My Dearest (2023) Episode 10 (Final Episode)

Episode 10 of My Dearest starts with Woo-mon asking Gil-chae to marry him. He has liked her since the first moment he saw her at Ganghwa Island and was impressed by her will to live. Gil-chae turns him down.

Arriving home, she finds out that her father is missing. He is outside looking for Gil-chae in the night and picks a fight with a local. He is almost beaten up when Woo-mon saves him and carries the guy home. Gil-chae’s father is delirious and Woo-mon helps calm him down. He tries to ask Gil-chae to marry him again, but he is still turned down. 

The next morning, Woo-mon visits Gil-chae at the forge, and his clothes catch fire by accident. When helping him apply ointment on the burns, Gil-chae notices his scars. She thinks that he got them while saving them at Ganghwa Island, and Woo-mon does not refute that claim. Instead, he says he had told her someone else saved them because he was shy.

He tries his luck again, asking Gil-chae to marry him, and she refuses. She says that many men like her smile and beauty, but when they discover her brazen side, they want her to change once she is married. She vows never to change and asks Woo-mon to give up on the marriage idea. Woo-mon says she can marry him with her feelings for Jang-hyun, and she eventually agrees.

What happens to Gil-chae and Jang-hyun?

Jang-hyun arrives back in Hanyang with the Crown Prince’s envoy, carrying many floral shoes as gifts for Gil-chae. However, when he goes searching for her, he finds out that she is getting married. He is so heartbroken that he burns the shoes he brought for Gil-chae.

Gil-chae also sees Jang-hyun as she receives the wedding chest; she searches for him at night. Gil-chae tells him that she agreed to marry Woo-mon because he saved her on the island.

Jang-hyun admits that it was he who saved her but fails to admit that it in the past because he feels guilty. She had gone to the island trusting his words and he put her in danger. Regardless, Gil-chae is unwilling to break the marriage since receiving the wedding gifts means she is practically Woo-mon’s wife. 

Jang-hyun finds out from Jong-jong how much Gil-chae cried when she thought he was dead. Still, she had waited for him, hoping he would return until Ryang-eum told her that he was dead and died in the arms of other women in Simyang. Gil-chae had no choice but to trust Ryang-eum’s words and gave up hope, then agreed to marry Woo-mon. 

Who does Gil-chae marry?

Jang-hyun is determined to get Gil-chae. He does not care whether or not she is marrying another man and wants her to give him an opportunity. Gil-chae wavers to his words and agrees to run away with him. However, before they leave, she goes back to bid her father goodbye. Seeing her father makes her change her mind and not meet Jang-hyun after all, who is waiting for her with a boat at Quay. 

She goes back home and goes ahead to marry Woo-mon. Jang-hyun sees her with Woo-mon and decides to walk away. Gil-chae sends Jong-jong to give Jang-hyun a parcel. Within it is a letter and the shoes Jang-hyun gave her. Jang-hyun boards the boat with Goo-jam and as he sails away, he reads the letter. Gil-chae writes that she did not trust neither him nor her love for him to leave everything behind and ran away.

Jang-hyun reads the letter and throws that and the shoes into the river. As the currents carry them away, Gil-chae stands on a cliff overlooking the river and watches him as he leaves, presumably forever. 

What happens to Gil-chae and Woo-moo?

At first, Gil-chae wavers about their marriage when Jang-hyun returns and she runs away. On the day she follows Jang-hyun, Woo-moo notices one of her shoes on the street and thinks that she was kidnapped. He sends his men to look for her and he relentlessly searches, worried about her safety.

He is unaware that Jang-hyun is back until one of his men mentions that Gil-chae saw a man whom they sent wedding gifts and was so stunned that she froze. They think it must have been someone returning from the dead.

Yeon-jun finally tells him the truth, that the man Gil-chae had thought to be dead is back, and she might have run away with him. 

Woo-moo uses Gil-chae’s father to try and find her. He knows she must return to see him, so he lets him wander the streets alone. As he predicted, Gil-chae comes to her father and he finds them at the river.

When he is told about Gil-chae running away with Jang-hyun, he is furious and says that he will kill them both. However, when he sees Gil-chae at the river with her father, he lets her go. 

The next day, Woo-mon goes to Gil-chae’s home to check up on the family. He sees Gil-chae’s shoes outside the door, and soon after, Gil-chae enters the room. She invites him in for a meal. Does that mean they get married? We are not sure, but the guess is they probably did. 

How does the episode end?

The final scenes of the episode happen two years later in Simyang. Joseon’s captives are trying to flee and a gang of bandits is trying to stop them. Jang-hyun had run into them previously when he was made to capture captives by Gol-dae in exchange for saving his life.

He seems familiar with one of them as he talks casually, saying they meet again. However, Jang-hyun helps the escaped captives this time by stopping them from being captured. Among the bandits is someone who always had a mask on.

The person caught Goo-jam’s eye the first time they met and he had suggested that she was a woman. This time, Jang-hyun startles the horse to make her miss her shot, and the horse jumps, making her fall off. He rushes to catch her and her hat comes off.

The episode ends as Jang-hyun pins the lady to the ground and leans in close to her face as they look intensely into each other’s eyes. 

The Episode Review

Jang-hyun and Gil-chae do not get their happy ending, which creates mixed feelings. Throughout the episodes, the two kept playing with each other’s feelings, constantly refusing to give in due to their similarities in personality. They were both brazen and refused to give in to their feelings or follow their heart. For this reason, it makes sense that their love was not meant to be.

On the other hand, unlike men like Yeon-jun, who would put duty first, or Woo-moo, who might not accept her bold side, Jang-hyun cherishes her, adores her brazen side, and always puts her first. However, it seems that would not be the case. 

When the Crown Prince visits Joseon, the King says something about the people seeing him as King already. He seems not to be happy that the Crown Prince was allowed to come back, and he mentions something about Gol-dae asking the King to make a gown with dragons, which is meant to be won by the ruling King.

He was also curious about how or why the Qing allowed the Crown Prince back to Joseon. He seems to suspect possibilities of treason. In addition, Jang-hyun had told the Crown Prince’s Eunuch to dress him in old clothes and make it seem like he suffered in Simyang. The scene leaves questions about the war and the King’s intentions with the Crown Prince.

Why did Jang-hyun insist that the Crown Prince not look his best when he visits Joseon, and why was the King not happy about the Crown Prince’s return? Is Gol-dae planning something since he asked for a royal gown from the Joseon King? What was the reason behind invading Joseon?

The end of the episode leaves audiences questioning about Jang-hyun and Gil-chae. Is their love over, and in the next part, will Jang-hyun have a different leading lady? Let us wait until the start of the next part in October to know what happens next.