The Legend of the Blue Sea (2016)

Background:

Broadcast Period: November to January 2016 (Korea)
Episodes:  20 +Special

Status: Complete

Executive Summary:

Love Story about a mermaid Shim Chung and Heo Joon-jae a con-artist.  
Mermaids have the ability to erase memories, have super strength and generate pearls when they cry (pink ones if it is a happy cry which is rare). Once on land their heart will stop beating unless the one they love loves them back.  Shim Chung erases Joon-jae's memories 2 times once in Spain and in the end when she went back to sea to recover from the gunshot.  Both times he ends up somehow remembering.  He kept a journal to remind him the second time when she erased everyone's memory.  Joon-jae and the little girl both can hear the inner voice of Shim Chung.

Joon-jae runs away from home as a teenager looking for his mom who left thinking he would have a better life with his rich father and new stepmom.  The step mom really wanted the money for her son she had with Dae-young and had a history of killing her prior husbands.

As the series progresses everyone is intertwine with their previous lives in the Joseon period as history seems to repeat itself and some of them including Dae-young, Joon-jae, the ajusshi have dreams of their past lives.

Cut to the Chase:

Shim Chung and Joon-jae get married and is pregnant with child. Joon-jae becomes a prosecutor and moves to the seaside with Shim Chung.  The stepmom and Dae-young goes to jail.  The stepbrother (the son of the stepmom and Dae-Young) commits suicide after he is caught trying to kill Joon-joe in a sting and shooting Shim Chung.  Joon-jae's father dies by being poisoned by the stepmom.  Shi-ah (Dam Ryeong's official wife) who always has a crush on Joon-jae ends up chasing after/proposing to Tae-ho (Joon-jae room mate hacker) who becomes a white hacker.  Joon-jae does meet up/finds mom when Shim Chung invites her to her birthday party.  Nam-Doo (the senior con-artist room mate) becomes a lecturer.  The Professor that sees both Joon-jae and Dae-young is the fortuneteller from the Joseon time.

Joseon Storyline Summary:

Sae Wa (Shim Chung's Joseon name) meets Dam Ryeong (Heo Joon-jae's previous life) when they are kids.  Dam Ryeong tries to go to the shore to meet her every chance he can get.  There they have fun as Dam Ryeong shows her things from the land she can't see.  Later he says that he can not come to see her anymore because he is getting married.  They want to be together but unfortunately she can not because as a young mermaid she can not transform legs until she is an adult.  During the night of Dam Ryeong marriage he runs to see Sae Wa and goes to the sea because he knows she will come.  She does but in a voice over she says that mermaids have the power to erase memories.  When he wakes up he has no memories of her.  Later he indicates that his late wife when she die hated him for leaving her on their wedding night which he never remembered what happened.  He connects that this story she tells him is his story.

Dam Ryeong as the new magistrate in town finds Sae Wa who is captured by the merchant.  He releases/saves her. After some time has pass Lord Yan (Dae-young) spread rumors of the mermaid (6) and finds opportunity to capture the mermaid to extra her tears.  Dam Ryeong finds her but is too late.  While he carries her body he tells her to meet in their next lifetime (7).  Sae Wa later returns to the sea.  Dam Ryeong is later exiled.  Lord Yang goes releasing lanterns on that day (it was a sign for Dam Ryeong and Sae Wa to meet).  Dam Ryeong realizes this and turns his boat around.  He makes it in time and dives in the ocean in time to save Sae Wa and a harpoon pierces thru him killing him.  Sae Wa saddened in his embrace plunges the harpoon thru her and dies with Ryeong (13).  The reveal is that the harpoon was thrown by the stepbrother Chi-hyun's prior life.  Lord Yang is killed by Nam-Doo, Joon-jae's friend (he was the son of a merchant that Dae-young killed) later when Lord Yang tries to escape with his ginseng (stepmom).

Current/Previous Lives:

• Joon-jae = Dam Ryeong
• Shim Chung = Sae Wa
• Dae-young = Lord Yang
• Stepmom = ginseng
• Stepbrother = Lord Yang's son (his son in both lives)
• Mom = madam/master of Jin-joo previous life
• Jin-joo = servant of mom
• Professor = fortuneteller
• Nam-Doo = son of merchant that was killed by Lord Yang and one that kills Lord Yang
• Detective Hong = friend of Dam Ryeong
• Shi-ah = Dam Ryeong official wife that never got the real love of Dam Ryeong
• Little girl = little girl that also heard the inner voice, she was a half human/half mermaid

Epilogues Episode Summary:

These are skits that aired at the end of the episodes.  Basically the continuation of the some of the scenes in the story line that we didn't get to see at the episode.

1. ?pending
2. ?pending
3. We are shown the scene after Shim Chung saves Heo Joon-jae to shore.  While he is unconscious, she gives him the jade bracelet. She says she will keep her promise and find him.  After saying she loves him she walks away back to the sea while Heo Joon-jae wakes up with no memory of her. 
4. In Joseon times Joon-jae's mom is the Madam and she orders Jin-Joo to take off and put on the covers of the paste jars.  When the male servant says they will be reborn to be together again and rich and ask her want she wants in her next life, she says she wants to be Jin-joo master in the next life.
5. In the Joseon times when Shim Chung was being throw rocks when she was capture calls for help in her inner voice.  The little girl hears this meanwhile her friend says he didn't hear anything and to just leave.  In modern times the same little girl looking out the window tells her mom that Shim Chung is asking for help when she was just hit by the car.  This illustrates who Shim Chung said to the Joseon Heo Joon-jae that mermaid do speak but not everyone can hear them.
6. Shim Chung drinks all the water and grabs the money Heo Joon-jae's brother gives as compensation for the car accident because she is afraid he will splash her with water.  She took the money and said she loves Heo Joon-jae and will not leave him.  Basically Shim Chung thought that like the TV drama the family offers money for the girl to leave the guy and if they don't take it they will splash water on them as the lady in the hospital said when she was explaining to her when they were watching the drama on TV.
7. Joon-jae asks the officer what he does for a living after Shim Chung goes back in the house.  The office tells him that the opportunities and chances are not always there which is the hint that Shim Chung's time is limited since a mermaid time is limited on land and has to have the person they love also love them back in a certain time frame.
8. Dam Ryeong is with Sae Wa who is injured.  She wakes up saying she will return to the sea.  That is the only way they will survive.  She will erase his memories like last time.  Dam Ryeong says the memories are his and to not erase them this time.
9. none?
10. no epilogue
11. After Shim Chung gives her number to the fake Santa to talk to fulfill her wish, Joon-jae meets him when he leaves to takes the number from him and tears it up.
12. no epilogues after 12

Thoughts:

I like how everyone was intertwine and related to their previous lives.  It seem that history just repeated itself at every corner.  But the only difference was we got our happy ending.  It was a nice touch how when Shim Chung returned she saw another mermaid and warn/taught her the troubles and how to act in the land world.  It was almost as if it was her from the beginning.


I would have been nice if they continued the epilogues.  I felt it was an attempt at mimicking "You from Another Star" the blockbuster hit that Shim Chung was in but then it stopped which was sad because I found it nice.

Overall is was an ok show although I kind of stopped at 12 and just did a marathon watch  as it didn't get me to rush and make sure I watch the show.  I actually ending up watching Healer an old series instead for some reason  I think the show was more hyped up because of the main actor's on the series which could have been it's selling point.  So what do you think of the show or did/will you be watching it?