Wild Romance (TV series)

For other uses, see Wild Romance.

Wild Romance (Korean: 난폭한 로맨스; RR: Nanpokhan romaenseu) is a 2012 South Korean television series. It aired on KBS2 from January 4 to February 23, 2012 on Wednesdays and Thursdays at 21:55 for 16 episodes. The screwball romantic comedy is about the love-hate relationship between an obnoxious superstar professional baseball player (Lee Dong-wook) and his tomboyish bodyguard (Lee Si-young).^[1][2]

Wild Romance
Promotional poster
Also known as	Aggressive Romance
Genre	Romance Comedy Sports Suspense
Written by	Park Yeon-seon
Directed by	Bae Kyung-soo Kim Jin-woo
Starring	Lee Dong-wook Lee Si-young Oh Man-seok Hwang Sun-hee
Music by	Kim Seon-min Kim Gyeong-beom
Ending theme	What to Do by Jessica Jung (ft.Kim Jin-pyo)
Country of origin	South Korea
Original language	Korean
No. of episodes	16
Production
Executive producers	Hwang Eui-kyung Oh Sung-min
Producer	Hwang In-hyuk
Production location	Korea
Running time	Wednesdays and Thursdays at 21:55 (KST)
Production company	GNG Production
Original release
Network	KBS2
Release	4 January (2012-01-04) – 23 February 2012 (2012-02-23)

Plot

Brash, arrogant Park Mu-yeol (Lee Dong-wook) is the star player of the pro baseball team Red Dreamers, renowned for both his skill and his bad temper. Stubborn bodyguard-by-trade Yoo Eun-jae (Lee Si-young) hates him; she's a lifelong fan of the Blue Seagulls, the Red Dreamers' rival team. The two mortal enemies are suddenly thrown together by fate.

A chance meeting during a drunken night of karaoke leads to a scuffle, which former judo athlete Eun-jae easily wins, flipping Mu-yeol on his back. The fight was captured on video however and soon erupts into a huge scandal, with Mu-yeol's reputation and Eun-jae's career as a bodyguard at stake. To fix things, their respective employers agree to assign Eun-jae to act as Mu-yeol's bodyguard. The mismatched pair are now around each other round the clock, and in the midst of constant squabbling and working to find each other's weak spots, they find out more about each other than they realized.^[3][4]

Cast

• Lee Dong-wook as Park Mu-yeol^[5][6]
• Lee Si-young as Yoo Eun-jae^{[7][8][9][10]}
• Oh Man-seok as Jin Dong-soo, Mu-yeol's best friend and former teammate^[11]
• Hwang Sun-hee as Oh Su-young, Dong-soo's wife
• Jessica Jung as Kang Jong-hee, Mu-yeol's ex-girlfriend^[12]
• Kang Dong-ho as Kim Tae-han, PR manager of the Red Dreamers
• Lim Ju-eun as Kim Dong-ah, Eun-jae's best friend and housemate^[13]
• Lee Hee-joon as Go Jae-hyo, reporter
• Lee Han-wi as Kevin Jang, Eun-jae's boss
• Lee Won-jong as Yoo Young-gil, Eun-jae's father
• Jang Tae-hoon as Yoo Chang-ho, Eun-jae's younger brother
• Hong Jong-hyun as Seo Yoon-yi
• Lee El as Mi-jin
• Kim Jin-woo as Jin Woo-young
• Lee Bo-hee as Yang Sun-hee, Mu-yeol's maid
• Kim Yun-tae as Mi-jin's partner

Reception

In the same timeslot as hit period drama Moon Embracing the Sun,^[14] Wild Romance garnered meager ratings of less than 10 percent. But the series gained a loyal following among TV drama fans. When it first began airing, the series was criticized for erratic editing, excessive sound effects and an implausible storyline, but those criticisms soon subsided as viewers praised writer Park Yeon-seon for her smart and irreverent comedy, tension-filled mystery thriller tropes, insightful lines full of depth, creative use of dialogue and intelligent characterization.^[15][16]

Ratings

in the tables below blue numbersrepresents lowest rating and red numbers represents highest rating .

Date	Episode	Nationwide	Seoul
2012-01-04	01	7.1% ,	8.8%
2012-01-05	02	6.7%	8.7%
2012-01-11	03	6.2%	7.2%
2012-01-12	04	6.5%	9.1%
2012-01-18	05	5.8%	9.4%
2012-01-19	06	5.3%	8.6%
2012-01-25	07	4.9%	8.5%
2012-01-26	08	5.8%	7.3%
2012-02-01	09	3.9%	8.1%
2012-02-02	10	4.0%	8.0%
2012-02-08	11	6.0%	9.5%
2012-02-09	12	5.9%	9.1%
2012-02-15	13	4.7%	8.8%
2012-02-16	14	4.0%	9.3%
2012-02-22	15	4.7%	7.8%
2012-02-23	16	5.0%	8.2%
Average		5.4%	8.5%

Source: TNmS Media Korea

International broadcast

• It began airing in Japan on TBS on May 7, 2013 as part of the network's "Hallyu Select" programming.^[17]
• In Thailand aired on True Asian Series in mid-year 2013.^[18]
• In Vietnam aired on VTV3 on September 10, 2013, under the title Chuyện tình nữ vệ sĩ.

Awards and nominations

Year	Award	Category	Recipient	Result
2012	2012 KBS Drama Awards	Excellence Award, Actor in a Miniseries	Lee Dong-wook	Nominated