Big: Episode 16 (Final)
by girlfriday
Well, it ends. Listen, my mother said that if I don’t have nice things to say… waitaminute, my mother never said that. Let the ragefest begin!
This show is basically a lesson in math. Turns out you can have great parts, but the sum can add up to less than those parts. I know! I didn’t know it worked that way either! But math is wily like that. And apparently, so are dramas.
SONG OF THE DAY
Big OST – Gong Yoo “Because It’s You” [ Download ]
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FINAL EPISODE RECAP
Da-ran makes her big confession (handy to have the whole cast rounded up) that she’s in love with KKJ. She takes off the ring and leaves it on the table. Kyung-joon drags her away, and her parents are left to apologize to the in-laws.
Kyung-joon calls her crazy—he’s going to lose his memory and she’ll be all alone and hurt. Da-ran: “I’m going to remember. Even if it hurts, I can’t pretend you weren’t here.”
He stammers, “You’re not going to pretend it didn’t happen?” Is the question you’re really asking, Then was the last episode all for nothing? Because that sure is MY question.
Da-ran: “No. Because I said that my feelings for you were real. The you that I like is there. He’s there now and will be in the future.” He looks at her, dumbfounded—but he might not remember, and he might call her a crazy person!
She says through her tears that it doesn’t matter. She’s going to remember and protect their love, and she’s going to tell him everything. She’s crazy now, so why not go with it? He agrees that she sure doesn’t appear sane.
She gives him the watch she fished out of the lake, and he decides she’s officially crazy. He cups her face in his hands, sighing that she’s all dirty and smelly. She says it again—that even if he can’t remember her, she’s going to remember for the both of them, and that she won’t let go of him.
A tear falls as he hugs her tight.
Little Kyung-joon’s vitals spike, and his heart rate gets dangerously high. Se-young calls the parents, who run over and stay up with him that night, worried.
Kyung-joon and Da-ran walk down the street hand-in-hand, and he asks if she doesn’t want to go home and shower first. But she says she’s going to have to learn to be seen as a crazy person by the entire world, so she may as well steel herself now.
To that end, she decides to pick some flowers out of a planter on the sidewalk, to make up for the time she threw out the flowers he gave her. She runs across the street to wave them about and sing the Pororo song, and she successfully gets called crazy.
Kyung-joon runs over and sighs that he’d hate to forget this—it’s fodder for a lifetime of mockery. She says in turn that there are so many things she didn’t do for him when she thought he’d remember, and now that he’s going to forget she’s just full of regret.
Mari comes back to the restaurant to retrieve her fake ring and asks Aunt and Uncle to be a witness for her when Kyung-joon wakes up, to say that she’s the one who was by his side the entire time.
They nod that she’s right about that, and she sighs that she’s the only one who has the right to be by his side, and not lying Gil Teacher who goes back on her promises.
The Gil family waits on pins and needles for the fallout, and Choong-shik worries—if Yoon-jae and Da-ran left like that, the air must be frosty between them right about now…
Cut to the happy couple shooting furtive smiles at each other across the kitchen table. Kyung-joon starts in on his interrogation: “When did you first start liking KKJ?!” He slams his hands on the table for emphasis.
She retraces her steps, like the time she felt something when he showed up at the theater, or realized in the park that she was no longer waiting for Yoon-jae, but searching for Kyung-joon.
She argues that they should be going over his half of the story since his is the memory they have to recreate, but he counters that his part is just full of pain, like the time he confessed he liked her and she called him a blood clot, and on and on ad infinitum. Well, when you put it like that, *sadface.*
She wonders why she didn’t find the courage to confess her feelings sooner, and he tells her to just do well from here on out, because he’s going to write it all down from now on. And then they just make moony eyes at each other in an explosion of cuteness.
Mom and Dad sit by Kyung-joon’s bedside all night, and Mom says it feels just like when Yoon-jae was young and sick all the time. She wonders how it feels the same now, watching over Kyung-joon.
Da-ran heads home to face the music, telling Kyung-joon that they can’t exactly see each other out in the open anymore. He asks if they should just run away to the boonies and she vows not to do any more running.
She steps through the door cautiously to find the whole family waiting for her. They send her upstairs right away. Mom comes in brandishing a pair of scissors: “Even when my mom cut off all my hair, I still liked your father.”
She tosses Da-ran a wedding photo, and in it Mom’s hair has been chopped off. She asks now if Da-ran wants to end up the same way. Da-ran says it doesn’t matter, because if she has to pretend her feelings aren’t real, then she’ll never be able to smile like Mom in this photo.
She closes her eyes and braces herself, and even when Mom grabs her hair and puts the scissors to her head, she says nothing in protest. Mom stops when she sees Da-ran’s resolve, sighing, “You’re really crazy, aren’t you?”
Mom sobs in her room, as Dad comes to pat her back. She adorably calls him Teacher, and cries that she just said the same things to her daughter that her mother said to her. She wonders now how much she broke her own mother’s heart. Aw.
Kyung-joon stops by the hospital to check on his coma body, and is alarmed to hear about the near-heart attack. Se-young remembers that he first woke up in the morgue after the accident, after being declared dead.
He confirms it. Oh noes. This is going to an ominous place.
He sits with Teddy, blowing balloons, and tells himself the body swap will be fine—just like inflating a balloon, deflating it, and then inflating it again. But next to him, Teddy over-inflates his, and it pops, jolting them both. Kyung-joon grabs his heart in fear.
Meanwhile Mom happily tells Se-young to wait for Yoon-jae to return to his old self. Mari tells Kyung-joon that she’s going with him to Germany, but he says they’re not going anywhere.
He tells her that Gil Teacher will stay by his side when he wakes up and Mari gapes—you mean by your side, the little brother of the man she just cheated on? She calls Da-ran crazy, and he affirms that she is with a goofy grin.
Kyung-joon spends the entire next day trying to see Da-ran, but the Gil Family is on high alert, taking shifts to watch her every move. He finally has to romeo his way to her window late at night, and puts his arms out to 10:10 for her to jump.
She’s about to when Mom stops her, reminding her not to do something as despicable as keep all her options open (ie. play both Yoon-jae and KKJ), a phrase that means in the literal sense, to “maintain your fishing pond.”
Da-ran grumbles that her pond only has the one fish, and then worries, “What if it dries up and dies?” She decides to jump, to water her fish and save it.
She gives Kyung-joon his watch, newly fixed, and then leaves him with a peck on the cheek. He watches her go with a swoon, muttering that if she was going to water the pond, she should’ve splashed him, not given him one little drop. But then he goes right back to swooning.
The next day Mari stomps into the hospital with a team of bodyguards in tow, and declares that she’s going to take Kyung-joon away. Um… are we adding kidnapping to your ever-growing list of crimes? Because you can’t just steal people’s coma bodies and get away with it!
Kyung-joon goes to see Mom to tell him that he’ll go to Germany with Dad, and they should leave Coma Kyung-joon here. To his surprise, Mom says she’ll stay here with Kyung-joon then.
But they’re quickly interrupted with bad news: Kyung-joon is gone. WUT. She really took him? How does a person just walk away with a coma patient? SIGH. Whatever.
She answers Kyung-joon’s call to announce that she’s going to hide him away till he wakes up, and keep him from ever seeing Gil Teacher again. “You said Gil Teacher was crazy? Well then I’m double double double crazy!” Um… were you waiting for someone to argue?
He tells her that he’ll just stay in this body forever then, and not get treated. She starts to panic that he’ll die that way, and Kyung-joon calls her bluff: he’ll meet her tantrum for tantrum, and he’ll just die in this body if she keeps going. She breaks down and tells him she’ll stop.
Kyung-joon tells her that being with Da-ran is what he wants, and Mari can’t force things to go her way while ignoring his feelings. She counters that he’s doing the same, ignoring her feelings and Yoon-jae’s.
She puts the ring on the table to remind him that when Yoon-jae wakes up and finds Da-ran by Kyung-joon’s side he’ll be as heartbroken as Mari. Yeah, but I doubt he’ll resort to kidnapping to argue the case.
At the same time, Little Kyung-joon’s vitals spike again. Teddy and Rabbit worry that they yanked too hard, and we see that the Miracle picture has been torn in two.
Mari continues on her quest to meddle, and why this character is even still trying to run interference at this point is beyond me. She goes to the mandoo restaurant to lie to Da-ran that she hid the ring in the mandoo filling, just to send her digging for it.
Da-ran bursts all the mandoo to look for the ring and then chases after the delivery guy to steal other people’s mandoo dinners, all the while feeling terrible that she ignored Yoon-jae’s feelings.
At the hospital, Yoon-jae-in-Kyung-joon’s-body cries a tear, and then his heart rate goes shooting up again. But Kyung-joon shows up to hold his hand, and he comes back down to normal. Kyung-joon says he’ll wait until Yoon-jae’s stopped time gets cleared up too.
He finds Da-ran trudging along in the street, looking for something. He guesses right away that it’s the ring and he says he found it. They stand across the street from each other, talking on the phone, and Kyung-joon sighs that it won’t work for them to hold hands right away, will it?
The blinking red light and her silent pause confirms that he’s right.
He wonders how long it’ll be before they can be together, hoping that it won’t take too long. He worries that he won’t remember and they’ll be apart for so long that they’ll miss their opportunity.
But she assures him that she’ll remember. Kyung-joon: “If my heart has grown enough to be able to look back at someone else’s heart, if my heart has grown just a little… then won’t I wake up, not as a child who knows nothing, but someone who can remember Gil Da-ran, just a little?”
She says that her heart will grow too, every day as she remembers him. She promises to keep growing her heart, so that it’ll be impossible to ever let him go.
Kyung-joon finally (FINALLY) spells it out plainly for Mari, that he’s not going to wake up by Da-ran’s side right away, but he’s not going to stay by Mari’s side either. He tells her to stop running after him, because no matter how much she does, he’ll never go to her.
Just think of all the felonies that could’ve been avoided had you done this sooner! He says he ignored her feelings completely in all this and did as he pleased, but now he feels sorry and can’t keep letting her do this.
He says he’ll put up a very clear signal for her, and puts up his hand, “Mari-ya, stop coming.”
She looks up with her puppy dog eyes and cries, and then steps forward, just until her head meets his outstretched hand. Aw, that’s kind of heartbreaking. She goes literally as far as he’ll let her, and stops there, resting her head against his palm. He drums his fingers on her head one last time.
And then Choong-shik sees her off at the airport with a long face, as he watches her approach the gate. He calls after her at the last minute and runs up to write his name on her purse.
Mari: “Gil Choong-shik!” Choong-shik: “That’s right! I’m Gil Choong-shik! This will probably take about ten years to repay via pizza. I will pledge that time to you. You wait, Jang Mari!”
And then he walks away, finally getting his cool exit down just right. She smiles after him.
Kyung-joon meets with Mom to go over travel plans, and finds her studying a notebook. He asks what it is, and she says it’s her Kyung-joon notes, gathered from Da-ran and Mari, so that she can learn as much about him as she can.
She worries that he’s a picky eater and that she isn’t the best cook, but Kyung-joon tells her to do her best, and prepare for a cold response since he’s not the most well-behaved child. He grins to himself, touched at her effort.
Ae-kyung and Na Teacher pass around their wedding invitations, and Ae-kyung asks Da-ran what she’ll do next if Yoon-jae heads off to Germany. She says that he’ll return someday to give her an answer.
She says that she’ll tell him then, that she’s no longer waiting for his answer, but has come to love someone else, even more.
Kyung-joon watches over his body and says that he’ll meet Yoon-jae soon, and by now I’m just screaming, You said that eons ago. Can soon be now?
He runs into Se-young and apologizes to her for acting so immature lately, and says that when she touched his arm after the accident that was kinda sexy. She should do it again, when Seo Yoon-jae returns. He walks away with a smile, leaving her confused.
Da-ran walks through the park and stops to drop some money for a homeless man sleeping on a bench, and is shocked to find her green umbrella sitting right there, still with her name and number on it.
Wait… did you just steal from a homeless man? Er…
She takes it to a shop to get it fixed and finds Kyung-joon watering the lawn. She tells him to make it rain and opens the umbrella, asking if he remembers the day they met.
He remembers, and confesses now that he followed her off the bus, not because she stole his umbrella, but because he swapped them on purpose. Ha.
They ride the bus together now, remembering that day, and he says how funny she was, giving herself away with the radio story. He saw that their umbrellas looked similar so he slid his over to her, and she picked his up without even looking.
They wonder that if he liked her enough to do that, maybe when he wakes up, there’ll still be a little of her in his heart.
They get off the bus and she opens her umbrella, and he puts his hands over hers just like that first day. She hopes that if she remains in his heart, he’ll come after her again. He asks that if he does, for her to hold onto him, no matter what, and tell him about their love.
Kyung-joon: “Then we’ll come back to this time.” She takes his watch and says that the moment she tells him her feelings, Kang Kyung-joon will return to this instant, and says he’s now been hypnotized.
They get ready to part, and she starts to cry but smiles through the tears. He ekes out that he’ll be going, but then stops to say one last thing. “I didn’t want to say this. I wanted to say it to you when I returned, but… Gil Da-ran, I love you.”
A tear trickles down his cheek as he says it, and then he puts the umbrella back in her hands, and walks away.
One year later.
Da-ran is a teacher at a new school, and Mari sends her an email to say that both boys have returned to their rightful places, and that neither remembers anything after the accident. Wait… the big finale body swap happens offscreen? @&*#$T#*#KK!
Kyung-joon hasn’t asked about Gil Teacher, and per her promise to Kyung-joon, Mari won’t tell him.
Da-ran says to herself that per her promise, she’ll continue to remember.
Rabbit gets better and even gets to go home from the hospital, and Teddy gives her a big hug. Ae-kyung and Na Teacher are pregnant and happy. And Da-ran still stops every time she sees sunflowers.
Choong-shik slices and dices as the new chef at the mandoo restaurant, and Mom and Dad say that Da-ran is due for a visit, after stopping by her old school. Choong-shik heads out to send Mari yet another package of mandoo, only to find her standing at his door.
She’s here to accept an award, having turned her stalker photographer skills into an artistic pursuit instead. Well that’s lemonade out of lemons if there ever was. Choong-shik asks hopefully if she’s been eating the mandoo he’s sent, and she says her dog enjoys them.
She admits she’s tasted at least one, and he asks her how many points she’d give them. She judiciously says, “One.” Choong-shik pumps his fist in the air, to have finally made it out of zeroland.
At this rate it’ll actually take you a hundred years to get your girl. He asks if they can take a picture together and eagerly awaits the day he’ll get to two points. Aw.
Da-ran drops by Kyung-joon’s old house and sees a mother and her son living there now. She says she used to live here and just dropped by, and as she leaves the kid says that the hyung who was just here said the same thing…
It starts to rain, and Da-ran hops on the bus. She hears her letter being read over the radio, wishing the person she loves a happy birthday this June 24. Da-ran whispers on the bus, “Happy birthday, Kyung-joon-ah.”
The radio message continues that she’ll be going next month to see him, and though he won’t remember, she’ll tell him everything that she remembers. She looks down at her watch and it’s 10:10.
The message concludes, “I’m running towards the time right now, 10:10.” She looks down at the aisle, where another green umbrella lies next to hers, and she smiles.
She gets off the bus with her umbrella, and then suddenly a voice calls out to her: “Gil Da-ran!” Wait, that’s still Gong Yoo’s voice. Urg, and though we only see him from above as he runs under her umbrella, it’s still Gong Yoo. WHY. Why Show, why.
It’s supposed to be Kyung-joon back in his own body, but they refuse to show it to us. This is so lame. I waited sixteen episodes for them to reunite like this?
He puts his hand over hers and she looks up. And then the scene is intercut with Kyung-joon’s farewell scene, earlier in the episode. If we were going to do that anyway, would it have killed you to have Shin playing the present-day half of his own character?
Past Kyung-joon tells her to hold onto him if he comes back. Da-ran looks up and smiles at him now, “Hello, Kang Kyung-joon.”
Kyung-joon plays it cool, saying that he just came around because he was curious how she was doing, and she says she knows the real reason (his little crush). He walks off with the umbrella and an, “Uh-oh, you’re overreacting.”
Back to Past Kyung-joon, who asks her to hold on, even if he’s mean and cold and bristly in the future. She runs after him now, returning that gesture and putting her hand over his under the umbrella.
Past Kyung-joon says that when she tells him her feelings, they’ll return to this moment. She smiles up at him now, and his watch reads 10:10.
Back to Past Da-ran: “I love you.” Past Kyung-joon: “The moment I hear those words, my heart will grow, as big as it is now. Like a miracle.”
They beam at each other, and then we end, on Past Kyung-joon and Past Da-ran, under the umbrella on that day they parted.
JAVABEANS’ COMMENTS
What? Huh? What? What? Was that just in her head? What? How did he get his memory back? What? What was the point of the year? Did Yoon-jae get over his sadface? What?
I have no more words for you. Drama, you don’t deserve any more words. Go sit in a corner and think about what you did.
RAGEQUIT.
GIRLFRIDAY’S COMMENTS
*HULKSMASH*
THE FUCK? We don’t even get ONE measly glimpse of Kyung-joon in his own body, even when they meet again? BAH. So. Disappointing. I know it’s jarring, but you’re the one who stuffed the hero in the wrong body for the entire goddamn series; own up to it and let us see the couple who’s supposed to be together, TOGETHER. If that’s the line you’re playing, you have to see it through!
It’s not like Shin has to appear 30 for crying out loud; he’s just 21 so how hard is it to let us see the 21-year old hero in his own body, finally getting the girl? I was so ready to say that despite some unnecessary episodes and senseless prolonging of plot points, that they managed to salvage a satisfactory ending. Until they didn’t show the swap. And then that last scene… where they didn’t give me my ONE moment, of Da-ran with the real Kyung-joon! Aaaaaaaaargh.
That’s just… plain mean.
Siiiigh. So many ways this drama went awry, and sadly, I think it began at the roots. They should’ve stuck with the original Big concept of a boy who rapid-grows into his own 30-year old body, because then at least it would’ve been HIS body. Having him stuck in Yoon-jae’s shell (even till the final moments of the show, dangnabbit) just kept me at arm’s length the whole time, knowing that she was having to look past his shell. Sure, it’s admirable that she can, and I went along because I expected that we’d get the final scene with Kyung-joon in his own body to say yes, Da-ran still loves him completely, as himself. IS THAT SO HARD? Why must you take that away from me? How can a story culminating in a body re-swap… not show the swap??? I. Don’t. Get. It. And did Yoon-jae just never come back to see his fiancée, or did that happen offscreen too? Why do you need a drama if all your most interesting narrative payoffs are going to happen OFFSCREEN?
Okay, calming down now. Truth be told, I might be angry now, but I was pretty checked out emotionally for most of the show’s run. There were definitely things that kept me invested, like Gong Yoo’s fantastic performance. But a showcase for one actor does not a drama make. And despite my love for Gong Yoo as the teenage Kyung-joon, my heart is always with the story first and foremost. That’s why I needed to see Shin playing the character in the end, because to me, telling me that they re-swapped offscreen is not enough. If I’m buying into the idea that he’s one character, no matter whose body he’s in, then you have to trust that I’m going to buy it till the very end. It shows a lack of trust in the audience, and for that, I feel betrayed.
I certainly don’t think that it was all bad, because there was a whole lot of cute and some good coming-of-age stuff in there amidst the confusing. But one thing I constantly asked all series long was: Are we there yet? I feel like somehow every step of the way, the show never got a step ahead, never surprised me. I held out hope that the boys would swap back sooner than the final hour (because honestly, I think the fallout is FAR more interesting than the lead-up), but that didn’t happen, and then to top it off, we didn’t even get to witness the big moment. No heartfelt first official meeting between the brothers, who saved each other’s lives? No my-hand-was-warm-because-you-reached-out-to-save-me-first? No wonder twins, activate? Nuthin’?
It’s really too bad that the whole drama failed in the writing department, because the Hong Sisters have penned some of my favorites over the years. I don’t love all their works before Big, and neither am I going to just write them off because of this one drama. But I’ll call a dud a dud, and this one just sailed right into the crapper. It turns out you can’t shape a whole drama on one big premise and leave things like logic and character motivation and emotional payoffs at the door. We kinda like that stuff. It’s sorta why we live here, in dramaland.
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Tags: Baek Sung-hyun, Big, featured, Gong Yoo, Lee Min-jung, Shin, Suzy
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301 BIG
July 25, 2012 at 1:57 PM
Even JB and GF drunken podcasts make a x100 more sense than this hot mess of a drama
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302 Nomi
July 25, 2012 at 2:50 PM
WTF....I...I don't even. Whats going on? where am I?
...what happened....who..wheeeh......why hongs? how could you do this to me slowly and painfully...-grabs head in pain- I think I think a hug TT__________TTwaaaaaa~~~~
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303 spiriticon
July 25, 2012 at 2:51 PM
WTF. Just finished this drama and my head is still spinning. Why didn't they just let Shin Won Ho play out the last 10 minutes after the terribly thought out offscreen body swap?
It would have made everything so much clearer.
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304 bundanafaqih
July 25, 2012 at 3:07 PM
only one that I wants to say. This is the first time I was really disappointed by hong sisters. sigh!
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305 K@T@M!
July 25, 2012 at 3:10 PM
I am sooo soo soo disapointed in u draaaamaaaaa pffffffffffffffft
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306 spazmo
July 25, 2012 at 3:21 PM
oh come on everybody -- Gong Yoo was worth the watch, no matter how the story ended all lame and everything. just remember how gorgeous he was in this drama, that's all i want to remember!! *swoon* : )
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Kiki
July 25, 2012 at 5:27 PM
I agree Gong Yoo was worth the watch because he's a great actor. But that ending just felt like the Hong sisters checked out and wrote just anything to finish.
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minhoswife
July 26, 2012 at 1:39 AM
AGREE!!!!!! Gong Yoo is still to die for, despite the crappy ending!!
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307 sleeplessinwgtn
July 25, 2012 at 3:59 PM
I stayed away from this because of the soul-switch premise. I thought I'll wait until the drama ends and watch then based on watcher's feedback.
I am so disappointed with the copout ending just from reading this thread. You can be open-ended but not that way.
And I was looking forward to GY's comback drama. Now I have to wait for the next one. I still need a good story to keep me invested in watching.
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sang
July 26, 2012 at 8:51 AM
i agree w/you fr the start i kinda hesitated coz of the storyline of this drama, i didn't even watch who are you but maybe that one was a lot better than this, glad i didn't continue watching this, it's kinda ridiculous story if i may say so, i luv GY but that doesn't mean it's great coz he's in it?
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308 melon
July 25, 2012 at 4:18 PM
I don't understand korean dramas these days...
They have the abilities of being good and fun at the begining and suck BIG time in the middle and at the end!
I'm still recovering from the bad ending of RTP and now... Big!
The era of great dramas such as SG, Coffee Prince is coming to the end........ :(((
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bd
July 25, 2012 at 9:50 PM
Take out SG and replace it w/ 'I Need Romance 2012' (which is still airing).
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claudefaye
July 26, 2012 at 8:31 AM
Yeah me too!! I'm still coping with the tearjerker ending of RTP and I found refuge here in BIG. But WHY????!!!!! I want something inspiring and happy!! Both RTP and Big have a thrilling plot and awesome cliffhangers. Please!!!! Make another drama that will satisfy our needs... We need happy ending. :)
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sang
July 26, 2012 at 8:53 AM
cldn't agree w/you any better than that, gone were the days of kdramas where u wanted to stay till 2 am to find out what happens next & the next, what's going on with middle, endings just for example i do i do, luvd it but the ending was a bit rushed also, i hope they won't do it in gentleman's dignity where it's really good these days & addictive! i didnt even watch the rest of RTP! glad i didn't
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309 pecut
July 25, 2012 at 5:09 PM
you guys, I'm with ya. this is HS worst drama ever.
and the best episode so far is the first episode where you got to see Kyung Jun in his own body.
I really love to see both GDR and KKJ play lovey dovey again...
Why don't they make him change back earlier in the 8th episode and show us how they be together or SDR back to love Yoon Jae again.
*sigh >.<
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310 Tara
July 25, 2012 at 5:10 PM
What a sucky ending! WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT? Really, for god's sake!
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311 whatsthescenario
July 25, 2012 at 5:13 PM
The ONLY ending that could have been worse that this one would be if she woke up in her bed and realized that the whole thing was a dream and none of it was real. Because, seriously, it can't get much worse than the crap I just watched.
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312 Kiki
July 25, 2012 at 5:24 PM
I wish all of the kdrama writers would realize that a drama is like gymnastics. You can have the most amazing routine in the world, but if you don't stick the landing, you go nowhere. I don't blame the actors at all. They got the best out of what they had. But man, these writers need to write the ending first. Know where they are going so that they don't end up with a maze that they can't figure out how to get out of. This ending wasn't even Deus ex machina. It was panicked and slapped together.
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lenrasoon
July 25, 2012 at 10:23 PM
i agree
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ilikemangos
July 26, 2012 at 7:20 PM
Nice analogy, and completely agree with everything you said.
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313 Syb
July 25, 2012 at 5:47 PM
WORST ENDING EVER!!!!
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314 rescel23
July 25, 2012 at 6:19 PM
The final episode was so dragging and childish and I waited till the end thinking maybe there will be no switch, maybe SYS will die in KKJ's body... or if there's a switch, it would be the matured KKJ that will appear before GDR. But...what the??? it's clearly still GY... voice, body and all!!! Oh, please... Oh well, story wise, not satisfying. Acting wise...great! Congratulations to all actors (especially GY, hope to see more dramas with you). Kudos, too, to the directors and crews. Good job. It's not your fault that the ending is bad (I'm sorry Hong sisters, you could have done better). But, still, thank you, anyway, for the episodes that were entertaining.
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315 Viki
July 25, 2012 at 6:24 PM
Big was such a great drama in the beginning, then it kinda went downhill =[ I like the first 12 episodes...and then it slowly didn't have any plot developments.
I feel like they want Gong Yoo in the last scene instead of a rookie actor a.k.a. Shin, on the last scene with Lee Min Jung. Which is stupid. They should have worried more about the drama than the actor even though we all love Gong Yoo and everything...
IMPERFECT! Hate the ending. I think this must be the 2nd most disappointing endings of the year after Fashion King...and I didn't even finish Fashion King...just skipped to the recap.
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Pat
July 25, 2012 at 6:45 PM
They could have had GY play Both brothers and made them
iD twins, not Fra.... one younger,and he could have slept in the bed all series watching himself. Still mad 600 comments later.
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316 addylovesbwood
July 25, 2012 at 6:39 PM
I'm not even mad about them not showing KKJ in his own body...i can't get over that 1 year jump. i really wanted to see them SWITCH. ahhhh aiiigoo.. i have a massive headache from screaming wtf at the end...so poorly written. 2nd worst ending next to fashion king. i want the 16 hours i invested in BIG back right now!!!
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317 stella sonjo
July 25, 2012 at 6:43 PM
Aish!!!
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318 Ryan
July 25, 2012 at 6:52 PM
Seems that a lot of people missed the ending. It is simply the juxtaposition of the two guys in which the older guy now has changed and the girl more patient and optimistic toward him (based on the younger's guy last request to "stay by 'him'" (he knew full well that the future "him" isn't going to be him
It is the only logical ending. She fell in love with the person fitting that very physical and mental aspects (sensitive, no fear of intimacy). In short, it is the changed older guy riding on the wave of her memories of the younger guys, giving the older guy the chance.
Any other "ending", her love would be self-destructive as it hangs on what has passed, dead and unreal, rather than focused on what can be built through patience, sensitivity, appreciativeness
The execution may be a bit clumsy, but it makes sense.
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319 fiske
July 25, 2012 at 6:57 PM
"Kyung-joon watches over his body and says that he’ll meet Yoon-jae soon, and by now I’m just screaming, You said that eons ago. Can soon be now?"
I just see this scene playing over and over in my head:
...
When will then be now?
Soon.
How Soon?
...
Greatest disappointment in my last trip to Korea was no Spaceballs on TV, got my hopes up when I saw Darth Vader everywhere.
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320 sora
July 25, 2012 at 7:05 PM
omo? omo? i so just hate this ending and i got so confused. oh well in the first place i just love the lead casts that's why i watched this until the end... oh no....... the story at first were fine until the body swap. oh crap.....
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321 coffeebeans
July 25, 2012 at 7:18 PM
WTF?! worst drama of hong sisters...can't believe i'd say that...a total disappointment...
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322 Arishia
July 25, 2012 at 7:53 PM
This show draws a blank, from start to finish. Not engaging in any way. Period. Moving on...
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323 iamdeb
July 25, 2012 at 8:51 PM
my goodness, almost 700 comments! Has there ever been this much rage at a final episode before? It's pretty intense...
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324 Sparkle
July 25, 2012 at 8:56 PM
A lot of people may think I'm crazy but I really enjoyed this drama! I will admit it took 5 episodes for me to get hooked. Once I was hooked, I had to watch until the end.
I think the last two episodes summed up the series really well. The point of the series was how much are you willing to risk for love? Your reputation? Your sanity? In the end, Da-Run choose to be honest about loving KKJ and didn't care what others thought. At least that was what I got of it.
But, if the whole series was about Da-Run finding the courage to love freely, why would they not show KKJ in the end? I can't believe I invested 16 hours into this drama, only for it to end like that. It really doesn't make sense.
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325 Makoto
July 25, 2012 at 9:01 PM
I expected little Kyung Joon appear in the end, as himself. Not that I don't like Gong Yoo, but little Kyung Joon would be make sense instead of big Kyung Joon. But, HELL. The ending of BIG is such a nightmare, it left me with a super BIG question mark in my head. Did Yoonjae die? Did little Kyung Joon forever trapped in his brother's shell?
You know, I had even prepared more tissues in case they would give two final episodes as sad as QIHM or 49 Days. Yeah, after they gave me such tear jerking scenes in episode 14. I imagined little Kyung Joon appeared somewhere without memories, then accidentally meet Da Ran. Something triggered his memory or anything. Big has happy ending for anyone but the viewers.
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326 Crazy9
July 25, 2012 at 9:29 PM
This drama has so many loose ends. What was Gong Yoo going to tell Da-Ran of her question ..."Do you love me?" before the accident.
If the memories only remained up until the accident when they switched, why wouldn't he have contacted her?
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327 bd
July 25, 2012 at 10:08 PM
The biggest problem w/ 'Big' (and there were plenty) is that the romantic relationship btwn Da-ran and KKJ wasn't exactly believable (esp. since the actor who played KKJ looked more like a 14 yr old boy than 18, much less 20).
And a big part of that was due to the character of Da-ran.
It's one thing for a teen-age boy to have a crush on a hot teacher and go all in and act irresponsibly, but for an adult woman to essentially discard her fiance (whose shell she did end up marrying) for a student (who turned out to be the younger brother of said fiance, who could have been a fraternal twin).
Da-ran falling for KKJ was essentially due to convenience and his close proximity.
What if Yoon-jae had been a doctor in the military and had been called overseas to active duty, asking DR to take care of his younger brother (let's say they are orphans), and that while he was overseas, Da-ran, while taking care of the younger brother, KKJ,developed feelings for KKJ due to proximity and abandoned YJ for KKJ.
That's essentially what happened.
DR seems to have ignored how her fiance would have felt and just went w/ what was convenient.
She even broke her promise to Mari.
As the female 'heroine'/protagonist, DR really wasn't likeable - starting w/ having no backbone (god, that slow 'baby talk' at the beginning was annoying) and being so undecisive and clueless throughout.
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328 Farpavilions
July 25, 2012 at 10:20 PM
Big = ENORMITY.
It got so bad I stopped watching the eps and just tuned into the recaps for the past 3 eps, but caught the finale out of sheer curiosity.
Why are the Hong sisters, who are usually so good at mocking kdrama cliches, committing all of them in the space of one episode? Unnecessary timeskip, pointless 2nd lead meddling, throwaway plotlines, utter waste of a premium cast...
GAKSITAL WILL NEVER FORGIVE YOU!!!! *screams of rage*
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Vick
July 25, 2012 at 10:23 PM
You are over reacting!
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329 Vick
July 25, 2012 at 10:21 PM
I actually think everyone complains way tooooo much! I love the ending. She went with her heart and was confident of her love for him. Who cares about the rest? What matters is they ended up together...regardless of the body! Heart us more than the mind and he found his way back to da ran! Love the whole drama!!!!!
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bd
July 26, 2012 at 9:43 AM
So, as long as a drama has a Hollywood/Disney ending, the rest doesn't matter if it is a complete mess?
Gee, that's an awfully low threshold.
And the ending wasn't well done either.
It's one thign if 'Big' had been an average drama, but it wasn't even a mediocre one (yes, it was THAT bad - right there w/ dreck like LTM, SG and RTP).
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330 Rose
July 25, 2012 at 10:29 PM
Gong Yoo deserves to be in a drama like Coffee Prince. And not to a BIG crap like this.
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331 Gee
July 25, 2012 at 11:47 PM
My opinion:
BIG=(ONE BIG EPIC FAIL) +
(Wait, WTF is happening? x infinity)
order of operations does not apply here as all of BIG was clearly not routed in any sort of meaningfully logical galaxy.
Sorry. I guess I could chalk some of that up to high expectations for entertainment, which quickly downgraded to pleas for stuff that made sense.
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Gee
July 25, 2012 at 11:51 PM
I apologize. That came under the category of probable overreacting.
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332 nabithoj
July 26, 2012 at 12:17 AM
I'm so glad I did not watch this drama. Reading the recaps already gave me a headache and annoy3d the #/$@&*$/ out of me, so no thanks. I like Gong Yoo and I can't remeber the main girl's name, but she did not appeal to me even from the recaps, so I'm happy I did not waste my time watching this drama. I thought about watching the ending, but I didn't understand the ending, so I doubt watching it will help me either. So disappointed. And I was so looking forward to a Gong Yoo drama. :*(
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333 JL
July 26, 2012 at 12:27 AM
I guess the purpose of not showing KKJ's real body with Gil Da Ran is because the main character of the show is supposed to be Gong Yoo. So if you ended with Shin's face, its kinda weird? So the director just try to portray to us that the REAL KKJ ended up with Da Ran and at the same time not showing Shin's face (because it would be kind of saying Gong Yoo is not the main character?)
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334 JL
July 26, 2012 at 12:29 AM
TYPO: So if the show* ended up with Shin's face
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335 Nickie
July 26, 2012 at 12:45 AM
I totally agree with your opinion, I was looking forward to kyung joon and yoon jae to meet again as brothers and have a happy life with their parents. Also to see Da ran to meet kyung joon in his own body.
I also found REALLY confusing that at the end they show Suzy texting da ran saying that yoon jae and kyung joon were both fine, in their own bodies and either of them had memories from before the accident, but then they show kyung joon in yoon jae's body and just... wtf?!
I was really dissappointed with that end ._.
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336 Tachan
July 26, 2012 at 1:53 AM
The ending only proves that I was here because of Gong Yoo, NOTHING else. This drama is such a let down, BIG time.....
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337 minhoswife
July 26, 2012 at 1:57 AM
Now, the big question is: WHEN IS GONG YOO's NEXT DRAMA!??!?!?!??! I miss him already!!!!!!!!!!!!
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Enz
July 27, 2012 at 2:51 AM
Me too... I miss him. Get a project quick gong yoo
! We love you
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338 fan
July 26, 2012 at 2:18 AM
they way the HONG sisters wrote this was just wrong and I feel like they were trying something different, but they didn't think about the audience, did they think the audience would except the student-teacher relationship/in my 35 fiance body without us seeing the sweep and Yoon Jae should have being include in the main story, but he was completely in a coma the whole time. I'm glad I jump ship in like episode 11.
the think is, I knew they wouldn't wake Yoon Jae up, which irritated me because he win me over in the first episode, then the kid
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339 maeumi
July 26, 2012 at 3:09 AM
hands down crap drama of the year. what a let down from hong sisters.
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340 Stupid JV
July 26, 2012 at 4:49 AM
I dont get why people have to bash its ending.. is it just because she is not with Shin Won Ho? In the end she end up with KJ! So u guys want her to end up alone?? You guys are all childish...OPEN UR EYES! Its a good ending.. Dont you guys ever dare to compare it with Fashion King.. This drama deserve better comment, because Fashion King is the worst K-Drama ever from the beginning till the end..
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ilikemangos
July 26, 2012 at 7:28 PM
If you've read some of the comments, you'll realize much of the backlash isn't because the ending didn't show both her and shin won ho.
The bigger picture is the fact that the end in general is sloppily made. Execution was a sad, sad thing.
And when you try to make sense of it all, all there is in your head is @@@@@@.
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341 Rainny
July 26, 2012 at 5:09 AM
I expected for happy ending but the ending is not clear.. I liked this drama cauz it's unpredictable..I couldn't predict what would going on like other dramas..really hoped that Hong's sis would give us answer in the end..but such ending really let me down.. =(( many things haven't solved yet T_T
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342 BIG auditor
July 26, 2012 at 6:13 AM
This is the theory!!!
Well, im not good in english, i try my best to explain.
I think the confusing ending was becaused the way the camera took scene after 1 year later, picture from past and present feel blured, i dont know maybe its on purpose..So please, keep your eyes on Daran and the man under umbrella outfit.
Mari said the truth, the two have returned back to their bodies and both of them have no memories of what happened after accident. The man after 1 year later is the real KKJ, the problem is camera never showed that man's face, only body 'facade' from Goong Yoo (which many people interpret as SYJ's body-and misunderstand that KKJ still in SYJ's body).
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343 Lilian
July 26, 2012 at 6:21 AM
a truly disappointing ending....there was a lot of conflict supposedly but nothing I was interested in. We could have lots more real conflict by showing us how the brothers react to one another...or how he accepts his new-found parents. I just feel cheated!
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344 Rosebread
July 26, 2012 at 6:30 AM
Hmmm...there was this comment I read on some site that explained the ending that it was kind of logical because kyung joon and yoon jae were meant to be identical twins, so the fact that yoon jae's shell instead of kyung joon's was shown is supposed to be logical.
But...I still don't know. I don't know if this story was even supposed to develop this way T_T why did it have to end this way? There were so many things left unsaid! Like yoon jae's suspicious behaviour, etc.
This drama has left me kinda confuzzled.
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345 Keke
July 26, 2012 at 7:59 AM
As much as I love Hong Dramas, there's one thing they never get right. And that's endings. This ending confused me. All along I said I didn't want them to swap back, because apart from the first ep, we've been used to Gong Joo. But when it actually happened...defo erased the big climax I was expecting. Meh. Doesn't mean I'd write off the entire drama though.
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346 Engshi
July 26, 2012 at 8:00 AM
thanks a lot girlfriday!!!
this really made me laugh: =))
Girlfriday: Well, it ends. Listen, my mother said that if I don’t have nice things to say… waitaminute, my mother never said that. Let the ragefest begin!
Seriously, this drama left me speechless for the err ending...sigh
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347 awesomebacon
July 26, 2012 at 8:06 AM
this is the worst finale of all k-dramas i've ever watched. really.
maybe they thought that shin won-ho's face is sooo cute that it'll make da-ran x kyung-joon pairing would look inappropriate.
but why bother cast him then??? they could've just cast someone who will look convincingly as a high school student AND as a more mature college student.
oh, and shin won-ho is actually a 91-liner. but he looks like a 15-year-old that his real age doesn't help.
but you know what? i don't really care about how he looks 'cause it's kyung-joon's personality that we (and da-ran) saw in him.
it's like you were going to give me a really delicious looking chocolate pudding but in the end, Hong Sisters, you just smashed it into my face.
i hate you Hong Sisters. now i OFFICIALLY hate you two. thank you.
when i first watched Big, i had some expectations and predictions for the ending. apparently now i think my own predictions actually make a way better story than this mess.
should i start writing my own drama too? lol :D
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348 yani
July 26, 2012 at 8:31 AM
what about yoon-jae's unclarified feelings towards da-ran?
what about kyung-joon and yoon-jae's first (official) encounter?
what about kyung-joon's reaction when he finally met his real parents that he never expected before?
what about da-ran finally showing her love towards kyung-joon in his real body?
i mean, come on!!! we skipped almost EVERY crucial part of this entire story.
and i found this memory loss thing is unnecessary.
what's the point in becoming BIG if you don't remember you've been an adult once, after all?? isn't that the MAIN point of the story? and wasn't it Kyung-Joon our main character, not Da-Ran?
the only one that isn't ruined in this story is Choong-shik. i like some of the first episodes but i'm definitely not going to re-watch this again.
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349 claudefaye
July 26, 2012 at 8:43 AM
Hong Sisters are still the best K DRAMA WRITERS FOR ME. They sticked to the plot and to the title. BIG. Both protagonists, Gil Da Ran and Kang Kyung Joon, matured in ways that they never expected. They brought the best of each other and proved their love. Gil Da Ran matured from being passive to the woman who knows what she wanted and go after it. Kang Kyung joon became someone who can be independent and someone to depend on, someone who knows how to show his feelings and not afraid anymore. Big miracle happened that brought big changes and developments to all of the characters. ALL! Including Mommy Seo, Daddy Seo, Choong Shik, Mari, the teachers, Gil Father and Mother, Lee Se Young, Seo Yoon Jae, Gil Da Ran and Kang Kyung joon. All these 16 episodes showed us how they developed and matured.. Maybe the ending is a bit disappointing but we should look beyond that.... Kudos Hong Sisters! You made us think again! Maybe they want us to be "BIG" too by giving us that shocker ending.. hahahahaha!!
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350 claudefaye
July 26, 2012 at 8:43 AM
Hong Sisters are still the best K DRAMA WRITERS FOR ME. They sticked to the plot and to the title. BIG. Both protagonists, Gil Da Ran and Kang Kyung Joon, matured in ways that they never expected. They brought the best of each other and proved their love. Gil Da Ran matured from being passive to the woman who knows what she wanted and go after it. Kang Kyung joon became someone who can be independent and someone to depend on, someone who knows how to show his feelings and not afraid anymore. Big miracle happened that brought big changes and developments to all of the characters. ALL! Including Mommy Seo, Daddy Seo, Choong Shik, Mari, the teachers, Gil Father and Mother, Lee Se Young, Seo Yoon Jae, Gil Da Ran and Kang Kyung joon. All these 16 episodes showed us how they developed and matured.. Maybe the ending is a bit disappointing but we should look beyond that.... Kudos Hong Sisters! You made us think again! Maybe they want us to be "BIG" too by giving us that shocker ending.. hahahahaha!!
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