K-drama Melancholia: Lim Soo-jung, Lee Do-hyun play teacher and student in forbidden high-school romance

He’s a student maths whiz, she’s an educator hired to teach high schoolers calculus. Surprise, surprise, they start spending time together and not just on maths

Lim’s character seems oblivious to how this appears to those around them and to ignore the contradiction with her principles. Not surprisingly, trouble ensues

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Lee Do-hyun (left) and Lim Soo-jung in a still from Melancholia.

Published: 9:15pm, 23 Nov 2021

Two years after Search: WWW, Lim Soo-jung returns to the small screen alongside Sweet Home’s Lee Do-hyun in maths-themed high school romantic drama Melancholia. A teacher and her brilliant student grapple with conniving and power-hungry students, parents and educators, as well as the dangerous emotions that bubble up between them.

The setting is Asung High School, a private institution rife with corruption which seeks to elevate its status further by incorporating an advanced calculus programme and taking part in the International Math Olympiad.

To help achieve this, the school hires the talented and committed maths teacher Ji Yoon-su (Lim) to lead the calculus class.

Yoon-su favours critical thinking and is not interested in helping students to memorise formulas to pass tests, but rather to approach problems by thinking outside the box. She hopes to instil a sense of wonder in her students for mathematics by highlighting its importance in art and natural beauty.

Melancholia begins with a flash forward, taking place four months after Yoon-su’s hiring, during a ritzy event where No Jung-a (Jin Kyung), who runs the school as an heir of the Asung Foundation, preaches to well-to-do parents about the value of status for their children’s education.