“Falling for SoonJung” aka “Beating Again” (Korean Drama) Review
‘Falling for SoonJung’, also known as ‘Beating again’, stars
- Jung Kyoung-Ho as Kang Min-Ho
- Kim So-Yeon as Kim Soon-Jung
- Yoon Hyun-Min as Lee Yoon-Hee
- Jin Goo as Ma Dong-Wook
- Gong Hyun-Joo as Han Ji-Hyun
- Park Young-Gyu as Kang Hyun-Chul
- Lee Si-Eon as Oh Woo-Sik
- and many other great actors/actresses.
Kang Min-Ho, the boy
Kang Min-Ho (Jung Kyoung-Ho) is a happy little boy living a comfortable life. His father is the CEO of Hermia Group, a cosmetics company, and the family is well off.
All that changes when his father suddenly passes. Hermia Group is forcefully taken over by Kang Min-Ho’s uncle. Kang Min-Ho and his mother are robbed of their inheritance. Shortly after he also loses his mother.
Feeling bereft, Kang Min-Ho blames his father for being too kind. To him, this kindness made his father weak and vulnerable to be taken advantage of. He vows to never be like his father and to one day take revenge.
Kan Min-Ho, the man
Fuelled by resentment and driven by his wish for revenge, Kang Min-Ho grows up to become a tough and ruthless business man. All his time and energy go into planning Hermia Group’s downfall.
Now in his late twenties, Kang Min-Ho returns to South Korea to take revenge. While abroad, he has made a name for himself as the youngest director for Gold Partners, a global Merger & Acquisition firm.
Through careful manipulation, Gold Partners is now the major shareholder of Hermia Group, which is experiencing financial difficulties. Kang Min-Ho plans to make sure it bankrupts, and is sold off piece by piece.
As the director in charge of this merger & acquisition project, the fate of everyone within Hermia Group is in his hands.
Gold Partners assumes Min-Ho’s wish for revenge is the reason he is so eager to quickly finish this particular project.
But Min-Ho’s personal assistant and his doctor know, that is not the only reason. His doctor – an old friend of his fathers – discovered that Min-Ho has a incurable heart disease. His heart could give out at any moment and only a heart transplant can save him.
Aware that the likelihood of finding a matching heart in time is slim to none, Kang Min-Ho is anxious to complete his revenge before dying.
Kim Soon-Jung
Kim Soon-Jung (Kim So-Yeon) is the head secretary to Min-Ho’s uncle, the current CEO of Hermia Group.
Both management and colleagues alike admire her for her competence & professionalism; and she enjoys being a secretary despite its challenges.
Soon-Jung’s boyfriend – a detective – proposes to her and she accepts. Together they start planning their wedding. The Boyfriend and his father have been like her family since the passing of her own father several years earlier. Her mother passed when she was little.
Clash of Characters
Kang Min-Ho remembers seeing Kim Soon-Jung once when they were little. Soon-Jung’s father was the personal assistant to Min-Ho’s father, but ended up switching to his uncle’s side after Min-Ho’s father passed.
In Min-Ho’s eyes, this makes Soon-Jung the daughter of a traitor. And since she is currently working for his uncle, she herself is a traitor as well.
As a result, Min-Ho starts doing all he can to make her job difficult and to make her look disloyal to Hermia Group management.
After a unfortunate run-in with Soon-Jung’s boyfriend, he threatens to make the same loose his detective position. Unless Soon-Jung helps him with something. Seeing no way out, she agrees.
In the middle of everything, Kang Min-Ho suffers a heart attack due to excess stress and is rushed to the hospital. Soon-Jung accompanies him to the hospital but is then called away due to a personal emergency.
Shortly afterwards a matching heart becomes available and Min-Ho’s doctor performs a heart transplant surgery.
Every end is a new beginning…
After recovering from his surgery, Kang Min-Ho eagerly gets back to his revenge plan. But all is not as it was before.
Min-Ho notices small changes in his behaviour, that he cannot explain. Specially whenever Soon-Jung is around he now finds himself strangely drawn to her.
Kang Min-Ho continues to interact with Soon-Jung through work. Witnessing the unhappy nature of his uncle’s life, he slowly starts considering giving up on his revenge.
Maybe he was given a new lease on life for a chance to turn things around. He realizes there are innocent people working within Hermia Groups factories affected by his actions.
Min-Ho remembers how fond his father was of these people. He decides to stop the acquisition and instead make Hermia solvent again. But to do that, he needs to go up against his former employer, Gold Partners.
Can he trust Soon-Jung to help him along the way? How can he turn around a series of events that he himself started?
Kang Min-Ho will have to figure out this and much more in order to save Hermia Group.
Ode to the writers
Each character in “Falling for SoonJung” is written so well and consistent. Everyone has their little quirks, their strong points and their weaknesses. I love it when the writers create characters that seem real and human because they have these flaws or strange habits.
I would like to give a special mention to the fact that the main female character was written as strong and independent. The same goes for several other female characters within this drama. **applause**
Ode to the acting
Jung Kyung-Ho did a great job making this complex character come to live. Although I was barely aware of him at all before this drama, he quickly became one of my favourites.
Kim So-Yeon has been one of my favourite actresses out there for years now, because she always “sells” her character. I’ve seen her portray so many roles: spoiled rich princess, a tough police detective and now this strong secretary. All these characters were so different and yet she was so convincing every time.
Takeaway
‘Falling for SoonJung’ depicts yet again how greed, envy and revenge can be all-consuming. Through certain characters we can see how acting on these emotions causes so much pain and destruction.
Our main character also has to face the fact, that even if you turn away from this destructive path, there will still be consequences for any bad action taken up to that point.
Author’s personal note
Watching ‘Falling for SoonJung’ the first time, it took me about 10 minutes to be hooked on this drama. Why it took me so long to start watching it in the first place, is yet a mystery to me.
I believe though, that when it originally aired, this drama got drowned out by other, more popular dramas. Therefore it did not get the recognition that it deserves.
As you could probably tell, I had a real hard time holding back the ’fangirling’ on this one. I feared if I said wrote too much, there might be spoilers and did not want to ruin the drama for anyone. That being said, I hope you have a great time watching ‘Falling for SoonJung’.
I’m currently re-watching this drama for like the 5th time – I stopped keeping exact count watching it the first 3 times – and still am so in love with it!! **insert fangirl moment here**
If you have already seen it, I would love to hear your thoughts on it. Let me know in the comments below what you liked/didn’t like.
Until we drama again,
-Cee
