My Sassy Girl: Episodes 7-8

by chickachunga

Our sassy princess’s beauty may outshine that of a flower, but she sure seems to pop up unwelcome wherever Gyun Woo happens to be like a defiant weed, and it’s driving him insane. He just can’t seem to avoid her, and he’s definitely annoyed, but “annoyed” doesn’t quite encapsulate the full breadth of his emotions, which are always more complicated than expected.

 
EPISODE 7 RECAP

The king is in good spirits as he returns from his hunting trip with his retinue that evening. They’re all on foot, with Minister Jung walking in tandem with the king. But a sly grin crosses Minister Jung’s face as he takes a step back. Suddenly, an arrow flies right in front of the king’s face, just barely missing it, and striking a tree.

Minister Jung orders the troops to protect the king, and the king yanks the arrow on which a letter is attached. He reads it out loud: “Tonight, the king will cry bitterly after he loses his child.” He fumes while Minister Jung clocks his reaction.

Meanwhile, Hyemyeong is tied to a post while gangster Dochi and his thugs threaten to hurt her. But a familiar voice calmly suggests that he back off. They turn to the source of the voice and are surprised to see Gyun Woo arrive, placidly fanning himself with an accordion fan. Relief washes over Hyemyeong’s face, and the gang attacks Gyun Woo, but he’s quite skilled with the fan, smacking away the first few assailants.

But one of the thugs drives a sword through Gyun Woo’s fan and manages to cut his shoulder in the process. He tumbles to the ground and finds himself surrounded until debris from above falls on top of Dochi, momentarily diverting the gang’s attention to the new threat: palace guard Joon-young. Joon-young single-handedly fends off the thugs with ease while Gyun Woo and Hyemyeong flee the scene together.

The two find themselves back at the lantern festival and notice they’ve been holding hands all this time, so they hastily let go. Hyemyeong sees the bloody cut on Gyun Woo’s shoulder and immediately rips off a strip from her dress and ties it around the wound. Gyun Woo watches her, touched by the gesture, until booming fireworks illuminate the sky and shift their attention.

They gaze at the sight of colorful lanterns (beautiful!) floating into the air. Hyemyeong’s wonder brings a smile to Gyun Woo’s face, but she notices and asks about his strange facial expression. He says he was simply praying for the country and its inhabitants since you’re supposed to make a wish when lanterns fly (nice try, buddy) which prompts Hyemyeong to ask if her face is a lantern, heh. He deflects, and then notices she’s not wearing any slippers.

We return to Joon-young, who has his sword pressed against gangster Dochi’s throat and demands to know who’s behind all this, but Dochi maintains his innocence.

Back at the festival, Hyemyeong admires the new slippers Gyun Woo bought for her. Then her bodyguard Byul arrives and informs her that the king is on his way back to the palace, sooner than expected.

They hurriedly make their way back, but so does the king, riding as fast as his horse will take him. As soon as the king arrives, he rushes past the surprised queen to check on the prince. He’s relieved to find the prince safe and sound, then immediately turns to go check on the princess.

Eunuch Young-shin paces nervously outside, but the king is already there and bursts through the princess’s doors… and finds Hyemyeong inside. Whew. While the king is relieved to see her, the queen is visibly disappointed that Hyemyeong made it back just in time to avoid potential punishment. When he leaves, Hyemyeong exhales in relief, but the queen sees her dirty socks and storms off.

Young-shin meets Gyun Woo outside and starts whimpering as he says the king wants to see him. Thinking all is lost, Gyun Woo wails as he slumps to the ground. But Hyemyeong appears and smugly makes fun of his pitiful state, and Young-shin gleefully apologizes for fibbing.

Gyun Woo’s not amused, but expresses relief that everything went well. Hyemyeong looks again at the gash on his arm and hands him a small pouch of herbs to treat it with, trying not to appear like she cares at all what he does with it. She turns to go, but Gyun Woo stops her by taking out her jade ring, though he doesn’t give it to her immediately. He instructs her not to sneak out again and to behave according to her status, to speak formally to him, and treat him as the prince’s teacher.

And if she promises to do all that, Gyun Woo says he’ll then give back the ring and forget about her sassy behavior. Hyemyeong suddenly becomes very polite and promises to do as he asks, but as soon as he hands her the ring, she kicks him hard in the shin and sweetly suggests that he forget this kick, too, heh.

Meanwhile, Minister Jung angrily flings his cup at the black-hatted man, WOL-MYUNG, for failing his mission to secure the princess, and his forehead bleeds.

Joon-young examines the threatening letter that was attached to the arrow that nearly struck the king. The king says this was done by the people behind the flyers and asks Joon-young if he has any inkling about who the perpetrators are.

Cut to: Gangster Dochi being dunked into a barrel of water as he’s questioned. He insists that there’s no one behind him calling the shots, but Joon-young orders his men to continue torturing him until he opens up.

In her room, Hyemyeong ties a leather string through her jade ring. Young-shin asks her if she thanked Gyun Woo for going through the trouble of finding it, but she says he merely did what he was supposed to for losing it. She quips that he shouldn’t be so arrogant, but is reminded of how bravely he fended off the thugs and even got hurt in the midst of trying to save her, making her feel slightly guilty for kicking him.

Gyun Woo returns home and tells his sister Gyun Hee not to tell their mother about his injury, and she deflects when he asks her why she was in such a dangerous part of town. In his room, he angrily crushes up the herbs from Hyemyeong in a mortar, offended that she didn’t thank him for his sincere advice and always kicks him like a bully. His dog plays around with the torn strip from Hyemyeong’s dress, and Gyun Woo grumbles that Hyemyeong gives him the illness and then the medicine, and the medicine and then the illness.

Outside, Hyemyeong looks at her jade ring, which she now wears around her neck. She flashes back to the moment a young man had given it to her and told her to keep it safe, vowing to return no matter what. Back in the present, she looks wistful as she holds the ring, and from a distance, Joon-young watches with concern.

The next day, the furious king holds up the threatening letter and shouts that the flyers have created lies and are ridiculing the royal family. Some say they’re not cause for concern since they’re merely rumors and the princess and prince ended up unharmed, but Gun Woo’s father, Minister Gyun, begs to differ, believing there may be a spy among them. Surprisingly, Minister Jung says he agrees and offers to conduct an investigation to put an end to it.

Minister Jung makes plans to use this investigation to his advantage, rather than fight it. To that end, Wol-myung arrives at a butcher shop and heads downstairs to a secret room where a group of people are drafting and make copies of the scandalous flyers.

Da-yeon fumes, thinking of Hyemyeong’s accusation that she abuses her family’s power to keep others down, and it doesn’t help that her maid wasn’t able to dig up much dirt on Hyemyeong. So she decides to ask Gyun Woo’s rival Chang-hui for his help. Chang-hui’s face lights up when he sees Da-yeon approaching, but is disappointed by her request to find out more about the crazy woman pestering Gyun Woo.

Chang-hui shakes with anger and then foists the task onto his friends, but he snaps when they deduce that Da-yeon must like Gyun Woo if she’s keen on learning more about the lady who follows him around. Heh.

During his lesson with Gyun Woo, the prince looks through a telescope and marvels at seeing distant objects up close. Gah, he’s so cute. He pouts over his sister’s absence since he enjoys learning with her, but Gyun Woo says they can finally focus on their studies. The prince wants to prolong the fun and picks up the telescope again, and sees Hyemyeong in the distance with Joon-young.

We cut to them, and Hyemyeong scolds Joon-young for his grim expression, explaining that she just got tangled up with some thugs by accident and will be more careful from now on. But Joon-young orders her to never to leave palace again because if she does, he’ll report her to the king immediately. Gyun Woo watches their encounter through the telescope and wonders what they were talking about, but then Hyemyeong catches him spying on her, and he hurriedly returns to his desk.

Hyemyeong joins the prince’s lesson and asks Gyun Woo why he was stealing glances at her. Gyun Woo is taken aback and insists that he was staring at an exquisitely crafted dragon head on the pavilion, but the prince interjects that the pavilion is in the other direction, heh. Hyemyeong asks if Gyun Woo’s taken an interest in her and encourages him to be honest since it’s no crime to be attracted to a beautiful woman.

But then she inches closer to him and tells him to snap out of it because she’d still reject a sly guy like him even if she were offered countless riches. The two sneer at each other while the prince looks on in amusement. After the lesson ends, Gyun Woo determines that he can’t handle this anymore and marches toward the king’s residence.

 
EPISODE 8 RECAP

We see an ominous wooden chest behind Hyemyeong, who is stripped of her royal dress and lying prostrate before the king. The angry king asks if she went outside the palace again, and she glares at Gyun Woo, who offers her a smirk. The king shouts that she doesn’t deserve to be a princess anymore and orders his men to depose her and lock her inside the chest.

She cries for mercy while getting dragged away, then asks that Gyun Woo be locked away with her since he was the one who took her to the festival. Uh oh. A stunned Gyun Woo shakes his head in denial, but it’s no use. The chest opens and we see Gyun Woo frantically screaming for help, but Hyemyeong eagerly pulls him back in, happy that she won’t be lonely anymore, ha.

Back in reality, Gyun Woo shakes that imaginary scenario out of his head—that won’t do. He wonders if there’s a better way to control the unruly princess.

Meanwhile, as Hyemyeong wonders where Byul and Young-shin are, she’s called to see the queen. It turns out that Byul and Young-shin are biting wads of cloth to muffle their cries while getting their calves whipped.

The queen contentedly sips her tea while they’re getting punished in front of her. Hyemyeong arrives, appalled, and demands to know why she’s doing this. The queen answers that they didn’t serve their master properly, but Hyemyeong says to punish her instead, which makes the queen cackle and ask how she could possibly do that.

Hyemyeong orders the queen’s court ladies to stop whipping them, and they comply, but the queen makes them resume. Hyemyeong goes over and snatches the cane and offers it to the queen so she can get hit instead. “Do you think I can’t do it?” the queen asks daringly.

Just then, the queen dowager arrives and wonders what’s going on, prompting the queen to feign remorse. The two have tea together, and while the queen dowager is surprised to learn that Hyemyeong left the palace yesterday, she rejects the queen’s suggestion of notifying the king and punishing Hyemyeong. This makes the queen livid, and she barely manages to contain her indignation.

Young-shin yelps while Hyemyeong dresses the red welts on his calves. He senses her morose mood and tells her not to be upset, but Hyemyeong apologizes since he and Byul got hurt because of her. She wraps a bandage around Young-shin’s calf and says in a somber voice, “It is not enough.”

Young-shin wonders what she means by that, and she replies that there’s not enough bandage for his calf so he should probably lose some weight, ha. Young-shin contends that it’s because his calf is swollen, and Hyemyeong says, “Sure, we’ll go with that.”

Over at the bookstore, Gyun Woo’s frustrated because he can’t find the books he’s looking for. The kooky bookseller shows him what’s hot these days: a book called The Princess’s Private Life, featuring a semi-clothed woman on the cover. Gyun Woo’s not interested and says he’s looking for books about revenge and punishment, so the bookseller gathers a stack with titles like Vengeance is Mine and Taming of the Shrew.

But even after reading them, Gyun Woo is uncertain he’ll be able to tame the princess. He then spots The Princess’s Private Life underneath the stack and can’t resist the temptation to read it.

As he reads the naughty book, we see a scene from it play out in his mind: Hyemyeong throws herself onto Gyun Woo and starts pulling off his clothes, ignoring his cries that he’s not ready yet, heh. She calls him cute and tells him not to think of going home tonight, and assures him that she’ll take the lead.

The next day, Gyun Woo returns to palace and tells himself that avoidance is also a very good tactic, only to run right into Hyemyeong with her crew. She spots him, too, but he awkwardly stomps off in the other direction, outright ignoring her wave, which makes Hyemyeong grin.

Gyun Woo’s mother and sister sit him down that night to talk about marriage. His mom circles qualities she likes, like a rich family, from a book full of eligible women who are all in line to marry him.

She wants to set him up on some blind dates, not so she can marry him off, but so she can brag about her son to other families. Gyun Woo says there’s no way he can meet all these women, but his mom says she’ll put them in order and starts numbering them. Next thing we know, we see Gyun Woo at the teahouse looking for the woman his mom set him up with.

Someone calls his name, and he turns around to find a lady who looks nothing like her picture in the book. But she confirms her identity and giggles, saying that she looks much better in person, while Gyun Woo mutters that the picture was inaccurately drawn. Suddenly, Hyemyeong pops up from behind her and asks if Gyun Woo was disappointed. What the, where’d she come from?!

He’s shocked to see her, and Hyemyeong gleefully recites the qualities Gyun Woo said he looked for in a woman, concluding that this lady is his ideal type. He tries to protest, but then she disappears just as suddenly as she appeared.

Somehow, she shows up on all five blind dates, doing the math on an abacus to determine if his date’s got the dough, examining her features with a magnifying glass, and cross-referencing with a book analyzing facial features, basically poking fun at his misery. Finally, Gyun Woo stands up, having had enough of the dates and Hyemyeong’s intrusive behavior, but again she disappears. Ha, did he imagine her all this time?

While Da-yeon and her girlfriends get manicures, some of them gossip about Gyun Woo going on all these blind dates and ask Gyun Hee if she gave up on having Da-yeon as her in-law. Sensing Da-yeon’s unease, Gyun Hee reassures everyone that her brother’s dates are all meaningless and that he’s just going on them to appease their mother. Then they wonder if the rumored “crazy girl” is Gyun Woo’s lover, which Gyun Hee insists is false.

Suddenly, the manicurist accidentally clips Da-yeon’s skin with the nail clipper, earning her a hard slap across the face. Yeesh. Da-yeon calmly warns her to be more careful, but she silently stews over the rumors involving Gyun Woo and his “lover.”

Se-ho and Kwang-soo reenact another classic drama scene (this time from I’m Sorry, I Love you) except their version takes place on horseback with Se-ho riding an invisible horse and Kwang-soo as the sad maiden riding behind him, heh. Gyun Woo arrives to grab a drink with them, and when asked how his blind dates went, his drained face says it all.

Over drinks, Gyun Woo explains that Hyemyeong keeps appearing before him like an enemy he doesn’t wish to see. Kwang-soo figures it’s because Gyun Woo’s eager for revenge, and Se-ho asks if he can be introduced to Hyemyeong; he finds it charming that she’s too much to handle. Se-ho then asks if Gyun Woo likes her, but he shouts that that’s preposterous, and his friends find his overreaction suspicious.

That night, masked men scale the rooftops of the palace and drop new stacks of flyers. The guards below pursue them, and Joon-young appears and orders his men to arrest all the intruders. He fights valiantly and chases one of them down, but he’s thwarted by a group of villagers, one of whom—the butcher from earlier—reminds Joon-young that behind them lies the gentry village, an area he’s not allowed to enter without the king’s orders.

In the palace, the queen’s court lady distributes stacks of flyers to her staff. They hide the flyers in their clothes and are made to promise discretion. They go off on their own and secretly drop flyers on the ground wherever they roam, and as the flyers get picked up, the rumors spread rapidly.

Gyun Woo stands on a bridge outside and figures that his complicated feelings are due to his eagerness for revenge. Choon Poong, flanked by his gisaengs, eagerly greets him, tickled that they keep running into each other like it’s fate. Gyun Woo notices the papers in the gisaengs’ hands and asks if they’re new flyers.

They say they found the flyers on the ground, adding that the rumors are about the princess attending the lantern festival and enjoying the night with a man. Gyun Woo gulps, but then they say the man is named Joon-young. Choon Poong adds that gangster Dochi is rumored to be the third leg of their love triangle, and Gyun Woo is baffled to hear Choon Poong say that Joon-young arrested Dochi because he found out he was dating the princess.

Gyun Woo says the rumors are hogwash, and he knows this because of a friend of a friend… of a friend, heh. Choon Poong guffaws, and one gisaeng states that the princess has another lover, a royal investigator, but that it’s been three years since their last meeting, so she’s probably over him now.

This is the first time Gyun Woo’s heard of this, and Choon Poong adds that the lover’s name is MIN YOO-HWAN, a man who went missing three years ago while conducting a secret investigation. Apparently the investigator was caught taking bribes, and Choon Poong figures he’s still on the wanted list.

Meanwhile, the king happens upon a flyer on the ground and reads it, his anger rising. The queen, however, is delighted by the content, and Minister Jung tells her that because the king’s trusty lieutenant Joon-young is featured in this latest rumor, the king definitely won’t stand for it this time.

The king confronts Joon-young and demands to know if any of what’s written in the flyer is true. Next we see Hyemyeong reading the flyers, and Young-shin tells her that the rumors have spread throughout the palace. He fears what will happen when the king finds out, and speak of the devil, the king arrives and demands to know why Hyemyeong left the palace.

Gyun Woo reads the flyer too, and mulls over what the gisaeng said, that the princess continues to sneak out of the palace to see her lover.

 
COMMENTS

It was nice to see a different side of Hyemyeong in this episode, one that’s able to recognize the severity and injustice of a situation and speak up about it, specifically when Young-shin and Byul were getting punished. I loved that glimmer of her cheeky self when she joked about Young-shin’s calves even though she was clearly upset about their ordeal and felt guilty about it. Most of the time, Hyemyeong is over-the-top and wacky, but I’m glad to see that she has some dimension and has instances where she’s quieter, grounded, and serious.

I’m thoroughly enjoying Gyun Woo and all his moments of discomfort. Anytime Hyemyeong or someone else disrupts his scholarly equanimity, I find his pouty expressions and childlike reactions pretty funny. When his buttons are pushed, he grumbles and wails like a kid, and it’s so fun to watch. Grumpypants Gyun Woo is pretty adorable, but I have to say, badass Gyun Woo and his creative use of a fan is equally, if not more so, attractive.

For a fusion sageuk rom-com, the fight scenes are impressively choreographed and captured. I appreciate that the action sequences don’t seem arbitrarily filmed, and that even a show with zany comedic moments has sleek fight choreography that can be appreciated. I hate when there are a zillion quick cuts in an action scene, which is why I really like the direction and editing here. Still solid.

We were finally shown the face of Hyemyeong’s supposed lover, and while I’m not dying to learn more about his story just yet, I did find it interesting that the reason why she keeps sneaking out just may be because of this Min Yoo-hwan guy. Is she meeting with him secretly? Is she searching for him? Or am I just getting carried away with the rumors in the flyers?

There are quite a few supporting characters that I’ve taken a liking to. I love how chill and sensible the queen dowager is and how she’s such a stark contrast to the conniving queen, who’s playing the evil stepmother to a tee. It was a surprise to see that Da-yeon is not the dainty and innocent lady she appears to be; that slap said it all. She’s not one to be messed with, and it seems she’s not used to being on the losing end of things. I’d love to see more scenes of jealous Chang-hui and his dimwitted bros; they’re like the dumb jocks of high school, except they’re somehow members of the investigative bureau.

Gyun Woo’s blind date scene went on for too long, and I KNEW actress Lee Do-yeon would be his first date. How many times has she been in dramas where her appearance is used as the butt of a joke? Sigh. I did, however, find that imagined rice chest scene pretty funny with Hyemeyong enthusiastically pulling a frantic Gyun Woo down with her (Crown Prince Sado is probably rolling in his grave!).

I think with Gyun Woo’s complicated feelings toward Hyemyeong and that meaningful look he had on his face while she tied his wound, we’re already seeing the first glimpse of an imminent romance. Right now, the feelings don’t seem mutual, but in due time, I’m pretty sure Hyemyeong will start seeing Gyun Woo in a different, more flattering light.

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