'Alice' Episode 4: Jin-gyeom distances himself from Tai-yi but instinctively time travels when she’s in danger
'Alice' Episode 4 introduces the theory of how Jin-gyeom (Joo Won) begins his journey as a time traveler. As of now, Jin-gyeom has only been speculating about the plausibility of his mother being connected to time traveling. At the beginning of the episode, he had not yet connected the strange men behind Eun-soo's kidnapping to his mother, at least, not until he saw the same card that his mother had left behind being used by a killer. This murderer had claimed that he was the younger brother fo the man that he had killed, and had been abused by his older brother, however, upon investigating; Jin-gyeom found out that the victim's younger brother is still a child.
That is when he had approached Tai-yi (Kim Hee-seon), a physicist, to analyze the card and find out what it was used for. It isn't until episode 4, however, that we Jin-gyeom realizes that time travel might be more than a smokescreen because he comes face to face with the man who was suspected of murdering his mother Park Sun-young all those years ago. He hasn't changed much and has, in fact, become the main guy at a research lab. After seeing professor Tai-yi's disrespectful behavior towards the things that were left behind by his mother, Jin-gyeom had decided not to involve her in his investigation further.
He also becomes the detective in charge of the black market dealer who had helped Eun-soo's mother from the future, kill the child's mother in the present so as to be able to replace her. So Jin-gyeom also concludes that this investigation might be more dangerous than the garden variety crime. So when he tries to find an alternative source to look into the time card, he meets the man who owns the research lab and is shocked to realize that he looks the same as the suspect sketch that was used to investigate his mother's murder.
He attacks this man called Seok O-won from Kuiper Institute of Advanced Science, in the presence of Tai-yi. He realizes that the professor knows O-won and that only makes Jin-gyeom warier because he still continues to believe that Tai-yi and his mother have some kind of connection. When his team fails to get an arrest warrant for O-won based simply on the suspect sketch from the past, he tells Tai-yi to stay away from the professor.
Tai-yi who is desperate to get her hands on the card now that she is hooked to learning what the card is all about agrees to all the conditions that Jin-gyeom sets, however, her only condition is that he give her the time card to research. He refuses and decides that it is better to maintain distance from the professor. It is while he maintains this distance that Tai-yi comes across Alice's drone again. The same drone that was visible on the day that Jin-gyeom was arrested and was also seen on the day Eun-soo was kidnapped.
This worries Jin-gyeom, who rushes out of the police station to try and reach Tai-yi as soon as possible. However, he fails because he meets with an accident on the way. However, when passersby attempt to help the person stuck in the car, all they see is an empty vehicle. Tai-yi, who is on the call while Jin-gyeom was driving is cut off from him and is also worried about him, but what is shocking really, is the fact that Jin-gyeom has become a time traveler and has now traveled back in time. He has gone back to the time when his mother was still a student at the university and all of this was made possible because he had held on to the card.
We also notice that a drawing in student Tai-yi's notebook is similar to the book that Alice was interested in acquiring in 1997. The last page of the book is still missing as it was hidden in a little girl's hand. It is the same book that Tai-yi from the future had stolen right from under Min-hyuk's nose. The book is a prophecy that makes time travel possible and from what we have seen so far, it could very well have been written by Tai-yi. However, at the moment, the book is in O-wan's hands, and he reads one particular page that is about the son of a time traveler beginning his journey for the first time after he comes in touch with a version of his mother.
The concept here is novel and so far, 'Alice' has managed to intrigue us but is this enough? With four episodes that have gone by, we wonder how things will pan out for Tai-yi, Jin-gyeom and Min-hyuk.
'Alice' airs on SBS on Fridays and Saturdays at 10 pm KST and can be streamed on Viki Global.