Warning: Spoilers
You can watch it: HERE
Last Episode – Episode 1
The show left us on a cliffhanger with Lee Hwa-Sun pointing her revolver and threatening to shoot. Now we’re back for episode 2!
Episode 2
[OPENING SCENE]
The scene starts where episode 1 left off, a huge cliffhanger.
At the edge of the sinkhole, Lee Hwa-Sun is under the influence of the dark smoke and hallucinates, while aiming a gun at Yoo Tae-Han. She attempts to kill the hallucinated killer of her husband but then her husband appears in her hallucination to stop her. She lowers her gun as she slowly returns to reality and the dark smoke in her eyes starts to clear up. Lee Hwa-Sun faints and Yoo Tae-Han picks her up to take her back to his house.
The shaman, Kim Sunn-Yeo, watches them as they leave. Then, she approaches the sinkhole and she hears whispers [I’m guessing it’s the whispers of the dark smoke]. The shaman declares her loyalty and starts to serve her new god after being betrayed by the previous one.
We move over to see the police officers, Sergeant Park Soon-Il and Officer Zo Hyun-Ho, who are trying to find Nam Young-Sik in the forest. Instead, they stumble upon a sinkhole. Sergeant Park Soon-Il reports this to Muji High School Chairman, Choi Kyung-Soo, who owns the area. The chairman yells at him and orders him to fill the sinkhole immediately.
Next, we’re introduced to Han Dong-Rim who is a quiet student being bullied. An expelled high school student, Lee Jin-Seok, forces her to join him and a group of bullies (iljin) to explore the sinkhole, even though the police officers had surrounded the sinkhole with police tape.
The group of iljin wants to take a look at what’s at the bottom of the sinkhole so they snatch Han Dong-Rim’s phone and tie it with police tape to lower into the sinkhole, whilst using another phone as a live stream monitor.
The live stream stops working and the phone tied to the police tape is suddenly being pulled by something. The anger from Lee Jin-Seok prompts the other girls to force Han Dong-Rim to retrieve her phone from the bottom of the sinkhole. Suddenly, the black smoke rises from the sink hole and two of the iljin inhale it. One attacks the other, choking her to death and then, the other infected bully commits suicide by jumping into the sinkhole.
Next scene, we return back to Lee Hwa-Sun who wakes up at Yoo Tae-Han’s house. Yoo Tae-Han tries to ask her for answers about the sinkhole and for reasons why his friend became insane, but Lee Hwa-Sun replies saying that she saw nothing.
She receives a call informing her about the last location where Lee Soo-Yeon was last seen — a tunnel. In the tunnel, Lee Hwa-Sun begins to hallucinate again but returns to reality because of her husband’s reappearance in her mind.
Lee Hwa-Sun and Yoo Tae-Han talk about the events in Muji and the existence of the sinkhole begins to make some sense. They also decide to go to the hospital.
Meanwhile, workers are trying to fill the sinkhole. Working at night is dangerous since light is so limited. An accident caused a power outage in the surrounding areas.
Tensions begin to rise between the workers and Sergeant Park Soon-Il, who is being pressured to quickly fill the sinkhole by the high school chairman. Dark smoke starts to enter the area where the workers are. Seeing one of the infected bullies tackles a worker down, the rest are thrown into a fit of panic and confusion. The other workers also start to inhale the black smoke and turn hostile towards each other. Sergeant Park Soon-Il escapes alone.
At the hospital, the hiker that was assumed dead in the autopsy room wakes up to attack two doctors by gouging out their eyes.
Jung Do-Yoon is home alone when someone, who claims to be her mother, knocks at the door. At the same time, Jung Do-Yoon’s mother, Kim Bo-Eun, video calls her from the hospital and sees a mutant break through the glass door.
Lee Hwa-Sun gets into a fight with the infected hiker at the front entrance of the hospital where patients and staff are exiting the building. Yoo Tae-Han comes to save her but the infected hiker has immense strength. Kim Bo-Eun is running out of the hospital but meets the gaze of the infected hiker and he attacks her. Lee Hwa-Sun shoots him in the head, saving Kim Bo-Eun.
Black eyes. Black blood. He is not human. How could this have happened…
Lee Hwa-Sun | Episode 2
Kim Bo-Eun tells Lee Hwa-Sun that something might have happened to her daughter which involves a woman with black eyes. So Lee Hwa-Sun splits ways with Yoo Tae-Han, who goes to find Nam Young-Sik.
It’s too late for Nam Young-Sik when Yoo Tae-Han discovers him in his disastrous state and kills him in a fight.
Meanwhile, Lee Hwa-Sun and Kim Bo-Eun find Jung Do-Yoon but as they escape in the van, Kim Bo-Eun fails to make it as she decides to hold off a mutant and urges Lee Hwa-Sun to drive away as a horde of infected and black smoke appears to take them.
Listen to the detective. Survive no matter what. Got it?
Kim Bo-Eun to Jung Do-Yoon | Episode 2
Driving through Muji City, the place is in chaos with car collisions, people fighting the infected and running away. Lee Hwa-Sun loses Jung Do-Yoon and a siren rings for people to head to Muji High School for shelter.
We’re left with a cliffhanger as the horde of infected runs into the main city square and Jung Do-Yoon is missing again.
Personal Thoughts and Theories
I’ve definitely fallen in love with the character, Lee Hwa-Sun; such a strong female lead for Dark Hole. With the second episode really raising the stakes for Lee Hwa-Sun’s goal of catching the killer, I can’t wait to see more character development for Lee Hwa-Sun.
In the beginning, I thought that Dark Hole would be about some kind of natural disaster that led to a post-apocalyptic scenario. So far, the mutation of people involves the dark smoke from these crystals and there is a lot of foreshadowing about something major involving the sinkhole near the large-scale petrochemical plant.
The only thing I’m not a fan of is how fast we’re switching between the characters. It’s hard to follow everyone’s storylines but I have a feeling that eventually everything will merge and the pacing may improve.
Is the black smoke self-aware? Is it a god?
The shaman did not inhale the black smoke but was able to hear its whispers and started to serve it as (though it was) a god. The more I think about it, the more I don’t believe that the supernatural is part of this K-drama. If we were to look at it from a sci-fi perspective, I think this could lean more towards something extraterrestrial. . .
This series is definitely binge-worthy and I would recommend it to anyone looking for thriller K-dramas.
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