Well, this is unexpected: Recent reports indicate that Park Hae-jin’s upcoming drama Four Men will actually be a prequel to his currently airing Man to Man. According to sources from the drama’s production company, Mountain Movement Story, Four Men was planned in conjunction with Man to Man since last year, and they’re currently in talks with SBS to secure a timeslot at the station.
The upcoming romantic thriller will center around a female detective who gets swept up in various events following the loss of the man she loves. Early reports mentioned Park Hae-jin playing four different characters and twins, so now I’m wondering whether they’re all just personas related to his job. Well, if the heroine gets involved with all of them, talk about occupational hazards. Part of me feels relieved by the news that Four Men is a prequel to Man to Man, because when I read earlier posts describing Park Hae-jin’s four-in-one role, my mind was doing somersaults trying to figure out how that would play out. I was afraid they were going to go with multiple personalities or four doppelgangers, which is already two too many.
I was kind of surprised to hear that Four Men was being shopped at SBS, since Man to Man is a JTBC show, and it feels weird that the prequel would air at a different station. Not that SBS would be a bad choice, because the broadcaster’s Six Flying Dragons (Man to Man’s Kim Min-jung if he has this epic romance with another heroine. I do look forward to learning more about our Agent K, though, since Man to Man is being really stingy about his background.
In other developments, director Oh Jin-seok, of Yongpal and fusion sageuk My Sassy Girl, will be joined by Kim Je-young as screenwriter. Kim Je-young, whose writing credits include Wonderful Radio and Miss Wife, is currently directing the Cheese in the Trap film, so he’ll be jumping from one project to the next with Park Hae-jin. With a different director and writer, I wonder if the light tone of Man to Man will carry over to its prequel, or if Four Men will have a darker, more serious vibe.
The producers hope to have the main and supporting cast lined up by July, and start filming in the latter half of the year. If it all goes according to schedule, we could see Seol-woo and his fantastic deadpan return to our screens before the end of 2017.
