To the Moon: Episode 1 (First Impressions)
by missvictrix
It’s a K-drama tale as old as time with To the Moon, but you won’t hear me complaining. Our opening episode introduces us to three leading ladies who are each SOL in their careers, and their overall morale is in the toilet. But not so fast. They’re hatching a plan to turn around their lousy fates, and it all starts with… crypto?
Editor’s note: This is a first impressions post only. To chat about the entire drama, visit the Drama Hangout post.
EPISODE 1
From the promo materials for To the Moon, I fully expected an over-the-top premiere episode with wacky comedy that tried too hard, and a setup that wanted to land, but really couldn’t. I expected a drama that would make me say, “It’ll probably get better in three more episodes if they can tighten the reins a bit” — much like Lee Sun-bin’s last drama.
But honestly? I was pleasantly surprised. To the Moon takes all the time it needs in Episode 1 time to paint the full picture of our three heroines and coworkers in their underdog Candy era. And because I love them and their camaraderie, when the wacky comedy does kick in, the plot can carry it.
We open up in 2014 with our heroine JUNG DA-HAE (Lee Sun-bin) interviewing for a job. This scene is everything we have come to expect from a K-drama job interview. Da-hae is desperate for the job and continues through the interview, even after getting strung in the eye by a rampant wasp. Even passing out and having a weird mystical meetup with her future self — who warns her of her coming miserable future in a few years if she takes the job — doesn’t stop her.
We then jump to 2017, the present day of our story. Da-hae might have her job at Marron Confectionery, but all has not turned peaches and cream for her. Her manager (the wonderful chameleon Eum Moon-seok) is terrible, whether it’s refusing to politely differentiate between her and her similarly named colleague, worrying about his laptop when Da-hae get doused in his entire cup of coffee, or making her climb 14 flights of stairs so he can take the maxed out elevator. We’ve seen it all before, but it still hits.
Terror strikes in the heart of all the Marron employees when it’s time for the performance reviews to come out. In a pretty funny montage, we see the expected and well-liked workers getting promoted, the others who have been passed over, and then our Da-hae, who gets slapped with the “average” rating.
It’s here that we meet her two pals at work, and thank God these women exist because how else would they survive in this hellscape? In another department, KANG EUN-SANG (Ra Mi-ran) regularly saves her hungover waste of a boss and is known to do the job of 10+ people, only to also get passed over for a promotion. But, she’s got a little something something going on, because we witness her checking her phone and monitoring the rising price of something called Enderion.
Similarly, KIM JI-SONG (Jo Ah-ram) — who acts like a chaebol princess but doesn’t have the assets to back up her lifestyle — has a boss who likes to touch her shoulder a little too much. He’s fed up with her, but to be fair, she seems to spend a good part of her work day online shopping and video chatting with her Chinese boyfriend Wei Lin (Zhang Hao of ZEROBASEONE, ha).
Our ladies first struck up a friendship because they had one thing in common: they were the three who were always left out, left behind, or forgotten. Da-hae calls them “the nobodys, misfits, and the off-cycle hires.” Well, three years later and they’re work besties who go to lunch together (tying back their hair in unison before digging in), vent to each other about their struggles, and even though we only have a few scenes of these three together so far, it’s the best vibe ever. If these are the misfits, count me in!
While they are treating themselves to sweet drinks to dull the pain of their non-promotions and to celebrate payday (so relatable, lol) we find out that there’s something else eating away at Da-hae. You see, her boyfriend has gone AWOL since yesterday. This is the same boyfriend who was lovingly attentive three years ago when she interviewed for her job. She was hoping they would move into together soon, but something doesn’t feel right.
Eventually, when his phone is still off, Da-hae decides to hike it over to the local precinct to report her boyfriend missing. On her way there, we get a flashback to their super cute evening the night before. They were about to eat their pasta when her boyfriend ran out for a corkscrew and never returned.
At the precinct, the police officer (genius cameo by Jung Eun-ji in a nod to Work Later, Drink Now) asks her questions to fill out the report. But in one of the most interesting moves the drama has pulled, when Da-hae is thinking back to last night, we see a very different reality to the one we saw a few minutes prior. The truth is, it wasn’t the greatest evening. They were making out, but her boyfriend got distracted by paperwork (huh?) and we learn that Da-hae is hoping to move in with him and advance things toward marriage one day. She cutely suggests it, but her discomfort in communicating to him is sending me red flags. And his non-responses as he stares into his phone are even worse. He changes the topic by suddenly running out for the Very Urgent Errand for the corkscrew, and never comes back.
Like any normal female, Da-hae is certain that her boyfriend must have fallen into a sinkhole. There’s obviously no other reason why he wouldn’t have returned to her apartment or called or texted her back. (LOL!) But as she’s trying to convince herself of this, the truth becomes painfully obvious, to the point where she drops the report, and turns to leave, mourning her relationship. All the squabbling people who were previously pulling each other’s hair out are now rapt with attention and cheering Da-hae on along with the officer. Ha, it’s so cute and quirky.
To compound matters, it’s also Da-hae’s birthday — and Christmas — so she prepares to spend a miserable night at home with that impossible-to-open bottle of wine. Da-hae runs outside only to find her boyfriend on her very doorstep! No, he hasn’t fallen into a sinkhole (too bad). And he’s not there to apologize, either. What unfolds is a truly painful argument between them where Da-hae lays out her dream of them moving in and getting married and being happy, and her boyfriend lays out the reality of how they’ll never make it, they can’t afford Seoul, she doesn’t have real job, etc., etc., etc. It’s brutal, and it goes through Da-hae like a knife. Before we even know what’s happened, she’s broken the bottle of wine in an effort to get him to shut up, and now she’s dripping in wine and tears.
Believe it or not, our girl hasn’t hit rock bottom yet. Her two besties were nearby with cake and streamers to celebrate her birthday, and in the chaos of the fight and the aftermath, Ji-song overhears the boyfriend having a conversation with his other girlfriend. So yeah, on top of having her heart crushed and her pride and hopes and dreams trampled, she’s also being cheated on.
What follows is both some time to mourn at the Han River with Ji-song and Eun-sang by her side — and some time to wreak hilarious revenge on the boyfriend who is currently macking it up with his new fling. Remember the cringey comedy I expected from this premiere? Well, this is when it really kicks in. But also, at this particular turning point of our heroine’s journey, I really didn’t mind seeing our three besties dancing a choreographed diss song in the street (complete with feather boas and lines like, “Being with you is absolute torture”) and then dumping a bucket of eels into the boyfriend’s car.
Their petty revenge may be petty, but it is super satisfying. And there just so happens to be someone in the car behind the boyfriend who is also satisfied by what he’s just witnessed. We’ve met him before, albeit briefly. He’s HAM JI-WOO (Kim Young-dae), a director at Marron Confectionary, though we haven’t formally met him yet.
But he’s met Da-hae twice before this car incident. The first (which we learn during the drama’s epilogue scene) was when she was interviewing with her bee sting, desperate for her dream of an ordinary life. It struck a nerve with him (he was even doodling her bee-stung eye in his notes lol). The second time was the day before at work. Da-hae had been tasked to deliver some goodies to a director’s office she’d never been to, and like any good heroine, instead of leaving the goods at the door, she nosed around and had a Goldilocks moment trying out the PPL massage chair. Seriously a genius integration of PPL, because we not only watch Da-hae enjoy the massage, but get stuck in the chair and pretend to be asleep when Ji-woo comes in. Classic meet-cute. I can’t wait for more of these two!
To close out the episode, our three ladies start to sink into the doldrums after the euphoria of their street dance revenge. Da-hae and Ji-song consider the giant patch of ice they have to cross on their way home to be the fitting conclusion to the piss-poor day. But Eun-sang has something else in mind, something she’s been trying to tell them all day, but in a running gag that was quite funny, kept getting interrupted.
Like a madcap heroine, Eun-sang puts her socks over her shoes for traction on the ice, and as she makes her way to the girls (while flying through the air in front of the moon, naturally), she tells them there’s a way out of their deadend, hopeless jobs. They can change their destiny by investing in crypto! Da-hae and Ji-song don’t know exactly what to make of this statement, but something about Eun-sang is magnetic and strangely convincing.
It’s here our episode comes to an end, and I have to say, I found this premiere to be pretty fun. To the Moon doesn’t really give our actors anything new to do — Lee Sun-bin is the funny, down-on-her-luck everygirl, Ra Mi-ran flexes her awesome combo of gravitas + hilarity, and Kim Young-dae gets to be his beautiful and puckish self — but this lack of novelty isn’t necessarily a bad thing.
The story and characters are familiar, but rather than giving off a feeling of boredom, it’s more like this cozy “I’m home!” feeling. And as for the plot itself? Universal. I will truly never tire of underdog heroines who fight on, whether it’s against the man, the machine, or anything in between.
Our crazy ladies want better for themselves, and I am invested enough to want to see where this adventure takes them — and I say that as someone with exactly zero knowledge of crypto and Bitcoin and the like. Interestingly, though the drama notes that it’s purely fiction, it purposefully points out that it references the 2018 crypto market, so take that for what you will. Me? I’m hoping our girls make millions.
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