Misty is ambiguous to the end. But isn’t that just life?: A review

From the beginning to the very end, Misty is ambiguous. The reason it ended like that is because it’s not the end. Rather than a story with a beginning, middle and end, what we got was just a look at several months of a woman’s story. Only a snapshot.

I was wondering why the drama is called misty…and then I realized. It’s because that’s just what life is. Unclear. Ambiguous. Vague. Difficult to tell what is wrong and what is right.

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I think the most heartbreaking part about Hye Ran was she never had the freedom to cry out loud. The pressure she had to be composed and put together felt like shackles.

Did Hye Ran kill Kevin Lee or not? Did Hye Ran love her husband or not? Is Hye Ran to blame for Myung Woo being in jail? Is Hye Ran happy or not?

Throughout the drama, the writer makes us ask these questions repeatedly. But sadly, even when we got answers, they didn’t come the way we had wanted them to.

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What is a marriage? What does love look like? The drama makes us question the answers we thought we had.

In the end, the drama was wasn’t really about a career woman who finally learned how to love — which is what you might expect. No. It’s simply a drama about a woman who really wanted success and what she did to get it.

The reason why Hye Ran couldn’t answer the audience member’s question about her happiness was because happiness was never what she wanted, so how would she know? You can rewatch the entire drama again and you’ll see that never once did she say she wanted to be happy.

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Hye Ran was punished repeatedly because she wanted something society didn’t deem acceptable for a woman.

She wanted a society with justice. She wanted success. She wanted to have the power to make the world better. She wanted to be accepted by Tae Wook’s parents. She wanted people to understand her.

She never asked for happiness, so she couldn’t have been able to answer that question even if we gave her an hour to think about it. So right when she was faced with that question, the drama ended.

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Nobody said love was easy. And this drama makes you wonder if love is even worth it.

It might seem cruel to not give her a traditional happy ending…but this is not a traditional drama.

In 16 episodes, what we got was a riveting social commentary on what it’s like to be a woman who not only wants success, but desperately craves it, in a man’s world. What it’s like to be a married woman in her late 30s without children or the desire to have a child. What it’s like to live being told you should stop chasing your dreams because they don’t match up with what society expects of you.

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I’m going to miss the frank interactions Hye Ran was able to have with Director Jang. He was the one person who understood her even more than her husband.

And it showed us the reality of life. The unfairness, the cruelty, the struggle, and the fact that to continue living actually means to continue making choices — no matter how difficult.

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Perhaps if Myung Woo knew what Tae Wook would do he wouldn’t have made this choice. But Myung Woo didn’t know, and this was what he thought was best.

And you will never know if the choice is right. You can only do the next best thing.

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7 comments / Add your comment below

  1. 1. I agree and disagree on why the drama is called “Misty.” On last episode, Tae Wook committed suicide severe misty weather. I think that was why the writer named title as “Misty”

    2. I disagree on the reason why Hye Ran couldn’t answer the audience member’s question about her “Are you happy?” Hae Ran was not happy. She was miserable due to she was living with husband who killed her ex boyfriend and Mang Woo’s life sentance or possible death. Hae Ran was very happy after her father in- law acknowledged her success. She was happy when she achieved her goal like most people. Her happiness did not last long enough for her. Happiness was all she wanted!

  2. Hae Ran’s face expression was showing sadness and almost teary…you can not see that?
    Anybody can tell how unhappy and sad Hae Ran was from her face expression on the last seen. That was answer when she was asked for happiness.

    You do not have to tell your feeling, you can also show your emotion from face or body language for the communication!!!

  3. Actually you can know of your choices are right or not, like if you drink poison that would obviously be the worng choice while if you dont drink the poison that would be the right choice

  4. Life is rarely so black and white. Sometimes our choices can lead to bad outcomes even if we thought we were so clearly making the right choice. That’s why people say hindsight is 20/20. This drama for me was filled with so much grey area its had to say who was right or wrong.

  5. Hae Ran’s actions was the catalyst behind everyone’s downfall. She wanted justice for everyone but didn’t admit her part in causing so much misery all around her. Kevin Lee was a jerk and didn’t care about his wife. He only wanted revenge for Hae Ran rejecting him years ago and Hae Ran couldn’t stay faithful to her husband. It was lame how one push caused Kevin Lee’s death. It would have been better if his wife killed him because he was a serial cheater.

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