Overview of The Interest of Love

The stories are filled with relatable characters who face real-life challenges as they navigate relationship complexities within the office setting. The journey of four young spirits who work at a bank and get involved in a booming love square. In Lee Seo-hyun and Lee Hyun-jeong’s stunning storyline, ‘The Interest of Love’ is designed in the mould of office romances, relationship complications, and social status issues.

The relatable story of finding love and heartbreaks, where four individuals try to navigate their way through love, adds to the quality of the thoughtful melodrama romance.

Profile

• Drama: The Interest of Love
• Director: Jo Young-min
• Writers: Lee Seo-hyun and Lee Hyun-jeong
• Network: JTBC
• Episodes: 16
• Release Date: December 21, 2022 – February 9, 2023
• Language: Korean
• Country: South Korea

Cast

• Yoo Yeon-seok as Ha Sang-soo: a manager at KCU Bank’s Yeongpo branch.
  • Moon Seong-hyun as young Ha Sang-soo
• Moon Ga-young as Ahn Soo-young: a fourth-year head teller at KCU Bank’s Yeongpo branch.
• Keum Sae-rok as Park Mi-kyung
• Jung Ga-ram as Jeong Jong-hyun

Supporting

• Moon Tae-yu as So Kyung-pil: Sang-soo’s friend who is the chief of the general affairs department.
• Jeong Jae-sung as Yook Si-kyung: branch manager.
• Lee Hwa-ryong as Noh Tae-pyeong: deputy manager.
• Park Hyung-soo as Lee Gu-il: a team leader.
• Lee Si-hoon as Ma Du-sik: an assistant manager.
• Yang Jo-ah as Seo Min-hee: a team leader.
• Jo In as Bae Eun-jung: a manager.
• Oh Dong-min as Yang Seok-hyun: Sang-soo’s friend who is an insider and a deputy.
• Oh So-hyun as Kim Ji-yoon: the youngest bank clerk.
• Seo Jeong-yeon as Han Jeong-im: Sang-soo’s mother.
• Park Mi-hyun as Shim Kyung-sook: Soo-young’s mother.
• Park Yoon-hee as Ahn In-jae: Soo-young’s father.
• Yoon Yoo-sun as Yoon Mi-sun: Mi-kyung’s mother.
• Park Sung-geun as Park Dae-sung: Mi-kyung’s father.

Synopsis

Ahn Soo-young (Moon Ga-young) is a contract clerk at KCU Bank. Soo-young struggles with depression and grief caused by her brother’s death and a strained relationship with her father. A new employee, Ha Sang-soo (Yoo Yeon-seok), joined the bank. Soo-young trains him, and they gradually become close.

Sang-soo joined three years later than her, but due to his higher academic qualifications, Sang-soo got promoted while Soo-young remained in the same position. Now, he has been promoted to section chief, and she still works as a service representative. This promotion leads to feelings of inadequacy.

Sang-soo has had a crush on Soo-young for some time now, so he finally invites her to meet in a restaurant. Soo-young waits for Sang-soo at a restaurant, but he hesitates before approaching her. This incident makes her realise that the relationship could never work out, so she pushes Sang-soo away and starts dating Jeong Jong-hyun (Jung Ga-ram).

Jong-hyun is a hard-working and sincere man who works as a bank security guard. He dreams of becoming a police officer. Sang-soo also gets into a new relationship with Park Mi-kyung (Keum Sae-rok). Park Mi-kyung works as an assistant manager of the PB team at KCU Bank’s Yeongpo branch and turns out to be Sang-soo’s junior in college.

Things get worse for them later, as Sang-soo is not over Ahn Soo-young, and Mi-kyung starts noticing this. Soo-young’s current boyfriend, Jong-hyun, was going through a financial crisis, and because of this, Soo-young lets him live at her place for the time being. Once the couple starts living together, they realise how incompatible they are with each other, and their relationship gradually starts to fall apart.

Soo-young and Sang-soo go through messy breakups with their former partners. Sang-soo believes he will have a happy relationship with Soo-young now, but Soo-young is unsure about it and cuts all contact with Sang-soo. Soo-young leaves the place without informing anyone, and Sang-soo searches for her, but to no avail.

To move on from Sang-soo, Mi-kyung gets a transfer to a branch in the US and informs their colleagues they have broken up. She was finally getting over Sang-soo, but it’s So Kyung-pil (Moon Tae-yu) that’s bothering her. Kyung-pil is the chief of the general affairs department. They have a tender moment when she asks Kyung-pil why he cheated on her in college. He is honest, saying he liked her, but her family told him he wasn’t supposed to, and he was not feeling brave enough to try to stay with her. Both needed that conversation and were likely to start the real healing process.

Where are Sang-soo, Soo-young, Mi-kyung, and Jong-hyun now?

Ha Sang-soo chose to allow Soo-young some room out of respect for her decision to leave; however, he continued to hold strong feelings for Soo-young even though four years had passed. Sang-soo honoured the choice that Soo-young made but couldn’t fathom it.

All the employees working at the Youngpo branch have been transferred to various branches except Kyung-pil. All of them rejoin for the wedding ceremony of a manager, Bae Eun-jung, and a senior clerk. Soo-young was not invited to the wedding, as she hasn’t kept in touch with anyone at the bank.

Soo-young now runs a drawing cafe in Yeomnam, and Sang-soo has just been transferred to a branch there in Yeomnam. On Sang-soo’s way to the new branch, he follows a woman, mistaking her for Soo-young, but she leads him towards Soo-young’s cafe. The cafe’s name is “Tomorrow’s Happiness”, and the visually appealing ambience of the cafe reminds him of Soo-young. He couldn’t find Soo-young there as she went out to apply for a loan at the bank. Sang-soo arrives late at the bank, but they couldn’t meet.

Sang-soo takes responsibility for Soo-young’s loan application and visits her at her cafe as a bank representative. Since it’s their first time meeting each other in four years, they don’t know where to begin the conversation. Later, Soo-young meets Jong-hyun years later, and she is happy that he is a police officer now.

Ending Explained

Sang-soo and Soo-young are coincidentally at Sang-soo’s favourite cafe, and as they start speaking, they get comfortable. Sang-soo confesses that he should have persuaded her with more perseverance instead of fearing the consequences. Soo-young also admits that she regrets being impatient and making bad decisions. With this comes a love confession: both of them feel that their lives would have turned out great if they had made better decisions. They realise that they were always in love with each other and still are.

Theme

‘The Interest of Love’ is a brilliantly layered mature melodrama focusing on the story of four individuals at a bank trying to understand the complete mess that is love. Four men and women with different insights about love meet in one space and begin their journey towards understanding the true meaning of love.

The drama showcases a very realistic side of adult romance and dating. It is not always butterflies, rainbows, and roses; not all people are looking for a suitable partner who matches their financial and social status. Even with the eye-opening, brutal side of adult relationships depicted in the drama, Soo-young and Sang-soo’s fated soulmate trope brings a happy ending as they are fated to come back to each other no matter what.

The story attempts to capture the realism that comes with wavering emotion and how one can’t shy away from what the heart wants. This is a drama about what people can do to people who love them when they do not return their love feelings. The story often attempts to blend in issues that the characters need to tackle, and their relationships bring up histories, insecurities, and thoughts around love.

Awards

No information is available.

Interesting Facts about The Interest of Love

1. The drama portrays a realistic depiction of a workplace environment.
2. ‘The Interest of Love’ takes over JTBC’s Wednesday and Thursday 22:30 time slots previously occupied by K-drama ‘Insider’ and followed by K-drama ‘The Good Bad Mother’ on April 26, 2023.
3. The drama is based on a novel with the same Korean title, “Sarangui Yihae,” by writer Lee Hyuk-jin.
4. ‘The Interest of Love’ is available for streaming on Netflix in selected regions.

FAQs

1. Who are the writers and director of ‘The Interest of Love’?
   The drama is written by Lee Seo-hyun and Lee Hyun-jeong and directed by Jo Young-min.
   
2. What is the genre of ‘The Interest of Love’?
   ‘The Interest of Love’ falls into the romance and melodrama genres. 
   
3. How many episodes are in ‘The Interest of Love’?
   ‘The Interest of Love’ has concluded a successful 16-episode run.
4. Is the K-drama ‘The Interest of Love’ worth watching?
   Yes, ‘The Interest of Love’ is a slow-burn romance filled with a lot of angst. It has a love square where viewers are torn between enemies to lovers and a workplace romance storyline.
5. What is the Instagram ID of Yoo Yeon-seok?
   yoo_yeonseok is the Instagram ID of Yoo Yeon-seok.
6. What is the Instagram ID of Moon Ga-young?
   m_kayoung is the Instagram ID of Moon Ga-young.