REGARDING JINSOL
you must understand that being raised within a toxic and abusive household, which considered him a hindrance, an outlaw by nature, was extremely damaging to jinsol's thought process, especially during young age. the moment his own mother denied his existence marked the beginning of his tendency to critisise and doubt himself and the credibility of his being. and, frankly speaking, it's unfair: he couldn't go to school properly, make friends and the like because his nature was 'flawed' according to societal norms. not only that, his society was filled with stereotypes that he couldn't escape from and were he to be found out his case would have quickly been sorted out (he'd have been killed).
also, our existence, goals, aspirations are directly linked with our emotions. expressing emotion is in turn deeply interconnected with speech, so it differs vastly for sb to have the ability to speak yet not to voice their true feelings than to text/write them down. that's why democracy is so important for our ability to evolve in every aspect. jinsol is an emotional being, his emotion, just like ours, is inevitably influenced by society's relugations and ideals.
having considered the above, his motivation to steal saegye's ability *mainly* stemmed from his hatred towards his father. he considered him scum and needed him gone. ofc and he desired to finally be sincere, however it was shown many times that he did possess some morals, mainly due to his self hatred. cus he was aware of the consequences his nature held; a lousy plan such as dumping his fate onto a stranger was out of the question. alongside his father, he wished for himself to disappear cus he felt incredibly overburneded by everyone. the whole world and his family which used to be his whole world as a kid were against him.
so regarding jinsol's plan, idk what you mean. he *did* manipulate saegye into loving him and he exploited his insecurities and desires. he chose him because he was a dare: sb who'd benefit him the most. why did he need another way? that was the plan which he as an individual came up with, cus it felt closer to whatever he deluded himself into believing he could 'successfully' pull off. and it makes sense he'd pick that way because his circumstances raised him to think this way, to be manipulative, self destructive and *overcalculative* (since he always had to think outside of the box). and obviously he didn't pull it off in the end.
he didn't pull it off cus what he needed was love and acceptance, a peaceful state of being (he also states this: "tell me ohn saegye. could it be that what i wanted wasn't a meaningful death, but a life worth living despite being meaningless?"). although his original plan was to mislead saegye it ended up being surprisingly difficult. he became overwhelmed and got caught up in it: he also found comfort through saegye's affection. and it wasn't easy for him to keep it up, if you reread the story oftentimes you notice jinsol being conflicted about his feelings and motives, it was difficult to distinguish, to draw the line between and within those two.
REGARDING CAESAR AND SAEGYE
obviously it wasn't saegye's decision alone to expose dares. if that were the case there would be no use to dedicate so many chapters to caesar. if anything, her backstory, her constant display of ideas, wisdom, down-to-earthedness, only amplified the fact that she was meant to be the deus ex machina, the turning point of events. and not only events, but saegye's ideology and goals.
it was a mutual contribution of the two, the exposure of dares. ultimately, she and saegye shared a common wish, to be free and live in a world free of discrimination. caesar helped saegye understand this wish by guiding him towards his truth, and saegye's truth made her in turn realise that she also wished for this more passionately that she originally thought, even if everyone was inconvenienced in some way. her target was her brother. that's why she encouraged saegye in the end.
caesar by making use of her intelligence and authority and saegye by utilising his wit and own essence, both made a scene and exposed the truth (ironic) to everyone. without saegye she couldn't have done anything and saegye also. there is no use considering the what-ifs. there is no use considering who did a better or a more useful job. that's not the message the story wants to convey. it unravelled the way it did for a reason.
lastly, her decision to tell tan that saegye was the one to change the world was to restore their relationship, aka a totally different reasoning. she is thoughtful, on top of everything else and glad to saegye and tan. tan because he was also part of teaching her brother a lesson. she didn't wish to be the one to adress the exposure of dares, her goal was to live peacefully.
the plotline idea on "people can't lie" revolves around the norms of whatever's considered objective today. and the truth can vary, precisely because it is rooted within the essence of emotion in this case. everyone's truth is different, and anyone can forge lies into their truth and speak it. that's why it's a tricky subject, it's not whimsical.
jinsol is hardly at fault here. it was a result of terrible parenting that caused him to evolve into the person he was. but that changed as well, after his journey with saegye, everything is bound to change. he's merely a teenager.
i'm telling you this because once you get into the spirit if this whole story it's an incredible display of valuable virtues. and although perhaps your dismay stems from the fact that caesar didn't get the recognition she deserved in the story the way you'd have liked to, trust, she does in our hearts !! she was an unimaginably well made character.
I havent read your comments in full (will do later), but regarding Caesar, no im not upset that she didnt get recognition. Im upset because she was a deus ex machina that basically rendered MC's effort useless if not for her. I have to disagree with you that she was a well made character, in fact, she's my least favorite.
Okay, ive read your comments. First of all, thank you for the in depth replies for what essentially my incoherent word vomit. Second of all, im sorry but i guess we'll have to agree to disagree. My points still stand, at least for me -- i understood perfectly what the author was trying to say, but i still think that they lacked the ability to flesh out the plot well.
Also, i'll only respond to this one point of your comment. About the kissing stuff, what i meant was: jinsol could have stolen a kiss from saegye, like he did to tan. He didnt have to make saegye fall for him to kiss him. He couldve just made a deal like he made one with tan. It would be in character, since he didnt care (or didnt realize that he cared) about saegye at that point, and the story wouldve turned out completely differently. That's why the kissing method was a "dumb" plot device imo, because it made the romance pointless.
Anyway, you dont have to reply back since i doubt i will change my opinion about this manhwa, but still thank you for the replies!
thank you for replying to me as well and i apologise for misunderstanding you. it may not work out, however i'd still like to try to reply to your comment regarding the "kissing plot device", not necessarily in hopes of changing your mind.
so this time i will keep it short. just like jinsol had mentioned in one of the chapters he had considered dumping his fate on sb else multiple times. however he didn't, and couldn't. because he had a contradictory sense of morals. it was alright to murder his father, cus he caused everyone so much harm, but it was both unethical and unsafe to exchange fates with sb else, precisely because the nature of False wasn't meant to exist according to societal views, it was dangerous. his morals were deeply corrupted due to the way his family treated him, and consequently he was lead to a narrowminded truth.
so he *practically* wasn't able to consider stealing a kiss from saegye or just anyone, and tan too. he did so with tan out of necessity, to advance his plans with saegye, and the reasoning behind it wasn't to proceed with murder. he never made a deal with him consciously either, it couldn't have been regarded as a deal in the first place because tan wasn't aware of what that entailed. and it is sensical, because were he to become aware of the existence of False he'd immediately be put in danger and also inconvenience jinsol. murder isn't a simple matter, he needed to secure both success and a deep connection with the other to increase the understanding, and just like a predator, mental manipulation through love is the most efficient.
jinsol has always cared, if anything, he's always cared way too much. about everyone, while disregarding and often discarding himself and his being. that's why it took him this long to execute the plan he's always dreamed of. making a deal with a dare is highly risky, and if you combine his calculative nature (cus he always had to rephrase and twist his words) with the above it becomes clear that his character wasn't meant to be of superficial thinking, w/o considering the consequences of his actions and the consequences of those consequences. he also subconsciously gravitated towards any situation that would provide him with acceptance and love, because he lacked that all his life.
lastly, i don't understand how kissing made any romance pointless. i am interested to learn about your views both on this and caesar if you're down for this, however there was no romance until jinsol finally realised his attraction to saegye. conversely, it deemed the tragedy very impactful. jinsol found it difficult to deceive and kiss saegye precisely because he was aware kissing was a display of affection with consequences and responsibilities, intensifying his conflicted feelings.
Between texting “I love you” and saying “I love you,” one hits stronger than the other.
tldr; interesting and original premise but poor execution. All the more disappointing because i had such a high hope for this manhwa.
(Spoiler alert)
The story is filled with too many plotholes, the rule of this world was so arbitrary that it became a joke, and the characters' actions and motivations made no sense -- for example, a False could tell the truth in writing, so why the hell did Jinseol get all angsty about not being able to be honest with his mom and sister? One of his motivations to steal Saegye's ability was because he wanted to truthfully say "i love you" to people -- just freakin text them! And also, putting aside the outrageously Dumb logic of swapping identities by kissing, why did Jinseol need to make Saegye fall for him in the first place? If all he needed was a kiss, he could've manipulated him or made up any excuse. He could get a kiss from Tan, but not from Saegye? And that public reveal about Dares were written so freaking poorly i actually laughed. The author made it as if it was Saegye's decision to expose the Dares (and by extension, his feelings for Jinseol) that changed the world, but what would he have done if Caesar didn't want to get involved? Wasn't it HER decision that mattered the most, in the end? She was a deus ex machina who had all the means and power to reveal Dares without getting buried by the government. She was the one who influenced Saegye the most in this matter -- at first, she didn't see any benefit when Saegye wanted to help Tan, so she discouraged him from exposing the Dares. But once she had her own agenda, she was the one who encouraged Saegye to expose himself and helped him to do it smoothly (with no real consequences shown, what the HELL). So why tf did she tell Tan that all of these huge changes for the freakin humanity was all because of Saegye? Without her, Saegye's choice or feelings for Jinseol meant shit in resolving the conflict, let alone changing the world -- and i hate that a lot (also she kissed a minor, so screw her)