After Park Min-young of ‘Sungkyunkwan Scandal’, and Park Eun-bin of ‘Yeopmo’, it‘s Kim Ji-eun’s turn for ‘Check In Hanyang’.

It seems that Kim Ji-eun has properly inherited the lineage of ‘cross-dressing women’ characters in fusion historical dramas, which is a global box office hit formula in K-drama. In ‘Check In Hanyang’, which began airing on the 21st of last month, she comically portrays her bumpy daily life as a woman working at a guesthouse (hotel) Yongcheonru while disguised as a man, receiving hot attention from viewers both domestically and internationally.

The character Kim Ji-eun plays is Hong Jae-on, who becomes a servant at the guesthouse in order to uncover the secret of Yongcheonru manager Seol Mae-hwa (Kim Min-jung), which is intertwined with her father‘s death. While living together with his fellow servants, he goes by the name Hong Deok-soo. To show off his ‘masculinity’(?), he intentionally imitates a deep voice and adds “man” to the end of every sentence, making people laugh.

Viewers are praising him for naturally digesting the character with his seasoned control of tempo, even though the setting where he had to pretend to be a man could have easily been portrayed as excessive and awkward. In addition, he completely dispelled concerns that he was following in the footsteps of Park Min-young and Park Eun-bin in ‘Sungkyunkwan Scandal’, which became global hits with similar settings.

Kim Ji-eun, who challenged her first historical drama since her debut through ‘Check In Hanyang’, has risen to the position of a key leading character. Although he has built up his leading role in ‘Again My Life’, ‘A Thousand Won Lawyer’, ‘Mom’s Friend‘s Son’, he has been able to properly resolve the regret of having mostly remained in the role of the main character’s assistant or ‘sub-couple’ with this drama.

In line with this, he is also playing a central role in storytelling by developing his own story with all the main characters. Among the four servants in the drama, Kim Ji-eun is increasing the fun by having a love triangle with Crown Prince Bae In-hyeok and the inn‘s successor Jeong Gun-ju, and by building a friendship through bickering with Jae-chan. In the future, she will also create tension by opposing Kim Min-jung and Yongcheonru owner Kim Eui-sung.

Thanks to his performance, ‘Check In Hanyang’ succeeded in gathering a solid fandom in just four episodes. Some say that the drama is the ‘weakest’ because it has a lineup of young stars who are not yet well-known to the public, but it is writing a surprising turn of events by beating out highly anticipated works such as Go Hyun-jung’s ‘Namib’ and ‘Miss Granny’, a remake of the popular film of the same name, and maintaining the top spot on the ‘TV·OTT topicality’ charts.


Reporter Yoo Ji-hye yjh0304@donga.com