EAW Ep 13: I'm coldly furious about the way Young-woo is being treated and I don't know how to breathe right now.
I’ve been sitting here on the couch with my hand over my mouth for at least ten minutes now, and I don’t even know what to say. I’m too tired and angry to cry. What has this turned into?
A lot of good stuff happened here, but I’m not in a mood to talk about that yet. I’m sure I’ll get there. But not fucking yet.
This is the *second time* I’ve had to watch Young-woo take on the emotional baggage of some nautistic shithead, see how much it hurt her, and then see her get no reaction other than her distress. No chance to respond, no ability to react, no time to process, fucking nothing. I still have no idea what happened after Mr. Seob Seob got all shirty with her in that alleyway. Did she just go inside, did they have more conversation, what happened? At the beginning of the episode, it seems like he’s awkward with her, but then after he tells her that he’s still upset (all pouty, which WAS cute, and which is in line with what Korean speaking fans are saying about how the translators are fucking Jun-ho over), things just seem to be fine. I have NO IDEA what the impact of that conversation was on Young-woo other than she brought it up to Geu-ra-mi and doesn’t really get why officially dating is necessary, or how do things change. This could be a simple social…like, I don’t get it either, honestly? I’m not talking about Korean dating culture here, because I know that’s much different than Americans, but on as an autistic person, there are a lot of social structures I just don’t GET. So what did she say to Jun-ho about that? It doesn’t look like I’ll ever know, and that’s a fucking problem for me, because that means (as the viewer) that the conversation ends with him unloading on her and her not responding.
Now, I get to listen to her sister go on and on about how upset their parents would be if he brought Young-woo home, and as an autistic person, get to deal with the emotional impact of that on me, but then see that Young-woo is standing there too, listening to all of it, being hurt by it (look at her hands, look at what her hands are saying as they clutch at her skirt) and she does not get a chance to react. We go from that fucking mess to the court case, which is happening at some unclear later date.
What *happened* after that? Did she say something to Jun-ho? Did she hold it in? Was it visible? Did she talk to Geu-ra-mi and Hairy? Did she go straight to bed? What is going on? What happened to Young-woo who came right back at Min-woo over his bullshit treatment of her? What happened to Young-woo who quietly told Jun-ho that autistic people were easy to trick and that she struggled to know if people were lying to her? I don’t *care* that Jun-ho was defending her, it doesn’t matter, that’s not the point right now.
For the first time, I felt like Young-woo’s struggle to eat something that wasn’t gimbap and reminding Jun-ho they couldn’t talk about whales were being played for a fucking laugh. My girl had pushed herself so fucking far out of her comfort zone and I was supposed to giggle at the goddamn faces she was making struggling to do what people wanted her to do to fit in.
I’m typing this and I’m sitting here rocking a little and rubbing my fingers over my new bracelet as I try to find words to say that aren’t just pain. Sheer pain.
Please don’t tell me that all couples in dramas have this thing where they break up and get back together, I know, okay, I fucking know but it’s different when this is the first autistic person I’ve *ever* seen as being considered as worthy of love, ever. This aches in a way that I don’t think I can explain.
Look, I honestly think that’s as much as I can say about this fucking episode right now. I’m going to go away and do literally anything that’s not think about this. I’m going to come back later because I do have other things I want to say about the episode, but frankly - this point is important enough to stand on its own.
At first, fans of the show were saying they didn’t want a romance to derail Young-woo’s growth and a LOT of us pushed back hard, saying that a romance with a disabled woman was so important and also knock it off with the sexism. I said “let disabled women love and be loved.” And now, I’m saying it to the show, which makes me so angry. Except it’s even worse. Let disabled women feel.
Please.
