Recap Korean Drama "Crash Course in Romance 2023" Episode 11

Episode 11 of Crash Course in Romance starts with Hae-e’s bombshell reveal. Dong-hui  takes Mr Popular out the hallway, leaving Chi-yeol to question the girl about her parentage. “She lied for my sake to protect me,” Hae-e says, going on to reveal that Haeng-seon isn’t married and she does like him. C

hi-yeol is speechless and leaves. When he does, he narrowly passes Haeng-seon who shows up with her bike. She speaks to Hae-e, who admits she did this because she has a conscience and wants Haeng-seon to be happy.

Chi-yeol  arrives to see Haeng-seon and hugs her outside his apartment, telling her he wishes she’d told him sooner about how she feels. He’s been tormenting himself with trying to get over her when the better option would have been leaning into his feelings and embracing them. In fact, the pair drive up to the Han River and discuss when they first had feelings for one another, with Chi-yeol admitting that Haeng-seon is her missing piece in his life.

Sun-jae’s mum heads home and immediately demands to know where Hui-jae is. He’s not in his room and there’s no signal from his phone. Sun-jae decides to go look for him but Seo-jin refuses, telling her that the important thing here is his math assignment.

As for Hui-jae, he happens to be at the vets where a stray cat is not in a good way. In fact, it passes away and Hui-jae has it cremated, struggling to hold back tears. Whatever psycho did this seems to be linked to the ball bearing case. Hui-jae does eventually head home, where his mum questions him over exactly what he’s been doing and where he’s been. He refuses to answer, and instead shuts the door and resets the data on his phone and begins crying. That certainly doesn’t seem like the behaviour of a psychopath killer, right?

Chi-yeol drives Haeng-seon back to the Side Dish restaurant where Hae-e, Jae-woo and Yeong-joo are all abuzz with questions, wanting to know how their date went. The pair end up texting that night, exchanging little stickers to one another.

Hae-e heads to school, bracing herself for a horrific reception from all her friends and other students. Instead, she gets smiles and praise all round. It’s a really heartwarming moment, especially when the whole class begin clapping. Not only that but opinion surrounding Chi-yeol has swung in his favour too, with plenty of people wanting to do interviews and get his opinion.

If that wasn’t enough, the faculty all return to work with him, dropping to their knees and apologizing for their rash decisions. Chi-yeol smiles and calls Hyo-won by the correct name too in a huge breakthrough. The Director also wants him to return to Pride Academy. Remember the guy who died last episode? Well, it turns out Mr Jin was one of the math teachers too, which only compounds the thoughts that it could be Dong-hui as the killer.

Unfortunately, the police don’t think that and instead they hone in on Hui-jae, who has been wearing this black hoody. Hui-jae also has his mum to deal with, who’s convinced he’s doing something shady. She takes drastic measures and organizes to work from home for a few says to keep an eye on him and also decides he’ll be going to the US when the paperwork is all done.

Meanwhile, the mums suggest Su-a apologize to Haeng-seon for what she’s done, riling everything up with her rumours and causing chaos. Su-a moves the goalposts and claims she didn’t do any harm and it’s not her fault. However, she does concede and agrees to do something to help all of them out. Wirthout Su-a, the rest of the women show up at the Side Dish store and tentatively sit down to drink a coffee with Haeng-seon.

Mi-ok takes the lead and speaks her piece. Of course, this also has the added element on wanting Haeng-seon to put a good word in for the All Care program too.

During the night’s study session, Hae-woo ends up embarrassing Haeng-seon by calling Chi-yeol brother-in-law. Chi-yeol doesn’t seem to mind though and and even stays behind to eat that evening, teasing Haeng-seon by suggesting she feed him with the chopsticks.

When the attention turns to Pride Academy, Chi-yeol admits he’s conflicted over what to do about this. Haeng-seon decides he should go back and so Chi-yeol takes her advice. Dong-hui is not happy, especially when he learns Haeng-seon went some way to convicne him. Not only that, but he’s going to try and work system so Hae-e gets back into the All-Care Program.

At school, Geon-hu has improved dramatically and manages to answer the first set of questions correctly. he decides to strike a deal with Hae-e, telling her that if he gets into college, he wants to date her. Naturally, Sun-jae does not look happy while Hae-e is incredulous over his reaction outside.

In her embarrassment, Hae-e heads into the bathroom but Geon-hu does the same. Sun-jae is there and he slaps him in the back of the head, pointing out he’s stabbed him in the back. Geon-hu grins and admits he’s going to study really hard.

Dan-ji knows that Sun-jae likes Hae-e and encourages him to ask her out before it’s too late or he loses his opportunity to do so. After buying her a gift and looking close to doing just that, Sun-jae receives a message from his mum telling him to come home and keep an eye on Hui-jae and study there. He’s conflicted but of course, family comes first.

Meanwhile, the detectives manage to get hold of the CCTV footage and find Hui-jae’s face. Unfortunately it’s only a matter of time before they track them down. At the same time, Dong-hui joins the group as they head out for a bowling date and tellingly, he doesn’t high five Haeng-seon and acts cold toward her, pointing out that she’s super persuasive before leaving.

Hui-jae ends up having bad dreams about being chased and someone trying to get him. He spirals out of control and ends up having a panic attack, just as Sun-jae heads home to hold him.

When Sun-jae heads outside, he notices the two detectives sniffing about and they show him a picture of Hui-jae. He struggles to hide his shock. When they knock on the door, Sun-jae lets them in and they decide to look around. Hui-jae bursts out his room and runs. When he does, he ends up face to face with Haeng-seon and Chi-yeol who happen to be driving.

The Episode Review

Crash Course in Romance delivers a heartwarming chapter, one that wraps up some of the bigger plot points, gets us closer to resolving the ball bearing case, and also setting everything up for a dramatic final series of episodes.

I would imagine we’re going to see Hui-jae wrongly imprisoned as the murderer, and then potentially see the real culprit make his move. Now, I think it’s fair to say Dong-hui is acting really suspiciously so it could be that he gets involved, going after Haeng-seon and ultimately ends up arrested, with Hui-jae released and this whole mess resolved. We’re getting ahead of ourselves though!

We do get two of the big plot points examined in much more detail here though, including Hae-e’s classmates’s reaction to Hae-e’s mum actually being her aunt and Haeng-Seon and Chi-yeol being honest about their feelings for one another. These are definitely the stand out moments in the episode, and both leads have great chemistry whenever they’re on-screen.