#like it was RIGHT THERE these are minimal tweaks they could've crammed in the last ep if push came to shove

[korusalka]

Why the canon ending of 25, 21 didn't work even though it could've worked

It's been like what, two weeks? And I still agree with people like @goyurim that I theoretically liked the ending. I like yearning, I like "right person, wrong timing", I could've cried over Baekdo and still labelled Twenty-Five, Twenty-One as my favourite kdrama of 2022. But the problem is, I know they dropped the ball on the execution, and that's why it left a bunch of us dissatisfied even though we expected a bittersweet ending.

The reason I know this is because about 10 years ago, I had the gigantic misfortune to watch Reply 1997, which is one of the greatest shows about dumb teens ever and made me label the critically acclaimed Derry Girls as "The Northern Irish Reply 1997".

For those of you who are so lucky to experience Reply 1997 for the first time, it's a show about unhinged fangirls in, you guessed it, the late nineties. The unhinged fangirls are about 18 years old and share a single braincell with their other friends from school. That's one of two main timelines. The other timeline is set in 2012, where the friends, who are now all in their early to mid-30s, meet at a class reunion. It's revealed that at this reunion, the female main character (Shiwon) is married to someone present. Over the course of the show, the viewers are made to analyse different clues in true HIMYM fashion in order to find out who the husband is. And it's tricky!

That's them by the way. <3

So why am I bringing up this slightly aged show besides obvious parallels of growing up in the 90s, interesting female characters, queer subplots, and hilariously stupid teen shenanigans? Don't worry, I'm about to make a point. I'm not going to ramble about the Reply series here even though I'm tempted. Just check it out, it's on Netflix as well.

See, what I always liked about the Reply 1997 ending (no spoilers) is that generally speaking, the characters grew up, but their personalities stayed the same. More specifically, the fangirls grew up to be well-rounded women who made room for romantic interests and careers, but still geeked out over boybands in a slightly cringy but still highly likable way. That's what I imagine and hope to be like at 30: Someone who's grown and made peace with certain things, but essentially stays just a little bit silly, just a little bit overattached to the things that mattered to me a lot 15 years ago. And they lost some of the things that mattered to them, and that's ok, they're older now, but life goes on.

That's the point that Twenty-Five, Twenty-One tried to make, and they almost managed it. As many issues as I had with the older Heedo (Jung Eunji did such a fantastic job of playing an 18yo and a 33yo that I would've accepted the ultimately more talented Taeri as a 40yo in a heartbeat), I believe the writers that you can lose people and never see them again. I believe that you can change. I also believe that life goes on and you find new things to care about and that you stay being the everchanging version of yourself.

So I would've accepted the ending under three conditions which were fulfilled in Reply 1997:

Heedo would treasure her experiences she made as a teen and the bonds she had with Yurim and Yijin in particular.

Heedo's current husband would be shown as someone kind and good she cares enough for to have married him. And she would've loved him, there's no doubt, because otherwise it wold've been entirely against her whole personality. That doesn't mean that the marriage had to be intact, but it would've been a nice bonus. I wish all the best things in the world to happen for Heedo.

The squad would be shown to be a group that lives their separate lives but comes together every once in a while for class reunions, casual hangouts and so on. Not because they're forced to see each other, but because they genuinely like each other. Because that's the vibe they always had.

And the show dropped the ball on the last two conditions. I think one of the problems was that the show was aimed at a younger demographic, but they didn't trust us to empathise with forty-year-olds and our own inevitable future. They wanted to tell us that relationships formed in our youth often don't stand the test of time and that life will change, but they didn't make us care about the future because they thought we wouldn't understand anyway. It's a sad oversight that made us fill all the gaps with confusion and misery, because mature Heedo seemed to be miserable.

But literally all it would've taken? Toning down mature Heedo's yearning for Yijin by a 1000, maybe not including the incredibly charged 2009 interview.

Instead, showing how Heedo comes home to someone every day who loves her and flips pancakes and loves their daughter so much he takes a treasured story of his wife and turns it into a sweet new one by writing on his daughter's ballet shoes. A man who respects her past and has his own and they met somewhere in the middle, the right people at the right time.

Instead, showing how Heedo and Yurim text each other every day ("after all these years, she's still my favourite person"). Instead, showing how the group manages to get together more often, and Seungwon fought for a fulfilling career in fair education. Yijin decides to join them for the first time. Their eyes meet over the table. "Reader, they were my first love." They smile. They say cheers and reminisce. And suddenly, it's all of their five younger selves sitting together again. Life is not the same, but some things will work out for the better, and some things are always going to stay a part of us. Fade out.