Recap Korean Drama "The Law Cafe (2022)" Episode 13-14

Jung-ho and Yuri are officially together, and while this is usually a cause for celebration in dramaland, my opinion is aligned with that of Joon, Eun-kang, and the neighborhood ajumas: their sugary sweet relationship is pretty dang annoying. I will concede, though, that their dynamic does have a note of maturity that is refreshing and unconventional (by K-drama standards). I mean, I’ve certainly never seen a character discuss birth control and orgasms with Yuri’s level of frankness before.

In my opinion, the novelty of this particular morning-after conversation was lost in the humorous formality of Yuri’s written relationship contract. While it was interesting that her blunt discussion of their sex life was her way of overcompensating for relationship insecurities and preemptively avoiding future misunderstandings by fostering open communication and intimacy, I’m not a fan of how her desire to talk about their sex life is quickly ignored in favor of featuring Jung-ho’s “passion” for PDA. The intended humor of the scene — and how quickly it diverts to a more socially acceptable topic — undercuts the important role such discussions play in real adult relationships. But, hey, maybe I shouldn’t get so caught up in how the content is being presented and just be happy it was included. Baby steps, amirite?

As our couple’s public displays of affection increase in frequency and intensity, the rest of our characters decide it’s time for an intervention. They can only stomach so much of Yuri and Jung-ho’s not-so-secret relationship, and it’s time for the couple to tone down the lovey-dovey crap. Unfortunately, without their former bickering and will-they-won’t-they tension, the spark is gone, so what does the drama do? Predictably, they are given a new case and a recycled reason to begin fighting again.

Yuri’s next case involves CHOI SONG-HWA (Lee Min-young), a cafe regular and the (single) mother of KANG YI-SEUL (Ahn Se-bin). Yi-seul seeks out Team Cafe because she fears her mother is terminally ill and won’t tell her about it, but the truth is that Song-hwa’s bouts of sickness are a psychological reaction to being sexually harassed by her boss Assemblyman CHOI YEO-HWAN (Lee Jae-yong), who is in bed with everyone’s favorite bad guy Pyun-woong.

The case stirs up relationship drama between Yuri and Jung-ho because — of course — Jung-ho is worried that provoking his uncle (again) will put Yuri in danger. Didn’t he absorb anything she said the last time they had this argument? Guess not, because when Yuri’s purse — and the spy pen containing audio of Song-hwa’s covert operation to record Yeon-hwan acting like a pervert — is stolen by one of Pyun-woong’s goons, Jung-ho goes into white-knight mode. Yuri, however, won’t allow fear for her personal safety prevent her from seeking justice for her client, so she and Jung-ho begin a new round of fighting that’s so uncomfortable for outsiders that our secondary characters host a second intervention.

While Jung-ho realizes that there’s no fighting Yuri on this particular issue and seeks his father’s input on how to bring down Yeo-hwan, Yuri takes a road trip out to a prison and picks up a recently released thief (cameo by Kim Jin-woo), who is kind of like a modern day Robin Hood with pick-pocket and safe-cracking skills. He, along with the rest of Team Cafe, perform an elaborate heist to steal back the recording from Pyun-woong’s hotel room, and once they have the audio in hand, they play the recording over the loudspeaker at an event Yeo-hwan is (ironically) hosting in honor of women.

This is only the first stage of their plan, though, because Seung-woon’s advice to Jung-ho was for him to create a rift between Yeo-hwan, Pyun-woong, and the rest of their corrupt boys’ club. They need to give the other members of the group a reason to abandon Yeo-hwan and hang him out to dry, so the sexual harassment allegations against Yeo-hwan need to be irrefutable.

Of course, the villains of this drama try to save their buddy by ruining Song-hwa’s reputation, twisting the narrative to paint her as a gold digger who was “asking for it.” Even the investigator for the prosecution is disgustingly sexist, ignoring Song-hwa’s statement that the skirt she’d worn on the day she was sexually assaulted had been modestly knee-length. Instead, he frustratingly latches onto the fact that the A-line design made it easy to lift up. Yuri and Jung-ho — who are now back to cooperating peacefully — take turns getting incensed and reining in each other’s urges to throttle the investigator for his obviously biased interpretation of events.

BAEK GUN-MAN (Oh Min-suk), the prosecutor assigned to the case, is not as prejudice as his investigator, but his narcissism blocks him from seeing reality — namely that Yuri, his ex, is over him. His ambition, however, works in Team Cafe’s favor. Jung-ho picks up on the fact that Gun-man has political ambitions, and this is just the kind of career-building case he needs to take to get his name out to the public. There’s just one problem: in order for the charges against Yeo-hwan to stick, he’s going to need more evidence that will push it past a classic case of he-said-she-said.

That’s where Team Cafe comes into play, and they begin contacting Yeo-hwan’s past and present employees. While most of them are unwilling to come forward, Eun-kang and Joon — who taps into his own experiences with sexual harassment during his military service — are able to convince one of Yeo-hwan’s former employees to come forward. And luckily, the employee also has dated journal entries chronicling the handsy assemblyman’s molestations.

With another witness coming forward to corroborate Song-hwa’s accusations, Yeo-hwan’s allies begin distancing themselves from him, and when Yeo-hwan catches wind that they are about to cut him loose, he turns to Byung-wook for help. He’s hugely mistaken in thinking Pyun-woong’s father will throw him a bone. Instead, Byung-wook not only tells Yeo-hwan to turn himself in, he wants the assemblyman to turn over a flash drive to the police and take Pyun-woong down with him.

With the case mostly wrapped up, the focus of our story returns to our leading couple, and while Yuri and Jung-ho worked harmoniously together during the latter half of the sexual assault lawsuit, trouble of a different kind has been steadily brewing. And the source of that trouble is Jung-ho’s relationship insecurities.

First, Gun-man dismissed Jung-ho as a viable suitor for Yuri. Then, Byung-wook tricks Jung-ho into attending a blind date because he disapproves of Yuri, and Yuri is — much to Jung-ho’s frustration — totally copacetic with the situation. Because, you know, it’s not like he chose to go on the blind date.

So how does Jung-ho compensate for his unjustified jealousy, anxiety, and overeagerness? Well, he decides to follow Beyonce’s advice and “put a ring on it.” (Oh, Jung-ho, you’re flying more red flags than the flagman at a NASCAR race.)

It comes as no surprise that — just as Jung-ho is about to propose — Yuri unknowingly crushes his plans by saying how happy she is in the moment. She, unlike Jung-ho, has no desire to rush things. You’d think that would be the billboard-sized hint he needs to slow down and remember that she isn’t on the same timeline as him. But nooooooo, after dinner, Yuri reiterates how blissful and secure she feels in their relationship, and Jung-ho decides her present happiness is the justification he needs to pop the question after all. *Facepalm*

Thanks to this cliffhanger, I have very mixed feelings going into the finale week. Best case scenario, I’m hoping there’s some yet-to-be-seen disclaimer that he tacks on to the end of his proposal. You know, like, “Will you marry me…two years from now?” Yeah, I doubt that will happen. In which case, my preference would be for Yuri to reject the proposal, but do I really want to suffer through the inevitable conflict her refusal will cause? Not particularly.

The longer I watch this drama, the more I realize I’m not actually a fan of the Yuri and Jung-ho pairing. Instead, I like Yuri, and until recently, her uniqueness — along with the drama’s representation of often avoided topics — has successfully overcompensated for Jung-ho’s dumbassery. But now that they’re a couple, the writers have taken measures to prominently feature and integrate Jung-ho’s flaws into the plot, and I find myself consistently siding with Yuri — and growing increasingly annoyed with Jung-ho’s clinginess. I definitely liked him better when he was trying to avoid her.

I’m also a bit disappointed in the side romance between Eun-kang and Song-hwa. On the one hand, given Song-hwa’s situation with her boss, it wasn’t the appropriate time for a flashy love confession, so I do like that Eun-kang expressed his interest in a more subdued manner. (Jung-ho could learn a thing or two from Eun-kang.) On the other hand, I still feel like Eun-kang didn’t get much of a redemption after that whole trapping-a-teenager-in-a-burning-building fiasco.

But I guess Eun-kang still got a better deal than poor Joon, who has yet to have his own little featurette. I’m resigned to the fact that we will not get to know much more about Joon, which is shame. After learning about his awful experience in the military, I’m even more curious to know more about his character.

One thing I am looking forward to is the final showdown between our heroes and Pyun-woong. I just hope this isn’t one of those dramas where the entire resolution to their conflict plays out in the courtroom — thanks to whatever evidence Byung-wook gave to Yeo-hwan. Obviously, I don’t want our good guys to go completely Vincenzo and set Pyun-woong on fire while blasting jazzercise music, but I at least want a climatic moment where we see Pyun-woong go completely off-the-rails before he is detained by authorities. And based on how we ended things with him this week, that moment may occur between him and his father.