Love in Contract

 Love in Contract

4/10

Love in Contract

Genre:                                   Episodes: 16                           Year: 2022

Romance

Comedy

Synopsis:

Choi Sang Eun is a charismatic woman who works as a contract wife. Her job is to help her clients in situations where a wife is required- such as looking good for school reunions, climbing the social ladder at work, or avoiding pressure from family to settle down. Sang Eun has a long term client, Jung Ji Ho, who she sees on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. A new client, Kang Hae Jin, is a popular actor who has hired her for Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays.

Cast:

Park Min Young (Choi Sang Eun)

Go Kyung Pyo (Jung Ji Ho)

Kim Jae Young (Kang Hae Jin)

Kang Hyung Suk (Woo Gwang Nam)

Jin Kyung (Yoo Mi Ho)

Lee Joo Bin (Jung Ji Eun)

General Thoughts:

I picked up this drama because I am a big fan of Park Min Young. Even though there was a lot of negativity floating around about this show, I honestly thought to myself “How bad can it be? Park Min Young chose to be in it,”. I wish I had listened to all those online posts saying that ‘Love in Contract’ was bad. Because sadly it is. And not even the good kind of bad where everything is so whacky that it’s almost fun to watch what a complete mess the show becomes. This show didn’t become a mess. It was just horribly, horrifically, mind-numbingly boring.

Big yawn

Most poor dramas tend to at least make it a good 5 or 6 episodes in before falling apart, but by episode 3 of ‘Love in Contract’ I was already pretty darn bored. There’s just no plot really. The whole set up of Sang Eun being a wife for hire was basically a lie, because after a short montage in the first episode, she retires. I kid you not. The whole THING of this show was that you could pay Sang Eun to be in a contract relationship and that was supposedly where all our story and tension would come from.

The contract expired before this drama even began

But then she retires except for two ‘clients’. Which pretty quickly takes it out of the professional realm and goes into personal. All the tropes you expect to get with a contract relationship (which is what people who like stories about contract relationships are looking for) just weren’t there. By the time the drama started it was pretty clear and obvious that Sang Eun had feelings for Ji Ho and Ji Ho had feelings for Sang Eun. There was no back and forth or awkwardness of getting around a predetermined relationship set up, and there was no proper confusion about whether the other persons’ feelings were genuine or if they were just playing a role. All the good parts about a scenario like this just weren’t in the show. And if they were in the show, they weren’t developed or explored fully. Even the supposed love-triangle was done poorly. By establishing Sang Eun’s feelings so early on in the show’s run, there was no real opportunity for Hae Jin to have a good chance. Which was a shame because he was probably the only character that didn’t bore me. I don’t think there was anyone watching this who honestly thought that Hae Jin had any hope of ending up with the girl. Beyond these two watered down scenarios, the only other storyline really happening was whatever the hell was going on between Sang Eun and Madam Yoo. And not only was that boring, but it was confusing too.

Why would you even offer to live with someone you actively dislike?

I actually didn’t mind where we ended up, with Madam Yoo being Sang Eun’s Mum and them both having known for a long time but just never broaching the subject. I just don’t like how it played out. Without knowing about the unique relationship between them it was completely baffling as to why Madam Yoo would go so out of her way to meddle in Sang Eun’s life, and why Sang Eun would go so far out of her way to make sure Madam Yoo had money and a place to live. For most of this drama’s run these two characters were making decisions that were virtually impossible for the viewers to understand as we had a big chunk of information missing that would only be revealed in the last few moments.

A lot of this drama would have made a lot more sense if we always knew they were related

I don’t think the relationship needed to be a big twist at the end- I think the drama would have benefitted more from giving insight into the life experiences and thought processes of the characters so that they could be understandable rather than holding back information to try and do a shock reveal- because by the time that reveal came, I really didn’t care anymore. It took too long to get there, and I had already mentally checked out. And then that bring us to the other main relationship Sang Eun had going on in her life- Ji Ho. I quite liked Ji Ho’s character at the start of the show- he seemed sweet but with a uniquely introverted and withdrawn nature.

Ain't no spice in this dish

For a while it was fun to see the differences between Ji Ho’s mindset of minding his own business to the extreme and Sang Eun’s mindset of caring way too much about everyone else's perception (which was kinda just her job). But then it rather quickly became obvious that the writer had absolutely no idea what to do with Ji Ho’s character. He was developed so poorly as the drama progressed that he stopped making any sense at all. Supposedly his divorce was so traumatic that it caused him to completely turn inwards and just start ignoring everyone else around him. Only we then find out that his divorce was due to…miscommunication. You know, the same reason 90% of divorces happen. Why this was so traumatic and why he blamed himself so much for it was left mainly up to the viewers’ imaginations. So it was never really explained why Ji Ho started to shun being social so much. I mean, he has to have been normal and social enough before to date and get married, right? So what happened? Similarly, he then starts to get along with Sang Eun and all his coworkers pretty easily once he decides to date her. Just because that’s what's convenient. This relationship is supposedly so amazing and so life-altering that it changes his outlook on the world completely, and changes how everyone he knows views him. But a major problem here is that there was NO CHEMISTRY. I have never seen Park Min Young not have chemistry with someone, but there you go. There was no spark between the leads and it just felt kind of awkward. The whole relationship felt very immature and high-schooly considering that they were both adults and one of them had been married before.

The show totally glossed over how and why they fell for each other too...

When so much of a drama is riding on nothing more than a romance, it’s super disappointing when that romance is lacklustre. While the characters were all fairly cr*p, I will say that the acting was good. There was nothing amazing (as with such a boring storyline the actors weren’t asked to deliver much), but at least I can say that the actors did a good enough job with the complete amount of nothing they were given.

I didn't really ship her with anyone to be honest

I’m not a huge fan of Go Kyung Pyo- not for any particular reason, he just lacks that sort of sparkle that really makes you love a leading actor. But he did do a good enough job of giving a bit of emotion to a very quiet character which can be a tricky ask. Did I completely love him? No. But did I find him annoying and terrible? Also no. So I mean, that’s a win I guess. On the other hand, Kim Jae Young felt much more male-leady. He had a more engaging character so that was probably a contributing factor. Hae Jin was also a much more emotional character than any of the others in this show, so he expressed himself often and had a larger range of emotions to portray. Not only did this give us insight into exactly how Hae Jin was feeling as a character, but it made Kim Jae Young feel like he was doing a really great job at bringing Hae Jin to life. There was an energy he provided to Hae Jin that just made him likeable as a character and made him stand out a tad more that Go Kyung Pyo. Poor Go Kyung Pyo- there’s only so much you can do when your character’s description is literally just be blank.

What Was Great:

Low Toxicity:

Do I have to put something in this section? I do? Fine, I'll try. While many of the characters were annoying or a little unlikeable, I will say that none of them were outright toxic or completely horrible. When Ji Ho’s ex, Ji Eun, came on the scene I honestly thought they were going to have her be a super b*tchy, horrible character whose only agenda was to break up the leading couple in some deluded attempt to get her ex back.

Though admittedly this drama did need some better conflict

But I was pretty thankful when that didn’t happen- I’ve seen enough spiteful exes on my screen for a lifetime. Similarly, Madam Yoo had a redemption arc towards the end as her character was explored more, and even the two Chaebol families weren’t that bad. They were stubborn and didn’t listen, but they weren’t outright hostile. Except for maybe Sun Jin, but to be honest he was around so sporadically and I really didn’t have any clue what his nefarious schemes were or why they mattered, so he was pretty easy to overlook and forget.

What Wasn’t:

The Leading Lady:

She was just so annoying guys. I couldn’t cope with how much I didn’t like Sang Eun. Even with Park Min Young acting her, there was just no way to save this character for me. I’m sure the writers thought they were giving us a bubbly, perky, somewhat sassy heroine, but that is just not what ended up happening.

Like, could she BE any more self-obsessed?

Sang Eun was so self-absorbed. It’s like the show thought they were giving us a heroine that was extremely selfless because her job was about ‘helping’ people who were needing ways out of certain situations. But that’s just not the case! Sure, Sang Eun focused on her clients when she was with them- else she wouldn’t get paid and she wouldn’t have a job! But when she was on her own time all she seemed to care about was herself- how she was feeling, what she was going through, what she was doing. I cannot count the amount of times Kwang Nam (who was DELIGHTFUL by the way) was trying to tell Sang Eun something or have a serious conversation with her about something he was going through just for her to brush him off or minimise his feelings. This is supposed to be her best friend and she cannot give him even five minutes of her d*mn time to hear him out. Even with Ji Ho she seemed to always be forcing what she wanted onto him. A stand-out in my mind is the hospital scene. Ji Ho didn’t want a fuss and just wanted to go home but Sang Eun completely ignored him and dismissed his feelings and took it upon herself to get him a private room and do it up like a mini house. Not only did Ji Ho not ask for this- he specifically said he didn’t want it. He had to come up with some bullsh*t lie in order to get Sang Eun to finally stop and let him go home. Was this behaviour supposed to be cute? It’s not! It’s controlling and annoying and not a sign of a healthy relationship! To be honest, I actually think I liked Sang Eun better when she was being a chaebol.

Also what the f*ck was with her ghosting Ji Ho in that last episode? He should have dumped her for that alone

In one of the last episodes where she strolls into Hae Jin’s company and utterly destroys Hae Jin’s brother, she was pretty cool. The icy, I’m-the-greatest-thing-ever concept really worked in this sort of Chaebol scenario. I don’t think I’ve ever said this before, but I think I would have preferred if the heroine had just been a Chaebol. It would have made her b*tchy, self-centred character a lot more tolerable.

Recommend?

No. I ignored all the bad things I’d heard about this drama, but please don’t ignore me. You will regret it.

Yay- it's over!