Summary
In Episode 10, Romance in the House finally reveals some key plot information, but it takes its greatest strides in the surrounding character development.
In Episode 10, Romance in the House finally digs deeper into Moo-jin’s past while continuing to deliver solid moments in the core relationships. Just two outings removed from the ending, it’s fair to say that the K-Drama has improved enough across its run to possibly deliver a real return on the audience’s time investment, even if a rocky start will inevitably mean that many viewers tapped out along the way.
Episode 9 boldly forced Mi-rae out of the Family Villa and delivered the season’s strongest emotional moments, so we’re picking up from rock-solid foundations. At the end of that episode, Tae-pyeong was revealed as a new intern who’ll be working under Mi-rae, and this chapter begins with a bit of additional context for that, with Tae-pyeong specifically asking CEO Nam not to bring up the fact that he’s his son. But no such luck.
This puts a bit of a spanner in the works of Mi-rae and Tae-pyeong’s relationship, which is still pretty secretive, forcing them to sneak around and be intimate privately while keeping things professional at work. Of course, they can’t keep things a secret for long and are quickly spotted by a couple of co-workers, which is likely to undermine CEO Nam’s wish for Mi-rae to mentor Tae-pyeong to better things.
Speaking of professions, meanwhile, Ae-yeon decides to accept the modeling gig, and Moo-jin positions himself as a kind of mentor for her. She knocks it out of the park immediately, supported by both Mi-rae and Moo-jin, which allows the two of them to bond a little more. It’s an interesting dynamic that Mi-rae moving out to spread her wings has allowed her mother to do the same thing.
These subplots do fall by the wayside a little in the rest of Romance in the House Episode 10, since a lot of it is focused on Moo-jin’s involvement with the previous landlord and the fire that started the season way back in the premiere.
We learn who started the fire here – Mr. Kim, the landlord. He set the place alight deliberately in an effort to cash out on the insurance money. However, he failed to get out in time.
This wasn’t a self-serving act, though. He wanted the insurance money to help his daughter get out of debt, and he wasn’t able to help her with his personal finances since he lost all of those in a scam. He had invested his fortune into Green Dragon Investment after being talked into it by their representative.
This is where Moo-jin comes into it since he introduced Kim to the firm. The assumption, therefore, is that Moo-jin stood to pocket the money that Kim was finessed out of, but he has no knowledge of the scam and advised Kim against investing in the company.
While this is a big moment in terms of the reveal, it’s a bigger moment in how Ae-yeon and even Mi-rae side with Moo-jin, believing his side of the story and knowing intuitively that he isn’t guilty of what he’s being accused of. It’s a big moment for the family, who finally come together to battle these circumstances as a unit for the first time in years. That’s the real progress here; the reveal itself is secondary.
Of course, through this, Ae-yeon and Moo-jin take that crucial next step in their rekindling relationship, steering us neatly towards a happy ending just in time for the final two episodes. There are still some matters to square away, but for the most part Romance in the House has carved out a nice trajectory for itself, which is impressive given how ropey the earlier episodes were.
Hopefully, it sticks the landing.
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