One Dollar Lawyer: Episodes 7-8
by missvictrix
Ladies and gentlemen, the award for most aggressive tonal change within one drama has been awarded to… One Dollar Lawyer! The full backstory of our one dollar lawyer is here, and it’s as rife with tragedy as we thought it would be.
EPISODES 7-8 WEECAP
Much to my surprise we spend all but 30 seconds of this week’s episodes in pure backstory — it’s not only the strongest tonal shift in one drama possibly ever, but it breaks up our drama in the strangest way.
We spent nearly the first half of our 14-episode drama with the non sequitur antics of our wacky lawyer, and then, at the halfway mark, dove into his past. It’s good, it’s tragic, and Namgoong Min’s acting will kill ya. But also, the story isn’t much different from every other legal or melo backstory we’ve seen.
However, here we go! In the present-day storyline, we see Mari drinking herself silly while listening to Prosecutor Na tell the tale of Ji-hoon’s past, and we dive again into our drama within a drama.
Ji-hoon is like a dog with a bone investigating his case, and refuses to give into the pressure. But the CEO of JQ Group is only the beginning — justice won’t be truly served until his slush fund and recipient(s) are identified and dealt with. Ji-hoon investigates, and then the terrible stuff starts to happen.
His one lead — the tail end of license plate digits — points straight to his own father, CANDIDATE KIM YOON-SEOB (Nam Myung-ryul). It’s a horrible moment of recognition, where our solemn Ji-hoon gets even more solemn (if you think it possible), when he recognizes the number.
The thing is, Ji-hoon’s always idolized his father, and he tells him that he dreamt of being a righteous prosecutor like he was — even though Ji-hoon spent most of his childhood missing his always-working father. His fondness for jajangmyeon becomes clear too: Ji-hoon equates it to missing his father.
That theme of missing his father soon packs even more punch, though, when his father jumps from a building and commits suicide right in front of his son. He had been complying with the investigation, and seemed willing to admit the truth… As such, there’s definitely more to the death than his father taking his life out of shame — his father was going to be the scapegoat to hide the others behind the slush fund dealings.
Ji-hoon, not even allowing himself to grieve, commits the next two difficult years of his life to uncovering the corruption around his father and the powerful politicians in his circle. I really feel for Ji-hoon, but can we get a story that gives us even a little something new?
It’s an awful time in Ji-hoon’s life, but there’s one person who keeps popping up around him, and that’s Joo-young. We learn about her through seeing her dealings with Ji-hoon. When the prosecution turned against him and he was blackballed at every turn, she was the one person that stood by his side, forced him to smile, and even laid in the street in the rain with him. You know, as you do when you’ve hit rock bottom in life.
We don’t see much of their romance, but it’s enough that in his misery Ji-hoon proposes marriage to her, and genuinely loves the light of goodness that she is, that we can fill in the blanks.
Joo-young decides to leave Baek Law Firm — turning down a partnership offer from Grandpa — and starts her own practice. And then we see that it was Joo-young who scoped out their current office, who filled the fish tank, who first took on Moo-jang’s case, and who decided, quite philanthropically, to help people for only a 1,000 won fee.
Joo-young wants Ji-hoon to join her, but we aren’t given too much reason to hope: we know that sad music that keeps playing is there for a reason. And sure enough, in a complete accident one day at Baek Law Firm, Joo-young inadvertently swaps documents with a baddie who slips past our notice. And those papers have life or death consequences.
When Joo-young sees them — and we get a glimpse of Ji-hoon’s father’s photo — she runs off to meet him. But, as we all expected, she doesn’t make it through the day. A hitman follows her onto the subway, and there’s this totally creepy and well-captured moment where she sees him, and knows he’s after her. By the time Ji-hoon locates her, she’s stabbed and bleeding out. It’s sad as hell, but it’s all moving so fast, I either wanted much more, or much less.
Ji-hoon is sadder than ever now, and we see him openly weeping while looking over her office. He puts on sunglasses to hide his swollen eyes when Moo-jang comes in for help with his case, and as they say, the rest is history.
It’s up for grabs whether we’ll jump back to the present-day timeline with Mari, or if we’ll watch Ji-hoon and Moo-jang in the past, but either way, I think seeing the story behind the office and 1,000 won was my favorite part of all of this. There was something quite nice about seeing the serious and solemn Ji-hoon of the past in the warm, shabby, and fishtank-filled law office where we first met him what feels like ages ago.
Another great connection made by the backstory is to give us the context behind Ji-hoon’s comment about parents from the previous episode. I appreciate how they were able to bring hints about Ji-hoon’s story full circle for the audience. I like full circle. I just can’t decide if the drama is going to go back to its prior tone and have our team of three complete the loop, or if the drama will try to become a hybrid of its two parts. Bets are on — what do you think?
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One Dollar Lawyer: Episodes 7-8
Source: Buzz Pinay Daily
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