The Good Bad Mother – K-drama Episode 1 Recap & Review

Changing Fate

Episode 1 of The Good Bad Mother begins with Jin Young-soon comparing the fate of pigs with human beings. It is 1986 and she works in a delivery business. She is strong and cheery and her clients are all nice to her. Choi Hae-sik, a pig farmer who likes her tries to propose but her boss interrupts and all hell breaks loose as his pig runs away with the engagement ring. The chase is chaotic but they get the ring and she agrees to be his wife.

Hae-sik and Young-soon live a good life and he is excited for their first child. As for Young-soon, she keeps offering to work whether it is building a new pigsty or making the banners for the Olympics Torch Relay despite being pregnant. But one day, some men from Yongra Constructions arrive to break the pig farm which falls on the route of the torch relay as it would be embarrassing to broadcast it on a global platform.

Hae-sik is furious and the boss tries to reason with him by bribing him with American cigarettes but he doesn’t listen. That night, the men burn down their farm. The trial goes against Hae-sik as the boss bribes all the locals to claim the farm had problems and the fire is most likely an accident. 

However, Hae-sik does his own research on other corrupt deeds of the boss, Director Song and gets a recording of a guilty local who confesses that Yongra threatened them. He goes to Prosecutor Oh and shows the evidence. He also pays him a heavy fee by giving him all the money he had saved for his unborn child.

As he leaves, it is shown that even Oh is working with Song and informs him. As Hae-sik is going home, Song’s men capture and hang him. They frame it as suicide but Young-soon refuses to believe it. She confronts Oh but he says the last he met him, Hae-sik was drunk and he gives her Hae-sik’s money back to her. 

Young-soon is brokenhearted but decides to live for her child to make sure they don’t face the same hardships again. She moves to a new village, sets up a pig farm and studies the law. However, the locals are shocked to find a pig farm as they pride in the cleanliness of their village. They show up with pitchforks to destroy the farm but the moment they see that the owner is a pregnant woman, the local mothers start bonding.

But they once again threaten her. She stands her ground and brings up the laws they are breaking and they start fighting. However, Young-soon and another local pregnant woman go into labour just minutes apart. Young-soon gives birth to her son, Kang-ho while the local woman, Geum-ja gives birth to her daughter, Mi-joo.

Sung-ae, one of the young mothers who helps the two pregnant women has her infant son, Sam-sik on her back the whole time and tells him that the babies are his younger siblings. As all of the villagers swarm to help, they all become friends and let Young-soon keep her pig farm.

It cuts to a few years later with Mi-joo and Kang-ho being friends. However, Sam-sik bullies him despite Mi-joo trying to stop him. Kang-ho isn’t able to take it and swears at him.

At home, Young-soon disciplines him for swearing by hitting him and says he should quietly take the bullying as it is in his fate to become a prosecutor and live a good life. But for that, she refuses to let him go to school picnics or eat to his full so that he can study the whole time and he writes down that she is a bad mother.

Meanwhile, Geum-ja’s husband beats her and Mi-joo is furious. While her older two sisters dance and play around, she confronts her father who is dancing at a club with a young girl with a fancy manicure. Later that night she notices her mother’s nails are bare and dirty and so she decides to colour it with a red pen. She continues to do it well into her teen years much to her mother’s frustrations.

On her birthday which also happens to be Kang-ho’s, she steals some gimbaps from her kitchen as it is something kids mostly eat when on picnics. She hides in the school’s supply closet where Kang-ho often studies and surprises him. As they sit and eat, Sam-sik who only sees Kang-ho going inside decides to play a prank on him and locks the closet from outside.

Inside, Kang-ho stops from eating a lot and he explains his mother’s logic that if he gets full he will get sleepy and won’t be able to study. Mi-joo finds it ridiculous and he agrees. He says he used to believe a person was fated for one thing but seeing other students change their dreams constantly, he felt ridiculous about himself. She asks what his dream is and he says he doesn’t know. As they finally try to leave, they realise they are locked in. 

At home, Young-soon lovingly prepares dinner and a cake for Kang-ho and waits all night. At midnight, she worries and asks everyone around. The village chief’s wife thinks they may have run off together which doesn’t help the mood. As they finally go to Sam-sik’s, on hearing that Mi-joo is also missing, he cries and runs to free her. 

Inside the closet, Kang-ho is busy studying for their mid-terms the next day while Mi-joo tries to get his attention. As he brushes her off, she eats candy and plays with a hula hoop. However, she starts choking on the candy and he has to rush to help her with the Heimlich manoeuvre.

As luck would have it, Sam-sik and the rest of the locals unlock the closet at that moment. Thinking that Kang-ho is hugging Mi-joo, Sam-sik is jealous while the village chief’s wife jokes that at least they are clothed. Young-soon, however, only frets that Kang-ho has missed his extra classes and picks up his books. She sees that the notebook in which he was studying is actually filled with a drawing of Mi-joo.

She doesn’t say anything and leaves while Sam-sik’s mother scolds him for the prank. At home, Kang-ho sees the food laid out for him but says that he has had gimbap. Young-soon simply tells him to study then as he should not eat anymore lest he gets full.

It cuts to Young-soon dropping Kang-ho for his law exam and then spending the day with Hae-sik’s grave as she roots for her son. Meanwhile, Mi-joo who is now dating Kang-ho stops by to give him gifts and encourage him. She even paints one of his nails yellow to match her nails and he finds it endearing.

However, just before she leaves, a bike hits her. A worried Kang-ho takes her to the hospital and misses his exam. As she comes to, she is scared for him but he kisses her and comforts her as he says he can take the exam the next year. 

But at home, his mother is furious and tells him not to waste away his life. He says he has no life and she says if he wants to leave, being a prosecutor is his only way out. He believes that she wants him to be a prosecutor not so he can help the weak but so that she won’t be the weak one anymore. He barges to his room and looking at his painted nail, he tears up.

It cuts to Young-soon praying for Kang-ho to win his ongoing trial. He is now a ruthless prosecutor who seems to be working with Director Song who has framed the defendant.

The Episode Review

The Good Bad Mother arrives with a strong premiere, establishing the story quite early on. Despite its several time jumps and quick paced structure, it does well to introduce all the characters, bring out their personalities and give them backstories.

Even though there is quite some time to go before the actual story starts of Kang-ho getting amnesia and moving back in with his mother, the way everything is unravelling has pretty much hooked everyone in.

As for that ending, it is some penultimate episode-worthy cliffhanger. Sure, Lee Do-hyun played a sort of deranged character in The Glory, but it doesn’t seem that his role in The Good Bad Mother is similarly negative as the story is depicted as a healing drama with the second chances trope.

While he can easily pull off a psychopath if that is the route Kang-ho is going, it doesn’t seem like it. It is more likely that our hero is working with Director Song to unearth the murder of his father.