Kdrama 2021

Hometown Cha Cha Cha (Kdrama Review & Summary)

✴️✴️✴️✴️/5

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• Genre: Modern Romance, Rural Life
• Release Date: 28 August 2021
• Origin: South Korea
• Cdrama: 16 Episodes
• Available: Netflix

 

Cast

• Shin Min Ah as Yoon Hye-Jin
• Kim Seon Ho as Hong Dusik
• Lee Sang Yi as Ji Seong-hyun
• In Gyo-jin as Jang Young-guk
• Jo Han-chul [ko] as Oh Cheon-jae
• Lee Bong-ryun as Yeo Hwa-jung
• Born and raised in Gongjin
• Kang Hyung-seok as Choi Eun-chul (Policeman)
• Lee Seok-hyung as Kang Do-ha
• Kim Young-ok as
• Cha Chung-hwa as Cho Nam Sook [Department store president / Chinese restaurant owner]
• Gong Min-jeung as Pyo Mi Seon (Dental Nurse/Hye Jin’s Best Friend)
• Lee Yong-yi as
• Shin Shin-ae as
• Woo Mi-hwa as Lee Myung-shin
• Hye-jin’s mother
• Baek Seung as In-woo

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Quick Precis

Yoon Hye Jin is a dentist who moved to the rural town of Gongjin where she met Hong Dusik, who by all accounts is unemployed by he is actually very busy.

He is a one-stop place for the village to go to for help and support and many more.

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Snippets

• This is a drama remake of a 2004 Movie, Mr Hong.

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Episode 1

I love, 💕 , love, 💕 love  💕 this drama.  It is heartwarming, it is slice of life.

Yoon Hye Jin is a dentist with a conscience.

She opted to resign from her lucrative job in the city rather than bowed down to the pressure from her manager to hike up the income of the dental company by making patients have more treatments than necessary which could even be harmful to the health of their teeth and gums.

So jobless and rather lonely, she went to visit a place where she was happiest to celebrate her mother’s birthday who had passed away when she was still very young.

She went to the seaside town of Gongjin.

Her visit was eventful, made more so by a handsome guy who seemed to pop out from nowhere every time.

Anyway, Hye Jin might be jobless but she’s got style and is rather branded as well.  Walking in the seaside with her favourite glitter pumps Roger Vivier, she reminisced the time when she, her ailing mother, and father took a trip to this very seaside.  They happily asked a passing elderly man taking a walk with his grandson to take their photo.

This photo was the last one taken of her whole family and at their happiest time.

Her trip down memory lane was cut short when she noticed that her pride and joy Roger Vivier were gone until a guy, who was rather annoyed came sauntering down to give her one of her shoes which he said almost got him in the eye.

She wanted to find out if he had seen the other one as well!

He just gave her a look that could kill.

This meeting started one event after another for her, for them both.

Episode 2

After finding more about the town and that there were no dentists for miles, she decided to sell her expensive city apartment and open a dental surgery in Gongjin.

Oops!  It was not easy for a city girl like her to get down into business with rural folks who had their own set of ethos.

She offended the lot and it took Mr Gorgeous Jack-of-all-Trade, Hong Du Sik to integrate her to the townsfolks’ way of life.

He even asked his friends to try Hye Jin’s surgery.

Episode 3

This episode is when Hye Jin went to Seoul and the old ladies asked her for a lift to the city with Du Sik as well.

They seemed to be a mystery with Du Sik as he went to urology in the city.

Episode 4

Du sik gave the other missing Roger Vivier back to Hye Jin after he found it while fishing.  They were both crushing on each other and when a nasty sexual predator who was a son of some bigwig in town started harassing Mi Seon and Hye Jin, Du Sik turned up and did not think twice about beating the man up.

Episode 5

Hye Jin was caught leaving Du Sik’s house in the morning by Cho Nam Sook.  Before noon, the whole village knew.

Episode 6

Musical Festica

Episode 7

Episode 8

Episode 9

Hye Jin’s father and stepmother came to visit and met Dusik.

Episode10

The pervert invaded Hye Jin’s house.  She was almost attacked if Dusik did not turn up.

Seong Hyun confessed to her that he had liked her for 14 years and he regretted not confessing to her then.

Hye Jin and Mi Seon went to Seoul to relax after the attack by the pervert.

Episode 11

I bet everyone is trying to find George Bataille’s book called Eroticism.

Awww this episode is so silly but so hilarious.

The dimpled couple was so adorable together.

Episode 12

They are just so cute.

Poor Dusik seemed to be carrying a very heavy burden.

He had a nightmare where he was talking to another him.  His other self was dismissive that he has happy and questioning about his rights of any happiness.

It was so good that he was woken up by Hye Jin who came to get him to watch the sunrise with her at 4:30am.

This was part of Hye Jin bucket list which Dusik enthusiastically did with her because he wanted to get to the bottom of her bucket list which I think is favourite of all.

But their relationship almost got derailed when they went to Seoul.

Hye Jin bought herself a very expensive diamond necklace which made Dusik a little uneasy.

When then got back to Gonjin, it looks like Dusik was keeping away but he came to see her and brought her to his favourite corner of the riverside when he decorated it beautifully.

Hye Jin confessed that she thought she had upset him about the necklace.

Dusik told her nothing of the sort and then he gave her a beautiful handmade jewelry box for her necklace.

She confessed that she had sold her necklace.

When he said that it looks like the jewelry box was useless, Hye Jin said  it was absolutely not because she has plenty of other pieces of jewelry.  They are loved up again.

Meanwhile, Mi Seon and  Eun Chul are now officially dating.

The secret of Yeo Hwa Jeong and Jang Yeok Guk’s divorce was revealed.  Yeo Hwa Jeong finally had had enough of Jang Yeok Guk leaving his used socks anywhere in the house and she was tired of picking after him.

13

14

Episode 15

Dusik’s story was absolutely incompressible.

Why would Dusik accept the responsibility of a greedy security guard who lost his money due to a market crash?

Dusik suffered every kind of humiliation and blame for something he really did not do nor have control over.

The son of the security guard who happened to be Kang Do Ha, the assistant director to Ji Sung Hyun beat up Dusik and blamed him bitterly for the attempted suicide of his father who Dusik, working as a fund manager then in Seoul, warned not to invest all his money or to learn about the funds first and get good advice.

But the father wanted to get rich quickly and give his family a better life so he did not only invest all his savings but also remortgage his house as well as borrowing more money.

And when the stockmarket crashed, he went to Dusik for help.  Dusik told him not to cash in or sell his shares because the stocks may recover and go up but the father said that he doesn’t have any money as he used his pension fund, his house as a collateral and borrowed money.

Dusik was helpless to assist the man plus the fact that he was busy with his own work trying to salvage his own client.

When Dusik heard that the father was in the hospital for attempted suicide, he tried to drive to the hospital but his best friend and pseudo-relative Park Jeong U saw the state Dusik was in so he drove the car but alas, they met an accident where the kindly and gentle Park Jeong U died.

Poor Dusik felt remorsefully guilty about what happened and his heartbreak was made worst by Park Jeong U blaming him for the death of her husband.

Dusik was on breaking point that still in his hospital gown he walked to the bridge by the Han River ready to jump in but he got a text from Ms Gam-ri tellin him that she wanted to meet us as she was in Seoul.  That she misses him as she had not seen him for years.

This stopped Dusik but he was left sobbing by the bridge and luck would have it, Hye Jin was passing in her car and got rather alarmed at the sight of a man looking all forlorn in his hospital gown by the bridge.  She call the emergency service which sent an ambulance.  At this point, they had not really ‘met’ yet.

I had a feeling Ms Gam-ri would die and she did in this episode.  She died in her sleep quite at peace.

Episode 16

The death of Ms Gam-ri became something of a celebration as she had wanted it to be.  She said they should be happy for her because she was going to a better place.

Every i’s have been dotted and T’s crossed.

First, the third secret or mystery of Gongji had been revealed.  Of all people, it was the unassuming police office, Choi Eun Chul who hold the third secret.  The secret was that he was a secret billionaire (in won).  He won the lottery but kept it a secret but he was very generous with alms giving.

So MiSeon can have her perfect house with no expense spared.

Jang Yeong Guk and Yeo Hwa Jeong are closer and he was a more nurturing husband.  It always brings tears of joy to his eyes when his wife happy.

Oh Jun Jae got a call from a television show wanting him to contact them because they are going to make a show of past hit-makers.

Ji Sung Hyun had a happy ending also but I feel that he was making do with Wang Ji Won.  I think Scriptwriter Wang is more a habit with Sung Hyun than a love match.

And speaking of love match, Hye  Jin and Dusik are it.

Hye Jin told Miseon that she was going to propose to Dusik.  So she tried to make it as romantic and a surprise as much as possible.

But she was the one who got the surprise when she asked Dusik to marry her and he said no.

Dusik then clarified that it was not because he did not want to marry her but because it was all wrong.  He was actually going to proposed to her.  Hye Jin cajoled him into ignoring her proposal as if it did not happen.

As she was so deliciously cute, he started saying that their first meeting was not really as horrible as she thought, in fact he immediately noticed how attractive she was and happy.

He then gave her a jewel box which opened and found a diamond necklace almost the same as the one she bought and then immediately sold online.

She was shocked because it was an expensive present but he told her that he hoped she will keep it and not sell it online.

She promised that she will keep it ss she we keep him on her side for always.

Ahhhh

Then they had their intimate pre-nup photoshoot which the whole neighbourhood tried to gatecrash.

Every is happy but life will never be boring.

The End