"My Perfect Stranger" drama: Episode eleven of sixteen recap

 

 Air Dates: May 1st until June 20, 2023 on KBS 2, Monday and Tuesdays nights at 9:45 pm

Director: Kang Soo-Yeon, episodes are 65 minutes in length and subs done by iTs

Rating for this episode: 4.5%, not high ratings as KBS2 is a cable network which means the numbers are actually very respectable. 

Main Cast: This drama was originally scheduled to air in the Autumn of 2022 but got pushed back twice. Have been looking forward to this series as it stars my second favorite Korean actress who is Jin Ki-Joo and hasn't seen her in any show for two years. Writing much of this up after viewing the first episode, there will be a lot of editing to the characters and more of them will be added in. This is a time travel drama, it began off in 2021 when the main male star Hae-Jun found a car that can travel in time either forwards or backwards! But think most of the drama will be set in 1987 and it could be nostalgic for any older K-drama fans who may visit here. 

**** When Yoon-Young was transported back to 1987 it was the evening of May 9th, dates will be important as a serial killer murders his first victim on May 14th.... or will he be stopped????

Kim Dong-Wook as Yoon Hae-Jun.... 32 year old KSBC anchor who one night happened to find this time travel car at the entrance to a tunnel! He believed in only facts but thought why not read the user manual to see if this car could travel in time... it could as Hae-Jun went to the year 3089! Shortly after returning to the year 2021 Hae-Jun took another trip and this time to 2037, what he found out is one of the main stories to this series. Hae-Jun discovered he was murdered in 2022 by a serial killer and went to visit this killer in prison upon returning to 2021. This man Go wasn't the true killer of many people way back in the year of 1987 but had been framed for the killings, Hae-Jun believed this man and to clear his name and also to save his own life Hae-Jun went back to the year 1987 to find out who the killer really was and to possibly stop the murders. The location will be the smallish country city of Woojung.

 Jin Ki-Joo as Baek Yoon-Young.... Editor in chief for a very popular woman author of murder novels though Yoon-Young seems to do most of the work. In the first episode she was fired by this author who was named Mi-Sook and it had to be a relief to be fired! Right around the time of Yoon-Young being fired her mother killed herself and she blames herself for the death, also her alcoholic father. A few days after her mother's death Yoon-Young was wandering near a tunnel when the time travel car driven by Hae-Jun came close to hitting her, at the time the machine was set to travel to 1987 which is where the pair ended up at. Of course Yoon-Young thought it was a dream but when she realized she had travelled back in time she was thrilled! The second main story will be of  Yoon-Young stopping her parents from meeting each other and getting married, if so what will happen to her???? Like Hae-Jun's story it will be set in the smallish city of Woojung. In the third episode Yoon-Young began to impersonate as a high school student to get closer to her mother. Yoon-Young is around thirty in age but claimed to Hae-Jun she could pass for being 22, she told everyone she had to stay back a few years because of family problems.

**** The above two are from the year 2021 but most of the action will take place in 1987, here are the main characters from that year. The location is a smallish city named Woojung-ri.

Seo Ji-Hye as Lee Soon-Ae.... In 1987 she was 18 in age and the top girl in her senior high school class. However she had no true friends and spent her time writing stories as she was such a fan of novels. Soon-Ae is actually Yoon-Young's mother and now that she somehow ended up in the year 1987 she's trying to prevent Soon-Ae getting married to Baek. So you have to wonder if Yoon-Young is successful would that mean she never existed?

 Lee Won-Jung as Baek Hee-Sub.... Yoon-Young's father though he too was only eighteen in 1987. He was a bit of an innocent lad and actually was quite nice back in 1987, Hee-Sub loved music but never began a band. He eventually became such an alcoholic and that was one of the reasons for Soon-Ae committing suicide in 2021. Hee-Sop is also a new transfer student at Woojung high school, he began on the same day Yoon-Young did.

Hong Seung-An as Baek Yu-Sub.... Hee-Sub's older brother who attends college in Seoul where he lies in a boarding house and also works PT at a leather factory. He does visit Woojung on the weekends to see his brother and is another suspect in the killings, the pair of brothers have quite a colorful past.

Park Soo-Hyung as Hyung-Man.... Soon-Ae's father who owns a combination tea shop, general store and bus stop for travelling to and from Seoul.

Kim Jun-Young as Ok-Ja.... Soon-Ae's mother and has two other children.

Hong Na-Hyun as Lee Kyung-Ae.... Soon-Ae's 22 year old sister who works at a hair salon. She loves to party and for so long had dreams of being in the Miss Korea pageant! In the seventh episode Kyung-Ae was supposed to be the second victim of the still unknown killer but that was thwarted by Hae-Jun, besides that show she may not have much screen time.

Kim Ye-Ji as Kim Hae-Kyung.... Friend of Soon-Ae's, like Hae-Kyung the other girls Soon-Ae hangs out with none of them are 'true friends' and all love to party which at times has gotten Soon-Ae into trouble. On the left below is Hae-Kyung, the other two are her cronies Eun-Ha in glasses and Yu-Ri, all bully Soon-Ae.

Ji Hye-Won as Ko Mi-Sook.... Another 'friend' of Soon-Ae's who we met near the end of the second episode. She's the same woman who became a popular writer many years later and of all things Yoon-Young was her editor in chief! Mi-Sook's first novel was a huge hit but she had actually stolen the story from Soon-Ae who never said a word. Mi-Sook was such a creep back in 1987 and was even worse in 2021! Mi-Soon does come from a very wealthy family so her snobbery began on the day she was born!

Kim Yeon-Woo as Ko Min-Soo.... Mi-Sook's older brother and the same man Hae-Jun met in 2021. In that year Ko had just been released from prison after serving 34 years for murders he never committed. Though innocent for those crimes Ko is still such a creep who may have raped some girls back in 1987 and almost did so to Yoon-Young!

Choi Young-Woo as Dong-Sik.... Hee-Seop's tough uncle who is a detective. We learned in the third show Hee-Sop's parents are dead and he's now moved in with his uncle. Baek is married with two young children.

Joo Yeon-Woo as Yoo Bum-Ryong.... High school student who became Hee-Sub's first friend in Woojung and we didn't meet him until the third episode. Bit of an oddball who is on the suspect list of some upcoming murders!

Jung Ga-Hee as Lee Joo-Young.... We met her in the fourth episode, she's attending school at Seoul University. Joo-Yung arrived in Woojung on May 12th, that's her below on the right. She's going to be a student teacher at the high school working with Hae-Jun. He knows that on May 14th she'll be the first victim of the killer, can he possibly prevent it? That happened and on May 15th Lee returned to Seoul.

Kim Jong-Soo as Yoon Byung-Gu.... Principal of the Woojung high school, on the left above and his son was attending school in America but returned to Korea in episode eight.

Jeong Jae-Kwang as Yoon Yeon-Woo.... The son of the above man who has just returned to Korea after attending an American university for three years. Yeon-Woo is very intelligent and has been asked by Hae-Jun to fix his Time Machine car, he's on the right below. There's one other common link between them which is that he's.... Hae-Jun's future father!

**** The below group of characters we met in the first episode who are from the year 2021, unsure if we'll be seeing much more of them as most of the drama takes place in 1987.

Lee Ji-Hyun as Lee Soon-Ae.... Yoon-Young's mother and the pair didn't get along so well, it was a reason for Soon-Ae committing suicide in the first episode.

Lee Kyu-Hoe as Baek Hee-Sop.... Yoon-Young's father who is such a waste as all he does is drink, him and his wife lived off what their daughter sent them in cash and he's the other main reason Soon-Ae killed herself.

Kim Hye-Eun as Go Mi-Sook.... Popular writer of murder mysteries, Yoon-Young was her editor who seemed to do most of the work until she was fired in the first show. Mi-Sook also lived back in Woojung in 1987 and had known Yoon-Young's mother, actually she stole the story for her first novel from her!

Im Jong-Yun as Ko Min-Soo.... Man who was accused of killing many people in the small city of Woojung back in 1987. However Go was innocent and after 34 years is about to be released from prison. No one had listened to Ko's pleas for all those years until Jae-Hun visited him the day before his release and has vowed to discover who the real killer was. 

 Whew, big cast and sure more characters will be introduced so that section above will be increasing for the first few shows and of course will also be updated.

Links to the previous recaps, may help to read a few of them and especially the first.

Episode one .... Episode two .... Episode three .... Episode four

Episode five .... Episode six .... Episode seven .... Episode eight

Episode nine .... Episode ten

Short promo video for the eleventh episode.

 

 

 Did have a minor goal to finish up this drama by the end of July which won't happen. However it could have been done but didn't want to rush through the final six episodes, found out when I zoom through dramas don't enjoy them as much. So will have a pair of recaps for today, the next two will be in about a week and then the following week will be the final pair. I am enjoying this series immensely though this was the first episode that began out a bit slowly but the second half was quite good and it may have had the best two scenes of the whole series. From those two scenes it made me think of a few questions on how/did things change between 1987 and 2021. Will bring those up in the next recap as not to give away any spoilers. 

 That's Hae-Jun above and until the end of the tenth episode we had never known that he had never seen his mother nor has he ever known her name. Added his future father Yeon-Woo to the above character list and he had a date with his mother to end off the previous episode. So that was the semi cliffhanger coming into this show and once Hae-Jun learned the woman's identity you can see his thoughts above and the third screenshot below.

 Hae-Jun knew his father Yeon-Woo was at the cinema that night, May 21st, with his future mother and went there to find out who she was. But Hae-Jun was quite a few rows back from Yeon-Woo and his date and couldn't see her face but saw she was wearing a pink hair ribbon. So after the movie ended Hae-Jun waited outside the cinema to see if he could spot the woman. In the first screenshot above is Mi-Sook and she was my prediction on who Hae-Jun's future mother would be. Wish I could retract that for Yeon-Woo just graduated from college in America and she's a high school senior, didn't take that into consideration. So it's not Mi-Sook but we will be seeing so much of her later and though so untrustworthy have liked her character. So that leaves the woman in the second screenshot who is Chung-A, she's the owner of the Bong Bong Teahouse and Hae-Jun's future mother! That name was always a favorite of Chung-A's which she was telling Yeon-Woo. The two had sent letters to each other while he was in America but this was their first date in three years. Chung-A ended up abandoning Hae-Jun after his birth and for now don't know why. That was the last we saw of her in this show but from the first second they met Hae-Jun has never liked her though she seems like a pleasant woman.

 In that middle screenshot is the Woojung police chief telling his troops to show some results! The date has zoomed from May 21st to June 1st, it's been two weeks since the murders took place and the police have no leads nor suspects. At first there were three suspects, Ko who was too injured to be in any kind of scrap, then Hee-Sub who had an airtight alibi thanks to Soon-Ae for the night of the murders. Then there was Bum-Ryong and his character has disappeared the last two shows but he's no longer a suspect. To Hae-Jun there were two others, one was Mi-Sook and her name stull hasn't been cleared. The other is Hee-Sub's older brother Yu-Sub and you need to read the previous episode to know why he's no longer a suspect in Hae-Jun's mind. He met with Yu-Sub who gave him some very key info and we viewers weren't aware of these facts. Yu-Sub had known the student teacher Lee from college and the pair spent two nights in Woojung at an abandoned house, he was hiding from the thugs mentioned in the last recap. Lee was the first victim on the night/morning of May 16th and 17th, the other victim was Kyung-Ae who befriended the two. Those characters are above and though this is new evidence for Hae-Jun how can he use it but least now he has no doubt Yu-Sub was not involved in the murders.

 Hae-Jun had related all of what Yu-Sub had revealed to him to Yoon-Young and the pair had a pow-wow to discuss where they stand in their investigation. For the most part it was the last time the killings were talked about in this episode though it still is the #1 storyline. There are a few connections to the murders of Lee and Kyung-Ae plus the death of Yoon-Young's mother Soon-Ae in 2021. All three had a matchbox from the Bong Bong Teahouse and in it was a message which Hae-Jun says in the top screenshot, 'Women who read are dangerous'. Plus at the time of their deaths all three women had a book with them, there is a connection but for now neither Hae-Jun nor Yoon-Young can figure out what it is but the clues being related to books/writing still makes me and perhaps Hae-Jun think that Mi-Sook is still a suspect. In that fourth screenshot is Hae-Jun's future father Yeon-Woo who has been working on the Time Machine car for about ten days now and has had no success? He came into the house to use the bathroom so Hae-Jun quickly scooped up all of the evidence and stashed it away before Yeon-Woo became curious. But be did drop the matchbox from 2021 which the camera focused on so you knew that would be important and it was right at the end of the episode.

 Moving on to a very long incident and it's been one of the highlights of the series up until now. If you've been reading these recaps you know that in the future Mi-Sook became a very popular author of murder/mystery novels. She wasn't the best of writers and often Yoon-Young's editing is what made the stories so compelling. Mi-Sook's first ever novel was released back in 1987 when she was a senior at     Woojung high school and that novel is above. "Small Door" is the title and Mi-Sook stole that story from Soon-Ae who had been writing it in a notebook which Mi-Sook somehow obtained. As Yoon-Young says above she didn't realize the book had come out so early and within two weeks Mi-Sook was the biggest sensation of the Korean literary world! The novel "Small Door" was flying off the shelves and no one at the school had realized it was their Mi-Sook who had written the book. Well of course she hadn't really penned the novel but who would ever find out, Mi-Sook may have added a bit in here and there but 95% of the novel was what Soon-Ae had written. That's the high school principal above who is Yoon and even he didn't know that it's his school's Mi-Sook that had written the book, there was a mini celebration in his office with Mi-Sook's mother and two reporters from Seoul.

 To say that Soon-Ae was furious with her story being stolen would be putting it mildly but she's a very quiet and meek girl who probably wouldn't say a word. However to our surprise Soon-Ae did as she burst into Yoon's office during that interview and demanded to talk to Mi-Sook privately. And that talk went nowhere for Soon-Ae as Mi-Sook said she had no evidence to back up her claim the story was stolen. As you can see above Mi-Sook told her to lay off on the accusation or else she could end up like her dead sister Kyung-Ae!!!! As mentioned earlier Mi-Sook isn't a likable character but she's one interesting young woman and has added so much to the story, still think she may have been involved in the murders. So after that failed talk with Mi-Sook Soon-Ae was prepared to slither away and not say a word as who would believe her story? Of course Yoon-Young knw the the facts and encouraged her to battle back, Yoon-Young told so many of her friends and family the true story of what happened. Hee-Sub above had pleaded with her to expose Mi-Sook and even Soon-Ae's mother Ok-Ja said to fight on as she'll back her 100%. And in a surprise even Soon-Ae's father is behind her and said to go for her dream of being a writer, he too wants his daughter to fight for her story.

 The father's name is Hyung-Man who sometimes drives the Woojung bus to Seoul, he did today which is June 1st as he brought Soon-Ae and Yoon-Young to the publishing company for a meeting. There was Mi-Sook along with her mother and the main editor of the company Park who is above in the bottom screenshot. Mi-Sook was on the offense as she stated how can Soon-Ae claim she wrote the story with no evidence to back up that claim and is Soon-Ae trying steal her glory? Yes, Soon-Ae didn't have the story as Mi-Sook had stolen the notebook that it was in. However Soon-Ae did have other notebooks that had drafts of the storylines plus some of the actual text and ideas for the book. Soon-Ae told the editor Park she could answer any question about the story, action, characters, etc., could Mi-Sook do the same? That's when Mi-Sook clammed up and Park said at that moment he also had some doubts if Mi-Sook actually wrote it all by herself so he read over all of the drafts that Soon-Ae had written. It didn't take long for Park to realize that Soon-Ae was the true author of "Small Door" and soon all of the books with Mi-Sook's name on it were recalled! That became a scandal with Mi-Sook now known as a literary thief and soon all of the books will be republished with Soon-Ae's name on it. Now that incident definitely changed history and am curious what the year 2021 now looks like for those characters.

 Justice was done properly and hope soon Soon-Ae does become known for her writing talents so that means the future will be changing but how? Meanwhile Mi-Sook's world came tumbling down and she's now a scorned person in Woojung, even her mother wants to disown her. There was a scene with Mi-Sook and her very drunk older brother Ko in an alley and we learned he had been abusing her since Mi-Sook was thirteen, physically but was it also sexually? Don't now that yet but the mother turned a blind eye to the abuse and that's a main reason why Mi-Sook stole the story so she could finally get respect from her mother which of course will now never happen. After that scene with her brother Ko Mi-Sook marched to the Woojung police station where she approached the detective Baek, that's him in the middle above. Mi-Sook had some new info for him which is that she knows who the killer might be.... her brother Ko! That scene ended with the accusation and Ko did end up serving 34 years in prison for the murders which he never did commit. 

 Down to the final few minutes which took place at Hae-Jun's garage. He and Yoon-Young were having a chat about their current situations, Hae-Jun has found out the identity of his mother though it appears he wish he didn't. Yoon-Young's activities have been a bit more positive as she did help out her future mother Soon-Ae immensely and does she still not want her to get married to Hee-Sub? That's the Time Machine car above which still hasn't been repaired, when/if it does will the pair immediately return to 2021 or stay in the year 1987 to find the true killer? In the final minute Hae-Jun's future father Yeon-Woo entered the garage and had a question for Hae-Jun.... why did he have a matchbox from Chung-A's Bong Bong Teashop with the message 'Women who read are dangerous'? That matchbox was from 2021 and was left at the scene of Soon-Ae's death, Yoon-Young had it in her pocket when she went back in time. That's also a key bit of evidence to the current two murders and Yeon-Woo is wondering has he been trying to repair the car of a killer???? The episode ended on that note with Yeon-Woo backing away from Hae-Jun and have no clue how that scene will end as I haven't viewed the next show yet. That recap is the next post and while this had a bit of a sluggish beginning this ended up being one of the best episodes to date.