By Jae-Ha Kim
KOCOWA
November 16, 2021
By now, you’ve all heard that a slew of South Korean celebrities were in Los Angeles earlier this month to attend the Los Angeles County Museum of Art + Film gala, right? After the black tie event, Lee Min Ho joined Lee Jung Jae (“Squid Game,” “Triple“), Lee Byung Hun (“All In,” “Mr. Sunshine”) and Korean American vocalist Eric Nam at Koreatown’s Hodori restaurant to enjoy a late-night meal.
Min Ho in Los Angeles
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Fans who spotted Min Ho at the LACMA event and at Hodori said he was as nice as can be. Video footage shot by fans show him stopping on the red carpet to wave to them. He even came by the barricades to chat with them a bit. One fan noted that he was the only celebrity that evening to spend that much time with his fans.
Huntington Beach
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When Min Ho posted this photo on his Instagram account, my spidey senses went off immediately. Why? Because he was walking around California’s Huntington Beach. You may be thinking, “So?” But all the diehard fans of “The Heirs” knows the relevance. Huntington Beach is where some of the K-drama’s most iconic scenes were filmed.
“The Heirs” Revisited
You’ll next see Lee Min Ho as the male lead in the upcoming Apple TV+ K-drama, “Pachinko.” And you’ve probably already watched him in “Boys Over Flowers,” “Personal Taste,” “City Hunter,” “The Great Doctor,” and “The King: Eternal Monarch.” But for many fans, “The Heirs” was the gateway series that introduced the handsome actor to them.
In the 2013 classic K-drama, Min Ho plays Kim Tan, one of the richest and most popular boys in high school. I saw Kim Tan as a continuation of Gu Jun Pyo, the morally ambiguous character Min Ho portrayed in “Boys Over Flowers.” Once again, he stars as a rich and handsome teenager, who isn’t above bullying others. But here, his character has a conscience and a sense of right and wrong. When he asks new peers if he had ever bullied them in the past, you get the idea that the boy truly feels shame for having behaved like his other privileged classmates.
Min Ho is one of South Korea’s biggest stars and “The Heirs” shows why he’s so beloved. Besides his obvious good looks, the actor has a knack for making unrelatable characters relatable. Paired with Park Shin Hye (who portrays his love interest Cha Eun Sang), Min Ho adds subtle nuances to the rich boy/poor girl cliche that makes his character endearing and compelling.
My big woe is that during a trip to Seoul a few years back, I had collected a few coffee cup sleeves at A Twosome Place that had Min Ho’s face plastered on them. I’m not sure what happened, but I can’t find my collection anymore. But there’s no sense in crying over that, when I can just re-watch “The Heirs” again. Join me?
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