5 Revelations In Episodes 13-14 Of "My Perfect Stranger" That Ramp Up The Tension

“My Perfect Stranger” is close to the end, and after that cliffhanger last week, our time-traveling sleuths have to use every weapon in their arsenal to stop the future that Yoon Hae Joon (Kim Dong Wook) witnessed from coming true. But the shocking reveals that began last week are far from over. With Hae Joon and Baek Yoon Young (Jin Ki Joo) rapidly running out of suspects and in desperation need of allies, they’re forced to re-examine everything they knew. And the culprit may be both closer than they know and the last person they could have imagined.

Warning: spoilers for episodes 13-14 below.

1. Hae Joon revealing that he’s a time-traveler to Dong Shik and his grandfather

Baek Dong Shik (Choi Young Woo) has been itching to figure out the mystery of why Hae Joon keeps appearing at crime scenes for some time now, and finding him at the scene of Yoo Bum Ryong’s (Jo Yeon Woo’s) murder is all the impetus he needs to bring him in. Part of him suspects that Hae Joon can’t be the killer, but there’s just too much that’s suspicious about him. Dong Shik quickly finds that Hae Joon’s credentials are all fake. There still isn’t enough to hold him, given that Hae Joon’s writing is very different from the killer’s, but the only person who can clear him, Lee Soon Ae (Seo Ji Hye), is unconscious after her ordeal.

Left with no choice and facing a police force that is increasingly eager to close the case, Hae Joon asks Dong Shik to come to his home and to bring his grandfather Principal Yoon Byung Gu (Kim Jong Soo). There, he reveals his crime room with articles from the future and that he is a time-traveler and Byung Gu’s grandson. The principal quickly believes him upon finding Hae Joon wearing a watch that he had just bought for his future grandson. It takes a little more convincing to win Dong Shik over, but the fact that Hae Joon knows the news headlines before they’re issued does the trick. With two new and valuable allies on his side and Soon Ae’s testimony that he saved her life, Hae Joon is quickly freed from prison, much to Yoon Young’s relief. But that leaves everyone without suspects. It clearly isn’t Baek Hee Seob (Lee Won Jung) or the currently jailed Go Min Soo (Kim Yeon Woo), and the third suspect on the police’s list (Bum Ryong) is dead. But the killer’s still about, and he’s starting to get nervous.

2. The killer visiting Soon Ae’s hospital room

Hae Joon and Yoon Young are terrified upon sighting the killer’s signature matchbox in Soon Ae’s room. The note within is different, warning her that he’ll see her soon. Dong Shik sees this as proof of the killer’s confidence, but Hae Joon sees it as the killer bluffing out of fear. No one has ever escaped his clutches until now. He’s trying to scare Soon Ae into silence. And the worst part is that it seems to be working. Woojung village has been crime-free for five years before this. The villagers don’t like hearing about murder and would rather pretend that it wasn’t happening than try to seek a culprit. The police chief, Dong Shik’s boss, is on the cusp of promotion and doesn’t want a failed murder investigation messing up his chances.

Now that Hae Joon’s been freed, the police are determined to make Min Soo the culprit, even though he was in jail at the time of Soon Ae’s abduction and near-murder. Their plan is to destroy the matchbox left at the site of Soon Ae’s near-murder and pretend that Min Soo was the real killer and that someone else was just attempting a copycat crime with Soon Ae. Dong Shik overhears this and is furious. He steals the evidence from the police storage and hands it to Hae Joon, who realizes that Dong Shik wasn’t the incompetent police officer he’d believed him to be.

This entire time, it was the police chief and his lackeys that were at fault. In the original timeline, Dong Shik took his life after Min Soo’s conviction for reasons that Hae Joon doesn’t know. With the police set on turning Min Soo into a scapegoat instead of solving the actual murder, Hae Joon devises a plan to force the police to do their job. The issue is, it involves the press.

3. Soon Ae reveals all to the press

Hae Joon has no other options available to pressure the police into investigating beyond involving the media. Soon Ae’s father is hesitant to do so as it could provoke the killer even further, but Soon Ae’s mother stands strong. Their family has already lost one daughter to the killer, and both the village and the police don’t seem to care. The police haven’t even posted an officer outside Soon Ae’s home despite the killer having gone as far as to visit her hospital room. Soon Ae agrees to go on air as well with her voice masked and her face blurred.

Hae Joon contacts some of his reporter friends (it never is clear on why these reporter friends trust him so easily), and they converge on the town to film a special on the murders. Desperate to save face, the police are forced to investigate seriously. The only issue is that they still want to turn Min Soo into the murderer, and his sister Go Mi Sook (Chi Hae Won) refuses to recant.

4. Min Soo’s alibi

Dong Shik visits Mi Sook, indicating that he’s aware that she’s lying and that things are going to get bad for her if she doesn’t recant now. Yet, Mi Sook sticks to her guns, lying pretty convincingly about how difficult it was for her to testify against her brother. Dong Shik can only marvel at the depth of her deception. It’s left to Hae Joon and Yoon Young to find what Min Soo was really up to during the time of the murders. This means that Hae Joon has to undertake the not-so-fun task of getting Min Soo out of jail. It’s a difficult endeavor because Min Soo genuinely is trash, abusing his sister and seeking to assault Yoon Young. But so long as he’s in jail, the police will try to make the evidence fit him instead of considering anyone else. It takes some digging, but Hae Joon and Yoon Young are able to locate hospital records, indicating that Min Soo’s hand was broken at the time of the murder, meaning that he couldn’t have tied up the victims in the killer’s signature red rope and killed them.

Hae Joon immediately goes to the media with Min Soo’s alibi, and the police have no choice but to release Min Soo. And that bodes very badly for Mi Sook. It’s easy to feel bad for her when she comes to pick up her brother and trails after him, knowing that it’s all over for her when they get home. Yoon Young realizes this upon spotting him, and as much as she doesn’t like Mi Sook, she hates Min Soo even more. She follows them and drags Mi Sook off with her to prevent her brother from assaulting her. Mi Sook finally breaks down in tears. Yoon Young notes that she didn’t cry when her classmates, their siblings, and teacher were killed by a man whose face only she has seen, but she sure is sobbing now.

5. Hae Joon’s declaration on television

In the middle of all the kerfuffle over the killer, Hae Joon’s also been navigating a personal crisis. His parents have met and are dating, and the part of the original timeline where Chung Ah (Jung Shin Hye), his mother, leaves his father is ensuing earlier than he anticipated. Due to the publicized manner of the murders and the fact that the killer was using matchboxes from the teashop, Chung Ah is closing up shop and leaving town. Hae Joon sees the baby clothes she’s packing and realizes that she’s pregnant with him. Despite his alleged apathy, he cares enough to accompany her to the bus terminal because he still can’t understand why this woman is going to abandon him after birth. When he hears her talking almost lovingly about how much she wanted a child, he’s even more confused but bears it stoically as she leaves.

At the same time, in a final bid to lure out the killer, Hae Joon announces on live television that he saw the killer’s face during Soon Ae’s rescue and would be able to recognize him if he saw him again. Yoon Young is horrified to find that Hae Joon did not blur out his voice or his face, pretty much asking the killer to target him. That’s exactly Hae Joon’s plan, and he paces his yard, waiting for the killer to show up. Dong Shik’s also hiding and watching. Only, the person who shows up isn’t the killer. It’s Chung Ah.

Hae Joon doesn’t understand why she’s here or how she seems to know that he was lying on television. But it all comes together when she begs him to leave with her because that man isn’t who she thought he was. Hae Joon’s frozen as his mother continues, saying that she realized it after hearing about the method of murder: the matchboxes, the rope, and that all of them had to do with her. She figured it out, and that’s why she had to leave without telling the father of her child. Because the father of her child is the killer.

Right at that moment, Yoon Yeon Woo (Jeon Jae Kyung), Hae Joon’s father and the man who’s been fixing up his time-travel car, appears on the scene. Dong Shik chases him, but it’s too late. He gets into Hae Joon’s garage and makes off with the time-travel car. He speeds toward the tunnel that’ll take him away from 1987 when Hae Joon jumps in front of the car. Yeon Woo knocks him down and gets out of the car. And the look in his eyes does not bode well.

Okay, but who would have thought that Hae Joon’s father was the murderer? I’m still waiting for some sort of fakeout. Surely, the timing of Yeon Woo’s arrival from the States doesn’t match up with the murders? But right now, it’s looking increasingly likely that Yeon Woo’s going to kill him and toss his body in the future, which is where 2021 Hae Joon finds his corpse, meaning this cycle starts all over again. In delving into the murders, Hae Joon seems to have brought out exactly what he was trying to avoid. Can Yoon Young somehow avert this future she dreads from coming true? Next week will tell!

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Shalini_A is a long time Asian-drama addict. When not watching dramas, she works as a lawyer, fangirls over Ji Sung, and attempts to write the greatest fantasy romance of all time. Follow her on Twitter and Instagram, and feel free to ask her anything!

Currently Watching:  “My Perfect Stranger,” “Tail of the Nine-Tailed 1938,” “Stealer: The Treasure Keeper,” “Dr. Romantic 3,” and “Black Knight.”
Looking Forward to: “Gyeongseong Creature,” “Ask The Stars,” “The Girl Downstairs,” “The Worst Evil,” “Queen of Tears,” “Vigilante,” “Demon,” “Daily Dose of Sunshine,” and Ji Sung’s next drama.