Bad People in the K-drama Industry

Recently, I read a book, "Monsters: What Do We Do With Great Art by Bad People?" by Claire Dederer. This question is always on my mind while watching a kdrama with an actor who said something or did something bad.

The book didn't come with an answer or calculator on how we should treat these kinds of things, but as a society, shouldn't we hold some of those people accountable?

Just to make sure, I'm not telling anyone what to do either. Support who you want to support, but we should be educated about their wrongdoings, is my standpoint. There are actors in this post that I will never watch dramas with, and others who will be on my watchlist.

Nobody is perfect, and it's your choice to make, at the end of the day.

When someone says we ought to separate the art from the artist, they're saying. Let the work be unstained. But that's not how stains work. We watch the glass fall to the floor; we don't get to decide whether the wine will spread across the carpet. - Claire Dederer

Bad press. Not Me

If you are in drama spaces, you will see the news of actors who have done bad things, said something, and the hardest question arises: should I show support for the drama?

Where do we draw the line? Is it when an actor says something out of stupidity, misogyny or by accident?

Park Seo Joon has come out and said that he wants his wife to stay at home with the kids, and made weird remarks that tall women are fine living alone, and skinny, short women are his type because they make him worry. KoiMoi

In 2013, Kim Young Kwang commented about how he thinks thick calves on women are ugly, and how he looks at people's physical appearance and says that they don't match him.

Ahn Bo Hyun was exposed for following controversial anti-feminist YouTube channels. Kdramastars

These are just three examples, but there are way more actors who said something misogynistic. The link to the Kdramastars article has a few more actors with statements about what they did.

On one hand, you can comment: it was so long ago that their opinion might have changed. Kim Young Kwang said it a very long time ago, Park Seo Joon was just stating his preference for wanting a stay-at-home wife. And what do we care what Ahn Bo Hyun is watching in his own time?

Is it fair to cancel them? Is it fair to the viewers who watch their predominantly romance dramas, and know that they are misogynistic assholes? (Not only talking about those three examples)

Does this influence whether you'll watch more of their dramas?

• 0%Yes, I still watch their dramas
• 0%I would try to avoid their projects
• 0%No, blacklisted for me

For now, the harshest sentence an actor could get is when the audience finds out that they were a bully. Rarely does anyone get back from it if proven that it was right.

Kim Dong Hee was a rising star, starring in a web series "A-Teen", when he later had a big break on "SKY Castle" and was a main lead for "Extracurricular". Jobs kept coming, and his dramas seemed to be doing well until he was accused of school-bullying.

It turned out to be true, and the actor admitted it. Surprisingly, cancelling worked for him, of course, if he doesn't come out ten years later like some others. NME

There are also more interesting cases, for example. Cho Byeong Kyu got accused of bullying when he studied in New Zealand. Two of the posters deleted it, and another one admitted that it was a lie.

It didn't stop with that, as the actor sued one of the posters for defamation. The judge said there wasn't enough evidence about the poster lying, and he might have deleted it because Cho Byeong Kyu's team intimidated him. Koreaboo

This has sparked even more hate towards the actor, but he still has work lined up ("Paradise" should premiere sometime in 2026, and in 2025, "A History of Losers" came out).

In the same drama, "A History of Losers", Song Ha Yoon was cast, who also had the same accusations. The actress insists that she didn't do it, but more should come out as the former classmate vowed to go to court with the case. Korean JoongAng Daily

Obviously, with these two being the main stars, people were not happy. The drama was put on hold for 3 years and was only released last February.

The drama aired without any noise and was quickly forgotten.

What about others? Situations where one actor does something bad and now everyone else suffers sucks.

For a lot of people, a line might have been drawn here. At least we can hope, but looking at the K-drama industry, there is another level to that: criminals.

The old man, number 1 from "Squid Games season 1", has sexually assaulted a woman. Somehow, in this case, he was successfully cancelled. Maybe because he wasn't very well known before this drama, maybe because he's an old, ugly man whom people cannot bother to defend.

After this news got out, people started looking into other cast members to find that the male lead, Lee Jung Jae, also has assault charges, DUI and some other past scandals. Tiger Times

This man is still thriving in the kdrama community. Getting thirst edits, he's handed more work, and it seems like nobody actually cares.

The late Kim Sae Ron's career was shattered into pieces after her DUI, but we love to see a man with the same thing and more still thriving. Neither of them did a good thing, but we should keep the same standards for both of them.

A bit different situation, but also leaves a bad taste in people's mouths is Lee Jin Wook. He was accused of raping a woman, but was found not guilty as there wasn't sufficient evidence to claim it was unconsensual. Yonhap News Agency

He is cast in a lot of dramas, and he has quite a fandom which protects him from the 'haters'. Lee Jin Wook was found not guilty, so why do people keep bringing it up?

That needs a nuanced conversation about how women are not believed, what kind of violence there needs to be put on the woman to have evidence that rape has happened. What about when that man has a lot of power?

South Korea is known for being lenient to rapists (One look at the Burning Sun scandal, Jung Joon Young, for raping and filming unconscious women with dozens of pieces of evidence, got only 5 years in prison).

Not sufficient evidence also doesn't mean he is completely not guilty. However, Lee Jin Wook is not an old, ugly man who got big with one project.

Time to cancel?

Going back to the line of not supporting criminals and the shows that they have done. There is this one ridiculous example.

A drama, "Taxi Driver" is well known for being about the bad guys and their asses getting kicked. They were the first to do an episode on the Burning Sun scandal; they deal with hard topics and have a satisfying ending. The hope that the world could be a better place after a vigilante kicks some asses is one of the points that makes the drama good.

So imagine, when this drama puts an actual criminal in it.

Is this some kind of 4th wall breaking? The criminal in real life, Lee Kyung Young, is also a bad guy in the drama, so is this a meta way of saying something about him?

Lee Kyung Young was convicted of prostitution of minors. He also has a lot of assault cases surrounding him. Everyone knew he had done wrong, as he was even suspended from appearing on KBS, EBS, and MBC for over 10 years.

He has appeared in a lot of dramas as a villain, but it's quite ironic that a show like that puts him in a position where a bad guy can earn some money.

But we see time and time again that people’s reputations and livelihoods remain firmly intact even after their wrongdoings are exposed. People and groups can and often are called out, yet they remain protected by the structures of our society – like the patriarchy – enough to hold onto their high-profile jobs or keep getting booked for gigs. - Maledine Lo-Booth

If we're talking about the actors that we see all the time, it's time to bring the directors too. They are the ones casting them, and they're the ones being monsters.

We cannot put all the fault on the viewers for not boycotting the show for supporting the actor's appearance. They are not the ones who put him there.

Directors to blame?

"Squid Game" creator Hwang Dong Hyuk has put many criminals in his show. Above-mentioned Lee Jung Jae and Oh Young Soo. Song Young Chan, who paid a minor to have sex with him, and Oh Dal Soo, who was accused of sexual harassment and was suspended from acting.

However, we can perfectly see how much the director doesn't care about any of that.

"Song Young Chang had already appeared in so many projects that I thought he was an actor whose problems had largely disappeared. He caused trouble about 20 years ago, and he had already appeared in numerous projects in the interim without any issues. Oh Dal Soo had also already made a comeback, and I thought he suited the character. I hadn't even met him before, but I thought his acting and image would suit the role of Captain Park. There was no particular intention behind bringing him back." - Hwang Dong Hyuk. Dailyline

It really makes you question, is it that hard to find an actor who is not a criminal? Yes, they could be a good fit for the role, but there might be some other people, too.

He has Netflix money to cast anyone, and he's doing THIS.

The success of the drama "The Glory", which is a revenge story about a protagonist who was severely bullied in high school, exposed director Ahn Gil Ho as a bully himself. He physically assaulted middle school students from another school when he was in high school. The Korea Herald

"The Glory" perfectly shows how cruel kids can be, and how the victim can suffer for such a long time. And the biggest irony is that the director and actress, who portrayed the bully (Kim Hi Eo Ra), were both accused of it themselves.

Maybe that's why it became such a success. Maybe that's why it's good when "Taxi Driver 3" also lets a criminal act as himself.

It makes you wonder if it's because those people have some kind of power behind the scenes to get roles, or most of them, like director Hwang Dong Hyuk, don't care.

"The ambition and the finishing: These are what make the artist. The artist must be monster enough not just to start the work, but to complete it. And to commit all the little savageries that lie in between." - Claire Dederer

I want to add that these are just some people I picked to write about, and there are many more examples. You can see that there are not many women mentioned, but let's be honest, they get more scrutinised with simpler stuff than these men, who actually committed a crime.

It really makes you wonder how much support you want to give to a person you know nothing about...