Cover Discover the wildest chaebol K-dramas, which come complete with wealthy heirs, inheritance battles, corporate rivalries, revenge and outrageous family secrets (Photo: Rakuten Viki)
Discover the wildest chaebol K-dramas, which come complete with wealthy heirs, inheritance battles, corporate rivalries, revenge and outrageous family secrets (Photo: Rakuten Viki)
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From secret kidnappings and body swaps to numerous fake deaths, these are the chaebol K-dramas where being rich is apparently not enough
What did they say? There is rich, and then there is crazy rich? In Korean dramas, there are rich people, and there are chaebol-rich people. An average rich person might buy a nice car. A chaebol heir will buy the company that employs the person who rejected him, have his parents investigate her family tree and then discover that someone has secretly been plotting his murder since childhood.
The chaebol is one of K-drama’s most enduring archetypes: the impossibly wealthy heir, the sprawling family conglomerate, the inheritance war and, inevitably, a romantic interest who somehow wanders into the middle of it all.
But some chaebol K-dramas take the fantasy much further than others. So, in the interest of science, here are the most unhinged chaebol K-dramas, ranked from relatively typical rich-person nonsense to families who should probably not be allowed near a boardroom.
In case you missed it: 10 most powerful chaebol families in K-dramas
1. ‘What’s Wrong with Secretary Kim?’ (2018)
Above He thinks his biggest problem is his secretary quitting; meanwhile, his family has spent 24 years keeping a kidnapping secret
The vice-chairman thinks his biggest problem is that his secretary is finally getting her own life. He does not realise his family has spent 24 years maintaining a wildly elaborate kidnapping cover-up.
Lee Young-joon (Park Seo-joon) is the vain, hyper-competent vice-chairman of a major company who is thrown into an existential crisis when his secretary Kim Mi-so (Park Min-young) announces that she wants to resign after nine years.
His response is not to wish her well. It is to decide that she should marry him.
That is already pretty classic chaebol behaviour. But the drama’s deeper family secret is considerably more deranged. As Mi-so investigates a childhood kidnapping she witnessed, she begins to realise that Young-joon was actually the boy abducted from her childhood—not his older brother Lee Sung-yeon (Lee Tae-hwan), who has spent years believing he was the victim. Their parents knew the truth but allowed the false memory and story to continue, believing they were protecting their sons from further trauma.
Unhinged rating: 5/10
The CEO is ridiculous. The parents, however, have committed to a 24-year psychological group project.
2. ‘Business Proposal’ (2022)
Above A blind date goes so badly that a chaebol heir decides the obvious solution is to turn it into a contract relationship
Your blind date turns out to be your CEO, so naturally, the solution is to pretend you’re someone else and accidentally end up dating him.
Kang Tae-moo (Ahn Hyo-seop), the young CEO of Go Food, is pressured by his grandfather to go on blind dates. Shin Ha-ri (Kim Se-jeong) agrees to attend one in place of her friend Jin Young-seo (Seol In-ah), intending to scare the man away.
Unfortunately, the man is Tae-moo.
Once he realises Ha-ri is not who she claims to be, he decides to turn the whole mess into a contract relationship designed to satisfy his grandfather and get everyone off his back.
Unhinged rating: 5.5/10
The chaebol response to an awkward blind date is apparently corporate paperwork.
See more: Love contracts: 8 fake relationships in K-dramas that had us invested
3. ‘King the Land’ (2023)
Above A hotel heir falls for an employee while his family turns succession into an increasingly personal corporate grudge match
A hotel heir falls for an employee while his own family is fighting over control of the business.
Gu Won (Lee Jun-ho) is the heir to King Group, a wealthy conglomerate whose luxury hotel division becomes part of a succession struggle with his older sister Gu Hwa-ran (Kim Sun-young). Cheon Sa-rang (Lim Yoon-a) is a hotel employee whose cheerful professionalism initially irritates Won before becoming the thing he is most drawn to.
As their relationship develops, Won’s position in the family makes a simple office romance considerably less simple.
Unhinged rating: 6/10
For chaebol K-dramas, this is practically well-adjusted. The man falls in love instead of launching an acquisition.
4. ‘Secret Garden’ (2010)
Above A CEO swaps bodies with a stuntwoman; of course, this leads to romance
A chaebol CEO pursues a stuntwoman, insults her social status and then wakes up in her body. Somehow this is considered a romantic development.
Kim Joo-won (Hyun Bin) is a wealthy department-store CEO who becomes fascinated by stuntwoman Gil Ra-im (Ha Ji-won), despite making it abundantly clear that he considers their social positions incompatible. Then, a mysterious encounter causes the pair to switch bodies.
Suddenly Joo-won has to experience life without the money, status and privileges he has always taken for granted, while Ra-im finds herself inhabiting the body of a man whose entire personality seems to have been assembled from expensive suits and entitlement.
Unhinged rating: 6.5/10
The supernatural body swap is outrageous. His belief that wealth is a personality is somehow more so.
See more: 8 unforgettable body swap K-dramas
5. ‘The Heirs’ (2013)
Above When your classmates are the children of Korea’s richest families, even teenage romance comes with a succession plan
What happens when you put a collection of Korea’s richest teenagers in one school? Apparently: inheritance warfare, secret parentage and romantic geopolitics.
Kim Tan (Lee Min-ho) is the second son of Jeguk Group’s chairman, while Cha Eun-sang (Park Shin-hye) is a scholarship student who finds herself pulled into his world. Choi Young-do (Kim Woo-bin), another chaebol heir, also becomes interested in her.
But romance is only one problem. Kim Tan’s illegitimate status, his position within the family and his growing stake in Jeguk Group make him a threat to his older brother Kim Won (Choi Jin-hyuk), while the adults around them manipulate their children’s lives according to their own business and social ambitions.
Unhinged rating: 7/10
Nothing says healthy adolescence like being educated alongside the children who may one day inherit your family’s conglomerate.
6. ‘Boys Over Flowers’ (2009)
Above A school bully with a billionaire family discovers that money, power and a terrifying mother can make romance everyone’s problem
Four chaebol heirs run their elite school like a private kingdom, and one of them responds to rejection by becoming increasingly obsessed with the girl who rejected him.
Geum Jan-di (Ku Hye-sun) earns a place at the elite Shinhwa High School, where she encounters F4, the school’s untouchable group of wealthy boys led by Goo Jun-pyo (Lee Min-ho).
Jun-pyo initially bullies Jan-di after she challenges his authority, but his hostility turns into an obsessive pursuit. His mother, Kang Hee-soo (Lee Hye-young), is even more determined to keep Jan-di away from her son and uses her insane wealth and influence to pressure her.
Unhinged rating: 7.5/10
The school has a bullying system apparently powered by the Korean stock market.
7. ‘Queen of Tears’ (2024)
Above A chaebol heiress and her husband are already contemplating divorce when a succession battle gives the family bigger problems
When your marriage falls apart, your terminal diagnosis should probably be the biggest problem. Unless, of course, your family is also fighting for control of a massive conglomerate.
Hong Hae-in (Kim Ji-won) is an heiress and CEO of Queens Department Store, while Baek Hyun-woo (Kim Soo-hyun), the son of a rural family, has risen to become the group’s legal director. Their marriage begins as a union between two very different worlds but deteriorates badly under the pressure of Hae-in’s family.
Then Hae-in is diagnosed with a serious illness, prompting Hyun-woo to reconsider the divorce he had been planning. At the same time, Yoon Eun-sung (Park Sung-hoon), a former Wall Street analyst and M&A expert with a history involving Hae-in, arrives and becomes entangled in the family’s struggle for control.
Unhinged rating: 8/10
Most families argue over Christmas dinner. The Queens family argues over who controls the conglomerate.
8. ‘Graceful Family’ (2019)
Above Most chaebol families have lawyers and PR teams; this one has a secret organisation dedicated to making scandals disappear
One chaebol heiress returns home and discovers that her family has essentially built a private intelligence agency to make scandals disappear.
Mo Seok-hee (Im Soo-hyang) is the only daughter of the MC Group. After leaving Korea following the death of her mother, she returns and begins investigating what really happened.
She teams up with Heo Yoon-do (Lee Jang-woo), a lawyer from a modest background, and slowly uncovers the family’s secrets. The most gloriously excessive part of the arrangement is Top, the organisation responsible for managing the family’s scandals, information and public image.
Unhinged rating: 8.5/10
Most wealthy families have PR people. The people in chaebol K-dramas have a secret crisis-management operation.
9. ‘Mine’ (2021)
Above Two women married into an elite chaebol family discover that the real fight is not over money but who gets to control the family
Two women marry into a chaebol dynasty expecting privilege, only to discover that the family’s greatest luxury is having enough power to keep its secrets.
Seo Hee-soo (Lee Bo-young) was a successful actress before marrying Han Ji-yong (Lee Hyun-wook), the second son of the family behind Hyowon Group. His sister-in-law, Jung Seo-hyun (Kim Seo-hyung), married into the same family and comes from a chaebol dynasty herself. Between them, they know exactly how this particular game works: money gets you the house, the clothes and the staff, but the family decides what you are allowed to keep.
And Hyowon is hardly a model dynasty. Its succession, marriages and family relationships are tangled up in secrets, affairs and questions of legitimacy, while the women of the household are expected to maintain the polished façade. When Hee-soo’s carefully constructed life is threatened, she and Seo-hyun begin pushing back against the family system that has defined them.
Unhinged rating: 9/10
Everyone wants to know what is mine, what is yours and, more importantly, who gets to decide. At Hyowon, apparently, even your own life can become a family asset.
10. ‘The Lady in Dignity’ / ‘Woman in Dignity’ (2017)
Above When the family fortune is enormous, even the caregiver might have an agenda. ‘The Lady in Dignity’ turns one wealthy household into a battleground of money, marriage, betrayal and social ambition
A wealthy family’s picture-perfect life starts to unravel when a mysterious caregiver works her way into their home—and toward the family fortune.
Woo Ah-jin (Kim Hee-sun) has married into the wealthy Ahn family, enjoying a life of luxury as the wife of Ahn Jae-suk (Jung Sang-hoon), the youngest son of super-rich Ahn Tae-dong. Her comfortable existence is threatened when Park Bok-ja (Kim Sun-ah), a mysterious woman from a modest background, becomes Tae-dong’s caregiver and works her way into the wealthy family.
Bok-ja’s arrival sets off a chain reaction inside the household. Jae-suk is having an affair with art teacher Yoon Sung-hee (Lee Tae-im), while Bok-ja becomes increasingly involved with Tae-dong and the family’s affairs. As Ah-jin’s marriage and position within the family deteriorate, the drama turns its attention to the privileges, resentments and power struggles that come with extreme wealth.
Rather than focusing on a conventional corporate succession battle, The Lady in Dignity makes its wealthy family the battlefield itself. Money determines where everyone stands—and who gets to stay there.
Unhinged rating: 9/10
If you thought marrying into a rich family meant you had made it, The Lady in Dignity has some very expensive news for you.
See more: Makjang excess: 9 guilt-free, over-the-top K-dramas to watch
11. ‘Money Flower’ (2017)
Above ‘Money Flower’ puts a corporate fixer at the centre of a chaebol power struggle that he has been secretly engineering himself
A corporate fixer secretly manipulates a powerful chaebol family from within while plotting revenge against the people who destroyed his past.
Kang Pil-joo (Jang Hyuk) is a brilliant managing director and lawyer at Chungah Group who has become indispensable to the founding family. What they do not know is that Pil-joo has risen through the group while secretly pursuing a revenge scheme against the chaebols.
His plan centres on Jang Bu-cheon (Jang Seung-jo), a Chungah Group heir whose mother wants him to take control of the company from his uncle. Pil-joo intends to use Na Mo-hyun (Park Se-young), an environmental activist and substitute science teacher, by arranging for her to marry Bu-cheon. But the plan becomes complicated when Pil-joo develops feelings for Mo-hyun.
As competing members of the Jang family fight over Chungah Group, Pil-joo’s revenge becomes tangled with the very family he has been manipulating. Here, succession isn’t simply about who gets the company. It is about who has spent years quietly moving everyone else into position.
Unhinged rating: 9.5/10
Money Flower takes the chaebol formula and removes the rose-tinted glasses: everyone wants the company, everyone has an agenda and nobody is quite as disposable as they think.
12. ‘Reborn Rich’ (2022)
Above He is betrayed and killed by the conglomerate he served, then wakes up in 1987 as its youngest grandson with one very specific career ambition: revenge
Chaebol K-dramas certainly love some good karma. Here, your chaebol employers murder you, so you reincarnate as their youngest grandson and decide to take over the company. Typical career progression.
Yoon Hyun-woo (Song Joong-ki) has spent more than a decade serving the powerful Soonyang family. After being falsely accused of embezzlement, he is killed while carrying out an assignment for them.
Then he wakes up in 1987 in the body of Jin Do-jun (Song Joong-ki), the youngest grandson of the very family that betrayed him. Armed with knowledge of the future, he decides to use his new position to take revenge and ultimately take control of Soonyang Group.
That means the central conflict is essentially a succession battle between one very wealthy family and the former employee who has literally been reincarnated into it.
Unhinged rating: 10/10
This is no longer a hostile takeover. It is a hostile reincarnation. We’re not even sure if this counts as nepotism.
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Sasha Lim Uy Mariposa is a lifestyle journalist who is known for her food writing. Based in Manila and currently a marketing content specialist, she still dabbles in entertainment, beauty and dining coverage. She was the former managing editor of Esquire Philippines and was the food editor at SPOT.ph. She also edited several best-selling books about food.
She now writes for the different Tatler Asia markets as a contributing writer for T-Labs.
