DNA Lover: Episodes 11-12

by Dramaddictally

This week is all about coming to terms with the truth. Now that the real DNA lover is revealed, all the other secrets, lies, and forgotten memories are coming to the fore. But what’s a girl to do when her hurtin’ heart wants something that’s just not in her DNA?

 
EPISODES 11-12

Last week we ended with the big reveal: Kang-hoon is actually So-jin’s genetically perfect match. But that’s a problem now that she’s got her heart set on Yeon-woo. So, she ventures out to prove that the news isn’t true — and that she and Yeon-woo are as deeply connected as she’d like to believe.

Our poor heroine doesn’t get far, though, before she realizes that all the “telepathic connections” she had with Yeon-woo could also apply to Kang-hoon. Whenever she put out the mental signals, Kang-hoon appeared, but she just kept tweaking her experiments until she got the result she wanted (which, as her colleague reminds her, is just bad science).

Still, So-jin wants to give it one more shot. And so, she reruns the experiment where she and Yeon-woo are supposed to meet in the same place at the same time, without telling where they’re going. Like before, Yeon-woo pulls the trick where he has his colleague follow her. Only this time, So-jin catches on. And when she’s calls Yeon-woo to ask where he is, he blatantly lies — while she’s standing right behind him.

So-jin is really upset to find out that Yeon-woo has been dishonest. Especially when he admits that he knew she had Kang-hoon’s DNA and not his. He says he wanted to do everything to make her happy, even if it included unintentional lies. And does it really matter that he lied since they like each other? Isn’t that the pertinent point? Well, not really. So-jin feels like he took advantage of her beliefs and tells him they need a timeout to think things through.

Yeon-woo doesn’t want to break up. And at Kang-hoon’s nudging (because uri Kang-hoon always has So-jin’s best interest in mind!), Yeon-woo reaches out to So-jin first, and apologizes for hurting her. She understands that he didn’t have bad intent, but she allowed herself to get hurt by him because she believed they were fated. She needs time to accept the fact that they’re not.

However, the tables turn when Yeon-woo is suddenly in mourning. There’s a lot of backstory about the troubled relationship between Yeon-woo’s parents, but the essential point here is that Yeon-woo’s dad dies in a fire — that it appears his mother purposefully set. She was in the fire too (evidently trying to die with her cheating husband) and is now laid up in a hospital bed unconscious. For plot purposes: So-jin feels really bad for Yeon-woo and tracks him down at the seaside, where he’s gone to mourn alone.

Once So-jin gets a sick Yeon-woo into bed, he begins to tell her about his family. He knows that he has trouble loving anyone because of the way his mom obsessively held onto his dad, while Dad moved out of the house and had many extramarital affairs. “The deeper you love someone, the deeper you get hurt,” Yeon-woo says. This is why he’s too afraid to say he loves So-jin, but he does ask her to stay by his side.

The two fall asleep holding hands, but when Yeon-woo wakes in the night, he runs away, leaving only a note for So-jin that says “Thank you. And I’m sorry.” Oof. Our beaten-down heroine tries to hold herself together, but finally loses it in a puddle of tears when Kang-hoon appears out of nowhere and finds her alone. He sees her, says “Let’s go eat,” and takes her hand — causing the first verifiable squee I’ve gotten from this show so far. Can we keep him?!

To make way for Kang-hoon — and to prove his love, of course — Yeon-woo dives into a pool of Noble Idiocy head first. He meets with So-jin to officially break it off, returning the couples bracelet that she gifted him. He’s cold about it, saying she should give it to her real DNA lover (ouch), but we know that in his mind he’s doing this for her ultimate happiness. He can’t love her for life, so she should be with the one who can.

And, not waiting around any longer, The One Who Can decides to get a head-to-toe makeover (thank you!) and ask So-jin out on a date. After her initial bafflement, they go ice skating, but So-jin is so sick with post-breakup heartache that everything reminds her of Yeon-woo. She thinks she may never be able to forget the good times and get over him — until later on, when she thinks that Kang-hoon is seriously injured in a fire.

When So-jin hears a news story that a firefighter is in critical condition, she races to the hospital in a fit of panic. But when she arrives, Kang-hoon is there unharmed, which makes her sob. In a flash, she remembers that four years earlier, when her father died, Kang-hoon was the one that stayed by her side. She feels terrified of what might have happened to him, and then rushes in to grab him around the waist for a hug. Yeon-woo, seeing this, turns away.

In voiceover, So-jin thinks about how Kang-hoon has always protected her. And when she pulls back from the hug, he wipes the tears from her face and brushes her hair to the side. (Gah! How are these two not endgame?) In that moment, she fully admits to herself that Kang-hoon is her DNA Lover, as our episodes close.

Oh, come on! Can’t we just go against the grain for once and put our second leads where they belong? Because it’s not only Kang-hoon that I’m loving — I’ve got SLS for our second female lead as well. Mi-eun gets very little screen time this week but when she does, she and Yeon-woo are open and flirty and shiny. Their rapport is lovely to watch and they just seem like a better fit. (FYI, Mi-eun has given up on her multiple boyfriends and decided she only wants one love. I’m not going to comment until I see where this goes, but for now, I think it’s a waste of a nuanced character.)

And the last thing I should mention is that we have a serial killer afoot. (Did you think we’d escape a rom-com in 2024 without one?) There’s a PRIEST (Lee Chul-woo) who’s been hanging around and acting shady for a while, and now it seems he may be behind the death of Yeon-woo’s dad. He’s out for the whole fam, though, with Yeon-woo and his mom next on the list. The good news (if you can call it that) is that at least this dude likely has a legit motive (with signs pointing to the possibility of Yeon-woo’s long-lost brother). But all that noise will be resolved next week, when we may or may not have to watch our seconds leads get their hearts trampled on (along with mine).

 
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