Motel California – K-drama Episode 2 Recap & Review

Episode 2

Episode 2 of Motel California starts with Yeon-soo and Chun-pil at Yeon-soo’s grandfather’s funeral. Chun-pil knows he’s waiting for Kang-hee to show up. A quick flashback shows Chun-pil, Yeon-soo and some other friends surprising Kang-hee by singing Happy Birthday for her.

She only seems to get annoyed though and walks away. Yeon-soo follows and says he will go wherever she goes for the rest of his life. When she asks why, he thinks that it is because he likes her. But he doesn’t say it out loud.

At present, Kang-hee is shocked to find Yeon-soo hugging her. She pays her respect to his grandfather when his portrait suddenly starts talking to her. He says he missed her and Kang-hee, in turn, asks why he “did that to her.” But she lets it go since it’s in the past. Yeon-soo’s mother Soon-ja comes running into the room then and falls down. She’s followed by her current husband.

Yeon-soo realises that Kang-hee has already left the hall. We see that she got tired of hearing the neighbours gossip about her and her parents. Yeon-soo goes after her and tells her to eat before she leaves. After Yeon-soo leaves, another of their friends, Seung-eon, tells Kang-hee to meet Ah-reum, another girl from their group.

Kang-hee sits down with her old friend but others in the funeral hall begin to talk about them in a derogative manner. A flashback shows Kang-hee, Seung-eon, Ah-reum, Han-woo and Yeon-soo as a group of friends.

The others teased them for various reasons, such as Kang-hee for living in a motel, Han-woo for living on a farm and Yeon-soo for being fat. They called them the Gangsters, playing on Kang-hee’s name. That’s when Kang-hee cleverly waited for lightning to strike them.

At present, Kang-hee goes over to the bullies’ table and reminds them of the lightning incident, particularly Heon-yeol, their leader. He mocks her and throws a drink over her but she upends a bowl of noodles over him and walks away. He throws a bottle at her but Yeon-soo intercepts it, even punching Heon-yeol when he goes too far. Seung-eon then escorts Kang-hee out.

At the funeral, Soon-ja criticises Kang-hee’s behaviour and warns Yeon-soo not to get involved with her. Meanwhile, Kang-hee thanks Seung-eon for living with her father (we learned earlier that he’s an orphan). They head back to the motel and Kang-hee recalls the night she left. She had told Yeon-soo that she couldn’t keep enduring in this town and had to leave.  

Kang-hee returns to the goshiwon (low rent lodging with small rooms) where she’s staying in Seoul. She gets a call from Seok-kyung and tells him she’s resigned from Moment, quickly cutting the call. She suddenly remembers that she had gotten drunk after quitting her job and Seok-kyung had called. In her drunken state, she had invited him over to her house and he had arrived.  

Kang-hee meets Jung-goo and we learn what happened. Esther had already seen Kang-hee’s design and she and Seok-kyung said they wanted her as the design head. Mr. Mok now asks Kang-hee to rejoin but she refuses to work with someone she dislikes. Instead, Seok-kyung and Esther offer to pay her a lot more to work with them directly.

She accepts the offer but not the payment because they’ve already paid her in self-respect as a designer. Esther then offers her friendship and invites Kang-hee to her wedding.

Kang-hee goes back to the goshiwon to find the pipes are not working and she can’t take a shower. Ah-reum calls her and asks if she can stay at Kang-hee’s house in Seoul for a day or two. Kang-hee lies and says she’s going on a business trip. But Ah-reum and Yeon-soo know that she’s lying and doesn’t work at Moment.

The two of them then catch a girl named Nan-woo trying to set a group of dogs free from being tested. Yeon-soo helps her send them to a dog shelter that he started in veterinary school. Nan-woo is very taken by him and later asks Ah-reum if Yeon-soo has a girlfriend and then if she knows what he’s doing on Christmas Eve.

Meanwhile, Kang-hee goes to Esther’s wedding and pictures her own wedding with Yeon-soo. She then meets Jung-goo and learns that she quit Moment as well, inspired by Kang-hee. Seok-kyung arrives and finds Kang-hee making a drawing of the wedding hall. He invites her for an after-party but she says she has plans.

A flashback shows Chun-pil taking Kang-hee to a fancy hotel for her birthday which happens to be on December 25th. This became their birthday routine. At present, Ah-reum calls Kang-hee and wishes her a happy birthday. Kang-hee then calls Yeon-soo to thank him for the Heon-yeol debacle but realises he is on a date with Nan-woo.

This seems to bother Kang-hee, who tells her father not to meet her at the hotel that night saying she has another man in her life. She then meets Seok-kyung and asks him if she can use him to get away from “a man claiming ownership of her.” She takes Seok-kyung up to the hotel room with her but instead of Chun-pil, Yeon-soo is waiting for her inside. Yeon-soo seems to recognise Seok-kyung.

A flashback to 2013 shows Yeon-soo and his friends playing music on stage with Chun-pil. Chun-pil had promised to tell Yeon-soo where Kang-hee lives in Seoul but only mentions that she stays in a goshiwon. Yeon-soo and Han-woo then go to Seoul and search for her but fail to do so. That is how Yeon-soo keeps coming back to Seoul and searching for Kang-hee.

He ends up finding her working part-time at a convenience store but sees her in the middle of a fight with her boss. Seok-kyung is there and tries to help Kang-hee by sending her a video of the altercation. Kang-hee sees Yeon-soo and gives him a can of soda, ordering him to go back and not come see her again.

At present, Seok-kyung is oblivious to the misunderstanding and tells Yeon-soo to transfer ownership of Kang-hee to him at the end of Motel California Episode 2.


 

The Episode Review

Motel California Episode 2 throws a lot at us but in a good way! Kang-hee bears the role of neighbourhood troublemaker back from the city, she finds the tables turned on her career, and we learn about her birthday routine with her father. There’s plenty going on and the multiple flashbacks keep adding more context to these characters’ current lives.

For example, Yeon-soo and Kang-hee’s stories are filled out and made more nuanced by the context of the rest of their friend group, particularly when we learn they were a group of underdogs banding together.  

With so many different elements, the story feels meaty and full even if the flow of it can be jumpy at times. You might need to connect a few dots yourself but for the most part, Kang-hee’s story is an easy one to invest in and the supporting characters seem real and nuanced themselves.

I am hoping we get more explanations of her behaviour, particularly her detachment from her childhood friends and her curtness with Yeon-soo when he searches all of Seoul for her.

That said, Lee Se-young portrays Kang-hee’s fiery determination very well and Na In-woo is extremely endearing as the awkward Yeon-soo. If nothing else, watching this over 6-foot tall man stumble around Kang-hee being lovestruck is a reason to keep watching this K-drama.

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