Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned

There is a character in "Seo Dong Yo" that I took an instant dislike to the first time I watched the drama. Every time since when I re-watch SDY, my dislike deepens. And that's Mo Jin.

Mo Jin first appears with her daughter Eun Jin when the Taehaksa gang is fleeing Baekjae. She soon emerges as the deputy leader of the exiled group. She seems to be the mother-figure to Moraksu's father-figure. But if that is the intention of the director/scriptwriter, I wonder if they realize they've created a prototype of the mother who gives her children complexes. I know someone who for years has been consulting a shrink (psychiatrist) whose diagnosis is his mother is the root cause of his neurosis. Of course shrinks have their own agendas and not all mothers are monsters.

Mo Jin's daughter Eun Jin is one of my favourite characters in SDY. I have often wondered how she could have grown up emotionally and psychologically sound, with a mother who is so stern and uptight all the time. Every time Mo Jin appears, her lips are pursed and there is a frown on her forehead. Her eyes are like daggers and there is hardly ever a kind look in her eyes.

This is the way she looks at Seo Dong all the time -- always with suspicion. She never cuts him any slack. She is prejudiced against him from the start. And you know why? Because of his mother. Or more precisely, because his mother is the woman with whom the man Mo Jin is in love with is in love with. What you just read is not a typographical error. That's the complicated relationship among Mo Jin, Moraksu, and Yun Gamo. As a matter of fact, it's very simple. Moraksu and Yun Gamo were a couple, and Mo Jin was never in the picture. It turns out she has always had a crush on Moraksu (who has never stopped loving Yun Gamo even after she disappeared.) This unrequited love may have caused all the passion to be pent up inside Mo Jin.

I have no problem with any of this. These eternal triangles are a fact of life -- some people always want what they can't have. What I detest about Mo Jin is the way she takes it out on Seo Dong, especially the boy Seo Dong. I can understand her mistrust of strangers, even though this is a stranger who has saved their lives. But to regard the child as an enemy agent is carrying things to extreme. Mo Jin has never quite accepted Seo Dong as one of them. She is very critical of, and even harsh to, him. You would have thought her maternal instincts would be aroused by the orphan whose mother is killed in front of him (and in front of all of them.) But no, she vents all her frustration on the child. I suspect she would have liked to get rid of him if she could.

What appalls me the most in the whole of "Seo Dong Yo" is not what Giroo and Buyusun do later, but something that occurs in the early episodes. A valued member of Taehaksa, Bum Saeng, is killed and the Baekjae exiles blame it all on Seo Dong (although he is only the cause of Bum Saeng's arrest and it is Bum Saeng's choice to die.) So they cast him out! They leave him behind; they refuse to let him retreat with them. How could they do this to a 13-yer-old? It's child abuse! Granted, they're not related in any way and they have no obligation to take care of Seo Dong. But he has lived and worked among them, and human beings have a moral duty to one another. In this incident I blame Moraksu more than Mo Jin. He is the one in charge and his word carries weight. Deep in his psyche he has never gotten over being jilted by Seo Dong's mother, and if I were to psychoanalyse him here, I'd say subconsciously he's taking it out on the son too. That's why I have never been a Moraksu fan, even though he redeems himself later.

Mo Jin redeems herself too, much later. She is told later than most of Seo Dong's real identity. Before that she keeps up her campaign of exclusion against him. The young Seo Dong is a survivor. Cast out, he manages to fend for himself living on the outskirts of the Baekjae exiles' camp. His resilience and persistence are remarkable, as are his survival skills. He even manages to teach himself the classics (bits and pieces anyway) and to write. When he passes that qualifying exam to be a trainee technician. Mo Jin accuses him of cheating. Instead of trying to find out how he accomplishes that, she jumps to conclusion, influenced by her heart, not her head. Every time something happens, Mo Jin never gives Seo Dong the benefit of the doubt; instead, she always thinks the worst of him. She never sees him as Jang (Seo Dong's real name), but as his mother's son, and this clouds her judgement.

You would have thought that such a woman, prim and proper, would always do her duty, right? Wrong! Remember that time when King Hye (Buyusun's father) is dying? Moraksu is summoned and Mo Jin intercepts the message and more or less kidnaps him (to try to save him.) The duty of a loyal subject is to serve the king, and Mo Jin here is not only guilty of dereliction of duty, she prevents Moraksu from doing his duty too which could have serious consequences. Here she is again following the dictates of her heart and not her head.

Mo Jin is a hard person. She is supposed to be so in love with Moraksu, but when she turns her back to him, she could shut him out completely. Mo Jin and Moraksu have a falling out over the role of Takhaksa in Baekjae court politics, and in protest she relinguishes her regular duties and becomes a kindergarten teacher at Taehaksa. When Moraksu and Seo Dong are being interrogated and tortured by Buyusun, the other members of Taehaksa tell Mo Jin that Moraksu is in grave danger, but she refuses to go to see him. She says she has washed her hands of him. She has a heart of stone!

When Mo Jin is finally let into the secret of Seo Dong's real identity, to be fair, she devotes herself to helping him ascend the throne. But (and maybe I'm prejudiced) I've always felt she sees him then as her rightful king and not as Jang, the boy and man she used to know.

I would prefer Mo Jin keep her feelings to herself. That part of the drama that shows Mo Jin declaring her love for Moraksu always makes me wince. And in that scene when they finally come together, Moraksu looks awkward and embarrassed. I doubt if Moraksu feels for Mo Jin what he feels for Yun Gamo. Affection? Yes. Love? I'm not so sure.

One thing, though, I have to say about Mo Jin, and that is -- she is consistent. She is the same uptight, rigid, sombre, strict, pent-up, opinionated, unyielding, unsmiling woman throughout the drama.

Nothing wrong with that, I suppose. I just don't like her.

P.S. There's something that has always intrigued me. Mo Jin has a daughter, so presumably she had a husband (who is never mentioned.) What happened to him? Did he die? Or did he leave her? He probably needed some fresh air.