Reborn Rich: Episodes 4-6
by mistyisles
Our reincarnated hero sets big plans into motion to 1) strike back at the chaebol family and 2) change the future for people he cares about. The question is, can he actually change the future, or is he only creating the future he’s already lived?
EPISODES 4-6 WEECAP
This week we start by diving a little deeper into the motivations of Chairman Jin’s three eldest children. First is Young-ki, whom we already know as Sung-joon’s father and Chairman Jin’s direct heir. He’s barely holding up under the immense pressure of handling every Soonyang crisis — and taking the blame for any failure. Most immediately, he’s tasked with winning the coveted acquisition of Hando Steel back from Se-hyun.
Then there’s JIN HWA-YOUNG (Kim Shin-rok), Chairman Jin’s only daughter. Hwa-young desperately tries to lobby for Chairman Jin to back the political ambitions of her husband, prosecutor CHOI CHANG-JE (Kim Do-hyun). Chairman Jin, however, has been burned by a few too many politicians, and wants none in his family. He goes so far as to not-so-subtly hint that Hwa-young should be content to “garnish” her brothers’ accomplishments instead of reaching for her own, making her more determined than ever to prove herself.
So when Chairman Jin’s biggest rival, Chairman JOO YOUNG-IL (Lee Byung-joon) of Daeyoung Group, unexpectedly throws his hat in the Hando Steel acquisition ring, it seems likely he got the extra money from Hwa-young. But no — that turns out to have been the doing of second Soonyang son JIN DONG-KI (Jo Han-chul), who’s tired of playing second fiddle to his older brother.
Dong-ki has a bit of extra leverage to work with, too: photo evidence of Se-hyun and Do-joon frequenting the same location. He sends a bug to their hotel room hidden in a flower bouquet, but as luck would have it, Min-young works part time at that same hotel and ends up delivering the flowers. She covertly tips Do-joon off about the bug, and he and Se-hyun stage an argument over Do-joon’s investment choices.
This, of course, gets reported straight to Chairman Jin. When questioned, Se-hyun answers truthfully that he helped Do-joon make an investment — but it wasn’t bidding for Hando Steel. Rather, Do-joon invested in a little American book-selling website that will later come to be known as Amazon. Ha!
Speaking of Min-young, she also works part-time at a coffee shop that Do-joon visits every day. She eventually works up the courage to ask him on a date, but circumstances intervene and he stands her up. When she confronts him, accusing him of looking down on her, he apologizes and counters that it’s him who doesn’t deserve her.
But back to the bidding war. With Hwa-young’s support, Young-ki pulls out all the stops and bids way above Soonyang’s means, winning the acquisition after all. But Do-joon is far from disappointed, because he got exactly what he wanted all along: to saddle Soonyang with a mountain of debt right before the IMF crisis hits. And the shot of Do-joon smirking over his drink as news anchors report bankruptcy after bankruptcy gives me serious chills.
As everyone scrambles to survive the economic crash, Do-joon and Se-hyun partner on a new investment company which they call Miracle Investments. They (and Chairman Jin) set their sights on another acquisition, this time of a business called Ahjin Motors. As with Hando Steel, Do-joon’s ultimate goal isn’t necessarily to win the acquisition himself (which sparks a real argument between him and Se-hyun). Unlike Hando Steel, however, Do-joon has a very personal stake in the fate of Ahjin Motors, because that’s where his (original) father works.
In the first timeline, when Ahjin Motors was acquired, all employees were laid off, and Hyun-woo’s mother collapsed from a fatal heart attack. So now Do-joon throws everything on the line to ensure Ahjin Motors employees get to keep their jobs.
Fortunately, the Hando Steel acquisition left Soonyang drained of financial resources. Add that to Chairman Jin’s dislike for politicians, and Se-hyun has enough leverage to strike a deal: he’ll fund Soonyang’s takeover of Ahjin Motors, and Chairman Jin will retain the existing employees. It works: Chairman Jin makes a self-titled “Big Deal” with the president that includes an employee buyout of Ahjin Motors, and Do-joon runs gleefully to his old home to deliver the deed to his mother’s restaurant, which he’s purchased on their behalf.
But she’s not there. He may have saved her from the heart attack, but he still couldn’t save her from dying… this time from suicide. She, like many innocent citizens, was taken in by the promise of big earnings from investing in a particular business, only to lose everything when that business was liquidated. A little more digging reveals that “business” was just another slush fund for Soonyang, and its liquidation was part of Chairman Jin’s “Big Deal” — A.K.A. a loophole to avoid restructuring Soonyang as per government mandates.
This is Do-joon’s first big failure in the new timeline, and it hits him like a train. Not only does it put him through the grief of losing his mother a second time, but it also calls into question his ability to effect any meaningful change. In fact, in some ways, the biggest changes he’s making this time around all seem to reinforce the future he’s already lived. Almost as though he’s building what killed him in the first place.
Perhaps the best example of this is how he helps Chairman Jin hold onto Soonyang Motors despite everyone else insisting it’s a lost cause. Soonyang is known for excelling at many things, but automobiles aren’t one of them, and a very embarrassing (and dangerous) accident involving one of their race cars doesn’t help. Chairman Jin is so enraged that he takes off alone instead of attending the subsidiary’s big unveiling ceremony.
Only Do-joon, who eagerly read Chairman Jin’s autobiography as a younger Hyun-woo, has any idea of where to find him. Chairman Jin wrote that when he felt overwhelmed, he’d revisit his roots by tinkering on the old delivery truck that launched his first business. That’s not exactly what he’s doing now, but it’s close enough for Do-joon to find him and initiate what feels like a moment of genuine connection.
Quoting the autobiography (which hasn’t been written yet), Do-joon points out that Soonyang Motors is like the “engine” of Soonyang as a whole, since it’s Chairman Jin’s true passion and where everything else started. And that inspires Chairman Jin — not just to attend the ceremony after all, but to use those exact words as his own.
The thing is, I think Hyun-woo genuinely respected Chairman Jin as a businessman and role model before he knew him personally. Even years into this new timeline, Do-joon still points to things like the Soonyang motto of “righteous business,” as if trying to nudge Chairman Jin toward doing the right thing. But now that idealistic image is shattering right before his eyes. As Chairman Jin’s words and actions attest, “righteous business” in his mind translates simply to “money.”
Needless to say, if Do-joon weren’t already motivated to burn Soonyang to the ground, he certainly is now. Especially once Chairman Jin looks him in the eye and tells him he doesn’t care who gets hurt by his money-making actions.
On top of everything else, Sung-joon reappears in Do-joon’s life, all grown up and back from studying abroad. Seeing him again gives Do-joon vivid flashbacks of being hit by a golf club and doused with tea, helping fuel his next step: winning the rights to oversee the development of Sangam-dong, the future center of media and culture. Which Chairman Jin is angling for Sung-joon to head up.
This battle depends more on politics than business, however. More specifically, it depends on the mayor’s approval. And wouldn’t you know it: the mayoral election is right around the corner. And who does Do-joon know that wants to run for mayor but can’t get Chairman Jin’s support to do so? That’s right — Chang-je.
The only problem is that Chang-je isn’t one to stand up to Chairman Jin. Instead, he prefers to keep his head down and crouch in Hwa-young’s shadow. But he also seems to genuinely care about making a positive change through politics, and with some convincing from Se-hyun and a push from Do-joon, he finally decides to step out of his comfort zone and run for mayor. And he wins.
Now Chairman Jin is falling over himself to convince Chang-je he’s always supported his dreams so Chang-je will give him the Sangam-dong project. But Chang-je has grown a spine, and he gives the project to Miracle Investments instead. So Chairman Jin falls back on the power of intimidation, summoning Chang-je to meet with him at home to ask if he’s being backed by Miracle.
But, to reiterate, Chang-je has grown a spine. They can talk about this outside, he says with newfound authority. And the power backing him up isn’t Miracle — it’s the people. He’s not budging, and it’s awesome.
Of course, Chairman Jin can tell that Miracle had a hand in this anyway. He levies the threat of financial ruin to intimidate Se-hyun into setting up a meeting with Miracle’s mysterious owner. We don’t see whether Se-hyun outs Do-joon or not, but regardless Do-joon shows up at Chairman Jin’s house and announces that he’s the true owner of Miracle Investments.
I did not expect this secret to come out so quickly, but I’m not complaining. Chairman Jin already had his suspicions about Do-joon, so it was really only a matter of time before he found out. I am curious how Do-joon plans to use it to his advantage, though, because I’m sure he has a plan of some kind.
And speaking of plans, I haven’t yet mentioned the other major player who was re-introduced this week: Sung-joon’s future wife, MO HYUN-MIN (Park Ji-hyun). We already saw her calling a lot of the shots in the first episode before Hyun-woo’s murder, and it looks like that’s been the case from the very beginning of her relationship with Sung-joon, right down to her orchestrating their first meeting on her own instead of waiting for parental introductions.
But now Do-joon has put himself on her radar, in more than one way at that. Not only did it not take her long to notice Do-joon and Se-hyun’s connection, but it also didn’t take her long to decide Do-joon might make a more intriguing target than Sung-joon. Which has interesting implications for the future to say the least.
Maybe Do-joon can’t do much to change overarching circumstances, but maybe he can change the people he interacts with, like Chang-je. And if that’s the case, maybe it will be enough for some of those people to make different choices this time around.
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Reborn Rich: Episodes 4-6
Source: Buzz Pinay Daily
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