Lie to me Episode 1 Recap

Hotel president Hyun Ki Joon (Kang Ji Hwan) starts his inspection rounds at his hotel, purposefully striding through the lobby, his exacting eyes missing not a single detail. He uses his hankerchief to wipe the counter, inspecting it to make sure there is no dust. He corrects even the tiniest details, and when he leaves all employees let out a silent sigh of relief. His hotel manager assures him that the preparations for an upcoming event is all complete, which we see is a wedding for a couple.

He’s got his right-hand woman, MANAGER PARK (Park Ji-yoon), constantly in his orbit, handling whatever task he needs addressed with her efficient calm. The hotel is preparing for a big event tomorrow, a lavish wedding (cameo by Paradise Ranch and Sol Pharmacy actress Yoo Hana as the bride). The hitch is: The sobbing bride has just seen her best friend and fiancee enter the hotel together, and her friends demand to know what room they’re in.

Three ladies exit a taxi, one crying piteously, while the other two prop her up and drag her along. They storm to the front desk, demanding to know the room number for a certain male guest and his female companion. Of course their request is denied, but the wailing woman in the middle confesses that she’s needs to know because the man is her fiancée and the woman is/was her best friend. Random aside, it appears that both Best Love and Lie to Me start off with two different Sam Soon references. 

The clerk won’t disclose that information to the shrill trio, until Ki-joon steps in and gives the okay. Together, the whole group travels up to the hotel room, where the bride hesitates — if she confirms her suspicions now, she won’t get the wedding, and she’ll lose her deposits, and forfeit her honeymoon. She’s getting cold feet about getting cold feet — is blissful ignorance really better than knowing? Ki-joon thinks to himself how brides are really about the wedding, not the groom.

She loses her nerve, so Ki-joon steps up instead and rings the bell. The door is opened by the groom in a robe, full of complaints over the hotel’s bad service, and the bride and her two friends barge in to let this unhappy scenario run its course.

Ki-joon leaves — his work is done here — and instructs Manager Park to clean up after the dust has settled. He advises her to wait ten minutes, which seems optimistic to me; from the screech level coming from the room, I’d say the groom has got a good hour of abuse in store for him.

Elsewhere, at a cultural festival and performance for foreign dignitaries and other guests, the Department of Culture, Tourism and Sports is overseeing an event designed to showcase the Korean arts. The foreign guests are enjoying the local honey harvested from Korean bees.

Low-level civil servant GONG AH-JUNG (Yoon Eun-hye) is proud of having spearheaded this effort and eager to reap the rewards. Her boss tries to take credit for her work, but she’s not too demure (thank God!) to let him sneak this out from under her, and confidently claims her due and is praised effusively by a minister.

The Minister of Culture is quite pleased with this shindig and compliments Ah Jung, telling her to keep working hard. Ah Jung steps forward to give a television interview, which is when all hell breaks loose. A falling branch dislodges the bee hive, and a swarm of angry CGI bees attack the festivities. While this is as stupid of a plot device as I’ve ever seen, the execution is actually quite hilarious, and I found myself chuckling at the mayhem.

People are screaming and running to and fro, trying to escape the bees. A co-worker of Ah Jung’s falls to the ground in a faint, getting up only to be hit by a column of water as others have turned out a giant hose in hopes of using water to dispel the bees. Ah Jung’s boss grabs the flag of Korea and waves it around to shoo the bees away as a representative of the Republic of Korea. Men dressed in Korean traditional garb carry a paladin chair over and the Minister of Culture is deposited on the chair in a dead faint and spirited away.

Ah Jung grabs the microphone to try and calm down the screaming masses, but to no avail. A bee stings her right at that moment on her chest, then promptly dies. She sits down on the ground in pain, realizing that she’s been stung on her chest. 

Afterwards, the poor beleaguered employees of the Department are back the office, everyone moaning, groaning, and covered in ointment and bandages. One is twitching, another can still hear the buzzing bees.

Ah Jung’s boss tells her to take responsibility for this fiasco, and write an apology letter. Ah Jung wonders why she has to take responsibility for a freak accident involving bees. Her boss reminds her that the Minister of Culture is in the hospital, as well as thirty other guests. Ah Jung is told that if she won’t write an apology letter, she should write a resignation letter instead. Ah Jung leaves, as her subordinate runs after her trying to put ointment on her.

Hyun Sang Hee (Sung Joon), the younger brother of Hyun Ki Joon, arrives back in Seoul and immediately heads for city center. He’s at a club and is flirting with a girl when his amorous activities garner him some pissy attitude from a girl nearby who is trying to do something important. Sang Hee turns around to find himself standing next to Ah Jung’s table.

Ah Jung knocks on the table to get their attention, asking them whether this is their bedroom or a hotel room? She tells them to be quiet and stop distracting her, using her scarf to shoo them away from her table. Ah Jung yells that it’s too loud here, and she puts on her earphones and takes a swig of beer. Sang Hee looks at this crazy chick and smiles, liking the entertaining strange girl.

In the club, Ah-jung is drunkenly scribbling her resignation letter, while Sang-hee has taken the seat next to her, observing for the fun of it. The way he humors her is adorable; he nods and follows her faulty logic gravely, like she makes perfect sense, although he does point out that a napkin resignation won’t appear very serious. Not that seriousness is her big concern when the letter reads: “My almighty self is resigning. Don’t live like that, you punks!” It’s decorated with a devil sticking out its tongue and declaring, “Neener!”

Sang Hee and Ah Jung drink and discuss her work woes. Ah Jung writes “I can’t work here any longer” looking up to finally notice Sang Hee sitting next to her and wondering what she’s up to. Ah Jung impatiently tells him that she is writing a resignation letter, what else does it look like? Sang Hee wonders why she’s writing it here, and Ah Jung wonders how long he’s going to sit there and bother her.

She tells Sang Hee that it’s clear he’s never written a resignation letter before, since it doesn’t look like he has a job. Sang Hee correctly wonders why she’s writing such an important letter on a napkin. Ha, so true. Ah Jung looks at him like he’s stupid – since she’s writing the letter here, a napkin is all she has to write on. Duh. Sang Hee remarks that a resignation letter written on a napkin doesn’t have much sincerity in it.

Ah Jung says that it’s better than writing it on a paper coaster. Ah Jung then drinks with Sang Hee, regaling him with her misadventures with the bees at the festival. Sang Hee wonders why she’s writing a resignation letter when all her boss asked her to do was write an apology letter? Ah Jung’s unique brain thinks that she didn’t do anything wrong, so it’s more unacceptable for her to write an apology letter.

She downs the best of her beer and asks for another. She gets up and trips on the table, and Sang Hee grabs her resignation napkin and reads it. Ah Jung wrote – the capable me cannot stand this any longer and you guys need to stop living like this, I quit. Sang Hee asks if she really is going to hand it in like this, and Ah Jung says that she will blow her nose on the napkin first before tendering it to her boss. Oh dear, I like this girl very very much.

Meanwhile, back at home, Ki-joon hunches over in his studio, working on some miniature models. Pfft, I love that our rich, perfect chaebol stud has a hobby as geeky as model building — and that he takes it so seriously. He gets some startling news, though, and rushes out.

Ki Joon chases Sang Hee outside just in time to see him get into a car and take off. Ah Jung has also realized that Sang Hee left, taking her resignation napkin with him. Ah Jung runs after Sang Hee, yelling at him to come back, she’s a civil servant of Korea! Ki Joon asks Ah Jung if she knows Sang Hee, which is when she starts to have some sort of seizure right in front of Ki Joon.

Ki-joon asks if she also knows Hyun Sang-hee, but Ah-jung starts choking (on air? on spit?) and grabs him in her panic. He shoves her off, which leads her to hilariously grab his ankle, and that’s a sight that draws eyes. The bystanders start murmuring over the scene, and Ki-joon realizes how bad this looks for him. (Literal ankle-grabbing = metaphorical ankle-grabbing = “Don’t leave me!” Thus, the guy ignoring the desperate ankle-grabber = cold-hearted bastard.)

Having passed out, she’s taken to the hospital in an ambulance, accompanied by Ki-joon, who tries to explain that he’s not her guarantor and that this is the first time he’s seen the girl. Everyone’s like “Yeah, sure” and continues to call him her guarantor anyway.

Because the blanket is caught under Ah Jung’s feet, Ki Joon tugs a little too hard on the blanket and finds himself tumbling towards Ah Jung. He stops himself, but his face is mere inches away from hers, which is when the sleeping beauty wakes up. Ah Jung groggily looks up to see Ki Joon, causing her to wonder who this handsome man is?

The doctor comes by to reassure Ah Jung that she’ll be fine. She just had alcohol poisoning, and the doctor asks her if she took any drugs. Ah Jung vehemently denies it, which is when the doctor notices the bee sting. The doctor explains that alcohol and bee venom may have disastrous consequences for certain people, and could be the cause for Ah Jung’s bad reaction last night. The patient in the bed next to Ah Jung offers her an orange, and compliments her on her handsome husband who stayed by her bed the entire night. Ah Jung tells her that he’s not her husband.

Ah-jung races outside to catch him before he leaves, and pounds on his taxi window. Ki-joon instructs the driver to go anyway, but the misunderstanding continues and the cabbie tells him sagely that one doesn’t treat women like this, and that in these circumstances, “Losing is winning.” Hee.

Ki Joon comes back and Ah Jung quickly pretends to have just woken up. He wants to ask her about Sang Hee, but first asks Ah Jung to fix her buttons on her shirt. He looks at disheveled Ah Jung and decides she can’t possibly have any connection with Sang Hee so he doesn’t ask. Ki Joon leaves, and Ah Jung runs after him like a madwoman. Ki Joon tries to get into a taxi and take off, but Ah Jung bangs on the window asking him to open up. The kind taxi driver won’t leave and instead tells Ki Joon to go talk with his girlfriend who is obvious needing him right now.