“Wait… Has the male lead always been this dumb?”
The 2005 MBC K-Drama My Lovely Sam Soon (also known as My Name Is Kim Sam Soon) has returned with a remastered “Director’s Cut” version in 2024.
The show was a huge hit then, achieving a peak viewership rating of 50% and an average rating of 36.9%. Kim Sam Soon (actress Kim Sun A), who didn’t like her “tacky” name and her “chubby” body, was not an average K-Drama female lead. Her twisted take on the Korean “Cinderella” rom-com genre garnered a significant response from female viewers—who found Sam Soom to be deeply relatable.
Research shows over 73 percent of Korean women believe they’re fat. And among those 73 percent, our heroine Kim Sam Soon exists. She’s a heartbroken 29-year-old woman. She didn’t go to college, got fired on Christmas, and has no boyfriend or a lovely car. She lives in harsh reality but still dreams like any other 29-year-old woman. She dreams of having a movie-like romance with her ideal man, but she knows it is unlikely to happen. When she buries herself in work, it feels like she can carry on without getting married and just travel around the world. But sometimes, her heart flutters to a kind man, and she starts to fear how time flies. She feels like she’ll be able to achieve all her dreams if she can just suddenly hit the jackpot. To all Sam Soons, we present you this romance. We hope you stay strong just like Sam Soon.
— Viki
The remastered version has been garnering a tremendous amount of attention as well, becoming one of the most popular new releases on the streaming platform Wave—except the reactions to the male lead, Hyun Jin Heon (actor Hyun Bin), have now become hostile.
In the original version, Hyun Jin Heon is a typical tsundere-style “as rude as he is rich” character whose violent behavior toward Kim Sam Soon was somehow interpreted as romantic and/or charismatic.
However, especially following the remastered version, viewers consider Hyun Jin Heon character to be the “biggest red flag” and, possibly, Hyun Bin’s “worst role to date.”
Hyun Jin Heon has always been a huge red flag… I never understood why people found him charming. I consider it Hyun Bin’s worst role to date. It’s the one K-Drama from his filmography that I always choose to skip.
— Netizen Comment
In one scene, one that has since been dubbed the worst case of Hyun Jin Heon being a menace in My Lovely Sam Soon, Hyun Jin Heon grows violent with Kim Sam Soon when she brings up his first love and ex-girlfriend.
The director, Kim Yoon Chul, knew Hyun Jin Heon would not sit well with viewers in 2024. The remastered version reinterprets the original 16 episodes into an 8-episode show to reflect current viewing trends. In this process, a lot of Hyun Jin Jeon’s scenes were omitted.
At a press conference, Kim explained that “making sense of the Hyun Jin Heon character was the most challenging aspect” of the remastering process.
Looking back and comparing 2005 to today, I wondered if Hyun Jin Heon would be accepted now. Back then, the stereotypical rich ‘knight in shining armor’ male lead sat OK with the viewers. But now, the character feels excessive. Because Hyun Jin Heon’s attitude is so far from today’s standard, I edited him out as much as possible without damaging the original too much.
— Kim Yoon Chul
Still, viewers slammed Hyun Jin Heon’s behavior, questioning themselves for ever having found him attractive for the crude personality.
- “Yeah, well, back then, aggressiveness was considered romantic. Like, forcing the female lead to kiss, pushing them into a wall, obsessing over them, etc.”
- “Stuff like this is all over older K-Dramas.”
- “Just a typical abusive boyfriend with anger management issues.”
- “Domestic violence.”
- “What a psycho, though…”
- “The director chose to remaster this in 2024. Criticism is inevitable.”
- “Sam Soon and Jin Heon didn’t belong together. Not in 2005, not in 2024… I think it’s only right that people are talking about it with more awareness now.”
- “I never liked this show. I couldn’t get myself to find Jin Heon attractive.”
- “Wait… Has the male lead always been this dumb?”
- “When I first heard that the director was omitting a lot of Hyun Jin Heon out, I wondered why… Now it makes sense, haha.”
- “I actually had this happen to me in real life and it traumatized me deeply. The show aired after I had it happen, so… I remember how everyone in my class fell in love with Jin Heon for some reason. I was the only one rooting for Sam Soon to stay single forever.”
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