bodyType

customContents

entityId

entityUuid

articlePageQuery

filter

article

articleBaseAdvertisingInfoArticle

articleListArticle

articleSeoArticle

helpersCheckIsPostiesArticle

hooksArticleAcknowledgementGateOverlayArticle

hooksTrackPageViewArticle

hooksContentInterestArticle

articleLinkingDataContent

hooksAmpRedirectArticle

articleSchemaContent

liveArticle

advertZone

sentiment

contentLock

topics

types

sections

moreOnThisArticles

urlAlias

commentCount

authorLocations

authors

corrections

sponsorType

displaySlideShow

multimediaEmbed

printHeadline

seriesContainer

socialHeadline

headline

flag

firstTopic

glossary

flattenTypeIds

publishedDate

additionalInfoBoxes

quizIds

images

image

relatedLinks

relatedNewsletters

__typename

createdDate

sponsor

paywallTypes

pdfFiles

seriesReverseOrder

series

disableOffPlatformContent

published

updatedDate

summary

subHeadline

body

keywords

readingTime

customTimezone

liveContents

Pierce Conran

This article contains minor spoilers.
3/5 stars
After overcoming a midseason wobble, bubbly Korean romantic comedy series Woori the Virgin came to an end by delivering exactly what it promised on the tin.
The show’s main promotional poster featured Woori (Lim Soo-hyang) in a wedding dress running a marathon. This coruscating image eluded us all season, but it’s precisely what happened in the show’s finale as our intrepid and innocent protagonist jumped a few eleventh hour hurdles to secure her inevitable happy ending.


Love triangles are exceedingly common in Korean dramas – always with two men – but for the most part it’s pretty clear who is going to be win the heroine’s affections when all is said and done, with the actions of the vanquished male generally serving as a way to push the main male co-star to dig deep and show his true feelings.
Woori the Virgin emphatically broke that trend by presenting two very different suitors who entered the finale stretch of the show neck-and-neck with an equal claim to victory.
Woori the Virgin midseason recap: K-drama loses momentum
Romantic comedies aren’t known for generating a lot of tension, but the photo finish here was more pulse-pounding and unpredictable than most of the thrillers that have graced our screens of late.
Dependable detective Lee Gang-jae (Shin Dong-wook) was the man Woori, a TV scriptwriter, started the show with. Her boyfriend of two years, he was always there for her, protecting her from wayward forces and her innocence from his own physical impulses.
However, Gang-jae was so pure and sexless that when Raphael (Sung Hoon), her long- lost first kiss, returned, he was immediately a threat. And that was even before Woori was mistakenly artificially impregnated with his child.

Swayed by Raphael’s doting affection for her and their unborn child and disappointed by Kang-jae, Woori eventually switches partners. Raphael breaks out the big guns with an engineered romantic getaway to South Korea’s Gangwon province, a piano serenade in a private restaurant, and eventually a dazzling flash mob dance proposal, which we saw him train for when Gang-jae earlier trailed him to a secret location.
This was the second carefully orchestrated proposal that Woori received in the series, and it prompted her second refusal, maintaining the narrative’s perfect symmetry of seemingly ideal yet frustrated would-be lovers.
Meanwhile, everything else in Woori’s life is going pretty well. She’s been promoted to head writer on her show, the scenario of which helpfully aligns with her own situation, allowing her to gain some perspective.

She has also gained a father in campy star Choi Sung-il (Kim Su-ro), and her bond with her mother, Oh Eun-ran (Hong Eun-hee), and grandmother Seo Gwi-nyeo (Yeon Woon-kyung) is as strong as ever.
There’s a brief medical scare when Woori develops appendicitis and worries how her treatment could affect the baby, but after deciding to keep the baby early in the show, she has no qualms about her impending motherhood. In fact she doesn’t seem to feel one way or another about it.
The people with real problems are those around her, as Gang-jae’s investigation into the murders connected to the Diamond Medical Foundation run by Raphael’s father finally takes shape late in the series. The haphazard case takes over the narrative for a few episodes, occupying most of the screen time for Gang-jae, the characters at the foundation and Raphael’s ex-wife, Lee Ma-ri (Hong Ji-yoon).
8 new Korean drama series to look out for in June 2022
In his search for the elusive “Chairman Kim”, Gang-je is only too happy to place suspicion on Raphael, but the real culprit is finally revealed, and turns out to be a character that we hardly could have been expected to notice before then.
There’s a genuinely exciting moment when Woori and Raphael’s father (Joo Jin-mo) need to be saved. The investigation thread wasn’t particularly meaningful for Woori’s character, but it was very significant for Gang-jae and Raphael, as it brought the romantic rivals together.
Their macho peacocking suddenly turns into camaraderie, and this makes it very difficult not to root for both of them to win Woori’s affections.

Woori the Virgin never quite recaptured the dizzy inventiveness and visual flair of its opening episodes, but it eventually settled into a groove that was probably more sustainable in the long run.
Its playful teasing of soap opera conventions never completely disappeared, but rather than remain a show that cheekily alluded to the overwrought silliness of the format, it was ultimately more comfortable assimilating those codes and becoming one.
This inconsistency also extended to the show’s varied narrative threads, as some were summarily dropped after they’d achieved some other function.

Woori’s mother Eun-ran’s reunion with her father, Sung-il, was briefly clouded by the emergence of Eun-ran’s boyfriend, Jung Hyun-sik (Ahn Shi-woo), while Gwi-nyeo started dating Jung Chun-sam (Jang Yong-bok). When the Jungs are revealed to be father and son, it provides an out for Eun-ran to go back to Sung-il, but Gwi-nyeo’s romantic dalliance ends as well.
What remains is wrapped up very neatly in a celebratory finale with enough smiles and spirit to almost make us forget about the show’s missed opportunities.
Woori the Virgin is streaming on Viu.


Netflix K-drama Resident Playbook midseason recap: Hospital Playlist spin-off lacks stakes

K-drama The Haunted Palace: Bona, Yook Sung-jae lead spirited period drama

Netflix K-drama Weak Hero Class 2: Park Ji-hoon back for school fight drama sequel

Netflix K-drama Heavenly Ever After: Kim Hye-ja, Son Suk-ku lead afterlife fantasy romcom

Korean drama reviews

K-drama review: Woori the Virgin – bubbly romcom starring Lim Soo-hyang recovers for a romantic photo finish

Lim Soo-hyang in a still from Woori the Virgin., in which she plays the title role.

Shin Dong-wook as Lee Gang-jae in a still from Woori the Virgin.

Sung Hoon (left) as Raphael and Yeon Woon-kyung as Woori’s grandmother Seo Gwi-nyeo in a still from Woori the Virgin.

Kim Su-ro (left) as Woori’s father, Choi Sung-il, and Yeon Woon-kyung as her grandmother in a still from Woori the Virgin.

Sung Hoon (left) as Raphael and Lim Soo-hyang as Woori in a still from Woori the Virgin.

Netflix K-drama Alchemy of Souls: Jung So-min, Lee Jae-wook in CGI-heavy fantasy action romance that offers a magical mix of genres

Jung So-min as Nak-su/Mu-deok in a still from Alchemy of Souls.

Lee Jae-wook as lead character Jang Uk in a still from Alchemy of Souls on Netflix, the latest Korean drama series from writers Hong Jung-eun and Hong Mi-ra.

Jung So-min (left) as Nak-su/Mu-deok and Lee Jae-wook as Jang Uk in a still from Alchemy of Souls.

Minhyun as Seo Yool in a still from Alchemy of Souls.

Minhyun (left) as Seo Yool and Yoo In-soo as Park Dang-gu in a still from Alchemy of Souls.

K-drama Jinxed at First: Seohyun, Na In-woo in cutesy fantasy romcom that comes on a little strong

Seohyun in a still from Jinxed at First.

Seohyun in a still from Jinxed at First. The Girls’ Generation member stars as Seul-bi, a female fortune-teller who comes from a long line of soothsayers.

Na In-woo as Soo-gwang/Myeong-seong (left) and Seohyun as soothsayer Seul-bi in a still from Jinxed at First.

Seohyun as Seul-bi in a still from Jinxed at First.

Seohyun as Seul-bi and Na In-woo as Soo-gwang/Myeong-seong in a still from Jinxed at First.

Na In-woo as Soo-gwang/Myeong-seong (left) and Seohyun as Seul-bi in a still from Jinxed at First.

K-drama midseason recap: Kiss Sixth Sense – Disney+’s muddled fantasy romance is seriously in need of an 11th-hour rescue

Seo Ji-hye in a still from Kiss Sixth Sense.

Seo Ji-hye (left) as ad agency worker Hong Ye-sul and Yoon Kye-sang as her boss Cha Min-hu in a still from Kiss Sixth Sense, a fantasy romance K-drama involving supernatural abilities on Disney+.

Yoon Kye-sang in a still from Kiss Sixth Sense.

Yoon Kye-sang (left) and Seo Ji-hye in a still from Kiss Sixth Sense.

Kim Ji-suk (left) as acclaimed director Lee Pil-yo and Yoon Kye-sang in a still from Kiss Sixth Sense.

Sweet Home on Netflix: seasons 2 and 3, new stars for monster K-drama series

Park Kyu-young in a still from Sweet Home season 1. Photo: Son Ik-Chung/Netflix

Song Kang in a still from Sweet Home season 1. Photo: Son Ik-Chung/Netflix

Cast members of Sweet Home wear shirts promoting its second and third seasons. Photo: Netflix

A still from Sweet Home season 1. Photo: Netflix

K-drama Yumi’s Cells season two: love is in the air as workplace romcom returns with Kim Go-eun and Jinyoung

Kim Go-eun (left) and Jinyoung in a still from Yumi’s Cells season 2.

Kim Go-eun (left) as Kim Yumi and Jinyoung as Bobby Yoo in a still from Yumi’s Cells season 2.

Kim Go-eun (left) as Yumi and Jinyoung as Bobby Yoo in a still from Yumi’s Cells season 2.

Kim Go-eun as Yumi and Jinyoung as Bobby Yoo in a still from Yumi’s Cells season 2. She turns him down when he asks her for a date.

Jinyoung as Bobby Yoo in a still from Yumi’s Cells season 2.

Kim Go-eun as Yumi and Jinyoung as Bobby Yoo in a still from Yumi’s Cells season 2. It’s only a matter of time before she warms to the idea of dating him.

Lifestyle

K-drama

Entertainment

Arts

Culture

Film & TV

K-Pop


For a while this Korean romantic comedy series seemed to lose momentum, but it recovered to set up a thrillingly unpredictable finale
Dependable detective Lee Gang-jae (Shin Dong-wook) and dashing Raphael (Sung Moon), both have valid claims to Woori’s affections. Who will she choose?



With an ending more unpredictable than a thriller, Korean romantic comedy series Woori the Virgin gets over its midseason wobble. Which suitor will win her hand – Lee Gang-jae or Raphael, love rivals turned buddies?


K-drama news

What's hot in Korea

South Korean celebrities

Fame and celebrity

TV shows and streaming video

An assessment or critique of a service, product or creative endeavour.  Film reviews, restaurant reviews, reviews of art exhibitions. (Eg. Crazy Rich Asians: an important film, yes, but a good one?)


Review

Review | K-drama review: Woori the Virgin – bubbly romcom starring Lim Soo-hyang recovers for a romantic photo finish

For a while this Korean romantic comedy series seemed to lose momentum, but it recovered to set up a thrillingly unpredictable finale Dependable detective Lee Gang-jae (Shin Dong-wook) and dashing Raphael (Sung Moon), both have valid claims to Woori’s affections. Who will she choose?

For a while this Korean romantic comedy series seemed to lose momentum, but it recovered to set up a thrillingly unpredictable finale

Dependable detective Lee Gang-jae (Shin Dong-wook) and dashing Raphael (Sung Moon), both have valid claims to Woori’s affections. Who will she choose?