Familiar Wife - Spoiler Central - Ep 1-4

Since my friend suggested to just make a blog post for all my rants, I decided to start off with the ever torturous "Familiar Wife" kdrama. I'm already into ep 3 and it's still just as frustrating as ep 1-2. It's pretty much about a guy who hates his current life, fears his wife, and changes his past so that he doesn't end up being married to her.

The first episode starts off with the main character, Cha Juhyeok, pretty much doing a crappy job of being a husband, a father, and a worker. He's got two kids, a toddler and a baby, who are mostly taken care of by his wife, Seo Wujin, while he does the least amount of child-rearing. Both are running late to work, but the wife is stuck dropping the kids off to daycare while the husband bails. Wujin asks Juhyeok to text her if he can't pick up the kids from daycare because she has an important work schedule, a request that he forgets about and ignores, which causes her to get in trouble at work later on in the episode. 

Juhyeok gets to work late, but this isn't what makes him a horrible worker. He passes a task he's too lazy to deal with to his newbie coworker, which causes a major screw-up to happen at work and later causes him to get into a car crash trying to fix the issue. The car crash ends up getting him into deep trouble with his wife because of her leaving work to pick-up the kids. So he's already shown to be pretty irresponsible in 3 different roles.

Wujin, on her part, does have problematic qualities as well. Although she is completely stressed out trying to balance being a working mom and wife, she shouldn't be getting physically abusive with Juhyeok. Juhyeok is actually traumatized by the violence from his wife. He legitimately fears her because of her anger. So she has issues of her own. 

Skip to ep 2 and this is where the plot moves forward. So we already see glimpses of how their relationship is plagued with problems and a bit of their characters, especially for Juhyeok.

Once again, we see Juhyeok being a horrible worker by prioritizing the wrong things in his life and taking shortcuts. Of course, this stems from another cut of him being a bad husband and father by coming back home super late and drunk from a company dinner party. He's stressed out by all the nagging from his wife, even though he doesn't do jack shit as a husband and father, and usually plays his game system to relieve stress. Unfortunately for him, it's broken. So he decides he needs to buy a good used game system to replace it. This is where the trouble starts. He works at a bank and a customer comes in to request for a loan, but she forgets her ID and asks him to wait until 6pm so she can bring it to him. Problem for him is that someone had contacted him to meet that day at 6pm to sell him what he wants at a good price. So... being the irresponsible person that he is, he okays her loan without an ID on record just to get his game. This leads to his bank branch getting into trouble with the surprise audit visit the next day. Mind you, days ago, he already screwed up at work.

Juhyeok isn't really a great guy in general. In another scene after getting scolded by his wife and having a crab pincer thrown at him, he meets up with his friends to destress. Juhyeok says that his wife isn't cute and completely different. She doesn't cook meals for him or dress up for him. His friends point out logically that she's a mom and has to work too, so it's unreasonable to ask her to do all that. He says something about knowing all that and trying to understand her about it, but the way he talks about it doesn't seem like he really does. It seems to me that he thinks the wife should be able to be his housemaid, cater to his needs, and his children while working. It's actually ridiculous on what he criticizes his wife on and says that he understands her side. Juhyeok then points out all the anger management issues that she has. Cue Wujin screaming at him and cuts of physical abuse. This is her major flaw.

Now let's talk about the catalyst that led to a completely different life in ep3. So we know that Wujin has serious anger issues from Juhyeok's talks and all the scenes we see of the couple on screen together. The final straw was when she was overly stressed after finding out that her mother needs to be put into a nursing home due to having severe dementia, but they cannot afford it with their income. This is on top of Juhyeok just constantly not being much of a father or husband lately. Remember that game system he bought? He decided to hide it behind some diapers, which Wujin finds. What does she do with it? Well, cut to him coming back home after having a terrible day at work from his incredible screw-up, and finding that his hidden game system is gone. Where is it? In the tub underwater with Wujin still drowning it in more water. So they have an intense, hurtful argument where she reams him for spending money on games when he should have quit cuz he shouldn't have hobbies as a father anymore and he tells her that she makes his life at home uncomfortable and worse than being at work with customers. He pretty much breaks her heart with his comment and storms out of the house.

So, the real reason he decide to change his current present life that he hates around is because he meets his first love, Hyewon, again. She's prettier and sweeter than his wife (duh, because she's single). She tells him that back when they were in college, she actually liked him. This leads him to daydream all day and again, ends up being a terrible worker. His daydreaming also ends up making him volunteer to go to the funeral of some old colleague instead. This journey ends up weirdly letting him go back into the past due to some weird magic time travel wormhole to the day where he first meets Wujin and accidentally misses the chance to end up with Hyewon. 

He repeats about half the events for that special day before getting hit by a motorcycle (which didn't happen in the past before) and ends up with a scar. He realizes that it was a dream, but the scar tells him that it really happened, especially because he goes to see the old colleague after having the huge fight with his wife later and finds out that the funeral he attended for the old colleague's mom is now alive and not dead. As in, his little deviation in the past made the mom live in his current life. So, being the selfish prick that he is, he tries to find that route again to go back in time to score himself a "new, better, prettier" wife. 

And he does, in ep3. He blatantly ignores young Wujin on that day so that he wouldn't miss meeting Hyewon and thus ending up with her as his wife. The excitement that he shows after finding out that his current wife is now Hyewon is kinda disgusting to see. It reminds me of the fantasty that some have where they trade their "annoying, shitty" spouse for a new one. It's basically avoiding responsibilities and working to either fix the issue, whether through divorce or actually talking/being communicative. He took the easy way out in his life. They tried to make him seem like he just wanted his wife to have a good life without him, but it doesn't come off as sincere.

Why do I say this? In ep 4, when Wujin comes into his life again in his new life with Hyewon as his wife, he tries to make her life difficult so she quits her job at his bank. The way he approaches everything in life is just so self-centered. Wujin is working at the bank so she can be closer to home to monitor her mother who still has dementia in this timeline. Note that Wujin hasn't done anything to Juhyeok in this timeline, but he tries his best to be rude and mean to her just to make her go away. He still is only interested in himself. 

We also see his self-centeredness with Hyewon. He doesn't really know anything about their relationship since he just woke up to Hyewon being his wife, where he's now living a richer lifestyle due to Hyewon's family wealth. He clearly only sees a wife as his maid because he gets all happy that Hyewon makes him homecooked meals and still keeps her "feminine" image as compared to when Wujin was his wife. Hyewon also works too, mind you. So Juhyeok meets his parents for lunch and since they were from out of town, he decided to bring them over to his house without informing Hyewon at all. This is a huge no-no with couples. You do not just bring their in-laws over without warning. The worst part? He expects Hyewon to cook them dinner and breakfast without warning. Hyewon has every right to feel wronged by that. She suggests for them to eat out and for his parents to stay at a hotel instead. Juhyeok gets angry and tells her that she's self-centered and rude for kicking his parents out. 

Let's look at this from Hyewon's POV. She's coming home from work, to find people in her house without notice, and it's her in-laws that she's not comfortable with and asked to cook and provide for them. Juhyeok pretty much ignores how uncomfortable Hyewon is feeling and demands her to house them for the night. He tells her to make them a "simple meal" and that's just infuriating because she doesn't have to do anything for them. For the record, their home was provided by her rich parents, so if anything, he was rude to bring guests over without telling her beforehand. Juhyeok's mother was also scolding her about wasting money on a housekeeper for their house. No one likes being told what to do by their in-laws. Hyewon is also definitely uncomfortable with his parents because she called them strangers. He's insulted by that but in reality, a lot of people don't like their in-laws and prefer not to see them as family. Hyewon probably has her reasons why, but again, Juhyeok just ignores her thoughts.

Just from the first 4 episodes, it really looks like someone who sees women as only housewives wrote this. If their intention was to show how stupid husbands who expect this sort of working mom wives to exist, then they've done a good job. So far, Juhyeok is my least favorite character and he's the main character. I only sympathize with his trauma from the abuse he suffered under Wujin. But his character also makes me no sympathize at all, not when he's also not a great husband with Hyewon either. He always just wants things but rarely gives. He doesn't seem to care for his partner's situation or opinion at all. He also really doesn't care to call or communicate with his wives.

Hyewon and Wujin aren't perfect either, but they sure aren't as aggravating as Juhyeok is. Both at least managed to be good workers and moms/wives, but Juhyeok couldn't manage to do any of those roles. I've said it a hundred times but he's self-centered and sees only what he wants to see until it's shoved into his face. The demands he makes of his wives when he doesn't do jack shit for them. However, it looks like Juhyeok has realized how much Wujin deteriorated as a person after their marriage and children. 

The only interesting plot point that keeps me going is Wujin's character. She's having dreams about what her life married to Juhyeok was like. Their past love life together. I want to know if she will start thinking it's real and if the angst will kick in from that point of view. At the end of ep4, she's feeling weird overwhelming emotions around Juhyeok. It really will be interesting now to watch their relationship in this timeline.