dangermousie | IRIS ep 17: we are finally beginning to see some "comfort" in the whole hurt/comfort feast.

Ep 17 of IRIS was amazing - the best episode yet. (But then I always say that, don't I?)

You know what strikes me - how unfixable Hyun Joon is. He is such a PTSD victim. I love the scene where he is driving in in the car with the cabinet member who is congratulating him on stopping the terrorists and all Hyun Joon sees, as he looks out at the now-peaceful scene, are the blasts and people dying. And when the President asks him to continue investigating IRIS, he looks like he'd rather be anywhere else and do anything else - it's like he is trying to withdraw into himself. But of course he agrees.

The scene with him questioning Baeksan and Sa Woo was so painful to watch for different reasons - with Sa Woo it's because this was his best friend, the first person who Hyun Joon loved (yes, loved - it may not have been sexual or romantic but it was definitely love) and who turned on him that way.

(Am I sick? Because, that's the hottest Sa Woo has ever been.)

And with Baeksan because Hyun Joon finds out his whole existence has always been at the mercy of Baeksan (who is terrifying - managing to break Hyun Joon a bit further without even trying, while he is the one who is a prisoner). Not to mention Baeksan's chilling comment that the reason this all happened is (paraphase) "You bit the forbidden fruit and this is your punishment. The life I planned for you did not allow you to have it." Not only am I getting a sinking feeling Baeksan meant Seung Hee was the forbidden fruit, the off-hand treatment of Hyun Joon as a thing...*shudder* Baeksan needs to DIE. He draws parallels between himself and Hyun Joon but there is a big difference - Hyun Joon is a genuinely good person, even after all the horrors visited on him. While Baeksan? Probably moonlights sacrificing virgins for the Black Mass.

I also loved the farewell scene between Hyun Joon and Sun Hwa. I never shipped the two of them but I loved their complicated relationship - she was at his side during so much, and he is the one who first showed her kindness, and just - they are damaged mirrors of each other.

In some ways, this ep shows how hard it is for Hyun Joon to adjust to normalcy (the flashbacks inserted throughout to the old Hyun Joon underline it even more starkly). See the way he looks at his old self in the photo in Seung Hee's apartment.

But throughout it all his one beacon and thread to sanity is Seung Hee.

That is why if she turns evil or dead at the end, I will smash something - it's not just love on his part - he needs her.

With her is the only time he gets close to his old self.

My shippiness is ridiculously insane:

Look the way they smile at each other:

He smiles, and oh God - he falls asleep on her couch for 34 hours because that's the first time since Hungary (i.e. 2 years!) he can sleep properly - he was not able to sleep for longer than 2 hours at a stretch before because of nightmares. He needs her to function - to live instead of existing. And I love how she is stroking his face when he is asleep with so much love in her eyes (once again - I have no idea even now if she is simply a profiler, a member of IRIS, or a Martian, but whatever she is, her love for him is incontrovertible).

(His sleeping posture is like a little kid's)

Thirty-four hours later (I have been a total and utter goner for the "messed-up beyond control guy can finally sleep without nightmares because he's with the woman he loves" trope since Lymond. Oh, and if I am bringing up Lymond, my obsession is hella serious):

Oh guys, don't go on a romantic trip! We know how well it ended last time! And also, I just realized - Hyun Joon still does not remember his parents. He never got his childhood memories back - all he remembers is that brief bit in the President's office and their deaths. Oh, that's so harsh.

Have a shippy MV:

In conclusion, it's official - Lee Byung Hun is my biggest Hallyu crush ever. Ever.

(In case you are interested, current top 10: (1) LBH (2) Kang Ji Hwan (3) Bae Yong Joon (4) Hyun Bin (5) Song Il Gook (6) Jang Hyuk (7) Song Seung Heon (8) Joo Ji Hoon (yeah yeah) (9) Gong Yoo (10) Jung Joon Ho. If I had to add a few more, I'd throw Jo In Sung, So Ji Sub, Lee Junki and Go Soo in there).