Recap Korean Drama "Inspector Koo" Episode 10

Jul 7, 2022

Episode 10 of Inspector Koo begins with Kyung-Yi laughing hysterically. Opening up the box outside their apartment, Kyung-Yi organizes the team to bring it inside.

So who is inside? Well, prior to this package arrive, news of Seong-Tae’s disposal spreads. Yong Sook turning her son into kimchi is big news and K happens to be listening in, camouflaged while hiding in a café.

She sneaks into the journalist’s house that night, tying him up and reading his report. So it seems Hyeong-Tae is the guy who’s known as Rabbit, and after strapping an alarm clock around his neck, K heads down to the beach to relax. We’re led to believe that she’s blown him up along with the whole karaoke bar just to prove a point. Yong Sook is delighted when she finds out.

Kim comes flying in with more good news just after this. Seong-Tae has been made the mayoral candidate and that means K is going to be a lot busier.

Back in the present, Kyung-Yi learns this guy is actually the tabloid journalist Yong Sook was led to believe was blown up. He was never killed, and in fact he actually received information from Ko-Dam regarding this big political scandal. This leaked footage happened to be lucrative footage from the docks. A 10 minute video where…nothing happens.

The gang, led by Geon-Wook this time, begin searching through the footage. Jun-Hyeon is there, along with five others. The thing is, it seems someone was unaccounted for. When Geon-Wook finds out, he rings K to let her know.

Kim shows up at his door dressed like a police officer, threatening him with a gun. After shooting the man in the stomach, Geon-Wook looks set to meet a sticky end… until his neighbour shows and inadvertently saves him at the last second.

Kim eventually heads back to the house and confronts K, wanting to know exactly what she’s been conspiring to do with Geon-Wook. He has her tranquilized and thrown in the basement for her troubles. Just before she loses consciousness though, K reveals that Kyung-Yi is still alive. If Yong Sook finds out, Mr Kim is going to be in a world of trouble.

This inevitably sees Kim confront Je-Hui, demanding to know where Kyung-Yi is. Je-Hui already knows of course, but hasn’t told Director Yong. She gives him the info regarding what Kyung-Yi is doing, and that inevitably sees him scramble up to Ko-Dam’s memorial center.

Only, he’s immediately put under arrest when he shows up. It turns out this whole thing was staged from the beginning. Santa, posing as a security guard, slips a ring in Kim’s pocket. Of course, prior to this the gang managed to take the SD card nestled on the back, so it looks like Kim has broken in and stolen the gear. More importantly than that though, it means Yong Sook’s right-hand man isn’t around for the fight to come.

K breaks free from her cell in what must be the easiest escape ever. She pretends to be asleep, waits for the guard to open up the cell, smacks him with a brick and sneaks out the drain pipes. With a blood-spattered face, she promises to fight back.

With the mission at Ko-Dam’s memorial site a success, Kyung-Yi uses the SD card, which holds an incriminating video. A home video of the boat gig is played. Cocaine is passed around, the party goers play games and someone drowns. Using the reflection from one of the guests’ glasses, Kyung-Yi learns that the person filming all of this happens to be Yong Sook’s younger son, Hyeong-Tae. He willingly lets the guy die. Of course, if this leaks out it would cause all sorts of problems for Yong Sook and her political campaign.

Eventually Kyung-Yi meets K on the train and makes her promise to leave Je-Hui alone. She agrees to the terms… if she makes it off the train unscathed. Unfortunately K comes prepared too.

She’s set up a bomb at Je-Hui’s house and confirms that if anyone gets off the train before it stops, then the apartment will blow sky high. K leaves, waving goodbye to Kyung-Yi as the train leaves the station. She hands over the trigger to a random girl at the station and tells her to press the button whenever she wants. And she does…which only cracks the glass on the clock. It was a big decoy all along.

As the episode closes out, Seong-Tae prepares to jog across a large suspension bridge. He makes it halfway until he slips. Looking up, he finds K staring back down at him.

The Episode Review

With one final week of episodes to go, Inspector Koo is just starting to ramp up the tension now. There’s a lot going on here, but it seems the end-goal is going to be stopping Yong Sook and taking down her whole criminal empire. In a way, this is actually quite disappointing, with a lot of the sparks surrounding the cat and mouse gamer for K and Kyung-Yi lacking in these later episodes.

Compared to some of the big missions midway through this season, these later chapters just haven’t quite had the same drive and urgency.