Variety Review: Running Man Episode 631-632 pt. 1

Guests: None

My Entertainment Score: 3 out of 10 laughs

This one simply didn’t work for me. It felt far too slow and I didn’t feel tense about the final results. The reason for the lack of tension was funny, but it wasn’t enough to carry nearly two full episodes worth of content for me.

What Happened: 

Theme: Lucky Number Race…Or A Modern Tortoise and Hare Tale

Running Man World Cup Watch Party (start of episode 631- 33:10)

Everyone gathered together, dressed in their soccer fan best to watch the South Korea-Ghana qualifying group game. 

Opening & Race Explanation (33:10- 43:43)

Each member is told to pick their favorite number between 1 and 10. That number determines what menu item they get for breakfast and becomes their number for the rest of the day. 

Everything they do will be determined by their number. How many stops they ride a bus for, which busses they can take, which item on a menu they eat, how many minutes they can ride in a taxi, how many people they have to beat in their missions. *Note: they can only ride taxis or buses for this race and they cannot ride a taxi twice in a row.*

Very, very simply, the members must get to a final location (Apgujeong Rodeo Street) and complete two tasks first (4 possible tasks. Each team will draw 2 randomly with no overlap possible). That’s it. They are put into teams (through a random draw) and draw a number from one member on the team…off they go. 

Lucky Numbers:

Seokjin- 9

Jaesuk- 1

Jongkook- 7

Haha- 3

Jihyo- 8

Sechan- 8

Somin- 5

Teams- Jaesuk, Sechan, Somin v. Seokjin, Jongkook, Haha, Jihyo

***Note: There was no way to do timestamps for each team, so I will only give you the time stamps for the two missions of each team (when they are carried out, not when they are drawn). Assume that the rest is the team attempting to travel or going out for a meal.***

RACE ON (43:43 of episode 631- 1:10:11 of episode 632)

Mission 1 (1:09:55 of episode 631): Jaesuk, Sechan, and Somin draw for a mission first. They must do a self-eyelash perm on their lucky number’s worth of eyes.

Mission 2 (29:45 of episode 632): Seokjin, Jongkook, Haha, and Jihyo draw for a mission next. They must beat their lucky number’s worth of games of bowling against people they meet in a bowling alley.

Mission 3 (42:19 of episode 632): Jaesuk, Sechan, and Somin draw for the third mission. They must score anywhere in the range of their lucky number’s…decade. So, if they had a 4, they would have to score between 40 and 49. A lucky number of 6 would need to score between 60 and 69 and so on.

Mission 4 (1:07:02): Seokjin, Jongkook, Haha, and Jihyo get the final mission. They kept this mission a secret from the viewers for a while. They had to show their call history. The listing that matched their lucky number was a person that they had to get a photo with.

Final Lottery (1:10:11 of episode 632- 1:16:16 of episode 632)

Each member of the winning team will get two tickets while members of the losing team will get one ticket to fill out. Five numbers will be drawn using only the numbers that the members drew during the race (so if they drew a number more than once, that number will be in the lottery drawing pool more than once). Prizes are given to the people that match 5, 4, or 3 of the drawn numbers. Order of the numbers is disregarded.

Preview: Singers BE’O (whooo—personally a big fan of his music this year) and Jukjae join the members for a year-end party…that appears to degenerate into a debate about lyrics? Also looks like there will be plenty of games. I’m excited!

!!!Spoilers!!!

First Number Choices

Both Teams start with the number 8 (remember Jihyo and Sechan both chose number 8).

Mission 1

The team draws another lucky number so that they only have to do 1 eye of eyelash perm. Then draw back to 8 to try to get on the right bus to get back on track.

Mission 2

The team draws 3, so they only have to win 3 games of bowling.

Mission 3

The team’s currently lucky number is 8, so they must score between 80 and 89. 

Mission 4

They were on 3 still. The third contact for Haha was Sechan, so they snuck in a picture at the last location before ALL the members of the other team entered.

Final Race Results

Seokjin, Jongkook, Haha, Jihyo Team wins.

Final Lottery Results

Seokjin- 3 correct numbers on 2 tickets each

Jaesuk- 2 correct numbers–no prize.

Jongkook- 3 correct numbers on 2 tickets each

Haha- 3 correct numbers on 1 ticket –prize, 2 correct numbers on 1 ticket–no prize

Jihyo- 3 correct numbers on 2 tickets each.

Sechan- 2 correct numbers–no prize

Somin- 3 correct numbers–prize

Everyone that got a prize received a box with their lucky number on it. Inside was a hat with their number on it, a pillow with their number on it, a mug with their number on it, a long-sleeved shirt with their number on it, and a lighted decoration of their number.