Vincenzo: Episode 1 Recap

It’s here! I couldn’t wait any longer and wanted to get started on my recaps for tvN’s popular drama ‘Vincenzo’ starring Song Joong-ki, Jeon Yeo-bin, and Taecyeon. This drama has been keeping me up the past 24 hours (literally.. sort of) and I just cannot get enough of it. What better way to fill the void than re-watch all the episodes and provide recaps for them? I’m reminded again of why I dislike live watching dramas as they’re airing; the wait for the next episode is so painful T_T

Based off of my ‘What Mary Thinks’ post, Song Joong-ki plays Vincenzo and returns to Korea after working for the Mafia in Italy. He has a personal mission that he needs to accomplish which involves a building that houses tenants like rightful and fair lawyer Hong Yu-chan (played by Yoo Jae-Myung). Vincenzo ends up working with feisty and confident Lawyer Hong Yu-chan’s daughter, Hong Cha-young (Jeon Yeo-bin), to fight against big corporation, Babel, who’s intent on taking over the building. A battle between Babel versus Vincenzo and Cha-young ensues and our power couple teams up to fight against the power conglomerate.

If you read my previous post about ‘Vincenzo’, you would know that Song Joong-ki and Jeon Yeo-bin was what sold me in on this drama. 6 episodes in and I don’t regret anything. In fact, I fall in love with the drama more and more every episode. I’m ready for what will be an insane, intense, and wild journey. Also, I’m just warning everyone now, all my recaps for this drama will probably contain an unhealthy amount of photos and screenshots of Song Joong-ki, Jeon Yeo-bin, and Taecyeon’s beautiful faces. I mean, no one’s complaining though, amirite? 😉 The more the merrier!

Vincenzo: Episode 1 Recap

The first episode starts off with Vincenzo standing opposite a building that he shares he plans on taking down. It’s nighttime and the sparkles in his eyes lit up even more upon witnessing the building crumble into pieces and onto the ground. All we know are his goals of destroying the building.

The drama then takes us back 72 hours in Rome, Italy. Vincenzo wakes up bright and early to his alarm (and he’s looking mighty fine for having just woken up from his sleep too I might add) and he gets ready for the day. We’re then introduced to his occupation and we learn that he’s a Consigliere to the Cassano family: a legal advisor or counselor of an Italian mafia’s boss. After he finishes getting ready, Vincenzo hops into his car and instructs his driver to take him to a man named Emilio’s place. As they inch closer to the mansion, Vincenzo spots an airplane flying up above and making rounds around the huge vineyard. Vincenzo is eventually permitted to visit Emilio and he makes his way up the grand stairs to the front of the mansion where Emilio is eating some food. Despite it being the funeral of Vincenzo’s boss, Vincenzo is still hard at work. He attempts to strike up a deal with Emilio for the mansion and land, but Emilio refuses.

Emilio urges Vincenzo to leave and repeatedly throws out racist slurs and comments towards Vincenzo. Enough is enough and Vincenzo has had enough of Emilio. Before heading back to his car, Vincenzo curses at Emilio in Korean as his form of payback. But that’s not enough. It turns out the airplane making rounds around the vineyard had been spraying gasoline throughout the fields the entire time and Vincenzo himself lits the entire place on fire using his golden lighter. While Emilio and everyone else back at the mansion panics and scrambles, Vincenzo calmly gets into his car and stares out the window as a huge fire blazes from behind him.

Vincenzo’s next stop is his boss’s funeral and he pays his respect to his Mafia boss, Fabio, who he refers to as ‘papa’. It’s obvious that Vincenzo and Paolo, Fabio’s son, have an intense relationship. Vincenzo relays that he accomplished the last mission that Fabio wanted him to do and that he’ll give Paolo some respect when he thinks Paolo deserves it. With that, Vincenzo returns home and plops on his couch. He can’t even smoke a cigarette without sighing and feeling exhausted. Later on that night, Vincenzo is attacked by three guys who were hired by Paolo to assassinate him. Vincenzo knew it was coming though and he shoots all 3 guys to death before contacting the man behind it all himself. He threatens Paolo to never contact him again as he will be leaving Italy with no plans of coming back. After relaying the message and warnings, Vincenzo relaxes on his airplane ride back to Korea. He studies some photos and documents with information on a building called Geumga Plaza that is currently in plans of being demolished by a powerful conglomerate.

Lawyer Hong Cha-young stops by to visit a man who was once a test subject for conglomerate Babel Pharmaceuticals, a top client of the law firm that she works at. It’s obvious it’s not her first time doing such a thing and she pays the man with some money and cake for the upcoming court case that she’s assigned to. Afterwards, Cha-young waits outside of the courthouse for her intern, Jang Joon-woo (Ok Taecyeon), who is running late and she makes sure to scold him as they enter the courthouse together. It’s a battle between father and daughter as Cha-young goes up against her father, Lawyer Hong Yu-chan (Yoo Jae-myung). Cha-young refutes the claims made that people have died as a side effect of a drug produced by Babel Pharmaceuticals while Yu-chan states otherwise. The two battle back and forth in court, but it is ultimately Cha-young who reigns as the winner. The man who she bribed earlier that day turned himself in for perjury so his statement as a witness is invalid. Everyone is shocked by the sudden news, especially the families of the victims who watch in horror as the situation unfolds.

With the court case ended, Lawyer Hong steps outside to smoke. He’s frustrated and exhausted, but he’s especially angry at his own daughter for buying off a witness and working for an evil conglomerate like Babel Pharmaceuticals. The father-daughter pair bicker outside and Lawyer Hong once again mentions the idea of disowning Cha-young. He doesn’t buy her childish antics when she cries and pleads him to stop, knowing that it’s all just for show. Cha-young is confident her father will never beat her in court and Lawyer Hong is confident he’ll somehow be able to disown Cha-young as his daughter.

Vincenzo lands safely in Korea, but it doesn’t take long for things to happen. He’s stopped shortly on his way out of the airport by a police officer who scans his passport to confirm Vincenzo’s identity. When the officer confirms that Vincenzo isn’t the wanted man that they’re searching for, he cracks a pun using Vincenzo’s name before letting the Consigliere go. Vincenzo prepares to grab a taxi, but he’s approached by a limousine driver who offers to drive Vincenzo to his destination. Vincenzo takes up on the offer and he relaxes for what would be an hour and a half drive. While in the back of the car, Vincenzo reminds himself of his reason for being in Korea: he must finish everything in a month and then he’ll head straight to Malta afterwards for a nice and rewarding vacation. He sips from the water bottle sitting right next to him and doesn’t pay any attention to the latest news playing on the car radio: thieves posing as taxi drivers at airports and purposely targeting foreigners only to drug them with infected water and steal their valuables afterwards. Unfortunately, Vincenzo is that next target and it doesn’t take long for the effects of the drug in the water bottle he sipped from to go into effect (nOOOOOO).

News of Vincenzo’s return to Korea alerts Mr. An (Lim Chul-soo) of the International Crime Response Agency and he informs his boss, Mr. Tae, about Vincenzo’s position as the Consigliere of the mafia in Italy. Mr. An is suspicious and interested in Vincenzo’s return to Korea, but Mr. Tae doesn’t think too much about it. He assumes Vincenzo might just be on a vacation or something, lol. He also warns Mr. An not to launch any operations on Vincenzo and to rather leave the man alone. Though Mr. An doesn’t agree, he has no choice but to listen to his boss. Cha-young and Joon-woo make their way back to the office at their law firm, Wusang Law Firm, and Cha-young is greeted with compliments and praises. She celebrates for a few seconds in her office before receiving a visit by Managing Partner Han (Jo Han-chul) who gifts her with a bonus for defeating her father in court that day.

The limo driver (cameo by Jin Sun-kyu) and his literal partner in crime (cameo by Lee Hee-jun) rejoice and celebrate as they steal all of Vincenzo’s valuable belongings. They discover lots of cash and even take Vincenzo’s authentic and luxurious watch. Before Vincenzo can fight the two criminals, they knock him out once more and leave him deserted in the middle of the dirt field. All Vincenzo has with him is a $50 bill that they placed around his finger and he uses it to get on a bus to his original destination prior to getting drugged and robbed. Vincenzo unleashes all his anger out by cursing in Italian at every chance he gets regardless of where he’s at or who’s around him. Poor Vincenzo.

He eventually makes it to Geumga Plaza and takes a good look at the building. His goal is to eventually take down the building for a personal reason. The episode then takes us back to 5 years ago during a meeting with Vincenzo and one of Fabio’s friends from China as well as the man’s translator, Mr. Cho. The man leans on Vincenzo’s expertise and intelligence in helping him hide his gold that he wants stored in Korea. Vincenzo follows through with the request and he follows a tradition that his Cassano family has practiced for decades. To store the man’s gold, they purchase an old building in Korea under Mr. Cho’s name. They then build a room in the basement as storage for the gold and fill in the rest of the building with shops and stores to avoid any suspicion. The secret room can only be opened and accessed by the owner of all the gold and he seems content with the storage upon seeing all his gold stacked in the room.

In the present, Vincenzo is warmly greeted by Mr. Cho Yeong-un (Choi Young-joon) who walks him to the apartment unit he’ll be residing in for the next month. While Mr. Cho fills Vincenzo in on the latest news of Babel E&C and their plans in taking over Geumga Plaza, another man watches the two carefully nearby and quietly follows them. When shown his living space, Vincenzo isn’t so impressed and it’s definitely not the luxurious, nice, and comfortable living that he was accustomed to back in Italy. Still, it’s all he’s got for now and he doesn’t think too much about it with the one-month timeline that he’s given himself. He also doesn’t have any plans of staying in Korea after everything ends.

The man who had noticed Vincenzo and Mr. Cho together immediately reports the sighting to Lawyer Hong and his assistant, Mr. Nam (Yoon Byung-hee). The man’s name is Lee Cheol-wook and he points out how scary and evil Vincenzo looked. It’s as if he was like those evil villains you see in the movies. Lawyer Hong suggests that they inform all the tenants in Geumga Plaza of Vincenzo’s presence and appearance. Speaking of tenants, Mr. Cho takes Vincenzo on a tour of the third floor in the building.

It’s nothing like Vincenzo expected and there’s a bunch of strange and odd things that stand out to him: a young lady with long black hair playing the piano passionately at her piano school as if she were a ghost from a horror movie, a dancer moving like a zombie at his dance studio, a teenager getting beaten up by his mother for his poor grades at their snack shop, a chef of an Italian restaurant threatening the two men with the knife in his hand, the owner of a dry cleaning shop also threatening the two men with the iron in his hand, and Cheol-wook bickering with his wife at their pawnshop. It’s all too much for Vincenzo to take in, but there’s still one more stop they have to visit and it’s the most important one: the place in the basement that sits right on top of their storage room with the gold.

Once again, Vincenzo is in for another surprise as he discovers the space is now occupied as a temple. Vincenzo does his best to focus on the fact that 15 tons of gold rests below where the head monk is sitting. Of course, it wouldn’t be Geumga Plaza without another surprise and both Vincenzo and Mr. Cho are surprised by Monk Chaeshin (Kwon Seung-woo) who pops up at the entrance of the temple. He’s suspicious of Vincenzo, but doesn’t think too much into it. Afterwards, Vincenzo stops by the dry cleaning shop and requests for the owner, Mr. Tak (Choi Duk-moon), to dry clean his expensive and limited edition suit. Mr. Tak doesn’t believe Vincenzo’s comment though and assumes he’s just bluffing. Hahaha. There’s no dull moment for Vincenzo as he’s greeted by the stares of all the tenants he just visited not too long ago, including Lawyer Hong and Mr. Nam. Lawyer Hong introduces himself to Vincenzo and makes it known that he’s the CEO of the Jipuragi Law Firm in the building as well as the chairman of the Development Opposition Committee they’ve created against Babel E&C.

Vincenzo exchanges a friendly greeting with Lawyer Hong and makes it clear that he’s only in Korea to be an advisor since he can’t practice law in Korea. It’s obvious that the tenants are distrustful of people like Vincenzo who they believe have ulterior motives and plans with Geumga Plaza. Before leaving back to his apartment unit, Vincenzo strikes up a small conversation with Mr. Baek, the Chef of the Italian restaurant, who traveled to Italy to study to become a chef. Mr. Baek, also known as Chef Toto, pretends as if he understands Italian and strings together some details about his study in Italy, but Vincenzo isn’t as impressed as the rest of the tenants are.

Vincenzo can’t seem to catch a break. If not with the tenants, it’s his own shower head that’s causing him concerns. The temperature of the water remains wishy-washy and Vincenzo even has a hard time taking a shower (LOL, this is my favorite scene in this episode! It’s so funny but also SO relatable. I’ve been in this situation plenty of times in my life). With Vincenzo’s sleep interrupted thanks to the loud pigeon right outside of his window, Vincenzo takes some time to review a document regarding an inmate from the Cheongju Women’s Correctional Institution. He’s reminded of a court hearing that he attended involving a woman, Ms. Oh Gyeong-ja, who was accused of assaulting and killing her employer. The woman’s past was also brought up during the court hearing and details about her abandoning her child is mentioned during the trial. The woman is livid, upset, and frustrated at all the allegations and her lawyer’s unwillingness to advocate for her. She gives up, knowing that there’s nothing she can do. She’s already lost. Back in the present, Vincenzo discovers that Lawyer Hong has now been appointed as Ms. Oh’s new lawyer as well as the fact that Ms. Oh has refused a retrial.

Prosecutor Choi Myung-hee (Kim Yeo-jin) practices her zumba skills at the laundromat while TV news about Cha-young’s and Lawyer Hong’s court case plays in the background. She’s in a positive mood until two boys who are also at the laundromat notice her dancing and take pictures of her. Prosecutor Choi is keen on teaching both boys a lesson for their childish and dangerous actions. It’s clear she’s not someone who you want to mess with. Vincenzo gets a head start at Chef Toto’s Italian restaurant. He’s excited for the food, but quickly becomes disappointed with the taste of the food. It’s nothing like what he expected and even goes as far as to describe it as trash. Vincenzo isn’t impressed with Chef Toto’s cooking skills nor his story about him studying in Italy. It’s clear that Chef Toto made up his story.

Lawyer Hong merely misses Vincenzo as he stops by the Cheongju Women’s Correctional Institution to pay Ms. Oh a visit. Ms. Oh can sense that things aren’t looking so bright for Lawyer Hong and she refuses the opportunity for a retrial once again. She’s not interested in the retrial; she feels as if she’s not deserving of it. Vincenzo and Mr. Cho host their meeting with the lead representative from Babel’s development team in the Jipuragi Law Firm office. Just like all the other times, Vincenzo and Mr. Cho deny any offers that the representative makes. They’re not interested in the offers and Vincenzo makes sure to let them know never to threaten him ever again.

A small town hall meeting is held in dancer, Larry Kang’s (Kim Seol-jin) dance studio. All the tenants are there and are soon joined afterwards by Vincenzo, Mr. Cho, and Lawyer Hong. News of an agreement will be drafted and shared the next day and all the tenants are to sign it. Of course, some are a little skeptical and cautious. They don’t really trust Vincenzo while some others, such as the young lady of the piano school Seo Mi-ri (Kim Yoon-hye) and Cheol-wook’s wife, Jang Yeon-jin (Seo Ye-hwa), completely leave things up to Vincenzo to handle. Monk Chaeshin pitches in a few words before everyone eventually gives in to agreeing with the agreement. They’ll eventually get their lots back once everything is settled and the building is reconstructed. Lawyer Hong has a word with Vincenzo after the meeting and warns Vincenzo to stay in his place. Lawyer Hong represents people while Vincenzo represents rich people with money. Though they are both lawyers, they stand for two completely different things. Lawyer Hong is keen on defeating Babel E&C regardless of what it takes.

Mr. Cho returns home later on that night and is attacked by gangsters from Babel E&C who coerce him into signing a contract of sales document for Geumga Plaza. His family is held hostage and he has no choice but to sign the document (noooo). Early the next morning, the gangsters leave once Mr. Cho receives the payment for the plaza in his bank account. Cha-young enters her office at work to find a document resting on her desk. When she opens the letter, she discovers that, long story short, her dad has petitioned to remove her from his family registry. He’s basically “disowned” her as his daughter. Things don’t sit right with Cha-young and she storms into her father’s office to confront him about the situation. She even goes as far to read out some of the statements written on the document such as how Lawyer Hong rejects to be addressed as “father” in all various types of languages. Lawyer Hong is disappointed in Cha-young for not having an ounce of duty or sense of justice in her work as a lawyer, but Cha-young can care less. She perceives her situation and her occupation in her own way and the two battle it out in the office.

Vincenzo grows upset upon seeing the damage that Mr. Tak has caused on his luxurious and expensive suit. It’s way too small for him now and it doesn’t fit him that great. Mr. Tak doesn’t think too much into it and leaves his shop due to an announcement made on the speakers calling for all the tenants to regroup. Vincenzo receives a phone call from Mr. Cho shortly afterwards who’s on his way to Geumga Plaza. However, his drive is cut short due to a car accident with a truck who plummets straight into Mr. Cho’s vehicle (nooooooo!). Mr. Park Seol-do, CEO of Ant company and chairman of the Babel development committee, arrives shortly at Geumga Plaza and the rest of his members stand behind him as they confront our Geumga tenants. Our tenants soon discover that Mr. Cho has sold the building to Babel E&C and they’re confused about the sudden and abrupt situation.

Mr. Park cuts straight to the point with the tenants: they will be compensated now that the building belongs to Babel E&C and should expect to be driven out shortly. Lawyer Hong remains doubtful and skeptical while some tenants express their distrust and anger in Vincenzo (Mr. Tak: “I should have shrunk his suit even more!” LOL). The intense situation is interrupted by Cheol-wook who excuses himself to use the restroom (LOL) and Cha-young has a moment herself when she stands up for Lawyer Hong (AKA her father LOL) when he gets shoved by Mr. Jeon (Mr. Park’s main sidekick). The two are close to battling it out in front of everyone until they hear a man yell out the words ‘Stop!’ in Italian.

Of course, it’s none other than our Italian prince, Vincenzo, who stands all the way at the end of the hallway. He makes the aisle his runway as everyone’s eyes are on him. He sneakily grabs Mr. Tak’s yellow tape measure on his way to the front of the group and introduces him to everybody (Cha-young is so curious, she recites Vincenzo’s name as ‘Vinchenzo Quassano’ LOL). Vincenzo makes it short and warns the Babel gang to leave. When they don’t take him seriously the first time around, it takes hitting Mr. Jeon and throwing Mr. Park outside over the edge of the building for them to realize the intensity of the situation. Mr. Park is barely hanging on by the thread of the tape measure and while everyone else panics, Vincenzo lets them know who he is. He’s not going to back down and he reiterates that Geumga Plaza belongs to him. Thanks to Mr. Toto’s interpretation of Vincenzo’s Italian comment, everyone ends up giving Vincenzo an applause (LOL). Vincenzo can only smirk upon staring at Mr. Park hang on for his dear life. Surely by now, they all know and recognize who he is.

My Thoughts:

Phew! Talk about getting thrown into things right away! It felt like I spent forever recapping this first episode because not only was it 1 hour and 20 minutes long, but it’s also been a good 5 months since my last recap. At one point, I just wanted to get all the recapping done so that I could move onto the commentary section. I would be lying if I said that recapping this first episode wasn’t a struggle.

And this recap was a struggle but for many good reasons! It’s going to be hard to not let future episodes influence how I feel and what I already know. I’m going to do my best to not spoil anything from later episodes and to keep things within the episode that they take place in, but I gotta admit, re-watching this first episode made me realize just how much information the drama was subtly throwing out there to lay out their foundation. You wouldn’t think that scenes such as Lawyer Choi dancing and practicing her zumba skills at the laundromat would be important. You assume that scenes like this are trivial, but if you pay really close attention to things happening in the background, the drama gives away certain details and information that you might otherwise would pass on by. Re-watching this episode also helped me gain a better understanding of Vincenzo’s background both as a Consigliere in Italy and also his personal life in Korea. Granted, it was our first episode so it wasn’t trying to give too much away, but again, if you pay close attention, you can sort of see where the drama is trying to go in terms of Ms. Oh and why he’s so interested in her case. I gotta admit, it’s small things like these that I only caught while re-watching this episode and I’m glad that I gave this introductory episode another watch.

I’m honestly skeptical and cautious of dramas where there’s many side characters like there is in this drama with the tenants of Geumga Plaza. I guess you can sort of blame ‘Hi Bye Mama’ for this trauma because of how lackluster and futile all the ghosts in that drama felt to me and how difficult of a time it was following everyone. I’m pretty sure there’s been other dramas with many side characters as seen in ‘Vincenzo’ which is why I had a hard time initially believing in this drama (basically the way that the tenants initially felt about Vincenzo the character was how I felt about ‘Vincenzo’ the drama lol). I was afraid it was going to follow ‘Hi Bye Mama’s’ formula and try to sell us on all the character’s stories without investing too much time into showing us their lives and backgrounds in the first place (recapping all the tenants and providing their names and shops is also another story!). While there are a handful of tenants (which makes sense given it is a plaza) which can make things difficult for me to follow, I liked the introductions of our tenants in this first episode. We were sort of given a preview as to what each tenant or each shop/store is like and we also saw how different but similar they all are as a group. The drama didn’t try to do too much with them in this episode and didn’t throw them at us which was nice to see. If you think about it, the tenants are what makes this story happen in the first place. Their existence and presence at Geumga Plaza is the reasoning behind Babel and Vincenzo’s appearance and yet, the drama gave us just enough of a sneak peek in their lives without overdoing it. I’m liking what the drama is showed us so far with our tenants.

My heart sort of broke for our tenants and their fear in losing their home, but also their general distrust in outsiders like Vincenzo who push their way through and come out of nowhere with supposedly good intentions. Despite the tenants primarily being set up in moments of comedy and humor, it was honestly sad watching them be skeptical of Vincenzo and not trust him so easily. They must have felt so betrayed and hurt and weak and powerless this entire time knowing that a huge conglomerate like Babel E&C is trying to take over their building and how there’s nothing they can do about it. As much as I want to root for Vincenzo and his fight in advocating for our tenants (even if he’s there for his own personal reasons and gains), I can understand where our tenants are coming from and the fear they harbor against Vincenzo. I also think that’s what’s going to make it so much more rewarding when he does go through with his words and does what he said he would do: win for both the tenants and also himself.

I sort of hinted in my ‘What Mary Thinks’ post about ‘Vincenzo’ that I was surprised at the level of comedy and humor that the drama possessed and embodied. I knew the drama was going to be intense, epic, and action-packed and I guess that’s all I was sort of expecting especially after watching the first 10 minutes of this episode so it came as a pleasant surprise when we were introduced to the tenants or when Vincenzo “moved in” to his apartment unit. I related to him so much because my bedroom at my apartment too has lit-up night stars hung up on the wall (from the previous tenant who resided in my unit before I moved in). I’ve also dealt with taking showers that were either extremely cold or extremely hot and I just could not stop laughing when Vincenzo was struggling to take his shower.

It’s one thing when the actors in your drama possess the right amount of comedic timing and don’t overdo it (which in this case, the tenants and Song Joong-ki are GREAT with their comedic timing), but things become so much funnier on another level when you can relate to certain scenes and moments. I wholeheartedly enjoyed watching this first episode because of the surprise comedy and humor and I gotta say it was Song Joong-ki’s shower scene that definitely sold me completely with this drama (I swear, it was the comedy and not his abs that made me fall in love with the drama). Other stand-out moments include scenes like Mr. Tak shrinking Vincenzo’s expensive and limited edition suit or the way he regretted not shrinking Vincenzo’s suit even more. Or the moment when Cheol-wook disrupted the intense situation by excusing himself to the bathroom or the moments when everyone seeked Monk Chaeshin’s wisdom and the sound effects that play in the background every time he speaks. I liked the tone and mood that the drama was going for in this first episode and its surprising ability to nicely balance both the intensity and humor.

Man was it nice to see Song Joong-ki back on my screen after what would be about a 2-year break after his last drama ‘Arthdal Chronicles.’ While that drama was definitely unique and different, it was not the easiest drama to follow or to watch and I couldn’t get around to really caring for it. I want to eventually get around to watching ‘Space Sweepers’ as I’ve heard rave reviews about it, but ‘Vincenzo’ is just taking up all my free time over the weekend. Regardless, Song Joong-ki is so good as an actor who also is known for his beautiful face and looks. He’s so charismatic in here and really fits his character as Vincenzo so well. I even love the small hints of comedic timing such as with the shower scene or the scene where he’s cursing his lungs out after having gotten all his belongings stolen. Song Joong-ki’s definitely so charming as Vincenzo and I never knew that I would miss seeing him on my screen this much until this drama aired.

Is it sad that I was skeptical of Yoo Jae-myung and his character because of how traumatizing his role in ‘Itaewon Class’ as the big bad villain was? It’s been about a year since I’ve seen that drama and I still cannot forget just how powerful and scary he was as the antagonist. Now I’m just fearful of the type of characters he plays in his projects and it’s gotten so bad to the point where I’m just praying that he doesn’t turn out to be like anything in ‘Itaewon Class.’ Yoo Jae-myung is brilliant and great in anything he does though and his portrayal of Lawyer Hong is no exception. His little bickers and fights with Cha-young are funny and I’m glad that he’s playing a nicer and more just character in this drama.

Unfortunately, I can’t say the same about Jeon Yeo-bin who I wasn’t completely sold on as the whimsical, haughty, and loud Cha-young. I knew from her very first scene that it was a different type of character that she was going to need time to lean into. This isn’t an attack towards Jeon Yeo-bin or her acting per se because I LOVE the actress and I think she has what it takes to be a wonderful one. We all saw how great and raw she was in ‘Be Melodramatic’ and how she carried herself in that drama. Her acting and her character arc was what sold me as a fan. While I love Jeon Yeo-bin, I can’t say the same about her portrayal of Cha-young, but I also don’t fault Jeon Yeo-bin entirely. I think a part of it also has to do with Cha-young the character itself and me not really knowing what type of character it wants to be. I can sort of see where the drama is trying to go with the character, but I definitely didn’t have as good of a grasp or understanding of the character like how I did with, say, Vincenzo or Lawyer Hong. Although she’s all these types of characteristics, she’s sort of a mystery to me and it’s going to take me a bit longer to figure out how she should be presented.

I really enjoyed the last 10 minutes of this episode and watching our tenants go up against the bad guys. Along with the comedic highlights, it was also nice to see our tenants not have to go through the battle alone like how they’ve been doing all along. Now they have Vincenzo on their side even if his reasonings and intentions are different. It’s nice to see him in action even if he’s there for his own personal gains and benefits rather than for the tenants and his want to protect them. They’re all there for different reasons and for Vincenzo, his goal is to access the gold hidden in the secret room of the basement. Of course, it all sounds easier said than done and all it takes is going up against a big and powerful conglomerate to get things done. It won’t be an easy fight by any means, but it should be one that will ultimately make Vincenzo’s one-month journey in Korea well worth it.

Extra photos from the first episode~