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Pierce Conran

This article contains mild spoilers.
Lead cast: Kim So-yeon, Yeon Woo-jin
Latest Nielsen rating: 5.58 per cent
In episode four of A Virtuous Business, lead character Han Jung-sook, played by The Penthouse star Kim So-yeon, looks up at a boxy TV screen to see a young Seo Taiji, the musician who pioneered the use of rap in mainstream Korean music.


Although now viewed as a Korean music legend, in 1992, when this scene is set, Seo was not yet an icon, and Jung-sook wonders wistfully how much it must hurt him to not be understood. Seo was ahead of his time.
Jung-sook is no musician, but she is also engaged in an activity unfamiliar and uncomfortable for the people in her community – selling racy lingerie and other adult products.
Whatever frustration Seo experienced before he revolutionised the Korean music industry was probably short-lived, but Jung-sook is unlikely to be on course for similar glory.
While discussion of female sexuality has come a long way in South Korea since the early 1990s, when the country was only a few years removed from its military dictatorship years, it has not exactly experienced a sexual revolution.

However, Jung-sook is steadily making inroads in her community, and by episode eight she has become her company’s best salesman and is appointed branch manager for her town.
What makes her journey compelling is the same as any story of a trailblazer. For each step forward she takes, she must first put herself in the line of fire, vulnerable to ridicule and censure.
Putting herself through the gauntlet time and again, her small victories become more meaningful, especially considering the personal struggles she goes through at the same time.
Jung-sook, a former local beauty queen, married her strapping high-school sweetheart Kwon Seong-soo (Choi Jae-rim), but he has grown up to become an insecure, belligerent drunk who struggles to hold down a job.

Early in the series Jung-sook walks in on Seong-soo having an intimate moment with her close friend Seong Mi-hwa (Hong Ji-hee). Their marriage falls to pieces soon afterwards, and divorce looms once Jung-sook discovers that Mi-hwa may be pregnant with Seong-soo’s child.
Her family in tatters, Jung-sook is also having trouble with her mother, Lee Bok-soon (Kang Ae-shim), who takes a very dim view of her new business venture. Thankfully, here at least there is a road to recovery, which mother and daughter embark on when Jung-sook learns about Bok-soon’s difficult past.
Yet what is the endgame for Jung-sook? The series that A Virtuous Business is based on, British show Brief Encounters, does not offer any concrete clues. The original was cancelled after its initial six-episode season, thus concluding on an open-ended note – something Korean cable TV dramas are loath to do.
Moreover, Brief Encounters was based on a non-fiction book about Ann Summers, a hugely successful British sex-toy and lingerie retailer, while the Korean remake has little to say about the progress of sexual mores in early 1990s Korea.

Beyond Jung-sook’s business with her three colleagues – sophisticated but frustrated housewife Oh Geum-hui (Kim Sung-ryung), struggling mother Seo Young-bok (Kim Sun-young) and perky hairdresser Lee Ju-ri (Lee Se-hee) – A Virtuous Business has also been teasing a village mystery involving brooding out-of-town detective Kim Do-hyeon (Yeon Woo-jin).
It has taken quite a while for the show to clue us in, beyond Do-hyeon brooding over his secret investigation board and asking around about fires that took place a long time ago.
When the truth finally begins to emerge, we learn that Do-hyeon is looking for his birth mother and that he may have been a victim of a strange series of arson cases in which ,young children were kidnapped. His only real piece of evidence is the burn scar on his arm.
Do-hyeon reveals these facts at an opportune time in his cautious and courteous relationship with Jung-sook, who has recently begun divorce proceedings.

The investigation is overly familiar and a little half-baked, but Kim and Yeon pull off the part that counts, namely the slow romance between their characters.
Beyond that, some of A Virtuous Business’ most enjoyable moments have been connected to cinema.
During a business trip, the lead quartet ask each other about their sexual fantasies, a cue for homages to famous scenes from Titanic and Basic Instinct. There is also a nod to a notable Korean erotic-film franchise when the business organises a scandalous matinee screening of Madame Aema 6.
Comprising 13 films, this is the longest-running film franchise in Korea and will soon be the subject of a Netflix drama, Aema, starring Lee Ha-nee.
A Virtuous Business is streaming on Netflix.


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