“No Gain, No Love” Ending Explained- Episode 12 Recap And Review

“No Gain, No Love” has ended its run a couple of hours ago, let us recap the 12^th episode and explain the ending!

“No Gain, No Love” episode 12 recap

The entire family arrives at the funeral location after finding out the mother is dead. Hae-Young is crushed to learn this but she has a lot of people to rely on.

The three of them are by her side to help with the funeral preparations. Even on the 1^st day, a lot of people come to the funeral including the kids she took care of.

Bothered by the chief mourner only being her, Ji Uk adds a bunch of other names of the kids whom she took care of.

She is buried next to her husband and the four of them say goodbye to her. On their way out, Hae-Young tells Ji Uk to let go. She wants to seperate. She gives the excuse that he needs to live for himself and not fulfilling promises to anyone. She tells him he held back despite wanting to see his mom and he should go see her. She says its burdensome for him to keep protecting her out of a promise and it will be hurting him later on.

Both take the breakup badly but move on.

At the launch event of what was originally Hae-Young’s idea, somehow Woo-Jae takes the lead and the credit. She’s upset by it but meets with Gyu-Hyun who says she should go say goodbye to Ji Uk who is leaving on this day.

At the airport, Manager Jang, Gyu-Hyun and the father are present. Manager Jang and Gyu-Hyun say goodbye to him while the father stands by on the side. Gyu-Hyun tries to make him reconsider saying he didn’t mean the things he said back then, Ji Uk understands but leaves.

6 months later

Gyu-Hyun delivers on what he promised to his father and says it means he can marry whom he wants. He even scheduled a lunch with his parents but his father has a surprise for him.

Hae-Young had quit and took secretary Yeo with her who is now working as a developer. They’re lacking in funding and struggling.

When Gyu-Hyun arrives to the lunch and discovers its a blind date, he’s pissed. As he gets out of the date, he discovers Ja-Yeon and in a moment of issue, a man whisks her away due to an incident and they have a fight because of it.

Hee-Sung goes to record for an audio project and runs into Tae-Hyung who eventually says he can’t live without her and demands to be with her even if the baby is not his. They eventually make up too.

The three girls celebrate the baby shower and Hae-Young’s birthday and she gets a gift from Ji Uk, a bunch of globes he collected traveling the world. She finds out everyone had kept in touch with him but her.

On another day, due to lacking of funding, she’s thinking of selling her mother’s house, she goes to see the buyer and turns out to be Ji Uk with a young woman smiling and laughing. She avoids him.

She then decides to swallow her pride and ask for funding from Gyu-Hyun, she and secretary Yeo go to see and beg him, he ends up giving them a chance for a pitch.

Ja-Yeon gives a lecture and Gyu-Hyun is there to see her and encourage her. They end up spending the day together having fun and eventually, he presents her a couples ring in a sweet way.

Then at night, Hae-Young realizes the supermarket Ji Uk worked at has closed down. She then sees him, she tells him congrats but it turns out the woman wasn’t his gf. He holds onto Hae-Young and asks if she regretted it, she says no but she missed him dearly.

He chugs down bear and admits he stills cares for her. He spends the night with her and in the morning because he’s not there, she worries but then, turns out he was out buying soup.

She tells him she loves him and they kiss.

The end.

“No Gain, No Love” ending explained- FAQ

“No Gain, No Love” ending- review

That was a very enjoyable drama, one of the best surprises of 2024, truly!

Many have already said this, but I just loved how “No Gain, No Love” boldly displayed cliches, subverted expectations and delivered even better punchlines in ways that don’t diminish the seriousness of the situations happening. Screenwriter Kim Hye-Young is a legend in the making, and this script is miles better than “Her Private Life.”

Truth be told, Ji Uk not telling Hae-Young he knew her is creepy but I wouldn’t have EVER guessed that he did it for a good reason. Him not knowing exactly why he should hide it from her but respecting her mother’s words only for it to turn out to have been a good reason, is top writing.

Ji Uk is an angel, indeed, and not a pretentious one, truly an angel.

Also, this might be an unpopular opinion, but as the older person, Hae-Young did well letting him go. He needed to be on his own and not live to fulfill a promise as it would eventually reflect on him as he grows older. She freed him from that and he came back to her.

I dont like that they broke up but I actually get it, I even agree with it to a degree.

There are several major plots left unresolved including how Hae-Young is still not getting the attention she deserves even when the issue with Ji Uk was apparently resolved. Its so weird she didn’t spearhead the idea to fruition.

The sub-plot between her and her ex was also unresolved and so was the issue of Ji Uk and Gyu-Hyun’s mother being heavily against him remaining in the country.

I would’ve loved for this drama to have had at least 2 more episodes because I feel like not everything was wrapped up correctly, but alas.

But then we have the spin-off “Spice Up Our Love” which should be interesting to see as I loved the chemistry between Lee Sang Yi and Han Ji-Hyun.

Overall, I had lots of fun watching this drama, so much. Thank you to the cast and crew for the amazing job.

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