It’s very rare for a kdrama to enter twitter worldwide trends, but tvN’s “It’s Okay To Not Be Okay” managed to do with more than 80K tweets after its recent episode aired.
“It’s Okay To Not Be Okay” 9th episode aired on July 18 and while it was a happy episode for the most part, the last five minutes were very difficult and emotional.
Note: spoilers of episode 9 ahead
Moon Young and Gang Tae finally make more progress in their relationship and take a trip together that ends with them spending the night together while Gang Tae tries his best to restrain himself. They kiss in this episode as well.
Gang Tae has finally surrendered to Moon Young and can no longer hide that he likes her. However, he doesn’t tell his brother that he’s gone on a trip with Moon Young because he’s afraid of hurting his feelings.
Regardless, one stupid rumor spread by the male nurse in their psychiatric hospital spreads like wild fire and Sang Tae ends up hearing the rumor that his brother is marrying Moon Young.
Gang Tae tries to calm him down but he explodes and ends up telling the entire hospital staff and patients that his brother tried to kill him when he was younger and wanted him to die. He goes on to say that his brother is trying to kill him screaming on the top of his lungs while everyone watches him.
Gang Tae collapses on the floor while denying he’s ever done this to the doctor and nurses while Moon Young looks at the situation from afar crying.
Fans had a lot of things to say about episode 9 of “It’s Okay To Not Be Okay” and this begins with praising Kim Soo Hyun, Seo Ye Ji and Oh Jung Se for their amazing performances.
Here are some of fans reactions to the episode:
Have you seen episode 9? What did you think of it?
My Personal Thoughts
I made the grave mistake of looking at the hashtag while it was trending on twitter, and I was already crying. This was one of the best episodes in the series thus far, I didn’t expect Sang Tae’s reaction to their relationship to be this volatile. I think he’s afraid of losing him above all else, but I don’t understand why he’d embarrass and scar him in front of everyone like that, it seems so unlike his character so I am waiting for a plausible explanation in episode 10. I don’t honestly know if autistic people behave like this when triggered but I know for a fact it differs from one person to another.
I also know that whatever Sang Tae does Gang Tae will always come back to him, so even if he does this, Gang Tae will not leave his side and probably stick even closer. He’s still haunted by that memory of him trying to get rid of his older brother.
I am starting to think that Gang Tae is as scarred as Moon Young but does a better job hiding it. I am so curious about episode 10.
I think this episode is probably the most shocking of the series thus far, I definitely didn’t expect this to happen. Now, we’ll probably get that mandatory separation period for our leads but it came sooner than I expected. I wonder how the writer will handle this.
In short, I think Kim Soo Hyun, Seo Ye Ji and Oh Jung Se are fucking amazing actors. Oh Jung Se, again, amazes me with his acting chops; this guy is one of the best ahjussi actors out there right now. I’ve been watching him in kdramas for a long time but began to notice him a lot more with his role in “When the Camellia Blooms” which he followed with the immensely successful series “Hot Stove League.” When he began taking on more daring roles, I began to notice how great he is.
I’m truly enjoying IONTBO. I knew from the start Sang Tae’s character will be my weakness. And this ep 9 had me crying like hell on its last 5 mins. Such great actors!
Btw,I hope this kind of write up was also written for The King Eternal Monarch -Ratings not being an indication if it’s a good kdrama or not. Looking back, TKEM was consistently criticized for getting “low” ratings in Korea on this blog. But was never positively noticed on this blog as a hit on Netflix and a consistent trending topic on twitter. Well I guess bec it’s a personal blog, so can’t really say much on your chosen content and headlines ya? Just noticed how IONTBO is getting this kind of positive vibe headlines unlike what TKEM had back then when it was ongoing where mostly where about how low and how or why TKEM was “struggling” on ratings.
Agreed totally!!!!!! TKEM was freakin so amazing. i wish people could have appreciated it a little more, after all it was worth it.
I noticed that too! I think TKEM was so unfairly treated by a lot of people. This is a personal blog I guess I can’t complain. But I noticed two completely different treatments from Soompi as well. I remember TKEM fans used to complain in the comment section “why do you have to make a title read the rating dips again every time you report?”. However, you can’t even find rating news for IONTBO if it dipped below 5. That happened to ep2, and ep10 at least. Sometimes, they reported only the second half (now TVN splits the rating to two parts like SBS which only started with IONTBO). Usually the second half is always much higher than the first. You can hardly hear any frustrations from fans complaining tones when reporting ratings as the only words they used were “steady” or “a boost”. As a matter of fact, DC had a heated discussion regarding a reporter who wrote news with completely biased tones when discussing ratings, scripts, and especially actors of these two recent dramas. Again, I have no right to complain about it here since this is a personal blog, just saw your reply and I want to share the same thoughts. Being a TKEM fan, it hurts sometimes.