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Friday, April 21, 2023

"Taxi Driver" Korean drama season one: Episode twelve recap

 


 Air Dates: April 9th until May 29, 2021 on SBS-TV, Saturday and Sundays at 10:00 pm
Director: Park Joon-Woo... Subs done by Sally G... This episode's rating: 12.7%

Main Cast: Bit of a large cast plus there's many guest stars whose roles are big but the episodes are an hour or longer. The setting is the Rainbow Taxi company which is a legit operation and is run by an older man named Jang. For now it seems 100% of the drivers are just your regular cabbies but there is one driver who goes beyond the call of duty and will be the first character you'll read about below. His name is Kim Do-Gi, usually in recaps use the last name for males and first names for females which I hope makes things easier. However will be referring to him as Do-Gi, there's a woman that I'll be using her last name who is Baek.

A second season began on February 17th of this year, hopefully can recap most of the episodes before that season ends and may do posts for that also. Almost all of my drama recaps for the past year have been for shows with the episodes being between 25-45 minutes and have been doing a good job at keeping them brief yet also not leaving any details out. So these recaps will definitely be longer but so much takes place in this show and will already give this series a very high recommendation. As it says in this screenshot this drama is about revenge and we need more in that vein!


Lee Je-Hoon as Kim Do-Gi.... This is a man who can do it all, if I described everything we'd be here for days! Do-Gi is the most unbeatable fighter I've seen to date in a drama, he had once been an elite member of the Special Forces division of Korea's military. Four years ago his mother was slain by a crazed killer who later committed suicide in prison which meant Do-Gi couldn't avenge his mother's death. He soon met the man below and above who is Jang and the owner the Rainbow Taxi, he told Do-Gi if he wants revenge to join his company. Which is a legit taxi service though Do-Gi also specializes in helping others getting back at those cruel people who have made their lives a living hell! Could add more in but that's enough for now....



Kim Eui-Sung as Jang Sung-Chul..... Owner of Rainbow Taxi and that's him two screenshots above. Jang's parents were murdered twenty years ago and since then has sworn to avenge the victims of brutal crimes or who have been mistreated so badly. There's five members at the taxi company who do work on helping others get revenge but after two shows unsure if that number just may be a bit higher. Jang also runs an organization called Blue Bird which helps victims of crimes.

Esom as Kang Ha-Na.... The exact name as one of my all time fave Korean actresses! She's a prosecutor for the Seoul Northern District and was hell bent on finding what happened to a goon named Cho who disappeared after being released early from prison. But Ha-Na's supervisor told her to lay off the case and has assigned her to work with Jang, besides owning the taxi company he also has an organization helping victims of crime. Since the second show Ha-Na has been a bit leery of how the company operates, are they mixed up in some illegal activities?

Pyo Ye-Jin as Ahn Go-Eun....  I need to do some regular posts for her! Go-Eun is an elite hacker and tech expert who works at Rainbow Taxi and is one of five people there who work on the unknown 'revenge squad'. Go-Eun's sister committed suicide a few years back, Jung-Sun was her sister's name and her story is in the seventh and eighth recaps.

 Jang Hyuk-Jin as Choi Kyung-Goo.... The head mechanic at Rainbow Taxi, Choi and his assistant Park also work for the 'revenge squad'. Along with the above Go-Eun him and Park also work off site doing surveillance work and other duties.

Bae Yoo-Ram as Park Jin-Eon.... Bae and Park are a also comedy team and I've seen them paired up often in dramas. Park's younger brother was married to Choi's younger sister but both were killed in an apartment fire set  by an arsonist.

Cha Ji-Yeon as Baek Sung-Mi.... A very mysterious middle aged lady who owns the Nakwon Company. When Jang has to stash one of the people who they've taken revenge on he brings them to Baek who charges some very high fees. She also owns a shady night club and appears to even run a call girl ring, we learn more about Baek in every episode..... but then again that adds to her mystery! **** Perhaps being a mystery was better for starting with the tenth show the more we learn about Baek the more we learn how cunning and ruthless she is!!!!

Lee Ho-Cheol as Goo Seok-Tae.... Baek's ruthless main bodyguard and though has been in every show just added him in for this eleventh episode. Main reason was his name wasn't revealed for so long and check the guest star list as his name will be there too.

Yoo Seung-Mok as Cho Jin-Woo.... The Deputy Chief Prosecutor for the Seoul Northern District office. Cho is Ha-Na's supervisor and he's also good friends with Jang.

Lee Yoo-Joon as Wang Min-Ho.... Ha-Na's assistant at the prosecutor's office.

Guest Star for the first nine episodes .... Have kept this first name here as he did make minor appearances and his storyline did become major until his death.
  
Cho Hyun-Woo as Cho Do-Chul.... A sexual offender who was sentenced to life in prison but was released after only eight years to public outrage.  He was picked up at court by none other than our hero Do-Gi who brought this sicko to first Jang then to Baek's 'prison'. Ha-Na is on the case to find out what's happened to Cho with no success.... yet. Cho had still been alive and kicking as in the sixth episode he was able to escape from the dungeon. But he was recaptured by Baek's bodyguards after he stabbed Jang and was killed at the end of the ninth show.


Guest stars for the eleventh through fourteenth episodes

Lee Ho-Cheol as Gu Young-Tae.... As you can see Lee plays two characters in these four shows.  He's playing a set of twin brothers, Seok-Tae is Baek's bodyguard while Young-Tae is a junior director at her Nakwom company. Both brothers are brutal but especially Young-Tae and who knows how many he's killed to date?!!!!

The twin brothers, on the left is Young-Tae and on the right is Seok-Tae.


Han Kyu-Won as Go Dong-Hee... We won't see much of him save for flashbacks but he worked as a salesman for a construction company. His disappearance was what opened this new case and all fingers are pointing towards Young-Tae who is presumed to have killed Go. The main reason is Go was engaged to the below woman who Young-Tae had eyes for.

Han -Hyun-Ah as Lee Hye-Yeon.... As mentioned she was engaged to Go and really did love him but if Young-Tae can't have her no man can!

Lee Yoon-He was Pastor Go.... The father of Go Dong-Hee, and turned down Jang's offer of getting revenge for his son's disappearance/death.

Jung Kang-Hee as Sim Woo-Sub.... An associate of Young-Tae but that man really abuses Sim endlessly. Sim owns the HM company which is really just a 'paper organization' that will be explained in the twelfth recap.


Previous recaps .... most cases are for two episodes but the fifth through eighth episodes were for one very long and intense revenge case. There's a second four episode story which ran from the eleventh to fourteenth episode.





 Quite the dramatic ending to the previous episode and sadly we have to say goodbye to the above man Wang. He was Ha-Na's assistant prosecutor and a real likable character, his murder was totally unexpected and will begin off the recap describing what took place. After that the intensity never slowed down and these last two shows have been the darkest ones to date. Many minor storylines keep popping up and also a few conspiracies, this story was supposed to be about getting revenge for a missing man named Go but now it's much more than that as Jang and his 'revenge squad' could be in a battle for life and death! That last episode needed five segments as it was a 71 minute show and so much took place, first time a recap has been that long in years. Hoping this recap won't be as long as it was only an hour show yet so much took place so up in the air for now how long this will be and though Wang was killed in the last show the incident wasn't explained until the beginning of this episode.







 Sure you read the above recap and it does need to be read as so much took place and can't talk about all of those details. The last episode ended with the twin Gu brothers on the hunt for an associate named Sim who had decided to help the prosecutor Ha-Na with her case. That was finding a missing man named Go, Sim met with the man suspect Gu Young-Tae and thought he found out what happened to Go. He called Ha-Na but it was all a trap for Sim as the twin brothers were soon about to pounce on him, Sim escaped from the bar he was drinking in with Young-Tae. In the fourth screenshot above are the twin brothers, on the left is Gu Young-Tae and he's the only suspect in the disappearance of Go. Will refer to him as Young-Tae and on the right is his twin brother Gu Seok-Tae, will call him Gu. He got in a scrap with Do-Gi who had come to Sim's rescue, approaching police sirens aborted the intense fight. Sim hid out in a nearly warehouse but was discovered by Young-Tae and it appeared he wouldn't be among the living for too much longer. However Ha-Na had been tracking Sim's phone, she was on her way to the area but her assistant Wang was closer and did arrive first.

 Wang was able to stop Young-Tae from killing Sim and gave him a good beating, Wang was about to arrest this goon which brought some laughs from him. That's because arriving on the scene was the other twin brother Gu who is one tough fighter. So wasn't Wang and for a while it appeared he would take down the second brother too. However Wang was unprepared for what happened next which was that Gu took out a knife and stabbed Wang many times, the brothers quickly fled the scene with Sim as their hostage. Wang held on for a while but his injuries were too severe and he sadly died a few minutes later. Besides being Ha-Na's assistant Wang was also a very good friend to her and his death upset her to no end, it will also change the course of this drama. All knew that Young-Tae had a hand in this murder but once again how can anyone prove it? So even though Ha-Na had Young-Tae arrested she couldn't hold him for too long due to a lack of hard evidence. Young-Tae is such a lowlife and it's going to be such a pleasure seeing him taken down. Ha-Na did question this thug and even started to rough him up a bit but was stopped by her superior Cho, that's in the bottom two screenshots above and right below.








 Of course Ha-Na's superior Cho was almost as upset as she was with Wang's murder but they are the law and must follow certain rules. Ha-Na has always believed the laws of justice would punish those who deserve it but now is beginning to wonder. First she has had two intense conversations with Do-Gi about how the law doesn't support the victims of crime and now with Wang's murder should she seek the one option that Do-Gi has suggested? That option is in the third screenshot above which was at Wang's funeral, Ha-Na asked Do-Gi what can she do to get justice for Wang and he told her one simple word.... REVENGE!!!! Do-Gi then took her away in his deluxe taxi where she told him everything about the Wang case, Do-Gi too wants to see justice done. Ha-Na was dropped off at a Karaoke club and told to check out a machine. Its a game we've seen four other times and it's one where a victim can employ the 'revenge squad' to get justice for them, even though Ha-Na is a top notch prosecutor she chose the option of having Do-Gi and his team get revenge for her! Which Jang's team will do but even if Ha-Na didn't hire them they would have been sucked into this case anyway.

 Ha-Na's boss Cho had asked Jang to help out with the Go case as Jang runs an organization called Blue Bird which helps out victims, this time around it was for Go's family. So now things will be moving forward at a much faster pace for Jang's team, they have some solid thoughts of what took place but there are some missing details and also concrete evidence. Go was last seen entering the office of Young-Tae, he had been drugged while out drinking with him. There were CCTV cameras in the area which saw Go enter the building but none had any footage of him leaving. Young-Tae's office and building was searched with no body being found, Go vanished into this air? Of course not so now it was a case of doing regular detective work for Do-Gi and his mates who interviewed many of the other shopkeepers and residents of the area. They did learn a lot but it did raise many other questions. For instance steam had been seen coming out of Young-Tae's office plus they were using a massive amount of water at times, what could that possibly mean? We're about to find out and that discovery also will change the course of this drama dramatically.








 After hiring Rainbow Taxi to help her avenge the murder of Wang we only saw Ha-Na in two short scenes. The first was unexpected and some of the screenshots are right above, of all people Ha-Na met up with Baek and her mysteriousness keeps growing! Ha-Na knows that Young-Tae worked for Baek's company Nakwon as a junior director and what would a thug like him be doing there? Good question and Baek never did give a good explanation in why, we viewers are also a bit up in the air but by the end of this recap have a strong inkling on his role. That mini interview was another one that kind of went nowhere for Ha-Na but it was effective to an extent as Baek knows the Seoul prosecutor's office is starting to learn more about her secrets and that will need to cease! After the mini meeting Baek even went to complain to Jang about the pressures she's been under, that's him right above. Jang then told her that Young-Tae has killed someone, could be Go and perhaps even Sim who still hasn't been located. The tears began to stream out of Baek's eyes and she is one superb actress, she can't believe what her staff is doing behind her back and was that a lot of bull she gave Jang!!!!

 Back to Do-Gi and his mates investigating Young-Tae's office, why had they been using so much water? According to Park in the second screenshot above a chemical such as sulfuric acid is very toxic, using it would mean much water would be needed to clean the air out but why would someone be using this hard to get chemical? Park also added that sulfuric acid is so strong it can disintegrate bones, could he have stumbled across the key clue to date? Yes Park has for a further inspection of two adjoining rooms to Young-Tae's office have revealed some hard to believe discoveries such as many tools one would use to dismember a body!!!! So adding everything together the 'revenge squad' team has deduced that Young-Tae and whoever else works with him has been cutting up bodies and then using sulfuric acid to melt the bones and skin! Now Do-Gi knows why Go was never seen leaving Young-Tae's office as his body was burnt to a crisp! Not just Go but that could be the outcome for Sim as his body has never been discovered, what has Jang's 'revenge squad stumbled upon? However Young-Tae's office isn't a place where they could do many of these 'operations', it was done to Go's body as there was no other choice so is there another location where Young-Tae has been working out of? Then the bigger question could be where does he get the sulfuric acid which is very difficult to obtain.









 Do-Gi notified Ha-Na of what his team has discovered but as he added it could be the tip of the iceberg. Ha-Na has the missing Sim's records and he was the owner of a company named HM which was just a front and never did any regular business. The tech whiz Go-Eun can find out every single thing possible in the world, she's found that the HM company has often ordered large amounts of.... sulfuric acid!!!! Of course it all went to Young-Tae but it's still unknown why he would need such large quantities of the acid, we'll soon find out. With Sim missing Young-Tae has to order the chemical on his own which he's done twice in one week, we'll also find out soon why he needs so much more. Go-Eun hacked into the company delivering the sulfuric acid and has changed the delivery time, taking the place of the regular drivers were the two mechanics Choi and Park. They delivered four large vats of the acid to Young-Tae near an amusement park as to not stand out, attached to one of the vats was a tracking device. Soon heading to the location was Do-Gi and what he found was an extremely shocking situation.

 During this period of time Young-Tae was nowhere to be found, above Ha-Na was asking about the fugitive but Do-Gi claimed ignorance which was true. Back to Do-Gi's tailing of the sulfuric acid and it led to Young-Tae's other hideaway which was in a remote section. After the mechanics made the delivery Do-Gi stormed the place and took out most of the security guards. He then checked out a few rooms which left Do-Gi gasping for air, he couldn't believe what he saw which also gave him some flashbacks of his past. One room was loaded with surgical tools to cut up a body, that screenshot is above and also in the room was a huge stack of drawers. In one of them was the missing Sim person who was dead and it appeared some surgery had been done on him. Not just any type of surgery but his vital organs had all been removed and that's when Do-Gi began to feel ultra queasy. He notified Go-Eun of his findings who soon contacted the prosecutor Ha-Na who brought a team to the remote building. Before she arrived Do-Gi found another room where a doctor was performing surgery to remove organs from a person.... who was still alive! Do-Gi prevented the operation from going any further and appearing in this room right after was none other than Young-Tae. The two had one major tussle but before Do-Gi could deliver the killing blow Young-Tae fled when he heard the police sirens, last we saw of him in this episode but he'll be back!









 Over the last year the Seoul prosecutor's office has seen such a large amount of missing person cases, Ha-Na began to investigate this which was prior to going to Young-Tae's second secret location. So when Ha-Na arrived there she had the missing persons list with her, besides Sim they found three other bodies. They were people on that list and all had their vital organs removed, how many dozens more has Young-Tae taken the organs from and there's no evidence thanks to using the sulfuric acid on the bodies! **** So what began off as a simple missing person case involving Go has turned into the biggest story in Korea when the news was leaked. It appears Ha-Na will be leading this possibly international case, it was the last we saw of her but there are almost ten more minutes to go. Soon Jang confronted Baek with all of this information, how could she not have known what Young-Tae was doing? But in a bombshell Baek confessed to Jang she too was taking organs from prisoners and selling them, what a lucrative business that is! When Jang's team captured one of those 'revenge case' criminals he handed them over to Baek who kept them stored in a dungeon deep below a remote building. She was using those criminals for their organs and to say Jang was taken back was an understatement, what else has been going on which he doesn't know about.

 Final paragraph and it appears her bodyguard Gu has ben helping out his twin brother Young-Tae with those other transplants and killings. Baek has agreed to help Jang and his team capture Gu, a meeting was set up with him the following day where Baek would give him some sleeping medicine and then Jang could drag him away. Like his twin brother Young-Tae Gu has also remained missing for the police also want him. At this meeting that was held at a restaurant the most unexpected occurrences took place. Gu drank the medicine hidden in a drink but remained awake, how could this happen and have to note that there were cameras in the room so Jang and his team could view the action. Gu then pounced on Baek and it looked like she would be getting a beating, Do-Gi then dashed to the scene. Which was an empty room and as Do-Gi says above.... 'We've been had!'. Somehow Baek had taped everything in advance, she and Gu had already fled out the back entrance and can't believe the tech whiz Go-Eun didn't notice the action was on tape. You can see Baek gloating above and she has become one of the cruelest characters you'll see in a drama. In the final minute Jang and his troops paid a visit to Baek's dungeon, they had sent the two mechanics there ahead of time. The pair were trapped in a cell and all the others were empty as Baek's henchmen had cleared all of the other prisoners out, what an ending and Jang's team really had the wool pulled in front of their eyes! Not much more to add in and these these two recaps for today were among the most intense and interesting shows I've ever viewed. Recommend checking out the bottom screenshots which will help you follow the action a bit better, think the next pair of recaps will be in eight days..... whew(!), these took a while to write up and need a break!



































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