The Director’s Daughter
Episode 6 of Snowdrop starts with Tae-il sanctioning Plan B, which entails eliminating all the North Korean spies. Soo-ho orders his men back into the passageway and rearms the boobytrap across its entrance. The surrounding ANSP agents are about to barge in when Chang-su terminates the operation. Gang-mu had been using the chaos to lead the hostages out of the cafeteria, but they’re intercepted by Comrade Joo’s return. Gang-mu leaps forward, pushing Comrade Joo’s gun upwards as he fires through his rounds. The bullets shatter a chandelier and the broken glass cuts Yeong-ro’s hand. Gang-mu pins Comrade Joo to the floor and almost stabs him with the tweezers when Soo-ho returns and shoots them right out of Gang-mu’s grip. Comrade Joo decides that it’s time to execute Gang-mu. His first attempt is foiled by the cafeteria lady’s hysterics and his second by his own empty magazine. He reloads and takes aim but this time Soo-ho steps in, threatening to cut Comrade Joo loose if he keeps up the volatile behaviour. Comrade Joo sends the hostages back to the cafeteria with an annoyed holler. As they depart, Soo-ho spots the blood dripping down Yeong-ro’s hand. At the ANSP base, Chang-su gets confirmation that Professor Han and all the spies that were on the ship with him are dead. On the coast guard’s side, Yeong-u is among four injured men. Chang-su delays notifying their families, inadvertently keeping himself in the dark. Chang-su wants to tell the press that the ANSP tried to rescue Professor Han from a North Korean abduction. Tae-il thinks that they can still use this as an opportunity to defame the opposition party – and keep their higher-ups off their backs – and wants to spin the story that Professor Han died while defecting to the North. Chief Ahn follows Tae-il’s instruction. Meanwhile, Seong-sim and Mi-hye have invited themselves over to Ae-ra’s house. Smug with the possibility that 13 virgins will die soon, Ae-ra rubs Chang-su’s status as a senior graduate of the Military Academy in Seong-sim’s face. Seong-sim drops all pretenses and grabs Ae-ra by her hair, physically and verbally asserting her higher family status. Back in the cafeteria, Soo-ho forces Yeong-ro to grab the first aid kit and follow him to the dorm room where Comrade Lee was deposited after being shot. Soo-ho makes her wait while he tends to Comrade Lee and then leads her to some hallway chairs. He sits her down and takes her hand to disinfect it. She snatches it right back with disgust in her eyes. Still, he persists and treats her wound. Soo-ho reveals that tomorrow morning he’ll be demanding a doctor for Comrade Lee, and he plans to free Yeong-ro when the ANSP requests for hostages to be released in exchange. With that, he intends to call it even between them and end their connection. Yeong-ro, dismissed, stomps back to the cafeteria. The other students break into accusatory whispers at the sight of her bandaged hand, and she segregates herself behind a pole. Chang-su calls Soo-ho again and informs him of his team’s demise on the sea. Soo-ho warns that, if he sees no way out of this for his remaining men, they’ll kill themselves and the hostages. As night falls, Bun-ok tears up over a flashback to her father lying in a hospital bed. In the flashback, she tucks in her mother, asleep on the seat next to him, and shoves an envelope under her pillow. In North Korea, Soo-ryeon tells Ji-rok to prepare himself for the Party’s judgement since Soo-ho’s mission is looking like a failure that has cost them $300M. Comrade Joo has made the same assessment and argues that the only way to defend their Leader’s honour is to kill all the hostages and blow themselves up. Soo-ho keeps his father’s reliance on him in mind and says that their deaths would be for nothing. Comrade Joo takes this as an assault on their ideology and becomes aggressive, repeating Soo-ryeon’s secret order while raising his gun. Soo-ho doesn’t give him the chance to fix his aim, shooting him in the chest without hesitation. Comrade Joo falls to the floor, coughing up blood, saved by his bulletproof vest. Soo-ho looms over him, asking why Comrade Joo disobeyed his orders and followed him to Mount Ogong in the first place. When Comrade Joo remains silent, Soo-ho presses down on his bruised chest with the threat that the next shot will be aimed at his head. Soo-ho calls Chang-su and gives him 20 minutes to get a doctor to the dorm or he’ll start executing hostages. With even the ANSP’s doctor too far away, Tae-il calls Chung-ya to the dorm. Chief Ahn also calls Han-na back with the intention of sending her in with Chung-ya to recover Yeong-ro. Upon her arrival, Tae-il explains the situation to Chung-ya. She’s uninterested until he mentions Yeong-ro. His plan is to have her kill Comrade Lee and Comrade Joo with lethal injections under the guise of administering painkillers. With the dorm almost completely wiretapped, Chung-ya will then say a code phrase and the ANSP’s SWAT team will break in to execute Soo-ho. Chung-ya agrees but will only drug the spies with sleep-inducers. In the matron’s office, Soo-ho has the matron compile the profiles of all the students taken hostage. The matron singles out the more unruly students for release. Returning to the cafeteria, Soo-ho announces that he’ll be releasing a group of hostages. He also lays out a rule: those who are cooperative will be picked for future exchanges and those who disobey him won’t make it out. The 207 girls are all among the first batch of students called by the matron. The other students start protesting that Yeong-ro and her friends are receiving special treatment. Bun-ok shrieks over the unfairness of students being the only ones eligible for release and calls for a random draw. Soo-ho grabs the last piece of paper from the matron’s hand and gives it to Bun-ok. It’s her resume. We flash back to the matron reasoning that Bun-ok is the sole carer for her sick parents and should be released. Soo-ho snatches Bun-ok’s resume back and rips it up – she won’t be going anywhere. He reiterates his earlier rule while giving Yeong-ro, who tried to give up her spot and stay behind, a stony glare. Gang-mu – blindfolded and tied to a chair in a separate dorm room – signals the ANSP agents through a series of knocks. They learn that the hostages are in the cafeteria and Gang-mu is in room 203. After Soo-ho agrees to let Han-na into the dorm with Chung-ya to verify the hostages’ safety, Comrade Joo disarms the main door, and they make their way inside. Comrade Joo searches Chung-ya’s medical kit, though he doesn’t find the gun she stowed in a hidden compartment for Han-na to sneak to Gang-mu. Comrade Lee’s condition is worsening, and he’s being kept in an improvised sick room sectioned off at the back of the cafeteria. Soo-ho is with him when Chung-ya steps inside. Recognition flashes in both of their eyes but neither acknowledges it. Outside the partition, Han-na observes Yeong-ro sitting with the other injured students waiting to be treated. She requests for the group to be released first. Soo-ho picks six other students at random instead. Another student dissolves into a panic attack and the matron asks for her release. Hearing this, the other hostages also start begging until Soo-ho loses his temper and threatens to kill them. Yeong-ro snaps, screaming out pleas for Soo-ho to release everyone else. She pushes down the gun he levels at her head and whispers her identity as the daughter of the ANSP’s director to him. Shock passes over Soo-ho expression before it turns arrogant.
The Episode Review
Still in the dorm, we’ve made little progress in the way of a bigger picture. The most notable development was Chung-ya and Soo-ho’s mutual moment. It’s looking certain that she’s a spy, but there also appears to be some shared history between them that his other comrades are not privy to. Speaking of the comrades in arms, Soo-ho doesn’t quite show the same blind zeal or trusting belief that Joo and Lee have towards their country’s doctrine respectively. He’s more concerned with individualistic struggles and keeping his team alive. That’s probably the only thing that has kept the hostages alive so far given that the ANSP’s leadership is habitually incompetent and often played for laughs. We end on a revelation, courtesy of Yeong-ro, that is likely to give her more trouble than power. Soo-ho, though he has been looking out for her in small ways, has also proven that he can be ruthless, and that smirk seemed to hint at nothing less.
