Ghost: Episode 19

by kaedejun

And we’re back! The one week delay certainly did not help the momentum of this drama, but thankfully we do get a little refresher in past events at the beginning of the episode: Hyun Min finds out for sure that Woo Hyun is really Ki Young, and is thus dubbed Woo-Young; Woo-Young takes down Dae Young Group and Eung Jin; however, manipulated evidence surfaces that shows Woo-Young as the killer of Nam Sang Won, which puts him on the wanted list. Woo-Young approaches Director Jun with the truth – that he’s really Ki Young and that Woo Hyun was investigating Jo Hyun Min. Chief Shin is confirmed to be on Hyun Min’s side, and Director Jun dies.

And now, during Jo Jae Min’s trial, Woo-Young arrives in court to announce that Hyun Min is the real killer.

Jo Hyun Min is NOT. HAPPY. The court is abuzz with this new revelation, and Jae Min’s lawyer wants to use Woo-Young as a new witness. However, the judge calls them to the bench and then makes his decision: the trial will be further postponed until after they interrogate the new witness. Both sides can recollect their evidence and find new witnesses.

Jae Min is led away back to his cell, but he turns to look back at Woo-Young and gives him a slight nod. Thanks man, for saving my life. Hyuk Joo also arrives in the courtroom, but this time to arrest Woo-Young for being an accomplice in Nam Sang Won’s murder. Well, that was bound to happen with that kind of outburst.

At the sight the handcuffs on Woo-Young’s wrists, Hyun Min walks out of the courthouse and right into a barrage of questions from reporters stationed outside. He slips into his car and orders Director Moon to find out everything that Woo-Young has done so far that could possibly sabotage him. Director Moon assures Hyun Min that no one will believe Woo-Young; though his words are meant to be encouraging, I’m sure Hyun Min’s not too confident about winning.

As Hyuk Joo leads Woo-Young out, he wonders if Hyun Min noticed. Noticed what?! Woo-Young believes that Hyun Min won’t learn a thing of their secret plan because they’ve caught most of his spies within the bureau, and they stopped the vaccine program. As long as their plan remains a secret, they’ll win. Funny to see Hyuk Joo actually nervous and scared for once, instead of blustering with confidence.

We flashback to 48 hours before the trial. Hyuk Joo and Kang Mi take Tae Gyun and Sang Woo out on a picnic as a way of rewarding them for catching Dae Young group. It’s funny how no one wants to eat Sang Woo’s kimbap, but Kang Mi and Hyuk Joo are too anxious to eat; something more important is weighing heavily on their minds…

They arrive at a deserted lake where no one can even get cellphone reception. Hyuk Joo has Tae Gyun and Sang Woo unload the van and start fishing for their meal. Fishing is quite boring though, and Sang Woo wants to bust open some beer. Hyuk Joo refuses: “I won’t drink alcohol until this case is solved!” What case? What suspect?

It’s time to ‘fess up. Hyuk Joo: “The reason why I brought you out here today is because I believe in you guys. It would be great if you could believe us too.” Right on cue, Woo-Young appears, heading towards their camp ground. Tae Gyun happily greets him, but Woo-Young replies: “I’m not Kim Woo Hyun. I’m Park Ki Young.”

Oho. Now everyone knows.

To catch Woo Hyun’s real killer, he had pretended to be Woo Hyun. However, he now realizes that to really catch Hyun Min, he has to be Woo Hyun. And he needs the Cy-Team’s help.

Back at Se Kang headquarters, Director Moon informs Hyun Min that Woo-Young is being held as an accomplice. Once Jae Min’s trial finishes up, there will be a bigger investigation on Nam Sang Won’s death. Director Moon can see that Woo-Young is sacrificing himself to catch Hyun Min, but doesn’t think it’ll work. Hyun Min’s doubtful of that – he knows that Ki Young must have a few tricks up his sleeve.

The day of the trial arrives again, and Woo-Young is ushered into the court room amidst all the reporters outside. In a voice over, we hear him anticipate Hyun Min’s moves: Hyun Min will become a witness for the prosecution and deny ever being present for Nam Sang Won’s murder. Therefore, Woo-Young needs help from the Cy-Team in helping recreate Woo Hyun’s memories to provide proof that he wasn’t an accomplice to murder, but did see Hyun Min kill Nam. If Hyun Min shows up as the prosecution’s witness, it means he took their bait, and it means that he thinks he can get away with all this.

The judge orders that the witnesses be separated in consideration of the fact that either one can be implicated for the crime, so he sends Hyun Min to an adjacent room, and has Woo-Young step forward. The prosecutor comes by to begin his examination – he first shows the video of Woo Hyun witnessing Nam Sang Woo’s death, and then asks who was there that night at the villa. Woo-Young insists that Hyun Min – not Jae Min – was also there.

Prosecutor: “If you were there, why didn’t you stop the murder from happening? Why were you there?!”

Next thing we know – Hyun Min is escorted out of the room, and Woo-Young is brought in. Standing at the witness seat, Hyun Min swears to tell nothing but the truth. Liar.

The defense lawyer – Jae Min’s lawyer – asks if Hyun Min was at the villa at the night of the murder. Hyun Min: “No.” He then asks what Hyun Min’s relationship was with Woo-Young; Hyun Min vaguely responds that they had an “incident” together and met a few times after that. Okay… the lawyer hands over a new piece of evidence. It’s a document that shows Kim Woo Hyun had approached Hyun Min on purpose as the target of an undercover investigation.

Well that’s new, and Hyun Min’s eyes widen ever so slightly.

Flashback to 48 hours ago. Sang Woo can’t possibly believe Ki Young changed his entire self to catch a criminal, or that Hyuk Joo and Kang Mi knew all along. Tae Gyun promises that he’ll help Woo-Young; he wants to catch the criminal no matter what. Kang Mi and Hyuk Joo drop another bombshell: Chief Shin is a spy for Hyun Min as well. Sang Woo wants to report him to internal investigations, but Woo-Young says they still need him.

They need the investigation report Woo-Young had given Director Jun, but was subsequently stolen when Jun was murdered. They’ll need to get it without hacking. So Tae Gyun types it all out, and with Hyuk Joo, presents it to Chief Shin. They want him to sign the hard copy report on Hyun Min and Safe Tech; no uploading to the servers or internet, in case of hacking. Chief Shin is stuck between a rock and a hard place.

During Woo-Young’s testimony, he stated that he had found evidence of Safe Tech’s hacking program in the vaccine program, but had no concrete evidence. Therefore he approached Hyun Min and pretended to sympathize with him in order to get more evidence. During that time, Hyun Min also killed Nam Sang Won. Hyun Min denies all knowledge of this. Since digital evidence can be easily altered, who’s to say that the report is real?

That’s exactly what the defense attorney expected as a response, and so he calls in another witness to the stand to verify the report’s authenticity: Chief Shin. OH YEAH. Slowly, Hyun Min sees that he’s effed, his mask ever so slowly cracking. Once again, Hyun Min is sent out of the court room while Chief Shin goes to testify. This puts Hyun Min and Woo-Young in the same room! Showdown!!

Hyun Min glares. Woo-Young smirks. (Oh my God, I think I’m actually more excited by the fact that Woo-Young smirked.) 

The defense attorney shows Chief Shin the investigation report that states only he and Woo Hyun knew of the undercover investigation. “Is this your signature on the report?” Don’t lie now, mister…

Inside the room, Hyun Min wants to know what Woo-Young did to make the case turn against him. Pfft – like Woo-Young would tell? Tae Gyun had found something strange in the Dae Young servers – a clue that would help majorly with getting Chief Shin on their side. When he and Hyuk Joo gave Chief Shin the report, Chief Shin didn’t want to sign it at first. However, Hyuk Joo forced him to read the second page; the next page detailed Chief Shin’s illegal foreign properties. The pages after that showed his tax evasion. The last page showed Kyung Shin’s bribery ledger. All these files were found in the Dae Young server.

Hyuk Joo also points out that Kyung Shin had paid all his accomplices $2 million – but Kim Suk Joon never got his pay. That’s because Chief Shin peddled it away for himself! Hyun Min had been collecting this type of information, and that’s why it was found in the Dae Young servers. However now, Hyuk Joo is using it to threaten Chief Shin: if the chief signs the investigative report, then the pages detailing his crimes will disappear.

So when we go back to the courtroom, Chief Shin affirms that it’s his signature on the investigative report, that he knew of Woo Hyun’s undercover investigation, and that Woo Hyun reported Nam Sang Won’s murder to him.

But the prosecution is not done yet. They have another witness – one that surprises Hyuk Joo. This fight is going to be a long and dirty one…

The new witness is Yeon Joo. She testifies that she’s doing a special report on Hades, since his hacking program had shown up at the police bureau. During her research into Hades/Park Ki Young, she found something strange. Ki Young had supposedly died in the factory explosion, and Woo Hyun had survived. However, he was so burned that the only way to recognize him was through his ID around his neck. Yeon Joo points out that Ki Young had broken into the bureau earlier that night with Woo Hyun’s ID. On top of that, she questioned the doctors, and they said that the face was so fractured that they had to reconstruct it completely. Theoretically, if they were given a different person’s face as a guidelines, the patient would have a totally different face.

Basically, she’s saying that the “Kim Woo Hyun” who testified before was really Park Ki Young. That also means, “Kim Woo Hyun’s” testimony just before would have been completely false. It would have been Park Ki Young making accusations without having really been there. Oh crap.

To verify all this, the prosecutor wants a DNA test on “Kim Woo Hyun.” Yeon Joo – wipe that smug smile off your face before I do it for you. Poor Jae Min, he looks crestfallen at the thought of his savior not really being able to save him. The court goes into recess as the judges discuss on what the next turn for the case will be.

Back to 48 hours ago (minus a few hours). Woo-Young wants to go back to Shin Hyo Jung’s case – did they find any digital evidence then? She used something to record Nam Sang Won’s death, so if they can locate that device, it would help them. The only thing that was missing at the scene of the crime was Shin Hyo Jung’s cellphone. Kang Mi had looked into her phone records and found nothing unusual, but she was checking the date Hyo Jung died, not the date when Nam Sang Won died.

Kang Mi and Sang Woo look up the investigation report regarding her case. A year ago, Sang Woo had questioned her company’s president, who was worried when he couldn’t reach her. Hyo Jung also had a tablet sponsored by another company, so he wanted to know about that too, since she had returned her cellphone back to the company.

Meanwhile, Woo-Young goes through Hyo Jung’s twitter feed again and finds another user, “Style0426,” thanking her for the new digital camera 18 days after Nam Sang Won’s murder. That “Phantom” video file could have been on that camera, or on the tablet she returned to the company. Sang Woo then asks what model her missing cellphone was; Kang Mi says it’s one issued by the phone carrier service. He’s surprised – when he had gone back to check her home per Hyuk Joo’s orders, he found a box with Se Kang on it. He thought her missing cellphone was a Se Kang one.

Now it looks like she had two cellphones. But the “Phantom” file could have been on the Se Kang phone.

Sang Woo goes to visit Hyo Jung’s former road manager to ask about the tablet she used. He points to the one on the table – that’s the one she received from the company, but never used it. Instead she just gave it to him. There’s nothing really for Sang Woo to analyze in it, but he does have his schedule from a year ago, and his schedule was the same as Hyo Jung’s. They take a look at what happened on May 16, 2011 – the night Nam Sang Won died. That day, Hyo Jung had a photo shoot for Se Kang cellphones – the same model that she had a box at home for.

So Kang Mi heads over to the studio and speaks to the photographer from that shoot. He admits to giving the cellphone to Hyo Jung as a gift, as it is customary for them to give it away to their models. He invited her out to a get together after the shoot, but she politely declined, saying she had somewhere else to be that day. Wanna bet it’s at Hae Myung Resorts? It’s now likely that cellphone – with it’s awesome zoom lenses – has the video.

Kang Mi heads over to where Hyo Jung’s relatives live, hoping that they may have her belongings. The aunt answers the door, and she says that Hyo Jung’s sister took care of all her belongings, but conveniently died several months after Hyo Jung’s death, and burned all of Hyo Jung’s things. Danggit – why did a small part of me almost wish Yeon Joo was Hyo Jung’s “unknown-until-now” sister?!

But their reinvestigations are causing some waves already. As soon as Sang Woo left, the road manager called up Director Moon saying that the police were snooping around Hyo Jung’s case. Hyun Min is sure that they won’t find any evidence, since they made sure all of her belongings were burned. (Maybe her sister is Yeon Joo!)

Back to the present, and Seung Yoon – who’s been present for the entire trial – finds Hyuk Joo in the rest area. Shouldn’t they do something to swap the DNA and make sure Ki Young isn’t caught?! She knows that Woo-Young is really Ki Young, and that Hyun Min must have killed Nam Sang Won. Hyuk Joo: “Kim Woo Hyun… is Kim Woo Hyun.” Part of me is wondering why he won’t just include her in the fold since she already knows, but part of me also understands that he’s protecting her. The less she knows, the better.

Woo-Young is called back out to court, and based on Hyun Min’s smirk, he knows that it has something to do with his identity and veracity as a witness. The judge informs him that they have reason to doubt his identity, and therefore his testimony. He orders for a DNA test. Woo-Young’s face falls – this is not looking good.

Kang Mi and Sang Woo rush into the courthouse and meet Hyuk Joo with a court representative. Looks like they’ve got something. The court representative bursts in and whispers something to the defense attorney.

Next thing we know, the defense attorney requests that the judge rescind his order for a DNA test, as he has new evidence to present instead. Woo-Young turns around, and is happily stunned to see Hyuk Joo, Sang Woo, and Kang Mi with triumphant faces, waiting in the back. They did it! They did it!

They did what?!

Hyun Min is ordered to come out of his room, and he’s ready to claim victory on this one. He sits on the witness chair, and once again the defense attorney asks if he was present with Woo Hyun and Nam Sang Won at the villa. Once again, Hyun Min denies it. So the defense attorney asks that they present the new evidence.

It’s a video file. It’s the Phantom video file. It’s the video of Nam Sang Won’s murder from a different angle, this time showing a third man in the room. Hyun Min is still cool as a cucumber; since no one can see the third man’s face, no one can claim that it’s him. However, the defense attorney asks that they rewind the video to a little bit before the murder.

This time, it shows the third man offering to get everyone a drink. He goes to the bar, and then turns around with two glasses filled. The face is unmistakably that of Hyun Min’s.

Checkmate?

Comments:

1) How on earth did they get that file!? Where was it!? Who gave it to them!?

2) Since when was a courtroom duel so interesting!?

3) Is it quite possible that no one will die in the last episode now? Or, if someone dies, it’s a baddie?

Questions are filling my brain right now. This episode brings everything we’ve learned in 18 episodes to the table for all to see. Question Woo-Young’s identity? Check. Find out about the case 13 years ago and the slush fund? Check. Find the Phantom file? Check. Make sure Hyun Min gets his comeuppance? Check. Everyone knows the truth now, but it’s just a matter of wielding the pieces of information to one’s advantage that’s the key.

I think Woo-Young and the Cy-Team have more to their advantage at the moment, although, through deceit and manipulation Hyun Min could have something else up his sleeve. Both Woo-Young and Hyun Min keep interchanging opportunities to smirk at each other or look fearful, but what’s telling is in their hand gestures. Hyun Min rubs his thumb and forefinger together in anxiety while waiting in that adjacent room; Woo-Young on the other hand rests his hand calmly on his knee. It’s great that this case has the opportunity to save both Woo Hyun and Ki Young’s reputation, as every crime is going to fall on Hyun Min’s head. I hope things won’t work out so well for Chief Shin either; I’m sure that Hyun Min will bring down everyone he can with him. Revenge is a bitch.

A couple of things were a little too “convenient” for me, such as the burning of Hyo Jung’s belongings, and the appearance of a sister we never heard about. I thought the writer is not the type to make throwaway plot points like that; every detail in the script has been used somewhere else or referred to later on. I hope these plot points make a reappearance in episode 20 because otherwise, they would have been totally useless to the story. The belongings didn’t have to go to a dead sister, and they didn’t have to be burned because clearly, the Cy-Team found the evidence – burned or not burned.

I’m glad that as the series is winding down, the writers managed to make a court trial as intense and exciting as it was. It’s hard to keep up momentum after one week’s delay, especially when the next episode features a courtroom with little action, and mostly talking. This case could be tidied up within the middle of the next episode, so I’m kind of hoping they’ll have a spectacular finish for this series. *Crosses fingers!*

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