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K-Drama Review: “The Interest of Love” Presents Realistic But Uneventful Office Romance

kdramadiary staff
The Interest of Love

The Interest Of Love is a quintessential romance melodrama with repetitive scenarios of whether the featured couple will or will not be together.

Designed in the mold of typical office romances with background differences, social status issues, relationship complications, and a game of timing in one’s destiny; The Interest of Love is a relatable story of finding love and heartbreaks.

It also highlights misunderstanding and hesitations, and the humane and flawed characters who were unable to get the love they deserve and settle for one that is safe.

The Interest of Love Quick Plot Recap

The story revolves around Su-young (Moon Ga Young) who is struggling with depression, grief from her brother’s death, and a strained relationship with her father. She trains Sang-soo (Yoo Yeon Seok) who joins the bank and they become close.

However, due to higher academic qualifications, Sang-soo gets promoted while Su-young remains in the same position, leading to feelings of inadequacy.

People discriminate against her and treat her badly. Sang-soo asks her to pursue the relationship but hesitates before approaching her. Su-young noticed it and that lead to a start of a back-and-forth complex relationship.

The societal situation made her realize that their relationship could never work out and so she pushes him away and starts dating Jong-hyun.

She never gave time to let go of her feeling for Sang-soo first before dating another person and the same goes for Sang-soo. He gets into a relationship with Mi-kyung a college friend who joined the bank recently and has a strong financial background.

 

Mi-kyung is overly protective and skeptical with the aura of acting like a “nice girl”. She perceives a connection between Sang-soo and Su-young and tries to establish a friendship with Su-young to guilt trip her to back off.

Giving Su-young her old clothes, taking her to lunches, and gifting her expensive things to keep her at bay; it’s the classical example of keeping your friends close and the enemy closer for Mi-kyung.

Despite her efforts, Su-young and Sang-soo can’t stay away from each other.

After many ups and downs and heartbreaks, Su-young leaves with an irrecoverable closure. She always runs away except this time Sang-soo decided not to chase after her. He respected her choice and decided to give her space.

Even after four years passed, Sang-soo always kept Su-young close to his heart. While he respected her decision, he just couldn’t understand it.

Su-young just wanted to disappear and have a fresh start but also wanted Sang-soo to chase after her or convince her to stay. Unfortunately, Sang-soo never speaks his mind and prefers to suffer in silence. They just want to be understood once in their lives and the story ends with a lot of what-ifs.

The final moments between the two leave the viewer with a sense of farewell, but their mental and emotional differences prevent them from fully resolving their issues.

The Interest of Love Series Highlights

Flawed and Humane Characters

The Interest of Love featured pragmatic and relatable characters. They are cowards, confused, and weak. They lack the confidence to reach out to their crush or hold onto the person leaving.

Broken and bound to make mistakes, they took wrong decisions and were hesitant to pursue their relationship under societal pressure. They are so close to what we are in our real lives. Choosing to give up on relationships could be sometimes because we don’t know what to do next.

 Realistic Depiction of Workplace

All the office places are like this. There are friends and then people who pretend to be your friends. Background and social status matter in the same level positions too.

There are people in the office busy giving their work to others. Some are always gossiping and some are just annoying.

In this background, the series emphasizes the difficulty expected for love to thrive. Something that needs extra effort for two people in love to work on which was missed badly by Su-young and Sang-soo.

Chemistry of the Lead Pairing

The leads were so perfect for each other, and yes, even more so in presenting the pain they engage in for not confronting their feelings properly. Those moments when they went to the beach, for a walk, and drink together captured the simplicity of romance they could have achieved, if only they were braved enough to claim it.

Nevertheless, the mutual understanding and comfort they shared imparted how some relationships, no matter how special have to end.

If only they did not listen to the world that told them again and again that they couldn’t or shouldn’t be together but believed in their relationship. This could have been beautiful.

The Interest of Love Series Musings

Painfully slow, the progression of The interest of Love is not for the general audience. The length seems exhausting even when the 2X button is turned on. At times, the one-hour episode showed very little or no tangible progress.

On the bright side, we never knew that such a slow drama can teach numerous life lessons. The story kept getting close to making the main leads a couple but didn’t. It leaves a lesson to not be hesitant in opening your heart but put effort to make it work. It turns into a lost opportunity and then all you will feel is regret.

Decisions made impulsively are not always the right ones and thinking before acting is always the best choice. It can be difficult to confront and handle your emotions but if you continue to avoid your problems, they will eventually catch up with you.

The Interest of Love presents characters that are resonating as humans with an average life and average issues. Expounding on how facing crossroads where we don’t say the thing we want to and then the timing goes off and people grow apart. It calls for encouragement to be able to know when to say yes, and also when to say no.

People lack courage and confidence. They think from their mind and try to reason everything. But love overlooks logic and it’s better to act upon your feeling and listen to your heart than regret the time you lost later.

Effectively gifting a significant nudge that people moving on can lead to a happier life, The Interest of Love brings unexpected solace especially if you enjoy realistic stories.

Photos: JTBC Drama

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