What's Wrong with Secretary Kim: What's Wrong with Secretary Kim
October 31, 2023 5:41 AM - Season 1 (Full Season) - Subscribe
A high maintenance, narcissistic CEO takes his hard-working secretary for granted. When she decides to quit, he realizes how much he depends on her. As he attempts to change her mind, the relationship between them evolves, and they also learn more about their traumatic childhoods.
Dramabeans show page
MyDramaList show page
The Fangirl Verdict - flash review
The Review Geek Season 1 Review – THIS is how you write a romcom!: "What’s Wrong With Secretary Kim is a classic romcom K-drama. Released back in 2018, this office drama absolutely holds its own to this day, with excellent acting, an interesting premise and some solid hearty laughs. While the later episodes do tend to drag on a bit and the central mystery is painfully obvious to figure out, the mad chemistry between our two leads is more than enough to overshadow that. This is one of those rare K-dramas where an enthralling story doesn’t need to be the central part of a drama to knock it out the park. Sometimes the chemistry between actors and the comradeship is enough to propel a show forward – and Secretary Kim is a great example of that. .... This is a beautifully written romance and the acting is outstanding across the board. Sometimes a show doesn’t need a mind-blowing story to see it elevate to become one of the best K-dramas – and What’s Wrong With Secretary Kim is the best example of that. An absolute must-watch."
Kdrama Kisses review: "I do still think the actual back story itself was a bit thin overall though. I wish we could have went much deeper and that it could have been spaced better throughout the drama. We ended up with very little in the beginning, a pretty decent middle, we had a huge info dump episode that wrapped things up, and then it felt like the last few episodes were mostly filler. This left me feeling pretty bored in that last quarter as all of the tension evaporated. But for those who just like to see the main couple in plenty of cute scenes with some minor issues that get in the way each episode, this probably won’t be much of a problem. If you’re mostly in it for the romance, the relationship progression is solid, and the drama ties up everything in a lovely bow."
The KPop Hero review: "Overall, this drama constantly had me on the edge of my seat. The story and back stories are extremely compelling. It had the perfect mix of serious, cute, dramatic, and sexy. I was in love with absolutely every single second of it. Plus, I forced a number of my friends, father included, to watch it as well. For my favorite dramas of the summer, this one is definitely up there. If you want a fun, easy, enjoyable show to watch, this one is one to see."
Dramabeans show page
MyDramaList show page
The Fangirl Verdict - flash review
The Review Geek Season 1 Review – THIS is how you write a romcom!: "What’s Wrong With Secretary Kim is a classic romcom K-drama. Released back in 2018, this office drama absolutely holds its own to this day, with excellent acting, an interesting premise and some solid hearty laughs. While the later episodes do tend to drag on a bit and the central mystery is painfully obvious to figure out, the mad chemistry between our two leads is more than enough to overshadow that. This is one of those rare K-dramas where an enthralling story doesn’t need to be the central part of a drama to knock it out the park. Sometimes the chemistry between actors and the comradeship is enough to propel a show forward – and Secretary Kim is a great example of that. .... This is a beautifully written romance and the acting is outstanding across the board. Sometimes a show doesn’t need a mind-blowing story to see it elevate to become one of the best K-dramas – and What’s Wrong With Secretary Kim is the best example of that. An absolute must-watch."
Kdrama Kisses review: "I do still think the actual back story itself was a bit thin overall though. I wish we could have went much deeper and that it could have been spaced better throughout the drama. We ended up with very little in the beginning, a pretty decent middle, we had a huge info dump episode that wrapped things up, and then it felt like the last few episodes were mostly filler. This left me feeling pretty bored in that last quarter as all of the tension evaporated. But for those who just like to see the main couple in plenty of cute scenes with some minor issues that get in the way each episode, this probably won’t be much of a problem. If you’re mostly in it for the romance, the relationship progression is solid, and the drama ties up everything in a lovely bow."
The KPop Hero review: "Overall, this drama constantly had me on the edge of my seat. The story and back stories are extremely compelling. It had the perfect mix of serious, cute, dramatic, and sexy. I was in love with absolutely every single second of it. Plus, I forced a number of my friends, father included, to watch it as well. For my favorite dramas of the summer, this one is definitely up there. If you want a fun, easy, enjoyable show to watch, this one is one to see."
'What's Wrong with Secretary Kim' was one of the first shows I added to my watchlist when I first signed up on Viki, since it got mentioned a lot in reviews of more recent chaebol-lead rom-coms, and was in a lot of 'favorite kdrama' lists. After being kind of underwhelmed by some of the recent weekly-broadcast shows, I decided I it was time to give this one a go. I really enjoyed it. It was nice to see Kang Ki Young back in his usual comedy side-character mode as President Park after watching him play one of the big bads in 'Uncanny Counter 2'. And I think this was my first Park Seo Joon drama, definitely need to see more of his.
I just went back and listened to the 'Afternoon Delight' podcast episode on it, and they noted that how bonkers or not you find the backstory to be probably correlates with how many kdramas you've seen. For someone new to kdramas, it's completely bonkers, but if you've seen a bunch already then it's just the kind of thing you expect to see.
posted by oh yeah! at 5:43 PM on November 3, 2023
I just went back and listened to the 'Afternoon Delight' podcast episode on it, and they noted that how bonkers or not you find the backstory to be probably correlates with how many kdramas you've seen. For someone new to kdramas, it's completely bonkers, but if you've seen a bunch already then it's just the kind of thing you expect to see.
posted by oh yeah! at 5:43 PM on November 3, 2023
Goodness, just finished this drama. I felt the writers made a mistake by wrapping up the mystery with a third of the episodes still to go. The last four episodes were a slog. Park Seo-joon (ML) is charismatic as hell! Park Min-young (FL) definitely resembles her character in the webtoon source material, doesn't she? I thought about commenting on the neck-snapping shifts in tone (slide-whistle sound effects in one scene, suicide in the next), the painfully obvious product placement ("This canned coffee has the fragrance all Koreans love!"), and the overused trope of amnesia, but I guess those things are hardly surprising in a K-drama.
Also, I felt like they were riffing on Secret Garden, my favorite drama (same filming locations, even bringing in Lee Byung-joon to play the wedding dress tailor), but that show had so many more layers, and even with an extension of four episodes never ran out of material. I must admit that all the side characters were cute, though.
posted by jabah at 6:46 PM on November 11, 2023
Also, I felt like they were riffing on Secret Garden, my favorite drama (same filming locations, even bringing in Lee Byung-joon to play the wedding dress tailor), but that show had so many more layers, and even with an extension of four episodes never ran out of material. I must admit that all the side characters were cute, though.
posted by jabah at 6:46 PM on November 11, 2023
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posted by jabah at 9:21 AM on November 2, 2023