Lee Min-jung's Return After 6 Years Faces Struggle with Sub-1% Ratings

Actress Lee Min-jung's long-awaited return to the small screen after six years is facing unexpectedly underwhelming results. Despite a lead cast featuring Lee Min-jung and Kim Ji-seok, alongside veteran director Joo Seong-woo, the drama's premiere saw viewership ratings languish in the 0% range. Analysts suggest this is the result of a combination of a challenging programming environment, intense platform competition, and the narrative limitations of the work itself, making it difficult to recover through the actors' star power or acting skills alone.

'Let's Get Divorced' made its debut on KBS Drama and GTV on the 19th of last month. According to Nielsen Korea, the viewership ratings for the first episode were 0.4% for KBS Drama and 0.2% for GTV. This marks a disappointing start, considering it is Lee Min-jung's first TV drama since her 2020 appearance in the KBS2 series 'Once Again.'

The fundamental premise of the drama held several elements that could have targeted a wide audience. The story follows Baek Mi-young (Lee Min-jung) and Ji Won-ho (Kim Ji-seok), who co-run the wedding dress shop 'G& White,' as they decide to divorce after a long marriage and reflect on their wounds and relationship in the process. Writer Hwang Ji-eon explained that the focus was on depicting the specific legal processes of divorce alongside the shifting emotions of the couple.

In the early stages, the drama presented conflict structures that went beyond simple marital disputes. The two characters' relationship deteriorated rapidly following a past miscarriage, and their emotional rift deepened due to clashes over company management and their appearances on a couple-themed variety show. Baek Mi-young eventually decides to divorce by throwing her wedding ring into a river, and the relationship becomes even more complex when she reunites with her former lover, Calvin (Lee Hyun-jin).

The problem lies in whether these conflict devices can be perceived by viewers as a fresh relational drama. The theme of divorce itself has been repeatedly consumed in Korean dramas. Therefore, simply layering devices such as suspicion of infidelity, the appearance of an ex-lover, or the involvement of a new romantic interest makes it difficult to capture the attention of modern viewers. In the actual broadcast, misunderstandings are amplified as Ji Won-ho (Kim Ji-seok) becomes entangled with Ahn Hee-ju (played by Lee Jin-yi), creating a narrative overlap involving Lee Min-jung and Lee Hyun-jin.

It is difficult to conclude that the actors' acting skills are the problem. Kim Ji-seok has been praised for expressing the temperature shifts in his character, oscillating between a professional wedding dress designer and a husband devastated by divorce proceedings. In recent episodes, he has served as the central axis of the drama, handling everything from psychological warfare surrounding the divorce to a kidnapping incident.

Lee Min-jung's return also carried significant symbolic weight as she returned to her primary profession after a long hiatus. She gained massive public recognition through the 2009 KBS2 hit 'Boys Over Flowers' and has since moved between romantic comedies, melodramas, and serious dramas through works such as 'Midas,' 'Big,' 'Sassy Divorced Woman,' 'Comebacklah,' and 'Destiny and Fury.' In particular, her performance in the 2020 family drama 'Once Again' led the series to massive success, exceeding a 30% peak viewership rating.

For Lee Min-jung, 'Let's Get Divorced' was a comeback work filled with a sense of paradox from the very title. While her previous works often depicted family recovery through the lives of characters experiencing divorce, this project places the breakdown and renegotiation of a couple deciding to divorce at the forefront. However, it is painful to see that the mass appeal and buzz she proved in previous works are not being effectively channeled into this production.

Furthermore, while Lee Min-jung appeared in the TVING original 'Villains' during her hiatus, the release was delayed longer than expected, resulting in a long practical gap in her acting career. With external variables beyond her control, it took considerable time for her to reappear before the audience as actress Lee Min-jung. In the interim, she maintained contact with the public through her personal YouTube channel, 'Lee Min-jung MJ,' where she shared her daily life and tastes.

Therefore, this comeback was intended to be more than just a single project; it was a test to see if Lee Min-jung could return to the center of TV dramas. However, the issues of platform and scheduling were cold. 'Let's Get Divorced' met viewers with an 11 PM time slot on KBS Drama and GTV, escaping the prime-time competition of terrestrial or general programming channels. The mass-market window through which interested viewers could naturally flow was inherently limited. The fact that the two channels saw ratings of only 0.4% and 0.2% respectively during the premiere clearly demonstrates these structural limitations.

However, it is also necessary to be cautious about attributing the low ratings entirely to 'scheduling luck.' If a work is good, there is still room for it to rise through word-of-mouth and online buzz even on limited platforms. Whether 'Let's Get Divorced' successfully varied the heavy theme of divorce and provocative relationship settings into a sufficiently new dramatic language remains a separate issue.

In particular, modern viewers demand more than simple good-versus-evil dynamics even in works dealing with infidelity and divorce; they seek depth in character psychology, social context, and the specific process of a relationship collapsing. To be competitive, the drama must present a multi-dimensional view of legal procedures, assets, family, wounds, and responsibilities, or offer a perspective that differentiates itself from existing marital dramas. Since the work puts 'divorce' at the forefront from its title, its ability to show a deep approach at this point is crucial.

Nevertheless, there remains room for a turnaround. In current broadcasts, as the truth of past events is revealed one by one, it is being highlighted that Baek Mi-young and Ji Won-ho were in a relationship that cannot be simply divided into perpetrator and victim. In particular, as it is revealed that Ji Won-ho was injured while trying to protect Baek Mi-young in the past, the interpretation of their conflict has shifted. The scene where Baek Mi-young collapses in tears upon learning that Ji Won-ho almost died because of her serves as a device to transform the initial simple marital conflict into a more complex relational drama.

The chemistry between Kim Ji-seok and Lee Min-jung is also an area where expectations can be maintained until the end. While playing a couple in sharp emotional conflict, the two actors are giving their respective characters persuasive depth. As the legal procedures and emotional relationships surrounding the divorce become fully entangled, there is a possibility that the narrative density will increase in the latter half.

Ultimately, the greatest disappointment of 'Let's Get Divorced' is not the actors, but that both the environment surrounding the work and the competitiveness of the content itself are being tested simultaneously. For Lee Min-jung, returning after six years, it was a golden opportunity to prove her mass appeal once again, but the combination of low accessibility, limited scheduling, and the familiar narrative grammar of the early episodes has prevented it from creating the expected impact.

However, it is still too early to define Lee Min-jung's comeback itself as a failure. Viewership ratings are just one metric for judging the success or failure of a work, and especially for non-prime cable programming, there are limits to evaluating the value of an actor or a work based on absolute numbers alone. What is needed now is a cold assessment of how well the work builds its own narrative in the remaining episodes, rather than focusing on the symbolism of her '6-year comeback.'

For Lee Min-jung, who stood before the camera again after waiting six years, the most bitter part may not be the performance of the work itself, but the fact that the news of 'Actress Lee Min-jung has returned' has not been fully translated into a major talking point. The extreme temperature difference—moving from the lead of a work with over 30% viewership to the lead of a cable drama with sub-1% ratings—is not a problem of the individual actor, but an example of how rapidly the programming structure and consumption methods of today's drama industry have changed.

Now, the question remains whether 'Let's Get Divorced' can rebound from its low starting point. If the work can persuade viewers through its own completeness rather than the rarity of Lee Min-jung's six-year return, the current numbers may not be the final report card. Conversely, if it merely follows familiar clichés, this comeback may remain a disappointing memory for the actress and stand as another case of 'good casting and bad scheduling' in the drama industry.