“The Golden Spoon” is a 2022 South Korean fantasy drama written by Kim Eun Hee and Yoon Eun Kyung based on the web novel of the same name by HD3. The series is directed by Song Hyun Wook and stars Yook Sung Jae, Lee Jong Won, Jung Cho Yeon, and Yeonwoo in leading roles.
Spoilers Ahead
Why Did Seung Cheon Buy ‘The Golden Spoon’?
Lee Seung Cheon is a high school student studying at one of the prestigious schools, Seoul Jeil High School. The school is for the richest and smartest students in the country, but most of the students in the high school just belong to rich families. However, Seung Cheon is just a smart student from a poor family who has gotten into the school through social welfare. The rich kids, who are born with a golden spoon in their mouth, bully those from poor families, calling them dirty spoons.
Seung Cheon works multiple part-time jobs, yet he cannot afford cram school, so he picks up thrown study sheets from the cram schools. His only friend in school is Park Jin Seok, who comes to the convenience store and asks Seung Cheon for cigarettes. Jin Seok just wants to show off the new shoes that his mother has bought him. He is happy because those were the shoes that he had wanted for a long time, but his family was too poor to buy him those.
Jin Seok goes home after celebrating his happiness to find out that his parents are dead. They wrote him a letter and committed suicide. His family was under loads of debt and were soon going to lose their home to demolition. Jin Seok couldn’t bear the pain and took his own life as well. Seung Cheon was heartbroken, but the rich kids still made fun of Jin Seok. The head of the Doshin company also attended the funeral as the father of Hwang Tae Yong, Jin Seok’s classmate, but he was accused of their death because his company was demolishing old residences for redevelopment.
Seung Cheon is the only poor student in his class, and his bully, Park Jang Gu, won’t stop bothering him. He calls Seung Cheon to Hwang Tae Yong’s house with the assignment. Jang Gu wants to keep Seung Cheon under control because he is not as submissive as Jin Seok. On his way to Tae Yong’s home, Seung Cheon meets an old lady who shows him all kinds of antiques that she has to sell. She shows him a golden spoon that can make him swap his parents for richer ones if he eats three meals with it at his desired home.
Unconvinced at first, he still buys the spoon and goes to Tae Yong’s home. Jang Gu insults him as usual, but Tae Yong makes him stay for a meal. When Jang Gu didn’t let him use the golden spoons other kids used, he took out his newly bought spoon and ate the meal with it. Tae Yong is the only heir to the Doshin group, and his father has already started training him. Tae Yong is not good at business and doesn’t understand anything that his father tries to teach him. Rather, he understands more about webtoons and supports even aspiring artists.
Seung Cheon comes home to find loan sharks looking for his father, who has hidden himself inside the house. His father used to be a comic artist but is now unemployed. Seung Cheon, his mother, and his elder sister all work to make money for the home. Seung Cheon has been receiving money for doing the rich kids’ assignments and also for getting bullied by them. He finds his new target, Tae Yong after he finds him struggling with economics. He makes a report for Tae Yong, which helps Tae Yong impress his father. Tae Yong is scared of his father and often gets panic attacks because of him.
Tae Yong becomes dependent on Seung Cheon, and the latter starts to receive regular payments for helping him. However, Jang Gu tells Tae Yong’s father about how he is deceiving him because he doesn’t like Seung Cheon getting closer to Tae Yong. Tae Yong’s father didn’t like Seung Cheon in the first place because he believed Tae Yong should choose his friends wisely. Tae Yong gets scared again and agrees to do anything his father wants him to do.
Tae Yong complains to the school that Seung Cheon has been extorting money from him, and his stepmother demands to expel him from school. Later, Tae Yong meets Seung Cheon and agrees that he has to lie. Seung Cheon records it and threatens Tae Yong with spreading the recording on the internet. In the fight to get the mobile phone, Seung Cheon falls down into the river, and Tae Yong isn’t able to save him even after he tried.
Seung Cheon thought that he was dying and thought of his friend, Jin Seok, but he didn’t want to die like this, so he swam up with all his might and got out of the water. He finds “the golden spoon” that he had thrown away and goes to Tae Yong’s house. Tae Yong hasn’t returned home yet, but Seung Cheon doesn’t care. He requests his father to let him have a meal for the last time, and he will leave Tae Yong’s company forever. Seung Cheon had already had two meals at Tae Yong’s home, and this was the third meal with “the golden spoon.”
Did Tae Yong and Seung Cheon Switch Their Lives?
Seung Cheon eats the meal at Tae Yong’s house while Tae Yong runs back to save Seung Cheon from dying. However, both of them switch their identities, and Tae Yong collapses in the middle of the road. Seung Cheon is not sure if he has switched lives yet and proceeds to leave Tae Yong’s house, but Ju Hee comes and slaps him. She calls him Tae Yong and calls him out for framing Seung Cheon unnecessarily.
Seung Cheon has just become Tae Yong, and the police arrive at his house. Seung Cheon has been missing since he was last seen with Tae Yong. A witness has reported Tae Yong, and the CCTV footage shows Tae Yong, who is now Seung Cheon, falling into the river. Seung Cheon goes through an interrogation, but Tae Yong’s father has already bought off the police, and they let Seung Cheon go. The police find Tae Yong in a hospital, and Seung Cheon rushes to meet him.
Tae Yong sees Seung Cheon and calls him by his name, which confuses Seung Cheon’s sister. Seung Cheon still has memories of the past, but Tae Yong is still confused about his memories. Tae Yong is found alive, and Seung Cheon’s family is happy to get their son back. Tae Yong’s father drops the violent case on Seung Cheon because he doesn’t want to get Tae Yong in more trouble. Tae Yong is happy because he has a mom now, as he has become Seung Cheon.
Seung Cheon gets the details of all the staff members and the house plan to understand his way around. He has been adapting to his new life, but he remembers what the old woman told him. He can switch his parents back after one month, one year, or ten years. He decides to live his best life before deciding further. Tae Yong’s father is happy recently because his son is studying business diligently but is also not happy with how he is spending money lately. Seung Cheon bought expensive gifts for his real family, but his mom had returned all of them.
Seung Cheon has no idea how disciplined Tae Yong’s father is and talks back to him. He claims that he will use his money however he wants, and his father is not happy with it. Seung Cheon has been changing the perception of Tae Yong that people had of him. He becomes friends with poor kids in the class and has been bullying the rich kids instead. There are many new things he has been discovering about Tae Yong.
‘The Golden Spoon’ Episode 2: Ending
Tae Yong has dinner with his father every Friday, and this time he meets with director Na and his daughter, Ju Hee. He finds out that he had been engaged to her, but she has come to break off the engagement. It is all surprising for Seung Cheon, but he follows Ju Hee after telling their parents that it is ridiculous to get high schoolers engaged. Ju Hee works part-time because she wants to live on her own, but her family thinks otherwise.
Ju Hee meets Tae Yong and tells him that he can come back to his part-time job whenever he feels better, and that’s when he understands that he needs to work as well and not just go to school and read comics at home now that he is Seung Cheon. Jang Gu’s father gets violent and beats him when he finds out that he is not among the top 30 scorers of the class. Jang Gu wants to take out his anger on Seung Cheon and brings him home to beat him. Some students call the real Seung Cheon and inform him that Jang Gu has taken Seung Cheon somewhere forcefully. He knows Jang Gu’s tactics and hence, goes to his home and starts hitting him instead.
Seung Cheon’s life has turned around because of “The Golden Spoon,” but he needs to be careful about his actions because he doesn’t know the consequences yet. Jang Gu had threatened him with his father’s gun before, and now, he takes the gun and points it at him, but this time, it has a real bullet in it.
See More: ‘The Golden Spoon’ Episode 3 & 4: Recap And Ending – Who Else Has Used The Golden Spoon?
