The Remarried Empress premiere proves it has all ingredients of a hit, but must win over Webtoon readers

The Remarried Empress was released on November 3. The drama stars Shin Min-a (famous for No Gain, No Love and Our Blues) as Navier and Lee Jong-suk (famous for Romance is a Bonus Book and Pinocchio) as Heinrey Alles Lazlo. Alongside, we also see Ju Ji-hoon (famous for Climax and Love Your Enemy) as Sovieshu Vict and Lee Se-young (famous for The Law Cafe and Doctor John) as Rashta.

The Remarried Empress premiere has an interesting start, showing Navier's marriage with Sovieshu falling apart. On the other hand, Rashta starts making her place in the palace. The secret letters between Navier and Heinrey add another layer to the story, and Rashta's claim at the end leaves things on a big cliffhanger. From the first look, the cast looks grand, and the drama seems to move at a good pace, setting up the main conflict.

But whether it can fully win over the large webtoon fanbase is a different question.

The Remarried Empress premiere recap: Sovieshu chooses Rashta, and Navier meets Heinrey

The story of The Remarried Empress starts with Navier and Sovieshu. The two have been married for years. However, their marriage has always been more about the roles they hold rather than love. The story soon takes a turn after Sovieshu brings Rashta, a runaway slave he saves during a hunt, and even makes her his mistress. He starts giving more attention to Rashta.

On the other hand, Navier has a little secret of her own. She has been exchanging letters with someone she has never met, with a large bird named Queen carrying their messages. These letters become special to her because she can speak freely without worrying about her position as empress. But what she doesn't know is that her pen pal is Heinrey, the prince of the Western Kingdom. He has been visiting the palace in the form of a bird.

After much letter exchange, Navier and Heinrey finally meet during a royal celebration. They even share a dance, and Sovieshu notices them together. But before Navier can tell Heinrey that she is the woman behind the letters, Rashta steps forward and claims to be his pen pal. The premiere ends on this note, with the truth about the letters remaining unknown.

The Remarried Empress premiere looks promising but has one big test ahead

So far, the premiere of The Remarried Empress looks promising, especially because of how it handles its characters. Navier, who has spent years being a good empress, keeps her feelings to herself and carries on with her responsibilities, even after Rashta comes into the picture. This makes her character more interesting, as she handles her feelings in private rather than expressing them openly in public.

On the other hand, Rashta is another character who makes the story intriguing to watch as she wants Navier's place. She looks like someone who wants to fit into palace life. Speaking about Rashta, Lee Se-young said in a statement reported by Variety that she wanted to make her a character who brings conflict to the story but is still difficult to hate.

The story also has two interesting sides to it. We have Navier's unhappy marriage with Sovieshu, but we also get her letters with Heinrey, which bring a completely different side to the story.

The palace settings, mainly filmed at Schleissheim Palace near Munich, Germany, and the costumes also make the drama interesting to watch. Variety reports that Shin Min-a liked the show's European-style fantasy setting, which is not common in Korean dramas.

Speaking of the series, Ju Ji-hoon said in a statement reported by Variety:

"Love, divorce, entanglement, the struggle for power, all make for a fascinating subject matter"

But there's a challenge. The Remarried Empress webtoon already has a big fan base, who know the story very well. Variety reports that The Remarried Empress has reached close to three billion views across ten languages since its 2019 debut on Naver Webtoon.

This also brings another test for the drama, as, if the story takes a different path from the original webtoon and novel, it will be interesting to see how readers react and whether they accept the changes or prefer the previous story that they know.

The Remarried Empress is already getting a strong response, with its main trailer crossing 13 million views in just forty-eight hours after its release. As of now, the premiere proves that the series has a good cast, an interesting story, and beautiful settings. It has made a good start, and it will be interesting to see how the rest of the series turns out.

Directed by Jo Soo-won and Shim Na-yeon, The Remarried Empress is streaming on Disney+.

Trending

Also read: Ultron's human avatar in VisionQuest might be a secret Horton all along

×

Was this article helpful?

Thank You for feedback