RECAP: Nine ep. 8

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Episode 8 begins with Sun Woo reappearing in his vehicle in the present. He is out of breath and grasping at thin air.  At the end of episode 7 Sun Woo had chased Jung Woo out of his father’s office after discovering him there with blood all over his hands. Right when he caught Jung Woo, his incense stick burnt out, and he returned to the future.

In 1992, Jung Woo opens his eyes and discovers that his pursuer is gone.  He falls to the ground while in the present Sun Woo catches his breath, buckles up and drives off.
The past Jung Woo stares at his blood covered hands and cries. Meanwhile, the present day Jung Woo is at dinner with his wife and friends when they notice Sun Woo enter the restaurant. Sun Woo says nothing as his sister-in-law gets up to greet him and heads straight for his brother who he immediately starts beating up.
The people who were having dinner with Jung Woo have to pull Sun Woo off of him. Sun Woo faints as they drag him away.
Back at the news station Min Young finishes up the news for Sun Woo. Their boss even allows her to read the ending written by Sun Woo.  Sun Woo’s boss leaves and asks one of the staff members to check if Sun Woo was admitted to any emergency rooms.

Min Young is trying to call Sun Woo when she goes off the air, but a call from her mother interrupts her. Her mother tells her to meet the family at the hospital, because Sun Woo was taken there after he collapsed. Yoo Jin goes back into the restaurant to ask Jung Woo why Sun Woo would run out in the middle of a broadcast just to beat him up. He doesn’t reply but asks what happened with Sun Woo.
Sun Woo wakes up to find himself in an ambulance. He asks for the time and gets up telling them to stop the car. He refuses to go to the hospital and gets out of the ambulance in the middle of traffic. (When he did this I seriously thought he was going to get hit by a car! Sun Woo is really starting to act like he has a death wish.)
Jung Woo’s wife gets a call telling her that Sun Woo jumped out of the ambulance and is shocked. She starts searching for the keys and remembers that they are inside. She leaves Jung Woo by the car where he gets a call from Sun Woo who demands to know why he didn’t say that he was with their father the night he died. Sun Woo rages at Jung Woo for killing his father. Jung Woo admits their mother told him not to tell. Sun Woo tells Jung Woo that he should be sorry for ruining his life after everything he did for him.
He hangs up saying that he will never forgive his brother. Jung Woo collapses against the car, and his wife finds him leaning against it and again asks him what is wrong.
Min Young is driving to the hospital while thinking about how Sun Woo has been acting lately. She wonders what he means by Joo Min Young. Her mother calls her again to tell her not to go as Sun Woo didn’t go to the hospital. She tells her to go home as her father is upset and will see her later.
Sun Woo once more lights an incense stick in his car and goes back to the past so he can mourn and say goodbye to his father and see the video of what happened. Rewinding the video he discovers his father was arguing with his mother about not being Jung Woo’s father.
After calling both Jung Woo and his mother psychopaths he reveals that Chairman Choi is Jung Woo’s father. His mother slaps his father and asks what is he saying. He hits back and starts choking her. His mother tries to get Jung Woo to leave, but he won’t as he tries to help his mother. In the struggle Jung Woo kills his father. Sun Woo is amazed. He fast forwards the recording and discovers when Chairman Choi arrives.

Choi convinced his mother not to call the police as he saw Jung Woo leave and knows that it was him that did it. He gets Sun Woo’s mother to go home and then Choi pages Jung Woo. On the phone, he tells him to pretend he was never there by going to the place he last was which ends up being Yoo Jin’s apartment.

In the present, Jung Woo is in his office and gives himself an injection.
Still in the past, Sun Woo stares at the recordings on his laptop when he hears someone else arrive.  Someone has entered the office with a big jug of gasoline. The person makes a call asking if anything is needed. He hangs up and starts throwing gasoline everywhere.
Sun watches this in the other room. The arsonist leaves, and Sun Woo closes the laptop. Tears fall down his face, and as smoke starts to enter the room he is in he opens his eyes and looks like he has made a choice.
Meanwhile, the teenage Sun Woo races to the hospital on his bike. He sees the fire in his father’s office and rushes inside. By that time, the future Sun Woo is already out of the building and watched from across the street as his past self ran inside. Inside the building, the teenage Sun Woo is hurt  trying to save his father.

Back in the present, Chairman Choi receives a visit from Sun Woo. Sun Woo has come to give him the news of what he has discovered. He apologizes as he now knows that Choi didn’t kill his father, but he knows that he helped cover it and blackmailed the victim. He says he will still pursue his revenge and leaves after giving him a copy of the recordings from the past on a USB. Choi watches the recordings and is shocked.

Back in 1992, it is the morning of December 31. Young Hoon is waiting at the station with Sun Woo’s date and her friend. Since Sun Woo hasn’t arrived, he tries to call him but gets no answer. In frustration, Sun Woo’s date leaves and tells her friend and Young Hoon to enjoy the ride.  Young Hoon gets dragged to the train.

In the present, the now married couple is dropping off their children at school. Young Hoon is deep in thought and almost misses the school. While his wife takes the girls in, he stays in the car and tries to call Sun Woo. He doesn’t answer, but he receives an audio message from him.  Sun Woo calls it his final message to his friend.
Sun Woo says he will keep secret what he discovered about his father’s death and admits that Young Hoon was right about it not being right to try to change the deaths. The message cuts off, and Young Hoon takes off to Sun Woo’s house, completely forgetting his wife who was chatting outside the school with other moms. (I don’t even think his poor wife had a purse/wallet with her!)
Young Hoon arrives at Sun Woo’s and rings the doorbell, but gets no answer, so he climbs over the fence to get inside. (Young Hoon is a really good friend to Sun Woo!)
Young Hoon finds Sun Woo’s phone with the battery taken out on the floor in his bathroom along with Sun Woo who is knocked out. At the same time, Min Young is driving to Sun Woo’s house determined to check up on him. As Min Young parks outside Young Hoon is searching frantically through Sun Woo’s things for the incense sticks, but can’t find them.

Young Hoon has put Sun Woo in bed and finally tries to get Sun Woo to wake up to tell him where the sticks are. Sun Woo says they are in a place that is not on the map.

Sun Woo left them in the past after taking his laptop and a USB with the recordings on it from the burning building.  He says he did it so that things are now how they had been before he heard of the sticks or the fantasy of changing the past. Young Hoon sits on the floor in despair.
Young Hoon doesn’t have long to process the news of the incense sticks when he hears someone coming in downstairs. He goes downstairs to see that Min Young has arrived.  He asks why she came and she replies that she came to see Sun Woo before asking why he is there. He lies that he drank all night with Sun Woo and that Sun Woo is knocked out from drinks. She asks to go upstairs and check on him, so he says sure. She goes upstairs but seeing Sun Woo is asleep starts closing up the drawers Young Hoon left open in his search. Young Hoon stays downstairs and calls the hospital to check his surgery schedule. It sounds like he is planning an emergency surgery for Sun Woo.
Sun Woo wakes up to see Min Young in his room and calls her Joo Min Young. He asks her to sit next to him to tell him about the news. Min Young asks Sun Woo if she can ask a question, and he says he will try to answer it. But for every one of her questions he can only reply it is a secret. So finally Min Young asks why he calls her Joo Min Young. He replies it is because that is her name although she probably doesn’t remember. He touches her cheek, and Min Young has no idea what he means. He says it is a riddle that she will never get right. They stare at each other, and as tears fall down his face she asks if he is crying. He says it’s a secret...

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I can’t believe Sun Woo decided to give up! He just let this happen to the incense sticks! While watching them burn I wonder if they would have worked if he waited another year to try again. He doesn’t have that long to live obviously, but maybe Young Hoon could have saved him. Now I am waiting for episode 9 eagerly to see how things can get worse as Sun Woo apparently has really bad luck. My prediction is that he ends up with Min Young in this alternate present anyway. How or why is a mystery for the next recap to solve.

Episodes Recapped: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20