Kim Bu-jang Box Office Hit Stalls Amid Ilbe Scandal

SBS's Friday-Saturday drama "Chief Kim" is a hit, recording a viewership rating of 18.8% just three episodes into its broadcast. Amidst this success, controversies surrounding "Webtoon God" Park Tae-joon, the executive producer of the original webtoon, and past allegations of him being associated with "Ilbe" (a far-right online community) are being re-examined.

A video released on the YouTube channel "Yeouido Moonrae-dong" raised suspicions that Park Tae-joon used scenes in his past webtoon "Lookism" that were reminiscent of the late former President Roh Moo-hyun. Specifically, the interpretation was that a scene where the protagonist looks at a stopwatch and says "5 minutes and 23 seconds," and the phrase "Rock Owling" written on a sign behind a speech bubble, evoked the date of Roh's death and the Bang-i Rock. Furthermore, in 2015, there were allegations that the depiction of a scene in the work borrowed from a photograph of the late former President Roh.

At the time, Park Tae-joon vehemently denied the allegations, stating, "I am not a person who would have the will or courage to do such a thing with the deceased's photograph." However, in 2021, he once again became the center of controversy for using expressions commonly used in far-right communities in the dialogue of another work.

With the recent popularity of "Chief Kim," these controversies are spreading again, primarily through online communities and social media. While "Chief Kim" continues its successful run, achieving a viewership rating of 18.8% within three episodes, attention is focused on how this controversy will affect the drama's success.

"Chief Kim" is a revenge action drama about an "ordinary dad" who fights to get his daughter back. Within three episodes, it recorded a metropolitan area average of 19.6% and a national average of 18.8%, breaking its own highest viewership ratings. This ranks it sixth in the history of SBS Friday-Saturday dramas for viewership ratings.