#As an older sibling Han Seok OFFENDS ME

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So I have a Jang bros theory, but I could be way way off base here.

I think when Han Seok says he didn't know people cared about family, what it tells us is that he either:

A) doesn't realize he actually cares about his brother and wouldn't realize it until Han Seo's been gone for a while because his version of caring about someone (anyone) is so messed up that he can't reconcile it with what other people classify as "caring".

Or

B) Doesn't think about it as caring about "family" because Han Seo's value doesn't come from being family, it comes from the role he plays or his function in Han Seok's life as someone who just needs to be "there" regardless of whether or not he's being useful and without any form of reciprocation.

In that sense, understanding that he needs Han Seo wouldn't translate into an understanding that he should take an equivalent person away from Vincenzo because indeed Vincenzo doesn't HAVE anyone who functions in that way. He has people about whom he genuinely cares as people, and as such he tries to keep them at arms length as much as he can to keep them safe, even if this is difficult, painful or inconvenient for him.

For example, when Vincenzo tells Chayoung, Mr. Tak and the Bye Bye Balloon people that he would be going to prove his innocence on his own, even though he is likely to need help, they're the ones who insist on joining him, and his relationships with the people he cares about continue to be meaningful and impactful to him regardless of whether or not they're physically present.

Han Seok's relationship with his brother is the opposite. When he goes to take a picture of the plaza, he tells Han Seo there's somewhere they both need to be, even though he could very well have gone on his own, and despite having just gotten furious enough at his brother to throw a blunt object at his head. And much like many psychopaths, he probably has an "out of sight, out of mind" mentality where knowing someone is "there" (in the general sense) doesn't matter much unless they're physically present.

Han Seo also sometimes slips and kind of forgets that he's supposed to be terrified, like when he pokes fun at Han Seok's "humongous" ears, implying that this sort of interaction is something that might've been a bit more commonplace at some point before they both started dealing with life or death situations on the daily. Which is not to say there wasn't torture and abuse, just a bit less so. (Han Seok, my boy, the bar's disturbingly low here)

This is one of the many reasons why I don't think Myung Hee's presence can really balance out Han Seo's absence, because her presence is predicated upon her usefulness, not because she is, in and of herself, required. And she certainly can't crack jokes at his expense. She also considers Han Seok very differently than his brother does. When something goes wrong (or right) everyone around Han Seok first has to make sure they won't be hurt because of it, but after that, Myung Hee's considerations are how it affects her and what to do about it. Her focus is mainly on what Han Seok would DO, whereas Han Seo (perhaps by virtue of the way the trauma programmed it into him, or by virtue of being a brother first, employee second) used to also consider how his brother would FEEL (disappointed? proud of me?). I say used to because we haven't really seen that in a while, but with Myung Hee, we've never seen it, and I don't think we ever will.

Now, to be fair, there is a chance that these sibling-ly contexts we see are just a necessity for filming certain scenes or have been written in such a way because there needs to be a pretext for the actors to deliver their dialogue, but I think it's unlikely given how much thought is put into their scenes together in general, and given that most of their scenes take place in a home setting rather than an office setting. The emphasis is on this being a family matter, not a business transaction.

#vincenzo #jang han seo #jang han seok #ok taecyeon #kwak dong yeon #jang joon woo #Kinda wanna write a Han Seo visits Han Seok in jail fic #Wishful thinking #vincenzo meta #As an older sibling Han Seok OFFENDS ME