Your Honor (2024) – K-drama Episode 8 Recap & Review

Episode 8

Episode 8 of Your Honor begins with a flashback of the scene where Cheong-gang shows Chae-rim the video. He also says that his father was at home at the time of the hit-and-run and therefore can’t be the culprit. This makes Chae-rim rush over to So-young and tells her that it wasn’t Sang-taek but Ho-young who killed Sang-hyeon. Prosecutor So-young says that they need to focus on getting Sang-hyuk for now.

The scene shifts to the night Chae-rim and Pan-ho went drinking. Afterwards, the driver who picks Chae-rim up begins to attack her but she’s saved by So-young and a colleague. So-young decides to make it look like Chae-rim was killed.

The show comes back to the present where Gang-heon is speaking with Ho-young. When Ho-young gets an asthma attack, Gang-heon recognises the sound of his gasps. But he doesn’t let on.

Ho-young goes back home where Pan-ho tells him to go to the US again since Chae-rim could be on to them. Ho-young says that Gang-heon has told him to date Eun for a while again. Once again, Pan-ho asks Ho-young if he did it all on purpose. Pan-ho says he knew that Gang-heon would influence the law when it comes to avenging his son’s death, which is why he helped cover the crime up. But he can’t stand being an accomplice to intentional murder.

Ho-young retorts that Pan-ho was complacent enough when Sang-hyuk got away while his mother died. He accuses his father of always protecting the law and tells him to do it once more and make sure Sang-hyuk is punished.

In court, Cheong-gang confesses that he saw Sang-hyuk kill Sang-taek and the others. Afterwards, Pan-ho calls up the Chief Secretary of the Blue House, Kang Moon-seok.  They meet and Moon-seok says he can get the President’s approval once the Woo One trial ends. He hints that they want a maximum sentence for Sang-hyuk.

Afterwards, they plan to put Gang-heon in his place and make Pan-ho an Assemblyman in two month’s time. The next day, Pan-ho calls Mi-yeon and asks her if she’s sure about her plan. If ‘it’ doesn’t work, they’ll all die.

At the hospital, Eun wakes up to find Ho-young by her side. She figured out that her father has ordered him to be here and asks him not to hate her. He hugs her but we see that Gang-heon is watching them through the CCTV footage.

Pan-ho meets with Gang-heon to discuss how to move forward with Sang-hyuk’s case. Before he can do so, Gang-heon reveals that he knows Ho-young is the real culprit. Pan-ho is shaken but reveals that Sang-hyuk raped his wife, after which she killed herself. But he insists his son ran into Sang-hyeon by accident.

Pan-ho asks Gang-heon to turn Cheong-gang to their side by telling him Chae-rim is just using him to get to Gang-heon. After the trial, Pan-ho agrees to let Gang-heon punish him as he sees fit. But he begs him to let Ho-young live.

Gang-heon walks away wordlessly. But Mi-yeon’s men ambush their car, as she and Pan-ho had planned. Pan-ho rushes to call her and tells her to stop. The men back away, all while Gang-heon is cool as a cucumber.

Back at the prosecutor’s office, Cheong-gang asks Chae-rim if both of them will be safe even after the trial. She vows to protect him. When Cheong-gang steps out, Yi Hwa approaches him. He tells Cheong-gang that Pan-ho is the reason his family is dead. He asks if Cheong-gang can really trust Chae-rim and So-young.

Chae-rim herself comes out then Yi-hwa brings out people from the internal affairs department. Apparently, a witness isn’t allowed to stay with the prosecutor. Cheong-gang, who’s changed his mind now, goes off with Yi-hwa.

Meanwhile, Pan-ho meets Moon-seok again. He says he’s being pressured by Woo One and wants to enter the Blue House as soon as the trial ends. Moon-seok then shows him pictures of Pan-ho kneeling before Gang-heon. Still, he says he’ll try and speak to the VIP, referring to the President.

Cheong-gang is taken to meet Gang-heon and he naively asks Gang-heon to punish Pan-ho. As a result of all this, Cheong-gang takes his statement about Sang-hyuk back. He even accuses So-young and Chae-rim of feeding him lies. After the defence lawyer makes her speech against them, Pan-ho adjourns the court.

At his own offices, Gang-heon learns the details about Eun-hye’s case after requesting them. He is told that Sang-hyuk was accused of forcibly giving Eun-hye drugs and sexually assaulting her. Chae-rim was in charge of the case. Gang-heon was in prison at the time, which is why he didn’t hear of it. The person giving him all the details is none other than Chae-rim’s boss!

Chae-rim herself is pretty upset about how things turned out. She tells So-young that she will do something about it even if she has to play dirty.

Pan-ho comes home only to be attacked by Chang-hyuk. This is seemingly in retaliation to Mi-yeon’s attack on Gang-heon. After he leaves, Pan-ho gets a call from Chae-rim who demands to see him. When they meet, Chae-rim says she has witnesses and evidence that Ho-young intentionally committed murder.

She tells him to give Sang-hyuk a not-guilty verdict if he wants her to bury the information. Pan-ho steps aside and calls Chang-hyuk. When he returns, he asks Chae-rim if she’ll be able to stow him and Ho-young away, in a safe place. She says she will.

When Pan-ho gets home he puts the same question to Ho-young again. Was it intentional? He then says he gave in to Sang-hyuk’s first trial (the one about Eun-hye’s death) because he wanted to focus on Ho-young, who was still alive.

Ho-young says living like this is worse than death and that’s what he wanted Gang-heon to feel as well. When Ho-young says he would prefer that Pan-ho let him die, Pan-ho promises that he’ll keep Ho-young alive, no matter what at the end of Your Honor Episode 8.

The Episode Review

The truth about Ho-young has finally dropped and everyone knows. Your Honor Episode 8 looks at the ramifications of this while revealing how Chae-rim and So-young plotted to take Sang-hyuk down. There are so many characters involved now and interesting to see how the power dynamic shifts based on who’s holding the most cards. Pan-ho himself is pulled in several directions but his determination to keep Ho-young alive keeps him going.

It even brings out his more calculating side as we see when he tells Gang-heon how to turn Cheong-gang’s loyalties over to their side. Along with Chae-rim’s decision to blackmail Pan-ho, there are some intriguing power plays here. At the same time, the logic doesn’t always track.

For example, Mi-yeon’s plan to send a bunch of goons to kill Gang-heon without a single gun in sight was positively embarrassing. Also, she barely has any screen time now and it doesn’t make sense that someone like Mi-yeon would sit with her hands tied during all of this.

When it comes to the philosophical parts of the show, the father-son debates between Pan-ho and Ho-young are definitely more compelling than the debates between Pan-ho and Gang-heon. The reasons for Pan-ho letting go of his wife’s case contradict his son’s inability to get over it. His desire to see his son live ultimately led Ho-young to do create this mess in the first place. That final conversation between them was a great portrayal of the complexity of love, grief and revenge.