I am more and more in love with this drama, the more I think about it....
I love that BD gave her the talisman - that is such a concrete, practical, Bong Do way of committment.
I loved all the details of their mundane togetherness in ep 15. And how like BD to be the ultimate bookworm and also have an endless thirst for knowledge (love his rapid-fire questioning of Hee Jin about the most random things). I know QIHM is a great love story, but what I love is that BD being in the modern world isn't just about being with the woman he loves - it is also a chance for him to learn all sorts of things he'd have never known in Joseon, to travel to lands he never could have gone there. He doesn't just have HJ, he has a whole new world.
The purpose of a tie. This scene is so full of sweetness and affection and giddy happiness (I also love BD's deadpan sense of humor and how openly affectionate HJ is - BD is very contained, he needs someone like this). Trust QIHM to take something utterly mundane and turn it into shippy heaven only to double back on itself in the next ep and twist the purpose of a tie in the most horrific way only to later get back to its original sweetness.
Awwwww. I wonder if HJ picked out that dorky sweater? :P You know what I love? How openly physically affectionate and how in each other's space this couple is with each other, in the way you rarely see in kdramas. It makes me think of twdramas.
Their date. I love everything about it - the fact that he is (of course!) reading before she gets there, the fact that he orders something pretty unpalatable to his period palate but tries to pretend it's OK (ah, macho pride :P) but then she feeds him some of hers and he swaps. Heeee. And just the sheer effortless open affection they show each other throughout. They just shine. It's especially wonderful to see normally rather deadpan BD look so blissful.
There is more adorable teasing when he goes to buy her cotton candy but then...
All of a sudden, he's back in Joseon. I knew it! Not only could the story have them be this happy narratively, not with all the story left, but we kept having all these dire warnings about the talisman having a mind of its own and they are coming true in the most horrible way.
He finds YW killed and I love how he goes grimly berserk. I think BD has always had a "I am willing to risk my life and throw it away if necessary" streak (I wonder if that is why the talisman was so effective) and it's chilling to see how he is not paying any attention even to his wounds to kill the man who killed YW - this is the same man who went back knowing he'd be tortured, who went back and had that insane 'I am going to get shot and maybe live" plan. He is miles away from the laughing man with HJ and that is, perhaps, the greatest gift modern world can give him - he can be a bookworm, giddily in love, and not this suicidal avenger.
Meanwhile, poor HJ!
This is here because they are both so pretty when they angst.
This scene was shocking. I mean, we always knew he risked his life somehow to get back but we never saw it! And for him to stand there, and slit his own throat, without knowing if the talisman would still work (and you see that uncertainty in his eyes, but overwhelmed by his desperation), to get back to her - holy &*&!!!!
He is back but only so their separation can be more cruel - they see each other for a second and he can sense something is wrong and then he winks back out, being forced back into the past in front of her eyes, just so she'd have no hope left.
This scene, of them reaching to each other across time, and breaking down as sheer impossibility hits them, now imprisoned on separate sides of the time divide forever - this is where I started bawling. For HJ, who weeps as though her heart is breaking (because it is) and for BD, who is so controlled that it's doubly horrifying to see him weep, because it means he's broken too.
Yeah.
His one hope is the monk. Who is now dead. But I don't think even if he was alive, he'd be able to replicate it. That talisman was fueled by YW's love - the paper was merely the conduit - and YW is dead now.
So he comes to a decision and the most heartwrenching part of the drama follows - he decides to burn the talisman so she won't be burdened with memories but writes a letter first in case he forgets too, because he does not want to forget. To see BD sob, actually sob - is awful. And to see HJ's total breakdown! You know, a lot of dramas try to tell you their OTP is true love who can't live without each other, but few sell me on it. QIHM does. And how bleakly fitting that the price for having your life saved is wishing you were dead anyway - by giving BD a glimpse, a possibility, a hope of a new life and of love and then snatching it away - that is the worst punishment, especially when any chance of life in Joseon is gone too. I know I posted this letter before, but it bears re-quoting.
This is a letter that's written both to you and to me at the same time. I might forget that I had ever written this letter...Or even this letter itself might disappear. For me or for you, this letter is written for whoever may live holding on to the memories. When I first happened to come into possession of this talisman, I was very curious about its cause and effect. At first, I thought that the realization of my dream was the effect. Shortly after, I thought meeting you was its effect. Then afterwards, I thought that beginning a new life in another world was the effect. But it's only now that I came to realize its effects. If the cause was me surviving, then me losing everything was the effect. My future. My honor. My values. My people. And you, too. In order to preserve my life, I had to give up an equivalent price. This only made sense. That I thought I could keep even one of those things was my own foolishness. How much more will I lose in order to repay the price? Not being able to see you anymore, I have now realized that even that was a luxury. Memories. Our memories. Memories. Losing them is the final price I must pay. I do not know what will happen now. Will we forget each other, or will we live unable to forget, forever in agony? If I have a final wish...it is to remember you. In a life without aims, to not even have those memories would be hell. And you...As for you...Even if you should happen to read this letter someday far in the future, I pray that you will not be able to realize whom it is for.
And then BD spends a year on the run. He's been able to keep his memories and I am not sure if it's a mercy or further punishment.
This scene - you see him just...give up. How long can you keep going with no goal or hope? And it hurts so much because BD has always been about fighting, about going on.
His wish came true. She is reading his letter and has no idea whom it's for. My heart!
This was surreally gorgeous - the two of them, sharing their space, separated by centuries, and HJ, who does not remember anything, starts to cry, not knowing why but somehow able to feel his proximity and his distress across the years.
You remember that cuteness with the tie? Yeah. This drama is about to turn it into something utterly horrifying. This is so wrong - that BD has been driven so far as to commit suicide, that he is using the tie HJ gave him - a relic of one of his happiest memories, that that that that...
And meanwhile HJ starts to break down, feeling his despair and imminent death across centuries, despite memory wipe, despite that she shouldn't remember, shouldn't feel because it's against laws of time and space and magic. And then she remembers even though she cannot, shouldn't. A greater magic than any talisman. She dials his number and stumbles out, crying...
She is like a madwoman, asking to see the documentary on KBD she was narrating...
Someone comes in and she asks for a moment only...
Her call went across time as he was dying, and once he managed to free himself (it was awful to watch) and pick it up, he was transported. I've seen contradictory takes on this but I loved it. No, of course the phone isn't a magic gimmick - just like the original talisman was, it is merely a conduit for feeling, in this case not YW's but HJ's. In this case, what drove the 'phone talisman' was HJ's love for BD, love that managed to survive despite laws of the Universe, the fact that she remembered him when she shouldn't have been able to, and the fact that he was about to die, thus hearkening back to the original 'die in order to live' mantra of the original talisman. (Also, thank God - if the original talisman was dependent on YW being alive, life expectancy of a gisaeng in 17th-century wasn't great in any event).
His joy, when he thought all is lost but he has a second chance, is a wonderful thing to behold.
"I came back because you called me." This final scene, with its tenderness, passion and sheer love is probably my favorite ending scene in any drama. I love his attempt at nonchalance which doesn't work, I love the way they eat each other up with their eyes, I love the physical contrast with HJ tiny, pale, like a porcelain doll, and BD tall and masculine and in black.
And now we are back to the PROPER purpose of a tie (when he tells her he missed the purpose of a tie so much he was going to die...ohhh, so much said with so little, and horrifically literally true, but now all erased in all the happiness).
I think this is the best kdrama kissing scene I've ever seen. In part because there is so much feeling and I am so invested and also it's gorgeously shot and they are glowing, but also because they actually kiss the way real people do - mouths open, devouring each other.
And now I feel like rewatching the ending again!