The Escape of the Seven: War for Survival (2023) Episode 16

Episode 16 of The Escape of The Seven starts on the roof before Paeng-hee jumps off with Mathew, and an explosion occurs. Jin-mo gets back to his car and finds 17 missed calls from Paeng-hee and a message asking him to save her from K. He calls back, but Paeng-hee does not answer. Jin-mo checks the tracker and sees Paeng-hee at the Yeoju Movie set. Consequently, Mathew’s men arrive looking for Mathew. 

Meanwhile, the results from the DNA test are out. Min Do-hyuk is Chairman Shim’s biological son. Chairman Shim thinks that the results are fabricated since he believes that his biological son is dead. Elsewhere, Mathew regains consciousness and finds himself hanging upside down. Baek Ik-ho arrives in time to pull Mathew up. He reports that Min Do-hyuk is at Chairman Shim’s house. Mathew tells him to look for Ha-na and send her outside the country to a place where she will never be found. 

Jin-mo anxiously heads to the last known location of Paeng-hee while trying to reach her. Paeng-hee finally picks up. She asks Jin-mo to take care of Ha-na and not to let her live as K’s daughter. Paeng-hee thanks Jin-mo before passing away. Meanwhile, Baek Ik-ho and his men are looking for Ha-na, and Mo-ne hides her in an abandoned building. The men search around, but they do not find her. Instead, Song Ji-sun finds her just as Jin-mo arrives at the location. 

Mo-ne asks Ji-sun for help, but she refuses, saying that bringing Mo-ne down is her intention. Mo-ne tells her the truth that Mathew is Jun-seok. He killed Song Ji-a. His idea is to use the movie about Da-mi to bring down the Sungchan Group, and Ji-sun is helping him. Mo-ne also tells her that Ha-na is her daughter and her father is Jun-seok, whom she knows as Mathew. Mo-ne asks Ji-sun to help her fight against Mathew and save her daughter. She will accept the punishment later for what she did to Ji-a and Bang Da-mi. In the meantime, Jin-mo finds Paeng-hee’s body. 

Ji-sun screams inside the abandoned building and alerts Ik-ho. Once inside, Ji-sun tells them she saw a little girl fall into the water and asks them to call the police. Ik-ho asks her to leave, and they will alert the police and wait for them. As she is leaving, she hears Ik-ho say that Ha-na made the job easier for them as she got rid of herself. 

Mathew arrives at Chairman Shim’s house. Chairman Shim recognises him as Jun-seok. Mathew says he had to fight back when Chairman Shim exiled him to an unknown Island in Vietnam. He changed his face since Chairman Shim ensured he could not return with the same face. Chairman Shim realises that his secretary has been working with Mathew. Soon after, he finds out that His secretary swapped out Chairman Shim’s son for his biological son. Consequently, the Chairman finds out that Min Do-hyuk is his real son. 

Mathew calls Do-hyuk using a voice changer, pretending to be Ki-tak. Do-hyuk rushes into the house only to fall into Mathew’s trap again. Mathew tells him that Chairman Shim is his birth father. Chairman Shim begs Mathew to spare Do-hyuk’s life, and he will give him anything he wants. Mathew says his scenario is much more exciting and shoots Do-hyuk. Using deep fake technology, Mathew has a video of Chairman Shim shooting Do-hyuk airing live.  

Mathew’s plan does not go as he intends. Chairman Shim saves Do-hyuk and gives him a chance to escape. He has no choice but to shut down the doctored live feed and run after Do-hyuk. Do-hyuk gets away. Mathew cannot kill Chairman Shim, who is passed out on the floor since Secretary Kang-jae says they need to use him as bait.

Chairman Shim slips into a comma. Jin-mo vows to kill K as revenge for Paeng-hee’s death. Mathew plans to acquire Sungchan Group and needs to find Chairman Bang’s money to do that. He intends to kill Lee Hwi-so soon after since he has no other need for him. 

Ju-ran discovers that Mathew is Jun-seok, and she tells La-hui that he is not Chairman Shim’s son. Ju-ran knows that Chairman Shim got a vasectomy after his wife had a difficult delivery. La-hui does not care about Mathew not being Chairman Shim’s son. She only cares about his money as the owner of TIKITAKA, and soon he will own Sungchan Group. 

La-hui tells Mathew that she knows the location of Chairman Bang’s money. She makes a deal for half the shares of Sungchan Group and half of Chairman Bang’s money once they find it. La-hui suggests that Mathew takes care of Ju-ran after they use her to get the money. She knows so much about Mathew, and La-hui wants to be the only one who knows Mathew’s real identity. 

Chul-woo and Ju-ran find Chairman Bang’s money. They alert La-hui, who tells Mathew, and he sets up their counter plan to take all the money. On the way to the meet-up location, Ju-ran and Chul-woo stop at a police checkpoint. The police officers ask them to step out of the vehicle. They hold them aside as a distraction as someone gets into the truck and drives away. After, the fake police get into their cars and drive off. The man who took the truck is Chairman Bang’s secretary. 

Do-hyuk sneaks into the hospital to see Chairman Shim. Ik-ho and his men chase after him, but Jin-mo helps. Do-hyuk attacks him since he thinks Jin-mo will give him up to Mathew and take credit. Jin-mo tells Do-hyuk that the reason he joined Mathew was to save Paeng-hee, but Mathew killed her. Therefore, things are different, and Mathew is his enemy. Do-hyuk wants to meet Chairman Shim and use him to reveal Mathew’s identity. Jin-mo distracts the guards by sending them to a different floor and gives Do-hyuk three minutes. 

Ju-ran confronts La-hui for betraying her and taking all the money, and La-hui thinks Mathew might have betrayed her. Mo-ne overhears their confrontation. Elsewhere, Mathew tells Ik-ho that Jin-mo might be a traitor. Mathew asks Ik-ho to set up a press conference. He plans to announce that Jin-mo is Do-hyuk’s accomplice and put up a huge reward for his capture. Meanwhile, Do-hyuk, Jin-mo, and Mo-ne work together to go after K. 

Jin-mo logs into Sungchan Group’s Talk App servers using the password from Chairman Shim. Do-hyuk tells him to reveal everything about Mathew and La-hui. Meanwhile, Mathew is getting ready for the press release when La-hui enters. Do-hyuk follows with flowers and sets up a spy camera in the office. 

After everyone leaves, La-hui and Mathew get into a confrontation. La-hui is angry for trusting Mathew since he thinks he betrayed her. In her angry fit, she calls Mathew Shim Jun-seok and asks where he hid her money. She also mentions that Jun-seok killed his mother. La-hui tells him that if he gives her back Chairman Bang’s money, she will hide the fact that he is the real Jun-seok. 

Mathew fights back and tells her that if people were to find out who he is, she would be done, too. Mathew threatens to tell the world that La-hui had a relationship with him, knowing that he killed her daughter, Bang Da-mi. Do-hyuk texts Mathew and asks him to check the phone on the table. The video Do-hyuk captures through the hidden cameras goes viral. The reports ask about the video when Mathew walks to the press conference. Mathew says the video is fake news created by Shim Jun-seok.

At the end of the episode, Do-hyuk walks up to the back of the conference room and watches La-hui and Mathew being caught lying in front of journalists.

The Episode Review

One scene executed perfectly in this episode is about Chairman Bang’s money. Chul-woo and Ju-ran easily getting to the money was so frustrating. How could they access the money so quickly? Why did the secretary not move it when he knew they would come for it? It was so satisfying seeing Secretary Hwang drive away in the truck. For once, Do-hyuk is starting to get points, and Mathew’s plan is slowly crumbling. 

In this episode, Do-hyuk exposes Mathew in a few minutes without using the deep fake technology. Mathew can now get a taste of his own medicine. The only difference is that his viral news is not fake. Will he be able to turn this around and make the public believe it’s Jun-seok’s fake news? 

The episode is satisfying. Seeing Do-hyuk fight back and make an easy hit on Mathew numbs the pain of the last few episodes. However, it feels too easy for Mathew. The Revenge of the Seven needs a few more episodes. However, we get one more episode. Will Lee Hwi-So finally join the fight? Is Kang Ki-tak dead? Will Chairman Shim survive so that Do-hyuk can be with his father? What will Mathew do to get back at Do-hyuk?