REVIEW: ‘When The Stars Gossip’ Episode 2

When The Stars Gossip Episode 2 picks up where the last one left off. Gong Ryong (Lee Min-ho) and Commander Eve Kim (Kong Hyo-jin) approach the space station, where they’ll spend one year researching cures and advancements for Alzheimer’s disease and infertility. Only Ryong’s girlfriend’s ex is on the space station as a research scientist, making Ryong’s success in his secret mission seem unlikely. At the same time, Eve is annoyed with Ryong and inadvertently also lends to Ryong’s ire.

A rom-com that deals with absurdity and sincerity, When The Stars Gossip Episode 2 adds more context to why everyone has assembled at the space station. Sex. Well, rather, the study of it and how to solve infertility in male sperm—inspired by a fellow astronaut, Santigo’s (Alex Hefner) infertility on Earth changing in zero gravity. While the last episode featured two bed sequences with our leads and their lovers (who aren’t each other), this episode doubles down on the show’s maturity with its humor and subject matter.

Ultimately, Gong Ryong is an OBGYN who wants to deliver babies into the world and save the women having them. That means that many of the discussions and humor on the ship always revert back to fertility, sex, and the womb. This happens in the opening of When The Stars Gossip Episode 2, where Eve, Ryong, and Santiago are delayed connecting and entering the spaceship when two flies decide to mate on the door handle.

It’s a funny moment with CGI animation that is definitely played for laughs. That said, the sincere response we see from Commander Eve helps ground her character. She is tough on Ryong, focused on rules, and dedicated to her profession. But when she sees the ability to capture research, her face lights up, her voice changes, and you see a new side of her that makes her already interesting character all the more dynamic.

Her curiosity and excitement are balanced by her grit and leadership in the last half of the episode, but in the first half, she’s matched by a clumsy Ryong. I haven’t seen Lee Min-ho play such an annoying character. At the same time, the first episode of the limited series set him up to be pretty unlikeable. When The Stars Gossip Episode 2 steers a slightly different direction, putting him on an endearing track. Sure, Ryong is annoying, but it’s all charming. He’s adorable in his clumsiness, allowing him to balance against Eve’s personality.

Commander Eve has more depth in When The Stars Gossip Episode 2.

Eve’s joy helps deepen Ryong’s crush on her. She likes babies, she’s tough, smart, and from how he ended the last episode, “has pretty toes.” As the crush begins to blossom, so does the teasing, with Ryong asking to drop honorifics and to call her by her name. To which our fierce leading lady responds, “Call me Commander.” It’s an assertion of hierarchy that is fun to see and indicative of the walls that Ryong will have to scale as the two begin to care for each other, as we saw in the marketing.

But even now, the chemistry is as electric as the lighting that struck their shuttle. At the same time, Ryong does balance the line between cute flirting and disrespectful. The two’s interactions in the latter half of When The Stars Gossip pulls it all into alignment.

With everything in this series always going back to baby-making, we get a peak behind the curtain on why Ryong is on the ship. We know from Episode 1 that he’s there at the request of his future father-in-law (Kim Eung-soo), and we know that the ex on the space station is the one who abandoned Go-eun (Han Ji-Eun) when she needed someone the most and wound up with Ryong in the hospital with an ectopic pregnancy. But the why here is important.

Not only is Ryong dating the daughter of the MZ Group, but he is also seeing Choi Dong-hun (Lee Doo-seok), the oldest son of the chaebol family, and his wife for fertility treatment. After Dong-hun’s death in a freak accident, there is only one way for the family to have an heir: space. Assuming that zero gravity will have a positive impact on Dong-hun’s sperm sample, Ryong is tasked to smuggle Dong-hun’s wife’s eggs onto the ship in order to create an embryo and then birth through IVF. It would be the first time that life has been created in outer space, and the MZ Group only cares about heirs instead of scientific advancement.

It’s been clear that Ryong doesn’t love Go-eun the way that she loves him, but it’s not for the money. When Ryong decides to accept the task, it’s not for Go-eun’s hand in marriage or a wealthy sum of cash. Ryong just asks for a fertility clinic to be started in space to help other couples (yes, a totally within the realm of possibility request).

Ryong has absolutely no idea what he’s doing most of the time, but it works.

What ensues once they board the space station is hijinks after hijinks. After a brief pissing contest with Kang Kang-su (Oh Jung-se), Ryong pulls out ice cream for the crew. One of them has eggs smuggled at the bottom of the container. It’s the most Scooby-Doo plan you could come up with, and its eccentricity works.

But it really kicks into high gear when Commander Eve confiscates the unreported cup of ice cream and accuses Ryong of smuggling in something that will destroy the station’s research. As he begs and pleads and hits his most pathetic moment, Eve nukes the eggs disguised as ice cream, pulls a gun on Ryong, and literally acts like it’s just a normal day once her accusation is proven false.

Look, I said in the previous review of the series, and I’ll say it again: Ryong is a mess. Lee Min-ho’s performance of Ryong is hilarious, with a hint of annoying, and somehow finds itself as something truly endearing. But he isn’t just a space tourist. He’s a doctor. The episode closes with Ryong saving Eve’s mouse, backing her play on trying to save the mouse’s life, and performing open heart surgery. You read that right. All the while, Kang Kang-su looks on with an arrogant grin.

This episode adds layers to Ryong that pay off well, with actor Lee’s performance bringing home physical comedy moving for the first time in zero gravity and thrill when he saves the station’s tiniest life. Melodramatic excellence is all you can call the performance, and that’s what it needs to be. Ryong is made a fool of when it’s revealed that he was never trusted to complete the task but instead just used as an egg-smuggler, with Kang chosen to complete the task. But when he’s at his lowest, in terms of self-esteem, he’s given the chance to show how great he actually is.

When The Stars Gossip is unashamed using sex and fertility as the backbone of its humor and theme.

The series is very much about new life and the intimacy that creates it. These characters aren’t idealized adults who never have sex; they’re people with pasts and unashamed about talking about sex. It’s refreshing to see sex discussed openly among the main ensemble cast, which includes Kang Kang-su, Mina Lee (Lee Cho-hee), Lee Seung-jun (Heo Nam-joon), Santiago, and our leads.

Whether it is heartfelt or just gossip, When The Stars Gossip features adult writing that sees the world as it is without pushing societal standards on its characters. But it’s also not having conversations and jokes about sex just to do so; instead, they’re all grounded in the professions and interests of characters instead of existing to subvert anything.

Even with so many successes, When The Stars Gossip Episode 2 also points out how difficult maintaining special effects in space will be. With many of the zero-g sequences clearly filmed in front of greenscreen and objects noticeably computer generated, it can’t help but be jarring. It’s also something that I’m not sure any other successes can easily fix. It’s hard to become immersed when the entire space setting feels extremely fake.

Still, When The Stars Gossip Episode 2 is just really good television. Its melodramatic romance and antics stand out. But once again, it’s the dynamic between Ryong and Eve that makes the series absolutely stellar to watch. Writer Seo Sook-Hyang and director Park Shin-woo are known for their character-driven dramas, and here, they’re firing on all cylinders, especially as we learn more about each of the characters and their backgrounds and watch them grow closer together over the next 14 episodes.

When The Stars Gossip Episode 2 is streaming now on Netflix, with new episodes every Saturday and Sunday throughout January and February in 2025.

Previous Episode | Next Episode