Dear writer X Kim Yoojung, hit the pillow on the casting..I'm sure you'll see a whole new face
Nov 03, 2025
|
The original `Dear X' (played by Choi Won-won, Ban Ji-woon, directed by Lee Eung-bok and Park So-hyun), which will be released on the 6th, depicts the story of Baek A-jin (Kim Yoo-jung), a woman who wears a mask to climb to the highest place from hell, and Xs who are brutally trampled on her. The destruction of Baek A-jin, who hid his cruel true colors behind his beautiful face, and the love of Yoon Joon-seo (Kim Young-dae), who chose hell to protect him, complete a never-before-seen doom-melo suspense.
Director Lee Eung-bok and director Park So-hyun, who have a number of mega-hit movies such as 'Sweet Home'Mr. Sunshine'Guardian'Descendants of the Sun', co-director Lee Eung-bok. On top of that, based on the popular webtoon with the same name with global fandom, Choi Won-won, who won the top prize in the KBS one-act play script contest in 2018, and Ban Ji-woon, the original author who created the webtoon 「Dear X」, co-wrote the book, raising expectations for a high-quality well-made series. In response, three days before its first release, the two artists directly answered their questions about the work.
First of all, Choi Jae-won was strongly impressed when he first read the original book. In particular, the subtle texture of emotions of the characters came to be attractive""I was mainly interested in human genres that looked warmly at the inside of humans, but this time, I wanted to capture the image of humans shaking in their wounds and desires with a slightly different perspective." In that sense, for me, 'Dear X' was an interesting challenge.'
In particular, in the original webtoon, the first thing that caught my heart was the protagonist 'Baek Ah-jin'. "A complicated character who lives using others but coexists with deficiency and solitude within him", he said. "I had a lot of worries about whether I could convincingly portray such a character, but at the same time, I wanted to deal with it at least once as a writer. Through this work, I wanted to make an attempt to understand 'I don't understand people'. It was the process of completing the narrative by combining human desires and choices that could not be concluded as good or evil, and the events unfolding from it."
The original author Ban Ji-woon was able to hear about the birth background of the webtoon Dear X. He recalled the item 'two faces of a sociopathic actress' at the time when he was immersed in a crime current affairs documentary. It was a work that asked questions about 'conscience' from the first time it was planned. "When a person abandons his conscience, how cruel he becomes, and how painful his surroundings are even if there is only one person in the world who has no conscience, the story that started from that thought."
I understand that the series participated in the process of continuing the story with points differentiated from the original to bring out as much as possible without losing the unique characteristic of 'Azin'He explained how he came to participate in writing the script, saying, `I was worried at first, but when I wrote Baek A-jin's lines in Part 5, I got a little goosebumps. I felt like my friend, who sent me a funeral, came back alive and faced me. 'I drew Baek Ah-jin in 2019, and I also thought that I'm stuck with him again now.'"
As "Dear X" has received great popularity and love since the webtoon was published, it is highly anticipated by the original fans and viewers. Writer Choi Jae-won, who completed a 63-episode webtoon with a 12-episode script, said, `The main character, Baek A-jin, is a villain. I think I thought the most about how to make people who see such characters sympathize and follow them. In addition, as it dealt with a person's life story, I thought it was important to create a probability and connect it dramatically whenever Baek A-jin steps through one chapter at a time", the main point of writing.
When asked about the difference from the original, Ban Ji-woon said, "Isn't the existence of director Lee Eung-bok the biggest difference?" and added, "It was time for new inspiration or ventilation, but I felt like the director lit the fire. I think viewers will also be able to feel the joy of life. How the scenes in the original work would have been expressed in the video, or how new scenes and characters that were not in the original work would have been expressed, and if you focus on these "mise-en-scène", it would be more interesting and satisfying."
Writer Choi Jae-won was also honored to work with director Lee Eung-bok. It was impressive that he tried to accept and reflect various opinions and that he listened carefully to even minor opinions"When I first met the director, he said 'I like beautiful things' and I could understand what he meant by watching the finished video. I felt that the beautiful video was intertwined with the main character's narrative, exuding a sense of despair and a unique atmosphere" expressed sincere admiration.
Along with director Lee Eung-bok in `Trust and Watch,' stories about actors who will bring characters from webtoons and scripts to life could not be left out. Writer Choi Jae-won said, "When I heard the casting news, I was really satisfied. Above all, I was convinced that actor Kim Yoo-jung would be able to show a completely new face. Expectations were high on how to express his complex emotional lines, which are different from his previous images. " Actors Kim Young-dae, Kim Do-hoon, and Lee Yeol-eum were also surprisingly similar to the characters in the play when they first met. The character was already permeated not only in appearance but also in each person's eyes, speech, and atmosphere."
Writer Ban Ji-woon also said, `I was happy to hear the news of actor Kim Yoo-jung's casting for the first time, and I remember only slapping a pitiful pillow with a strong heart. After that, whenever news of the casting spread, I thought 'The work is very blessed' and 'I think the synchronicity between the original characters and actors couldn't be better at '1000%'. It was amazing because the actors' faces naturally came to mind while writing the lines."
Finally, writer Choi Ja-woon expressed confidence, saying, `It will be a work that gives viewers a new experience through the protagonist who cannot love and support, and cannot hate, and nevertheless cannot take their eyes off.' Writer Ban Ji-woon cites 'monster' as the keyword penetrating 'Dear X' and thinks that the question of "Will monsters be born or made?" plays a role in the axis from the beginning to the end of the work. The copy of the main poster is also 'Wouldn't it be better to be a monster yourself if it was a life that started in hell?' As such, Baek A-jin's actions and trajectories will eventually become a keyword penetrating the work."
Meanwhile, the TVing original 'Dear X' will release episodes 1-4 at 6 p.m. on the 6th. After that, two episodes will be released sequentially every Thursday at 6 p.m.
lunamoon@sportschosun.com
