It’s been almost six years since Reply 1988 first aired in Korea, but it continues to be heralded as a modern classic thanks to how well it catered to all types of viewers. While majority of us were glued to the family and community drama in Ssangmundong, we couldn’t keep ourselves from trying to guess the answer to one of the biggest mysteries in the show: who is Deok-sun’s husband?
Spoilers ahead! If you haven’t watched Reply 1988 until the last episode, we highly suggest you keep from reading this article any further. We would like to recommend you read our ultimate guide in watching the Reply series instead.
After nineteen feature-length episodes, Sung Deok-sun’s husband was revealed to be Choi Taek, the shy and timid professional Go game player. This reveal was the most satisfying resolution to a loveline/love triangle that I’ve ever witnessed in my 23 years of existence. Not only was I part of Team Taek since his introduction in the second episode, but that love triangle was so freaking unpredictable.
It’s so easy to guess how a love triangle is gonna go from the very first episode. In some cases, you don’t even need to watch the show to know who will end up with whom. Take Start-Up for example: we all knew that Nam Do-san was going to end up with Seo Dal-mi (even if Ji-pyeong was the superior choice) because all the promos for the show featured both of them.
That is not how you do a love triangle, especially if you’re going to focus the show heavily on that element. Reply 1988 is the perfect example of keeping things well-balanced for the two candidates: Kim Jung-hwan and Choi Taek. It was never obvious which one of them was going to end up as Deok-sun’s husband — not until we got closer to the big reveal where little things started to hint towards the answer. Even when we were at that point, we were never truly sure until present-day Deok-sun called her husband by his name.
I think even people from Team Jung-hwan couldn’t be too angry at how the love triangle turned out. It just made a lot of sense for Taek and Deok-sun to end up together.
However, I do believe Jung-hwan was originally planned to be Deok-sun’s husband. My gut had been telling me that from the very first episode, and it has not waivered since I finished the k-drama five months ago. There were just some evidence lying around that the writers changed course halfway through the show.
While I love Taek, he was not supposed to get the girl. At least not at first.
A lot of our proof is based on how Reply 1997 and Reply 1994 panned out. So we marked them with spoiler tags in case you hadn’t watched the previous installments yet.
Remember the scene in the second episode where all of the boys slept together in one room after drinking? Dong-ryong brought up that Deok-sun had “become cuter” in the past days.
Sun-won, who at this point was a top contender to be Deok-sun’s husband, agreed with him. Taek also nodded his head in agreement. But then Jung-hwan sat up furiously because everyone else agreef that she was cute. “You all must be crazy! You’re all out of your minds.”
This scene particularly stood out to me because the writers made it a point for Jung-hwan to be so repulsed by the idea that Deok-sun could be seen as cute. It was the moment when I thought I had it all figured out. Why go through all the trouble of emphasizing the differences in their reactions when Jung-hwan, the outliar of the group, wouldn’t be The One?
I mean I get that this isn’t supposed to be the Holy Grail of evidence, but come on. Taek looks nothing like him! If anything, Jung-hwan is the splitting image of this guy. Just look at the hair and skin color.
There’s also the fact that Deok-sun’s husband actually speaks… a lot. We all know that Taek isn’t the type to express himself with words, let alone get into arguments with present-day Deok-sun. While I get that people change throughout their lives, it seems pretty suspicious that Reply 1988 already showed the husband’s “talkative side” pretty earlier on when Taek’s character still barely spoke.
I believe the writers cleverly retconned this late into the series by pointing out how Taek’s father looked a lot like him when he was younger.
For all you saying that the present-day husband of Deok-sun was not supposed to look like anyone specific since that would give away the mystery too early, I agree with you. But let me tell you this: I don’t think Reply 1988 was ever intended to center around the romance aspect, so it would’ve been totally fine to show that Deok-sun’s husband in the present-day does look like his younger version.
I can already hear you say it doesn’t matter, but let’s look at it from a TV writing perspective.
If you’re going to introduce a series-long mystery that revolves around one key person (in this case, “who is Deok-sun’s husband”) in the first episode, wouldn’t it make more sense for the answer to be hinted at in the first episode?
As you can see in the picture above, Jung-hwan was seated right beside Deok-sun in the very first scene of the k-drama.
And think of all the shows you’ve watched that had a central mystery or love triangle that did not follow through with their original plan. We’re talking shows like Dawson’s Creek or The Vampire Diaries whose writers switched the guy whom the girl was going to end up in the middle of the series. They all had blinking neon signs that read “hey, this guy is gonna end up with the girl!”
It was obvious to everybody.
The “Other Guy” is always supposed to be just another obstacle for the main couple getting together, but when fanfare and natural story progression kick in, the writers choose to do a full 180.
I feel like the same thing happened in Reply 1998 because Jung-hwan had more interactions with Deok-sun and a stronger presence than Taek did in the early episodes.
I don’t know about you, but I only started to see Taek as a “real contender” to being Deok-sun’s husband in this phone booth scene. Just to refresh your mind, a lot of that episode was dedicated to Deok-sun trying to get her postcard read on-air by a radio broadcaster named Lee Moon-se.
She wrote that she wanted the guy she liked to confess to her on the first day of snowfall. Then lo and behold, Deok-sun gets a call: it was Taek calling from a phone booth outside when it had just started snowing. While he didn’t confess his love for her, he did ask her if she wanted to go to the movies with him.
It was a pretty sweet moment, and by this time, I actually do feel like the writers were testing the waters with Taek. At this time, Sun-won had basically been written off as Deok-sun’s potential husband because they were already pushing his romance with Bo-ra.
But what I wanted to point out was that there is actually a sort of “curse” in the Reply trilogy that involves phone booths.
It was obvious that the writers wanted us to think that the main love line was going to be between Sun-won, Deok-sun, and Jung-hwan. I mean Deok-sun was pining hard for Sun-won since the first episode while Jung-hwan was still denying his feelings for her. We were led to believe that one of them would definitely be Deok-sun’s husband… and then swerve.
Sun-won goes after Bo-ra and never looks back.
What’s interesting though is that at the time Sun-won revealed that the girl he actually liked was Bora, Taek was still a non-factor when it came to the love line; he barely had any screen time or intimate moments with Deok-sun. Sure, some of us were probably all like “wouldn’t it be nice if this Taek guy ended up with Deok-sun,” but we knew next to nothing about him that made him a legitimate threat to Jung-hwan.
As a comparison, we’ve already gotten moments early on where Jung-hwan displayed his soft spot for Deok-sun. There was the time he unwillingly volunteered himself and the guys to dance in a talent show to get her a Walkman.
So when the time came when Taek was making moves on Deok-sun, it all felt like a way to keep the husband mystery going even when it seemed inevitable that it was Jung-hwan. I mean to give him credit, he was there from the very start.
Do you know that trope in TV or movies where the girl picks the “comfortable” one (usually a best friend) over the successful and rich guy? We saw this recently in Start-Up. If we were to follow that line of logic, then Taek had no business being Deok-sun’s husband.
I do see how Jung-hwan and Taek would both be the comfortable choice for Deok-sun. They had many similarities in that regard like how they’re both reserved people who provided her a shoulder to cry on.
But let’s also not forget how they were both successful and rich as well. Jung-hwan’s brother won the lottery that made their family instant millionaires. And he might not be successful in the traditional sense of being a famous household name, but Jung-hwan was a consistent top student in his class who eventually pursued his dream.
Then there’s Taek who was successful in the traditional sense. He was on the news almost all the time, could easily buy Deok-sun the mittens that she wanted, and he was “too big” for the humble Ssangmundong community. The kicker is his bad character traits were not really that bad.
It was almost like he came out of someone’s vision board of an ideal guy because he was close to flawless. That fact alone made it hard to believe that someone as perfect as Taek was always planned to be Deok-sun’s husband.
So in summary, here is my theory on what I think happened in Reply 1998.
Jung-hwan was always originally intended to be Deok-sun’s husband. Sun-won was also intended to confuse the viewers, but the writers really did not mean for him and Deok-sun to end up together because of Bo-ra. When they had revealed that Sun-won actually liked Bo-ra, they had to keep the husband mystery going and intended for Taek to take over the “loser” role.
Then halfway through the show, the writers changed their minds either because of fan pressure or seeing the potential in Taek and Deok-sun. And the rest is history…
I think this would also explain why Jung-hwan got such an unsatisfactory ending to his character arc; his happy ending was always supposed to be with Deok-sun, but that got scrapped and they didn’t know what to do with him.
In any case, this is all just a theory and I do acknowledge that Taek also had some things going for him in the early episodes like getting a character backstory narrated by Deok-sun. And P.S.: my belief on who Deok-sun’s husband was originally supposed to be still doesn’t change the fact that I am Team Taek through and through!
Do you think Taek was always supposed to be Deok-sun’s husband? Leave your thoughts in the comments below!
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I just finished watching the series and although I agree on some of ur points, I think you forgot one big clue. On the first cut scene where the husband was present, he went out for a cigarette. In their gang, only taek smoked.
Ooohhh, that's a good one! There were a lot of red herrings with the husband's identity in the present, so I never gave the clues there a serious look. Another big clue in favor of Taek: he got his own backstory explored in the second episode!
hihi
I agree with you through and through, but since appearance was being talked about, I do think that the husband did resemble taek as well since Jung hwan had really prominent lips while the man in the future doesn’t really have thick ones, they are so similar to CT’s.
Even in episode 9 after the concert scene where Jung-hwan and Deok Sun take a picture together, the future scene shows her saying, "He must have liked me since then."
Yes this gave this away for me. I was sad it wouldn't be jung hwan.
although I agree with the smoking part, I must say that “he must have liked me since then” isn’t really accurate because of the translation! in original (korean) grown up Deok Sun doesn’t actually say “he” because there are no pronouns used in Korean (at least here)! she could’ve said “[you] must have liked me since then”! :))
I also noticed that one only when I re watched the series with my sister, a told my self, oh that's right, Taek do smoke, so its definitely him.
the photo of January 1989 they took in china also
Yes. present day Duk seon said while looking at the picture with husband by her side: "This must be the best day of your life."
helloo
I just finished watching Reply 1988 and I agree with you, I also think the writers changed their minds as to who the mystery husband will be. From the beginning, Jung-hwan is a strong contender and Taek was just a handsome competition who’s barely in the picture. Also, there were obvious signs in the present time where the writers WOULD WANT US TO THINK that Taek is the husband (i.e when they’re talking about public image, smoke break), since these signs were too obvious, I was thinking Jung-hwan was the husband since the writers love to put twists and unexpected plots in the story.
It was not a satisfactory ending for me. The story that they created for Jung-hwan from the beginning only to be made a complication of the Daeksun-Taek love story in the end does not make sense. (pretty much the same of how I felt after I watched Start Up)
No, the husband was always taeki because the husband is shown drinking coffee and water with his left hand in the very initial episode and choi taek is left handed whereas JH is right handed, and the smoking would be a big loop hole if the husband was JH since air force officers have to maintain their health and hence him smoking won't make sense
The writers said in fact that JH was supposed to DIE.
I read somewhere that Taek was always the first and only choice for the Husband because the original script involved JungPal dying in a plane crash and the whole show was sort of him remembering his youth and his first love in what were supposed to be his final moments. Which when you think out of it kind of makes sense, towards the end we constantly see JungPal's mom anxious and the plot twist was that she felt that way because her son was about to die and her motherly instincts could sense it. However, around ep 17 the production stopped and the show came back after a two-week hiatus so there were a lot of fans who speculated that they re-shot certain scenes and decided ultimately not to kill off the character because let's face it that would have devasted viewers beyond consolation. But this explains why JungPal had almost no screen time in the last episode because he was supposed to die around episode 19 and then Taek would become the only choice.
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If what you say is true, this makes the most sense. If we followed typical tropes, Jung-hwan would've been the easy winner. Cause even though there are many main characters, the show did seem to revolve around two characters the most, Deok-sun and Jung-hwan. And it was weird that he had so little screen time towards the end.
Taek wasn't a bad choice, but he always felt like a side character to me and him winning in the end felt a little forced, like the writers just wanted to include a twist. If Jung-hwan was supposed to die, then that explains everything.
The writers totally confirmed this.
I just finished watching the show for the 100th time and it always seems to be Taeki for me from the beginning. for example
1) Taeki has been constantly called her husband in different ways like when she tells him to grow up fast and marry him or how his parents call him their son in law or when his mother tells her to grow up and marry him or when his friends tell him to marry her.
2) When she chooses the gloves given by Taeki over Jung Hwan.
3) The way even though Taeki showed up in 6th episode the story still in some way or form constantly revolved around him.
4) The husband smoking.
5) In the photo episode the future her says, "look at his expression he is dying of happiness" but jung hwan has a shy reluctant smile on his face whereas bo gum is full blown smiling.
Lastly I also think the husband looks alot like taeki's dad.
On episode 6 after the phone scene they switch to the adult scene and during the deok sun and hubby moment they mentioned about the 1988 song festival, in which deok sun said hubby wasn’t there with her since she was watching at home with the gang. Plus they also argued about the winning song. Afterwards on episode 7 they showed the said 1988 song festival scene. I believe writer nim already sort of picked Taek at that point?
writer nim might have tried to confuse us and wellll that 1988 song festival could be twisted as deok sun and hubby forgetting most of it anyway but judging from the previous reply style they only mostly tried to dodged and showed the adult second lead more (the misleading part) instead of twisting the past facts itself. Also by that logic, writer nim could also try to highlight Past Junghwan in comparison to adult second lead on other reply series. Just a thought.
I just finished watching this series , after Sun-won said he likes Bo-ra , if was pretty clear that Jung-hwan will be Deok-Sun husband . because they had more chemistry together , I really wanted them to be together , but the writer just blow off his character and didn't give him a good ending too , Deok-Sun was just taking care of taek has he didn't open himself to others more , But really and more clarified person to be Deok-Sun husband is Jung-hwan , He cared for Deok-Sun from the early episodes of the series where he tells about it in the 19 episode, the writer just messed up with this love triangle , How can the writer make taek has her husband , it's so heartbreaking , I really don't like the ending of this series , it just left me with lots of unsolved questions .
yesssss my girlll.. I'm likee in real disbelief it's like i can't accept the fact of the chance in scrip... It's not that i don't like taek.. but it was jung hwan who actually cared a lot about deok-sun... Also see when adult deok sun said - "look at him smiling so loud, maybe it's the time he stared to like me.." man taek was smiling hard.. but jung hwan was so shy and soooo cutee..." that was the major thing tht made me ship deok sun and jung hwan.. also those to had a lot off cute romantic scenesss andd the chemistry had a great sparkk...
i don't agree with this at all. the writers knew it was taek the entire time and dropped very subtle hints about it throughout the entire movie. so i'll be trying to debunk these point because well, i don't have a life and i'll defend taek to the end <3 no junghwan hate intended tho
1.) Jung-hwan was the only one who said he didn’t like Deok-sun - this point just doesnt make any sense other than prove the fact that junghwan is a cute tsundere lol
2.) Deok-sun’s future husband looked nothing like Taek - people change over time. that includes physical appearance. we still do see hints that it could be taek though, the general look of the actor resembles park bogum the most, the eyes and the way the face is chiseled hints to that, also you think taek would stay the same after getting married to deoksun for so long? he already started swearing and even got mad throughout 1988-1994, over time he developed some traits from the gang which is probably why he acted like junghwan during the first few flashfowards
3.) Taek had close to zero screen time in the first episode - this is just funny to me lol we open up in taek's room, we are introduced to the fact that he's a comic loving genius baduk player, it makes sense for him to not have screen time during the start of the drama because it had to be emphasized that he was a baduk player that's away for a lot of competitions. there's also a thing in baduk called handicap where the stronger players let the weaker players place a few stones first, so that they have an equal chance against them, we see that evident in the first few episodes, where taek just takes the backseat and let junghwan and the rest make the move first. also i think it prevents the viewer from having to take in everything at once, since taek is the "slow and steady" type of character.... was deoksun outright saying she wants to marry taek in episode *TWO* not enough forshadowing for the eonamryus?
4.) Taek’s call from the phone booth was doomed - no one ever notes how lee moonsae's monologue literally just right before this scene was something alone the lines of "i hope that everyone who gives love confessions will be successfully accepted. and if someone hasn't confessed to their crush, or you're suffering from love problems don't be sad. maybe right now someone likes you secretly, and maybe he will confess to you, if all this time he likes you and you don't realize it." taek literally called at that moment, alluding to the fact that he's the secret admirer and that deoksun never realized it
5.) Jung-hwan had been a “contender” from the start - it makes sense why the writers took this direction. if they didn't implement taek's "handicap" system i mentioned earlier, junghwan wouldn't be as strong of a contender as he actually is, if taek was introduced at the same rate junghwan was, most people would be able to see where the drama would go and the element of surprise would be taken away. it would also mess up taek's character of being the slow and steady one (taek literally gives deoksun a golden turtle in the last episode and no one ever talks about the significance of that scene, it showed that taek was the strong force, although he might haved lagged behind at first, during the entire thing). it was also crucial so junghwan could build up a relationship with deoksun the time that taek's appearance was minimal, so that he has an equal chance against him later on
6.) Taek was the successful one - taek became successful because of deoksun's dad, that strengthens taek's bond with deoksun and her family even further. if you think taek being the successful one made him perfect, think about it this way. taek earned his fame and money and remained humble. he lost his mom early on. he had many sleepless nights and even developed dependency on medicine to get him through. junghwan was poor, but won the lottery. you might think that as a way that he "earned" it that way but you'd be wrong. if junghwan were to be the main lead, he should've stayed poor. he was already smart and had a complete family then. add the lottery on to that, he's literally what you would say is "perfect". junghwan never really had much of a flaw that we could see him improving throughout the drama, at least not in the sense that deoksun could help with that leads to them bonding, unlike taek that even though rich and successful, earned that at the expense of his health and a typical experience of youth (going to highschool, etc). taek had that flaw that deoksun could help with improving, as evident in future taek's words in the last episode "best thing after we started dating? ah! quitting my sleeping pills" deoksun helped him with his battle against medicine abuse. so in this sense, junghwan is the successful one, the only thing that was going wrong for him was his first love.
this along with junghwan supposed to be dying in the original script, deoksun's family's general want for taek to be part of their family (although intended as jokes), taek being a smoker, deoksun always choosing taek (gloves, dongryong vs taek, etc), and the countless hints in the flashfowards about taek not wearing warm clothing, the music festival argument, the photo, and him being really into "weird comics" in deoksun's words... it's pretty clear it was intended for taek to be the main lead the entire time lmao
(btw i actually don't hate junghwan, i just don't think he would've been the husband knowing taek and deoksun's characters... im actually really attached to junghwan which is why i don't value the original plane crash script as much value as the eonamryus regard it to have)
I agree with you on all of your thoughts regarding this drama. I almost went insane about knowing who the husband will be but i knew it was going to be Taek because of the smoking habit that was revealed in the first half. Our difference is that i am team Jung hwan. I still hoped up until the end that maybe he could be the husband lol. Specially the scene where Jung hwan finally let out all of his true feelings to Deok sun infront of Sun woo and Dong Ryong. My heart totally raced but he made it just a joke in the end. I am immensely sad that Jung hwan ended by giving up Deok sun to Taek. And i was eager to know what happened to Jung hwan, like who did he end up to or does he ever got married? I wasnt satisfied with the ending. I think it was nice if they let the viewers see the gang together again when they were aldults but over all Reply 1988 was superb! A great drama to watch indeed.
M so happy I watched this series! I wish I did earlier, but better late than never!
And Dnllm, your comment is EXACTLY how I felt too! The scene where Jung Hwan finally proposes - it sent my heart racing too! Was always team Jung Hwan from the start, was soo happy that Sun-Woo's part of love triangle was resolved early on and that now the path was clear. Was heartbroken when JH had to hear CT's confession about Deoksun :(
I was soo mad at JH when he didn't rush out soon enough to make it on time to accompany DoekSun and was again heartbroken for him to have to refrain.
I was hoping for some more closure on his character too. The series mentioned everything about what everyone else was now doing - including JungBong. But not JH.
I was relieved because even if Deok sun didnt end up with Jung hwan in the drama, they ended up together in real life. It's still a win for us all Team Jung hwan out there!!!!
So true!!! I found it under Trivia section on iMdB right after the series ended for me, where i had gone to find out answers about why not JH. I was sooooo happy to have read this detail.
I stopped at epi 19 when CT was revealed as husband … so unfair… but doesn’t this plot make Deok Sun too easy becos initially even she liked Jung hwan…
So had come this forum to knw other ppl views n was so relieved to see them as real life couple😍
A win is a win!!!