In Can This Love Be Translated?, Go Youn-jung and Kim Seon-ho fall in love in some of the most beautiful locations across the world, all while showing audiences exactly why to be loved is to be understood.
Last Friday, Netflix dropped all 12 episodes of Can This Love Be Translated?, the first K-drama from its 2026 lineup. The drama tells the story of actress Cha Muhee (Go Younjung) who becomes an overnight sensation after her role in a horror-comedy movie becomes a hit, and Joo Hojin (Kim Seonho), a reserved translator who keeps crossing paths with her.
If you’re on the fence about diving into a new drama, check out the full recap of the series below. Major spoilers ahead, so read at your own risk.
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Meet you at Enoshima
The show opens with a scene in Italy, where the world-famous actress Cha Muhee (Go Younjung) is wrapping up filming of the travel show Romance Trip with the Japanese actor Hiro Kurosawa (Sota Fukushi). As she gets ready to say her final goodbye, he surprises her with the confession that he’s loved her all this time. On the other side of the monitors, her interpreter Joo Hojin (Kim Seonho) makes sure the message has gotten through.
We then flashback to how Muhee and Hojin met a year before at a ramen shop in Enoshima, Japan. Muhee is there to confront her ex-boyfriend, who she believes left her for a Japanese woman. After realizing that Hojin is fluent in many languages, she enlists the help of this “human Papago” to translate everything she wants to say. Hojin reluctantly agrees to translate everything except her curse words.
The confrontation initially goes badly, but Hojin helps Muhee save face, and they end up spending the rest of the day together. Hojin tells Muhee that he goes to Enoshima every year on the birthday of the girl he fell in love with while traveling. While looking for the restaurant they’re supposed to have dinner at, Hojin receives word that this girl is back in Enoshima. Muhee encourages him to go after her, and they part on opposite sides of a train track.
Introducing Do Rami
Back in Seoul, Muhee suffers an accident on set while filming the movie The Quiet Woman. In the movie, she plays the zombie Do Rami, who whimsically scares everyone she meets and kills the man she loves. Muhee is in a coma for six months. When she comes to, she finds that the movie was a hit and she’s now famous.
Muhee enjoys the success, feeling like it’s finally “a festival just for her.” However, all is not well as she soon sees visions of Do Rami everywhere, taunting and threatening her. She meets Hojin again in front of her hotel room, where she is in tears from her encounters with Do Rami. He helps her communicate with a doctor, though this does little to stave off her hallucinations.
A trip with everybody’s Hiro
Despite freaking out during the audition due to her visions of Do Rami, Muhee gets cast in Romance Trip. Her costar is Hiro Kurosawa, a famous Japanese actor known for his prince-like image. Behind the camera, Hiro is far from the perfect prince everyone thinks he is. He initially dislikes Muhee because he doesn’t want to pretend to be nice to the “zombie” who doesn’t even recognize him.
Muhee convinces Hojin to come on Romance Trip as the interpreter, claiming he’s the only one who understands her enough to help her calm down if Do Rami shows up. While in Canada, Hojin protects Muhee from Hiro’s mockery. He mediates between Hiro and the crew and finds a way to appease him so that he’d cooperate and lay off Muhee.
The Jisun problem
As Muhee and Hojin get closer, one of the show’s producers gets called back to Korea and is replaced by Shin Jisun, the girl Hojin met in Enoshima. Hojin and Jisun meant to meet again, but when the day came, Jisun was already dating Hojin’s older half-brother, Jinsuk. Ever since then, Hojin kept his distance from her. One of the reasons why he agreed to work on Romance Trip was because the Canada filming would allow him to miss Jisun and Jinsuk’s upcoming wedding.
Meanwhile, unbeknownst to everyone, Jisun had actually called off her own wedding, as she realized that Jinsuk didn’t really want to get married; he was only going along with what Jisun wanted. While out filming, she gets a text from Jinsuk, asking for her forgiveness. Yongu, Muhee’s manager, accidentally reads this text and Jisun threatens him so he won’t tell anyone.
Miscommunication
Hiro and Muhee start to get along as cast-mates and maybe something more. While Hiro is genuinely developing a fascination with Muhee, Muhee’s cheerfulness is due to being around Hojin.
On a stroll in search of a waterfall, Muhee kisses Hojin. In her shock, she says Do Rami made her do it and avoids him for the rest of the trip. However, Hojin tells her that he’ll seriously consider her feelings. He just has to straighten out his feelings with Jisun first.
When Yongu tells Muhee that Jisun’s wedding is off, Muhee feels insecure that Hojin would end up choosing Jisun now that she’s single. She sabotages her own chances at happiness by telling Hojin that she hopes things work out with Jisun. Hojin takes this as a rejection and the two part ways again.
Family trauma
Muhee and Hojin cross paths again at a classical music concert. The night ends with the writer Kim Younghwan inviting Muhee to Hojin’s home. Hojin lives alone in a large house full of antiques and books left behind by his grandfather, who was a famous academic. His parents are divorced and living abroad, while his brother is often off traveling. In their absence, Mr. Kim often invites guests to tour the home, while also acting as a father figure to Hojin.
Muhee and Hojin patch things up. Muhee leaves Hojin’s home with the record that he was going to give her before they had their argument, but she only took the sleeve. Hojin drives to meet her with the record, but she doesn’t show up. Her aunt and uncle have come to visit her, as the press has figured out the connections between them.
Muhee’s parents died when she was a child, though she claims to have no memory of what happened to them. She was taken in by her aunt and uncle, but they were very unkind to her and she cut ties with them right after high school. Her relatives’ reappearance brings up painful memories she cannot bear to face, triggering the return of Do Rami.
Love lines
When Yongu learned about Jisun’s marriage getting cancelled, he mentioned that cheating would be the most direct way to end the relationship for good. Jisun started considering who to cheat with, taking Hojin off the table because she had loved him before. She ends up kissing Yongu. They spend a night together, and later start an official relationship.
Meanwhile, Hiro finds himself in Korea, looking for an explanation from Muhee. On the plane back from Canada, Muhee had woken up, said “I choose you.” and kissed him. When Hiro tells Muhee what she did, she has no idea what he’s talking about. Muhee realizes that Do Rami has been doing things without her knowledge. Meanwhile, Hiro hides that he’s heartbroken.
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Do Rami in Italy
When Do Rami is fronting, she does whatever Muhee is unable or cannot bring herself to do. She confronts Muhee’s aunt and uncle and flies off to Italy ahead of the Romance Trip crew. She flirts with Hojin since Muhee can’t bring herself to spend time with him ever since she stood him up. Hojin quickly realizes that he has to protect Muhee from Do Rami’s irresponsible actions, so he spends all night watching over her and brainstorming the best way to get her to disappear.
Because of her childhood trauma, Do Rami believes that Muhee can never be happy and can never be loved. Muhee loves Hojin but that love is merely a painful delusion, because once he finds out her secret, he will realize how unloveable she is.
Do Rami tells Hojin the truth of what happened to Muhee’s parents: her mother killed her father and was about to kill Muhee as well. Instead of pushing Muhee/Do Rami away like her aunt and uncle did, Hojin embraces her, showing her the kindness she had craved and searched for her whole life, all while believing she never deserved it.
Back to the start
An emergency location change leads the Romance Trip crew to film at Hojin’s mom’s winery in Italy. Muhee helps Hojin reconnect with his mother, who he hasn’t spoken to in 13 years. Hojin’s mom is getting married again years after separating from Hojin’s dad, and the Romance Trip crew attends. At the reception, Muhee tells Hiro her planned farewell speech for the last day of shooting. Hiro feels that the words are pleasant and polite, not meant for anyone special.
This brings us back to the first scene: Hiro’s confession. Muhee simply responds, “Okay. Thank you. Me too.” Later, she receives a message from the producer with a video of Hojin breaking down after witnessing Hiro’s confession. Muhee retreats into her mind and remembers all the time she spent with Hojin through the eyes of Do Rami. She finally decides to be happy and be with Hojin.
Together at last
In Korea, Muhee and Hiro watch the final cut of Romance Trip and talk about everything that happened. She realizes Hiro was sincere in his confession and takes responsibility for Do Rami’s actions. Hiro regrets not being honest with his feelings, but accepts Muhee’s apology. They part on good terms.
Jisun and Hojin have a similar talk. They both admit that they had liked each other back then, but with everything that had happened, they have both moved on and are now in happy relationships.
Yongu gets offered a job at a sports agency in the UK. Not wanting to leave Jisun behind, he meets her in Busan and asks to marry her. She decides to come with him instead to study abroad.
The end
Muhee’s aunt and uncle return one last time to tell Hojin about the truth of Muhee’s childhood. They reveal that the reason they had shunned Muhee for so long was because she looked exactly like the crazy woman who killed her husband and attempted to kill her child. Muhee realizes that Do Rami, a terrifying woman who looks like her and constantly tells her that she’ll never be happy or loved, had been a representation of her mother.
Her relatives also reveal that both her parents had actually survived and are still living abroad. Muhee decides to meet them, ending her relationship with Hojin. However, months later, she returns to meet him under the dark sky of Korea, waiting to see the stars.
What was your favorite part of Can This Love Be Translated?
Source: Netflix PH
