Recap Korean Drama "To My Star 2: Our Untold Stories" Episode 1

Season 2 of To My Star starts with a short recap of what happened last season as fans are taken back to the way Actor Kang Seo-joon falls in love with Chef Han Ji-woo. A year has passed since and the couple has dated for the same period. In what seems like a flashback, Seo-joon and Ji-woo are in a happy relationship as they profess their love for each other as they do mundane chores at their house.

The episode then cuts to a scene where Seo-joon is filming for one of his upcoming projects. The director of the project keeps delaying his shoot and disrupting his schedule. Seo-joon’s manager Baek Ho-min too is unable to speak up for the actor as the assistant director of the projects seems to be under a lot of pressure. 

Suddenly, Seo-joon plans on fleeing after abandoning the shoot. He explains that the assistant director and the rest of the crew were not sleeping well to meet the director’s demands. This could possibly disrupt the rest of the shooting schedule which is why Seo-joon was being the bad guy now so that the crew could rest.

On his drive back, Seo-joon threatens Ho-min by saying he will stop working on the rest of his schedule. He asks if Kim Pil-hyun, the CEO of his acting agency, TB Entertainment had found the man Seo-joon was looking for. When the CEO states that he was not yet found, Seo-joon throws a tantrum.

The CEO states that the man will be found soon and Seo-joon agrees to continue working for another day. Seo-joon goes back home and recalls a flashback scene of being greeted by Ji-woo at the door. In present time, Seo-joon enters an empty room and it is obvious that Ji-woo has left him after a sour breakup.

Seo-joon tries calling Ji-woo but his number is still unreachable. The next morning, Seo-joon has another flashback of the good times with Ji-woo as the chef wakes his boyfriend up. That day Seo-joon is shooting an advertisement for a jewelry collection. 

As he exits the green room he steps on a bracelet belonging to the jewellery designer – Jung Sung-yoon. He offers to compensate her for the item of jewellery but Sung-yoon declines and asks him to compensate her by working hard on the advertisement.

After his shoot, Seo-joon visits Pil-hyun at the TB Entertainment headquarters. The CEO informs the actor that he had found the person he had been looking for. Pil-hyun states that Ji-woo’s partner Chef Kim Hyung-ki.

Pil-hyun reveals that Ji-woo had started his own restaurant – Ti Aspetto in his hometown. Curious about his ex-boyfriend, Seo-joon immediately leaves to visit Ji-woo. The restaurant is a 3-4 hour drive away from Seoul. Seo-joon states that Ji-woon had gone too far from him. 

Seo-joon recalls how Ji-woo had broken up with him by leaving a note by calling it quits before he disappeared without an explanation. He reveals how he managed to cope with Ji-woo’s disappearance with the hope that the chef would return someday but that never happened.

The actor can be seen trying hard to cope with the heartbreak as in present-day Seo-joon states that the only reason he was reaching out to Ji-woo was that he needed answers. Seo-joon mentions that he only wanted to ask Ji-woo what he did was so wrong to make the chef leave him.

Seo-joon arrives at Ji-woo’s restaurant which is now closed. The village chief meets him outside and leads him to Ji-woo’s house. The chief mentions that Ji-woo was not very friendly with the locals and his business was not even doing well because he served Italian food in a rural area. 

Just as Seo-joon was about to enter the front yard of Ji-woo’s house, the chef walked out of his house with a plate of food. Seo-joon is left dumbfounded looking at his ex-boyfriend a year after Ji-woo ended things. Just then a young child walks towards Ji-woo’s house with his mother and addresses Ji-woo as ‘dad’ shocking Seo-joon.

The actor asks why the little girl calls Ji-woo her ‘dad’ when her mother clarifies that they were just close to the chef and were friends. Ji-woo tells the lady that she needn’t explain herself and hands the plate of food to them asking them to eat by themselves.

Seo-joon is shocked and asks the girl not to call just anyone her dad. The child explains that she and the chef share the same surname which is why she jokingly addressed him as her father. After the woman and the child leave, Seo-joon invites himself inside the chef’s house.

Ji-woo asks him to stop kidding around and declares that they had broken up. Seo-joon asks that they had not mutually agreed upon and break up after a discussion and that Ji-woo had just up and left without an explanation. 

A prologue shows Ji-woo and Seo-joon on a date as they discuss their futures years later. Back then Seo-joon hopes that the couple would live in a low-key town in a hut-like home. Ji-woo says that it would be hard to imagine the two together after so many years but states that he would still like to see it through. 

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The Episode Review

When it comes to Korean BL’s, the only thing that is off-putting is the fact that the shows only last less than 30 minutes per episode. Having a back story in the form of a 2-hour long movie sort of a first season which was divided into 10 very very short episodes, fans know what they are walking into when they start the second season of ‘To My Star’.

The second season has taken a leap and a lot has changed. I expected the lead couple, Seo-joon and Ji-woo to have had differences but given the journey, the two had in the first season was very refreshing. It is very strange to have Ji-woo just up and leave in the second season after breaking up with Seo-joon over text.

If Pil-hyun had been friends with Ji-woo for years, I wonder why it took him so long to trace the chef. Nevertheless, it seems like our boys have differences, and knowing how most stories end with a happy ending, I wish the first season ended with a cliffhanger, perhaps having Ji-woo leave so that the plot would have built further up.