Honestly, if you watched The Glory and didn't feel a weird, complicated mix of disgust and pity for Son Myeong-oh, did you even watch it? He’s the guy with the "Memento Mori" tattoo crawling up his neck, the one who spent most of his adult life playing glorified errand boy for a man who didn't even respect him enough to remember his birthday.
Most people just see Myeong-oh as the "dumb muscle" or the bottom-tier bully. But that’s a massive oversimplification.
Son Myeong-oh is basically the walking personification of what happens when you try to play a high-stakes game with people who have much deeper pockets than you. He was the only one in the original high school gang who didn't come from money. That distinction defines every single choice he makes, right up until his skull meets the business end of a heavy champagne bottle.
Why Son Myeong-oh Was Never Really Part of the Gang
Let’s be real for a second. Park Yeon-jin, Jeon Jae-jun, and Lee Sa-ra weren't Myeong-oh's "friends." They were his employers, even when they were teenagers.
While Yeon-jin was using her mother’s police connections to scrub her record, and Jae-jun was inheriting a golf course, Myeong-oh was doing the dirty work. He was the one delivering drugs. He was the one driving the cars. He was the one taking the physical risks while the others hid behind their family names.
The dynamic is sort of pathetic when you look at it closely. He desperately wanted the status that came with their circle, but he was always the "puppy"—a nickname Sa-ra used with zero irony.
His character is a sharp critique of the Korean class system. Even in a group of monsters, there’s a hierarchy. Myeong-oh was at the bottom, and his desperation to climb out of that hole is exactly what Moon Dong-eun exploited. She knew he was the weak link because he was the only one who actually needed the money she was dangling.
The Mystery of Son Myeong-oh’s Death Explained
For a long time, the show keeps us guessing. We saw the blood. We saw the designer boutique Siesta. We saw Yeon-jin looking absolutely frantic.
But what really happened to Son Myeong-oh?
It’s one of the most layered reveals in the series. Initially, it looks like a straightforward crime of passion. Myeong-oh, thinking he’s finally got the upper hand, tries to blackmail Yeon-jin using the death of Yoon So-hee. He thinks he’s being clever. He thinks he’s the hunter now.
But he underestimated how much of a cornered animal Yeon-jin becomes when her "perfect" life is threatened. She bashes his head in with a bottle of 1984 Louis Roederer Cristal (ironic, right?).
The twist, though, is that she didn't actually kill him. Not technically.
The final blow came from Kim Gyeong-ran. She’s the girl who stayed behind at Siesta, working for the very people who tortured her for decades. When she found a bloodied Myeong-oh crawling on the floor, begging for help, the trauma of his past sexual assaults on her took over. She didn't call an ambulance. She finished the job.
Why the "Who Did It" Matters
- Poetic Justice: Myeong-oh died at the hands of someone he considered "nothing."
- Dong-eun’s Brilliance: She didn't have to pull the trigger (or swing the bottle). She just put the pieces on the board.
- The Legal Loophole: This specific detail is what makes Yeon-jin’s downfall so satisfying—she’s convicted for a murder she technically only "started."
Kim Gun-woo: The Genius Behind the Grime
We have to talk about the actor, Kim Gun-woo. It’s hard to believe he’s actually a soft-spoken, highly trained actor from the Korea National University of Arts.
He brought a specific kind of "dirty" charisma to the role. You can almost smell the cigarette smoke and cheap cologne through the screen. His performance is nuanced because he managed to make Myeong-oh feel like a threat while simultaneously making him look like a scared kid trying to act tough.
Interestingly, Gun-woo has mentioned in interviews that he looked at Myeong-oh as a "wild dog." Someone who bites because he’s hungry and scared, not because he’s a mastermind. That’s why his scenes with Song Hye-kyo are so electric. You have the ultimate planner vs. the ultimate chaotic element.
The Symbolism You Probably Missed
That neck tattoo isn't just there to make him look like a thug.
"Memento Mori" means Remember you must die.
In high school, Myeong-oh used to cover up parts of it so it read "Me mori," which is Spanish for "I died." It’s a bit of heavy-handed foreshadowing by the writers, but it works. He was a dead man walking from the moment he stepped back into Dong-eun's life.
His style is also a massive giveaway of his character's internal struggle. He wears flashy, expensive clothes—Versace patterns and loud silks—but they never quite fit him right. He looks like he’s wearing a costume. Compare that to the quiet, tailor-made luxury of Ha Do-yeong. Myeong-oh is trying to scream "I have money," while people who actually have it don't need to make a sound.
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Is Myeong-oh a Victim or a Villain?
This is where things get messy.
By any standard, he’s a villain. He participated in the horrific burning of Dong-eun. He sexually assaulted Gyeong-ran. He sold drugs to Sa-ra. He was a bad guy.
But within the ecosystem of The Glory, he’s also a victim of a different kind. He’s a victim of the "Golden Spoon" culture. He was used as a shield for the rich kids' crimes. When the heat got turned up, the group didn't protect him; they threw him to the wolves.
Does that excuse what he did? Absolutely not. But it explains why he was so willing to betray them. There was no loyalty in that group, only mutual destruction held together by secrets.
Actionable Insights for Fans of The Glory
If you’re looking to dive deeper into the world of Myeong-oh and the rest of the Semyeong gang, here is what you should do next:
- Rewatch the Siesta Scenes: Pay attention to the background of the boutique in Part 1. You can see the mirror that hides the secret room where Gyeong-ran lived/worked. The clues for his death were there since the beginning.
- Check out Kim Gun-woo’s other work: If you want to see his range, watch Record of Youth or Fight for My Way. He plays a completely different vibe, proving how much of a transformation Myeong-oh really was.
- Analyze the "Drug" Hierarchy: Notice how Myeong-oh handles the drugs. He’s the supplier for Sa-ra, which gives him a temporary sense of power, but notice how she treats him like a common dealer rather than a friend. It’s a masterclass in social dynamics.
The tragedy of Son Myeong-oh isn't that he died. It’s that he died thinking he was finally becoming the lead character in his own story, when he was actually just a footnote in Moon Dong-eun's masterpiece. He was a man who tried to buy his way into heaven with blood money, only to realize that in the world of the 1%, he was always going to be the one who had to clean up the mess.