By Jae-Ha Kim
Substack
August 27, 2021
Seo Hi-Soo (played by Lee Bo-Young)
Jung Seo-Hyun (played by Kim Seo-Hyung)
↑Note: Korean names denote the surname followed by the given name.
If you found your child’s tutor trying on your evening gown — without your permission — would you:
- Fire her
- Fire her
or - Fire her
Me? I’d fire her. Not so with Hi-Soo, a retired actress married to the rich son of a chaebol family. Even though she knows the tutor overstepped her boundaries … by a lot … She allows herself to be manipulated into thinking she’s the one who’s being paranoid.
Like “Search: WWW,” “Mine” is a women-centric series centered around Hi-Soo, her sister-in-law Seo-Hyun and Ja-Kyung (the mysterious tutor, portrayed by Ok Ja-Yeon).
Here’s a character chart of the primary characters. NOTE: Skip over the following photo if you think seeing it might give you a spoiler. That said, the secret is revealed in the first episode, so I don’t think it’s a big deal. Also, this chart is from tvN via Newsen. (I added in the character names in English to make it easier for those who don’t read Korean.)
The series deals with the immorality of most of the central men. But the meat of this K-drama is dealing with the aftermath of their actions. The family patriarch cheated on his wife with a woman who he still mourns and grieves for decades after her death. His harpy of a wife can’t compete with her memory. Instead of divorcing him, and losing the social status and money of being married to a wealthy and powerful man, she mistreats his son, Ji-Yong (who will marry Hi-Soo and repeat his father’s philandering). Growing up as the family outcast, simply because of his birth origin, he grows up lacking love and a moral compass.
Hi-Soo is constantly told that Ha-Joon, the child she dotes on, isn’t her son, because she didn’t give birth to him. He is considered illegitimate, since he was born out of wedlock, before she and her husband ever met.
Hiding a child’s lineage is never a good idea. Children aren’t stupid. Ha-Joon knows how old he is and when his parents got married. That’s something his school friends’ parents gossip about as well. Lying about Hi-Soo having given birth to the boy makes no sense. As a top star, she would’ve been captured by paparazzi, which would’ve proved that she never looked visibly pregnant during the time she and Ji-Yong dated.
If they had been transparent with the child and explained prior to his having to answer questions from nosy classmates, he would’ve had the verbal wherewithal to say: My birth mother died and my stepmother raised me after marrying my dad.
The theme of who’s a real mother is reiterated throughout this series. Because Hi-Soo didn’t give birth to Ha-Joon, she isn’t considered his real mother by anyone. Even she is conflicted when the child’s biological mother enters the picture.
This series is filled with wonderful characters, some of whom you love to hate. For instance, the family matriarch is very annoying, as is her daughter (whose storyline borrowed liberally from the real-life Korean Air nut rage incident).
Lee Bo-Young’s Hi-Soo initially comes across as a people pleaser. But when she realizes she could lose her child, she shows the strength that she’s always had, but wasn’t supposed to show.
But this series belongs to Kim Seo-Hyung, whose portrayal of Seo-Hyun is commanding. Childless by choice, she gets things done, even if she has to twist the law every now and again. Strong, smart and beautiful, she conveys the longing for a love that someone in her position isn’t allowed to have.
Controversy: There was a segment of conservative Korean Christians in South Korea who decried the plot of “Mine,” which includes a lesbian subplot. Though the gay narrative between two men was played off for laughs (Ji-Yong’s older brother pretending to have a crush on one of the male servants), the very real feelings that Seo-Hyun tries to repress was said to be immoral by some netizens. The controversy may have subsided quicker, had Yoo Eun-Sung — the husband of actress Kim Jung Hwa, who played Seo-Hyun’s former lover — kept his mouth shut. Yoo basically said that while his wife played a role for a fictional series, they personally are against same-sex relationships. Yeah, that didn’t go over well with anyone, especially the LGBTQ community.
Airdates: Sixteen 70-minute episodes aired from May 8 to June 27, 2021 on tvN.
Spoiler Alert: Handsome, smart and charming, Ji-Yong (Lee Hyun-wook) is seemingly the perfect husband. In reality, he’s the devil incarnate. He attends private, underground fight clubs where he’s not satisfied until the victor kills his opponent. He brings in his own son’s biological mother into their home as the boy’s tutor. He was never loved by his chaebol father, biological mother (who was his father’s mistress) or his stepmother. And we later learn that he’s not biologically related to his father, either. His mother was pregnant with him by another man, but the chaebol was so besotted that he said he and his wife would raise her child as their own son. Earlier, his father had said that Ji-Yong would never be his heir. Of course, in the chaebol world, he would not leave his conglomeration to a man who didn’t share a drop of his own blood. All this makes viewers feel bad for Ji-Yong. But the fact is, he is a psychopath.
As for Ja-Kyung, Ha-Joon’s birth mother/tutor, she initially is presented as a crazy seductress. She and Ji-Yong have been having an affair for the past two years, before he decided to bring her into their household. His theory is that Ha-Joon being raised by his stepmother and birth mother is the perfect way for the child to grow up with all the love and attention that he himself had been deprived of as a youngster.
Ja-Kyung is initially presented as a sociopath. But she has an odd 180-degree change of heart after Hi-Soo miscarries. From that point on, she aligns herself with Hi-Soo and Seo-Hyun to seek revenge against Ji-Yong. It was a strange turnabout and I didn’t understand why her feelings would change. Yes, I can see her having sympathy for another woman’s misfortune. But I didn’t buy it. This woman wouldn’t have been overly distraught that her rival miscarried. Certainly not to the point of giving up her son. Again.
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