saltypjmramyeon

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exactly

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Go Youn Jung as Oh Yi Young in Resident Playbook (2025)

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In which we are all Cho Seung Woo. (x)

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Feb 2025 | W Korea (x)

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crossover - requested by @theaggresivepacifist

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In which we are all Cho Seung Woo. (x)

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Cho Seung Woo speaking for us all back in 2021. From You Quiz on the Block, Ep 117 (x)

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Squid Game / 오징어 게임 (2021—) | Season 2 Promo | Kang Ha-neul, Kang Dae-ho/Player 388

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ooohhhh my ptsd babyyy......

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a very serious drama

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deeply appreciate how the main reaction to seo dongjae's continued misfortunes in the spin-off is simply 'lmao.'

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Another beautiful moment of character development–all played out in a ~15-minute stretch, but with the weight of the entire season behind it, as per usual in this show. <3

If, as I babbled last week, the endpoint of a character’s arc is facing and moving beyond their flaws/fears, this is Si-mok’s for season 2, in my opinion. There are other big moments that are contenders, but this feels the most concrete to me. He and Yeo-jin spent the season easing back into a partnership that has been on pause for two years, learning that they’ve both changed and adjusting to those changes– and Si-mok has been the one reaching out (in his own way) for a lot of that process.

A lot of that is because Yeo-jin is under much more pressure in season 2, and she’s much more susceptible to that pressure than Si-mok, who doesn’t do politics or favors and doesn’t have much experience with personal attachments.

On my first watch of S2 I read the frequent observations by their bosses that they spend a lot of time together mostly as a sort of in-joke nod to kdrama romance conventions. I still think that’s part of it, but a second watch suggests it was all serving this arc, because a guy who doesn’t do personal attachments doesn’t have to worry about them being used as leverage against him. Si-mok’s surprise when Yeo-jin is called to Chief Woo’s office is genuine: he expected to take the fall for this on his own, because there’s never been anybody he got close enough to that they could be used.

Lee Soo-yeon created his character from the notion that it’s impossible to control a man who wants and fears nothing (source)–and that may have been the case in season 1, but I don’t think we’re meant to see it that way now. The moment above when Si-mok realizes it’s their friendship more than their work that has put Yeo-jin in the crosshairs is, god, such a quiet and lovely piece of acting, with all of Cho Seung-woo’s considerable skill and subtlety informing it.

And then the next moment, where Si-mok departs from his usual approach and makes an emotional appeal to Choi Bit…nicely layered with logical and ethical argument, but I note that he has no answer when Bit calls him on it: they both know what he’s really there for.

We’ve spent the season watching him ask for help, a notable difference from his lone-wolf approach in S1 and in the beginning of S2–but only ever for a case, and only when there was already a certain amount of trust established. (In other words, pretty much only from Kang Won-chul and Yeo-jin.) Here he’s taking a risk I really can’t see him taking at any point in the show before this moment. Choi Bit could do more than refuse: she could make things worse for both of them, and it would certainly be in her best interests to do so.

It would make more sense to step back and regroup, find a new angle or new evidence. Instead Si-mok pushes forward on the strength of his faith in Yeo-jin’s ability to judge Choi Bit’s character–and on his faith in his ability to judge her character. It’s a decision based almost entirely on feeling. It feels like a threshold-crossing.

I’m really looking forward to seeing where they take it in the next season. (I refuse to believe we won’t get another season.)

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Is that why she was promoted from being the chief of a rural station to working for the Intelligence Bureau? She got her position for cleaning up the Intelligence Bureau Director’s mess? Well, who wouldn’t?

Han Yeo-jin’s heartbreak + Hwang Si-mok’s concern

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By the way, what makes you think that you can trust what I’m telling you? Who says I do? I don’t trust you.

BAE DOO-NA and CHO SEUNG-WOO as Han Yeo-jin and Hwang Shi-mok SECRET FOREST (2017) dir. Ahn Gil-ho

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S2E15, when putting a phone into a locker is the closest thing to a hug we get

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Reunion of our Secret Forest/Stranger duo!

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damn, that makes me sad, it doesn't have to be like that. if you rewrite your life, may i still play a part?

JI JIN-HEE & SON SUK-KU in DESIGNATED SURVIVOR: 60 DAYS | 60일, 지정생존자 (2019) (insp.)