Review and Recaps: Jirisan episode 11 (also known as ‘Cliffhanger’ or ‘Mountain Jiri’)

It’s the year 2020, and the episode starts with Yi-gang lying unconsciously near the bridge she tried to climb by herself. Kim Sol asks her if she is ok.

He then helps her get up and drops her at the ranger station. He is also a ranger and While dropping her he tells her it is very easy for anyone to take the gloves of captain Dae-jin and put them in the spot of death. Someone might have taken it from the common washing spot of the rangers.

This makes Yi-gang think. She visits the police station to meet Captain Dae-Jin. Officer Eung informs her that he has denied all the charges and he might be released the next day.

The first thing Yi-gang asks after meeting Dae-Jin was why he went to Jaekmongol that day and tells him that she just wants to know what exactly happened. Captain Dae-Jin tells her that he doesn’t know what happened to Da-won that day but he should have taken her with him on that day.

When Yi-gang confesses that she saw the blood-stained yellow ribbon on his desk, he asks if she came back because of these ribbons which mislead the hikers and the poisoned yogurt drink. This shocks her and it becomes evident he knows something but their meeting time gets over.

Before leaving Captain Dae-Jin asks Yi-gang to meet Il-Hae as he knows everything. When she leaves the police station she gets a call from Hyun-Jo’s hospital and it seems his condition is getting worse and at this rate, he will become brain dead. His family may plan to let him go if he is declared brain dead. Yi-gang asks the nurse to inform her before they let Hyun-Jo die in peace.

While going in the car she thinks if Hyun-Jo is not able to leave the mountains because he has an intense desire to catch the murderer. And thinks, What if she catches the murderer, would he be able to wake up then?. She prays to the mountain to save him.

Yi-gang goes to the Haedong ranger station. She tries to speak with Gu-Yeong regarding the matter but he is still upset with her and tries to leave the room. Il-Hae enter the room with a walking stick.

It appears he has got transferred to headquarters citing his leg injury and does file works there. Gu-Yeong angrily asks if even Il-Jae thinks their captain is the murderer and il-Hae says the captain is not the murderer but someone else is.

Il-Hae explains to him how captain Dae-Jin found that people were killed and it was made to look like an accident. Few people were lost in one location but their bodies were found in a very far away location. Il-Hae shows Gu-Yeong the reports of Yang Guen-tak (president of the national park)- Guen-tak got lost in Yiseokjae but his body was found somewhere else near Gaem falls. It was the first time Dae-Jin found it fishy and started to look near the region. Dae-Jin found blood-stained yellow ribbons. The fishy thing about it is- it was tied in a way to mislead the hikers and make them get lost but in general, these yellow ribbons were used by illegal hikers to not get lost.

The same thing happened with another victim whose body was found near orraey valley and the captain again found blood-stained yellow ribbons. He also got to know from the illegal herb collector who Yi-gang saved was poisoned from yogurt drink.

Dae-jin started looking for the yogurt drink also and when he found some he sent it to il-hae to the headquarters to find the ingredients of the drink. Unfortunately, since the drinks were spoiled they couldn’t find the ingredients.

Gu-Yeong asks what if this is all in the head of the captain and all were just coincidence. Yi-gang interrupts now and tells them that Hyun-Jo knew who was the murderer. She starts telling them what exactly happened during her and Hyun-Jo’s accident back in 2019.

It’s 2019 and it’s snowing heavily. No one is in the ranger station and when Yi-gang searches for Hyun-Jo he is not there and his cabinet was open.

She finds the trial in the snow and she thinks that even now Hyun-Jo is after the murderer and follows the trial. As she follows the trial at one place she finds the hiking pole and it strikes her mind that while leaving from the ranger station one of the poles was lying down in the room.

Before she thinks it’s fishy the snow below her starts breaking and she falls from a great height. She loses her consciousness alone in the snow, covered with blood. She wakes up in a cave and finds Hyun-Jo near her. He tells her that he is not able to contact the station and says he will go outside and try to contact the station from his phone.

Yi-gang tells him that the murderer tricked her and kept the pole in the cornice on purpose. He assures her he will be back soon and leaves but he never came back.

At this part of Yi-gang narration, Gu-Yeong remembers that the station got the call from Hyun-Jo that morning. Captain Dae-Jin was the one to pick up the call, though Hyun-Jo’s voice was breaking terribly he could convey that Yi-gang is hurt and they are in black bridge village.

The entire Haedong ranger team goes in search of the two and first they find Hyun-Jo lying in the snow, covered in blood with no vital signs. They try to help him.

Yi-gang also remembers that day in the cave after Hyun-Jo left someone with a ranger dress was standing in front of her and she couldn’t see his face but spot his black glove. When she heard a few people shouting her name the person left the cave. She told this incident to the police but they didn’t believe her because she didn’t see the person hurting Hyun-Jo or her.

Yi-gang now tells Gu-Yeong that there must be something in the black bridge village that’s why Hyun-Jo went to the place on the day of the accident. Gu-Yeong asks what might be the evidence. Yi-gang asks him to take her with them to find the evidence that she is not yet sure of.

The three leave to the black bridge village. Gu-Yeong carries Yi-gang in his back and Il-Hae follows them.

Half a day before, When Il-Hae reaches Jirisan, Yi-gang is waiting for him at the bus stop and, she tells him her suspicion on Gu-Yeong.

She tells him that, Gu-Yeong came from the mountain on the day of the death of Da-won. She suspects that the murderer has to be a ranger because on the day of her accident the murderer was wearing a ranger’s dress. Gu-Yeong is the only ranger left in their team and, he could have easily got the captain’s gloves.

Il-hae and Yi-gang plan to take Gu-Yeong to black bridge village and if he is told she has important evidence against the murderer, Gu-Yeong would surely try to kill her in the mountains. Il-Hae knows the plan is risky but they don’t have any other evidence against Gu-Yeong so he agrees.

At present, the trio takes a break after climbing the mountains for a long hour. Yi-gang deliberately asks Gu-Yeong what he was doing in the mountains on the day Da-won went missing. Gu-Yeong for some reason dodges the question. (This of course will increase their suspicion. Idk what would happen now in the black bridge village.).

As they climb the mountain after the break, Yi-gang talks to Hyun-Jo in her mind – “If I end up dying, maybe I can meet you Hyun-Jo. If I could meet him, maybe I could tell him what I couldn’t hear, what I couldn’t say.”

They take another break, Gu-Yeong asks her how long Hyun-Jo and her have known about the murderer and have Hyun-Jo talked about the murderer before the accident on the snowy mountain. She tells him she didn’t speak to him since the last summer incident. (It seems something bad happened last summer.).

Now they narrate the last summer incident.

It’s 2019, Hyun-Jo and Yi-gang had lost some games with their teammates. They are made to do all the office chores because of that. When Hyun-Jo and Yi-Gang dry all the ranger dresses and gloves, Yi-gang points out that many rangers have black gloves and with civilians in the count, they would never be able to find the murderer with just the information that he has black gloves.

Hyun-Jo says there is one common pattern. All the victims are either Poachers, herb collectors, and the only victim left is Hyeon-su (Hyun-Jo’s junior who died during the march ) but he is also from jirisan.

Hyun-Jo then tells her that it is their 1st anniversary that day. Yi-gang becomes shy and asks why is he keeping track of this as if they are dating. Hyun- Jo tells her it’s the day they saved Seung-hun (The young boy they saved the first time under a rock despite being in heavy rain) and not because of her. This infuriates and she leaves asking him to finish all the work and she is busy. Poor Hyun-Jo then does all the chores.

Since Yi-gang and Hyun-Jo lost everyone calls them loser and take early leave asking them to take care of the ranger station. When Yi-gang arranges the summer disaster workshop posters, A woman comes running saying she found someone lying unconsciously on her way and he didn’t respond when she called.

Yi-gang immediately relays the message over the walkie-talkie. Hyun-Jo responds that he is 2Km away from the location and Yi-gang tells the fatal situation of the hiker and informs him she will leave to the spot too.

By the time Hyun-Jo reaches the man is dead and Yi-gang is sitting in shock after seeing his dead body. Hyun-Jo consoles her and asks her to leave but Yi-gang denies to leave saying she is a ranger too.

After some time, In an attempt to calm her, Hyun-Jo tells her that when he was a commander and his junior died in the mountain- his junior’s dog tag was missing and this affected Hyun-Jo. He somehow wanted to find it and give it to his family.

He came to the mountains after that to search for the dog tag and he always used to look down and never see here and there because the mountains intimidated him soo much. But one day when he reached the top it was not intimidating anymore but the mountain gave him some comfort. Similarly, the mountain would give comfort to this dead man.

The police come and take the dead man away and when they take the dead man had a white flower bunch with him. Yi-gang remembers the day when her father used to bring her the flower bunch saying it is meant to bring happiness and she threw the flower down and went away pushing him away.

The next day it is the summer disaster workshop. Everyone settles and Gu-Yeong teases Hyun-Jo as the needle of the mountain and asks where is the thread of the mountain asking for Yi-gang.

Everyone settle at someplace and when it is time for the workshop, Hyun-Jo searches for Yi-gang.

After seeing Hyun-Jo searching for Yi-gang, Gu-Yeong informs him she is on leave that day. Captain Dae-Jin enters now and starts with the presentation. It seems that the summer period is dangerous in Jirisan because of the risk of Torrential downpour. A lot of time the clouds when don’t pass through the high mountain peaks, they lead to Torrential downpour and nearly water washes away at a speed of 3m per second uprooting big trees and shelters. He gives an example of the 1995 flood. (This was the flood where Yi-gang lost her parents.).

Fortunately, due to technology development, the disaster can be controlled but they need to be vigilant. Captain Dae-Jin then finishes his speech with the technologies.

At the ranger station, Gu-Yeong informs Hyun-Jo about Village ancestral rites. He asks Hyun-Jo to help in the town hall arrangements. Hyun-Jo asks Gu-Yeong if Yi-gang lost her parents in the 1995 flood.

Gu-Yeong tells him that she lost her parents in the very same flood. Her parents were in the shelter that got into that got washed away by the flood and died. At that time whoever died wrote a will to their loved ones in the Records of the shelter except for Yi-gang’s parents. Maybe that is why she never attends the ancestral rites.

On the same day, 2 groups – Wildlife ecology evaluators for mount jirisan cable cars led by the president of the National park and an Environmental organization led by the head of the national park are going for a hike in the mountains. They have a plan to explore the mountain during the day and stay at the bidam shelter for the night.

As it is the village ancestral rite day Yi-gang leaves to the mountains to stay alone by herself along with the mountains. Her grandma tries to make her stay saying they are responsible for the food for the event but Yi-gang doesn’t listen to a word of her grandma. Few more people stay at the mountain that day. An unknown person and the lottery girl. (The girl who lost her lottery ticket and she is still searching.).

At the town hall, all the rangers are busy with the arrangements of the hall. Hyun-Jo comes late and searches for Yi-gang. At the hall, he notices a photo of volunteers of the rescue team. He finds 3 people name Choi Il man, Kim jin dok, Lee jong gu who were killed recently by the black-gloved murderer. He thinks to himself why all the three are in the same photo.

He immediately goes to Gu-Yeong and enquires about the record that was saved in the 1995 flood that Gu-Yeong mentioned earlier in the ranger station. Gu-Yeong tells him it would be in the Document room of the main station.

The next thing Hyun-Jo does is go to the main station and to the document room. He finds the list of volunteers and survivors of the 1995 flood in Dowon valley shelter. On the last page, he finds the names of the victims. (This also has the names of Yi-gang’s parents.)

The file then has a notebook of Mujin station’s August month status log. A person has written all the logs starting from how the weather was getting worst time by time and how it started raining heavily. There were 3 students, 3 volunteers (whom Hyun-Jo saw recently in the photo in town hall ), 2 rangers (Captain Dae-Jin and Kim Nam sik), Yi-gang’s parents, and an old couple (the old women’s leg is badly injured.).

People were staying in the shelter in the hope someone would come to their rescue. But as time passed and the situation got worse, especially when the bridge broke due to the flood, the volunteers planned to leave the place. Dae-Jin couldn’t let the three go in such a risky situation so he also joined to help them and planned to come back with a rescue team.

The only people who stayed in the shelter were the old couple and to help them ranger Nam-sik and Yi-gang’s parents also stayed.

Ranger Nam-sik continues to write the logs. They stay on the first floor and the water enters the top and they all sit at a table. They all know they are going to die anyway. The old man asks why he is writing the logs anyways it is going to be washed away.

Nam-sik says he will put it in the safe and they should let the outside world of what happened there. The old couple and nam-sik write their last will in the log. But for some reason, Yi-gang’s parents don’t write in the note. (Her father even in that situation looks as if he is confident that he will escape the place.)

When Hyun-Jo reads the will of ranger nam-sik it is addressed to his son Hyeon su (same name as the private who died in jirisan when he was commander). Hyun-Jo immediately calls his old friend and confirms his fellow colleague’s father’s name to be the ranger’s name – Kim Nam- sik who died in the flood.

Hyun-Jo finally gets the whole picture and tells himself, “All the victims are realated to the 1995 flood”.

On the other side, Yi- gang is sitting near the Gwigam rock in a temple. Kim Sol now comes to Yi-gang and talks to her casually. As they talk Yi-gang notices something different.

She gets up and looks at the sky and tells “Doesn’t the air feel heavy”.
When most of the village people are in the ancestral rite few people like rangers, the cable car and environment team, the lottery girl and a few tourists are at the mountains.

Suddenly the whole mountain and the village is filled with loud scary siren noise. And the episode ends with everyone looking into where the noise is coming from… even Yi-gang’s face looks as if something bad is going to happen.

I guess something to extent of the 1995 flood is going to happen, but not to that intensity. And why is the murderer trying to be casual with Yi-gang?

Now I can’t imagine any motive for the murderer killing …knowing that all the victims of his murders are 1995 flood survivors. Comment your idea of what might be his motto. I would really want to know.

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