Lee Jin-wook says no to Hello Monster, maybe to In Time With You remake

by javabeans

This is a good-news-bad-news situation, but I’m feeling fine because I think the good news is stronger: Lee Jin-wook has dropped out of the romance-thriller drama Hello Monster where he was to play a police profiler, but is now in the running to do the In Time With You remake drama, The Time I Loved You, 7000 Days.

So he may not romance Jang Nara as a fellow cop colleague, but he might get to fall in love with Ha Ji-won as his longtime best friend instead? Sign me up.

Both dramas sound promising on their own merits, with Hello Monster coming from the writer of Protect the Boss and based on the unusual-sounding plotline where one man and the woman who stalks him end up working together to fight corruption. Okay, so the stalking thing is a little discomfiting, but it could be interesting. I’ll be watching to see who steps into Lee Jin-wook’s vacated shoes, although admittedly with him out of the picture, my interest is put a little on hold.

With The Time I Loved You, 7000 Days, I’m pretty much in regardless of who plays the leads because I love the premise where lifelong friends spend years setting each other up with dates, are always dissatisfied with the matches, and belatedly realize it’s because they’ve been in love all this time. Casting Ha Ji-won (still not yet confirmed) and Lee Jin-wook would shoot that interest even higher, because they’re both actors who bring extra energy to their roles and have a way of making them their own.

Furthermore, Lee Jin-wook hasn’t done a rom-com in a while, and the ones he has done (I Need Romance 2012, Myung-wol the Spy) haven’t really done it for me. I actually think he had way more sexual tension and romantic chemistry with the co-stars in his non-romance-centric action/thriller shows (Nine, Three Musketeers), so I’d love to see him take his (new-in-recent-years) rascally charm and apply it to a straight-up rom-com.

The Time I’ve Loved You, 7000 Days will air on SBS as a 16-episode drama and has not yet fixed on an air date.

Via TV Daily

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