K-drama High Class: Parasite actress Cho Yeo-jeong stars in by-the-numbers high society drama, elevated by its Jeju location

Beyond its appealing setting, High Class has laid the foundations clearly in its first four episodes, with a smooth storyline and convincing performances

There are definitely secrets between the characters waiting to be unearthed, but the show has stuck to a fairly conventional path so far

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Cho Yeo-jeong in a scene from high society K-drama High Class.

Published: 7:15pm, 17 Sep 2021

Following the massive success of SKY Castle three years ago, high society dramas have been all the rage in Korea, and this year, our TV schedules have been full of them. Both The Road: The Tragedy of One and the final season of The Penthouse have just wound to a close, and here to fill the void they’ve left behind is tvN’s new drama High Class.

Playing a very similar role to the one she performed in the Academy Award-winning movie Parasite, Cho Yeo-jeong leads this drama as Song Yeo-wool, a well-off and well-meaning but somewhat naive mother who dotes on her only son, Yi-chan (Jang Sun-yool). She enrols him in a prestigious school on Jeju Island following the death of her husband.

Yeo-wool has taken a sabbatical from her job as a lawyer at a top firm, as she wants to get closer to her son, who has been having trouble at school in Seoul. She also wants to escape from suspicious eyes and talk, as she was briefly considered to be a suspect in her husband’s death although it was ultimately ruled as a suicide.

She receives a mysterious invitation to enrol Yi-chan in the HSC International School in Jeju, though they both still need to pass a rigorous selection process. It is during a series of gatherings and interviews at the school that she meets Nam Ji-sun (Kim Ji-soo) and Cha Do-young (Gong Hyun-joo), the high society mothers of other prospective students.

Ji-sun is the queen bee of the island aristocracy. She has exacting standards and has her eye on everything, and anything she doesn’t like is just a phone call away from being removed from her sight. Do-young, a vain has-been star with a predilection for Instagram poses, obediently hangs by Ji-sun’s side.