"Love in Contract" Questions a Woman's Worth

The protagonist is an astute businesswoman who's mistaken for a gold digger

Go Kyung-pyo, Park Min-young and Kim Jae-young (Photo courtesy of tvN)

☆☆½ (out of ☆☆☆☆)
Choi Sang-eun (played by Park Min-young)
Jung Ji-ho (played by Go Kyung-pyo)
Kang Hae-jin (played by Kim Jae-young)
↑Note: Korean names denote the surname followed by the given name.

"Love in Contract" started off really strong. The cast is delightful and, as many of you already know, I'll watch anything with Park Min-young in it. That said, the series lost steam in the last few episodes, making the main points of the plot redundant. This series could've benefitted from some judicious editing to make more of an impact without the unnecessary filler.

Sang-eun (Park Min-young) is a stunning young woman who has carved out a niche for herself marrying men. Nope, she's not a gold digger. Her relationships with her clients are platonic and are based on a meticulously-worded love contract. Well educated and discreet, she is the perfect girlfriend/bride for men who need a well-heeled partner to show off. One of her clients hires her to attend his high school reunion with him. His former classmates, who had bullied him in school, are stunned that he married such a gorgeous and smart woman. Another needs to show his higher ups at work that he is a stable family man. And then there's Gwang-nam (Kang Hyung-seok), a gay taekwondo master, who marries Sang-eun to to make his family believe that he is "normal."

(Not for nothing, but for too many episodes, I mistook the actor who portrayed Gwang-nam for Joo Jong-hyuk from "Extraordinary Attorney Woo." Oops.)

The marriages are legal and when she and her clients divorce at an agreed-upon time, everyone is happy.

Park Min-young, the star of “Love in Contract.” (Photo courtesy of tvN)

Sang-eun's longest client is a morose family court judge named Ji-ho (Go Kyung-pyo). They've met three times a week for five years, where he wanted just one thing from her: to share dinners with him. This may sound like an odd deal, but it also highlights how sometimes small things like having someone to eat with is something we take for granted. Ji-ho is an orphan, divorced and has no friends. For him, Sang-eun is a lifeline who appreciates his home-cooked meals and allows him to feel that he, too, is normal.

In many ways, "Love Contract" is a story about broken people who are attempting to present themselves as normal to the outside world. Sang-eun herself has many secrets about why she chose this profession for herself when she had other options. She's skilled enough to be a professional chef, compete as an equestrian or pursue a career as a golf pro.

The second lead syndrome presents himself in the form of handsome movie star and secret chaebol maknae Hae-jin (Kim Jae-young). Though Hae-jin says he fell in love with Sang-eun from the first time they met (when he was a high school student and she was a couple years older), it seems that what he really fell in love with was her independent spirit. And her refusal to bow down to his powerful family — something he was too timid to do — gave him the courage to go into acting, against his family's wishes.

Oddly enough, though he's a wealthy, world-famous star, his parents constantly badger him to move back home and work for the family conglomerate. LOL WTF?

When he is reunited with Sang-eun as adults, he hires her to be his pretend girlfriend to get his marriage-minded parents off his back. Coincidentally, he ends up moving one floor above where Ji-ho lives. Which begs the question... How does a family court judge have enough money to buy a flat in a luxury building where a chaebol movie star lives?

There are many subplots, including the return of Sang-eun's former nanny, Mi-ho (played with calculated coldness by Jin Kyung) and a stalker.

One thing I really disliked about this series was how Ji-ho's inability to drink alcohol was played for laughs. At one point, he asks others to teach him to drink well. Why? So he can be a drinking companion for Sang-eun. Pushing this drinking agenda, often to the point where all the imbibers are stone-cold drunk by the end of the evening, is a part of Korean culture that I strongly dislike. If you can handle drinking responsibly and you're of age, by all means, do so. But if it's something you don't enjoy doing, don't. You can be a good drinking partner while drinking a soda or water and making sure your friends/loved ones get home safely.

The Gay Character: Unlike some K-dramas where gay characters are introduced to make fun of them (I'm looking at you, "Strong Woman Do Bong-Soon"), Gwang-nam is written as a man who doesn't want to live in the closet. Though he's essentially forced to quit his job as a taekwondo instructor after he tells his boss he's gay, Hae-jin hires him to be his bodyguard and tells him he doesn't care about Gwang-nam’s sexuality.

Airdates: Sixteen hour-long episodes aired on tvN from September 21 to November 10, 2022. (I watched this K-drama on Viki.)

Spoiler Alert: Gwang-nam's family is disgusted that he's gay. In the final episode, his older sisters chastise him and tell him to get married to a woman, even though they know he's gay. His parents are no better. Only after Hae-jin's manager — who has been eager to sign him as a singer — tells them that their son has the potential to become a huge star do they express any sense of happiness and pride in him. And they're not necessarily happy for him, but for themselves. Because to them, Hae-jin's gayness is an embarrassment to the family. Only the possibility of him becoming rich and famous made them come around. They never accepted who he is. They are pleased that they have someone they could potentially brag about. And the fact that he wants these people — his poor excuse for a family — to be proud of him is simply heartbreaking.

Sang-eun is Mi-ho's real-life daughter. After Mi-ho gave birth, she placed Sang-eun in a child welfare facility. After about six years, she returned for the child with a plan. A wealthy chaebol couple had no heirs. She presented the girl — now renamed Jamie — to the couple to pass off as their own biological daughter. But they didn't really want a daughter. Rather, what they wanted was a beautiful girl who could help strengthen their own company by marrying into another chaebol family.

They send her off to the United States to become educated and hide her from prying eyes. I'm not sure how they thought that a chaebol family would be able to hide her heritage when Dispatch exists, but I was willing to go along with this plot line. Initially, Sang-eun is so happy to meet her adoptive parents (who she hasn't spent any time with previously) that she is excited to attend the dinner between the two chaebol families. She is even willing to marry one of the other conglomerate's sons.

Early in the series, we see Sang-eun angrily destroying the chaebol dinner and pouring gravy over the eldest son Sun-jin's head. (He's played by Oh Ryoong, who was also despicable in "Big Mouth.") To all the horrified onlookers, she appears to be unhinged. But near the end of the series, we see what had led to this incident. The happy, young Sang-eun was approached by Sun-jin in the ladies room. The entitled and spoiled man touched her salaciously without her consent and ordered her to meet him afterwards. For sex. That's what led her to do what she did. And more power to her.

The finale ends with Sang-eun and Ji-ho getting married out of genuine love, rather than a love contract.

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What I’ve Been (Re)Watching:

° “Love in the Big City” (the K-drama. I haven’t seen the film of the same title yet.)
° “Culinary Class Wars” (I have an article I’d like to write about this before the year ends, if I get my act together!)
° “Kim Ji-young: Born 1982” (I’m re-visiting both the book and film for an upcoming piece.)

° “When the Phone Rings” (this is a new title and only two episodes are out, but I’ve been enjoying this one so far.)

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