One of the biggest things I learnt while watching this drama is we’re all good bad people when it comes to the people we love.

Throughout the drama, I wondered why pigs? And then it finally hit me around episode 10. At the beginning we got a back story of pigs. They were never filthy animals we now know them to be. Pigs are actually quite clean. They do their business in one area and eat in another. It wasn’t until humans began confining them that they had no freedom to do such. Hence the filth. The only way a pig can see the sky is if it falls on its back. This was again repeated by Young Soon after Kang Ho got into his accident and was I rehabilitation mode. The comparison I made was Kang Honwas the pig. He lived a life only seeing what his mom laid out in front of him. Básica having tunnel vision. It wasn’t until his accident that he “fell on his back” like a pig and was able to see the bright blue sky.

Jin Young Soon
A dedicated daughter, wife, mother and friend. She had her shortcomings (don’t we all). At first I hate her character. The way she basically robbed Kang Ho of a childhood and pressured him into a career and life he never wanted pissed me off so bad?. It wasn’t until later episodes that I was like, “ahhhhhh….that’s why she so twisted and hell bent on certain things.”
From day 1 her life was filled with pain. Witnessing the death of her parents. Then her husband, watching her son get into an accident and then finally dying from stomach cancer?‍?
Everything she did for her beloved son was deeply rooted in fear and love.

Fear - because she was scared to loose him the same way she lost everything she held so dear in her life. We see this clearly when Kang Ho never went on school trips. Gimbap are an essential snack on every school child’s trip. With Young Soon gimbap was basically a bad luck charm. She made it the morning of her family’s trip to her dad’s work picnic and they crashed then she made some for her husband and he ended murdered. So naturally a connection formed gimbap = death.

Love - Kang Ho was/is her pride and joy. She sacrificed all she could to make sure he never felt the absence of his dad. Granted she may have held on to him a bit to tightly, but this was only done because the thought of loosing him too would be devastating. Granted some of her ways of showing her love were unorthodox. But we love how we’re thought to right? And also life shapes the way we act and do certain things.

Her being a good bad mother in my interpretation was, she was a good mom because she loved and sacrificed everything to make sure he lol succeed in life. And a bad mother in the sense that she sometimes held on too tight and didn’t allow Kang Ho any chance to experience life in a sense. She wanted to be his shield always. That’s a good thing but also bad.

Kang Ho everything he did he did for his mom. As much as he may have had his dislike for her way of raising him, he always knew why she did it. He knew the driving force behind his mother’s absurd behavior and obsession with him becoming a prosecutor. He knew she didn’t want him to be like his father. Then when he got sick he knew she was making amends for what she cause him to go through as a child. Through it all he could’ve easily hated her but instead he kept loving her and even left clues incase anything should happen to him.

Their dynamic as mother and son was one of the best I’ve seen in dramas. Both Ran Mi Ran and Lee Do Hyun were perfectly casted for this role and pulled it off stupendously.

Now the villagers themselves ??well they sure are something. Their dynamic perfectly portrays a community turned family. At first they were hesitant when Young Soon moved in but later welcomed her with open arms. They were there for each other through the highs and lows. The perfect blend chemistry between each of the cast mates.

I loved how from beginning to end we never saw the village chiefs wife face?. This woman basically had an endlessly supply of face masks, scarves and hats to cover her face. At one point I wondered if she was getting over hydrated in the face. The finally we got a face reveal and a pregnancy announcement! And the story of her being a yakuza’s daughter actually was real.

The take down of Oh Tae Soo and Chairman Song was perfect. Honestly OTS is a scum of a human and father. The man really was something (also am I the only one who noticed that he never plays a good character in any dramas? He’s always some slim shady snakey dude). The 2 of them deserved what they got and I’m glad his daughter stepped up and exposed her dad even if it meant she also went to jail for being an accessory to his crime.

Episode 14 ended perfectly. Mi Joo and Kang Ho’s scene where he proposes with a pig, was exactly how his mom got proposed to. He even said the exact words and the pig also ran away?. And Sam Sik and his sticky fingers and heart on his sleeve self remained the same.

The one thing that stood out the most was the song Young Soon always played. Noticed how that was the song her dad had playing before the crash. The she had it as her ringtone. Despite the songs cheery lyrics it was a painful memory for her. Everyrime her phone rings she’s reminded of what she lost. But at her funeral when KH started singing, “I am happy, I am happy, I am happy…. I am very very happy.” In that moment, those words took on a new meaning. From being a constant remind of what she’d lost to becoming a song of hope and new beginning that shift was clear. Yes… it was being sung with tears in their eyes but you could clearly see it wa showing to be a song of all the good times. That was shown as Mr Bang sung that song, and our precious lettuce farms were singing quite jolly and drives the blush pink truck with “Happy Farm” boldly written on it.

We’re all good bad people. We love passionately and sometimes hold on too tightly in fear of what may happen. Omce in a while let’s be like pigs. Fall on your back and appreciate the bright blue sky and warm sun.