The Deceit
Episode 5 of Beyond Evil begins with Dong-Sik learning Geum-Ja’s name and immediately turning the tables on his colleague. He knows who Joo-Won hired to try and trick him. In response, Dong-Sik brings up a list of other officers at the station who he could potentially be protecting. It’s an incredibly chilling dialogue, one that sees Dong-Sik chuckle as he turns on the news. The Chief Superintendent apologizes to the public for his son’s words, bowing and taking responsibility for it. He claims that all of this was done without evidence and essentially wipes his hands of any involvement with his son. He even promises to hold Joo-Won accountable. However, it seems there’s more than one motive for this, especially with the redevelopment project due to take place. That evening, Dong-Sok heads back to the butcher’s and speaks to Jung-Je. He finds his colleague completely wasted and sketching a doe in silence. As Dong-Sik sits and talks to him, Jung-Je mentions how he keeps hearing women’s voices, who call to him and ask for help. The next day, a reporter called Im Gyui-Seok shows up at the police station and requests an interview with Joo-Won. He refuses, until Dong-Sik shows and calls the reporter out for defamation. With all the officers together, they surround the reporter and ask for his card. Tthey check his ID badge and eventually forbid the man from showing up at the Substation. They manage to warn him off, as Joo-Won stands confused and wonders what this means. Dong-Sik quickly explains that they’re Manyang Police and they protect each other. Only, these words hold a double meaning. On the one hand, it’s good for stopping their enemies together. On the other, it could also mean these officers are covering for each other if one is a murderer. He’s immediately interrupted though by an enraged Dong-Sik hurrying into the patrol car and racing downtown. With Joo-Won in the car next to him, Dong-Sik stops in town where Jin-Mook happens to be speaking publicly up on the podium in front of everyone. Dong-Sik tells Joo-Won to stay inside the car while he heads up to stop Jin-Mook. After, he confronts a woman in the crowd who claims that Min-Jung isn’t the same as her daughter given their characters are completely different. Dong-Sik is enraged and even more so when he speaks to Councilwoman Do after. This official mentions how they suffered together 20 years ago. As we soon see, this is a direct result off her showing up at Dong-Sik’s and berating him for being let free from the police station and using Jung-Je. Eventually this bad blood spills over into a big brawl out by the stage. Joo-Won gets involved and helps his colleague. With them both seemingly on the same page for now, the officers call out Chang-Jim and arrest him for instigating assault courtesy of his goons. With Joo-Won and Dong-Sik also held in custody, the Superintendent watches the footage of his son in a gang fight and struggles to compose himself. Unable to get through to Joo-Won, he instead rings Chang-Jin. While they’re on the phone together, both Dong-Sik and Joo-Won are in the interrogation room again. Only, this time the dynamic is slightly different and less hostile. Ji-Hwa arrives and warns that because they’ve ruined the event then it puts them in a tricky position going forward. Eventually Dong-Sik caves and decides to take the deal in exchange for the videos being taken down from the internet. Out in the parking lot, Dong-Sik and Joo-Won come to blows over their changed ideologies. Dong-Sik eventually leaves, popping pills in the back on the taxi as he heads home. Meanwhile, Joo-Won meets his brother in the bar again, who gives him instructions to lay low with a well-rehearsed scenario to cover their backs. Kwon-Hyeok confirms that the audit office will handle this. Joo-Won eventually caves and asks Kwon-Hyeok for help in investigating Jung-Je’s history and seeing what he could be hiding. After, Joo-Won heads home and starts cycling, thinking over Jung-Je’s past and whether he could be the big culprit here. Dong-Sik speaks to the reporter and learns that someone tipped him off. That someone, as we know, is Ji-Hoon and he calls him out for it later that day. As they sit together, we cut back to that fateful night with Min-Jung. Now, Ji-Hoon was there but he wasn’t the person she smiled at. She actually smiled at Jung-Je who showed up to see her before him. Ji-Hoon pleads his case with Dong-Sik, telling him he’s not a stalker but didn’t say anything before as this could have caused big problems for them. Later that evening, more about Jung-Je is unveiled. Joo-Won has done his research and brings up an incident involving Jun-Je in the past. Apparently he killed someone who looked like a doe. It seems like Dong-Sik and the others have completely covered this up. Dong-Sik loses his patience, asking Joo-Won outright where his evidence is that links all of this together. There is none, of course, beyond the hunches that Joo-Won has. As the two stand face to face, Joo-Won admits everything about the sting operation and wants to catch the culprit and bring them to justice. We then cut back to the night with Min-Jung where Jin-Mook happens to be standing, watching everything transpire from afar. Oh no, is this another suspect?
The Episode Review
Is Jin-Mook the killer? It certainly seems that way based on the ending we’ve just seen but Beyond Evil continues to deliver these absolutely thrilling cliffhangers with lots of red herrings and question marks hanging over who could be responsible. In fact, Beyond Evil has done a fantastic job keeping everything mysterious while peppering in enough suspects and different motives to keep us guessing the right way through. I mentioned a couple of episodes back that Jin-Mook seems suspicious for his comment about everything being in order. The ending now seems to prove as much too. On top of that, we’ve got Ji-Hoon who’s been drawing that doe and seemingly killed someone in the past. If that wasn’t enough, we’ve got both Dong-Sik and Joo-Won keeping secrets along with powerful people at the top fighting for domination. Could we be looking at multiple killers perhaps? The ending certainly sets things up nicely for the episodes to come and this Korean drama is just starting to tighten the screw and become much more involving. Roll on the next episode!
