“She Was Practically Flying”: Kim Hyun-joo, the Actress Yeon Sang-ho Cast Four Times

Featured photo: Kim Hyun-joo at the “Paradise Lost” press conference, Busan International Film Festival, October 2026. Photo: Arielaortizb, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Kim Hyun-joo’s charm is that after nearly three decades at the top, she still has new faces to show. Director Yeon Sang-ho cast her in Netflix’s “Hellbound,” “JUNG_E” and “The Bequeathed,” then again this fall in his film “Paradise Lost,” four times in a row. And after watching “100 Days of Deception,” now streaming on Netflix, he said this: “She was practically flying.” (Sports Chosun)

In the same interview, Yeon added: “She’s an actress who has lived as a top star since she was 20, and lately she’s been showing a new side of herself as a performer. It feels like the true depth of her craft is coming through, and I’m glad.” Reading that, I felt proud as a fan, as if someone had praised my own family. The girl who first caught the country’s eye in Kim Hyun-chul’s 1996 music video “Ilsaeng-eul” (“For a Lifetime”) (Wikipedia) went on to win the top excellence award twice at the KBS Drama Awards and once at the MBC Drama Awards. Now she’s the actress a director brags about first.

Fall 2026: Yu So-ran in “100 Days of Deception”

“100 Days of Deception” is tvN’s 20th-anniversary spy romance, set in 1932 Gyeongseong, colonial-era Seoul, where Japanese, English and Chinese mixed in the streets. Kim stars alongside Kim You-jung, Park Jinyoung, Lee Moo-saeng and Jin Seon-kyu, and the series passed its halfway mark with ratings peaking at 11.6% in the Seoul metropolitan area (MHN). Park Jinyoung’s turn in it is its own comeback story: the “0% actor” label on Park Jinyoung never held up.

• Leader of the resistance. Kim plays Yu So-ran, a woman who has lived with revenge in her heart, yet leads the Guguk-dan, a band of independence fighters, giving faith and strength to everyone around her (Maeil Business). Director Yoo In-sik said of her, “When you look at her, you trust her. You want to lean on her.” (Wikitree)
• The only one acting in Chinese. She is the only member of the main cast who took on Chinese-language acting. Because her character is a Chinese woman who speaks Korean, she focused less on a perfect accent and more on a naturalness that fits the character (My Daily).
• Last weekend’s scene. In episode 10 on November 8, after the bombing plot fell apart, Yu So-ran gently closed the eyes of her comrade Song Jeon, shot dead by Sato Shinichi (Jin Seon-kyu). Lee Ga-kyung (Kim You-jung), who could have boarded the train to America, turned back to save her (iMBC, Etoday).
• What’s left. Saturdays and Sundays at 9:10 p.m. Korea time, 7:10 a.m. the same day on the U.S. East Coast. Episodes 11 and 12 air November 14 and 15; the finale, episodes 15 and 16, airs November 28 and 29.

Where to watch: Netflix (U.S. and Korea; also TVING in Korea; JustWatch, checked November 9, 2026). The show’s leading lady has her own story too: Kim You-jung cracked Japan’s Netflix Top 10 despite the “anti-Japan drama” label.

Also read: Two Years Away, Kim Seol-hyun Returns to Face Song Hye-kyo in Netflix's Tantara

The same fall: Ryu So-young in “Paradise Lost”

In October, the same month “100 Days of Deception” premiered, Kim also stood on the big screen in Yeon Sang-ho’s low-budget film “Paradise Lost.” It’s a psychological thriller that begins when Ryu So-young, a mother who lost her son nine years ago when a camping-school bus vanished, sees the boy she believed was dead (Bae Hyeon-seong) come back alive, like a miracle (The Fact).

After invitations to Toronto, Busan and Hawaii, the film was also invited to the Stockholm International Film Festival, and on November 2 it passed 150,000 admissions in Korea (bnt News).

Where to watch: in theaters in Korea (Megabox booking, checked November 9, 2026). An international release has not been announced yet.

Filmography: four meetings with Yeon Sang-ho

• 2021, “Hellbound.” In a world where people receive “decrees” sentencing them to hell, she played Min Hye-jin, the lawyer who stands up to a religious group, and carried both seasons (Wikipedia).

Where to watch: Netflix (U.S., JustWatch, checked November 9, 2026).

• 2023, “JUNG_E.” As Jung-yi, the legendary mercenary whose brain becomes the subject of a cloning experiment, she was the center of the film, just as its title says (Wikipedia).

Where to watch: Netflix (U.S. and Korea, JustWatch, checked November 9, 2026).

• 2024, “The Bequeathed.” In this Netflix thriller written by Yeon Sang-ho, she played Yoon Seo-ha, a woman pulled into a string of eerie events after she inherits her family’s burial ground (Wikipedia).

Where to watch: Netflix (U.S., JustWatch, checked November 9, 2026).

Over the four times Yeon Sang-ho called her, Kim Hyun-joo went from lawyer to mercenary to heir to mother, and became a revolutionary in 1932 Gyeongseong. I’m counting down every Saturday night to see what faces Yu So-ran still has to show in the six episodes left.