Asian Addicts Anonymous

“Attic Cat”, episode 2, titled: “In which nichan screams, ‘This guy is a total jerk!'” for an hour.

In the previous episode, Kyung Min had gone to Jung Eun’s house late at night after being chased around by a bad plot point; Jung Eun, meanwhile, had just discovered that Kyung Min had been blatantly using her to get to Hye Ryun. This episode picks up right where that episode left off, with Kyung Min begging his way through the door, then thinking up a hundred excuses to stay, none of which involve explaining the actual reason behind his visit. (It’s later explained, by the way: He’s a compulsive gambler and owes some thugs a lot of money.) Jung Eun tries valiantly to kick him out, but he finally throws it in her face that since he paid the rent, it’s sort’ve his house. She ends up having to give in, and he winds up sleeping on the floor. (Which, by the way, leads to an hysterical scene about the bathroom…)

Anyway, this episode is filled with instance after instance of Kyung Min being an absolute jerk. He’s a bad house guest, he spends Jung Eun’s money to buy an expensive necklace for Hye Ryun (who doesn’t want it, and subsequently gives it to Jung Eun), he makes fun of Jung Eun’s attempts to earn a living, and then… Then there’s the biggie:

On Jung Eun’s birthday, Kyung Min promises to make her birthday soup, to help with the chores, and to be ready and waiting for her return home from a promising job interview. So Jung Eun sets out, inexplicably assuming Kyung Min will keep his word for once, and goes to her interview at an advertising company.

Well, meanwhile, Hye Ryun had just the night before been at that very advertising company, because the guy she has her eye on works there. His name is Dong Joon, and he’s pretty serious and career-oriented. But Hye Ryun’s really, really interested in him, and it’s starting to appear like she’s stalking him as much as Kyung Min is stalking her. She asks him to attend a party her parents are throwing the next night, and he sort’ve blows her off with only a half-hearted commitment.

Back to Jung Eun’s birthday, though. She’s started her interview and is trying to make herself look good, when suddenly Dong Joon enters the room, recognizes her, and begins to talk to her in English, which she’d insisted she knows how to speak. Problem is, she only knows a few words, and she totally blows her end of the conversation. In an embarrassed huff, she tells Dong Joon off and storms out of the building.

Kyung Min’s task this whole time is to simply do the chores around the house and make birthday soup. A few minutes in, though, he gets a call from Hye Ryun, asking him to come to the party with her. Being the jerk he is, he immediately, immediately, forgets all about Jung Eun, and he trashes the living room while ripping through his luggage to get to his best suit. The problem is, he also needs new shoes, so he tears the cupboards apart until he finds Jung Eun’s secret stash of money, and he proceeds to steal everything but the change. …When Jung Eun comes back from failing miserably at her interview, it’s to a destroyed house and no savings.

Kyung Min runs all the way to the party, where he meets up with Hye Ryun. It seems a little odd to him that she won’t introduce him to anyone, but he follows her around like a puppy dog, anyway. All of a sudden she sends him out of the room to go get something to drink. …Come to find out, Dong Joon has just shown up, and she throws herself at him, timing it so that when Kyung Min returns, she’ll be draped all over Dong Joon. This leads to Kyung Min finally, finally, having it jammed into his thick skull that she doesn’t want him. It also gives Hye Ryun an excuse to try a sob story on Dong Joon that this creepy guy is stalking her, and his playing along is the only way she’ll be able to get rid of him.

Broken hearted, Kyung Min starts the long walk home, only slowly remembering that Jung Eun exists and that he’d not only stolen her money, but that he was supposed to make her soup. He stops at a bakery on the way back and buys a super cheap cake, then tries to play everything off like it’d been his plan the whole time.

Jung Eun calls him out on it, though, and demands to know why he took her money (he needed some), what he spent it on (shoes), where he went (to a party to stalk a girl), and why he gets so blasted stupid over Hye Ryun so much (because she looks like his mom). (Yes. You read that right: Hye Ryun looks like his mom. …So now he’s a total jerkface and really creepy!!!) Jung Eun tells him to stop being an idiot and tries to point out how completely non-spectacular Hye Ryun really is.

Kyung Min listens to her, and then, I dunno, feels bad for her or something; maybe he feels bad that he took the money, or maybe (probably) he feels bad for himself, or maybe he’s just a jerk… Whatever his motivations are, he leans over and kisses her. Like, oh my god, you steal her money to go chase after her friend, and then when her friend doesn’t hook up with you, you try to blow it off and you kiss her? What the [expletive] is wrong with you?!?

So the end of the episode comes with… (*sigh*) …Jung Eun and Kyung Min waking up in bed together after a night of fooling around.

Somebody in this series needs to have some sense smacked into ’em!!!