September 26, 2021

Second Life: Slow Study

Her homelife stinks. This we know when a teenager (Jung Da-eun) overhears her neglectful parents fighting in another room. At school, life's not much better when she wakes up in class only to find other girls having fun around a birthday cake which she is not invited to share. Will her situation improve when she gifts EXO concert tickets to her popular peers? Yes but...No good deed goes unpunished.

What goes wrong? Is it lying to her mother to get money to scalp those tickets? Or making up a story about two recently acquired rings out of her price range? Whatever her first misstep, by catapulting herself from outcast to kook, this troubled teen goes from being a source of indifference to a target of derision. Does she learn a lesson? Um, no.

Instead she attempts to frame one young woman whom she especially envies, a strategy that backfires terribly. Does she learn from this? Again, no. At least not immediately. But as the old A.A. adage goes: "Helping others is the foundation stone of recovery." Our anti-heroine may not be an alcoholic but she's definitely got issues. Perhaps some time hanging out with orphans will shape her into a better person. From the looks of it, she does become a better student. Which should serve her at the fancy private high school. But will it be enough?

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