one day, three autumns

i did suspect time to not be linear. and there are like 5 million hints about seori being danshim's reincarnation the way segye is yi hyun's.

then here ...

could it be she is in her body of a different joseon era timeline. like what if this is NOT after the poisoning scene but before it? what if THIS is the chance for her to change her own history and "keep living after death"... so that she can finally meet Yi Hyun and resolve that longing and resentment. somehow... doesn't it feel like kang danshim needed to go to the future to truly realise how much hyun loved her? i really hope it's a story where they reunite in both timelines :( maybe she needs to die in this world with the desire to let go, so that she can return as shin seori, without that 300 year old loneliness.

and may I add... she has the face of a queen. what if.... 🤔🤔

my heart breaks so incredibly much for seori because even her original present self is someone lost to this world. who knows how lonely she was and is still if she's there at all. danshim has been similarly lonely and fending for herself all her life. even now she's trying her best and doing so well in this unknown world after being fucking framed and killed. so even seori's new identity as danshim, which earned her more confidence and fighting instincts as well as love, is not enough. there's just something about her across time and space in a way that makes these selfish people unleash their bullshit on her.

it's as if this man has decided she is too destined to be lonely for him. as if it's her destiny in all her lives. does this even make sense? he's so selfish and controlling and emotionally manipulative. why would you tell this young girl who just admitted to you that she's a lonely person that it is her loneliness that makes you disapprove her relationship with segye?

i can't imagine Seori dying to let Danshim live in her body as an idea of a happy ending in the slightest and i have a feeling that's also not what this show wants. because even if we are told this is danshim in Seori's body, it's not even possession or time travel. it's like a travel of memories behind which the real Seori has always existed like a shadow waiting to be seen, as the imposter in her own body. and a lot of the individual dan-shim was while in seori's body felt like a reflection of seori herself. whatever little we knew of her. the caring for her grandmother as an instinct, the immediate desire to fulfil her dream of becoming a famous actress, the not recognising segye since this is the first time they meet in this life (as if she only recalls the past in the form of a dream, so initially recognition was limited to simply two people), the closed off heart which opens gradually. Most importantly, acting which is a difficult art. All Danshim's identity did was give her confidence to fight for the opportunities and connections she used to shy away from. It doesn't really improve her status as an actor because she's still a side character, still getting bullied and slapped and what not. Except now, she stands up for herself when she gets slapped.

I am choosing to think they are more of a single individual than fully seperate souls. like two sides of the moon, different parts of the same person. We don't know how yet, but hopefully it is this. otherwise why would they make segye meet her grandmother in this episode alone? literally the only person who holds all of real seori's memories even though seori seems to have forgotten them. she is the only person in the world who has loved seori all her life and if there's anyone who would feel it's not the same person, it would be her.