By: Cameron Tyo
August 19th, 2024
Spoiler Alert: This review could contain mild spoilers for the show “My Demon”
My Demon is a fantasy rom-com that aired on SBS TV from the end of last year to the beginning of this one, airing for sixteen episodes. It was written by Choi Ah-il and directed by Kim Jang-han and Kwon Da-som. This is the first fantasy rom-com I’ve watched regarding the many K-Drama outings I’ve seen. Many other K-Dramas have been written in this genre, but in the last couple of years, it has appeared that there have been fewer.
The show’s synopsis is quite simple. A seemingly ordinary man but an actual demon with supernatural abilities, Jeong Gu-won (Song Kang) has a chance encounter with the haughty heiress of a conglomerate and CEO of Mirae F&B Do Dohee (Kim Yoo-jung). After a few more chance encounters, something happens that causes Gu-won’s demon powers to transfer to Do Dohee. From that point onwards, Gu-won stays by Dohee’s side to ensure nothing bad happens to her while learning how to get back his powers from her, navigate the world without his powers, and, in the process, learn how to feel emotions like a human.
On the other hand, the members of the Mirae group are in cahoots as to who should be chairman/woman after a tragic event happened amongst the Noh family. The members doing so include Noh Seok-min (Kim Tae-hoon), Noh Soo-an (Lee Yoon-ji), Kim Se-ra (Jo Yeon-hee), Noh Do-gyeong (Kang Seung-ho), and Joo Seok-hoon (Lee Sang-yi). The K-drama shows multiple times the lengths that any of them would go in order to show authority over each other and the things they’d do to convince people to elect them as chairman/woman. Do Dohee, who was adopted into the family, must overcome dealing with the family’s complaints after a will reveals that she should take the place of chairman once the current one dies.
As this is going on, a masked serial killer is on the loose who seems to target people related to Do Dohee, including herself. Do Dohee, Gu-won, Seok-hoon, and many others end up trying to help find the serial killer’s identity and the reasons for their actions. These revelations lead to suspenseful and heartbreaking scenes.
This is all introduced in the first three episodes and from that point forward new plot revelations come up that move along the story in a seamless manner.
Topics from abuse and suicide are mixed into the story, typically within the scenes of the Noh family, to show how dysfunctional the family actually is and show how much the desire to want something can change a person for the absolute worse.
There is plenty of melodrama in this story, but as the genre suggests, it is also filled with comedy and romance.
For example, you have the employees at Mirae F&B like Shin Da-jeong (Seo Jeong-yeon), Han Min-soo (Park Jin-woo), Choi Jung-mi (Lee Ji-won), and Lee Han-seong (Hong Jin-ki), all of whom get themselves into wacky scenarios that might not have much relevance to the plot but help switch the mood after watching a scene much more serious-in-tone.
You also have the members of the Wild Dog gang. Watch the show to see their scenes. You won’t regret it.
On the other hand, you have characters such as Jin Ga-young (Jo Hye-joo) and Park Bok-gyu (Heo Jung-do), who work at the Sunwol Foundation with Gu-won and have previous ties with him. They both have their own struggles and things they’re dealing with, which often get them involved in the the more violent situations Gu-won gets himself in while trying to protect Dohee.
I thought the acting of the show was on point. You could sense how people felt based on their facials alone, and their actions only helped show it.
I really liked the character of Joo Seok-hoon, who is the nephew of Joo Cheon-sook (Kim Hae-sook). He wants to be the chairman just like her, but unlike the rest of his family, he is way less focused on doing so by any means necessary. When Dohee is in trouble, he makes helping her the priority. Throughout the show, he does some things that can be seen as problematic, but for the most part, he never does anything to hurt anyone but to help his loved ones. He is shown to be a red herring multiple times, but I’m glad they didn’t go the way of making him the villain.
I also really liked the family’s acting.
Do-gyeong is the son of Noh Seok-min and Kim Se-ra and tries to make his family proud by doing anything his father asks him to do, no matter how immoral it might be. He often fails and gets punished for it. He eventually contemplates how his life will go on, leading to developing many mental issues that cause him to do lots of things relating to the central conflict of the show, etc.
You can’t have the show without the main two leads.
I thought that Song Kang did a great job at not only playing a demon who basically had no personality, couldn’t feel about anything he did relating to deals, etc., into a caring individual who could feel things like urgency and sadness when the people he loved were in danger.
Kim Yoo-jung was able to play the part of a haughty heiress well but also played the part of a woman who truly cared for the people around her. She was often only seen as arrogant near her family to show she was just as capable of running the company as any of them, much to their disapproval.
The relationship between the two leads was one of the cutest I’ve ever seen on any show. I loved the funny and serious moments they shared together. Their different personalities meshed well on screen. I read that they won Best Couple at the 2023 KBS Drama Awards show, and I can see the reason why.
The cinematography does its part to capture the fantastical elements of the show that are set in, most often or not, a regular backdrop of a bustling city in an awe-dropping way.
And the soundtrack! It not only helps make the romantic moments feel intimate and obviously beautiful but also makes the tragic event that happens in the show feel real. It is as if you witnessed something in person along with the person who was impacted.
I cried so many times during the events of the show that I might not have to if there wasn’t any music playing.
There were a few questions I thought were left unanswered regarding a couple of scenes showing Gu-won in a past life, so to speak, but without giving away any spoilers, I can’t really reveal them. I just thought they could’ve added a couple of extra scenes to quickly reveal answers to them.
The show itself was predictable, more often or not, but being mostly a rom-com, it didn’t bother me much. I watched the show in three days and had an amazing time doing so. There were lots of things about the general story that I didn’t mention in this review to prevent major spoilers. But if you are a fan of K-dramas or even just fantastical rom-coms, I think you should give this one a chance. I’m sure you won’t be disappointed.