Age of Feeling: Episode 5

by HeadsNo2

Oh, so pretty. The drama, I mean. And no, it’s not just because there was a fire sale on pretty faces and this show bought the lot of them, but because the directing has such a nice aesthetic quality to it that manages to toe the delicate balance between function and fun. There’s no dearth of flattering shots or badass entrances this hour either, which means the show is still maintaining what I can only describe as its cool factor. Because instead of using tangible qualities to describe the merits of this show’s production—even if it’s still somewhat lacking in delivering a solid emotional hook—I can’t seem to think of a better word than cool. It is what it is.

Note: Long story short, despite reports that Episode 6 would be preempted, it wasn’t. Recaps will continue as scheduled.

SONG OF THE DAY

Age of Feeling OST – Yim Jae-bum “Destiny” [ Download ]

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EPISODE 5 RECAP

Jung-tae fights his way through a group of thugs to reach their boss, whom he speaks to as if it’s a chore far below him. Though he knows all about their smuggling operations, he couldn’t seem to care less about their inflated sense of self-importance.

He explains that he’s come to teach them to be sorry for that they’ve done, because the men sitting before him wouldn’t even know the meaning of the word “repent.” Then Jung-tae takes out all the other thugs in the room until it’s just him and the boss.

“Where are the children?” Jung-tae demands to know. Ah, so this gang smuggles children, which explains Jung-tae’s attitude. The boss fights back with what looks like a double-edged mace, though Jung-tae’s still the better fighter and is able to disarm him quickly enough.

Again, Jung-tae demands to know where the children are. While the boss refuses to tell him, his lackeys get a second wind and start bludgeoning Jung-tae into submission.

Before they’re able to do any serious damage, Jung-tae’s backup arrives in the form of Poong-cha and Jjang-ddol (now Shin Seung-hwan), who eliminate the gangsters so that Jung-tae can rescue the group of children stashed behind a wall. “It’s all right,” he assures them.

“It’s not all right,” we hear Ok-ryun (now Jin Se-yeon) stress in the next scene as she bandages Jung-tae up. She complains about having to do this for him all the time even though she should be used to it by now—but she isn’t, and still gets nauseous at the sight of blood.

Ok-ryun complains lightheartedly about the wrinkles she’s getting from worrying over him and how they’ll affect her chances of getting married, though she doesn’t get any rise out of Jung-tae since he’s preoccupied with worries for the kids he saved.

She just sighs that Jung-tae always replies with another question when he doesn’t want to answer one, clearly used to his behavior by now. But she’s still the same old Ok-ryun in that she never wants to leave his side even when he tries sending her away.

Jung-tae pays a visit to Dokku, who’s trying (and failing) to immerse himself in Japanese culture in order to act like he’s above his fellow countrymen. Jung-tae reminds him that he is one of those “Joseon people” he talked about, but Dokku retorts that he thought Joseon collapsed. (If we’ve returned to the year 1936 like I think we have, then Korea is still very much under Japanese rule. It would not become an independent nation again until the end of World War II in 1945.)

When Jung-tae brings up his very first dobinori experience and how he knows Dokku planted the couple who stabbed him upon arrival, Dokku waves him off, all, That time I tried to kill you? All in the past.

But here’s where things get interesting: Dokku claims he saw Jung-tae’s sister the day she supposedly committed suicide, and tells Jung-tae that if he catches “that bastard,” he’ll find his sister.

Jung-tae responds by smashing his glass onto the table, demanding to know who that bastard even is and what he looks like. Dokku fidgets nervously as his eyes flit from Jung-tae’s bloody hand to his determined face and talks him off the ledge.

The only way Jung-tae will get any information on his sister is if he pays Dokku back for the money he owes him—which I’m assuming is still from the dobinori incident. That’s how Dokku manages to keep Jung-tae on a tight leash.

We meet Kaya (Im Soo-hyang) and Shinichi (everyone else aged very well in this show) as they stand on the veranda of a temple perched on a cliff.

He tells her of the famous Kiyomizu-dera temple, located in modern Kyoto, and the tradition that existed during the Edo Period of people who would jump off the veranda. The belief existed that if you survived the forty-two foot drop, your wish would be granted. And if you didn’t, well, oops.

But to Shinichi’s surprise, Kaya hops up onto the railing to prove her fearlessness, since his tale was about those who would walk on the railing and be punished if they chickened out by falling to the inside.

She walks as if on a balancing beam, since falling one way would send her far down the cliff and to her death. If she feels any fear she hides it well, and hops back down like it was nothing.

When she makes light of Shinichi being more afraid than she was, he gives her a hard slap and a stern warning not to ever attempt something like that again. Whether she’s pleased with her feat or just pleased about getting such a reaction out of him, we don’t know.

So it seems like common knowledge now that Chung-ah is not dead, and that Jung-tae is on a quest to find her. Boss Hwang tries to use Chung-ah as a reminder for Jung-tae to be a little less reckless, but Jung-tae doesn’t heed him—he’s too busy thinking about his sister.

He tells Boss Hwang that their mother died when Chung-ah was six. After suffering from constant hunger afterward, Jung-tae caved and desperately sold her to an innkeeper in the hopes that she’d at least always be fed.

We see the events in flashback as he relates them to Boss Hwang, and the story reaches its emotional apex when he tells of how little Chung-ah somehow found him, miles away from where he’d left her, just to offer him candy.

Even though she looked like a beggar, and even knowing that her brother had abandoned her, Chung-ah cared more for his well-being and only wanted to tell him that he wouldn’t have to worry about her anymore. She was being fed and taken care of. She only entreated him never to forget her.

That was the turning point in Jung-tae’s life, since he was eating with the pennies he gained from selling his sister. Tears threaten to flow as he tells Boss Hwang the promise he made to himself:

“From that day onward, I swore that I would protect Chung-ah with my life. Even though I don’t know how other people should live, I know that I don’t want to be a bastard who would sell his sister just to live better, or a parent who abandons their children. Even if I had to risk my life, I promised myself that I wouldn’t throw away my family, who share the same blood as me… But now, I’ve already lost Chung-ah. This bastard, Shin Jung-tae… has lost Chung-ah.”

To put our timeline in perspective, it’s only been three years since we last saw everyone. Shinichi takes Kaya to meet her grandfather (though she doesn’t know it yet) Denkai, and gives her insanely strict codes of conduct that more or less fall along the lines of: Speak only when spoken to and drink fish scales with your tea.

In Denkai’s presence, Kaya drinks the Fish Scale Tea as she was told. Her face contorts in pain soon after as she spits up blood, but retains her composure. Denkai then reveals that the fish scales have sharpened edges, and like all things in this house of horrors, was yet another test for her to pass.

But pass she did, which means that she gets officially appointed as Shinichi’s new master. Shinichi refers to her as hime-nim (hime being a Japanese term of for a noble woman of higher birth, and/or princess), before offering her one of his small swords as a way of putting his life in her hands, since he declares that he can only die by that very blade.

Denkai finally gives her permission to look at him, though the sudden eye contact seems to shake his resolve. Then Kaya breaks the first rule of Fight Club by asking a question—is the man who killed her mother among them?

Her grandfather doesn’t answer, instead bidding her to follow him.

After a strange interlude with Ok-ryun attending an interview to become a singer, we meet a dapper KIM SOO-OK (Kim Jae-wook) as he swindles a rich girl out of her father’s money on the false promise that he’ll marry her. In the end he just drugs her drink so he can make a clean escape with the cash.

Soo-ok ends up stopping outside the building where Ok-ryun is auditioning (using “Over the Rainbow”, even if it didn’t exist until 1939 and we’re supposedly in the year of our lord 1936), drawn by the sound of her voice.

Ok-ryun does well for her audition, though the shady man running it claims she’ll need some lessons first. That’s when Soo-ok makes his entrance, causing the shady man to all but quake in his boots. He and Soo-ok have a past together, and it’s not a good one—Soo-ok punches him upon arrival.

Then he flashes Ok-ryun a smirk as he repeats the shady man’s thoughts on her singing: she CAN sing, but only a liiiiiittle bit.

Kaya follows her grandfather into a prison holding a man who betrayed their organization. Nothing like the “If you’re so evil, eat this kitten” trope to liven things up—in order to prove herself worthy, Kaya must kill the prisoner.

Shinichi claims she’s not ready in an attempt to plead her case to Denkai, but the grandmaster grandfather isn’t having it. Their way is the way of the sword, and they must kill to live.

Despite the fact that Soo-ok saved Ok-ryun from a conman, she’s no more amicable toward him because of it. He tries asking her out for tea only to be firmly rejected—she claims she has a man, thank-you-very-much.

But Soo-ok keenly mentions how Ok-ryun doesn’t wear a ring from said man, which only makes Ok-ryun walk away from him faster. Ha. He just smiles after her and sighs, “So pretty.”

Meanwhile in Japan, the prisoner begs for his life as Kaya prepares to kill him. Unbeknownst to her, he’s slowly slipping his hands from his bonds as he stays her hand by telling her that he’s a single father with a young daughter.

This manages to stay her hand, because it brings back memories of her own dead father. But when the prisoner isn’t able to answer when she asks him for his daughter’s name, she knows she’s being tricked. Just at that time, the prisoner scrambles for the sword she dropped…

We don’t see the fight that ensues, only Kaya emerging from the room shaken and drenched in blood. Since she’s passed yet another test, she again asks Denkai if the man who killed her mother is in their organization, Ilgookhwe. He says yes.

That’s the only answer she’s allowed, since she won’t be told who did it until she goes to Shineuijoo, the border between Joseon and China, in order to do something non-specific.

Once alone in her room, Kaya breaks down into heaving sobs over the horrible deed she just committed while attempting (and mostly failing) to wash the blood off.

Shinichi asks Denkai if he plans on telling Kaya the truth should she complete the task he’s given her, to which Denkai replies with a question: “Do you know what I am afraid of, Shinichi? Losing Kaya like I lost her mother, Ryoko.”

He claims that he can’t let his bloodline die, something Shinichi assures him won’t happen now that Kaya is under his protection.

As Mama Kim prepares to go to a temple to pray, she receives a bad omen in the form of her mirror breaking and cutting her finger.

In another short and semi-random scene, we see the ajusshi Choi Su-ri that Mama Kim spoke to once use a sniper rifle to shoot and kill as many Japanese officials as he can before he runs.

Aboard the ship taking them from Japan to Joseon, Kaya holds something she’s kept dear all these years: the piece of cloth Jung-tae used to bandage her hand when they first met.

She knows to hide it in front of Shinichi, who remarks that she’ll be returning to conquer Shineuijoo as a totally different person than she was when she left. Kaya agrees, but she’s well aware of the special treatment she’s received—she was accepted into Ilgookhwe in just three years, given its third-in-command as her personal bodyguard, and is now in charge of their operations in Shineuijoo.

So she’s guessed that Denkai might be her grandfather, and if she had any doubts, Shinichi’s rigid response should be a clear indicator that she’s right. Either way, she vows that she’ll find the truth on her own.

While Dokku talks his reticent boss into getting involved with Ilgookhwe’s arrival, Boss Hwang and Poong-cha hang a lantern on Jung-tae’s new personality. Then Boss Hwang tells him that he found the couple who stabbed Jung-tae and left him to die.

And while Ajusshi Choi digs out a bullet he got from his sniper skirmish, Jung-tae nabs Ok-ryun from the gibang, where she was just trying on a gisaeng’s ring.

They then hold hands (!!!) as they head to dinner. Are they a Thing now? Officially? He’s the epitome of the somber boyfriend while she happily chats enough for the both of them, and it’s adorable.

He has a brief moment where he holds her hand and inspects the empty real estate on her ring finger like he’s considering it, but Ok-ryun is the one who cuts the awkward moment off early. They agree on noodles after he tells her he’s going to Dandong (in China) a for a few days, the very same town he got stabbed outside of. Yay.

As fate would have it, Kaya is also in Dandong, and is looked upon none too kindly for her Japanese garb—again, I’m not completely sure what year we’re in, but if it’s anytime after 1937 then Japan and China would be in the midst of the Second Sino-Japanese War. So that might Explain Things.

Kaya and her men end up in a fight when their Chinese gang counterparts don’t feel like giving up their leader, and they kick some decent ass until that leader actually shows up. This show knows how to give its characters rockstar entrances, that’s for sure. Except their rockstars are eerily good at killing people.

Anyway, it’s the man in black who saved Jung-tae’s life, and he introduces himself as MO IL-HWA (Song Jae-rim) after using his superhuman abilities to kill two of Kaya’s men in front of her. They exchange pleasantries as if they’re not surrounded by dead bodies.

Kaya, having seen Il-hwa’s inhuman speed and agility, asks Shinichi if he’d be able to protect her from him. Instead of an affirmation Shinichi just says “I think you should be careful,” which I take as code for “No.”

Things go seemingly well over tea until Kaya offers Il-hwa an apology and a favor. The apology is for Il-hwa’s mother, who was killed by a Japanese soldier. Il-hwa’s amicable features morph into something much darker at the mention of his mother, putting Shinichi on guard.

But he calms down well enough when Kaya claims that Ilgookhwe was in no way involved, and that she’s just apologizing on behalf of Japan. Her request is that Il-hwa just turn the other way when Ilgookhwe takes over Shineuijoo and Dandong, otherwise the streets of his city will run red with blood.

Il-hwa’s smile is back in place as he politely declines Kaya’s takeover, and assures her that if anyone’s blood will run in the streets, it’ll be hers. Them’s fightin’ words.

Jung-tae doesn’t know why Poong-cha has brought him to Dandong until they come upon the couple team who stabbed him. The realization hits Jung-tae slowly, but when it does he tries to remain calm as he asks: “Who told you to do it?”

The man isn’t forthcoming with any information, since disclosing who hired him would mean his job and his life. He still manages to be a complete tool about it though, and when he offers to finish the job he started, Jung-tae takes him on unarmed.

Though the man is skilled with a knife and manages to slice Jung-tae’s hand, he’s still no match for our hero. After a solid beating, Jung-tae throws the man into his butcher stand and punches the living daylights out of him while Poong-cha takes care of the wife.

Jung-tae trembles with rage as he demands to know who ordered his stabbing, but the man keeps mum about it. But he’s not mum about goading Jung-tae on for whatever reason, and is finally shut up when Jung-tae knocks him out cold.

Since Jung-tae wants to meet the man who saved him, Poong-cha leads him to Il-hwa’s temple of doom right as Kaya and Shinichi are leaving it.

Then Kaya and Jung-tae lock gazes, recognizing each other instantly.

 
COMMENTS

Waitaminute, so this show is telling me that people can recognize each other after being apart for a few years? Why do I feel like this is the exception and not the norm?

Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for it. Even though it’s only been three short years in the drama’s timeline and just an episode for us, it’s refreshing to have Jung-tae and Kaya back in each other’s orbits without any mistaken or forgotten identities to muck up the works. I especially like that it has only been such a short while, because childhood backstories tend to feel redundant if more than a decade passes before we see their adult counterparts—especially when it’s been 10+ years of someone holding onto the same crush/conflict and all we’re left wondering is, “Why hasn’t anyone moved on yet?”

But by placing the adult story only three years after the episodes spent with the kids, we get a more immediate story and one we’re (thankfully) a little bit familiar with. So it makes sense then that Jung-tae is still paying off an old debt, even if I’m still not sure what he promised to Dokku in the first place and why he still owes him when Dokku tried to have him killed. It also makes sense that Jung-tae would still be obsessed with finding the truth behind his sister, especially if she might still be alive. The logistics of all that makes a little less sense comparably, but this show isn’t one for early (or any) reveals, so waiting that mystery out is our only option.

Kaya and Jung-tae share something in common in that they’re operating partially because someone is lording information they want over them, which is an easy enough character motivator but also a slippery slope. It’s easier to feel for Jung-tae since we saw how he was with his sister and know how much finding her means to him, and also because they’re not making that his One Modus Operandi. If his goal is to raise enough money to pay his debt off, then it’s a motivator without a time limit, much like Kaya’s vengeance quest.

So, her top priority right now is finding out who killed her mother. Easy enough I suppose, but why does it feel so left-field still? While Jung-tae’s relationship with his sister was interwoven with the plot, Kaya’s obsession with her mother’s killer didn’t rear its head until late in the setup phase. And even then, it was a whiplash moment for her character, since all she did was tell us that it was Very Important to her before it just was, like it had been that way the whole time. The subject of mothers came up when Kaya asked permission to visit Jung-tae’s late mom, sure, but never did she drop a hint that she was losing sleep over the mystery surrounding her mom.

It all comes down to a matter of show versus tell. We were shown Jung-tae’s life and how his every waking moment revolved around providing for his sick sister, whereas we were shown this whole life with Kaya and a father who was killed right in front of her only to have her biggest motivator become something we were only told about afterward. I believe her though, I really do. I’m just not quite feeling it yet.

 
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