Start-Up Season 1 Episode 5 Recap – Hackathon

[00:01:00] Chul-san and Yong-san notice Do-san acts weird. He continues to crochet in silence despite Chul-san asking him if there is something wrong. They tell Do-san his birthday date with Dal-mi goes well. Do-san hesitates to tell them what is on his mind, but they convince him to tell the truth. Do-san tells them what Dal-mi likes about him. First, Dal-mi doesn’t like anything about the real Do-san, but she finally tells him she likes his big hands. Yong-san gives Do-san a quote from their pinboard. The quote reads, “Man is most intelligent because he has hands.” Meanwhile, Dal-mi calls her grandmother to tell her what happened on her first day at Sandbox. She recalls how Do-san extended his hand to accept her as their CEO.

[00:06:00] Both Dal-mi and Do-san think so low of themselves they find it amazing someone out there wants to be with them. Meanwhile, Dong-cheon continues to watch the live broadcast with Ji-pyeong. He is a mentor for the event last year, so he knows how hard it is to be a mentor. Dong-cheon doesn’t know Ji-pyeong volunteered to be a mentor, so he could be closer with Dal-mi. Dal-mi receives instructions from the Sandbox representatives when she sees her team ransacking the buffet table. She goes over to help Do-san get more snacks. Chul-san and Yong-san ask Dal-mi who their last team member will be. Dal-mi is about to ask Do-san for his opinion, but he suddenly disappears. All that is left is a trail of candies scattered on the floor.

[00:08:00] Ji-pyeong pulls Do-san away from his team to ask him how much Dal-mi knows about their secret. He’s worried Dal-mi is angry at them for lying to her, but Do-san tells him Dal-mi doesn’t know about the letters yet. Do-san tells Ji-pyeong that he will handle things, but Ji-pyeong refuses. He tells Do-san he’s not ready to handle things independently. Ji-pyeong once again belittles Do-san by telling him he should compensate Chul-san and Yong-san for the two years they spent building the company with him. Ji-pyeong wears his mentor shirt and tells Do-san he’ll help them. He notices the candies hidden inside Do-san’s jacket. He took all the candies and starts opening one. Do-san takes one specific candy back;  the one Dal-mi gave him. He tells Ji-pyeong it’s his candy.

[00:10:30] Dal-mi finds Do-san as he heads back to the venue. She calls out to him and eventually bumps into Ji-pyeong as well. She wants to ask Ji-pyeong some questions, but he isn’t ready to speak with her. He finds a scapegoat in Dong-cheon as he spots him walking from their office. Ji-pyeong goes over and drags Dong-cheon away from Do-san and Dal-mi. Do-san asks Dal-mi what she will ask Ji-pyeong, but she doesn’t tell Do-san. They walk back to the venue as Ji-pyeong drags Dong-cheon back to their office. When they get back, Ji-pyeong decides to give the mentor shirt to Dong-cheon. He heads back to the venue in his normal clothes instead.

[00:13:00] Meanwhile, Chul-san and Yong-san bump into their colleagues, Shin Hyeon and Shin Jeong. They pretend to be friendly with them before they notice that Hyeon and Jeong are also participating in the residency program. Hyeon and Jeong tell them they are part of the best team in the competition. Chul-san and Yong-san are intimidated about them being part of the best team. The team they are talking about is none other than In-jae’s team. Dal-mi sees Hyeon and Jeong approaching In-jae’s table. She asks Do-san if the two are also developers. Do-san knows them and tells Dal-mi they’re twins — top-notch developers. Chul-san tries to uplift their team, but Do-san keeps dragging them down. Chul-san tells Dal-mi they are famous globally while Hyeon and Jeong are famous locally.

[00:15:00] Do-san tells everyone Hyeon and Jeong have been famous since college. He also tells them they went to MIT. Dal-mi left their table to continue hunting for their fifth member. She knows they need an ace to beat In-jae’s team. She combs through the crowd of participants with fifteen minutes remaining. While Dal-mi is out looking for their fifth member, Chul-san accidentally finds out about her credentials. He is playing with his ID when he finds the option to scan the QR code. Each participant has a unique QR code that pulls up their past achievements when scanned. Chul-san sees Dal-mi’s profile and tells the team she didn’t go to college. Both Yong-san and Do-san are surprised their CEO didn’t have the proper educational background.

[00:16:30] Chul-san wants to return to In-jae’s team, but Do-san tells him to trust Dal-mi. Chul-san knows they would be the laughing stock of the competition, but Do-san doesn’t know how to look down on people. Chul-san and Yong-san tell Do-san they aren’t looking down on Dal-mi and return to work. Sa-ha continues to turn down other teams’ offers to include her on their roster. She is really being picky about which team she would join. With five minutes remaining, she sees Dal-mi kneeling behind her. She begs Sa-ha to join Samsan Tech to handle their designs. Sa-ha tells Dal-mi CEOs don’t kneel, but Dal-mi responds she’s kneeling so people would look up to Sa-ha. Dal-mi tells Sa-ha she’ll look desperate if she makes her decision at the last minute. Sa-ha wants to know Dal-mi’s reason for recruiting her.

[00:19:00] Sa-ha joins Dal-mi and heads over to their table. She convinces Sa-ha to join the team, but we don’t know what Dal-mi told her yet. Chul-san sees Sa-ha the moment she walks inside the venue — love at first sight. He greets Sa-ha, but she immediately turns him down. Chul-san takes Sa-ha’s luggage and offers her a seat. Dal-mi introduces Sa-ha as their designer. Chul-san recognizes Sa-ha from the bookstore. He tells Sa-ha they are meant to cross paths, but she doesn’t like the sound of lame expressions. Sa-ha tells them lame expressions are banned as of the moment. She goes as far as telling the name of their company is lame. Sa-ha reminds Dal-mi she didn’t choose to become part of their company which means she could still leave. Their conversation is cut short as Seon-hak takes the stage to start phase two.

[00:21:00] All the teams are given 48 hours to develop a new business model. Everyone can make use of Sandbox’s resources as long as they would be able to complete the business model within the allotted time. Dal-mi asks Seon-hak about the winning criteria. She responds teams will be judged by their ability to make a practical and feasible model and pitch it in just three minutes. Seon-hak wishes everyone good luck as the timer starts.

[00:22:30] The team’s idea is to launch a service based on machine learning. Chul-san asks Dal-mi if she knows anything about machine learning. She responds Do-san explained machine learning to her the other day. Dal-mi tells everyone machine learning is romantic. Chul-san and Yong-san think it is absurd, but they ask Do-san what kind of explanation he gave. It was during their date after In-jae’s event. Dal-mi asked Do-san to tell her something about him. They talked about his work, but Dal-mi had no idea what machine learning meant. Do-san explained to her machine learning is like Tarzan and Jane. Tarzan ended up on a deserted island without anyone to talk to. Jane arrived, and Tarzan decided to do everything to gain Jane’s trust and affection.

[00:25:00] At first, Tarzan gave Jane some rocks, but Jane didn’t like rocks. Tarzan gave Jane some flowers, which she accepted. Tarzan continued the process until he finally got Jane’s approval. Dal-mi understood Tarzan learned the process of courting from scratch, which involved trial and error, much like how a machine learns on its own. Do-san thought his story and example were boring, but Dal-mi found it interesting and cool. As they make sure Dal-mi knows what they’re going to do, they set out to find a dataset for their machine. They find data based on handwriting and penmanship from a bank. They want to develop a service to detect forgery in handwriting and signatures. Dong-cheon hears their idea and thinks it is good. It isn’t guaranteed to be doable, but Do-san wants to try.

[00:27:30] Ji-pyeong goes to the event to check on Samsan Tech. He asks Dong-cheong about their model. He tells Ji-pyeong they are making a service to detect forgery in handwriting and signatures. Ji-pyeong thinks it is a terrible idea until he finds out Dal-mi thought of it herself. While the team is planning on their model, Jeong does some spying and finds out what they are up to. In-jae doesn’t have a model yet, so Jeong suggests the same thing. She reminds In-jae about how she got rejected by Do-san over Dal-mi. Jeong wants to get revenge by beating them with their own idea. In-jae doesn’t want to agree at first, but she knows it is a competition; she eventually agrees. Hyeon and Jeong create the same machine learning model, but they succeeded quicker than Samsan Tech.

[00:31:30] Since they can make the model ahead of time, In-jae and her team left ahead of all the other teams. Samsan Tech has difficulty generating their data, so they had to redo some of their work. After a few trials, Do-san decides to redo the whole thing. They already spent a lot of time on their first try, so they won’t have time to redo anything if it doesn’t work. Do-san and Dal-mi agree on the risk, and they redo everything.

[00:34:30] Samsan Tech is left working through the night on their model. Yong-san, Chul-san, and Sa-ha are exhausted and decide to take a nap. Do-san’s parents walk back home when they see a man riding a segway. Mr. Nam disapproves of a grown man riding a toy, but the man hears him and decides to talk to him. They are surprised when the man starts asking where Do-san lives. He gives them his calling card and introduces himself as Alex. He tells them he’s looking for Do-san about a business opportunity. They tell Alex that Do-san isn’t at home. Meanwhile, Won-deok goes to Sandbox to give Dal-mi some food. Dal-mi responds she’s already eating at the moment. Won-deok decides to leave, but she bumps into her daughter-in-law, Cha A-hyun.

[00:38:00] Dal-mi sees In-jae at the ladies’ bathroom and asks what she’s doing at Sandbox. She tells Dal-mi she quit her job to start things over. She remembers what Dal-mi told her that she only has a big company because of her stepfather’s money. In-jae tells Dal-mi to fight her with everything she has because they are on even grounds. She pities Dal-mi for making the wrong decision again in choosing Samsan Tech, but Dal-mi points out only time will tell who made the wrong decision. In-jae leaves as Dal-mi cleans herself up, but she tells Dal-mi they’re working on the same thing to keep things fair. Dal-mi rushes back to the venue and bumps into Do-san on the way back. Do-san tells Dal-mi their model is a success with 99.8% accuracy.

[00:40:00] Dal-mi thanks Do-san for keeping her hopes and dreams alive. Seon-hak looks at the candidates’ aspirations when Ji-pyeong sees him. She tells Ji-pyeong the kid who inspired her to create Sandbox is participating in the residency program. Ji-pyeong wants to know who it is, but Seon-hak refuses to tell him. The hackathon event is coming to a close, so the judges are called to the auditorium. Ji-pyeong sees Won-deok on his way to the auditorium and decides to greet her first. Won-deok drinks coffee with A-hyun; it has been ten years since they last saw and talked to each other. As he approaches the table, he overhears Won-deok’s conversation with A-hyun. Won-deok hates A-hyun for abandoning her son. A-hyun asks her how Dal-mi is while growing up. Won-deok recalls all of their hardships as Dal-mi is while growing up.

[00:43:00] Won-deok sold her food stall to pay for Dal-mi’s tuition fee, but she decided to quit school and started working to help her grandmother make money. Dal-mi saved enough money to buy Won-deok a mobile food stall. She got upset when Dal-mi broke her leg while working. Won-deok told Dal-mi she should’ve joined A-hyun and In-jae, so she could have a better life. Dal-mi remained positive and remembered what her father told her. She explained the world would be covered in deserts if it was always sunny. She told Won-deok they needed rain and snow to grow fruits like the tangerine she was eating. Ji-pyeong overheard the conversation and blamed himself for not reaching out to Won-deok. Won-deok leaves the meal she made for Dal-mi with A-hyun.

[00:45:00] Ji-pyeong follows Won-deok out of Sandbox to confront her. He asks her why she didn’t come to him for help with Dal-mi’s tuition fee. Won-deok tells him she didn’t need her money. Ji-pyeong asks again if she regrets not taking his money. He knows if Won-deok had his money, she would’ve kept her food stall, and Dal-mi would’ve finished college. Won-deok regrets not meeting Ji-pyeong sooner. She tells him they would’ve played cards during the holidays, and she would’ve made food for him. Won-deok would’ve defended him against bullies. She knows she couldn’t replace his parents, but she would’ve been the nosy grandmother next door. The thought of having Won-deok as his guardian brings Ji-pyeong to tears. He holds his tears back and walks away from Won-deok. She decides to go home as Ji-pyeong goes back to Sandbox.

[00:48:00] Ji-pyeong goes to Dong-cheon and takes the mentor shirt off his back. He tells Ji-pyeong he isn’t wearing anything underneath, but Ji-pyeong doesn’t care. Dong-cheon took the shirt off in front of everyone and ran after Ji-pyeong. Meanwhile, Chul-san and Yong-san call Do-san over. They tell him CEOs don’t need to pitch the idea to the panel. They want Do-san to pitch the idea, but he refuses. He tells them again not to look down on Dal-mi because they know how it feels to be looked down upon. They tell Do-san they will fail if Dal-mi won’t be able to pitch their model properly. Ji-pyeong finds them discussing their plan and gives them a backup plan. He tells them he will invest in their company personally if Dal-mi fails to get them into Sandbox.

[00:51:30] They want to know why Ji-pyeong will save them, but he doesn’t respond. Ji-pyeong tells them to come back inside because the presentation will start soon. Seon-hak goes back upstage to call on the CEOs, so they can start presenting their models. Some of the teams have done well, but others aren’t so lucky. Dal-mi sees In-jae reading her notes, but she can’t handle the pressure. She steps out of the room and bumps into Ji-pyeong. She opens her water bottle and offers to check and revise her notes. After a while, Seon-hak calls on Dal-mi as the CEO of Samsan Tech. She goes up on stage but froze as soon as she sees everyone. They think she will not say anything, but Dal-mi manages to regain her composure and start her pitch.

[00:56:00] Dal-mi introduces herself to everyone present at the residency program. She starts strong, and by the time she is halfway through, majority of the participants are already in awe. Dal-mi is doing so well that Chul-san and Yong-san are already cheering for her; all their doubts have faded away. Meanwhile, Do-san remembers everything Ji-pyeong told him. He doubted Ji-pyeong at first, but now everything is clear to him. He knows he isn’t built to become a CEO. Do-san knows he couldn’t do what Dal-mi is doing up on stage. Dal-mi finishes within three minutes while Chul-san and Yong-san jump out of their seats. Even Sa-ha is impressed with how things turned out.

[01:00:30] Do-san goes to check on Dal-mi after her presentation. She feels she messed up, but Do-san tells her no one could’ve done better than her. After Dal-mi’s presentation, the panel calls for In-jae. She presents their model with the same data set, but instead of recognizing handwriting, they made custom fonts. In-jae pauses in the middle of her pitch because she sees her stepfather within the panel. Chairman Won Du-jeong watches as In-jae completes her pitch. Their custom fonts are made within less than 40 hours, impressing many people, especially the panel. Du-jeong goes a little further by comparing the technology between Samsan Tech and In-jae company. Since In-jae’s font set is brand new, he wants to know if Samsan Tech’s handwriting service will be able to detect it as forgery.

[01:04:00] Samsan Tech can’t respond, but they know they need to respond to the challenge. Dal-mi confidently tells Du-jeong their service can detect the new font style as forgery. Du-jeong wants to put it to the test, so he invites Samsan Tech on stage. Do-san places the font style into their data set, but their machine can’t detect it. Samsan Tech feels embarrassed. Do-san’s doubt with himself also didn’t help. He is so angry he snaps his pen in two. Do-san doesn’t know Alex is part of the panel, and he is impressed with his work despite the failure to detect In-jae’s font style.

[01:07:00] The panel completes scoring all of the participants, but Seon-hak states the final team to enter the Sandbox is tied with another team. Alex tells them he hasn’t scored the final team. After a few minutes, Alex tells Seon-hak he has the final score. Do-san apologizes to Chul-san and Yong-san for failing them. They tell him not to worry because they have a plan B if they don’t get into Sandbox. Sa-ha asks them why they aren’t planning on leaving. Samsan Tech is still hoping to get into Sandbox. Sa-ha berates them for not knowing their place. Yong-san asks Sa-ha why she joined their team. Sa-ha tells them Dal-mi managed to convince her to join them. She told Sa-ha they have a brilliant developer, but Sa-ha tells Do-san he isn’t special.

[01:11:00] Sa-ha tells Do-san that Dal-mi probably regrets her decision to choose Samsan Tech. After Sa-ha left, Do-san decides to look for Dal-mi. Ji-pyeong finds Dal-mi sleeping at Sandbox’s sleeping lounge. He sits beside Dal-mi, but he doesn’t notice she is awake. Dal-mi apologizes for how things turned out, but he tells her there’s nothing to apologize for. Dal-mi wants to know why Ji-pyeong lied to her. She understood why Do-san lied, but she doesn’t understand why he would also lie. Ji-pyeong is about to tell Dal-mi the truth, but Do-san interrupts their conversation. He tells Dal-mi they got accepted into Sandbox.

[01:15:00] Ji-pyeong leaves Dal-mi and Do-san to celebrate their victory, feeling disappointed.