Previously on Hotel King… recap ep 22

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Anna’s Recap

SPOILER ALERT: Do not proceed if you do not want to know what has happened so far!

Finally! After all the awkward reunions last episode, the characters finally know one another’s “secret,” or more accurately, real identities. And it’s about time. Everyone’s masks are now off, for now at least. Knowing this show, each person probably still has three or more secret identities that they haven’t shared with us yet. Either way, now that the characters are squaring off with one another as their true selves, there might be a shift in motives and allegiances that could further damage Ciel’s already shaky foundation. Oh well, let’s just let them fight it out anyways.

After secretly following Chairwoman Baek to the Baek Mi-yeon house, Jae-wan throws caution to the wind and stands directly behind her watching her watch the house. So much for being stealthy. He followed her thinking that she was going there to meet with John Howard to discuss their plans for Ciel, but that wasn’t the case. Thinking that Jae-wan is probably still in cahoots with Joong-goo, she warns him to leave Roman alone and to go after her instead because she will rain hellfire upon him if he hurts her son. Jae-wan smirks, tells her he knows that he knows Roman isn’t actually her son, and leaves. Boom. That was a cool exit and all, but Jae-wan just made Chairwoman Baek go from threatening to attack mode.

Joong-goo also goes to the house, but misses seeing the confrontation between Chairwoman Baek and Jae-wan. He does, however, see Chairwoman Baek as she’s leaving the house and saying goodbye to a couple there. The couple is the same one that Joong-goo met awhile back when he went to the house after first receiving the threatening letters from “Baek Mi-yeon.” The couple was hired by Chairwoman Baek to stay at the house because the woman is coincidentally named Baek Mi-yeon, and that they don’t actually live there. Joong-goo does some investigating and discovers that Baek Mi-yeon was never actually certified dead 33 years ago. He puts two and two together and realizes that Chairwoman Baek is indeed the real Baek Mi-yeon.

Chairwoman Baek ain’t the only woman pissed off with Jae-wan. Unbeknownst to him, Chae-kyung witnessed the entire make-out session between him and Mo-ne from the night before. Let’s not forget that Jae-wan had promised Chae-kyung that he won’t get back together with Mo-ne if she helps him take down Chairwoman Baek. All bets are off now. To get back at them, Chae-kyung organizes a party for her and her rich lady friends, and makes Mo-ne act as the maid/server for the party. Her friends humiliate Mo-ne and intentionally make the job harder for her. Jae-wan hears what’s happening from Woo-hyun, and rushes to the party to help Mo-ne. Seeing Jae-wan come to Mo-ne’s rescue, Chae-kyung nearly busts a blood vessel and ends the party right away.

Jae-wan chases after Chae-kyung to explain himself, but she’s not in the mood for more of his broken promises. Since he didn’t uphold his end of the promise, she won’t either. She vows to Jae-wan that she will hate him with every ounce of energy she has and destroy him. To further emphasize her point, Chae-kyung informs Roman that she will be his resource in his takedown of Jae-wan because she knows all of his weaknesses. Jae-wan’s got no one to blame for this but himself. Learn to keep your promises, man!

Following all that party drama from the day, Woo-hyun tries to get Mo-ne to play basketball with him to blow off some steam. She says no, but he won’t leave her alone and keeps telling her to go with him. Probably annoyed with his persistence, Mo-ne asks him if he likes her. Woo-hyun admits to it, but is rejected by Mo-ne right away. Despite her rejection, Woo-hyun says that he will continue to care for her. But when he later brings her the message that Jae-wan wants to meet with her in the garden, he tells her that he’d rather she didn’t go. Mo-ne obviously then goes straight to the garden to see Jae-wan. Woo-hyun should probably just give up already. When she gets there and sees Jae-wan waiting, she recalls Chairwoman Baek mocking her before for being so preoccupied with Jae-wan that she keeps losing sight of the bigger picture of avenging her father’s death. Using that as a wakeup call, Mo-ne leaves without meeting Jae-wan. Well, that reconciliation certainly didn’t last very long.

After being rejected by both Mo-ne and Chae-kyung, Jae-wan dives back into the work of saving Ciel. Looking at a few library books, he suddenly makes the connection that the series of letters and numbers (CL1998-K305) that Chairman Ah wrote on many of his mementos is the serial number for books in Ciel’s library. Jae-wan finds the book with that serial number stored in the basement with all the old books. The book is entitled, “Mo-ne,” and the contents shocked Jae-wan but they haven’t been revealed yet. Following his discovery, Jae-wan sends Team Leader Cha, Mo-ne’s former “assistant” and his confidante, abroad to look for more evidence related to this book. All signs point to this being Chairman Ah’s missing journal from Chairwoman Baek’s collection.

Ciel’s staff starts panicking when someone writes on the bulletin board that Chairwoman Baek is trying to sell the hotel and how John Howard is here to complete the sell. Amidst the chaos, Joong-goo befriends Chae-kyung by revealing to her that Jae-wan is his son. He convinces her to team up with him to convince John Howard to abandon his partnership with Chairwoman Baek and work for them instead. When pictures of Joong-goo meeting with John Howard are sent to Chairwoman Baek, she knows that he’s up to no good. She pays him back by sending Joong-goo’s wife a recording of him ordering that Chairman Ah be given the fake meds that caused him to lose his mind. His wife serves Joong-goo with divorce papers and leaves with his daughter.

Knowing that Chairwoman Baek sent the recording, Joong-goo rushes to Ciel and convinces her to go on a drive with him by threatening to meet with Roman instead if she refuses. He drives them to the bridge where Baek Mi-yeon had her car accident/explosion, and reveals that he knows that she’s actually Baek Mi-yeon. Chairwoman Baek goes crazy when they get to the bridge and tries to strangle Joong-goo with her bare hands during their confrontation. While strangling him, she continuously blames Joong-goo for ruining her life and taking her son away from her, thinking that he, Hyun-woo, is dead. Roman arrives at the scene after hearing that Joong-goo took his mother away from the hotel, and convinces her to let go of him. Joong-goo quickly drives away, and Chairwoman Baek is left to lament the death of her real son and her inability to kill Joong-goo when she had the chance.

The problems never stop at Ciel, and the latest is guests are checking out of their rooms because the water and electricity suddenly stopped working. Jae-wan confirms to the hotel staff that Chairwoman Baek’s behind these problems and she’s trying to sell the hotel. Jae-wan appeals to the staff to work harder to help save Ciel and their jobs. He makes the executive decision to reverse the changes that Chairwoman Baek had put in place to ruin the hotel, hoping to end her sabotage plans. When she and Roman hear Woo-hyun following Jae-wan’s new rules instead of the ones she passed down, Chairwoman Baek and Jae-wan argue in the hotel lobby about who has the hotel’s best interests in mind. Joong-goo suddenly shows up out of nowhere and steps in to apologize for his son, Jae-wan. Upon hearing that Jae-wan is Joong-goo’s son, Chairwoman Baek appears to realize that Jae-wan may be her son too.

Oh my god.

Et cetera:

Jae-wan asks Team Leader Yoo (aka the traitorous food poisoning guy from the last two episodes) to look into the house’s owner, Baek Mi-yeon. Since he’s working for Chairwoman Baek, she tells Yoo to tell Jae-wan the “truth,” that Baek Mi-yeon is the woman staying there, and has nothing to do with her.

Chairwoman Baek admits to Roman that she was in the office the night that Chairman Ah died, but she didn’t kill him. The murderer is still at large!

Joong-goo lost one of his legs during Baek Mi-yeon’s car crash/explosion, where she was burned 100% and he thought she died.

After forming new alliances with Roman and then Joong-goo, Chae-kyung meets with Mo-ne and gives her a plane ticket for Jae-wan. What is the destination of this flight?