Liar Game

Sunhwa is asked to explain her reasoning behind giving Teacher Kim her share of the prize money during an on-camera interview, but is reluctant to answer when asked if she expects Teacher Kim to ever give the money back. I’m sure she knows better now.
PD Dasom displays actual human concern for Sunhwa, because she knows that if the girl were to get eliminated in the next round, she’d be in deep debt to the broadcast company since she just gave her prize money away.
Still, she tells Sunhwa to stay strong, especially since she won’t have Joon to help her going forward. And she promises to help Sunhwa get in touch with her father if nothing else, which is oddly sweet of her.
At home, Sunhwa stares at the picture of her and her father as she asks, “Dad, I did well, right? Right? Tell me I did well. Please?” Aw.
We see the broadcast of Liar Game the way the general public has been watching it.
And just like Seunghyun predicted, Joon is taking the nation by storm. Seung-hyun tells the people that before Joon was put in prison, he was the youngest professor of applied psychology at Seoul University, and everyone eats his and Sunhwa’s mentor/student relationship up.
Because the show is now a wild success and is on everyone’s screens, Sunhwa’s father ends up seeing his daughter on TV wherever he is.
After nursing a drunken Daniel who’s heartbroken that she gave her winnings away, Daniel has to face the same sort of attitude when Joon shows up. He accuses her of breaking her promise that she’d stop filming after this first game, but Sunhwa is firm when she says she didn’t mean to betray him.
Joon thinks she was a fool for giving her money to Teacher Kim, and tells her as much. But she stands by her decision, because she knew what would’ve happened otherwise—Teacher Kim wouldn’t have been able to see his family again.
“That pain seemed like my own,” she tells him. “I didn’t want any more pain. That’s why I did it. I thought… you could read people’s hearts when you see them. Don’t you know how much pain and torment he would have been in? Even someone like me would know that.”
Joon takes offense at this accusation, and flat-out tells her that she’s much more stupid than he thought she was. Ouch.
The only journalist who questioned Seunghyun and the whole Liar Game concept, Reporter Kim Ji-won is now the only one throwing shade at the sudden appearance of the creditors at Teacher Kim’s house—it’s all so convenient, isn’t it? Like it was staged by the producers?
Even her boss is drinking the Liar Game kool-aid, so for now, Reporter Kim Ji-won doesn’t have any support when it comes to her conspiracy theories. Instead, her boss wants her to interview Joon, since they both graduated from the same school.
She and Joon know each other a little better than that, and at least are on friendly terms when they meet. She’s ashamed that she works for a gossip rag now instead of a major newspaper, but produces files he asked her for nonetheless—on the promise that he’ll provide her with any new dirt from within Liar Game.
For exposition’s sake, Reporter Ji-won tells Joon what she already knows about him: that his mother ran a non-profit organization and passed away after she was scammed, that he used his genius to take down the finance company responsible, that the CEO of that company was murdered shortly after, that he was found innocent of it and got out of jail a year later. And now, he’s in Liar Game.
But what she wonders about his involvement is actually an interesting tidbit to think about—is there some sort of connection between the show and what happened to his mother? Is that why Joon is participating?
Joon points out that the rooftop they’re currently meeting on is the one his mother jumped from, and that this will be his starting point. “How did I get here? Where do I go? Who am I dealing with? I’m thinking of finding that out.” Existential Joon for the win.
Though there’s no dearth of backlash against the show, Seunghyun shows absolutely no concern at all when PD Dasom frets that more and more contestants might begin to forfeit.
Even if they do, Seunghyun argues that it’ll only equal press for them—and any press is good press. But Director Kim Seung-woo seems to think differently, even if he’s willing to handle the bad press they’ll get from Joon’s appearance.
What he’s not happy about is the creditors showing up in the broadcast, he recognizes in an almost comedically monotone voice, “Yes, ratings. We’re number one.” But he wonders where the line is. Will Seunghyun allow them to film a greed-fueled murder next?

Notes

Sorry about the short and nothing on(!) chapter...