Food Mart
Sae-Bom heads over to Seo-Yoon’s place to check on her. With a baseball bat to hand, she intends to keep them safe. The thing is, there’s no signal for either the mobile phones or TVs, meaning they’re well and truly on their own now.
It appears that Sung-Sil, the old lady from Room 302, may actually be infected with the virus. She’s itchy and as she takes her hand away from her back, spatters of blood can be seen. Her obnoxious blogger son, Dong-Hyun, is too interested in his 1000 views on his latest video to pay much attention.
The residents of the building below are discussing how everyone has gotten infected so quickly and how they don’t know what to do. Ms Oh is among them, but she encourages anyone who wants to leave to do so. However, most of the residents don’t want to brave the parking lot.
With dwindling food supplies and Ms. Oh on their side for now, the group discusses what to do next and the very real possibility that they will be in this for the long haul. ..
This latest development in the infection is that the infected can randomly revert back to their human form. This has been confirmed by the blood spatter on the door being wiped off. It seems as though the security guard we saw last episode is back to being human again.
The problem is that the infection isn’t just limited to the apartment complex. Tae-Seol shows up to a nightclub with his guys, hearing ominous banging downstairs behind a door. It’s actually because one of the infected is there, after the club was cleared out earlier on thanks to a member’s only party. Tae-Seok encourages his security detail to keep everything secret. ..
The lawyer, Hae-Sung, is trying to get money from Sang-Hee to buy supplies for the infected. He offers her $1000 but she refuses. He then offers $300 but she refuses again. Finally, he offers $1000 but she still won’t let him in.
Yi-Hyun and Sae-Bom head back to check on Sae-Yoon. She immediately questions what’s happening with the infected but Sae-Bom is confident things will get better. She shrugs it off, claiming that all of this will be done in a week and that a vaccine is coming. At least, that’s what she tells Sae-Yoon. When she notices the messages to her mum still not getting through, she’s understandably concerned.
A briefing on the Mad Person virus is taking place. Or the Lytta virus, as they’re referring to it. Infection is caused when the virus enters the bloodstream but the target actually doesn’t feel anything or start to turn until it reaches the brain. Being bitten, scratched or taking Next is what starts infection, but Next is also the catalyst for Patient Zero and how this all began.
Unfortunately, there doesn’t seem to be a cure for this disease. Especially when Tae-Seok confirms that the barrier to the brain prevents it. They’re working with a live virus to try and formulate a solution but that could take a month. 3 weeks longer than they have. Based on Tae-Seok’s projected model, he thinks they’ll be completely overrun after a week. What he doesn’t tell the other members of the group though is that this is a lost cause.
We are on day 5 of the quarantine and Tae-Seok contemplates whether to widen the area of lockdown and try to secure the infected. He also seriously considers just having everyone killed too.
The latest twist in the Joo-Yeong bribery scandal is that two of the people caught up in the scheme, Yi-Hyun and Sae-Bom, are also head of security for a major company. This raises questions about whether or not Joo-Yeong is using them as a front to pay off those who have broken his trust.
As we make our way to the food mart, we hear a loud scream from down the street. It turns out to be one of the infected, who has been killed by security guard. We quickly run towards the sound and find a group of people being held hostage by the infected. They’re clearly in a lot of pain and don’t have much time left. We try to help as much as we can, but it’s all too late.
Dong-Hyun lingers too long and as several of the infected appear, they corner him. Andrew happens to be in the supply room, keeping him deathly silent, while Yi-Hyun and Sa-Bom also find one of the workers at the store who doesn’t appear to be infected Thankfully they all manage to get away, shutting the gate down on the others. ..
Ms Oh. has an uneasy encounter with one of the infected down in the parking lot too. They act normally to begin with and she almost opens the door to let the man in too. That is, until she remembers the play about being thirsty and stops what she’s doing. Dropping water on the ground, the guy ends up crazed.
The group of survivors make it back to the apartment complex, but Joo-Yeong refuses to let them in. Instead, he plays on the fears of the infected and starts to lure them over to their location. It’s chaos as Joo-Hyeon slips away while the doors are finally opened and the group head inside. ..
Yi-Hyun is absolutely livid and immediately confronts Joo-Hyeong. He rubs blood all over the man’s face, sending the guy into frenzied uproar. When Sae-Bom shows, she manages to calm Yi-Hyun down and hugs her husband warmly.
Tae-Seok learns that an infected has escaped the apartment complex and makes a massive call. He decides to let the guy go in a controlled environment, making sure that no one is hurt but also to sway the public opinion so these infected are feared and loathed.
The Episode Review
The lockdown has been going on for weeks now and it’s clear that the plan was never very well thought out. The infection is spreading at an alarming rate and it’s clear that Tae-Seok is fighting a losing battle against it. This chapter does well to show how the infection is breaking out of the locked down area and about to hit Korea at large.
The idea that the apartment complex will be the only safe place left in Korea is still on, and it will be interesting to see what direction they go with this in the future. However, the human implications of this virus and seeing how quickly these people descend into selfish desires – even Sae-Bom when she wanted to leave Andrew and Dong-Hyun behind – shows just how quickly panic can spread. ..
The ending of the show definitely hints that things are about to get a whole lot more dramatic. ..
