Why does the Kim family lie their way into the Park household? 

The Kim family lies their way into the Park household because they believe it’s their best opportunity to change their circumstances. The Kims live in a grim, semi-basement apartment and rely on gig work (like folding pizza boxes) to survive. When Min offers Ki-woo a chance to take over his tutoring job with the wealthy Park family, Ki-woo eagerly accepts. With help from Ki-jung, who forges a fake university document, he impresses Yeon-kyo in an interview and secures the job. After he successfully gains employment as the Park family tutor, Ki-woo realizes that he may be able to help the rest of his family escape their life in the semi-basement. One by one, the Kims replace the Parks’ existing employees. Ki-jung poses as an art therapist for the Parks’ young son, despite having no training. Chung-sook takes over as housekeeper, and Ki-taek becomes the family’s new driver. All the while, the Parks remain unaware that their entire household staff is made up of one family, each pretending not to know the others.  

The Kims excel at their new jobs, tailoring their identities to the Parks’ upper-class preferences. They never directly steal money from the Parks, but they do exploit the fact that the Parks cannot imagine that impoverished people could be clever or coordinated enough to infiltrate their lives. Rather than framing the Kims as nothing but dishonest scammers, Parasite seems to say that telling a few lies can seem like the only way to succeed for a family left behind by a system that offers them no real support or opportunity. 

Why does Moon-gwang return to the Park house during the rainstorm? 

Moon-gwang returns to the Park house during the rainstorm because her husband Geun-sae is secretly living in the Park family's basement bunker. After the Kims have installed themselves as the Parks’ staff, Moon-gwang rings the bell late at night while the Park family is away. She begs Chung-sook to let her inside and persuades her to do so by explaining that she left something important in the basement. Once inside, Moon-gwang reveals the hidden entrance to the secret bunker beneath the house. The Park family is unaware of the bunker’s existence, and has no idea that Moon-gwang's husband, Geun-sae, has been living in the bunker for years, hiding from the loan sharks and surviving on the food that Moon-gwang brings him.  

She returns during the storm because she knows Geun-sae will be trapped and hungry. Moon-gwang's reappearance is a pivotal plot point; her discovery that the Kims are related and working under fake identities puts their entire scheme at risk. The situation turns ugly when she records video evidence on her phone and threatens to expose them to the Parks. A physical struggle follows, and during the chaos, Ki-woo shoves Moon-gwang down the stairs leading to the bunker. She hits her head on the wall as she falls, sustaining a serious head injury (which will later prove to be fatal). 

Why does Ki-taek kill Mr. Park at the garden party?  

Ki-taek kills Mr. Park because he is overwhelmed by years of accumulated humiliation and mistreatment. The garden party takes place the day after a flood has utterly destroyed the Kims’ home. The Kims arrive at the Parks’ home in borrowed clothes, exhausted and disheveled from spending the night in a crowded gymnasium shelter with other displaced people.  

A chain of violent events is set in motion by Geun-sae after he emerges from the basement; he fatally stabs Ki-jung and seriously injures Ki-woo before Chung-sook kills him with a meat skewer. In the chaos, Ki-taek watches Mr. Park hesitate to retrieve his car keys from beneath Geun-sae’s body, recoiling in disgust at the man’s smell. The moment reminds Ki-taek of Mr. Park’s earlier comments about his own scent—comparing him to the subway, a dishrag, or old radishes—confirming that to Mr. Park, Ki-taek smells unmistakably like a poor person. Mr. Park’s revulsion confirms what Ki-taek has always suspected: that no matter how well he plays his role, he will never be seen as equal—he’ll merely be tolerated, and the Parks will always look at him and his family with thinly veiled distaste. 

This, combined with Mr. Park’s indifference to Ki-jung’s fatal injury, pushes Ki-taek past his breaking point. Although the murder isn’t premeditated, it isn’t random either. It’s the culmination of months—if not years—of silent, simmering resentment toward a class that has ignored, used, and mistreated his family. Ki-taek's decision is triggered by a lifetime of powerlessness against poverty and the painful recognition that in Mr. Park’s world, the poor are at best only worthy of indifference, and at worst, deserving of revulsion. 

Why does Ki-taek hide in the bunker after the party massacre? 

Ki-taek hides in the bunker because after murdering Mr. Park, he has no other option. As police and paramedics arrive in the chaos following the garden party, Ki-taek quietly disappears. It’s later revealed that he has taken shelter in the same underground bunker where Geun-sae once lived. His retreat highlights both his emotional collapse and his total erasure from society. Ki-taek is now invisible—unable to work, live in public, or reunite with his family. 

The bunker marks an even deeper descent for Ki-taek, who has always existed beneath the notice of the rich. When Ki-woo later imagines earning enough money to buy the house and free his father, it becomes clear that this vision is pure fantasy. Ki-taek’s confinement isn’t just physical; it’s symbolic of the hopelessness of poverty. He could leave at any time, but only by accepting the consequences. Instead, his self-imposed exile demonstrates how poverty can become a kind of life sentence—one that is nearly impossible to escape. 

What does the scholar’s rock mean to Ki-woo? 

The scholar’s rock represents Ki-woo’s hope for a better future, but it eventually becomes a symbol of the false promise of improving his family’s social status. At the beginning of the film, Min-kyuk gives Ki-woo the rock as a good luck charm to bring his family prosperity. Ki-woo accepts the gift as the first indication that things are going to improve for the Kims. However, the things the Ki-woo believes the rock promises—stable jobs, social mobility, and even happiness—only briefly materialize. The same object that was supposed to ensure Ki-woo’s rise becomes a weapon that almost ends his life, as Geun-sae later uses the rock to try to kill Ki-woo. Even after he survives being beaten with it, Ki-woo does not blame the rock. Instead, he releases it gently into a river. By discarding the rock, he’s symbolically giving up on the idea that hard work and belief alone can change his circumstances. Ki-woo’s relationship with the rock is one of Parasite’s clearest rejections of the myth that luck and effort alone are enough to overcome systemic poverty.  

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