A Virtuous Business kdrama – Episode 3 Recap and Spoilers.
‘A Virtuous Business’: Kim So-yeon Deeply Understands Her Mother’s Harsh Criticism of ‘Disgusting’
According to Nielsen Korea, the third episode of the JTBC weekend drama A Virtuous Business, which aired on the 19th, broke its own record with a viewership rating of 5.1% in the metropolitan area and 4.6% nationwide (based on paid households).
In this episode, Han Jeong-sook (Kim So-yeon) is shocked when graffiti criticizing her door-to-door sales of adult products appears, further exacerbated by her mother Lee Bok-soon’s (Kang Ae-shim) harsh words. Jeong-sook, dealing with her husband Kwon Seong-soo’s (Choi Jae-rim) affair and struggling to raise her son Min-ho alone, seeks comfort but finds none from her mother. Bok-soon chastises her, saying, “Selling dirty and disgusting things is more outrageous than Kwon Seo-bang’s affair,” and turns her back, claiming that if Jeong-sook continues this work, she can no longer care for her child.
Meanwhile, Park In-tae (Sim Wan-joon), completely unaware of his wife Park Mi-hwa’s (Hong Ji-hee) affair, asks Jeong-sook to do door-to-door sales for a birthday event he wants to throw for her. Jeong-sook feels even more miserable as she realizes In-tae’s deep feelings about adult products; he hopes they can rekindle his interest in married life, as they have been unable to have children. Despite her reservations, Jeong-sook, unable to pass up a difficult sales opportunity, gathers herself and completes the sale professionally, especially when In-tae offers to look after Min-ho.
However, trouble arises when Min-ho goes missing while In-tae is at the theater buying popcorn. Desperate to find her son, Jeong-sook encounters Bok-soon, who scolds her again, saying, “I tremble when I think about my daughter selling such cheap stuff. Act like a mother.” Jeong-sook, already upset, can no longer hold back and retorts, “Is it really a motherly thing to say harsh words to someone who’s already going crazy?” Fortunately, thanks to the quick thinking of detective Kim Do-hyun (Yeon Woo-jin), who accompanied Jeong-sook after receiving the missing person report, Min-ho is found safe. Based on Jeong-sook’s comment that “he wanted to see his father,” Min-ho is located in front of the gochujang factory where Seong-soo used to work.
After this tumultuous time, Jeong-sook finally gets a day to forget her worries. On her much-anticipated first payday, she receives a thick envelope and goes shopping with Seo Young-bok (Kim Sun-young). Jeong-sook buys a school bag for Min-ho while Young-bok purchases a sturdy wooden table for her eldest daughter. While picking up side dishes and snacks for Min-ho, Jeong-sook spots Bok-soon looking around blankly. To her surprise, she sees her father coming out of the clothing store with his ‘concubine’ dressed in fine attire.
Later, Jeong-sook finds her mother standing in the pouring rain and offers her an umbrella. It’s only then that Bok-soon confesses why she had been so harsh. When she was Jeong-sook’s age, her husband had returned from Seoul with another woman. Although she tried to cope, she couldn’t bear the thought of her ‘baby’s’ clothes being washed alongside the ‘concubine’s’ underwear. Bok-soon left home and raised Jeong-sook and her sister on her own. Despite knowing how hard Jeong-sook had worked to survive, she felt guilty for her harsh words but couldn’t shake the thought of her daughter selling underwear meant for someone else.
In a touching gesture, Jeong-sook gives Bok-soon a beautiful one-piece dress she bought with her first paycheck. It symbolizes her apology and her wish for her mother to live happily for herself, not for her husband or children. When Jeong-sook returns home, she cries silently, burdened by sorrow, reflecting, “It’s okay because I’m a mother.” In this moment, she realizes just how lonely and painful those years had been, and now, as a mother herself, she feels the weight of that hurt deeply.
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