[Recap] Rookie Agent Rouge Ep. 17-20

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Synopsis:

Can a young woman prove her loyalty to her country and her family? Lan Yan Zhi (Zhao Li Ying) is privileged banker’s daughter in Shanghai and a student activist who mistakenly comes into possession of a letter from the Japanese Army in 1937. She gets misunderstood for a spy by Song Mian, an upstanding officer in the Chinese Army. To prove her innocence, Yan Zhi agrees to infiltrate the home of her best friend, Feng Man Na (Tao Xin Ran), and help track down a mysterious spy.

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Episodes 17-20

Yanzhi goes out to buy floral water and Zhou Yuhao sees her. However, someone is following him so he takes care of the guy following him before grabbing Yanzhi. He takes her to a restaurant, but Yanzhi drugs him and is able to escape. He hopes this will serve as a warning and she will leave her room in front of the Special Squad Headquarters (SSH). She decides not to leave and wait for Song Mian.

The next day Zhou Yuhao confronts Watanabe in front of Manna for sending someone to follow him. Some time later Manna cracks the code and finds out that Yanzhi is staying right across the street from her headquarters. They arrive at Yanzhi’s room, but she is not longer there. Song Mian had contacted Yanzhi and told her to leave.

 Yanzhi arrives at a meeting point for the National Salvation Army.  She takes a while to spot the person she was suppose to meet and her behavior arouses suspicion from police officers. They arrest her and find the radio she is carrying. The officers immediately inform the Special Squad Headquarters (SSH). Manna, Zhou Yuhao, and Watanabe leave to go capture Yanzhi.

Meanwhile Yanzhi manages to knock out one of the guards. The spy she was suppose to meet with rescues her by killing both police officers. When they are about to leave, the special squad arrives and injures the spy. Yanzhi and the spy are forced to leave the radio behind and make a run for it. Manna and Watanabe follow them.

Song Mian is waiting for Yanzhi and the spy  in a car and tries to rescue them.  Since the spy is injured he tells them to go ahead and sacrifices himself to allow them to escape. As Song Mian drives, Yanzhi looks at the spy getting shot multiple times. They are both emotionally shaken by the experience. They finally arrive at a safe facility. There they meet with Leader Wan, who berates them for the failure of this mission. Two lives were lost and they lost the new code and radio. Leader Wan tells Yanzhi that her arrogance is her weakness. He tells her that she will have to stay put for some time. Song Mian takes Yanzhi to the Japanese Concession in Shanghai so she can safely hide.

Zhou Yuhao injures himself and says that he was attacked by the National Salvation Army spies and that they stole the radio. In reality he hid the radio in the building.

Afterwards, he is recovering in a hospital room. Manna is really worried about his injury, but Watanabe is really suspicious. Qing Mu comes in and he is angry at Manna for their lack of results. Afterwards, he raises her rank to Major since she was able to break the code. He brings up some suspicions about Zhou Yuhao, but Manna turns them down.

Zhou Yuhao recovers and goes back to retrieve the radio. He sets it up in the same room that Yanzhi was renting. He thinks it can be useful to the Communist Party. While walking on the street a lot of things remind him of Yanzhi. He goes into a makeup store and buys the Twin powder brand that Yanzhi uses.

Qing Mu meets with his boss, who tells him he wants to start spreading fake currency to crash the Chinese economy. They need a local bank that is trusted by the common people so they their eyes on the bank run by Yanzhi’s father. Qing Mu asks Manna to carry out a plan to force Yanzhi’s father to cooperate with them. He tells her that could be part of her revenge.

Leader Wan goes to visit Yanzhi and tells her that he thinks Song Mian is a double agent and that she needs to follow his movements tomorrow. Yanzhi thinks there is no way Song Mian could be working for the enemy. Leader Wan hopes so too. He gives her a gift box with a gun before leaving.

Yanzhi meets Song Mian at a park and follows him afterwards. She sees him passing information to a man working for the Japanese. When she is about to leave, Song Mian drives by and tells her to get in his car. He drives to a remote location. Song Mian asks Yanzhi to go look in the trunk. As she is looking inside the trunk he points a gun to her head from behind. Yanzhi shoots him.

She kneels next to him and asks him why he did that. Song Mian tells her to not trust anyone including him. She cries while holding onto Song Mian. Then Leader Wan appears out of nowhere and starts clapping. It was all an act. This was the last test for her as a spy. Yanzhi obviously feels that her feelings were betrayed. She doesn’t say anything and just walks back to the car.

Zhou Yuhao is out on a date taking pictures of Manna. He gives her a present, a powder compact Twin brand. She recognizes it as the brand that Yanzhi uses and throws it into a lake. She then takes Zhou Yuhao to outside the house of Yanzhi’s parents and tells him that she wants Yanzhi to be feel what it is like to have your parents branded as traitors. Zhou Yuhao thinks this is wrong and that whatever problem she has with Yanzhi, she shouldn’t involve her parents.

Back from dropping Yanzhi off, Leader Wan is discussing future plans with Song Mian. He tells Song Mian that the real radio code was successfully brought into the French Concession. The plan to bring the other code was just a diversion so that it would be easier to bring in the real code. Song Mian is shaken by this. All their missions to obtain the code and get into the city were just a facade. It must be hard for him to accept this since some of his students died. Leader Wan says there is one mission that only Yanzhi can do and that they may have to sacrifice themselves in the future for her.

Manna sets her plan to bring down Yanzhi’s father. First she sets off a bomb in his bank, then she spreads rumors that he plans on running away and closing his bank. People get desperate and start demanding their money. Yanzhi’s dad contacts someone who has valuable antiques in his bank to get some emergency money. The person tells him he will get him the money. On the way to the bank his car is stopped by the Special Squad and they change the money he is bringing in for counterfeit money. People realize the money is fake and attack Yanzhi’s dad, who ends up in the hospital.

In the hospital, Yanzhi’s mom is waiting with Tian Mu when Manna arrives. Tian Mu ignores Manna, which upsets her. As Manna walks out of the hospital, you can see her officers are all undercover throughout the hospital. She tells Zhou Yuhao that she expects Yanzhi to come rescue her dad.

Zhou Yuhao tries to come up with a plan to rescue Yanzhi’s dad that way she won’t be captured. He asks his supervisor to help him rescue Yanzhi’s dad.

At the same time, Yanzhi reads news about her dad in the newspaper and starts crying. She cries herself to sleep. Some time later, Leader Wan comes in to give her a new mission. Her mission is to pretend to rescue her dad and get captured by Manna. She is to endure all torture and infiltrate their ranks. Yanzhi refuses at first, but Leader Wan tells her she is their last hope. He takes out some bullets from his pocket and lines them up on the table. He keeps one bullet on his hand and says that one is for himself in case they can’t see the day of victory. Yanzhi agrees to take on this mission. Leader Wan tells her that he is the only one that knows about this mission.

Zhou Yuhao sends a message to Yanzhi’s dad that there is something he can use to escape in the restroom. Yanzhi’s dad tries to go to the restroom but his guard won’t let him.

The next day Yanzhi receives a message from Song Mian to meet. They meet with Leader Wan and plan out how to rescue her dad. They think the Japanese captured her dad because he has a mold to make money in his bank.

Yanzhi’s dad plans to escape and tells his wife to pack her things and run away. Yanzhi is brought into the hospital as an injured patient. Tian Mu takes her to a separate room., where Yanzhi changes into a nurse’s outfit. One of the special squad officials, Shrimp, walks in on them.

Meanwhile, Yanzhi’s dad is trying to escape by using what Zhou Yuhao left for him in the bathroom. He finally causes an explosion that allows him to escape the hospital. At that same moment, Yanzhi shoots Shrimp in the head.

Yanzhi’s dad  is running away but gets cut off by Manna and some of her agents. Song Mian starts shooting at them from far away. Zhou Yuhao sees him, but doesn’t interfere until more Special Squad agents arrive. He then shoots a warning shot near Song Mian so he can run away.

Manna and some of her people go back to the hospital to look for Yanzhi. Yanzhi runs aways from the hospital and into Zhou Yuhao. He tells her to hide in the sewer and come out in a few days.

She asks him if he has a crush on her and that is why he is helping her? Then she fires her guns into the air, alerting her enemies of her location. She tells him to remember that from now on they work for the same side. Everyone else arrives and take her away.

On their way out they run into Yanzhi’s dad, who is devastated once he sees they captured Yanzhi. Yanzhi kneels before him and asks for forgiveness for dragging him into this mess. Manna tells him that his job is done and he can go back. As they drive away, he cries out for Yanzhi.

Back at the National Salvation hideout, Song Mian is explaining how things went wrong to Leader Wan. They plan on destroying all their intelligence houses and meeting points since Yanzhi was captured. However, other officers don’t think Yanzhi would give up any information to the enemy.

Zhou Yuhao goes to see Qing Mu about keeping Yanzhi alive so they can use her father.

At the port, Yanzhi’s mom is about to board a boat. She sees her husband walking towards the port and runs to him. He tells her that Yanzhi has been captured. They hug each other while crying and agreeing that Yanzhi is a good child.

Back at the Special Squad headquarters, Manna confronts Yanzhi.

Impressions

I really liked these episodes. There was a lot going on and it kept me guessing. You can really feel their struggle to try and take back their country. There were a lot of patriotic moments in the drama, but that part where Leader Wan implies he rather die than live under Japanese was very well done.

I kind of felt bad for Shrimp since he really didn’t want to work again for the Japanese and he got forced into it by Manna. He was the less evil of her posse.

The actor playing Yanzhi’s dad did a great job. I could really feel his desperation when he saw that Yanzhi was captured. He is a very likable actor. Yanzhi’s mother is also good but I think the actor playing her dad gets more screen time and allows the audience to connect with his character more. The scene of her parent hugging each other was very touching.  Zhou Yuhao redeemed himself in these episodes. Now, he is on my good side. I also think he is done with Manna. At first, he felt bad for her and wanted to bring her to his side. But I think by now he thinks she is hopeless.

On the bad side, the production team had a big oversight. Out of nowhere Yanzhi has the same outfit she had when she left Shanghai after it fell into Japanese control. I guess I am to assume Song Mian brought it in for her. It is not a big deal, but details like this one bother me. I rather they just get her a simple new outfit.

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Note: I am sorry I am taking so long with the recaps.

Rookie Agent finished airing this week. It has over 5 billion views. It was also the most viewed drama online during some days and came #1 on its timeslot. Congrats!

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