The Day (2023) K Drama Episode 3

Episode 3 of The Kidnapping Day starts where we left off as Ro-hee asks about her identity and her parents. She is shattered to learn that her real father was killed but Myung-joon swears that he didn’t do it. Ro-hee throws a fit and begs to be sent back home. She promises to keep Myung-joon’s identity a secret and play along with his lie. 

On the other hand, Sang-yoon finds it odd that  Ro-hee willingly held Myung-joon’s hand and pulled him out of the hospital herself as they were fleeing from the hospital. On the other hand, Ro-hee asks Myung-joon near the police station and decides to go in alone in order to save Myung-joon.

Ro-hee asks Myung-joon about Hee-ae and asks him to take care of his daughter and get her surgery done before the cops are able to get to him. The two bid each other farewell and Ro-hee starts to go inside the police station when she sees a cop car enter the vicinity and regain some parts of her memory from the night of her kidnapping after hearing the sirens. 

Ro-hee recalls seeing a police car outside her house when she had decided to run. She starts to panic just as a cop finds her. She tells the cop that she is lost and reveals that Myung-joon is her father. The cop chases after Myung-joon and leaves Ro-hee with her because he is her legal guardian. After the cop leaves, Ro-hee tells Myung-joon that she suspected that a cop was the person behind her parents’ death.

Sang-yoon rechecks the CCTV footage from the time Myung-joon put Ro-hee in his car to when the little girl pulled her kidnapper’s hand to flee from the hospital. He tries to make sense of it but doesn’t understand anything. Meanwhile, Ro-hee asks Myung-joon to take responsibility for his actions and keep her with him until Hee-ae’s operation.

Unwillingly, Myung-joon agrees and decides to take Ro-hee with him as they crash at a nearby hotel. Ro-hee writes down a contract, majorly in her own favour, and forces Myung-joon to sign it. At the same time, Dr Yeong-do calls Cheol-won to the hospital rooftop for a chat and starts gossiping about Dr Choi’s death. 

The board of lawyers discusses the current situation of the Choi family who had no legal heir. Since Ro-hee, the sole legal heir was missing and a ransom call hadn’t been placed, she was out of the picture and Dr Choi’s uncle – President Choi would inherit all his wealth due to the absence of a will. One of the lawyers who knew Ro-hee wonders where she was and what she was up to. 

On the contrary, Ro-hee learns that Hye-eun was involved in the kidnapping and wonders why she had chosen her as the victim. Myung-joon also tells her that he burned the car and they wonder how they could skip town with the cops pedalling all exit public transport stations. The cops arrive at Myung-joon’s house and try to look for clues. They find a family photo with Hye-eun in it and decide to look her up. 

The cops also learned that 5 payments totalling up to 10 billion won had been made to Dr Choi from 5 people. Sang-yoon also learns that each party had paid 2 billion won to the deceased doctor and asks for these people to be called in for questioning. At the same time, a man named Ho-young is keeping tabs on Myung-joon’s house and notices that the cops have gone inside the house.

After the cops leave, the scrap collector sneaks inside the house but is attacked by Ho-young. Ho-young captures the man and beats him up, asking why he was following Ro-hee. Just then, he hears a noise and runs to see who it is. In the meantime, the scrap collector flees away but Ho-young follows the trail of blood and finds the scrap collector.

Since Myung-joon did not have any money for a taxi, Ro-hee hatches a plan to fool the cops in order to take a train to Seoul. Myung-joon calls the cops and reports seeing a child with a suspicious man at a location near the train station.  The cops are alerted and everyone scatters to the location, leaving the train station unattended.

Ro-hee and Myung-joon sneak into the station and go their separate ways in order to stop the cops inside the station from arresting Myung-joon. Ro-hee joins a single mother and helps take her child to the station while Myung-joon flees inside when the cops are distracted.

At the station, Sang-yoon tells the cops that a civilian informant should not have been trusted as the news of Ro-hee’s kidnapping was not made public. He asks the cops to go back to the train station and arrest the two before they can flee to the big city. The CCTV footage shows how Ro-hee had planned their escape while Myung-hoon was his follower.

Sang-yoon decides to announce the fact that Ro-hee was kidnapped as it would be difficult for them to track Myung-joon down in Seoul. On the train ride to Seoul, Myung-joon tells Ro-hee that Hye-eun lives in the big city which gives the little girl an idea. Once they arrive, Myung-joon and Ro-hee see that the news of her kidnapping has been made public. Dr Mo Eun-sun is called in for an interrogation after it is found out that she was one of the five people who sent money to Dr Choi.

Dr Mo tells the cops that Dr Choi was running illegal research in his house with 5 researchers. She tells Sang-yoon that the money was a payment from these researchers. That evening, Dr Choi’s lawyers show up at the police station to ask the cops to take down the news item about Ro-hee’s kidnapping.

The lawyer states that Dr Choi would not want to damage his reputation and would never consent to this. Sang-yoon refuses to take the news out and threatens to sue the cops. Ro-hee and Myung-joon wait outside Hye-eun’s house and threaten to go to the cops if she does not let them stay the night.

After trying to figure out why Hye-eun picked Ro-hee as the victim, the little girl learns that she’s being abused by her father because she was a child genius as well as a member of Mensa Korea. At the same time, the commissioner of police tells Sang-yoon that Ro-hee is a child genius.

Myung-joon and Hye-eun come to an agreement whereby Myung-joon will agree to take the entire blame for the kidnapping if Hye-eun decides to take care of Hee-ae once she is out of surgery. The episode ends with Sang-yoon trying to find more leads on the kidnapping case when Jeong-man tells him that Myung-joon has a past criminal murder record. 

The Episode Review

The episode was pure chaos from start to finish and the final moments of the show have me worried for Ro-hee. While Myung-joon’s funny antics look cute and are hilarious to watch, Ro-hee could be in immense trouble if the guy was a real psychopath and was actually the person who killed Ro-hee’s parents.

Hye-eun is living a lavish life in Seoul while Myung-joon struggles to make ends meet to help their daughter. The woman has zero motherly instincts. On the other hand, there were so many new characters in this episode that left viewers with questions.

Ho-young and the scrap dealer’s role in Ro-hee’s life is unclear but one could assume that Ro-hee had a cash prize to her name given her intellectual skills. The episode leaves me excited for the next and I can’t wait to see how the kidnapper and his victim navigate their circumstances as the show progresses.