When The Phone Rings – K-drama Episode 11 Recap & Review

What-ifs

Episode 11 of When the Phone Rings starts Sa-eon thinking of the what-ifs. What if he confessed his love three years ago, soon after marrying Hee-joo? What if she agreed to give their marriage a real effort? However, there is only regret as we circle back to where we left off in the previous episode.

After Hee-joo told him not to come save her, Sa-eon still tried to track her down. In the meantime, Hee-joo crushes her car in an attempt to end everything.

By the time the police find traces of the car, it looks like a futile job. The car crashed into a guardrail and fell off a cliff into a mass body of water. The police assure Sa-eon they will start the search immediately.

Hee-joo’s family also arrive on the scene, overcome with worry and desperate for answers. Simultaneously, Ui-hyong shows up and gets into a fight with II-kyeong. While the chaos continues, Sa-eon notes that his mom is a no-show and asks the detective in charge to look into her whereabouts.

In the evening, Sa-eon drops by the family house to check Kyu-jin’s dash cam car. He discovers someone has wiped the dashcam and calls the detective. He asks the guy to get a warrant and search Kyu-jin’s car. Kyu-jin spots him and they confront each other.

According to Kyu-jin, she is no longer worried about her real son. Years ago, she lived in fear and desperation, thinking he drowned in the lake. Jang-ho lied to her that her son’s death was an accident. She looked for her son for years and thinks Sa-eon deserves the same fate.

The following morning, You-ri goes off script while reading the news and begs the public to help bring Hee-joo back. Later, she and Sang-woo drive to the site to look for Hee-joo. On the way, Sang-woo reveals that Hee-joo can speak, and You-ri looks forward to scolding Hee-joo and hearing her voice. They arrive at the site to find Sa-eon’s colleagues, but Sa-eon is nowhere in sight. He got a call and left to meet with the detective in charge.

After searching for hours, they still have not found Hee-joo, and everyone thinks they will find her body. However, Sa-eon is adamant they can’t give up until they find Hee-joo. The detective informs him that they couldn’t get a warrant for Kyu-jin, and Sa-eon offers a solution to this hurdle.

The scene cuts to Ui-yong holding a press conference, explaining how their son drowned years ago. He paints the picture of grieving parents who stumbled upon a homeless kid and thought it was fate. It is a moving story, if only it was true! Hyeok-jin takes the opportunity to call out Ui-yong on his lies and plays a recording of Do-jae, explaining how he met the kidnapper.

The scene alternates between Do-jae giving his testimony in prison and the press conference. Through the recording, Hyeok-jin links the kidnapper to the missing orphanage children, Paik Jang-ho to the cover-up, and Ui-hyong tries to stop the recording from getting out. However, a bigger problem arises when the police interrupt the press conference to arrest Kyu-jin over murder charges.

At the precinct, Kyu-jin is confident there is no evidence linking her to any murder. She assumes the police are referring to Hee-joo, but actually, she is being charged with Paik Jang-ho’s murder. It turns out the old man was wearing a ring with a camera while on his deathbed.

The camera recorded his last conversation with Kyu-jin. In the video, Paik Jang-ho admitted that Sa-eon is his son. He also refused to apologise for what she did to Kyu-jin’s son. In anger, Kyu-jin smothered him with a pillow. Sa-eon has been holding on to this evidence for years, plotting the fall of the Paik family, but now he is using it to save Hee-joo.

Kyu-jin refuses to admit she has Hee-joo and the real Sa-eon hidden somewhere. She tries to explain that Hee-joo serves no purpose to her, dead or alive. However, Sa-eon sees through her lies as he knows her hate for him runs deep. He is sure that she is keeping Hee-joo alive to torment him with the unknown.

In retrospect, he is right. When Hee-joo’s car hit the guardrail, it didn’t go over the cliff. Mr Min found Hee-joo and the kidnapper. Following Kyu-jin’s orders, he saved both of them and took them to the old mansion near the orphanage. While there, she locked the two in different rooms in the basement.

Hee-joo gained consciousness but refused to eat because she knew Kyu-jin’s endgame plan. She didn’t want Sa-eon to be tormented for years, looking for her. She would rather die than let Kyu-jin win.  As Sa-eon and Kyu-jin confront each other, the police discover Hee-joo’s location after restoring the dashcam footage. They all rush to the old mansion, with Sa-eon leading the way. All he can do as he drives to the old mansion is pray that Hee-joo holds on until he arrives.

Concurrently, Mr Min decides to go against Kyu-jin’s orders and frees Hee-joo once the former is arrested. He attempts to lock the kidnapper forever in the basement, but Ui-hyong shows up with a gun and orders him to open the door.

As Hee-joo runs into the woods, she hears a gunshot, trips, and passes out. Back in the basement, we see Mr Min lying down while the kidnapper and Ui-yong struggle over the rifle. In the end, Ui-yong sees himself in his son and lets go of the gun. The kidnapper shoots him, and the gunshot sound wakes Hee-joo.

The kidnapper starts chasing after Hee-joo, who is trying her best to live. She initially wanted to die, but now she misses Sa-eon and wants to see him again. She manages to hide and run towards the main road just as Sa-eon is pulling up to the house. He is shocked and relieved to see her.

As they embrace, the police also arrive. The kidnapper sees the police and hides behind a tree. Sa-eon carries Hee-joo to his car, and she informs him that the kidnapper is armed and alive. The police spread out to look for the kidnapper while Sa-eon opts to drive Hee-joo to the hospital. The main detective offers to escort Sa-eon while the others continue the search.

Unfortunately, the kidnapper appears in front of Sa-eon’s car as he drives off. He orders Sa-eon to get out of the car, and even though Hee-joo begs him not to, Sa-eon alights from the car. He asks Hee-joo to stay in the car and promises to put an end to everything. Once Sa-eon is out of the car, he tries to reason with the kidnapper. However, the kidnapper insists that Sa-eon must pay since he is Paik Jang-ho’s son.

He whispers something to Sa-eon, and whatever it is, it breaks Sa-eon’s heart. With teary, sad eyes, he looks back to Hee-joo in the car and seems completely defeated. The police arrive and surround the two men. 

The kidnapper seems unfazed and pleased with himself after seeing Sa-eon’s defeated expression.  He pulls his gun on Sa-eon; a gunshot is heard, and the scene switches to Hee-joo imagining a happy life with Sa-eon. She regrets never confessing her feelings for the past three years. She wonders why Sa-eon left her and what the kidnapper told him that fateful night. She keeps calling Sa-eon, but he never picks up.

The episode ends with Hee-joo getting an international call, and she eagerly picks it up. The caller on the other end doesn’t say anything, but Hee-joo thinks it is Sa-eon.

The Episode Review

Where do we even begin? What a wild, emotional roller coaster this episode was! So let us get this straight: Sa-eon is Jang-ho’s son. This means that Ui-yong is his brother, the kidnapper is his nephew, and Kyu-jin is his sister-in-law.

On top of that, there is a deeper, darker secret that the kidnapper told Sa-eon that made him leave Hee-joo. The twists in this show are so diabolical, and never in our wild theories did we see this coming! Our theory is that Paik Jang-ho was behind the accident that killed Hee-joo’s brother and put her life on a different course. Sa-eon might be staying away from Hee-joo out of shame and guilt over what his dad did.

That major plot twist aside, let us talk about Kyu-jin. She threw everything away to kill a dying man. Her hatred for him couldn’t let her sit by and watch him die peacefully. She made it her mission to give him an early appointment with the Grim Reaper.

To think Sa-eon knew this for years but kept it hidden is mind-blowing. He waited for the perfect moment to use this information to destroy Kyu-jin. There is also Ui-yong; he should have left Mr Min to lock his son in the basement until the police arrived.

In all these, we owe Sang-woo the deepest apologies. He was a good guy, but we suspected him way too much. However, it is a good thing that he is a good guy. He and You-ri make a sweet, cute couple.