By the end of the first season of the Korean drama adaptation of Yumi's Cells, it's already been announced that a second season will follow as the journey of Yumi's life continues. Yumi's Cells season 2 stars  Kim Go Eun reprising her role as the main character Kim Yumi and Park Jin Young as Yoo Babi. This will be a long post for I'll be tackling all important aspects of the story together with my views.

They started this new season by picking up where we left off by the end of the first season, the break up of Yumi and Woong. We were shown a bit of Yumi's struggle dealing with the break up, her cells trying to find ways on how they can help Yumi feel better. In my personal opinion, her co-worker Babi showed a bit of interest even way back during the first season, though not so clear if it's romantic or just friendly type. In this season, it became clearer that Babi is romantically interested with Yumi. Being straightforward as he is, he directly asked Yumi if they can start dating. Yumi not feeling ready to entertain someone new, she rejected him but this is where the story became more interesting. After the rejection, Yumi started becoming more aware of Babi, found more interesting things about him and eventually started developing feelings for him. I like how they showed this in the cell village where there's actually a Babi's fan club and in every interaction of Yumi with Babi, the number of cells in the fan club increases. Despite her love cell being not ready to fall in love again, she eventually agreed to date Babi.

Then we were introduced to Babi's world full of romance. As it turns out, Babi is a really sweet boyfriend and lover. In this season, we get more skin ship and sweet moments between our main couple compared to the first season. I will mention the kissing scenes of Yumi and Babi here. It's really nice to watch a Korean drama where they realistically show a kissing scene between a couple compared to the others. Kudos to Kim Go Eun and Jinyoung for raising the bar here. Babi is a very supportive boyfriend and he's actually the one who discovered Yumi's talent for writing. Later on, Yumi started thinking about her dream of becoming a creative writer. Despite her age and uncertainties, she eventually resigned and started working on her journey to write stories. Babi's career also took off as he was promoted though reassigned to their company's jeju branch. The couple then have to deal with a long distance relationship where the problem started.

At the Jeju branch where Babi works, Yumi then discovered about the young cute intern named Da Eun. It's obvious that Da Eun likes Babi and meeting her had Yumi's gf warning bells ringing. From here I can see that Yumi still has trust issues based on her previous relationship experiences. Babi on the other hand, being nice as he is didn't find anything wrong with giving rides to Da Eun or helping her. Now we found the flaw of Babi's character. He is too nice! In my opinion, you can be nice to other girls but you need to be cautious since you're currently in a relationship. You can't control what other people thinks and feels so this is bound to a misunderstanding in worst case scenarios. Babi should have established boundaries between him and the intern given their hierarchy of position and office relations. Since Babi gave time and attention more than it should despite the good intentions with Da Eun, this eventually made him swayed when she indirectly confessed her feelings to him and even had an earthquake in his cell village. What worried me that most is that the earthquake as they found out is caused by his love cell. When Yumi found Da Eun wearing babi's jacket which he obviously lent her, it was deja vu so Yumi started asking Babi on when he actually started liking her given the familiar circumstances at present. Since Babi is actually wise and he can read Yumi well, he decided to cover the true answer to that question.

Triggering point for Yumi is when she found out the real reason on why Babi decided to move houses in Jeju. I appreciate though that Babi did this as to avoid further possible problems with his relationship with Yumi. But as humans, we have non-negotiables in a relationship and here we found out that Yumi's is "her bf being swayed by another girl" is a no-no. What I noticed about Yumi even before is how she adjusted during her relationship with Babi. Those things that she seemed to doesn't like before, she accepted it. That's what we call compromising. But for her this matter is really non-negotiable which other drama viewers doesn't seem to understand. In real life, we have differences and its just a matter of respect for individuality. Yumi confronting Babi about the real reason of him moving, at first we saw Babi trying to discredit Yumi's doubts saying that why should you believe an immature kid etc. This is clearly gaslighting which often happens in a relationship, not that I agree with it. Finally admitting the truth, as painful as the decision is for Yumi looking back at how their relationship seemed really perfect, Yumi decided to break up with Babi. Special mention to the acting of Kim Go Eun and Jinyoung here in the break up scene. It was perfect and the emotions were real felt! Babi pleaded of course not wanting to lose Yumi, we saw Yumi's cell village where love cell is trying to hold onto the relationship and almost swayed to forgive him, we saw the transformation of her love to being toxic. 

Babi seems to be a really great boyfriend, he's sweet, caring and very supportive to Yumi's dream of becoming a writer. He's the one there for Yumi as she struggles and also during her life turning point when she got an offer from a publisher. But in this case, I agreed with Yumi's decision to break up for their relationship won't be the same as before. The fact that Babi became attracted to another girl will be like a scar for Yumi which may eventually haunt her.  It's just that there are people who forgives and forgets easily but there are others who can't. Babi seems perfect but he actually isn't. Analyzing his character, his niceness hinders him from fully showing his inner self which he should given that he is in a serious relationship with Yumi.  He seems to love helping and pleasing other people which actually isn't a bad thing but at times hinders him from conveying the truth so he lies. White lies yes but I worry that this is getting habitual for him. I know this because personally I see myself in Babi. (Thank you babi for making me realize things)

In the inner thoughts of Yumi, we saw her maturity and character development. Love cell became toxic and full of rage because of pain but Yumi doesn't want to live with that. She decided to change her life's priority from love to focusing on her dreams and passion as a writer.  I love how they showed this in her cell village where we saw Yumi coming personally to talk to Love cell, comforting her and telling her to transfer the prime cell position to writing cell. I really loved the representation of the scene. Yumi really grew as a person. She realized that she doesn't need to be in a relationship to be happy. Her happiness shouldn't always depend on other people.

So Yumi focused on writing her novel where coincidentally she met Woong again, her ex-bf. Woong is now successful and rich but didn't swayed even though it's obvious that he wants to get back with her. Then came back Babi to work again in Seoul. Even though they live in the same neighborhood, they successfully avoided each other at first not until they met at a cafe. We also got an insight about Babi after the break up. He seemed really devastated showing his cell village in crumbles. He even questioned and asked what if Yumi trusted him the way he trusted her which I can't help but agree. Meeting again, Yumi eventually decided to get back with him. The concern is, love cell is still missing and it was emotional cell who decided on this solely. So what Yumi did is is an emotional decision neglecting love and reason to which I do not agree personally.

As they dated again, it was truly awkward between them. Turning point was when Babi actually got into an accident but didn't tell Yumi. So here we have Yumi believing that he pushed through with his supposed business trip in the US. When Yumi found out, she followed him to his house. Before coming in, here we saw the effect of Da Eun being still there in her anxiousness. I told you this is a scar for her. I love this confrontation scene where she found out about Babi's accident. As she repeatedly said many times, does it make any sense that Babi didn't told her? Yeah it still doesn't make sense to me but here we see Babi who white lied. Again!. I appreciate though that Babi became a bit more open and here we found out that each other thought that they regret getting back together. They cleared this up but then came the sudden marriage proposal from Babi. I was like why??? It's obvious that they still have issues in this relationship, that's why they had a confrontation like this in the first place. In my opinion, they're so totally not ready for marriage, not until they fixed all things.

But then to my disagreement, they got engaged. Their relationship dynamics seems back to normal though. Here we have sweet Babi again taking good care of sick Yumi, which really makes us swoon that's why so many viewers became Babi fans (which seems extremes to me sometimes). 

That same night, Da Eun drunked dialed Babi and it was Yumi who saw the missed call. Then Yumi seemed to be thinking. When Babi saw the missed call on his phone finding Yumi already asleep, he deleted Da Eun's contact which I actually appreciate truly. The time gap brings us then to 8 months after, as it turns out Yumi eventually broke up with Babi. Yes AGAIN. She broke up with him when she realizes she's no longer in love with Babi. Seeing Da Eun's call made her realize that for as her line said "How can a person in love be calm". I see lots of arguments from viewers about this for yes when you seem to have found the right person, he/she calms you. But here I think she pertains more about indifference. Meaning unexpectedly, she found out that she no longer has that same care as before with matters regarding their relationship. Not pushing through with marriage at this point is the right decision I think. It wouldn't be fair for both of them for you can't force loving someone. Why push it when it's really no longer there? It won't be fair for Babi as well. This is the repercussion of her emotional cell acting on its own and made her date Babi again. You may argue that this is how they started anyway but still in this case, love cell is still missing. How can you be in a serious relationship when you're no longer in love?

In the last episode, they showed a coincidental scene where Babi and Yumi met at the airport. I really like this scene for they showed no resentment between the two. Meaning they ended the relationship amicably this time, with maturity and acceptance. 

Yumi was about to end the part 2 of her novel. She may be single but she looks genuinely happy with her loved ones, friends surrounding her. We saw Yumi, getting back her love cell which signifies her heart being fully healed after a year. Yes, she's ready to love again and be more happier. They ended with her meeting Soonrok, which in the webtoon original story, is her endgame. 

Yes, Yumi shouldn't have gotten back together with Babi in the first place which seemed like she led him on and hurt him more. But this is why I really like how her character is depicted. Yumi is perfectly imperfect just like all of us. Yumi's character is presented as an ordinary human who is bound to make mistakes. She may hurt people but not intentionally and that doesn't make her a bad person. Viewers are really engaged with the show for the scenarios are realistic and relatable. The ordinariness of Yumi's character makes it easier for us to relate to her. Kim Go Eun's realistic acting also helped a great deal for this impact.

In my view, Babi and Yumi are meant to meet in this lifetime. Even though they're not meant to end up together, we can't deny the big impact of Babi in Yumi's life and dreams. He really is special but not perfect as others views him to be. They really leveled up Babi in this drama version compared to the webtoon (or is it the effect of Jinyoung's acting too?). What I really like about him is his genuine belief and support in Yumi's talent as a writer as shown in the last episode of the drama. As they say, there are people who you meet in life for a purpose, some will give you love, passion, happy or painful experiences and life lessons. That's what Woong and Babi is for Yumi. They really helped her grow as a person and find her real self and happiness. I'm also glad to see Yumi now despite being single again as we first met her, seems more full of life and happiness this time. For now she realized that happiness will always be her choice despite the current circumstances of her life. I also admire her being brave enough to really pursue her dreams and I'm glad she met all these people she needs to help her achieve this. This is a really great drama adaptation, not perfect yes but still great in my opinion. The casts acting were great and to be honest in this season 2, we saw more of Kim Go Eun's great ability as an actress to stir our emotions specifically in the break up and confrontation/proposal scene. Jinyoung's acting is notably good too! and they really nailed those scenes. 

Ending this drama, highlighting a happy content despite being single Yumi is better for me than revising and making her end up with Babi or even Woong. I love how they stayed true to the core of the story that Yumi is only main character of her life.