'Pro Bono' Episodes 7-8 Recap: What Is The Real Big Case Of This Show? 

Pro Bono is a K-drama that focuses on the downtrodden, just like most other law dramas. It’s got some interesting themes, and despite a slow start, I think I’m finally beginning to appreciate the show a little bit. I must talk about Jung Kyung-Ho’s tribute to his girlfriend, thanks to the “Gee” dance move he does in this episode. Love that she’s also playing a lawyer right now in another popular show airing on Netflix. These two episodes focus on how the law should be on the side of those suffering under the guise of family. Additionally, it focuses on the life of an idol, a class of public figure who often have their lives ruined thanks to people thinking that not only are they stars, but they also have to be perfect dolls. This allows no room for error but also immediate criticism if anything goes wrong. Anyway, with that said, let’s jump straight into episodes 7 and 8.

Spoiler Alert

Episode 7 of Pro Bono begins with Gi-Ppeum telling Da-Wit that he’s innocent because, after watching the video multiple times, she’s realized that Da-Wit was probably drugged on the day he was meant to take a bribe, i.e., he was basically unconscious, and so she now believes in him again, meaning she’ll help him prove that he’s innocent. On the other hand, Oh tells his daughter that he plans on replacing her if she doesn’t disband the pro bono team. This kind of comes out of nowhere, and the only excuse is that he wants the firm to be profitable, but the team’s only got Da-Wit a little while ago, so why the rush to make changes? I don’t know. Anyway, Da-Wit hears about what Oh has said and immediately rushes to see him. He makes a bet: he’s going to steal the richest clients from a rival company, and if he succeeds, the team remains as it is, and if they fail, Da-Wit will leave with no questions asked. 

There are two main cases in these two episodes. One is that of the idol Elijah, and the other is that of Ji-Hye, an intellectually disabled woman whom Yeong-Sil is looking after. When Elijah walks into the office, the environment shifts drastically. Not only is this a big opportunity, but some of the members of the team are also massive fans of her. Elijah doesn’t seem to mind and agrees to work with them, despite the nature of the team. There’s a video floating around of her abusing her power by flipping out on 3 school kids, all fans, essentially stalking her with a camera in the middle of the night while she was leaving her boyfriend’s place. This has gone viral after a YouTuber started to harass Elijah by using this video as evidence of her being a black sheep of the country. 

Meanwhile, Da-Wit has to defend himself, because the team is scared of what’s happening to them. Da-Wit tells them about the video and why he quit being a judge and joined the “Pro Bono” team. The gang decides to have a meeting without him and Gi-Ppeum, who they’re upset with, because she knew and didn’t say a thing to them. But the conclusion is that he’s a good person, so he’s likely innocent, so until proven otherwise, they’ll trust in him. This case is a win for Da-Wit, because there’s a meeting with the rival Myeong-Hun, and he ends up losing the client after asking her to cry “prettily” in order to be forgiven, while Nan-Hui, a huge fan of the idol, defends her as innocent. Additionally, Elijah remembers Nan-Hui from a fan meeting, so now they have a special bond. I suppose that counts as one client stolen, no? 

The trial against the YouTuber, Yeong-Suk, begins, and the argument is that suing her would count as censorship, because it would be withholding information from the public. But ironically, the public that she keeps talking about in her defense is nowhere to be seen helping her or siding with her. Turns out, the comments on her videos against Elijah have all been from her own fake accounts. While Elijah does defend herself, she’s also agreed to pay the students compensation, because she’s a good person. She asks Yeong-Suk to say all the things she said in her videos in person, but the woman stays mum. The ending of episode 7 takes a different turn, though. Ji-Hwan tells Da-Wit that it was Elijah’s mother, the CEO of KT Entertainment (Elijah’s management company), who leaked information about her boyfriend to him. 

In episode 8, Ji-Hwan drops the news that Elijah’s boyfriend is cheating on her. When Da-Wit and Gi-Ppeum go straight to the source, Jin-Hui, Elijah’s mother, says she did it out of love because she worries for her daughter. It appears Jin-Hui’s been doing this for a long time, and all of Elijah’s boyfriends have been falsely chased away, with her not being at fault. It appears Elijah’s brother, also the director of the company, is embezzling money and using Elijah’s name for it. This includes having taken out insurance in her name. This is all because his daughter, So-Yeon, is very sick. Meanwhile, Da-Wit lets Elijah know all of the information he’s found out, and she decides to sue her mother’s company. Gi-Ppeum offers her boarding in her own place, and Elijah even helps her deaf parents at their cafe. Meanwhile, Yeong-Sil’s client, Ji-Hye, also gets to meet Elijah, and the latter finds out about how she’s being abused by her own uncle. 

Things are further messed up when Jin-Hui takes the blame for the embezzlement, and since it’s a direct lineage thing, Elijah can’t sue her own mother. There’s an “Exemption of Crimes by Family” law, and the same thing leaves Ji-Hye vulnerable to being abused by her uncle. Elijah wants to use her position of power to help Ji-Hye. But the bigger problem in all of this is that, if Elijah becomes the client, she’s penniless, while KT Entertainment was paying the company, which is why Oh is certain Da-Wit is leaving the company soon. 

But owing to his pure heart, Da-Wit decides to stick with the “fools” and agrees to take on the case anyway. Even Jun-U agrees to side with him on the condition that he wins without fail. Meanwhile, Jung-In uses her father’s own tactics against him and threatens to expose him. She finally seems to impress him (lame). But things turn crazy when Myeong-Hun makes Elijah reveal that she had an abusive father, whom her mother saved her from, but now she’s trying to use the law against this same mother, who always took care of her. Now, earlier in the episode, Myeong-Hun had called Elijah “man-obsessed,” but that’s more true of her mother, who has a boy toy, whom Da-Wit has found out about and uses against her. Finally, Elijah has nothing more to say but that she just wants her contract cancelled, and she wants to live an independent life. More importantly, this law isn’t just hurting her, but her fans, too, like Ji-Hye, so she wants to make a difference for them since she has the power too. Even Myeong-Hun gets annoyed by his client after all of this and leaves her. 

At the end of Pro Bono episode 8, a month has passed, and the Court reveals that the Exemption of Crimes by Family has been cancelled, and Elijah’s mother gets arrested. We can imagine this helps in Ji-Hye’s case, too. This means Da-Wit actually won, but his problems are far from gone. This is when the big reveal of the show comes: Jae-Beom tells Gi-Ppeum that Da-Wit, when he was a judge, killed his father by cheating him in his trial. Whether it was some sort of misunderstanding or someone else messed up and made it look like Da-Wit did it, we don’t know. On the other hand, it could just be that Da-Wit did make Jae-Beom’s father out to be the bad guy, because that was true, but the dude thinks he manipulated the trial. Anyway, we’ll have to wait to find out.