Second Shot at Love: Episodes 1-2 (First Impressions)

Second Shot at Love: Episodes 1-2 (First Impressions)

by SailorJumun

tvN’s Second Shot at Love tackles a pretty heavy topic, following a successful career woman’s descent into alcoholism. After the heroine’s drinking gets her single and homeless, she’s dragged to her quiet little hometown to get sober. And though she’s got plenty of people around to support her, she’s not yet ready to accept that she even needs the help.

Editor’s note: This is an opening review only. For a place to chat about the entire drama, visit the Drama Hangout.
 
EPISODES 1-2

As someone who 1) doesn’t drink and 2) doesn’t like how dramas portray excessive drinking as cute and funny, I approached this drama cautiously — because the theme may be serious, but this is very much marketed as a romantic comedy. I’m all for some decent laughs, so long as there’s enough heart to keep us grounded.

We open to doctor SEO EUI-JOON (Gong Myung) giving a presentation about alcoholism. Cut to: HAN GEUM-JOO (Sooyoung), a hardworking mechanic who also spends quite a lot of time drinking. She goes all out one night, ignoring her fiancé’s phone calls and later dancing in the streets.

The following morning, Geum-joo’s fiancé KIM JOO-YEOP (Yoo Eui-tae) confronts her about her drinking problem, which she denies being a problem. He gives her an ultimatum — him or the alcohol — and to his surprise, she coldly chooses alcohol. Just like that, she calls off their engagement.

When Geum-joo’s mother (Kim Sung-ryung) finds out about the breakup, and about the fact that it was over alcohol, she’s furious. After all, Geum-joo has lost her future partner, she’s been replaced at work, and her lease is almost up on her apartment. In order to get her daughter’s life back on track, Mom drags Geum-joo back to their small hometown of Bochun.

At home, we meet Geum-joo’s father (Kim Sang-ho) and older sister HAN HYUN-JOO (Jo Yoon-hee) as they’re drinking plum wine. Eek, talk about bad timing — Mom goes off on them for pretty much raising Geum-joo on alcohol and bans drinking in the house. She wants to keep Geum-joo’s predicament a secret, but of course, in a small town like this, it’s not long before the gossip starts.

Geum-joo has some high school friends in town, but she’s really hoping she doesn’t run into her ex-friend-turned-town-doctor Eui-joon. They do end up crossing paths, and she insists that they pretend they don’t know each other… only to be annoyed when he obliges, heh.

The alcohol ban has Geum-joo on edge, but Mom says that she won’t budge until Geum-joo quits. She should at least feel sorry towards her fiancé for hurting him. But Geum-joo scoffs at that and goes out to the lake alone. There, she recalls the day before the breakup, when she caught Joo-yeop buying a pregnancy test. Oh no…

Geum-joo followed Joo-yeop to a meeting with his pregnant lover and overheard him saying that he’d planned on ditching Geum-joo anyway. And that is why Geum-joo drank herself silly that night, why she broke up with him first. At the lake, we see her do her little drunk dance again, only this time, she’s crying.

Later, Geum-joo’s friends try to get her and Eui-joon together to settle their beef, but Geum-joo stops short when she overhears the boys talking about her drinking. Rather than join them, she goes off and drinks alone. She doesn’t return home until she’s completely drunk, causing a scene as her family is prepping her grandfather’s memorial service.

At this point, as harsh as Mom can be, I totally understand her frustration towards Geum-joo. But because we know what Geum-joo is going through, and because we feel that through Sooyoung’s very real portrayal, she hasn’t lost my sympathy. It’s clear that, for her, alcohol is associated with happiness and comfort, and she’s desperate to lean into that when she’s suffering.

The alcohol, however, is just getting Geum-joo into more and more trouble. She wanders out of the house, onto the road, and causes Eui-joon to crash his car. Even though Eui-joon’s foot is injured, he carries Geum-joo back to his house and lets her spend the night. All the while, Geum-joo’s slippers are found by the lake, and everyone freaks out, presuming that she drowned.

After Geum-joo makes the walk of shame back, showing that she is indeed alive, she has to pay the consequences. To add to the ban at home, Mom threatens the neighbors that she’ll cut business ties if they sell any of her family alcohol.

Geum-joo, Hyun-joo, and their dad are absolutely miserable during this prohibition, but Geum-joo is at least distracted with other things. For one, she has to act as Eui-joon’s personal driver to and from patients since he broke his foot. They continue to bicker, him telling her to quit drinking and live up to her name (“Geum-joo” literally translates to “abstinence”) and her pushing back.

Geum-joo thinks that Eui-joon is being hypocritical since he’s also a big drinker, but according to their mutual friends, he quit a long time ago. There’s even a rumor that his fiancé left him and that he drank himself into depression, which is why he felt he had to quit and move back to the countryside.

Obviously, Geum-joo relates, and though she tries to convince herself she doesn’t care, she finds herself wanting to support Eui-joon. The next time they’re together, she rambles that he shouldn’t let a traitorous fiancé get in the way of him being a hotshot doctor in Seoul… right as she gets a text that the rumors aren’t true. Wah-wah.

What’s interesting is that, misunderstanding aside, Eui-joon insists that they stay out of each other’s personal lives. It surprises Geum-joo, and it reminds her of something similar he said years ago, when they were arguing. With that, Geum-joo agrees, and they continue their business-only relationship. That night, however, Eui-joon has trouble sleeping. Due to regret, maybe?

The next day, Geum-joo realizes that it’s her ex-fiancé’s birthday — and that a special cake she ordered months in advance is on its way to his apartment. Thrown into a panic, she cancels on Eui-joon and races off to Seoul to stop the delivery. She manages to get the cake but runs into Mr. Asshole Ex and his girlfriend in the elevator.

Joo-yeop pulls out some bullshit excuses, and Geum-joo scoffs that he should get his life together for the sake of his baby. Joo-yeop throws the insult back at her, which gets him a well-earned cake in the face. It’s incredibly satisfying, but as expected, Geum-joo is left hurting and immediately turns to soju.

When Geum-joo returns to Buchon, Eui-joon is disappointed to see that she’s drunk again (especially after worrying about her all day). Later, in his home, we see that he’s actually got his own stash of alcohol. As he takes a swig, he reads another rumor on an online message board — that the real reason he left Seoul was because he killed someone. And smash, his soju bottle drops to the floor.

Seems like Geum-joo’s not the only one with deep-rooted drinking issues. I like this, because for a while, I was worried that we had a case of Perfect doctor helps alcoholic and ends up saving her with his perfect love. Thankfully, these characters and their situations come across as perfectly imperfect. They have to fight their personal attachment to alcohol on top of the work/social pressures. (Also, this drama feels like a full circle for Gong Myung, as Drinking Solo was one of the first things I saw him in!)

So… so far so good? I mean, the drama’s really leaning into the humor with these first two episodes, but it’s also hinting at having the heart that I wanted. And I have a feeling that once Geum-joo takes her problem more seriously, the drama will ease into that seriousness too, tonally. If she does get her second shot at love, like the title suggests, cool — I am digging the romantic chemistry — but I’m hoping that what she really gets is a second shot at a happy, healthy life.

 
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