Penultimate Problems
The penultimate episode to Melting Me Softly is here and it certainly didn’t disappoint, setting things up nicely for the finale tomorrow with quite the cliffhanger surrounding Mi-Ran’s fate. While the show hasn’t been the strongest k-drama this year and often felt quite slow, the last episode promises to end things in dramatic fashion for our two protagonists. We start the episode where we left off from before, with the killer approaching Mi-Ran. As he reaches out for her, Mi-Ran grabs the taser and electrocutes him. She then jumps in the driver seat and manages to get away while we see Dong-Chang being taken back home from the lab by Ji-Hoon. Noticing that he has a missed call from Mi-Ran, he calls her and, noticing something wrong with his voice, she decides to stay quiet about her incident. While Ha-Young decides to do a piece about the killer on the news, Dong-Chan finds out that Mi-Ran got attacked. As he struggles to get up, he finds her at his doorstep. She reveals that she’ll do anything to catch the killer and after they do get him, they cling to the thought of living a normal life after they have both taken the shot. As we see Dong-Chan keeping a video diary of his progress, he gives some advice to his siblings about their personal and professional lives. In the office, Hyun-Ki organises a meeting to discuss the show but as they all fire off different ideas, Dong-Chan happens to be the one who comes up with the best. After leaving the room, we then see that for the first time he starts to feel cold again, meaning the antidote is working. Ha-Young meets with Dong-Chan to tell him she has been offered a job in Washington and wonders if they can stay friends. After their talk, he requests from Hong-Suk to broadcast the killer’s face on TV in a bid to catch him as he’s still after them. As he becomes agitated, he realizes that his temperature is not going up; another very good sign. Driving home, Mi-Ran marvels at the fact that Dong-Chan is now feeling the cold. While Young-Sun and his son discuss their lives and tell each other how happy they are, Dong-Chan and Mi-Ran spend a fun afternoon together before she heads back to work. The next day, Dong-Chan gets his last shot and Professor Hwang reveals that things might be a little rough while his temperature returns to normal. After sleeping, Dong-Chan wakes up to find his temperature at 36.5. He quickly calls Mi-Ran to tell her the good news and it’s here Professor Hwang confirms that he’s cured. This prompts him to request Mi-Ran to visit as soon as possible to take her shot. After having breakfast with his family, Dong-Chan speaks with Mi-Ran’s parents about the success of his antidote. Realising what it means for their daughter, they weep for joy, relieved that she will finally live a normal life. During the shooting of their show, Dong-Chan arrives to watch Mi-Ran in action. Unfortunately, she sees the killer approaching Dong-Chan. She runs towards him and as she jumps into his arms, the killer stabs her and runs off. She’s rushed into hospital and things aren’t looking good as she needs surgery but the anaesthesia could cause her body temperature to go up. With no other viable solution, Dong-Chang decides to put Mi-Ran back in a cryonic capsule while they find medicine to instantly restore her temperature, as the one they have now takes a week to kick in. However, her condition is quite severe and the doctor reveals she only has 24 hours. The episode then ends with Mi-Ran being put back in the capsule while a sad Dong-Chan watches on, remembering the promise he made to her when she asked him not to follow if she was ever to be frozen again. With the finale looming on the horizon. Melting Me Softly offers up quite the thrilling episode, with a decent twist at the end. Dong-Chan had quite a difficult decision to make as he put Mi-Ran back in the capsule and this definitely made the episode more interesting. This appears to have been foreshadowed in the previous episode too when Mi-Ran mentions going back in the capsule but I didn’t see this connection until quite late on and the twist certainly came as a surprise. While some of the secondary characters seem to have been given happy endings in the episode, the biggest questions remain hovering over our two protagonists. How long will Mi-Ran have to stay frozen? Will Dong-Chan decide to be frozen with her? Or will he grow old as they scramble to find another cure? All these questions should hopefully be answered in the finale tomorrow and I’m certainly intrigued to see how this one will wrap up!
