

I've watched up to ep. 6, and I feel like it's the usual medical drama with the typical focus on power & politics within the hospital. Some characters' actions (or lack thereof) are rather mind-boggling – as if a day into the catastrophe they still haven't realised what is going on.

Some characters are quite engaging though.

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"I feel like it’s the usual medical drama with the typical focus on power & politics within the hospital."

NOOOOOOOOO! I was hoping it would be anything but this....

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Tbh It really isn't. Yeah, there are hospital politics involved, it happens in real life & it wouldn't be a medical drama without it, but that's really not so much the basis of it. I hate politics focused medical dramas, but this one adds more & the characters along with the great quality is what's keeping me around. I love how layered the characters are and everyone brings in something to the overall plot, they're not just there for convenience.

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Agreed on @alua.

For me it is watchable, and i have less expectation for this drama. Kim Young-kwang and Jung So Min are also doing great.

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<They were just waiting to say “good-bye” — Sister is worried about her family and Ddol-mi isn’t familiar with this hospital, so she’d just be a hindrance.

This is the kind of thing that has me shaking my head with this drama. Yes, they should be worried about their families but this scene of "yeah, we've done our bit, we're heading home now" makes no sense. This is a major emergency. They are trained medical professionals. They'd be a hindrance because they don't know the hospital? There's a shortage of medical staff! There is a constant stream of injured people (or at least there should be).

Perplexed at how much power politics & petty squabbling (whether among politicians or medical professionals) they are throwing in too ––– like they didn't get the message that a major earthquake just killed thousands of people....

I kind of wish Woo-jin's character wasn't set up in such an extreme manner. He's just so blatantly against everything, that it's hard to believe he's a doctor at all. Director Park is very much an archetype, I don't find he adds anything to the drama at all that we haven't seen before. At least with Woo-jin we should get some internal conflict at some point (b/c I'm pretty sure his trajectory will be to become the doctor he once was again).

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Some parts of this are almost like if half the characters in "Walking Dead" just all of a sudden decided to become pacifists. Like, "hey there are 40,000 dead folks out there, and you are making people fill out forms to avoid lawsuits?".

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Actually I am not familiar with Walking Dead....

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Walking Dead is that Zombie Apocalypse TV show. Basically zombies are not nice folks and trying to reason with them is probably a waste of time.

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...I feel like you're not watching Walking Dead right lol.

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In 'The Walking Dead', there are only a few thousand humans left alive in the entire state of Georgia, and they spend most of the series bickering with each other, bullying each other, imprisoning, torturing, and killing each other. There are millions of zombies roaming the country, of course. However, the humans have plenty of tools and equipment. They just never organize themselves to systematically destroy the things shambling around threatening their lives.

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Jung So Min...I generally love her but also love all the kick ass women characters here

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The aeriel shot in which they showed the bost moving across the broken bridge... I think that was to symbolize/show the tragedy of the unknown number of lives lost when cars plunged into deep under. I thought that was kinda cool.

And lol, Dr Kang is so much better at PR than Chief ever will be. No wonder she got the larger share of funding - she circumvates the hospital's ridiculousness with sneaky, sly win-win solutions.

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We need a lot more than one bus hanging off a bridge though. We need that everywhere. And we need people dying in the hospital – but there've been so few casualties shown to us.

Dr. Kang is an interesting character, one that generally makes sense – in her professionalism while at the same time suffering inside b/c she doesn't know where her son is. The Chief is an archetype, a money-grabbing no-man who appears in every medical drama ever (Korean as well as Japanese).

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Thanks @odilettante.

I feel this is a show that has to be watched for the human stories and character growth mainly, that struggles to take place in spite of the inadequate emergency responses, corruption, politicking and downright bad interpersonal relations. Then, that we get some good CGI, some inventive life-saving ideas, warm moments and medical competence becomes plus points.

In other shows, I notice hosts and hosts of extras. I wonder why they did not have even (what seems like) half the number of them in this one. Maybe the high cost of the great CGIs have taken from the production value?

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It kills me to think that this drama got a massive budget and was preproduced, when this exact same channel cut The End of the World in half partway through its run, on short notice too. All the more when you look at the technical brilliance and meticulous attention to detail Ahn Pan-seok achieved in such insane working conditions, versus the mountain of logic fails, continuity errors, lack of research, posing and sheer laziness this crack team produced with all the money and time in the world. The injustice of it all...

Questions for this episode...who thought it was a good idea to get on a boat after an earthquake? (do we need to talk about tsunami awareness and the risks post-earthquakes now lol) Why were the trees and power lines all standing and undamaged in places where buildings had collapsed? How can anyone justify throwing cancer patients out on the street (streets that are too dangerous for cute young female interns, we are told), many of whom are in the middle of intensive therapies, extreme drug regimens, close to death, hardly able to walk, etc, and where is this supposed flood of emergency patients when the hospital looks barely full? Why would the hospital be understaffed when the disaster occurred in the middle of the work day? Why would the eeeevil director spend funds on making his hospital an earthquake-proof fortress, when we are told he is stingy and greedy? For that matter, why is he considering building a trauma center, if he hates traumatology sooooo much? Will this drama ever regain touch with reality about anything? Will its attempts at genre ever rise above masturbatory, exploitative, reductive nonsense?

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About the best i can say so far is that this drama makes more sense and is more watchable than Heirs, Dr. Jin or Dr. StrangeDude. It is full of WTF logical inconsistencies that make you wonder "who would actually ever do/say that?".

All the budget in the world won't help if the writing and directing do goofy things.

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i like this show, its getting so cool .
i want to read more.

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Why in poo perfect hell are people on this show so freaking useless. I actively need to fast-forward through several scenes to watch the show. WTF!
Woo-jin for instance. I lost count of the number of times he has insisted that the hospital not take any extra patients. I mean yeah ok we get it, you're the poster boy for inaction you don't have to remind us every 5 minutes. And that doctor who was grouchy for having his nap disturbed to treat patients or that intern who was cribbing about grunt work. And every time there is a problem the first response is "that's not my job".
What really is your job? As far as I can see there isn't a single one you have actively accepted. If you have such an issue with doing pretty much anything, why the fuck are you still there? Leave! stop taking up space and using up the limited resources that can be used for those who need them.
It looks so convincingly systemic I'm curious is this the norm in Korea or over dramatization? (I mean no offence. I'm genuinely curious)
Also, the argument that they're not equipped to deal with certain types of injuries does not hold water. You're doctors, you may be specialists now, but you had to know the basics before specialisation. People run field hospitals at disaster sites. Saying 'we cant do it here' in a big hospital is unconscionable.
I have doctors in my immediate family, and as a result, several family friends who are doctors as well. This weird portrayal actively gets on my nerves.

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Woo-jin is a very disappointing character. He's so selective about patients, I really don't understand why he's a doctor at all. He should be working in a plastic surgery clinic maybe or a private house doctor for a millionaire, not at a general (if private) hospital. His total inaction is supposed to contrast our action hero boy (see ep. 6!), but it's coming at a cost – I'm doubting he's a doctor at all.

<And that doctor who was grouchy for having his nap disturbed to treat patients or that intern who was cribbing about grunt work. And every time there is a problem the first response is “that’s not my job”.

These are small things that make no sense to me in a disaster drama. Major earthquake with thousands of dead & injured and Mr. Intern is complaining about carrying blankets. But maybe we can't blame them – that stream of incoming patients that should be happening just hasn't been seen. Nothing to do with lack of budget, just bad writing (using clichés from medical dramas that have no place in a disaster story). Instead of "I'm too good to carry blankets" they should be giving us scenes of a) exhaustion from non-stop work b) some people traumatised by the large scale of what happened. We finally get some of this in ep 5, but it's like Mr Intern took a day to realise that there was a major earthquake....

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Let's look at the positives here: Woo-jin is a relatively realistic character. He's a doctor, specialised in his field (like doctors in real life are), he takes pride in what he does and thinks it's the coolest thing ever (as very many doctors in real life are) and for him, patients are objects to be treated (a very typical attitude by surgeons and doctors in real life).

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@Jon G. I have to disagree with you there. Woo-jin is IMO the exact opposite of realistic.
He may be a specialist who takes pride in his work. So? Becoming a specialist does not mean you magically become incapable of dispensing other kinds of medical care. In fact you ought to be even more capable than the rest. And again, what kind of pride prevents you from dispensing emergency care? He actively advocates turning away the injured, not treating ANYONE he comes across infact basically not doing anything! Not only is this a gross violation of the Hippocratic oath but his response to absolutely every crisis is "we can't do this, what if something goes wrong!" it's a miracle he became a doctor let alone a surgeon.

Side note, I have been around a LOT of doctors in my life and while they all tend to maintain varying degrees of impersonal distance with their patients to retain objectivity, I have yet to meet one who thinks of patients as objects (Outside of fiction anyway). That is not to say that they don't exist but I sincerely doubt there are that many of them.

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No, the exact opposite of realistic is Hye-sung.

He may be a specialist who takes pride in his work. So? Becoming a specialist does not mean you magically become incapable of dispensing other kinds of medical care.

A surgeon in a hospital never learned most "kinds of medical care" in the first place (much less a very young specialist in robot surgery). He will be as useless in the ER as a psychiatrist in the OR.

Yes, he should step out of his comfort zone here, but so far, not a single doctor in this show has reacted appropriately to the disaster they are supposedly faced with. I cannot blame Woo-jin of all people to be the one who does.

Side note, I have been around a LOT of doctors in my life and while they all tend to maintain varying degrees of impersonal distance with their patients to retain objectivity, I have yet to meet one who thinks of patients as objects (Outside of fiction anyway). That is not to say that they don’t exist but I sincerely doubt there are that many of them.

Doctors in general don't. Surgeons on the other hand do that a lot, and they have to, especially when they are specialised in a high risk field. When >25% of your operations end with the patient dying, treating them as objects is the right thing to do.

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<not a single doctor in this show has reacted appropriately to the disaster they are supposedly faced with. I cannot blame Woo-jin of all people to be the one who does.

I don't disagree with that. I commented only on Woo-jin because I really wish he wasn't just a 100% "No!"-man, which is overdone purely for contrasting with the Hye-sung.

But Hye-sung is pretty unrealistic himself – his little hissy fit of frustration, his action-hero moves and total stupidity (both in ep. 6). I did note elsewhere that Ddol-mi's "I'm leaving now because I don't know the hospital and would be hindrance" was ludicrous – because indeed, none of these doctors are acting like a major disaster just happened. I've said that several times already too: with all the petty squabbling, hospital politics and even comfortably chatting/flirting, it's like none of them has realised that they've got a major emergency (one that will last days and days) on their hands...

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I'll agree with you there Hye-sung has a lot to gain in the realistic department as well. Between him and Woo-jin they'd probably make one barely competent surgeon.

To address your other points ave you met many surgeons (competent in robotic surgery or otherwise)? I have. Any surgeon needs to know at least the very basics of surgery before he can attempt specialization in any field. In a crisis, you need to be willing to pitch in to do whatever you can. Ever since the quake struck he has yet to meet a patient he wants to treat.
And no I don't buy that he's useless. His official title is professor of surgery which is not something that can be conferred upon him if he's only competent at that one thing. And he has shown himself to be at least knowledgeable about surgical procedures as seen in later episodes.

And you know what? Say you're right. His specialization renders him completely useless to do anything else. Then why is he interfering with the others who are able, and willing to do what needs to be done? He has an opinion about everything. What has to be done, how it needs to be done etc. Why is he giving opinions on matters he has no knowledge about? Let him sit quietly in a corner.

>25% surgeries result in death? Where did you get such a random number? And FYI that statistic if it is true is completely pointless. Different kinds of surgeries have vastly different mortality rates depending upon the condition of the patient, severity of problem complexity of surgery and level of innovation in techniques. You cannot make such a broad generalization as "more surgeons than doctors treat patients as objects".

And to use your own logic, the few fields in which robotic surgeries are now being used; have incredibly high success rates. Reassured of happy endings, a person in that field would be less likely to want to treat his patient dispassionately.
And I have seen in real life, the couple of robotic surgeons I've met are in fact very compassionate people (I cannot comment on whether or not this is the norm but this is my lived experience).

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Why should we not expect them to portray a disaster scenario in a reasonably realistic manner?

They gave us the fiction of a massive, life-changing earthquake, with a CGI landscape that more or less shows that. But then the streets of Seoul are largely deserted and there are only a trickle of patients coming in – in a city of 10 million – and barely anyone has died yet. That's just the tip of the WTF iceberg here... which is sad, given the potential that was there.

They had a huge budget and the drama was almost entirely pre-produced. We get enough lack of realism in all other medical dramas, so why make such a big production and then create something that is barely different from what we've seen before (except for the CGI)?

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@nochang I've said it before. If 'it's fiction' was an appropriate excuse we might as well have Godzilla be the cause of the earthquake and the doctors disarming a nuclear bomb for the finale. If the focus of the show is on human behavior, well they're so NOT acting like real humans would in the same situation. There is enough potential in a crisis situation for some amazing human stories. And it is being completely wasted. That's our problem you see. What @alua mentioned in her comment as well. The show was completely pre-produced. Plus we have already seen some great character moments and writing when it comes to our good guy characters (not flawless but significantly better than the rest). Seeing what the writers are capable of WRT the good guys gives us hope , we end up expecting more for the others as well, so when the show fails to deliver, our disappointment is massive.

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I never understand the "it's fiction, not real life" argument. Fiction is fine, but it doesn't excuse crappy/lazy writing. Suspension of disbelief is also fine (give me a Godzilla, zombies and aliens, no problem!), but you still have to set up a world within which any flights of imagination you throw to the viewer make sense. Meaning, a flattened Seoul needs to show us plenty of dead and injured bodies not a ghost town, otherwise I'm not buying it (or assuming alien abduction instead).

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I actually want to know more about Woo-jin and Hye-sung. Woo-jin used to be a good doctor just like Hye-sung but somehow something make him change. I think it's something to do with Hye-sung's mom.

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Well, It didn't effect me, I don't need to see 10000corpse to believe that earthquake hit Seoul, its enough for me to see few different patients with different problem and how the doctors handle it. As they show the back story of the characters you'll get the idea of why they become the way they are. In episode5 we get to know that actually Woojin used to be such a good doctor, exactly like Hyesung but something happen that make him turn into such a cold doctor. It make me curious of what actually happen to him that make him change like that. It also show that actually Park Jina is the daughter of hospital chief. I'm curious to know her story too. So far, I don't have problem with the drama.. Like I said earlier, this drama not that far from makjang dramas. Maybe I watch too many makjang dramas that make me don't really care about "the real life" situation. I just accept it the way it is.

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Wow! Why so serious? For me this drama still watchable and acceptable. I kinda know how it feels like when we don't really know what to do in disaster situation because we don't familiar with it. In my country, when tsunami hit our country for the first time we don't know what to do and we don't even know that it's actually tsunami. Some people even went to see and take videos of it and end up washed away by the water. At that time none of us think that tsunami would ever hit our country.

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I think you guys are reacting just a little remember this is a drama and I have yet to see any medical drama Chinese, Japanese, American that is completely realistic and perfect. Sure some dramas do it better than others. Emergency Couple and Iryu seasons 1-4 come to mind. But I watched this drama because I'm a fan of foreign medical dramas as I can't stand my own countries drama's (American). To much sex for me. If you don't like the drama then drop it. Simple as that.

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Medical dramas from any country are rarely realistic. But we are not really talking about the medical part here, but the people doing the med stuff. And a lot of what they are doing simply makes no sense.

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I think it's a great thing that viewers question what they are watching. Not every tv show needs to be mindless entertainment. I enjoy reading about other people's different POV (what they like and dislike about the show). Most of the time it's more enjoyable than the show itself.

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I forgot to add Korean medical dramas lol.

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A crisis, like money, has a tendency to amplify who you really are not change it. If you were a selfish, cowardly, ambitious ass before disaster struck, you'll be an even bigger version in a crisis.

Some of the complaints here amount to no more than you being upset that the shows creators imagination differed from your own.

Could trees still be standing even while the structures around them collapsed? After the tsunami in Malaysia, trees were still standing in the midst of total devastation. There were reports that a large tribe of fishermen who escaped out to see on boats had no casualties. If a tsunami occurred on the Han Rivere is being on land near the river any safer than being on a boat in the river?

Where are the people? Dead maybe. Ep 1 the guy said that 7 out of 10 buildings, including hospitals and schools, weren't equipped to withstand an earthquake. Shocked and hiding. Unable to get to the hospitals because the roads are closed.

Why is the hospital understaffed? As a matter of choice. In California, they've shut down nearly every trauma center in the hospitals that had them. There's like one per county, if that. LA County's population alone is the size of a number of small countries. Seems very realistic.

Why would medical personnel be more worried about their families than their professional duties? Because the event affected their families as well. It's easier to maintain your focus and professionalism when you know the people you love and care about are safe. Self-interests normally trumps other people.

Would people remain focused on their own ambitions when lives are on the lines? Yes. People in charge even more so. They often use it as a chance to improve their positions and standings. When Hurricane Sandy hit the Northeast US, Red Cross workers complained that corporate took emergency Red Cross trucks out of circulation to use them as backdrops for press conferences with politicians. UN Peacekeepers were reported to be exchanging food for sex with children at refugee camps. The UN brought charges against the man who reported it before any of the child-rapist soldiers. PR trumps lives when money is at stake in real life all the time.

Would a doctor give a ridiculous bulls*** excuse to get out of helping? Yes. Because it's a disaster and it's overwhelming.

This isn't a Hollywood blockbuster. A few million dollars isn't big bucks in the vfx world. The effects have been decent. The human side portrayal has been very realistic. Given the circumstances even what would normally be considered exaggerated characteristics has worked for me, specifically because it is a crisis. Like a number of people above have said, so far it's been more realistic that any of the romantic chaebol based dramas I've watched.

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Excuse my long response. I've been holding it in since Ep. 1 comments.

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Thank you for your realistic perspective.

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Please, someone, tell Ddol-Mi to ditch that filthy lab jacket.

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