Recap "Now, We Are Breaking Up" Episode 16 with Song Hye Kyo and Jang Ki Young (Finale Episode)

What becomes of Sono and its team?

Seeing the team flounder after her sudden departure, she annotates each of their design sketchbooks with advice and leaves The One for the final time.

Chi-sook steps up, wanting to help Sono succeed as its co-founder now that Young-eun won’t be around.

Does Soo-ho actually replace Mi-sook with Min-kyung?

Min-kyung waits for Soo-ho as he leaves Vision PR one night. She regrets that she’ll never be able to apologise to Mi-sook and offers to be a big sister to Ji-min to make up for her wrongs. She also promises to think of Soo-ho as a colleague and nothing more.

After going home, Soo-ho – now confident doing housework – prepares dinner and helps Ji-min to change up. He finds a box Mi-sook left in Ji-min’s drawer full of useful items, birthday cards, and presents for Ji-min as she grows older.

Overcome with emotion, Soo-ho pledges to do his best by Ji-min so that Mi-sook doesn’t have to worry over them anymore.

What does Young-eun do after leaving The One?

Young-eun throws herself into her design process, motivated by the thought that her strength and her clothes will carry her to Jae-guk eventually.

Unfortunately, she has a hard time finding suppliers or a factory that will run the production for a mini line and she can’t finance anything more than that. She pulls strength from her memories of Jae-guk as rejections keep coming her way.

Word of her struggles finds its way back to everyone she left behind at The One.

What are Hye-ok and Yoo-jung doing now?

We get two brief scenes with our dreaded antagonists.

Hye-ok eats dinner alone in her home under the portrait she took with Jae-guk, which now hangs next to the existing one she has with Soo-wan.

Yoo-jung continues to remember and miss Soo-wan while life goes on around her.

Does Young-eun ever get her brand on its feet?

So-yong and Chi-hyung hand in their resignations and join Young-eun’s brand despite her unwillingness to drag them into such an unstable environment. They help her clear out her big walk-in closet and turn it into their new office space.

That same night, Young-eun gets a call from her old senior saying that Chi-sook has apparently landed into hot water again. She rushes over to the restaurant that her senior runs to find that Chi-sook has thrown her a surprise farewell party. Gwang-soo, Na-ri, and Sun-ju are in attendance.

Gwang-soo has also gathered Ms Choi and a few other suppliers that Young-eun worked with while at Sono. They all agree to help Young-eun launch her mini line.

What does Jae-guk get up to in Paris?

Jae-guk continues to yearn for Young-eun and uses his memories of her as motivation. He journeys to scenic locations for his photography and successfully holds his exhibition.

Two years pass and he gets a call from the Korean Fashion Industry Association about the upcoming Fashion Week in Busan – they want him to work on a project involving a leading fashion brand and a rising designer.

Do-hoon picks Jae-guk up when he returns to Korea and mentions Young-eun’s brand. Jae-guk has a knowing smile on his face – it’s possible that she’s the rising designer.

Do Chi-sook and Do-hoon live happily ever after?

Shortly after Jae-guk left for Paris, Chi-sook confessed to loving Do-hoon with all her heart. Now, two years later, they’ve taken the next step and moved in together.

CEO Hwang is scandalized, worrying over what people will say about them living together without first getting married. Chi-sook doesn’t share an ounce of his concern and Do-hoon sticks to his belief that marriage is a private matter between the partners involved.

CEO Hwang is stressed by their nonchalance but it’s unlikely that he’ll give them much more trouble than that.

Do Jung-ja and Taek-soo finally file their divorce? 

Yes. Although, Taek-soo now lives next door and when he comes over to fix Jung-ja’s faulty lights, it seems like there is some romantic tension brewing between them.

Jung-ja explains that she had wanted him to show this sort of concern and thought for her when they were actually married. She sends him home with a bag full of side dishes that leaves him giddy.

Do Young-eun and Jae-guk get back together?

Yes and no.

With Fashion Week just over the horizon, everyone flocks to Busan. Young-eun and Jae-guk stroll around the city, just missing each other multiple times in true K-drama style.

They finally come face-to-face, greeting each other with warm smiles. Young-eun praises Jae-guk’s exhibition, which she saw in a magazine.

Young-eun has a flashback to the day she decided on her brand name: “Hwa”, taken from the Korean word for “reciprocation”. For the love that Jae-guk gave her, the love that showed her how to be fearless, she considers building her brand until she’s successful enough to meet him again a form of reciprocation.

While this would seem like a solid path to a renewed relationship, Young-eun’s voice over then defines them as still being in the process of breaking up. And that’s where we leave this couple – in a relationship perpetually defined by its end.

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The Episode Review

Now, We Are Breaking Up’s finale is as much of a non-event as the majority of its episodes have been so far. Even with a two-year time skip, Young-eun hasn’t matured enough to comprehend her romance outside of its place in a countdown until an eventual breakup.

The conflict keeping this couple apart in the first place was stretched so thin that the writer doesn’t even bother to explain why it’s no longer relevant even though there’s no sign that their parents have suddenly consented to their relationship.

At least Chi-sook and Do-hoon are establishing healthy boundaries with CEO Hwang and seem to be heading into a blissful future together. Soo-ho and Ji-min are also learning how to move forward while keeping Mi-sook in their hearts. Taek-soo and Jung-ja’s entire subplot was random and poorly executed and it ends in much the same way.

This drama’s biggest victim, its fashion premise, remains underused until the very end. And without it, we’re left with something entirely forgettable.