Summary
Love Next Door remains a very enjoyable K-Drama as it continues to use the shared past of its leads to flesh out their present day relationship.
This is good, isn’t it? I know I’ve said it before, but Episode 4 of Love Next Door only crystallizes my point that recapping this alongside Romance in the House is a stark reminder of the differences in fundamental quality between the two shows. And it’s slightly more impressive in this case since Love Next Door is so generic and overfamiliar – evoking the aforementioned Doctor Slump, as well as Welcome to Samdal-ri and several others – that the fact it’s so compelling is a really impressive achievement.
And I still can’t put my finger on why. It’s very well-acted, obviously, and solidly written, but I don’t think that’s it. There remains a feeling of just-right intangibles that really elevate what would otherwise be a highly generic romantic K-Drama. You approach a show like Romance in the House with a professional curiosity, but you come at Love Next Door with a fan’s enthusiasm.
Lost in Time
Anyway, picking up from where Episode 3 left off, Seok-ryu and Seung-hyo reached something of a turning point in their present-day relationship by finally asking some relevant questions and giving some honest answers. The outcome was that he was on the right path, more or less, while Seok-ryu had made some decisions that she’d redo given a chance.
Maybe that chance is coming, in a way.
When Seok-ryu and Seung-hyo open the time capsule, they discover that Mo-eun’s is missing. As it turns out she took it out years ago and read the other two, but claims not to remember their contents. Fat chance. Seung-hyo keeps his to himself and contemplates the contents, which we know is his past self asking his future self if he confessed his feelings for Seok-ryu, which we know he didn’t. He tries to convince himself that his high school crush isn’t a factor anymore, but again, fat chance.
Speaking of Mo-eun, she meets a little girl in this episode that is probably Dan-ho’s daughter but more on this another time.
The First Falling Out
Inevitably, Seok-ryu and Seung-hyo have a falling out in this episode which stems from a work conflict, but it gets to the core of their personalities.
Basically, Seok-ryu is enlisted to communicate with her previous company, Griep, on a new project that they’re offering Atelier. Seung-hyo is a demented workaholic who throws himself into projects like a madman, so when Seok-ryu overhears that the project has already been passed on to a bigger Korean firm and these conversations are just a formality, Seung-hyo isn’t inclined to believe it. Her cautioning him to perhaps not work quite so hard on something that will likely turn out to be unimportant offends Seung-hyo at a core level, presumably because he knows, deep down, that she’s right.
Seok-ryu is also going out of her way for Seung-hyo here since she has a lot of anxiety bundled up in her former workplace and with some of her former colleagues, including a guy named Chris, who is involved in the meetings. Seok-ryu’s enthusiasm for work led to her being treated like a doormat and her mental health not being taken at all seriously, which is obviously underscoring her point to Seung-hyo about protecting himself.
Chris’s disgraceful treatment of Seok-ryu leads to pushback from her and Seung-hyo, who defends her, so that’s one way to patch up a disagreement.
Getting Closer
Chris ends up being fired, which is nice, and the project didn’t turn out to be a waste of time after all, which is nicer still. But what really counts is the developing relationship between Seung-hyo and Seok-ryu, which has evidently been developing a long time if the flashbacks are anything to go by.
Love Next Door Episode 4 ends, I think, with the two of them closer than ever to realizing their feelings for one another without yet having reached the point of confessing them. But that’s clearly the implication. And that’s good, since their past gives their present-day relationship important context and texture, and it remains a real pleasure unravelling the history.
We’re getting there with these two, and I think it’s safe to say we’ve almost arrived at the next turning point.
Read More: Love Next Door Review
Seok-ryu and Seung-hyo’s relationship continues be complicated in Episodes 5 & 6.
