Reply 1997
Reply 1997
Reply 1997
Reply 1997

GENERAL INFORMATION

Reply 1997

KOREAN DRAMA

Synopsis

In 1997 six friends are in their last year of high school in Busan. Sung Shi Won is forty-eighth in a class of forty-eight and her whole world is H.O.T. — Tony in particular, whom she fully intends to marry. Her best friend Yoo Jung falls for a different idol every week and has just defected to Sechs Kies, which Shi Won treats as treason. Yoon Jae, the boy next door who has all but lived at the Sung house since his parents died, is first in that same class and quietly in love with her; his best friend Jun Hee is quietly in love with him.

Fifteen years later the six meet again over dinner, thirty-three years old now, and two of them announce they are getting married. Which two is the question the drama spends sixteen episodes not quite answering — while it reconstructs, in obsessive detail, what it was to be eighteen in 1997, when K-pop was new and a fan club was something you fought over.

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THE CAST

CHARACTERS SUMMARY

EXTENDED CHARACTERS

Young versions
Note: young, Ep. 9

Note: young, Ep. 9

Note: young, Ep. 9

Note: young, Ep. 9

Shi Won's family
Note: Shi Won's father, a Busan Seagulls coach

Note: Shi Won's mother

Note: Shi Won's older sister

Yoon Jae's family
Note: Yoon Jae's father

Note: Yoon Jae's mother

Classmates and others
Note: classmate

Note: classmate

SYNOPSIS BY EPISODE

EPISODES 01-08

1 Six friends meet for a high school reunion, and it is time to go back to 1997. Shi Won sings an oldie at the karaoke in front of her parents. She can hardly believe it has been fifteen years since she and her friends swooned over every member of H.O.T.

2 A flashback to 1997 finds Shi Won handing her father a terrible report card — forty-eighth in a class of forty-eight. Those monkey-faced performers have done it this time: he tears the H.O.T. posters off her wall and threatens to adopt Yoon Jae instead.

3 Shi Won ventures to Seoul with the other H.O.T. devotees. One is missing: Yoo Jung, who has defected to Sechs Kies. Shi Won meets Tony at last, then comes home to a short, ragged haircut as punishment.

4 The Korea-Japan World Cup qualifier. Everyone gathers in front of the television and nobody, not even a roach, is outside — except that Shi Won forgot to order the fried chicken, so the whole room watches hungry.

5 Shi Won and her parents have a fender-bender, and her parents seize the chance to fake injuries in front of the other driver. They end up in hospital as a precaution, where her father is cleared of any accident injury and handed a startling diagnosis instead.

6 After surgery, Shi Won's father complains about his crowded hospital room and waits for the results. Shi Won gets into a fangirl brawl over the use of a classroom VCR — it starts innocently and turns serious enough that Yoon Jae is called out of a basketball game.

7 Shi Won's grades threaten to keep her out of university, so she writes fanfic instead and finds an audience. When a teacher humiliates her by reading a romantic H.O.T. fantasy of hers to the class, it wins her an invitation to a writing contest.

8 A countdown to two D-days. In the present, two hundred days until Tae Woong learns whether he will be president. In the past, one day until Yoon Jae plans to declare himself — with a puppy — to a Shi Won who is already taken.

EPISODES 09-16

9 Yoon Jae gives the puppy to a delighted Jun Hee instead, while Tae Woong, newly resigned from teaching, drifts around the house with nothing to do. Shi Won gets a fashionable and ridiculous new hairdo that her father offers to pay her to undo.

10 The group goes out to an underage nightclub, where Jun Hee performs a dance routine. It has Shi Won and Yoo Jung squealing, but Jun Hee is less interested in impressing girls than in impressing Yoon Jae.

11 Shi Won's parents leave for a cruise, unaware of her secret night job. Her father, sure that crime is rising, wants Yoon Jae to stay over. She refuses — until the night a stranger follows her home from work and Yoon Jae's line is busy.

12 Yoo Jung and Shi Won are trying on hair clips when Hak Chan walks past with Dan Ji. Shi Won insists he only has eyes for Yoo Jung, who marches outside to find out. Shi Won packs her H.O.T. posters for Seoul while Tae Woong buys a ring.

13 It is 2005. Yoon Jae is a successful judge, Tae Woong rich enough to consider going back to teaching, Yoo Jung teaches kindergarten, Hak Chan is studying film, Jun Hee is a medical intern and Sung Jae a civil servant. Where Shi Won is, nobody says.

14 Sung Jae gets a break from his job when Hak Chan and Yoo Jung take him hiking, and thanks Hak Chan for the video that made him so popular at work — Hawaii clearly taught him more than film. Shi Won, meanwhile, decides between Tae Woong and Yoon Jae.

15 Yoo Jung gets the surprise of her life when Hak Chan introduces her to his parents as his girlfriend. Shi Won causes a quarrel between the brothers, who both admit they love her; Tae Woong stands aside for Yoon Jae, on the condition that he gets his chance if Yoon Jae fails.

16 March 2013, and Shi Won's parents are pacing a hospital corridor waiting for news of their grandchild. When the doctor appears she has no news for them — only a question. Where, and who, is Shi Won's husband?

VARIETIES

Audience

Date Episode National AGB Nielsen (%) Seoul AGB Nielsen (%) National TNmS (%) Seoul TNmS (%)
July 24, 2012 01 1.20%
July 24, 2012 02 1.20%
July 31, 2012 03 1.20%
July 31, 2012 04 1.20%
August 7, 2012 05 1.00%
August 7, 2012 06 1.00%
August 14, 2012 07 3.25%
August 14, 2012 08 3.25%
August 21, 2012 09 3.00%
August 21, 2012 10 3.00%
August 28, 2012 11 3.46%
August 28, 2012 12 3.46%
September 4, 2012 13 3.70%
September 4, 2012 14 3.70%
September 11, 2012 15 4.17%
September 18, 2012 16 7.55%
Average 2.83%

MORE DETAILS

Broadcast period: July 24, 2012 - September 18, 2012
Air time: Tuesday 23:00
Drama OST: Reply 1997 OST
Runtime: 30 minutes (60 for the final two episodes)
Viewership ratings: 1.00% - 7.55% (TNmS, nationwide)

PRODUCTION CREDITS

Screenwriters: Lee Woo Jung, Lee Sun Hye, Kim Ran Ju
Director: Shin Won Ho
Production company: tvN

RECOGNITIONS

Year Award Recognition
2012 5th Style Icon Awards Top 10 Style Icons — Seo In Guk and Jeong Eun Ji
2012 5th Korea Drama Awards Best Couple Award — Seo In Guk and Jeong Eun Ji
2012 5th Korea Drama Awards Best New Actor — Seo In Guk
2012 14th Mnet Asian Music Awards Best OST — "All For You", Seo In Guk and Jeong Eun Ji
2012 4th Melon Music Awards Best OST — "All For You", Seo In Guk and Jeong Eun Ji
2012 1st K-Drama Star Awards Rising Star Award — Seo In Guk
2012 1st K-Drama Star Awards Rising Star Award — Jeong Eun Ji
2012 1st K-Drama Star Awards Best OST — "All For You", Seo In Guk and Jeong Eun Ji
2012 1st K-Drama Star Awards Best Couple Award — Seo In Guk and Jeong Eun Ji
2012 1st K-Drama Star Awards Acting Award, Actress — Jeong Eun Ji (nominated)
2012 1st DramaFever Awards Best Kiss — Seo In Guk and Jeong Eun Ji
2012 1st DramaFever Awards Best Couple Not Meant To Be — Seo In Guk and Hoya
2012 2012 Soompi Gayo Awards Top Drama/Movie OST — "All For You"
2013 7th Cable TV Broadcasting Awards Grand Prize (Daesang)
2013 49th Baeksang Arts Awards Best New Actress (TV) — Jeong Eun Ji
2013 49th Baeksang Arts Awards Best New Actor (TV) — Seo In Guk (nominated)
2013 49th Baeksang Arts Awards Best Screenplay (TV) — Lee Woo Jung (nominated)
2013 8th Seoul International Drama Awards Best Series Drama (nominated)
2016 tvN10 Awards Special Acting Award — Sung Dong Il
2016 tvN10 Awards Best Content Award, Drama
2016 tvN10 Awards Made in tvN, Actor in Drama — Seo In Guk
2016 tvN10 Awards Best Kiss Award — Seo In Guk and Jeong Eun Ji
2016 tvN10 Awards Best Actor — Sung Dong Il (nominated)
2016 tvN10 Awards Made in tvN, Actress in Drama — Jeong Eun Ji (nominated)
2016 tvN10 Awards Scene Stealer Award, Actress — Lee Il Hwa (nominated)

NOTES & VARIETIES

It took the timeslot left by "I Love Lee Tae-Ri" and was followed by "Flower Boy Next Door" on January 7, 2013.
The first fourteen episodes ran thirty minutes and went out two at a time over seven weeks; the last two were an hour each, because the crew did not want to cut the material down. Those final two were simulcast on Mnet, OCN, O'live, Ongamenet and OnStyle.
It was Jeong Eun Ji's acting debut. Casting the A Pink vocalist as the lead drew criticism at the time — she had never acted, and she was an idol — and her performance is generally credited with settling the argument.
She and Seo In Guk had both auditioned for supporting parts; the production moved them into the leads.
Korean cable shows were considered a success at 1%. This one opened at 1.20%, and its finale took 7.55% — the highest a Korean cable drama had recorded at the time.
Most of the principal cast are from Busan, where the drama is set, so the Gyeongsang dialect is the real thing. The dialogue leans on slang specific to the time and the place.
Eun Ji Won was cast partly as an in-joke: a real Sechs Kies member playing a schoolboy in 1997, and someone director Shin Won Ho and the writers already knew from the variety show "1 Night & 2 Days".
Because it aired on pay television, many people could not watch it live — it passed a million hits on the streaming service Tving.
Seo In Guk, Eun Ji Won, Lee Si Eon and Shin So Yool hosted the September 15, 2012 episode of "Saturday Night Live Korea", which parodied scenes from the drama.
A novelisation followed in January 2013, and Shin Won Ho re-cut all sixteen episodes for a director's DVD released that February, with 358 minutes of extra footage, bloopers and commentary.
It is credited with starting the retro wave in South Korea and reviving interest in first-generation idol groups. The reunions of Jinusean, S.E.S., Sechs Kies and H.O.T., and the "Saturday, Saturday is for Singers" segment on "Infinite Challenge", all followed in its wake.
Two more series came from the same writer and director: "Reply 1994" (2013) and "Reply 1988" (2015). Sung Dong Il and Lee Il Hwa play the parents in all three, as different families each time; most of the 1997 cast appear in cameo in "Reply 1994".
It aired in the Philippines on GMA Network dubbed into Tagalog from August 2015, in Thailand on Workpoint TV from May 2013 as "ย้อนรอยรัก 1997", in Malaysia on 8TV, and across Southeast Asia on tvN Asia.
An American remake, "Answer Me 1999", was announced in development at Fox, written by Amy Andelson and Emily Meyer with a pilot to be directed by Jon M. Chu.

ORIGINAL SOUND TRACK(S)

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