This historical drama has it all– gender bending, a masked crusader, corrupt officials, a little romance, and even a murder mystery to solve.
Plus, it has spunky heroine written all over it in spades. It was a hoot to watch from start to finish. What’s not to love?
Park Min Young plays Kim Yoon Hee, a girl who disguises herself as a her ill brother in order to take scribing jobs from the local book merchant. She gets paid the most for writing study guides for the Sungkyunkwan University where young men have to pass an entrance exam and then go study to become officials. Most of the young men are sons of wealthy or prestigious families, so the family honor as well as their grades ride on these exams. Her father was actually a professor there once, but he died while she was still very young. She learned many things by sitting outside the door of the room where he was teaching her brother, when she was supposed to be learning how to be a “lady”. When her father died though, her family fell on hard times– especially since her brother became chronically ill.
During the time period the show is set, women are not allowed a formal education or to attend the Sunkyunkwan. Any girl found inside the Sunkyunkwan can be put to death. She’s never even thought of going there herself, until she agrees to write a “cheat sheet” that will pay for her brother’s medicines for some of the spoiled rich kids. This goes horribly wrong, and she manages to get herself tangled up with the Lee Seon Joon (Park Yoo Chun), son of a powerful noble. He is notorious for being stupidly upright and arrogant. He is against lying, cheating, and stealing in all its forms, and he won’t look the other way no matter what the extenuating circumstances might be. Hes absolutely bent on showing the the miscreant boy Yoon Hee is disguised as that he can provide for his family through upright means…. and he kind of traps Yoon Hee into sitting for the Sungkyunkwan entrance exams.
That’s really only the start of her problems though, because if she enters the doors of Sunkyunkwan, she has to live the rest of her life as a man. If anyone finds out her secret, they can all be severely punished and she can be killed. But Seon Joon is absolutely right about one thing– the stipend given to Sungkyunkwan students will provide for her family.
She almost leaves town instead of entering, but at the last minute her brother convinces her she’ll be happier if she goes, even if that means that she lives his life, and he ends up a shut-in at home, because he can’t go any where anyway. But this means she’s trying to fit in on an all male campus. She lucks out in that one of her roommates is Lee Seon Joon, who’s already firmly convinced she’s a guy, but her other roommate Moon Jae Shin, played by Yoo Ah In, is known as Geol Oh or “Crazy Horse” the school delinquent and a political rival of Lee Seon Joon. Strangely, Geol Oh hangs around with the school playboy, Goo Yong Ha, played by Song Joong Ki. Yoon Hee has run into Yong Ha while running around town in her disguise before; he was the one person she was hoping not to meet. He isn’t quite convinced by her disguise and has called her out for being much too pretty for a guy before.
Yoon Hee just wants to get through her classes without being found out, but unconsciously starts breaking some hearts along the way when she accidentally rescues the top Ginsaeng, Cho Sun played by Kim Min Seo, from an embarrassing and potentially harmful situation. She also picks up an enemy that way, since Lee Seon’s main rival, Ha In Soo (Jeon Tae Soo) has been trying to win Cho Sun’s affections for years. He already doesn’t like Yoon Hee because she’s always hanging out with Seon Joon, but the fact that Cho Sun obviously prefers Yoon Hee is the straw that really starts him down the path to crazy time. He starts a one man vendetta to politically discredit and humiliate both Yoon Hee and Seon Joon.
The show is really complex socially and politically, so it’s hard to go into more detail here without giving out some pretty large spoilers, but ultimately it’s a really well rounded show and a lot of fun. Very highly recommended.
Please support the Korean cast and crew by watching SungKyunkwan Scandal at official sites. You can find it here:
SungKyunkwan Scandal aired on KBS in Korea on and has 20 episodes.
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