Channel A‘s weekend drama ’The Witch‘ Park Jin-young has begun a full-fledged journey of salvation for Noh Jeong-ui. It was an ending that exploded with hopeful expectations as to whether his life-threatening struggle would be able to prove the denial of the existence of witches. The viewership ratings recorded 3.1% in the metropolitan area and 2.9% nationwide, and showed an upward trend with a peak of 3.6% per minute. (Provided by Nielsen Korea, based on paid broadcast households)

Episode 4 of ’The Witch‘, which aired on the 23rd, announced the beginning of Dong-jin’s (Park Jin-young) life-threatening journey to prove that Mi-jung (Noh Jeong-ui) is not a witch. Dong-jin realized that the ‘denial of the existence of the witch’ report he wrote for Mi-jung had made a statistical error that instead pointed her out as a witch, and was frustrated several times because he could not find an answer, but he pulled himself together again after the death of his mother Mi-sook (Jang Hye-jin). Mi-sook, who was tormented by guilt for having kicked Mi-jung out of the neighborhood, read and reread her son Dong-jin’s report full of errors until it was worn down, and firmly believed that Mi-jung was not a witch. For the sake of her mother, Mi-jung had to be even more of a witch.

Dong-jin, a promising data miner, quit his job and stayed close to Mi-jung. He did this to analyze the patterns of events surrounding Mi-jung and predict dangers to prevent further damage. Dong-jin’s meticulous consideration revealed in the process was another touching point of the day’s broadcast. He repaired a streetlight that was dying to brighten up the dark night road for Mi-jung, who only came out to breathe fresh air during the least crowded times on the street and fed stray cats.

Dong-jin also painfully realized that the world’s problems cannot be answered with numbers alone. The suspect who had recently destroyed Dong-jin’s car was identified. It was the factory owner Joong-ho (played by Jeong Eui-gap) who had been damaged by Dong-jin’s small business bank loan algorithm. He defaulted on his loan that had been approved due to changes in banking regulations, and his family was thrown out on the streets overnight. It was a harsh and realistic lesson that statistical errors can lead to unintended victims.

Dong-jin did not ignore the pain. That is why he took the wrath of Joong-ho, who harbored a grudge and even came to swing his fists after committing a car attack, without any resistance. Then, he sincerely apologized and bought him a warm meal when he was hungry. He met Chairman Lee (played by Jeon Gook-hwan), who had been kind to him, and asked him to let Joong-ho do even a small job at the casino.

In this day and age where Chairman Lee is not interested in anything other than his own work, he saw through Dong-jin’s good intentions to save people, which is rare. Previously, Dong-jin had extracted big data for Chairman Lee’s continued casino operations, but ended up coming up with a plan to save people who were becoming losers at the casino. In this way, Dong-jin‘s struggle was not simply due to his feelings for Mi-jeong, but rather his good will to save others who were in pain.

And that great good will gave rise to the seed of hope that Mi-jeong’s curse could be lifted. Mi-jeong still lived in a small attic that was her whole world. With the help of her only friend Eun-sil (Jang Hee-ryeong), a broadcasting station PD, she made a living by doing translation work, and she consoled herself that it was okay by looking at the scarecrows of her mom and dad who guarded the place, but she could not hide the loneliness of not meeting anyone. What kept Mi-jeong alive was a small hope. She wanted to go to Hallstatt, a small Austrian town that was not an island but was quiet and had few people, and she hoped that maybe she could change there.

And maybe that hope was already close by. Seeing Mi-jeong, who had lost her daily life like a fairy tale character who was trapped in a castle due to a curse, Dong-jin vowed to find a way. In order to extract the data that was insufficient to find the answer to the error, he headed to his hometown Taebaek, the starting point of the incident. He then gathered his classmates and entered the warehouse where the school materials were stored. The ending of Dongjin‘s determination to extract what he needed from there raised curiosity about whether he would be able to find a clue to lift the unspoken curse and the next episode.

Channel A’s Saturday-Sunday drama ‘The Witch’ airs every Saturday and Sunday at 9:10 p.m.

Jeon Hyo-jin, Donga.com reporter jhj@donga.com

This article is automatically translated using Google AI. If you notice any inaccuracies, please let us know at allkstar@donga.com.