Sun Young and Tae-Yi
2021
Episode 9 of Alice begins with Tae-Yi in the police station asking about Jin-Gyeom’s death. She refuses to believe it though and walks away. As she tries in vain to ring him, she finds his house completely abandoned and breaks down crying.
2020
In the present, Jin-Gyeom manages to track down Tae-Yi using the GPS tracker. Only, when he shows up she’s not there because she’s a year ahead. (how does that work?) Instead, he looks over the post-it notes they’ve been leaving and asks if Tae-Yi is in the house as well. He promises to save her regardless of the year she’s in.
2021
As Tae-Yi walks down the street she finds her sister, encouraging her to come in the house and eat. It’s here she realizes that it’s 2021. As Tae-Yi sits at her desk, she looks at her laptop and finds a screen of her and Jin-Gyeom posing and looking happy together. She quickly starts looking into Jin-Gyeom’s death online and researching exactly what may have caused it. This brings her to Professor Seok who tells her to travel back to 2020. She presses him about the Book of Prophecy and it’s here he reveals that Jin-Gyeom looking into the Book is what actually got him killed. There’s no way to save herself and Jin-Gyeom is already dead.
2020
Jin-Gyeom remains determined to find Tae-Yi, realizing that this ties to his Mother’s case. As he talks, he tells Do-Yeon that Tae-Yi isn’t the same in the past. Apparently there’s two versions of her and they’re both doppelgangers which is how two can exist at the same time. One of them is from another dimension which explains the difference. This investigation eventually leads to the morgue where he examines the body of Lee Se-Hoon.
The Bad Guy
Hyeon-Seok descends into the basement and questions the Professor about where the Book of Prophecy is. For now though, he remains tight-lipped over its whereabouts.
Alice
Min-Hyuk questions Si-Young about her meeting with Tae-Yi and what happened. She reveals information he already knows and confirms the meeting took place in 2011. As he leaves, Min-Hyuk receives news of Se-Hoon’s death. Apparently they missed it as the Watch Team weren’t watching. Oh, the irony. Realizing they can’t leave an illegal time traveler in the past, Alice send out agents to retrieve his body. As Jin-Gyeom chases after the operatives, Si-Young presents herself and holds a gun up to his head. He recognizes her from the funeral though, where she reveals that Tae-Yi is not her Mother.
Controlling Time
Just as Si-Young fires a bullet at Jin-Gyeom, time freezes just like it did before with the truck. “The child born through the door of time will one day control time” rings through from the prophecy as Jin-Gyeom manages to evade certain death. In doing so, he actually changes his own death date as fragments from the future fade in regards to Jin-Gyeom’s death. Somehow he also manages to pull Tae-Yi back through time and saves her life. As he hugs her he sees a tribute for Sun-Young behind him and passes out.
Alice
Back at Alice, Min-Hyuk receives the autopsy report on Se-Hoon. It turns out he had a strange implant that allowed him to travel through time easier. He also questions the likelihood of a baby surviving a jump through a wormhole like this. After thinking for some time, the doctor confirms that the baby may well have some serious side effects.
2010
As Do-Yeon and Tae-Yi come to blows, eventually the latter asks exactly when her affection for Jin-Gyeom began. This brings us back to 2010 as Do-Yeon brings over a gift from her house. Given the time is 10pm, she encourages him to walk her down the street. This is the first instance she fell in love with him.
Alice
Teary-eyed, Min-Hyuk stares at a tablet and leaves the room. As he does, the camera pans over to show a family registry confirming that Park Sun-Young is Jin-Gyeom’s Mother.
Happy Birthday
As the episode draws to a close, Tae-Yi’s birthday celebrations get underway between Tae-Yi and Jin-Gyeom. He sings happy birthday to her and hands over a present on her way out the door. Opening it up, she finds a necklace; the same necklace from her time in 2021 she found on her desk. Uh oh. As she passes out on the floor, Min-Hyuk happens to be round the corner and notices that Tae-Yi has spots all over her arm.
The Episode Review
This episode is doing absolutely everything it can to establish Tae-Yi and Sun-Young are two completely different people. Presumably this is done so we can have the foreshadowed romance between the two leads. Regardless if it’s a version of Tae-Yi from another dimension or not, this still feels like a bit of a weak explanation for what will undoubtedly be a bizarre romantic angle. Alongside that you have Alice who have consistently shown they really don’t know what they’re doing. The Watch Team weren’t watching the screens when people jumped over and they seem to be one step behind everything now. In terms of plotting, the entire thing is pushing hard for this inter-dimensional play so the romance isn’t too icky. Unfortunately it’s going to be hard to argue that Tae-Yi and Sun-Young aren’t basically the same people. Still, some of the ideas are quite intriguing and there’s enough here to see this mystery through to its conclusion. Compared to The King: Eternal Monarch however, this one leaves a lot to be desired.
