“Do Do Sol Sol La La Sol” (도도솔솔라라솔)

By Jae-Ha Kim
Substack
November 27, 2020

Goo Ra-Ra (played by Go Ara)
Sunwoo Joon (played by Lee Jae-Wook)
↑Note: Korean names denote the surname followed by the given name.

I am going to start off with a mild spoiler from the first episode that sets up the premise: Ra-Ra is an optimistic and pampered young woman, whose life is turned upside down after her wealthy widower father dies. Left at the alter by her fiancé, she moves away from Seoul to the small town of Eunpo, but never loses her upbeat outlook on life. People are good, more than bad, she believes. And she will survive just fine, because she has her beloved dog (Mimi) and Juju — a car gifted to her by her father.

A gentle soul, but not the sharpest crayon in the box, Ra-Ra has never had to fend for herself. She was prepared to move from her father’s house to her husband’s home. She wasn’t raised to work, other than perhaps offering piano lessons to other privileged families. A so-so student who wasn’t particularly gifted in music, she continued to take piano lessons because it made her father happy.

There is a beautiful scene early on when a very young Ra-Ra freezes at her piano recital, forgetting how to play her piece. Nervous and embarrassed, she starts to sob on stage. Her father stands up in the audience, beaming with pride, and shouts out, “Bravo!” as he claps for her. Does he think she’s the next Mozart? Not likely. But he has unconditional love for his child and it was good enough for him to see her give it her all. With that encouragement, she continued playing her song. At her final recital as a college student, she adds a bit of “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” into her performance as an homage to her childhood … and to make her father smile.

When she meets Joon — an industrious young man of 23 (her age) — she relies on him for financial support, which she promises to pay back.

Oh, did I forget to mention that she accidentally hit him with her car? Even though he was on a bicycle, he somehow miraculously escaped being injured seriously … while she was hospitalized. Okay.

Early on, I could not understand why Joon was so fascinated with Ra-Ra, other than that she’s pretty. All she seems to do is ask him for favors and borrow money. But all this is explained in later episodes (which I’ll talk about in the Spoiler Alert below).

Speaking of which, “Do Do Sol Sol La La Sol” is similar to “Emily in Paris” in one respect: Every man who encounters the female lead seems to fall head over heels for her. In this case, Joon’s primary competition is a newly divorced handsome doctor, played by Kim Joo-Hun (who portrayed Seo Ye-Ji’s publisher in “It’s Okay to Not Be Okay” and currently is in “Start-Up“). There is no hateful competition for her attention, though, and it was lovely to see the two men eventually bond and trust each other.

The plot involves overbearing parents who try to force their children to follow their paths and a stalker who pieces together Ra-Ra’s social media posts to hunt her down. But the best parts of this uneven series is not the relationship between Ra-Ra and Joon, but that of the close-knit villagers who socialize together and watch after each other like the family they’ve become. The eldest member of Eunpo is called 할아버지 in honor of his age, but he also behaves like everyone’s grandfather and is treated lovingly as such. Everyone keeps a watchful eye on little piano prodigy, Jae-Min, who is often home alone while his father is out working.

Go Ara is a hit or miss for me in K-Dramas. She is spectacular in series like “Ms. Hammurabi” and “Reply 1994.” But in K-Dramas like this, her character grates away at my nerves.

“Do Do Sol Sol La La Sol” is Lee Jae-Wook’s debut as the leading man and he is very good with what he’s given, but this series isn’t nearly the caliber of previous roles he’s had (“Search: WWW,” “Memories of the Alhambra“).

And both actors deserved a better finale than what they were given.

Airdates:

Sixteen episodes — about an hour each — aired from October 7 to November 26, 2020 on KBS2.

Spoiler Alert:

Both lead characters are supposed to be 24 (Korean age, which is 23, international age). She is. But Joon is only 18 years old. His legal ID shows he was born in 2002. There’s a convoluted story about why he lied to her about his age. Long story short: his best friend, Ji-Hoon, had an older sister who was also a pianist. While Joon and Ji-Hoon were still high school students, Ji-Hoon told his friend that he had a big crush on Ra-Ra and wanted to marry her one day. By chance, Joon delivered Ra-Ra’s bouquet to her on her wedding day. He recognized her immediately, but she had no recollection of him. When she asked his age, he lied and said 24, because he didn’t want her to piece together who he was. And when chance reunited them again in Eunpo, it was too late for him to reveal that he was still in his teens.

OK, so her falling in love with him thinking he’s a man in his 20s is forgivable, since she didn’t know. But once it all came out in the open, no one thought it was mildly creepy that a woman in her mid-20s was dating a high school senior. In South Korea, you aren’t a legal adult until you turn 19 years old. So if you are going by today’s date, you will have to have been born on November 27, 2001 (or earlier) to do things like rent your own apartment without a guardian’s permission. Joon mentions that age is just a number and their age difference won’t matter when he’s 30 and she’s 35. Granted, he was far more mature than she was in many ways. But at 18, he was still legally a kid.

Their age difference would’ve still been an issue even if her father was still alive and his business was thriving (which it wasn’t at the time of his death — which is why she was left mostly penniless). Joon’s parents may have allowed the two to date, though, and marry after he graduated from college. Because they would’ve viewed the marriage as a business venture that would benefit both families.

He’s also a runaway. After Ji-Hoon died, his classmates and father callously suggested that with the No. 1 student out of the way, Joon could now ascend to the top.

The plot twist that ruined this series for me was Joon’s leukemia diagnosis near the finale. It came out of nowhere and created some incredibly 답답하다 moments. Though they are madly in love and have exchanged what are essentially engagement rings, he doesn’t tell her he is deathly ill. In Episode 16, his mother visits Ra-Ra to tearfully tell her that he is gone, implying he has died. But there is no funeral that Ra-Ra knows of or is invited to attend.

The series flash forwards five years and in the last seven minutes, he reappears healthy. He hadn’t wanted to return to her life until he was sure he would survive. (There’s also the possibility that his return is a figment of her imagination.) This is where his young age and lack of life experience came into play. He thought he was sparing her, but he took away her ability to support him during his toughest time. There’s a reason why we have funerals. It’s for the living to deal with their loss.

Dude… WTF?!! Yes, no one wants their loved ones to watch them suffer. But to disappear without allowing the people closest to you to have some kind of closure is also a cruelty that can’t be taken back. (I couldn’t help thinking about all the people who have died alone in quarantine due to Covid-19, unable to have family members hug them goodbye — and how that will eat away at the survivors forever.)

And while Ra-Ra was madly in love with Joon, five years is a long time. She could’ve grieved, met someone else and moved on with her life. What would he have done then?

As it was, she hadn’t found someone else. But she was at peace with her life. The ending was meant to be happy, but I felt horrible for Ra-Ra. How would she be able to trust anything Joon said to her in the future?

© 2020 JAE-HA KIM | All Rights Reserved