I thought it was an interesting reveal that it was Sun that influenced Mr. Paik to turn Jin from a Manager Trainee into a henchman/executioner.

Actually, I saw Sun's failure to do what was right...again.

1. Sun lied to Jin saying furniture and honeymoon were needed.
2. Jin discovers the money and doesn't want it.
3. Sun meets Jin's bio-mama and says "I can have you whacked but I'm gonna give you the money anyway".

I think Sun could have handled this better.

Actually, I saw Sun's failure to do what was right...again.

1. Sun lied to Jin saying furniture and honeymoon were needed.
2. Jin discovers the money and doesn't want it.
3. Sun meets Jin's bio-mama and says "I can have you whacked but I'm gonna give you the money anyway".

I think Sun could have handled this better.

I was really afraid Sun was going to murder the woman--I was relieved when she only threatened to.

But she should know that you can never be rid of a blackmailer.

She may have been able to handle it better, but everything she did was out of love for Jin... right or wrong.

Okay before this debate really gets raging and we start pointing the finger, MR. PAIK IS A HUGE A**HOLE AND HE IS THE ONE WHO MADE JIN A HENCHMAN!!!!!!

okay I feel better now, well not really! A hundred grand? Pfffft, that's nothing to that guy. If he really cared about his daughter he would want her to be happy in her marraige and would not force a decent guy to do such things as it would obviously cause problems at home. This is the one thing about this episode that is really pissing me off! I hate Mr Paik! DAMN!!!

Actually, I saw Sun's failure to do what was right...again.

1. Sun lied to Jin saying furniture and honeymoon were needed.
2. Jin discovers the money and doesn't want it.
3. Sun meets Jin's bio-mama and says "I can have you whacked but I'm gonna give you the money anyway".

I think Sun could have handled this better.
What else are ya gonna do with a blackmailing ex-prostitute mother-in-law who has no interest in her son other than as a tool to obtain money?? At least her threat seemed to stick with the woman. I don't think Sun had ever had to deal with anything like the blackmailing mother-in-law from hell.

She may have been able to handle it better, but everything she did was out of love for Jin... right or wrong.
So true, Rodimus! She was trying to protect him as Jin's father had done for years. (How much do we love Mr. Kwon??!! :heart: He seems like such a sweetheart but nobody's dummy!)

Okay before this debate really gets raging and we start pointing the finger, MR. PAIK IS A HUGE A**HOLE AND HE IS THE ONE WHO MADE JIN A HENCHMAN!!!!!!...


That's right. It was Mr. Paik's conditions and not Sun's. Sometimes you make a decision thinking you have all the facts and can live with what you believe it will entail. It's only after you're in the middle of things that you realize that what you thought was the deal wasn't what you thought it would be. I think this is what happened with Sun.

I found it sad that she loved him so much she was willing to turn him into the debt of her father rather than learn of his mother -
It must really be bad in his culture to be from the wrong family to say his father is dead and the father to accept it - imagine what that would have done to him to learn his mother was a hooker and that the man that raised him might not even be his dad -
I think it took a lot of courage for her to do what she did - I just wish he Daddy would have let her help him without asking for Jin's soul in return!

She may have been able to handle it better, but everything she did was out of love for Jin... right or wrong.

Indeed, but I did find the irony that she was trying to save him from the shame of who he was (the son of a prostitute and possibly a poor fisherman (with an extremely good heart)), and instead brought about the shame in who he eventually became (a henchman) which nearly ended their marriage.
100%

It must really be bad in his culture to be from the wrong family to say his father is dead and the father to accept it - imagine what that would have done to him to learn his mother was a hooker and that the man that raised him might not even be his dad

You have no idea. In the West, we deal with this kind of scandal now and wear it almost like a badge of honer, but in Korea and Japan, it would be a scandal that would ruin you completely. We take for granted the ability to rise above who we were to better ourselves, but where you come from plays a huge part in how you are perceived and what opportunities you have in other cultures.

I like that we learned why Jin became the henchman. It goes back to the long running theme about how our choices affect our lives, and the lives of others.

I like that we learned why Jin became the henchman. It goes back to the long running theme about how our choices affect our lives, and the lives of others.

Indeed. Nothing happens in a vacuum.

It was a choice that she had to make between the lesser of two evils. Sun knew that in their culture, Jin's shame would have been worse than becoming her father's lackey. I agree that she could have handled it much better, but she doesn't really have that much of her father in her. If she was more like her dad, Jin's momma would have been 6 feet under. This just really goes to show how decisions that you make, decisions that you are forced into making can have serious consequences. The blackmail thing set the wheels in motion for them to wind up on the island. If Sun wasn't blackmailed, Jin would not have had to become a henchman, their relationship would not have become strained, Sun would not have slept with Jael, they would not have been on the flight for her father.

When Sun said that she was trying to save someone she loved from shame, and her dad asked if it was her husband, I thought "Oh, no. She just chose her husband over him." He wants to ruin Jin, make him into someone Sun would not respect, so that he can be #1 to his little girl again.

I think Paik would have given Jin the job anyway, regardless of the money. That's the kind of guy he is. He didn't care that he was ruining his daughter's life by doing this to the man she loves.

Actually, I saw Sun's failure to do what was right...again.

1. Sun lied to Jin saying furniture and honeymoon were needed.
2. Jin discovers the money and doesn't want it.
3. Sun meets Jin's bio-mama and says "I can have you whacked but I'm gonna give you the money anyway".

I think Sun could have handled this better.


i know! i was so ticked off, i thought her character smarter than that. especially once her father said Jin would have to be in his service....

I admire almost everything about the way Sun handled this entire thing...except for ONE thing: When Paik said, IF this is for your husband, I will remove him as floor manager and bring him to work for me, and you know what that means, WHY did she not simply say "Father, the money is not for him or due to anything he did." End of prob and he could have stayed on as floor manager. Paik just needed to hear that Jin wasn't the reason she was asking for the money, and really he was not. It was his dang Virgie-Arthur-esque mother blackmailing Sun, whom he didn't even know was alive.

So I didn't understand why Sun didn't say something, as there was a pregnant pause there when she could have easily assured Paik that, no, this is nothing to do with anything that Jin did or caused, and don't ask me any more questions. ...Maybe she felt that if she did say that, however, he would demand to know what the money WAS for, and she felt that she should just take it while the taking was good, ya know?

Unlike some posters I've read on the board today (not just in this thread), I don't see anything wrong at all with the threat Sun issued to Jin's mother in her last scene with her. This woman, judging by everything we know about her so far, not only didn't care at all about her own son, whom she abandoned at birth, but now she is coming back trying to exploit him for profit. Nice. I say, you GO, Sun! All she did was threaten her, she did not hurt her and it was self defense. This woman was threatening to hurt her husband in a devastating way. All she did was use what she had--the power of her family name--to get this bee-otch to back off for good. Again, I see NOTHING wrong with it, ethically. Now, that said, had she actually had the woman killed, that would be a horse of a different color, ethically. But all she did was defend Jin with the only weapon she had, and it didn't hurt anyone. I think Sun rocked in this episode.

My only prob was that she didn't disabuse her dad of the notion that Jin had caused the need for the 100k. On first glance, it would seem such a simple, easy thing to do and one that could have spared Jin so much at the hands of Paik. But even just in the course of composing this post, I'm realizing that it was more complicated than that (aren't things always on LOST *lol*...which is why I love the show!). I really think now that Sun knows her father and that, had she said "Jin didn't cause this, leave him alone." or whatever, he would have pressed her further about what she wanted the money for. When she said "no questions asked", he said NO, you don't get to say no questions asked. I think she knows her father and she knew, okay, I have to let him think that or I'm not walking out of here with 100k.

Anyway, I think Sun rocked, ethically and every other way, in this episode. I loved her scene with Jin's lovely father (that man is so wonderful, I just love him more and more each time we learn more about him). They were both so frank, caring and warm in that scene. Both of them truly love Jin and just wanted to do what was best for him.

I did not see this anywhere but it is in line with this thread. In the subtitles, she said something like she would keep their secrets. I believed this to be secrets between her father and her. Part of her attempt to manipulate her father into getting the money. Did anyone else see that and what secrets?

I thought she was great! And the scene with the bio-mama at the end of the flashbacks-she is one tough Sun! Played perfectly!

So how long do you think it'll be before we see Mr. Paik finding out Sun is being blackmailed...and sending Jin to take care of it?

Okay before this debate really gets raging and we start pointing the finger, MR. PAIK IS A HUGE A**HOLE AND HE IS THE ONE WHO MADE JIN A HENCHMAN!!!!!!

okay I feel better now, well not really! A hundred grand? Pfffft, that's nothing to that guy. If he really cared about his daughter he would want her to be happy in her marraige and would not force a decent guy to do such things as it would obviously cause problems at home. This is the one thing about this episode that is really pissing me off! I hate Mr Paik! DAMN!!!

After watching the episode again I want to revisit what I wrote. I kind of think Sun could have approached her father differently. She asked for the money and didn't want to give an explanation, which her Father didn't agree with. Instead of being truthfull she tried to put her Father, a total control freak on a power trip, in a position he just wouldn't allow (can't quite find the words, kind of like not on higher ground than Sun?). So to maintain his control and "Face", he had to demand something in return.

Now I still hate Mr. Paik, and I'm not sure how he would have behaved if Sun took a different tact, maybe he still would have made the same decision. But I think Sun came across as very insubordinate and forced his hand. I wish they could have talked about it some how and maybe if somebody had to be in debt it could have been Sun.

I hated this 'reveal'. Sun knows that it's her fault that Jin does that work, and she knows what it is. But when you watch the earlier episodes, it's like she blames Jin for it, like it was his choice, even though we've been shown that she knew all along why it was happening. Seems really tacked on and ill-thought out to me. I don't believe the writers always had this planned from the start, similar to lots of Jack's flashbacks which don't add to me regarding his father's drinking, and reason for drinking...

I thought Sun's intentions were very sweet. It's important to remember the visit that she had with Jin's father. He asked, as a personal favor to him, that she not let Jin find out. And how could anyone deny that sweet old man?? We know what happened to Jin, and his relationship with Sun, as a result of his career change. I don't know if, when she took the money, she could have predicted this or not. Maybe if she knew what would happen she would have done things differently, but at the time IMO she did the right thing.

I'm curious as to whether or not the dipiction of Korean culture in the episode is accurate. I realize that compared to Western culture, honor plays a much bigger role. But I also know that Korea is changing very rapidly, and I wonder if the events from DOC were accurate, or just an old-fashioned stereotype.

Are there any Koreans out there who can enlighten me???