"i was always going to leave the morning after, han ju-won. that was always going to be the plan, that's the way that it aways is. i don't let anybody in."
"then why did you let me take you out to breakfast?"
"self-preservation, i guess. my car keys were in your jacket."
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"you don't really want to know me, ju-won. nobody does. what you find out might scare you."
SONG NAM-RA IS FULL OF SECRETS. She doesn't let people in easily. Doesn't want to be known. Maybe that's why she left Busan, left everything she had ever known. Left her past behind. Left behind the reason she never truly allowed herself to be happy. She tortures herself with the could-have-beens, the one night stands, the mediocrity. Once upon a time, she was on a fast track to law school. Valedictorian.
And then she just disappeared. Nobody heard from Song Nam-Ra again. She was a ghost.
ENTER HAN JU-WON. The deputy commissioners unloved son. The man who had everything to prove, and everything to lose. They're similar, but still vastly different when they cross paths in a bar the night before Ju-Won is set to move to Munju and begin his new placement at the substation. Nam-Ra does what she always does, the same pattern of seduction and self-destruction that leaves a bad feeling in her stomach the next morning. Ju-Won is the same: no attachment, just release. Be cordial the morning after, but don't stick around. It's almost clinical, reducing sex to a task that needed to be completed, an itch that needs to be scratched. And Ju-Won likes it that way. There's less of a chance to get hurt.
UNTIL KANG MIN-JEONG GOES MISSING ON JU-WON'S THIRD DAY IN TOWN. And low and behold, who should he bump into at the crime scene but the woman he had fucked five ways from Sunday and then ghosted after buying her a coffee the morning after. Song Nam-Ra is there, in tight black jeans, a tube top and a KSCI jacket, her hair pulled in to a tight ponytail not unlike the one he held her hair in as she gave him arguably the best blowjob of his life, he's not sure what to think. She seemed too smart to be a mere crime scene technician. But then again, what did he know? He was just another man on a long list of conquests. He didn't know anything about her other than what position she preferred in bed and what she sounded like when she moaned his name. Or, moaned his title, more like.
NAM-RA WANTS NOTHING TO DO WITH HIM. Wants to spare herself the embarrassment. It would go against everything she stood for to get involved with the mysterious police inspector who drove a flashy American car and gated the thought of using a ceramic bowl that someone else had used previously. But she's the only person in town that Ju-Won thinks he can trust. When Min-Jeong's death turns into something far more sinister, he realizes that he's going to need Nam-Ra's help. Nam-Ra is all too happy to tag along, a bag of sour candy in hand. A part of her still longs for adventure, for what her life once was.
AS THE MYSTERY GROWS DEEPER AND DARKER, THEY CAN'T DENY THEIR ATTRACTION FOR EACH OTHER. But Nam-Ra is scared. Scared of letting someone in, of getting hurt again. Of someone finding out what she did in high school, the past she keeps running from. The people she's hurt. And Ju-Won is scared of commitment, of being abandoned. They keep shunting their feelings away, but sooner or later, they'll need to face the truth about their pasts, their feelings and their futures.
arden cho as song nam-ra
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"you weren't criticizing the navel piercing when you had me on my knees, inspector han. why is it an issue now?"
yeo jin-goo as han ju-won
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"it's a problem now because it's unsanitary, miss song. do you know how many germs are contained at a crime scene? by flashing your little diamond stud around, you could be letting any number of pathogens into your body."
NOTES
- if you haven't seen beyond evil, go watch it now. it's genuinely one of the best crime dramas i have ever seen
- i actually cried at the end, ju-won and dong-sik were so precious to me by the end of it , even though they're both their own brand of crazy
