The sky’s the limit for the comedic potential of this pairing if it happens: Oh Yeon-seo (My Sassy Girl) is considering an offer to star in the new Hong sisters fantasy romance drama Hwayugi opposite Lee Seung-gi (You’re All Surrounded), who is up for the leading role. The new tvN series is a contemporary reworking of the classic Chinese novel Journey to the West with a fanciful romance twist.
The horror-fantasy-romance is set in modern-day Seoul, which happens to be filled with darkness and evil spirits. The heroine was born with a monk’s calling to rid the world of these demons, and her life will take on an extraordinary and supernatural dynamic when she crosses paths with the hero, Sun Wukong the Monkey King. The Monkey King is a mischievous minor god who’s been exiled to the human realm because of his pride. The two characters will bicker and butt heads, but they’ll team up to fight the dark forces and end up falling in love.
Cha Seung-won is considering an offer to costar as the Bull Demon King, and in recent casting reports, it says he’ll be at odds with the hero. That could make him anything from a villain to one half of a reluctant bromantic pairing (remember You’re All Surrounded?), so we’ll have to wait and see what shape his character takes on.
I like Oh Yeon-seo’s spunky comic style, which I can already picture opposite Lee Seung-gi’s. My Sassy Girl was certainly over-the-top as a show on the whole, but she was completely committed to going for the laughs. I still think Come Back, Ajusshi was her best, where she played a woman possessed by the ghost of an ajusshi gangster; she was pee-your-pants funny in that. With this casting, I’m expecting wacky, outlandish humor from Hwayugi now, so I hope that’s what’s in store!
Hwayugi is planning to air in tvN’s weekend slot this December.