My Lovely Journey: Episodes 3-4
by Dramaddictally
My Lovely Journey turns episodic with heartfelt mysteries of the week that spur our heroine past her feelings of failure and onto her own path. While the doppelganger puzzle is solved, a pampered pet arrives to take our former reporter on her next trip.
EPISODES 3-4
Well, I wanted to love it. And while I think the idea for this show is great, the execution is not. Structuring it with stories of the week makes total sense for a show about short trips, but even with mini-mysteries holding it together, there’s so much dead time in between happenings that I find it hard to invest.
Last week we were left to wonder about this woman in the US who has a dead ringer in Buyeo. This week Yeo-reum is back on the case — and yet she refuses to write to Kate to ask why she may have a doppelganger in Korea. Instead, she tosses and turns at night, mulling over the weirdness of it all.
How do we get to this point? Well, Yeo-reum continues to be a substitute traveler, filming the local scenery for Kate — and actually, when the show savors the local foods, plants, and crafts, it’s at its very best. Unfortunately, it doesn’t realize its own strengths, and moves on quickly.
Since Yeo-reum is feeling better and like her old self again (that was fast!), Yeon-seok and Sang-shik leave her on her lonesome to continue her trek. Before they depart, Yeon-seok teaches her a few things about video equipment and she starts calling him oppa straight away. Note: this wholly manufactured closeness doesn’t lead much of anywhere.
Yeo-reum learns that the Kate lookalike is a woman who was famous for making hanbok, but recently stopped, following her mother’s death. Yeo-reum plays friendly with the woman and says she’s stopped by her house to interview her and learn about hanbok. They spend the day together amidst colorful fabrics, but when Yeo-reum returns the next day, the woman is angry and doesn’t let her enter.
Yeo-reum knows that the woman and her recently deceased mother had bad blood, and she’s also learned the woman has no siblings. She just can’t come up with a reason for why this woman looks so much like Kate (if the mystery here feels hollow, you’re reading it right). And so, to save the day, Yeon-seok secretly writes to Kate and simply asks.
At the same time, Yeo-reum runs into the Kate lookalike in the forest while filming the prayer bead tree. The woman sees Yeo-reum’s bracelet and wants to know where it’s from — as it turns out, she has an identical one. Yeo-reum tells her about Kate, and we learn that the lookalike is at the tree to mourn her mother, who used to sit under the tree and cry.
They assume the women must be twin sisters, which is confirmed when Kate replies to Yeon-seok’s secretly sent email. Kate says that she was abandoned under a tree in Buyeo, and that’s all she knows about her life before being adopted. We learn that the sister who stayed in Korea was sick at birth, and Mom abandoned the healthy twin in order to save the sick one, whom she raised on her own. It’s implied the sisters will be reunited, and everyone is feeling happy.
At the close of the first case, it’s already decided that Sang-shik will turn his failing entertainment agency into a travel agency. Yeon-seok is on board to help, and they ask Yeo-reum to be the face of it. The idea is to make a business of substitute traveling, where Yeo-reum takes trips for people who can’t travel for one reason or another.
After the Buyeo trip, Yeo-reum finally feels like she has something to offer the world again. Her spirits have lifted and Sang-shik sees the same spark in her that he saw all those years ago when she started her career. And so, she’s excited to get on with this new endeavor.
The next case comes along just as mysteriously as the first, when a dog appears with instructions from an anonymous owner. It’s obviously someone wealthy, since the dog’s diet, exercise, and leisure routines trump those of most people. And Yeo-reum is tasked with taking the dog to another seaside town, where she stays in a pre-paid luxury villa.
In the middle of this new job, Yeo-reum texts her first love — the one who’s now dating her former idol-group friend — and sends a pic of the dog, asking him how his own dog is doing. We can see that Mr. First Love has not responded to her last text. And, sadly, he doesn’t respond to this one either.
The thing I didn’t realize before is that Yeo-reum and this guy were actually seriously dating in the past. They had couple rings and all, and Yeo-reum is still holding onto hers — the way she’s still holding onto him in her heart. Just at the moment when she’s crying over the dating rumors that have publicly surfaced about her ex-beau and ex-friend, the dog eats her couple ring while trying to get at some snacks.
The plot movement then consists of Yeo-reum encouraging the dog to have his own movement so she can get her ring back. (Yep. That’s the story.) By the time Yeo-reum is shuttling the dog around the beach town taking pictures, she’s increasingly annoyed that the dog won’t do what she wants. Each time she stops in front of a restaurant to snap a photo, the pampered pet remains seated and she has to continually coax him along.
When she sits on a bench to take a bite of kimbap and look at her phone, she sees the news that Mr. First Love has confirmed his coupledom to the public. At that moment, the dog runs away, and Yeo-reum searches everywhere while it starts to rain. Finally, she locates him when a restaurant owner calls her — because Yeon-seok has put Yeo-reum’s name on the dog’s tag, unbeknownst to her.
We end when the dog gets sick and has to stay at the vet overnight. As Yeo-reum goes through the day’s photos, she realizes that every time the dog sat down and wouldn’t move, it was in front of a restaurant with pictures of patrons on the walls. The same guy appears on the wall in each photo, and Yeo-reum realizes the dog must have recognized his owner.
Then, there’s a chase scene, where the guy from the photo is apprehending a man with a knife, and the final moment is him trying to fend off being stabbed.
I think this drama wants to be feel good, but I mostly feel bored. The male lead is overstepping, in my opinion, and since there’s no real development between the leads it’s starting to feel creepy. I also don’t get what his actions are supposed to say about the heroine, when the whole point was for her to live an independent life.
One thing I do like is the parallel this week with Sang-shik’s problems and Yeo-reum’s problems. We learn that Sang-shik also feels like a failure — his agency is going under, he’s divorced, and he’s perpetually in debt. That pep talk he gave Yeo-reum last week obviously came from a place of knowing, as he’s trying to pick himself up and keep going as well.
Also, as Yeo-reum deals with the heartbreak of her former love, Sang-shik is still not over his ex-wife, whom he’s now friends with. The problem with being friends with your ex is that when they start dating someone new, it’s not clear where the line is in asking them about it. So, when Sang-shik gets jealous and confronts his ex-wife, she tells him it’s none of his business. It’s these little, tiny life details that I like about the drama, but they’re so far apart — with so much cotton in between — that I can’t say it’s the loveliest journey.
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