Cheat on Me, If You Can | Review and Ending Discussion

A crime novelist will kill her husband if he cheats.
Notable Actors/Actresses

Cho Yeo-jeong: Kang Yeo-joo

Ko Jun: Han Woo-sung

Kim Young-dae: Cha Soo-ho

Yeon Woo: Go Mi-rae

Korean Title Translation

If You Cheat, You Die

Year: 2020
Episodes: 16

Short Review

[The Story Simplified] Kang Yeo Joo is a crime novelist. Her husband, Han Woo Sung, proposed by giving her his life. Literally. He signed a paper that if he cheats his life will be hers. Guess what, he’s a serial cheater. Does Kang Yeo Joo know? If she knows, will she kill him? That’s the story. Oh and there’s also an NIS agent investigating our novelist.

[Mini-review]

• This is my new taste in mysteries: comedically scary.
• Watching this drama felt like reading a really good mystery book where I couldn’t guess anything but everything that happened was logically plausible with the exact same hints.
• It’s the type of drama I love to dissect because there’s so much to unpack. I wished I had watched this with much more focus than I had.
• I personally really like this but there are its flaws: 
• This would have fared better with a quicker unveil of the hints (or less episodes). All the reveals were condensed into the last two episodes.
• An open ending (that I don't actually think is that big of a flaw)

[Actors/Actresses]

• My favourite character is obviously Cho Yeo Jung's Kang Yeo Joo. She's innocently malicious. She perfectly toned her character into someone who is both robotic and human with the most minute expressions. 
• Go Joon isn't the best looking guy but his scenes with Cho Yeo Jung as the cowardly husband who's quite the cunning one in the art of cheating are the funniest ones. Him shivering in fear brings me joy because 1) his reactions are funny and 2) he deserves it. 
• The tiny brewing romance between Kim Young Dae's Cha Soo Ho and Cho Yeo Jung’s Kang Yeo Joo got my romantic hopes up. However, I do think Kim Young Dae lacks a little oomph to his acting to really sell his character. He's the impeccable bodyguard. I'm supposed to fall head over heels for this silent protector but my love for him stayed in the "like" zone. 

❢❢ Spoilers beyond this point ❢❢

The main purpose of this post is mainly to discuss the ending.

Ending Discussion

Did Kang Yeo Joo know Han Woo Sung was cheating?

No. Not until the final episode. You would think she’s that smart so how can she not know. It’s simply because she loves him and trusts him. 

I would think it’s also because she trained him into becoming the perfect cheater. Her sharp perception and quick deduction have conditioned him into a brilliant serial cheater who continues to cheat each time he succeeds – that is until his next affair becomes a murder.

Did Kang Yeo Joo kill Han Woo Sung?

First of all, I love how they used the same scene from the end of Episode 1 but at the end of Episode 16 we don’t get to see whether it was a fake knife. Also, she uses the way Soo Ho taught her how to kill when he applied to be her assistant. Everything was laid out from the beginning. 

My answer for this question: Yes. I translated the Korean title and it should be "If You Cheat, You Die". In the last episode she found out he cheated, then she found out he hired a hitman to kill her. It makes sense with her personality she would kill him. It would be ironic if the cheater in this drama doesn't get his retribution when everyone else got theirs (e.g. step mom is in jail for murder; dad’s publicity is down because of her book).  

My biggest question for this open ending is assuming she killed him, how could she turn this into the perfect murder like her book’s synopsis? Although she might be a murderer, she’s not someone I want in jail because of her cheating husband. Kang Yeo Joo deserves better than that! 

Since her husband failed at being the perfect cheater, maybe she too failed at being the perfect murderer. :(((

Did Han Woo Sung ever love Kang Yeo Joo?

The constant question I had for 10+ episodes is why did this guy even marry her if he’s so afraid of her. The answer is he did love her. Episode 14 was when I was convinced (he had cleaned up her mother’s grave without her knowing). For a fleeting moment, I actually felt that maybe it was possible between these two despite his affairs.

At the end he was settled on "never" cheating anymore. Too bad he forgot to get a refund on his hitman request to kill his wife. 

Did Han Woo Sung cheat with Go Mi Rae?

Not physically. I thinks it’s also questionable if he cheated psychologically with Go Mi Rae. Undoubtedly, she likes him. But did he love her? He was interested in her but he never initiated anything (unless I missed something). He helped a girl in need. To me, he was on the verge of cheating but never actually cheated with Go Mi Rae.

Ironically, Go Mi Rae is the only girl Han Woo Sung didn't sleep with who got onto Kang Yeo Joo's radar. After finding out there isn’t anything cheating-worthy, Kang Yeo Joo trusted her husband again until the final episode. Go Mi Rae is the biggest red herring for both Kang Yeo Joo and for us as the audience. 

Did Kang Yeo Joo ever have feelings for Cha Soo Ho?

This answer can go either way. The hopeful shippers would say yes especially when he flirted with her in the last few minutes of the last episode. She may have had a fleeting thought of a future with him. Who knows. 

Personally, I don’t think so. I believe in Kang Yeo Joo's consistency. She sticks to her principles. She won’t cheat. However, I do like Soo Ho and wished she had considered him. The umbrella scene in Ep15 was the most romantic moment in this drama. 

Do Ahn Se Jin and Jang Seung Cheol (the detectives) end up together?

No. Unfortunately. The guy is married. This is a drama where shippable couples don't sail. At least So Jin Ho's (Woo Sung's friend) family stays rather harmonious.

Who killed Baek Soo Jung?

Kang Yeo Joo's stepmother (for political reasons; the president was having an affair with Baek Soo Jung which is why the NIS is involved)

What happened to Kang Yeo Joo before she met Han Woo Sung?

• Kang Yeo Joo's mother died because her stepmother forced her out of the window. Her father had cheated on her mother. The trauma of seeing her mother's death and being under the stepmother's threat rendered her silent. At a young age, she was admitted to a psychological hospital because of her stepmother. (So sad!) 
• This explains why Kang Yeo Joo’s unapproachable personality. If she hadn't trusted Han Woo Sung with all her heart, she would never marry him.  
• She didn't have a loving mother growing up but fortunately she has a loving housekeeper in Yeom Jin Ok. Her housekeeper even takes on her crime if her mistress really killed someone. 
• In the last episode when she asked Yeom Jin Ok why everyone thought she killed Baek Soo Jung was the only moment I felt her vulnerability in the entire drama. She trusted her husband with her heart. In that particular scene I pitied her a lot. What an astute girl to fall at the hands of a man like that...
• Kang Yeo Joo's previous marriage was fake 
• I thought it was a pretty cool twist that her fiancé could have been Ma Dong Kyun and how "romantically" it was portrayed when he saved her from the fire. She had known he was her father's men all along. I'm also glad his scarred face isn't entirely Kang Yeo Joo's fault. It was her father's orders that he saved her. I kind of pitied him for losing his fiancée because of this. I also loved his "Trouble Maker" scene.
• The fake fiancé was a fellow reporter who she was collaborating with to expose her father. The car explosion had nothing to do with Kang Yeo Joo, it was her father. 

[Verdict] Enthralling mystery with a flare of comedy among the scary. Watch a cheating husband be scared out of his wits. Watch a wife meticulously and menacingly hunt down the truth.