“Duty After School” Part 2 Ending Explained

TVING has dropped the last four episodes of “Duty After School” aka “Duty After School” part 2. Here is a recap of the finale and the ending explained!

Related: “Duty After School” Part 1 Ending Explained, When Will Part 2 Air?

“Duty After School” part 2 episode 4 recap

The episode begins with Kim Chi-Yeol on the floor surrounded by what appears to be his friends all covered in blood.

We go back a couple of hours back.

The students arrive at what appears to be a port but discover some students they ran into died too. They try to re-start a bus but it doesn’t work. Kook Young-Soo begin to panic saying they should return to Seoul for the CSAT points. He panics and tries to convince them to return, no one listens to him.

Then, the students arrive at an amusement park and rest, then, one of them goes to open the power generator. The lights come on.

Then, they find food and begin to eat. They also forgive Kwon Il-Ha and the others who made the mistake. They ask them to eat with them. They check their devices and no spheres are around, so they decide to have fun. They play around the park.

Kook Young-Soo is upset and drifts away, he mumbles about marks and such, and how he should not become like his parents. Then, he stumbles upon a newspaper rack and read that the CSATs are happening after all.

He then sees Cha So-Yeon with Jo Jang-Soo sitting by the beach speaking to each other. He’s jealous.

The students are still having fun at the park when they replay the recording device and see how Do Soo-Chul died. He died dropping from the building fighting off the spheres.

As she’s going back, Cha So-Yeon is confronted by Kook Young-Soo who tells her he’s found a newspaper that says the tests are happening, she tells him they’re old. He insists and becomes very touchy, then lashes out because he believes she’s looking down on him, he pushes her away and she falls to the ground after hitting her face.

Then, he recalls how he likes her but she doesn’t like him back and proceeds to kiss her lying body on the ground. Kwon Il-Ha sees this and pushes him away and tries to wake her up. He then draws the gun at him and tells Kwon Il-Ha to not tell the kids. He promises but then tackles him as he draws away his gun. Eventually, both draw their guns back at each other.

The kids are still having fun when they hear gun shots. They rush to see Cha So-Yeon on the ground and Kook Young-Soo is by the sea. Turns out, he killed Kwon Il-Ha and then disposed of his body to the sea. He speaks fast and is not making sense but the kids don’t suspect him. Cha So-Yeon is awaken, and he claims spheres came and killed Kwon Il-Ha, when they look at the device, it says they’re near. They escape.

It starts raining. The kids then take cover at a school.

Kook Young-Soo slowly descends into madness as he believes its only time before Cha So-Yeon remembers. He goes out and then loses it outside thinking its everybody’s fault but him. He then sees Jo Jang-Soo and Cha So-Yeon talking, she’s trying to remember what happened but she’s not sure the spheres were there. Jo Jang-Soo tells her not to doubt Kook Young-Soo, yet.

It appears he goes on full psychosis after stumbling upon them, but he didn’t quite hear the conversation, and then barges into the room where the students are.

The students had been speaking about what they want to do when the war is over. He then interrupts them and shoots as many as he can. Kim Chi-Yeol is defended by Kim Deok-Joong who blocks the bullets but dies.

Lee Soon-Yi escapes as some of the rest who survived did, he catches up to them and tries to finish the job.

Lee Soon-Yi begs him to spare her life but he kills her. Then he comes to Kim Chi-Yeol and Lee Na-Ra who are still barely alive, he tries to kill them but No Ae-Seol didn’t die and then proceeds to shoot him dead.

He apologizes as he goes on the ground.

Everybody with the exception of four students died that night.

2 years later

The government had found a way to kill the spheres after about two to three weeks of the incident. Now, the parents are cheering on the kids as they take the CSATs. Kim Chi-Yeol is taking it alone without his friends. He tries to answer the test, he marks that he served in the military before thinking to himself why he’s doing that, he doesn’t know why he’s taking the exam.

He goes out with his paper, he then leaves the school saying in voiceover that perhaps what they were fighting weren’t the spheres but something else.

In what appears to be the epilogue, the entire kids are back together at the school, they’re putting on makeup and the boys tease them before the teacher comes and asks them to take off the makeup.

Ending credit scene

The ending credit scene, the entire students cast sing and rap about the exams, protecting the country from aliens and such. Then, Lee Choon-Ho shows up and yells at them. He tells to stop and go to the yard. The students end up leaving, he then swipes the new military song they made from the board, but then hesitates to erase the last one. Then, he puts on his sunglasses and begin to rap the last verse.

The end.

“Duty After School” part 2 ending explained- FAQ

“Duty After School” part 2 episode 4 review

Well… that was one way to end it, that’s for sure.

I mean, I did expect everybody to die as I said in my 1^st half review, but I didn’t expect them to be killed off by one of their own, not that it wouldn’t make sense.

To talk about “Duty After School” part 2 ending. I’d say, it was fine. I totally understand why one student might lose their mind in all of this. Having said this, I know for a fact that many did not like the ending. Kdrama fans usually rarely like sad endings, with few exceptions.

If you were into the drama and totally sucked in, I think you were hurt deeply by its ending, as I’d expect.

Personally speaking, I think its fine. It didn’t shock me since it seemed the way the scenes set up from the start of the finale were leading towards making an impact when everybody eventually gets killed off.

Now onto the production.

I will not fault the young adults or teenagers who chose this drama as their next project even if I think the performances were the worst part of it, however, I can talk about how the casting director fumbled this one.

I said this before, the performances on the women side are for the most part great, however, the performances on the men’s side were mixed, AT BEST. And those who are good actors die off too early.

The key characters are played by actors who clearly are rookies and need more time to develop depth in their performances, they end up coming off either wooden or lacking in expression. I mean no hate but its been some time since I’ve seen high school centered dramas which often feature rookie actors.

Kim Chi-Yeol and Kwon Il-Ha characters could have been played by good former child actors. I realize that Kook Young-Soo is played by a former child actor, but I felt it needed someone who could capture the depth of the character’s descend into madness. I just think it could have been better. I know many of you won’t agree with me on this point, but I personally felt the performances could have been better in some cases.

Overall, in terms of script, I understand what the screenwriter was trying to say, and although the writing wasn’t always the best, it had some good moments. Its focused on how students become obsessed with the CSAT as a measure of success so much so that in the middle of an actual alien invasion, we still have students worried about that.

The message its trying to send is nice on that front, that there is more to life than CSAT. I just think that fans will walk away from this upset their favorite characters died.

Have you seen “Duty After School” part 2 finale yet? Thoughts?