After nearly a year languishing in production hell, we’ve finally got an update and a premiere date for Absolute Boyfriend! SBS has decided to take the drama under its wing, and has slated the show to follow currently airing Big Issue. In case you’ve forgotten — like me — the sci-fi(-ish) rom-com will be headlined by Yeo Jin-gu (The Crowned Clown), Minah (Beautiful Gong Shim), and Hong Jong-hyun (Mother of Mine), and since the show is 100% pre-produced, that means Yeo Jin-gu will be appearing in three dramas this year in relatively quick succession, and Hong Jong-hyun will be in concurrently airing shows for several months.
Absolute Boyfriend is an adaptation of Japanese manga Zettai Kareshi, and will revolve around an improbable love story between a humanoid robot built for romance, played by Yeo Jin-gu, and a special effects makeup artist, played by Minah, with a hardened heart from a past love’s wounds. Hong Jong-hyun will play a top star with a prickly outer shell who is actually vulnerable underneath his porcupine exterior. We all know the type after a K-drama or two.
I vaguely remember watching the Japanese drama adaptation of the manga about ten years ago (man, does time fly), and the setup sounds a little different from both the manga and the Japanese adaptation: For one, the female heroine is a high schooler in the manga, and a normal office worker in the Japanese show. And the second lead is alternately a childhood friend of the heroine, and then her boss. But the main conflicts remain the same: Whether a robot and a human can really fall in love, and whether a robot can become more “human” with a will and ego of his own.
Absolute Boyfriend will be directed by PD Jung Jung-hwa, whose credits include Flower Boy Next Door and Flower Boy Ramyun Shop, while the adaptation will be penned by Yang Hyuk-moon, who also wrote Mirror of the Witch. I have to admit that there’s a lot of potential for disaster with this adaptation, but seeing the director-writer duo gives me some hope that this won’t be a complete trainwreck. Please don’t let me down, drama gods!
Absolute Boyfriend will air on SBS’s Wednesday-Thursday slot following Big Issue in May.