Manager Kim So Jisub's wall was too high. While Manager Kim surpassed a 20% viewership rating and set its own highest rating, Namkoong Min's The Husband announced a meager start in the 4% range.
According to viewership survey company Nielsen Korea's aggregated results on the 5th, the first episode of KBS 2TV weekend drama The Husband (directed by Kim Junghyun, Kim Min-tae, written by Jung Jae-ha), which premiered on the 4th, recorded a 4.4% viewership rating (national households).
Meanwhile, the SBS Fri-Sat drama Manager Kim (written by Nam Dae-jung, directed by Lee Seung-young, Lee So-eun) airing at the same time surpassed a 20% viewership rating. That day's fourth episode of Manager Kim recorded 21.6%. That is a 2.8 percentage point increase compared with the 18.8% recorded for episode three.
Manager Kim started at 9.5% on the 26th of last month and showed a fierce rise with episode two recording 15.7%, and in just four episodes it set the record of exceeding a 20% viewership rating.
Amid Manager Kim's rising momentum, The Husband opened. This drama is a perilous crime thriller about a man who wages an extreme battle against a heartless criminal to save his wife, who was kidnapped just before their divorce.
In The Husband, Namkoong Min plays Kang Tae-Ju, a neurosurgeon who, after telling his wife Ko Se-yoon (Lee Sul) he wanted a divorce, the next day becomes embroiled in an incident in which his wife is kidnapped. Namkoong Min once again foreshadowed creating a defining role in his career with his explosive acting, from reckless action to chase scenes.
Earlier at the production press conference, Namkoong Min said he chose the project because he always selects dramas that give a good first impression, and when he first read it he had a hunch. He thought it would be easy for viewers to watch and that it could be loved by a wide range of age groups, so he chose it. I read the script through to episode four quickly without resting. The script was so fun and unique, so I chose it, he said.
He added that he was confident because the first impression of a work is very important. Although his previous work Our Movie was a good piece, he felt it did not entertain as much and he considered that. For the next work, he wanted a drama that could entertain many people easily and approach them comfortably. Comfortable does not simply mean it is easy to watch; he thought it meant a work that could keep viewers' attention. After reading up to episode four, aside from the process of building the early narrative from the beginning to the middle of episode one — which he also believed was necessary for this drama — he thought the drama itself would continue to hold viewers' attention even if they were not concentrating, so he felt confident, he emphasized.
Although Namkoong Min was confident about The Husband, the wall of Manager Kim, which first grabbed viewers' attention and pulled ahead, was too high. Manager Kim is an action revenge drama in the father universe in which the 'most ordinary' father becomes the 'most dangerous' man to reclaim his only daughter.
In only three episodes on air, it achieved the feat of ranking sixth in SBS Fri-Sat drama history in both the Seoul metropolitan area and nationwide viewership ratings. On the metropolitan basis, it followed The Penthouse 2 (30.6%), The Fiery Priest (24.7%), Taxi Driver 2 (21.8%), The Penthouse 3 (21.0%), and Stove League (20.8%), a record that put it shoulder to shoulder with SBS's representative hits after only three episodes, continuing an overwhelming run.
Then, its fourth episode surpassed 20% with 21.6%, ranking fourth in SBS Fri-Sat drama history. At this pace, it seems only a matter of time before it overtakes Taxi Driver 2 and The Fiery Priest. In that situation, it appears difficult for Namkoong Min to catch up with So Jisub's box office success.
[Photo] OSEN DB, SBS, KBS provided
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