TV Recap: City Hunter Episode 3

Guess what time it is? It's CITY HUNTER TIME WOOOOT.

Remember how I mentioned last week that I read the City Hunter manga a long time ago? I actually binge-read all of the current English scanlations (up to Chapter 136) recently, so now I can conclusively report that the manga is absolutely nothing like this drama. Ryo Saeba... like I remembered, he's a huge pervert, but no one can deny that he's very charming. I suspect the Lee Min Ho playboy behavior that weirded me out last episode was probably inspired by Ryo, but the two City Hunters are rather different. For starters, I'm not ready to bestow the title of Major Badass upon Lee Min Ho yet. Though I'll admit he's got a pretty face, he has yet to convince me he's worthy of such an honor, especially if he's still getting judo-thrown by Nana. Ryo Saeba though... he freaking shoots through his own left hand in order to slow down the bullet enough so that it doesn't hit other civilians. And this happens only in the second chapter!

On another note, I've discovered the secret to preventing binge-watching TV. If you force yourself to write a recap each time, there's no way you're gonna plow through episodes! BAHAHAHAHAHAHA. Ahem. Without further ado....

At the end of Episode 2, Lee Min Ho uncovers the nefarious schemes of Evil Councilman #1, whom I'm just gonna refer to now as Numero Uno because it's shorter and my fingers have to reach farther to hit the # sign. He catches Numero Uno's accomplice shredding some suspicious documents, and so Lee Min Ho sets off the fire alarm, forcing everyone to evacuate so he can take photos of incriminating paperwork on his iPhone and steal the shredded paper.  During all this, I wonder why nobody notices him on all the security cameras, but I guess maybe they're too busy trying to save their own asses to notice.

With incredible painstaking patience that I am probably incapable of displaying (fortunately fast-forwarded so we only saw like 20 seconds of work), Lee Min Ho tapes the shredded documents back together, and it pretty much confirms what we already suspected--the two orphan kids never received their food stamps and someone pocketed the money instead. Then he tracks down Numero Uno's partner and takes out a bunch of dudes in broad daylight before stealing their important files. Lee Min Ho sends all the incriminating evidence to Cute Prosecutor. This whole sequence is very Dark Knight to me... Lee Min Ho as Christian Bale as Bruce Wayne, rich playboy extraordinaire by day and mysterious vigilante by night, Cute Prosecutor as the respected lawyer and nice guy, Harvey Dent.  Or maybe Commissioner Gordon. Something like that.

So Numero Uno is on trial for corruption, and he gives a rousing speech claiming innocence. Or rather, he flails his hands around wildly while screaming hoarsely about justice and such. I just snorted while trying to imagine President Obama talking like this. Unfortunately, the other assemblymen must collectively vote whether to arrest Numero Uno, and to no one's surprise, Numero Uno gets off jail-free. Poor Cute Prosecutor. Is this really how South Korea operates? I hope not. Maybe I misinterpreted what was going on, but what's the logic for having the assemblymen vote whether or not their own people can be arrested?? That's like summoning a gang to be the jury for their own member. 

Anyways, so the stupid bastard gets of free, and people be pissed. Lee Min Ho broods in the shadows after the verdict--and totally unrelated, but it finally occurs to me that I hate his hair right now so much because it reminds me of Justin Bieber's kiddie helmet cut from back when he was tolerable. Crazy McCrazypants is so angry that he HULK-CRUSHES a glass with his bare hands. Then there's a scene of Lee Min Ho being pissed at the shooting range where he shoots consecutive bullets all into the hole so it looks like he only got one shot on the target, much to the glee of his jealously inferior co-workers. He's still being angry and brooding until he goes to Nana's house, where she feeds him and the orphans. She makes some comment about whether or not it tastes like his mother's home-cooking, and he gets all sad.

Then there's this moment that I'm guessing is supposed to be cute but gave me the biggest eye-roll.

ONLY IN K-DRAMAS:
Boy:   I'm gonna go.
//stalks off//
20 seconds pass
Girl: I didn't even get to say goodbye!

Talk about slow reaction, yeesh.

So then a hodge-podge of scenes happen that shed light on some things but mainly just make me more confused. Cute Prosecutor visits his ex-girlfriend, who seems to own a pet store, and it seems he has some sort of connection to Nana so he's looking out for her. Meanwhile, sad Lee Min Ho calls the gambler who's taking care of some unconscious lady lying in the bed. At first, I thought his foster mother survived the gunshot, but then the gambler calls her by some other name so now I have no idea who this person is. Then I realize that the quasi-nice councilman who orders everyone's death is actually the president now (SAY WHAAAAT) and he warns the others in the Council of Five that corruption should be dealt with justice.

So the President's daughter shows up at the workplace the next day and insists that Lee Min Ho become her tutor... while also massively hitting on him.  God, this girl... she's cute and she knows it. And usually this irritates the hell out of me in real life, but I can't help but kinda like her, because she is an effing riot. He shuts her down real good, and later he picks up the Gambler from the airport because Crazy McCrazypants decided to send him back to Korea to keep an eye on Lee Min Ho. Except Nana thinks he rushed off during the lunch break in order to go out with another one of his supposed many girlfriends, so she's acting all pissy-flirty that night when she informs him that the orphans were chosen as flower kids for Numero Uno's book-signing event.

Fast-forward to the day of the book-signing event, and all the key players are there. If there is a competition for cheesiest and corniest book titles out there, I bet all my money on Numero Uno's: "The Day the Citizens' Tears Fall is the Day I Weep." Excuse me for a moment as I wipe the vomit of corn and cheese from my keyboard. The orphans get hustled off to see Numero Uno in less-than-welcoming fashion, while Nana has a nice moment with the Cute Prosecutor and they are adorbs. Meanwhile, Lee Min Ho and the Gambler start planning their elaborate scheme around the premises. Numero Uno tries to intimidate the two orphans to reveal Lee Min Ho's identity, since he found out that Lee Min Ho was the one who stole the documents, but Lee Min Ho shows up and allows the bodyguards to bring him before Numero Uno.

Numero Uno apparently is not only gross and heartless, but really really stupid. In a moment of bravado, he starts spit-spraying in that annoying hoarse yelling of his about how nobody cares about the orphans and how it's okay for him to embezzle money from taxes. It always irritates me when villains are like, "Before I get rid of you... let me tell you EVERYTHING ABOUT MY MASTERPLAN, so just in case you manage to get out of here alive you can report back to everyone about what you heard!" But actually, I'm only half-paying attention to all the shit this guy is spouting, because Lee Min Ho's lips are ridiculously glossy and distracting.

Lee Min Ho records all this on a tiny camera embedded in his glasses, and the Gambler uploads this onto the computer for broadcast. In another Batman-esque moment, the video of Numero Uno's confession starts playing on like every computer in South Korea. Numero Uno is about to give some speech about weeping about his citizen's tears or something, when his presentation changes to that video and everyone is all appalled. One of the other councilmen (who fudged the numbers in the first place) orders his bodyguard to get rid of Numero Uno, and the bodyguard drags him offstage and takes him away.

Meanwhile upstairs, Lee Min Ho dispatches the other guards with ease and comes face to face with a fat cook. The cook knocks him down and is about to fillet him with a butcher knife but Lee Min Ho takes him down with a spoon HAHAHA. Then he ziplines down to the dock and onto the yacht where the bodyguard is about to strangle Numero Uno. He knocks the bodyguard into the water and then shoots a tranquilizer dart into Numero Uno's fat body. Cut to the next scene, where the Gambler and Lee Min Ho pose as deliverymen and drop off this huge box at the prosecutor's office. A bunch of reporters show up, having received a tip to go there. Cute Prosecutor opens the package and inside is Numero Uno all tied up with a bunch of dog tags around his neck.

The Gambler drops Lee Min Ho off at the park where Nana and the orphans are. Then we're treated to another scene oozing with cheese, where Lee Min Ho walks into one of those fountains where water shoots out of the ground while wearing a suit and dress shoes. WTF MAN! THOSE THINGS ARE EXPENSIVE! He comments how they never had these in the US, which I'm calling bullshit because I've definitely seen those in California before. Well, maybe they don't have them at MIT. Anyways, he tries to cheer up the orphans who are all sad and disillusioned because now they think adults are just crocks full of shit. Eventually, all four of them run around the fountains like a happy family.

Lee Min Ho has dinner at Nana's and they have some cute moments that make me consider jumping ship from Cute Prosector/Nana to this one that's obviously endgame. They're watching TV and Nana is totally admiring the prosecutor for doing good work while insulting Lee Min Ho for doing nothing all day except going on dates with women. Someone on the TV dubs the mysterious vigilante as the "City Hunter." Lee Min Ho gets a call from Dad, which he doesn't answer until after he leaves Nana's. Oh boy, CRAZY MCCRAZYPANTS IS PISSED HAHAHA. If Lee Min Ho's not doing your stupid revenge plan properly, you get yo ass over and do it yourself, ya stinker!!

In a parallel storyline, the prosecutor's office discovers that the dog tags belong to special agents who all went MIA in 1983. BA-DUM-DUM. The President gets all worried, and so he goes off to visit a certain someone...

Meanwhile, the Gambler is concerned about Lee Min Ho's seemingly cold attitude towards the identity of his birth mother, so the Gambler tracks down her address and gives it to Lee Min Ho, who responds coldly and disinterestedly. But of course, he's actually kind of curious, so he goes over to his mom's place and watches her cooking dokbokki at this little snack shop. But then this mysterious black car shows up, and an agent goes up and say something to her that Lee Min Ho can't quite catch. She LEAVES THE DOKBOKKI STILL COOKING ON THE STOVE (collective gasp from the audience... aka, just me) and goes down to the car where it turns out the President is sitting in the backseat. Then Lee Min Ho turns around, and we see CRAZY MCCRAZYPANTS in the flesh and in Seoul!! END EPISODE.

SL: mmmmm his mom is making dokbokki. i want some...

      what the frick she just leaves the food there cooking??!!

       i am very concerned for the dokbokki

       awwwww shit crazy mccrazypants is here. damn i hate that guy
YY: hahaha in kpop universe the laws of science do no exist. 
       things happen only if the script says so

       do not fear for the dokbokki unless it is meant to be ruined.
       in which case nothing can stop it from being ruined.

        yeah...that guy does not get better with time....

SL: okay, episode 3 has ended

       WHAT WILL HAPPEN NEXT TO OUR INTREPID HERO?
       WHAT DOES THE PRESIDENT WANT FROM HIS MOTHER?
       AND WHAT WILL HAPPEN TO THE DOKBOKKI???
       FIND OUT IN THE NEXT EPISODE OF.... CITY HUNTERRRRRRRR!!!!