Love In Contract – K-Drama Episode 12 Recap & Review

Sang-Eun’s Dilemma

The 12th episode of Love in Contract starts with Hae-Jin on the air, doing damage control. After taking down the biker, the viewers begin to the stalker’s ties and his involvement with Sang-Eun. The incident is now going to the masses and everyone is now in a dangerous situation.

Sang-Eun is aware of this, and she points out how difficult it is. She is determined to sort out the issue and determine what harm this has caused and Ji-Ho is entrusting her to take on the best she can and leaving her on her own. When Sang-Eun finally reads the blog posts correctly and realizes that she was Sun-ho’s daughter she struggles to contain her tears.

In the office, Ji-Ho is congratulated on his promotion by his department. It appears that the Chief doesn’t know the situation since he’s subscribed to a newspaper and therefore doesn’t know about the scandals. Ji-Ho however rejects his job and decides that he wants to continue doing his current job.

In the meantime, Jung comes up with an ingenuous strategy to make Sang-Eun appear as the villain throughout the whole thing and then frame it so that Hae-Jin becomes the victim. Although Hae-Jin doesn’t like it and Sang-Eun is against it, she decides to ride out the storm and confront the consequences herself. While it could mean that she’ll be ridiculed all over the world, it’ll help protect the image of Hae-Jin. Hae-Jin however, rises up and attempts to speak about letting her go.

While Gwang-Nam is talking to Ji-Ho, and she reveals how much Sang-Eun loves his friend. But the thing is, Madam Yoo is a constant source of irritation and as she tries to interfere in the life of Sang-Eun she is afraid that she will never be content.

When she hears Ji-Ho’s words, she immediately begins to study Eena Group in a bid to learn more about Yoo’s role in the group. The reason for this is having a conversation with Jung as a partner in her efforts to assist Sang-Eun. But, Jung refuses to play ball, saying that she’d rather dislike her rather than work to improve his relationship with her.

When he calls Sang-Eun she suggests they stay away from each other at least for the moment. Ji-Ho doesn’t agree and then comes up to meet her in the cafe, in tears. Ji-Ho soothes her.

In the meantime, Hae-Jin plans to host a press conference in order to rectify the wrongs, but Jung becomes involved and promises to do all she can to restore their relationship. Hae-Jin is adamant about her trust, but, of course, Jung immediately exposes Sang-Eun’s twelve divorces prior to that and informs the public that Hae-Jin and Sang-Eun are more passionate than any other couple. After watching the news, Sang-Eun realizes that she has to meet Hae-Jin in order to sort things out correctly.

Together, they debate the best course of action. Hae-Jin believes they should marry, while Sang-Eun makes an absolute screamer. She reveals that she’s not her mother’s daughter from Eena Group. She grew up in a foreign country to conceal that fact because she was considered to be the Eena Group’s “project”. She further explains that they’re fundamentally distinct and consequently marriage is out of the question.

Ji-Ho and Sang Eun keep their relationship after dark In fact, she attends Miss Kim’s birthday celebration later that evening. The situation is awkward until Sang-Eun comes out and discusses what happened and why she truly loves Ji-Ho. When Miss Kim discovers that Sang-Eun and Hae-Jin don’t actually marry, she is ecstatic the group appears to be an extremely nice group and doesn’t judge them either and that’s a great thing.

So Madame Yoo continues to plot as usual and she learns from Gwang Nam that Ji-Ho is in love with Sang-Eun. When Sang-Eun discovers this she confronts Yoo and asks what she’s up to. She isn’t forthcoming, however, but Ji-Ho’s done some investigation and found Yoo’s contact number. He contacts her, and they decide to discuss the past, specifically her ties with Sang-Eun, and the events that occurred thirteen years ago. As they prepare to get together, a vehicle is speeding towards Yoo in the roadway which prompts Ji-Ho to race ahead and attempt to save her.

The Episode Review

The episode of this week is over with plenty of plotting and tension between the three main characters. It appears that Sang-Eun is making her choice this week and it effectively ends the tepid love triangle. The show hasn’t really lit up the charts and looking at the ratings across the country which have been on a slight downtrend for a while it is perhaps not too surprising.

It’s a pity since there’s some great stuff in this show and the storyline involving Ji-Ho and Sang Eun does quite well. They’ve got pretty good chemistry And Park Min-Young’s an excellent actress. She is able to bring the character to life extremely well.

We’ve got four more episodes to go and it’s looking like we’re seeing some short bursts of drama in the late hours to keep the story exciting. How this will translate into storytelling terms remains to be observed.