Kevin C. Wong

Link: Eat, Love, Kill (2022) [+]

Link: Eat, Love, Kill is a Korean romance drama of 16 hour+ episodes. Eun Gye-hoon (Yeo Jin-goo) is a celebrity chef who moves back to his lower-income hometown to start his own upscale fusion restaurant. Noh Da-hyun (Moon Ga-young) Is young woman who failed in the big city and has moved back home and eventually gets a job as a hostess in Gye-hoon's restaurant. Oh, and she's hiding from a stalker.

For some reason Jin-goo can feel Da-hyun's emotions whenever she has intense emotions. Just like with his sister who was kidnapped 18 years previously and presumably was murdered. But could Da-hyun be his long lost sister? Luckily after a couple of episodes Gye-hoon realizes Da-hyun is not his sister which helps because Da-hyun is attracted to him but he's been rebuffing her.

Anyway Jin-hoo is really back home to find out who murdered his sister. Pretty much the same people are still here and although one man was accused and later exonerated he believes the murderer still lives in the neighborhood. Meanwhile Da-hyun has her stalker who turns out to be one of the neighborhood kids from 18 years ago. And she starts to remember flashbacks from the time when Jin-hoo's sister was kidnapped, a time when something also happened to Da-hyun but she's blacked it out of her memory for almost two decades…

This is a romance plus crime thriller since the murderer is still out there and is a threat to both lead characters. The romance is fine although I don't think they ever really use the Link all that much. For supporting characters I like Hwang Min-jo (Lee Bom-so-ri) as the cute police officer partnered with her ex-boyfriend Ji Won-tak (Song Duk-ho) who has secrets of his own.

Threat of being murdered is a bit too high stakes for my tastes. It's also annoying that Da-hyun (and to a lesser extent Jin-goo) are willing to investigate or do things on their own late at night with no backup.

Overall this is an entertaining series. About average for K-romance drama but the average is very good compared to Western television.