My Lovely Liar (2023) Episode 1

My Lovely Liar episode 1 starts one night in 2018. There are three men about to be thrown off a building. It seems they work for a gang and the boss suspects one of them has betrayed him. Sol-hee soon arrives and approaches the gang. The boss is wary that she is the liar hunter and calls the person who recommended her. 

After being assured that Sol-Hee is the right person, he allows her to question the three men. She realizes the three barely hanging on for their lives are innocent and the true culprit is the boss’s second-in-command. The boss orders his other men to beat up the culprit and Sol-Hee makes him promise not to kill the traitor. She quickly takes her leave after getting paid.

Sol-hee is hoping to get home before the end of a soccer game. On the way, she spots a man wearing the same jersey as her and is delighted to see another fan. However, the man she spots is carrying what looks like a bloody t-shirt. He is walking slowly and seems lost in his thoughts. 

The next morning, Sol-hee wakes up to find the gangster she outed outside her house. He is planning to get his revenge and chases her across a rice field. Sol-Hee makes it to the bus station and quickly books a ticket for the earliest bus to Seoul. She manages to get on board but the bus doesn’t take off immediately. 

An older man, Eom-ho, starts attacking one of the passengers accusing him of betraying his sister. Eom-ho wants the young man, Kim Do-ha to get off the bus and help him look for his sister who has gone MIA. Do-ha refuses and states he didn’t cheat and is not willing to get off the bus since he already broke up with Eom-ho’s sister.

Eom-ho proceeds to hit him over and over again. Sol-hee realizes that she must intervene before the gangster spots her on the bus. She kicks Eom-ho out of the bus and the gangster is unable to get to the bus in time. 

With that settled, the bus takes off and Sol-hee asks Do-ha why he never defended himself when he is innocent. Do-ha mildly snaps at her, asking what she knows and she introduces herself as the liar hunter, giving him her card.

The scene then cuts to Sol-hee in an expensive car, dressed luxuriously. One of her workers, Chi-hoon, is driving her to see her next client Ji-hye. Ji-hye has recently found new love, Ji-woon and wants Sol-hee to find out if he truly loves her or is after her money. Sol-hee pretends to be Ji-hye’s cousin and they gather for lunch. 

The lunch soon turns into a disaster as Sol-hee asks intrusive questions and Ji-woon keeps lying. In a cliche twist, it is revealed that Ji-woon is having an affair with Jihye’s maid and they have a baby on the way. Ji-hye is devastated but pays Sol-hee for her services without any delay.

On the way back, Chi-hoon curiously asks Sol-hee why she works so hard but never spoils herself. Sol-hee increases her charges annually to cater for her employees and curb the high cost of living but she is not greedy for money. Chi-hoon suggests she looks into doing rituals to offer the clients new services but Sol-hee refuses. 

Apparently, rituals are not her thing; she feels it might be related to the rumour that she got her gift during a ritual. When her mom was pregnant with her, she went to different religious rituals begging the deities to bless her child with a gift. Particularly, she prayed for a gift that doesn’t require money as they come from a poor background.

After she was born, Sol-hee discovered she hears a blaring sound every time someone lied to her. For a long time, she detested her gift until she got to high school and realized she can use it to her advantage and make a living. Her initial plan was to be a prosecutor but why study so hard when she can start making a living with her talent? 

She soon started pretending to be a shaman who can detect lies and worked on marketing herself and building a brand. In no time, she had managed to get clients and even open a tarot cafe. However, she can only discern the lies if she hears them in person. This is why she has to travel to her clients and ask direct questions to get to the bottom of everything. 

As the ride progresses, Chi-hoon changes the topic to his favourite songwriter, Kim Do-ha who works with Syaon. Chi-hoon is excited to go to an award show later that night and is hoping to see Do-ha. Do-ha never meets anyone in person and even in his Zoom meetings,  he covers his face. 

Night rolls by , and, we see a masked Do-ha driving while ignoring  Syaon’s calls. He is stopped by police at a checkpoint and seems antsy about blowing into an alcohol breathalyser. Just before he can take off his mask, another car rushes past the checkpoint and hits one of the officers. Do-ha uses the distraction to drive off. He drives to a secluded area and tries to calm down since he’s so close to being caught. However, we still don’t know what he is hiding and why he got so anxious at the police stop.

Elsewhere, the award show continues and Syaon performs her recent hit to her adoring fans. Do-ha receives the Best Composer Award but since he is a no-show, Syaon accepts the award on his behalf. She gives quite a moving speech on how he helped her achieve her dream.  The celebration carries on to the afterparty as the attendees wonder why Do-ha is so secretive about his identity. 

Some claim that he is staying low to protect his main job as an agent at the National Intelligence Service. Others claim he is a young chaebol doomed by his parents to forgo his true love, music and work in the family business after finishing his studies. There is also the rumour that he is a music genius with savant syndrome.  They all try to get more from Syaon but she tells them she has never met him in person. She only knows he has a nice voice and a good ear for music. 

The scene cuts to Do-ha giving some musical advice to someone through a Zoom meeting. We can see he has a picture of three people in his room. 

Back at the afterparty, Syaon asks Deuk-chan to take her home claiming she is exhausted. Deuk-chan begs her to stay for a while but she keeps getting bombarded with questions about Do-ha. Other musicians want her to introduce them to Do-ha. Deuk-chan is forced to step in and help Syaon since he is the CEO of the agency. 

There is also Mr Park, who is feeling jealous about losing to Do-ha and starts a drunken rant claiming Do-ha ripped off one of his songs. He demands to meet Do-ha and asks Deuk-chan to set up a meeting. 

After the party, some paparazzi decide to secretly follow Syaon to see where she delivers Do-ha’s award.  Meanwhile, Do-ha reads the outrageous rumours about him online and has a good chuckle. Syaon arrives and questions if Do-ha is seeing someone. She starts looking frantically about the house for the woman Do-ha is “supposedly” seeing. This prompts Do-ha to tell her that he is not seeing anyone and that he won’t hide it if he does. 

He asks her to leave but she stays and presents his award to him. They take a picture and Syaon reminisces about the old days when they used to work in a smelly basement studio. They acknowledge they have come far. Do-ha remarks he knew they were destined for success the moment he heard her sing his song.

He asks her to leave but she refuses and brings up soccer. Do-ha loves soccer and takes offense to the fact that Syaon can’t say the team’s name correctly so he kicks her out. On her way out, the sneaky paparazzi take photos of her coming out with only one trophy.

In the meantime, Do-ha goes to bed after taking his anxiety medication. He has a nightmare about standing by the sea with a young woman. He sees himself holding a bloody piece of glass and then his hands turn bloody. The nightmare forces him to wake up startled. 

The next day, at Sol-hee’s tarot shop, Cassandra welcomes a new client and ushers her in to see Sol-hee. 

On the other hand, Deuk-chan tries to get a hold of Do-ha to warn him not to go home but Do-ha fails to see the messages. He is confronted by one of the paparazzi at the parking lot and his anxiety is triggered when his photos are taken. This is when we learn that Do-ha was a suspect in a murder case and has anxiety attacks from the trauma he faced at the hands of the media and the public. 

He manages to run to his house and Deuk-chan visits and informs him that his address was compromised after the paparazzi followed Syaon. Do-ha is worried about Syaon but Deuk-chan asks him to worry about himself. He suggests that Do-ha moves to one of his houses until things calm down. He promises not to tell Syaon too.

Do-ha refuses and insists on hiding in his house. Deuk-chan is frustrated by Do-ha’s stubbornness and asks how long he will live in hiding. He reminds Do-ha that what happened in the past was not his fault but Do-ha doesn’t feel the same. Deuk-chan leaves but begs Do-ha to reconsider moving and living freely. 

Later at night, Do-ha puts on his mask and goes for a walk. We then see a woman walking home while a masked man follows her. A police car passes by and the woman starts running. Soon after, a scream rents the air.

A few moments later, Sol-hee sees a masked man watching her at a convenience store and notices a poster at the till about a wanted masked man. She believes the man behind her is the suspect and starts getting nervous. She quickly pays for her things and starts walking home. The man follows her out and gives chase. She makes it home but the man waits outside her building to see her house number.

The following morning, the people in the neighbourhood discuss the posters of the criminal put up across the street. They hope the man will be caught soon.

Sol-hee tells Cassandra about the incident with the pervert and Cassandra gives her a protection charm.  As they talk, Sol-hee brings up an upcoming shopkeepers’ cooperative meeting held at the bar next door. It will be held late at night and she is having second thoughts about attending.

After much thought, Sol-hee attends the meeting and O-baek invites her to sit with him, Bo-ro and Cho-rok. They are curious about the secrecy in Sol-hee’s tarot cafe and she explains it is for her client’s privacy.

The meeting officially starts and they discuss the pervert and promise to remain vigilant. While the meeting goes on, Cassandra is attacked by that man. She tries to fight him off and her screams alert the people at the meeting. They quickly rush out to assess the situation and try to catch the culprit. Bo-ro runs in the pervert’s direction and sees a man in a hoodie wearing a mask. He quickly grabs him, believing he has finally caught the man. 

Sol-hee stays behind to comfort Cassandra, who tells her about how she accidentally used her perfume instead of pepper spray on the pervert. Meanwhile, the man Bo-ro caught pleads his innocence and Sol-hee steps forward to question him. The man turns out to be Do-ha and he recognizes Sol-hee from the day he saved him from Eom-ho.

The Episode Review

This is the first episode and we are starting to get a feel of the characters and how they relate to each other. Do-ha is secluding himself because of his past trauma and he can only rely on Syaon and Deuk-chan. However, Syaon seems to want more than friendship, which Do-ha is not ready to give her. Nonetheless, the three of them have been through some things and we look forward to seeing how the past has shaped them.

On the other hand, we have Sol-hee, a gifted liar hunter. She does a good job but we are not sure when the whole,” If I say so then it is,” approach will fail to work. There needs to be more evidence backing up her story if she is going to get involved in the pervert case. Let us see how things will progress but so far so good!