Recap Korean Drama "Cheer Up" Episode 10-11

Is it just me or is this show getting better? No, there’s no cheering this week, which is a disappointment, but there’s also almost no mystery, prophecy, or death talk either. And when you take those things out of the equation I realized just how good of a drama this could be. We are left with college kids dealing with the dilemmas of their families, their hearts, and their growth toward adulthood, with a few alcohol blackouts along the way. These episodes left me smiling and wanting to see more of these characters, which hasn’t always been the case.

First, nothing comes of the observatory meeting that we ended Episode 9 with. Jung-woo leaves without ever coming face to face with the culprit. We don’t learn anything new about the motives of this creepy sunbae in these episodes either. But in lieu of all that, we get moments that are heartfelt and downright hilarious, like when Jin-hee and Chun-yang come to campus and finally realize who each other’s kids are.

After the festival, Jin-hee saunters up to the team and offers to buy them dinner. What she really wants is to find out who this girl is that her son is rumored to be dating. Hae-yi raises her hand but says that she and Sun-ho are not dating. To clarify, Sun-ho admits that he’s the one with the crush on Hae-yi, not the other way around. Jin-hee can’t believe it and begins to protest when Chun-yang walks up and defends Hae-yi. Of course Sun-ho is the one with the crush on her daughter — and he’s not the only one! The two moms bicker and Sun-ho feels embarrassed, but Hae-yi is clearly proud.

While I loved this scene because of the moms showing off, it also serves to let Jung-woo know that Hae-yi does not have feelings for Sun-ho. Sun-ho’s confession — in front of the whole team — leads to teasing when they all go to Cheers for celebratory drinks. There, the team has about ten drinks too many and wakes up in Busan unsure of how they arrived.

It turns out they’re all at Jung-woo’s mom’s house. They took a taxi from Seoul when Jung-woo started drunkenly crying about how he treated his mom the day before. They got the idea for all of them to go apologize to her together — which they did, in total mayhem — and now here they are, hungover and broke. Even worse is that Jung-woo’s mom wants payment for room and board since she allowed them to stay in the middle of the night and fed them breakfast. With no money, she sends them down to the street market to work of their debt (and I have no clue whose flower-print clothes they’re all wearing as they do it).

Hae-yi is no stranger to hard work so she gets down to business. But as she does, memories of the night before start creeping back into her blacked out brain. Somewhere in the drunkenness, there was a kiss! But with who? She tries to sneakily ask Sun-ho and Jung-woo who both deny anything out of the ordinary happened.

Later, Jung-woo and Hae-yi are sitting on the beach after dark, bonding over what it was like to wait for their working mothers to come home when they were kids. Hae-yi at least had her little brother, but she imagines that Jung-woo must have been lonely. We learned earlier that Jung-woo’s father was a singer (and not a successful one) and that is why his mom was wary of him focusing on cheering rather than studying. In the end, she tells him to keep doing what he loves because he shines so bright doing it.

In high spirits after the talk with his mom, and with Hae-yi right beside him as fireworks go off above the water, Jung-woo confesses to Hae-yi. Just at that moment, Hae-yi remembers the face of the person she kissed last night — and it’s Sun-ho. Ahhhh! Not only did she kiss him, she then puked all over him. Ugh, that’s rough (and gross). With this new information, she begins to avoid both boys as they vie hard for her attention.

Oddly, the kiss seems to confuse Hae-yi. Where she was once clear about her lack of feelings for Sun-ho, she now feels like she can’t decide who she likes and is stressed trying to figure it out. At home, she hears Jae-yi on the phone saying I love you to his girlfriend and suddenly the tables are turned. For once, Jae-yi is the one giving advice, and it’s adorable. He tells his noona that it’s simple, at some point she’ll just know who she likes.

Hae-yi gets a chance to test this advice when — thanks to a class assignment — she must go on a $10 date with both Sun-ho and Jung-woo. (Why didn’t I get any assignments like this in college?!)

Because of Hae-yi’s crazy work schedule, she sets up her dates with both guys on the same day. Sun-ho is first and when he realizes that she remembers the kiss, he says to pretend it never happened so they can feel comfortable around each other. With the $10 limit, Sun-ho borrows the apartment of a friend, where he and Hae-yi have river views, video games, and pasta making.

When Sun-ho burns the pasta, Hae-yi looks at his phone for the recipe but finds instead his well-researched notes on how to win her heart. He had everything planned for their date, including all the lines he would say to her (which she had thought sounded a little inauthentic, and now she understands why). As he’s trying to reclaim his phone, the two fall on the couch, face to face, but after an awkward pause it’s clear there will be no sober kissing for these two.

Hae-yi rushes off to her date with Jung-woo (waiting at a bus stop where the ad space reads, “Follow your heart”). While Sun-ho had everything planned and perfected, nothing goes right on the date with Jung-woo. The noodle shop has a two-hour wait, so they skip their meal only to find out the library he wanted to show her is closed. He drags her all over town, boring her, until they end up at the main event. Jung-woo is an astrophysics major, and so, he’s reserved time on the telescope at the observatory.

When Hae-yi sees Jung-woo in his element with the telescope, there’s no hiding her attraction. Looking up at the stars, she gets sentimental, asking if people turn to stars when they die. He answers her like a total nerd, giving a scientific explanation of matter. (She seems annoyed but I think I just fell for him.) She says she was thinking of her dad and wondering if he was up there. The intimacy between these two is unmistakable, as they always go back to discussing topics they hold close. Even if the beginning of the date was a failure, looking at the night sky moves her in a way that Sun-ho’s date plans couldn’t.

When Jung-woo and Hae-yi are walking home from their date in the rain, sharing an umbrella, Hae-yi takes the initiative she knows Jung-woo won’t. She grabs his wrist and leaves him wide-eyed with a kiss. The umbrella falls and we get lots of slow motion kissing. Before the episode ends, we see Hae-yi meet with Sun-ho and definitively dump him. She then goes to Jung-woo for more umbrella kissing and the two seem sealed in coupledom. Of course this leaves the question: what about the team’s no dating rule?

I know I haven’t been favorable to Jung-woo, but he really grew on me in these episodes. After he confessed to Hae-yi, he was instantly softer. His demeanor became looser and his face brighter. Sure, it’s probably in big part thanks to the makeup team, but he was literally glowing. When he put on that pink shirt and started showing off his brains, Sun-ho never stood a chance.